The Memory Place

 

This is the memory place, the preserve

of hollow wallpaper grandmothers,

stale gingerbread eyes balanced on

straw shoulders, fragile as a dream.

In this place, maple-leaf red and long

as love letters, her hair revives again.

The swing rope rewinds itself and 

her feet are steady on the knot. 

This is the place where what once was

soaks the air like a diary left on a porch rail. 

Everything is musty, throats close, eyes water

until I take my place, brittle, superannuated,

a carousel horse with painted eyes, spinning.

Self Portrait

 

There's someone in here,

inside my

skin,

someone Frankensteined

up from a girl

I used to be or

never was

or

someone on a greased slide

to the boneyard

(yep, that was

me)

but she got

off at

El Paso

sweet little woman get along.

See, I'm living for two 

now,

preggers with myself

and way

overdue

but we're cute af

in certain light

or in 

my imagination

or 

in the sight of God

with a 

heave

and a

ho

I just couldn't let her go.

_______

Moon Rabbit

Moon Rabbit came back,
long after NASA had been sold for scrap.

"Bunny," I said, finding him there,
"you must be hungry,
coming from such a barren garden
so sparse of leaf and short of air."

I have a dusty hope chest
down a dusty stair
as dusty gray as the moonlit coat
of my silver-silent friend, the hare.

Moon Rabbit seemed
to like my hair
and made a red-spun warren there
where moon can light and moon can find
his loneliness and mine--entwined.
_______

for Sunday Muse #103 

Blues #3

(image is "Play For Me" by Ian Dooley)

At Susannha's, when they asked for "As Time Goes By,"
you gave them "St. James Infirmary Blues."
That's when I knew
Suss had chosen right.
You play as crisp as your white shirt 
and as blue as the river my brother never came out of
when he was just eleven.

I showed Suss his notebook
with the stories about stowing the teacher in a closet
and running down a dirt road in summer.
Suss said she liked his made-up world better,
kissed my cheek and whispered, "You're a dreamer, too."

When I slide my hand between your suspenders and white shirt,
you play "St. Louis Blues" when they want "Sweet Georgia Brown."
It's my fingers running through your hair,
and my breath on your cheek when it's Suss's you want.
Then you play "Smokestack Lightning" to break the moment.

Bobby, upstairs I've got
spray starch on the shelf,
raspberry jam on the table. 
Here, you've got Suss's picture instead of sheet music.
It's late, close the lid over the keys.
Come sleep on my couch again
and play "St. James Infirmary Blues" in your head.
I miss her as much as you, dear Bobby,
and wish it was me instead.
________

For Margaret's images at Real Toads.