nostalgia is no good
When the pretty back flip you
Executed clean off the kicker
Is called a tantrum
And the suit this party
Requires
Will not cover
The girl who was twelve yesterday
Six a minute ago
Now at least 18
Still not old enough for legal margaritas
Which was always just another name for daisies
Can you see
The pretty, young girls
All in a row?
Tutus and princess tiaras/
Flowers in her hair
Who eats apples for breakfast
Measures summer in hours of freedom
Needs no reflections to
Understand that
Logic does not govern either
Her fear or the sharks
Hunting the deep.
first, he corrects the misnomer–
“Body image contest!”
Still, sly words written on the human body
Numbers, he corrects again
Pointing to the charcoal digits written
on their extremities
So close to the branding iron or…
The shadow of all his gone siblings
Fall ash across our faces
his once-alive sisters would have had
A string of dark
Numbers tattooed on young skin
Which is how he got here in the first place–
I remind him of my own
Memories from The Penal Colony
How do you
“Be just”
Without piercing
The heart of every man?
I ask. Brush his beautiful dark
Hair back
How young you look, darling
He flinches as we almost touch
Ghosts at the bikini contest
was it really
Hemingway who wrote
The apocryphally short
Story about baby shoes
Never worn?
Could be a tutu
In any condition
Little girl gone
We don’t know by what vehicle
Age or demise
Matters that she is gone
And with her
All we knew
Of innocence
sigh
They are all so…
Cute
Lost between loves
What makes a human
Jettison a cat?
Their faces so lovable
How can we
Let them go?
then
Keep their flat glossy
Images so
Egyptian gods (of them)
Emblazoned on our internet
Flat ghosts
Of souls we
Refuse to keep.
you were always
Mythical.
A place I longed to be
A harbor in the storm
Heck–flowers and chocolate!
Go no distance to describe
The way these stem cells of each
Her babies carry her
As she and they
Grow up
Her eldest may lodge
In her vision
Her youngest in her chest
And each in between
Find places in her blood and bone to
Insinuate their eternal
DNA into hers
You might call them sneaky
But she will call them all
Dear–
Dear to stay
When each day she fears
This child will be too soon
“A grown-assed man, Mom!”
(Sic)
And she will compress and fold
Each memory of her babies
In the laugh lines
Around her eyes.
Donning her eye patch
From the foyer
Of this quiet
suburban domicile
mother spies the place
Where she will hoist
The skull-and-crossed bones
Talisman
of her new-found pirate
Heart. She shimmies the gutter pipe
Hangs the flag from the gabled roof
Bids the children–
Swab the deck! Hoist the sail! Board the stern!
Bemused, they do their level best
This ship once an ordinary…
Home?
Until Papa returns
Salutes his lawless mate (sailcloth on her makeshift mast
suspiciously similar to
laundry on the line)
The Jolly Roger, eh? He asks
Surprising unfazed.
Come down, my Pirate Queen
And tell all
Your loyal crew
What hast tha’ plundered for our dinner?
girl you got
Wings down your spine
Silvery feathers
An anthem in your head
Sing it, Girl–
Sing loud
Whole world to hear
Percuss.
heart a bird caged in bones
Use it all to
Question every undisputed
Law mitigating the force
Of gravity and light
With your full-throated
Iridescent flight
Rise up
Rise.
late at night
I search for something to cover
My fear
A wedding dress? day-glo body-paint?
Or Marilyn Monroe
‘s iconic white shift
When truth is all you really
Need
A body is
Mostly just water-
River wide and shimmering in the sun
Deep muddy current
Run all the way
to the infinite
Sea
you think Vikings
Drawn swords and treasure chests
In the strong man’s house
Who ties and binds matters
The scars on His wrists forever
I am the plunder
So grateful to be found
Restored eternal
From the house of the strong man
Strewn with bones and promises
Redeemed by this warrior
King
Carrying Light 