there is a homeless, homesick, aching animal masquerading as a woman with my name. her eyes look like mine, but more afraid. not homeless like an uncaged beast howling through the night for a tender place to sink teeth, but homeless like a rabbit with a broken limb, rescued and tended to in a warm place where nothing smells safe. there are kind people telling me i'm okay, here, but all i hear is sound. all i feel is the beating of my heart, faster and faster, almost so fast that i will die of it.
i am drinking in poetry like rain after the drought. i am practicing moon magic. it is waxing gibbous inside of me now, like the swell before the spilling over, the pouring into earth. i am shearing off the dead and dying parts, but i am leaving the roots to splay out like fingertips trying to find the warm bed again at night by touch alone. i am finally tucking myself into my life and glad for it. the rains are here now, my love. let's stay awhile.
it is me and the dogs now, and i am guarding the soft animal of my body against them. my brother used to whistle to chipmunks in the wood shed before the dogs came. they chase rabbits and other prey in the woods. i am sure they do not eat them - not as well fed as they are - but i am less sure that they do not kill them for the primal, bloody joy of it. this far north, we're all just animals when the winter sets in. the days are getting shorter. i tell myself that i am a wild dog, too. i pretend that they don't know that i'm not.
I wasn't ready for you. I was ready
for a brawl. I was ready to trade in the hand
I'd been dealt for new cards, all of them
the queen of hearts. I was ready
to fight my mother for the next four years,
to blow so many holes in our relationship that we're
still half-sunk & bailing water out of a boat
we don't recognise anymore.
I was ready for a drink. I was ready
to hit rock bottom & start digging, to put out
my own fire with dirt and a shovel. I was ready
to be the kind of shitty girlfriend that leaves
you hanging on the other end of the line
while I chain smoke cigarettes
in the rain,
to spend six years and counting
waiting for another m
my father has started to take pictures. by this-epiphany, literature
Literature
my father has started to take pictures.
my father has started
to take pictures: of the flowers
and birds he sees on his way
to the lookout, a hike that my lover
and I have yet to successfully
complete but my aging father
walks daily; of the puppy
he bought my sister for
her birthday, all paws
and ears; of a moose
eating out of our bird feeder
last week; of the black bear that lives
in our backyard, which my father's
dog trees every other week; of
the land he tends to all summer,
even after long days of aching
backs and feet and hands. he is
so proud of them, in his shy way,
so eager but apprehensive
when I ask to see. I wish
I could make him understand
how much he has already
my mother's mother only knew her by this-epiphany, literature
Literature
my mother's mother only knew her
my mother's mother only knew her
sometimes. mama, I have lioness
songs for you & the years you spent
waiting for someone's warm arms
to wrap around you. & I know
it's not over yet, all those years of surviving
sleeping heavy in your bones.
you & your shaking hands
that held me tight. you
& your enduring heart still waiting
for a familiar voice to call you home.
---
until it is still and quiet again. by this-epiphany, literature
Literature
until it is still and quiet again.
there are places
where the ground never thaws. I would
bury my love there, drag it
north & northwest heavy
on my skin. the land
is hard here but I
took & gave you harder,
miss you now
the hardest.
---
have you seen your father by this-epiphany, literature
Literature
have you seen your father
hugging the cat, my mother asks
& I laugh because I have. the
cat hugs him back, wraps his paws
around my father's neck, rubs
his face against the bristle
of my father's greying beard. &
I imagine my father whispering
sweetly to him & the cat's
low rumble in reply. just yesterday
they were fighting, my father
threatening to drown him
in the lake, cradling a
bird with broken wings.
he loves them, every
bird & ground squirrel,
buries them & storms around
all day. but by night they are
embracing, my father & his cat,
making peace between themselves
too low for our ears. these
things I cannot hear, but see
& feel: my father's
endless well of lo
my father is telling stories by this-epiphany, literature
Literature
my father is telling stories
he moves his hands like
I do, curling & uncurling his
fists. my father who belongs
to a different time, who raised
his babies on the edge
of the wilderness, taught my brother
how to chop wood, adopted
a half-wild wolf dog that
chases bears. he works
at the sawmill, operates
heavy machinery all day,
builds calluses through layers
of sweat & dirt. & I love
him so much, this man who took me
ice fishing on the frozen lake instead
of to school, taught me
to call to the coyotes at night,
how to fell a tree in the snow. when
I tell these stories, I move
my hands like he does.
I got that from him. a gift.
---