In My Closet (10.15.16)

I am surrounded by fabric
whose sole purpose is to cover me.
The full-body mirror reflects
my limp breasts,
my pale saddlebags,
the bloom of a birthmark on my shoulder,
and my daughter,
who toddled in, bunny in hand.

She sees her own face:
the one I made in secret,
quietly thrilling at my masterpiece,
this soon-to-be published work
that would make me an artist.

She sees her own face--
not her swollen belly,
the tousled wisps in her eyes,
the body parts she doesn't know the name of yet.

She sees her own face
and kisses it.

Open Air (3 May 2006)

for d.

I suffocated for twenty years, breathing
a thick, soupy kind of air
before You came along.
I didn’t realize what I was missing
until I broke through
into open air
and took my first gasp of it.
Thank God
It is a Miracle.
It’s as if I have been drowning
and You pulled me from the water,
pressed your lips to mine
and told me to breathe.
And I do.
I breathe deeply.

Ghost (30 April 2011)

One day, you will kill me.

I have borne your ghost through ten winters,
listened to its faint scrapings,
smiled when your shadow
skittered across the floor.
One day, you will finally kill me.

It has always been this way:
fighting for a chance to live with you
smothering me with giant hands.
Why should it be otherwise?

I have grown accustomed to your woo-ing
and knocking on the walls.
I matched my decor to your shrouds.
We know you don't belong here.
One day, I shall be rid of you,

and it will kill me.

In the Shower (9.27.06)

this morning, I watched
a mosquito
try to suck the life
from a white ceramic tile.
Oh, feisty girl,
I, too, get angry
when the impossible
doesn’t happen.

I Promise (23 August 2010)

(for a.)

Your prince is waiting somewhere:
in a library,
or behind a Starbucks counter.
For your sake, I hope he is
humming something from "Les Miz."
I hope he is like Dad,
and plays the guitar.
I know already how he smiles at you:
tenderly, holding your image
like a Faberge egg.
I can see how quick he is to take your
hand oh why
can't you see it?

Still,

he is there, waiting for you.
He is reading a Neil Gaiman novel
at the Starbucks by your house.

As for the villain who stole your smile,
locked it in the basement with
the rest of the booty
(to be forgotten),
one day you will smile at him
with triumphant pity.

AfterLife (5 September 2008)

It is my hope
that the afterlife
not be splendid.
I do not wish for glory,
choruses, or colors.
Only a cup of tea,
and beautiful music playing
softly, in another room.
I hope there are not
too many people:
my husband, perhaps.
He will read the paper, silently.
I will sip my tea,
and look out the window,
where someone else’s glory
revels on the horizon,
somewhere far from me.

You Must Have Fallen (28 June 2007)

to c.

because you're cracked.
The shattered pieces
catch the light and blind me.
And you look so pitiful there, lying
in your own glittering mess
like a child whose costume
box has exploded.
I long to pick you up: not
to be your friend
but to fix you. I reach down,
trusting and ungloved,
but the shards are sharp.
My blood is everywhere;
I don't have much left.
I am told that was your plan
all along, but it can't be so.
I refuse to believe it.
No one is that cruel.