summer drips off walls and
coats black roads
we are melting into tomorrow
today was nailed and hammered by a carpenter with
a golden voice
It’s blurry, but I see it
people have lost livers and kidneys
and legs
and pets
and children
and I am sad for them, I am
from under a rock
from the depths of the Pacific
from unknown planets
where I am carried by a carpenter and His golden voice
Swarming in with poisoned tips tucked
under innocence,
Nature’s vengeance dancing from
flower to flower,
no matter the color,
or the size,
or shape.
They are the thieves of each unique
fragrance,
and I wonder,
Do they watch for the tulip to open toward the warmth of the sun?
Do they wait for a rose to display her heart proudly?
Do they time each moment precisely
for attack?
The light of the sun is unconditional;
food for the flowers,
heat for the thieves,
and on those magical days,
when I am the Bells of Ireland,
exposed,
hungry for the warmth of my Sun,
they swarm in and attack!
his laugh is familiar
like an old couch that swallowed me
every night, while I dreamed of
an old waxen witch
my hands are angry tonight,
but all I can think about is
that old couch,
wrapping me in its faded blue
arms, holding my fright in
its warped interior,
sucking me away from solitude
before any man, I found intimacy
in stretched fabric, I relinquished my
sweet innocence to an upholstered
mass
and find it all again,
in a laugh.
There is a song, just one,
that brings him to me.
It rolls in slowly,
a drum beats lowly,
a repetitive wave that wraps
his thick arms around me,
piano keys move softly, light
fingers that grip my arms, pulling
me on to his warm chest.
She raises her golden voice to
dim candle light, our bodies braided
in shadow on his impenetrable walls.
My heart beats in my toes,
my fingertips,
I am nothing but pulse as he grazes
me with his full lips,
the piano keys surge,
the drums urge him to sink deep
within me,
her voice becomes the angel of depth.
I shed my skin before him, an offering;
begging him to belong
to the music forever.
My heart beat follows
his fingertips outlining my sleek design,
my breath, taken by his touch,
the piano drips between my thighs,
his blue eyes recite the sky,
his honest promise.
The drum beats slow,
the piano keys gather his warm
body, his lips, his touch and
leave me alone with all the words I
want to say,
but my voice cannot reach over this song.
I think of my skeleton as a
canker, burning hollow in
a deep, deep cave.
My son cries about my skeleton and
I tell him,
“hush now! It is just bones.
It is just white, not blood or bed.”
And it is not.
I have a long, thin canker and
I have a man with knitting hands.
He wraps me in warm stitches;
in strong pursuit.
He points me with pressed thumbs
just enough that
I pound with his heartbeat.
I am a canker and he is a mouth hosting
an ulcer. He cleans,
cauterizes me with searing tips and
I cry about my skeleton and he says,
“hush now, it is just bones.”
But, it is not.
It is not hard wood, not the
gleaming – glossy
hard wood.
It is unpolished.
Raw wood.
It was built quick and quietly. An emergency.
Like when a young girl was
sent away quickly
then
returned – everything in
tact, yet emptier.
Ssshhh…We don’t talk about that.
It did not have the luxury of central air
or Vinyl Siding…
an “unfinished home”.
Unpolished, unfinished and
dysfunctional!!
The hot water was arrogant and the
cold water, cruel!
December nights waltzed in through the
cracks in the unstable
structure like they were made to take over the
place.
Pneumonia often leeched it’s way in,
threatening the morsel of comfort contained in
bronchial tubes.
Homes are cold and aloof though,
comfort is of no concern to them.
The set-up just stood, hard and rigid.
The floor boards shrieking out, as
if a bare-foot was
too much to sustain.
After some time, the ceiling began to cave. It had
been standing straight for
as long as its resources would allow.
It grew weak and frail, the floor
began to rot away, broken windows
sat bandaged back together, paralyzed.
Cinder blocks carried in cobwebs
that housed spiders more comfortably
than this house did its inhabitants.
One day, all of the inhabitants
packed and went away. No remorse, no sadness,
just the bare-feet walking further and further away.
I am a little ashamed to admit this
but I am sure I am not the only
girl who has.
I used your body
to remind me of a time
when the waters laid
softly around me. I let your arm lay over my side
and I rested my life against you.
A man carries so much strength and I
borrowed it to catch up
with the chaotic crashing waves of
water that I row through now.
I didn’t need your voice, or your thoughts
or your laugh. I didn’t need the silly act that
men like to play. I didn’t need words dipped in
chocolate
or that sparkle in your smile.
I just needed your feet to curl
mine inside, two strong arms to wrap my
dreams up tight, a heavy chest that could
hold the weight of the heaviness
I hold – I just needed your body
to give mine a mold!
maggiemaeijustsaythis 