something dark from April’s failed 30-30

The moon would rest more
calmly in cobbled midnights if
all i were giving away was my body, if
all i begged the earth to swallow
was the percussion of a red stiletto
drilling uptown’s lacquered asphalt.
The dust chattering my wine glasses awake
would hush if it trusted i would only jump
naked from montrose pier to cool some lust
wild rivered in thighs lined with a thousand
unblinking eyes. That these legs might scissor
black water to silent fury, not sing a sinking
stillness, that these hose aren’t full of rocks,
that these pockets hold only poems, or that this dress
is too tight for pockets. Poets are easily distracted
by glitter so my browbones shimmer till the lilt
of hollow invitations coagulate in merlot chiseled
in the thistle of their throats. How brazen
backseam will make some bristle, will make some
willow pity for evening shade. How fumbling thanks
for complimenting my legs will bewitch your forgetting
what hours i spend dreaming the most elegant ways
to undecide my face.

an afternoon freewrite

It was the end of everything, the sand
grew cold, I stopped looking for the moon,
I munched my nails bloody. It was Sunday
in the tampon aisle. It was joking that I blamed you,

but I wasn’t joking at all. I was numb
on pain killers. I was eager for sex.
I was often eager for sex, and I suppose
that’s how we arrive here. I wrote the longest letters

One of them I typed, to obscure the raw
destruction I was sure would be evident
in my frantic scrawl and the yellowing circles
of wrinkles from sloppy tears plunging as I wrote.

I don’t remember cursive. My pen
is halting. I saw you running. What
I thought was barren ambivalence
would settle to a cool gel of hatred, a cast

of regret. I was harpooning
my veins with serrated knives; well,
I was only practicing.

I.

The words feel borrowed, purloined;
the refrigerator clicks on,
the denim tumbles in the dryer,
I use muscle as a verb
in just the same way I did
in a poem three years ago,
and nothing. I don’t even know
how to hold a pen. Transcribing
silence. Moving from thought
to product. I don’t remember how.

II.
In the pilgrimage of mouths,
to speak, to name, is to disrupt
the steady trod, threaten stampede,
needle to riot. The sojourn must be silent;
the road must be uncluttered
with signs. Lips must peel apart
only to breathe.

I miss the woman I used to be. This is her:

June 23, 2010

I am filled with gratitude. I am filled with gratitude for my experience of love. I am filled with gratitude for my experience of my creativity. I am filled with gratitude for my experience of my body, its strength, its flexibility, its endurance, its melanin, its natural beauty. I am trying to learn to forgive myself for my impatience, frustration, and unkindness with myself. I am trying to exist more mindfully, constantly reaching for my Highest Thought in each moment. I constantly fall short of that, and I am trying to accept that that is okay too, that this part of the journey is no less beautiful than any other part.