Blue notes ready
get the fumes ready
we’re going to spread this
wild.
City streets rain down
pistol shots
whiskey shots
wake me up, I’m just a
child.
Sell me back to classical keys
the ones that leave
fire in oxygen.
Your spirit still sits
in your acoustic strings.
Baby, I could see a future of missing
your blue river running
wildly over
everything.
Don’t tempt the flames
they’re easier than Spring.
We’re going to spread this wilder
than fire.
inch of time spent over the sea,
dragging your dead body back
from the sharks I fed you to.
There should be enough salt
to drown in. Now that is something
you don’t hear of!
But, I have heard of Buddha,
and Ghandi,
and what great advice for the
blonde girls in white dresses,
not scratched by hands of
light drinking, or hard gunfire;
the girls untouched by
living a dead life, waking under floorboards
built by their mothers.
Your heavy photograph burns to
my tongue. I spit. I curse you out
of your newly dried grave.
I am ecstatic for your corpse,
it grows on me like tough leather.
Now for her.
I carry a monsoon to her driveway.
She is lit up. A bright pumpkin
ripened for plummet.
She dresses in honeysuckle,
and flickers like whiskey.
I haven’t thought of her name,
she is black as a canvas; a new galaxy
before energy matters.
If her heart happens to
do that, I will carve it out.
I will take it back to July in my teeth
where the desert is waiting for me,
it’s Queen.
Separating skin from a tree
is a faint task, like
twisting glass back to sand.
Long, narrow veins exposed to chaos,
leave their limbs. I climb inside
them for hydration.
I’m a fish, shallow in water,
borrowing lungs from
a human.
Don’t make it glacial,
blue is the true color.
It is royal.
It is blood.
I am oxygen and it feels good!
My husband left me sweltering
during the ripe moon. I grew
ripe, too; a full cherry
hunger in a bottle
of Gin.
Then this tree, he’s latched on
to me. I pour my fingernails
in. He knows his strength
matches me tightly.
We seize together on Earth’s early
tremor, and just as I start to peel,
layer by layer,
his exposed veins melt into
venom, he turns me,
my swift hourglass
resets, twisting sand
back into glass.
In truth, I open my eyes.
I am punished
for my power.
I have refused water to dry people
and tied anchor to those who heard the word
and believed it.
I became a burning flame in
bedrooms of strange
men, who desire reward
like Corinthians say they deserve.
I am a sin by nature,
by thought,
by curve,
and undeserving.
I open my eyes.
I am power.
It is true.
I am younger than insult.
My hard body soaks in salt water.
If you like it, I will bottle it,
a beautiful, gentle tea.
I smell steady. Like a brief cut
across my fingertip fades,
so will this scent. Let me package it.
Let me blush while you reach for
my confessions,
let my heart run a rabbit’s run.
Touch my breath,
intruder! Take me as a stranger,
open legged;
a boiling black tea.
I gracefully apologize.
This is me.
It is always the moon whispering
with foul breath to me,
while stars drip like bad oil
paint, chips in a perfect, black sky.
The sun doesn’t say anything. It just sits
in its place, waiting for the day
it can finally rest.
I let the sun go, on its own,
but I try to join the night.
I try to wrap my body, like silk, around
time that sleeps,
that nods with my conversation
and smiles
in agreement.
We speak a language together, of
the deep ocean’s waves of regret
that cry into the dry sand of nostalgia,
creating mud of desire,
longing for its peaceful aquatic home
below the drama of tides;
of every shadow that
slices through jealous silence,
lonely crickets,
hollow frogs,
desperate bats free of their caves;
I will never be involved with a burning star –
I am part of the night.
I am a dead reflection of light
watching the world sleep.
Yesterday, you were
quixotic while I
came from lazy beggars. Yesterday, I
was obedient; buttoned up from the lips
down, waiting for a king’s summon.
Then, his majesty came out, knocking
on my
sun stained door. He arrived erect,
like a statue of a king
might, speaking assertively, made
up of upper-class
things.
I stood small. Barely reaching his knees.
Pushing myself to
abound in poise, to receive him equally.
We drew cards. When he smiled, I matched it.
When he threw wit, I caught it
in reciprocation.
I baked his boasts in cinnamon and
ate them as dessert.
By his majesty’s departure, he had
narrowed in volume.
Shrunk and blushing, he requested
me,
as a future gift to himself.
Now, I sit with his once luxurious crown,
recalling his Utopian image that left with him
yesterday.
Step 1.
Press the blade against metal ablaze –
a razor as sharp as
the educated man; with wit and vainglory,
ready to shred your worth into
the palm of his hand.
Step 2.
Use the discriminating blade to
carve out expression; to cut out
surface, scowl and shape.
The eyes MUST be extracted – this is the most
treasured part of the face. A face cannot be
successfully peeled off if the
eyes remain
intact.
Step 3.
No need for apprehension or moderation!
Grip the skin from the top of the face
and pull! Peel it away!
Step 4.
A mask will be needed at this time.
Replace the original layer of expression, surface,
scowl and shape with
the artificial layers of rubber, plastic and paint.
Step 5.
Recovery time is required.
It is not realizable to become acquainted
with a new face immediately. Take
some time to learn how
to mold to it.
Step 6.
Dispose of the old face. Burn it, throw it out, eat it,
feed it to the dog….it does not matter how, just get rid of it.
The sooner the old one is forgotten,
the quicker the new one
will begin to
feel real.
maggiemaeijustsaythis 