I gave smallest permission
ants streamed and valved
set about their destiny
with precision and very little cursing
wanting to make it happen
like in the movies then you catapulted
under what spell
I hung from the dock on orange bungees
counted jellyfish a child in the back seat
on the way to her first drive-in The Ice Queen
waved my hands in phosphor
bright ambulance doors
kelp tangled my ankles
cried a nuisance did you see my did you
an empty syringe refuse the lush grass
reeled undressed gardenias
smashed their mouths against glass
you became a fox alight along the edge
of my animal face sweat on my palms
pooled on my belly your most terrible
tongue in the sugar box slow and quick
I killed my chest’s engine
what I mean is gardenias your mother’s red braid
her foxtail coat your voice
inside the pink clock
November smelled of heartland and prairies
battered in the infantry
let my lippy me be stolen by a witch
nothing was more private than our pink
pink happy your breath pure in half air
***
The Whore
[an owl shrieks speaks]
All night I painted brain tumors
with Israeli scorpion venom yellow
neurotoxins on the stub-toothed man
during surgery I removed fruit
but failed to remove the cancer
which looked like part of his brain or
a key lime
a meyer lemon
a blood orange
a satsuma
a fortuna
his hand stroked my foot an overturned truck
I feigned sleep an entire year
approached the hole in his scalp
where he broke down
a child’s birthday trick
the pony gave out viscous drops slid off the tip
cream-colored pony kitchen pipes clanked
November in the rills plagued by tangled hair
because that kind of surprise always jumps from an alley
whispering in an attempt to appear normal I made the bed
flung the sheet so hard it snapped the glasses off my face
crocodiles removed their cigars
chyme spread in a heart-shaped puddle
his name was odd the top of his head
flapped like a prop hat
in Waiting for Lefty
I applauded from the audience dressed
in my slip my slippers my
slip slippery slip
'
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