Abstract
One Friday at the Women’s Rehab
I’d selected Beatty, Cafagna, Daniels.
Urban. Gritty. Portrait-poems.
Now you write one: autobiographical,
include your mother’s and father’s names,
where you were born,
story from your life.
Each woman read aloud,
except one. Write a lie poem,
change the facts: some, all, any.
She asked to be excused.
Be right back.
But she wasn’t.
Someone said, That’s Shelley.
I know she’s not supposed to leave,
but she’s just eighteen.
Her father was murdered.
Her mother’s dead. Shelley was driving,
drunk. Her mom was in the car.
My breath gone,
falling, suddenly,
over a cliff. I collected my books.
The pencils and holders
go in the counselor’s office.
Through its glass I saw Shelley,
crying. I went to the bathroom,
washed my coffee cup,
talked with one of the women.
Seeing the counselor,
I walked over, clutching the pencils.
She hadn’t cried before.
Some pain I cannot imagine.
On the way home, I tried.
I took my dog for a walk, heated leftovers,
cleaned the vents. Beneath each vent,
a ragged hole, where plaster was cut
to fit the ductwork.
There is no moral.
That girl’s pain is another country.
Gestalt Poem
This poem won’t make you forget your tight life,
how the seam of your jeans cuts into your hip
as you read, the weight of your shirt
along your forearms, the hair that tickles
the back of your neck.
This poem can’t transport you.
You are way too heavy for it,
and one or another of your limbs keeps flopping
out of its reach, as a compliant dog’s
will when a young boy carries it,
its eyes patient and pleading.
Reading this will not invite you
into the poet’s head, or bed. The mysteries
hidden in this poet’s skin are staying there.
Places exist for no one but you.
Moment upon moment,
the opportunity to attend.
This poem says feel your eyes
as they move back and forth,
the oceanic waves of your chest
as it rises, recedes. Feel the chair
against the backs of your thighs, the places
your body touches itself as you read.
Palmetto Spice Box
After a piece featured in an exhibit of Judaica at the Carnegie Museum of Art, 1998
Stars deck its doors, a vertical split like a stage curtain
fortress doors, a woman. They will creak on opening.
Above and around these doors, twenty-one spikes
of silver arc: a guard—or beams—of praise.
Inside you'll find cardamom, cloves, almonds, anise, dates.
Treasures wrapped in dough and leaves, hidden
like God, in exchanges of food, host’s gifts to a guest.
Entering, smell comes first. Inhale. Coffee. You hear
jingling. Rhythm. A foot slaps the ground. Laughter.
Palm leaves rustle. She is before you,
dancing for the others. All are women.
They do not see you. A wave curves slowly
through her fingers, into her wrist, her forearm,
elbow, biceps, into and out of her shoulder.
One wave, another—crossing her breasts
down her torso. Her abdomen quivers.
The wave becomes a series. Her hips blur.
Skin-rippling, her undulations are curving sands,
desert sirocco. She lifts her veil, it arcs as she turns.
She is hidden. Revealed. Hidden.
Another joins. Hips circle in unison.
Here, where water gathers like postage stamps,
hides in rivers one must dig for,
swells the veins of ever-flowing palms, here
women dance eddies, waves,
water, wind,
hidden treasure.