I pay a fortune for the rent on my lot every month,
but it's just a sparrow flying through my head and out my mouth.
At the communal mailbox, you'll see me.
I'm the hag with the horse blanket hair,
replying in Romany when you say good morning.
My trailer, in afternoon,
is like the inside of a space capsule awaiting rescue at sea.
Helicopters bring in storms, report that conditions are bad
and what is an old Gypsy woman to them anyway?
Knock on my door at dusk,
I'll answer holding a knife wet with chicken blood.
(Don't go so white, it's only a box mix.)
I was young once, with skin as dark as a stolen horse's flanks.
The city men, with voodoo wives screeching from their wallets
log-walked on the wheels of my wagon, on fire for my exciting scorn.
Now, televised baseball creates spring, and everybody's fortune is the same.
How I long for something else,
for the lever on my recliner to be a hatchet,
for the goose on my cinder block steps to be an imp,
And for you to return from the dead, little hunchback.
I would like to be loved one last time,
here in the shadow of the church tower, where the bells sound like
women in the throes--
Where I might be denied entry, but you my deaf romancer?
Never you, because God loves a true heart
and I want to roam, reborn, in your reflected glory.
_______