ISADORE—THERE IS A DOOR SOMEWHERE
paused in the breath of a thousand
horses where we wait for light
to catch our arms, bodies into nets,
golden sea flecked with ravens’
wings. Dear, I want to fly as quick as I can
into a canyon, leap hard into your
eyelids—how they never formed
enough to open—I will wait, still.
In this dream we circle you
in prayer and open any body willing
to be demolished in your name.
FRANCINE IMAGINES A JURY OF TWELVE WOMEN AT HER FUNERAL
Francine tastes the first words at sunrise, splits the verdict between them: her accuser at one end of the table, her Father at the other. I have guns of forgiveness for both of them, she writes. To Francine, forgiveness is a weapon for the last day she will be alive. To slice the throats of my accusers with kindness, a warm waterlike love washing us slick, she writes, in artichoke blood.
HOW BEGINNINGS ARE MADE
How the hay hobbled on
the mule-backs toward ice
caps covered with the unborn
on blankets beneath the one
star, beating-hearth, mother,
her snow watch, warming—
how before-children wanted
to see the one who loved
their bodies until she broke
herself open—how, off course,
mules moved holy hay, making
prints, perfect O’s, hooves
above the tree-line, to feed
the birth-sick their sight, source.
