a barnacle/a marriage
a ring: circle shell signals sibilant
track of wave across water, shushes tide slapping
side of shallow-bottom boats asleep at anchor
amid docks’ dense knots of watercraft—cling
through sun and storm for centuries—more
(who needs a heart? the truth is in the holding)
pity human ties frailer than this dense grip
that bonds you to rock and lull of fiberglass hull,
link severed only by meticulous scrape and
slice, sent back to the spray that bore you—
stinging knife of separation.
Love Song for the Motel Summers of My Childhood, Atlantic Beach, 1986
Sing of thin efficiency carpets, perpetually damp and gritty with years of salt
and sand, of aggressively floral bedspreads concealing worn-out
mattresses, creaky wheeled cot rolled in between feet of double
beds and scratched dressers, of the pallet on the floor crafted from extra
motel blankets the brown harlequin-patterned quilt Mama packed for just
this purpose, of the insistent nocturnal clanging of the ice machine outside our room.
Sing of over-chlorinated hotel pools, stinging eyes and sunburn kissing the bridge of my
sister’s nose, of window AC units creating cool, dark caves—crank it up ‘cause we
don’t have to pay this electric bill—and the shiver of putting on a damp bathing
suit to head back over the dunes, the chillwet price exacted for late afternoons
on Bogue Shore under a sun that smiles instead of glares.
Sing of lunches, of pocketbook sandwiches assembled from the contents of Playmate
coolers, washed down with Sundrop, Pop-Tart breakfasts and blue Chilly
Willies, cold grape soda that tasted just like purple, of every artificial thing,
of that bare-butt Coppertone baby and the days we thought SPF 8 was responsible,
of twenty agonizing minutes on shore until we could return to the sea, inept
baby turtles bobbing beyond breakers in handmedown swimsuits, snorting
gallons of saltwater.
Sing of sandy fingers throwing store-brand Cheez-Its to opportunistic gulls like
the dingbatters we are, giggling as they squawk and circle closer, chasing
feathers through sand that scalds baby feet, of my mama’s Virginia Slims lit
by matches from a yellow book, hands sheltering fragile flame from unrelenting wind.
Sing of shells by the armload, dragged back to the motel in white-handled dollar
store sand buckets, dumped on concrete motel sidewalks, of broken un-loveliness, tired conch exoskeletons worn soft and shapeless tide-change, of the glinting
sharp of newly broken oysters.
Sing of the metallic tang of blood sucked from cut fingers, of the breeze that all
day long blows three heads of girlhair into briny Gordian knots to be
meticulously detangled in a bathtub full of sand and child limbs and shrieks
turned snot and tears as comb teeth bite and tear at tangles and tender
scalps. Of being tucked in tight and “Now I lay me down to sleep”.
And late, late night, when you wake up and roll over in your cozy pallet-bed, sing
one more song, a lullaby, in a room like a womb with everyone you love most,
frosty air and sliding glass door cracked open, like you, the ocean, your sisters,
and parents share for one night the same lungs, limbs, heart. You are all
here, whisper-close and whole, breathing together.
Things Better Left Unsaid
for the bravest woman I know
With a little spackle, we can fix the place where your fist fragmented our home, where dry wall dust choked my tear ducts dry. No one will even notice, just like they didn’t notice the livid purple of hand-shaped bruise on my thigh. I’ll tell you over and over that it’s not your fault, tell myself that this is not my husband, not my life. We’ll go back to counseling with the pastor, you’ll actually read the Bible verses about honoring each other, we’ll renew vows that are barely four years old; start over, do it for real this holy matrimony thing. I’ll be more patient, more understanding of how much you gave up to be a father and a husband, how supporting our family takes up all your money and most of your time. I’ll shut my mouth and put dinner on the table each night. I’ll bow my head and fold dreams for my future into paper footballs, sail them across the living room, watch them fumble into overflowing garbage you never take out. I’ll change and launder sheets stained with piss and vomit from nights you drink to forget everything that has you (me) trapped here. I’ll take the babies to Dad’s when you need your space, travel everywhere with changes of clothes in the car in case we come home to you and a gun instead of the empty rooms I wish for.
Ephemera
Luna moths live seven days
from first expansion of grass-green appendage
first breath of fleeting vitality
til wings still for the final time.
This is the way of all wild things—
fight fuck fade.
However stubbornly she
persists, resists, every mermaid
washes up eventually, shell bra
left to weather in the punishing sunshine,
dulled scales ripening to rot
in oppressive heat.
The enormity of mortality
stretches endlessly wide
like an Appalachian ridgeline
peppering all our horizons
with an end to possibility
a separation from our beloved
what-ifs and could-have-beens
a step toward the terrific unknown—
our only remaining decision,
the grace of our transition.
Lamentation (Consolation)
All the good poems are taken.
(Not so, sweet girl.)
I mean, what do poets even write now?
(What they’ve always written. What they must.
The words that burn too much to hold within.)
“Stopping by Cookout on a Snowy Evening”?
“Ode on a Spilled Sippy Cup”?
(Yes, yes! Start there. Start now.)
More often than not, the Muse
finds herself too exhausted
to sing,
(Aren’t we all? Sound your jagged notes anyway.)
too overwhelmed
by the odyssey of errands to pen
an epic narrative of contemporary
womanhood.
(Just stop for a moment. Invite the overwhelm,
offer the page your tears, your time, your rage
and frustration. Offer it all.)
Most days Inspiration
turns up her nose at the cheap, bitter
grounds lingering in the Keurig,
(Fuck Inspiration. She’s a stuffy bitch anyway.)
eyes the basement writing desk covered
over by children’s toys and clutter,
(Those–write about those!)
declines to stick around for coffee.
(Listen, honey: hurl her mug against the wall,
watch the dregs drip down the baseboards—
write the poems lying in its pieces.)
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