Salome
Slowly, you pass your gaze in the mirror.
The bedroom walls behind you no longer
wear white. You remember dancing for your
dad, his hands folded into a triangle. Your
mother watched from the corner. Waiting
means something is being groomed. Lambs
know what it means to be married to silence;
what it means to be comforted with the stealth
of a lover’s kiss while breaking your hymen.
Failure feels like watching evening clouds
burn the rim of what we believe is unreachable.
They swim and move as flames playing through
a cold night. The eyes, exhausted, prohibits the lids
their shutter lest you miss something again.
Thaw
I live with the knowledge
of fear and trembling, trembling
is what I do when close to the earth
which is my husband
I make a home in the slums
by his side, his eyes partially
open meet mine and his luminous
stare leaves ears of light pressed
again the pillow
My Othello slept without arms tonight
Could this mean I am changing?
Is there mystery in sleeping nude
next to a man with a delicate history
These are the questions of January,
the season of ice and want where everything
I touch feels like fire
Polygamy
I remember standing
in the kitchen watching
a sheet of clouds
hang over the horizon
like the last breath
of a troubled soul
a qualm was present
and then…
rain began to march
through the room
reminding me of hard
things like how colors
meet in a Rothko or
how you could smile
at me still wearing her
scent in my presence
