DAMAGED

1
 
When I finally saw the devil
she was half raven

her gauzy white dress
tipped with the darkest indigo

black ferned
translucent skin
goat eyes,
yellow.

She offered me frosted cake

her long fingers
silken spider webs
that stuck to things

she hissed a sound
like someone taking
their last breath.

I thought I heard
death rattle.


2
 
It is possible
to not remember
 
until your body
reveals it one photograph
at a time.

This is when I noticed the blood.

This is when I pulled you
from your covering.

This is when I started running.


3
 
Each day
I can see my hair growing whiter.

If I had scissors
I would cut it all off.

Then everyone would know
how crazy I feel.


4
 
All at once
I have the eyes of a hawk.

I notice every change
every normality.

In the wild mothers reject weakness.

I feel like packing my bags,
small parts of my brain.


5
 
In my head
there is a screaming
small child

that rips open
grey matter
the child is in pain
the child wants its mother

every last kink
from the night before
a concrete tumor
wrapped around my spine

tendrilous and wicked
smart and sexy


6

Your aunt
sent you
a small pair
of red embroidered shoes
from the silk road

inscribed
a message
on the bottom
of one shoe

you are a glorious addition
to our living universe

I imagine how many steps
it will take
before the blessing
disappears            


7
 
Eating spoonfuls
of jam
in the sunlight

one toe rocking a cradle

the face of my watch
a golden moon
orbiting
in space

how many times
must I ask myself
will this pass?

Every window
in this house
is fragile

it feels as if it will
blow apart.


8
 
Barren are the branches
in winter

a womb
that has already shed
its child

every inch of me is cold

I miss my bathtub;
the mother hug of it
 

9
 
I heard the moan
of an oak tree
growing larger
 
and watched as birds
gathered
 
a swarm of grooming black
like a drop of blood
soaking into water
 
and I,
a hummingbird
cutting its way
out of its skinned layer
into color


10
 
We buried it deep
so the dogs could not smell it


in the floodplains of the Delaware

beneath a grey sycamore tree
forked in two
separate
but equal parts

we buried it
at the root

where the vines
were too thick
to pull with our hands
and the soil was black
and welcoming

later when we talked
about the
bright red

my mother said
it was so real


​11
 
My darling, my black hole

I am a bus stop
somewhere
between generations

this electric current
a suspended chord
between
breathing objects

which part of me
will evolve
into you
 



(First published in the Bellevue Literary Review,  
“Damaged” was chosen by Major Jackson as Honorable Mention for Bellevue Literary Review’s 2015 Marica and Jan Vilcek Prize for Poetry.)