Picnic, no Basket

Down by river, they check for stragglers.
Revolver in holster, keys clink
a warning to vulgar
visitors who come to get a reading
from some lowdown sundown
hat check girl. You picked my number.

You fit in my cheeks like apricots.
Your stance is earthen, your surges, solar.
Knee low, I am wearing
your secrets, cross-creek park
somewhere east of California.

Next time you will bring sandwiches.
Next time we’ll pack corn in ears.
For camouflage dress in gray
or by chance color these woods we walk.

My tongue traces covert felonies
in a waltz-two-three cadence.
Shoulder bite, claws extended into inconceivable
holds as seen in the last animal planet episode.
Lover, come groom my fur, bring purple feathers, twine.

the night has 17 eyes

“If ever if still I were clever enough I would tell you I would tell you why. I would label all our numbers and give them meaning.”

17
hangs alone in space
wondering what it will become:
orange slices, degrees Kelvin,
meters per second squared?

I hang there too
wondering what is the unit of I?

Anna.
Anna what?

Trochaic dimeter or spondee
doesn’t matter.
Anna of Wemberly
Anna daughter of Saul
Anna with the ringlet curls
Anna scissor kick side swimmer.

How to count a girl by seventeen.
Years. Lovers. Thanksgiving turkeys
under aluminum tents.
Needle sticks.

I forget how to make your cock hard from such a distance.
How to make you sing my stories. Scroll my seas.
My skin, peeled. My flesh, sectioned.
My seeds, removed and set aside.
I sit in little boats, drying on your plate.

Red Ochre and Kohl

Eyelash and brow
are supposed to shield eyes
from winds that etch
the ageless desert.

Tweezer, wand, charcoal stick:
thin brow, extend lash,
trace rims, soon transformed
into a curious wide-eyed fawn.

This too trips signals
wired deep as stick twisting wrens,
feathered peacock-
my cheeks blushed with peach,
skin papaya-polished smooth
into a fruit-scented promise
of barely ripened youth.

Your low growl calls me close.
Shy eyes lowered,
I lean forward,
slow lift hips tease.
“Oh look at you pretty girl,
You gonna come to Daddy?“

I am high pitched and hairless. Wax smooth,
fingers slide easy between
surgical tightness as
my lollipop lipgloss on your tongue
takes you backseat
twenty years.

A box of auburn waits its turn
in this fool’s game.
Cold cream, warm cloth,
starlight, sleep.

I already feel morning’s sand
in my eyes.

Last Prayer (of the mourning mistress)

Death never answers prayers
(you lied)

He hacks the party line,
cracks in between the upbeats of
electronic hold music.

“Oh god, I hope we don’t get caught”

Death lifts a finger.
“I got this one”

Rules of Identification

Don’t even try to predict the spin
on the trigger-finger status

chin chopper chin chopper
chin chopper chin

or estimate the town tower elevation.
Left wing depository crinkles with cellophane
and roughshod solder.

Never assume the words that are hers
are hers, they might be yours all spinning with
flywheel grease and stillborn cinders.
tell me differently
tell me differently

Sometimes the lean-in cleavage
is a mocking bird’s midnight call.
Sometimes the wrap-skirt lift
is just spring wind updraft,
like exposed white leaf bellies
of the ghost maple.

storm, coming

Don’t try to fight spitfire supermarket
standards or their spills and trip-wire logic
that stumble down the Goya aisle. Maria slices
needles from prickly pear.

Christen me, my cracking bird.
Christen me, my ticktack girl.
Make me play it even,
make me play it green,
quick catch the iron rain, cut corners
from the cross-stitch sampler.

Home is where the dog is.
Signed, X