It was on your father's work bench In the barn that you undid Your skirt: hair, kinked hair Thick as a child's black scribbling, Pink when you breathed And opened. You watched Me watch you. The barn ticked. Pigeons shifted in the rafters, Their wings like prayers as we made Hurt noises and blood cried…
Walter could almost feel the rush of breath, hear the women roaring, mothers, girlfriends, sisters, sweeping up towards the flight deck, the warm fall day, San Francisco, 1945. A couple chasing a blue jump-suited baby girl just beginning to walk wobbled by him in exaggerated pursuit. He had been alone that day. Hadn’t wanted to…
If you feel around with your fingers there is a corner to every sin Upon finding that tight spot one must remember what to do Listen I have been out setting this trap Cabbage is cheap Nobody has seen me if I eat right I'll grow…
The earth already knows too much About us. We dig holes And throw ourselves in, Weep, set stones Where no stone would sleep. The mountains, blue yoke in the distance, Are coming down— Rock, bush, slaughtered tree. The sea is washing salt from the bodies Over and over, and without rest. I tell my daughter,…
for Galina Gabay Green rivers run in February at the curbsides. Moscow is so huge, the snow so deep that when once the melt starts, nothing can stop it. People rejoice at that rushing water as we do at the first snow drops. We walk around goony in mid-March. “Fifty-one degrees,” we say. The sun…
Small operas, the seedy merchants at the blurred ends of fuming streets in the immigrant photographs, insist on it. What are you supposed to do with desire in America where your heart is so many poor shops? He takes a girl to the Catskills on a bus. Her dull kerchief and the black hairs wire…
for wisdom bits, I had to act now that father'd suited me up for St-hood. Better late next time. It wasn't that I minded my toy-razor or lathering up so early, just that the sink swallowing my hairless suds would go all the way to hell and back before it let on there was anything…
At the airport waiting for our plane, we sat next to a Chinese man. He took off his shoe and sock and massaged his foot, working his thumb and fingers over the sole and delicate arch of the instep. Then he held his whole foot between his palms and forgave it, rocking it gently back…
We tore into each other's fragrances enough to hold Wednesday to its last possible moment, but it swept across the windows nevertheless. He always set the table and never cleared it, hoping dinner would break through into something that wouldn't wipe away. They said it was past closing time at the Indian restaurant. We both…
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