Leviticus

From God to the sons of Levi,
to Me. I think now I see,
how I've been sowing my vineyard with
Wildflowers and corn, uncovering my
Nakedness, and yours. I make
Sin offerings to idols who talk back, whoring
myself out, a widow returning dishonored to my
father's house, only bringing one turtle
dove.

I wait for the priest in his purple, blue, and
green to sprinkle a little blood here
and there for me. I overflow his table with
my Meat but curl up my big toe, putting one foot in
Canaan and looking back to Egypt; never keeping
Sundry Laws: I can't count to seven. I have no holy
convocation.

It is due season and the rain has
not come, my field yields no fruit. Terror
and burning consume my Eyes and Heart.
Heaven is iron, Earth is brass.

Enough

She started from a dream: In the minutes before her alarm rang, her internal clock ticked her toes, her legs, her torso, her arms, her heart and her head awake. In this tick, tick, ticking awake state that indecisively fluttered between consciousness and unconsciousness, she couldn't tell if the scene she saw was only the inside of her eyelids, which of her thoughts originated in dreams or reality, whether or not... It had to be real, that wasn't a thing she could imagine or create out of air, such a thing had to come from something more corporeal--or someone. She inhaled deeply again and, smiling with excitement, opened her eyes; but he wasn't there--he wasn't standing next to her to wake her up, or give her one of his famous hugs, or just watching her sleep because they were both content with the silence they found in one another. He wasn't there. It was gone: the scent of him was gone.

She sat up in bed and crossed her legs, placing her elbows on her knees and putting her forehead in her hand. Her body, so quiet only moments before, wrenched into impassioned, uncontrollable sobs--fiery tears she hoped would purge her from the inside-- a drop of remorse, a drop of longing, a drop of anguish: she could have swum in the ocean of her misery, she could equally have drowned in it. Her abdomen began to scream its complaint, followed by her throat, hollow and rasping. She fell onto her side, letting her head hit the pillow hard. She hugged her knees into her chest and held so tight to her opposite elbows that her fingernails left markings there. Her bones screamed the paroxysm her voice failed to evince. Her arms gave out, muscles twitching in protestation. She unfolded in a mess of limbs falling gracelessly limp, like a paralytic bird falling from the sky. She barely had enough strength to think how she could have imagined it. Too much.

She wanted to crawl back beneath her covers and hide herself from life, from reality. She grasped at an evanescent dream that had taunted her. It slid like smoke through the fingers of her consciousness, becoming more scattered the more she reached, fruitlessly. She tried to go back to sleep, hoping a REM cycle would coax it out of its corner; but the sun reached out her arm-like rays and cradled her, rocking away her grief, singing the hopeful songs of dawn, promising the day didn’t have to start this way.

She sat up on the inhale straight, tall, strong, feet planted firmly on the floor, ready to meet the memories that escaped her sleep and followed her into her waking hours while she searched for it.

It wasn’t like the Old Spice or Axe that a lot of guys, including her brother, wore because their girlfriends or sisters picked it up from a drugstore for them. It was never so strong, either. She shuddered to remember the suffocating breath of air inundated with the too-liberally-applied spray in junior high halls, outside the men’s locker room, with her dance partner. She didn’t associate the scent for which she searched with any of these things. It wasn’t the Jean Paul Gaultier donned by rich boys with tacky taste and their Hispanic wife-beater-and-bling-wearing counterparts. Nor was it the “eau de gay” sold at Abercrombie and Hollister, spritzed by nancy boys and prep wannabes who idolized the models with their pouts made to look pensive, succeeding only in looking confused and daft, probably because they didn’t know where they’d left their shirts. It wasn’t like the “I’ve-just-stepped-off-my-yacht” salt-breeze sported by her former math tutor that she found so irresistible she kept going to sessions even though she taught him more than he taught her. It wasn’t any of these things. She knew what it wasn’t, but beyond that… Tears traced her cheeks again.

She couldn’t remember the scent, but she remembered what it meant. It meant a shower to remove the sweat and grease and a change of clothes to impress her father. It meant a firm handshake, hands placed coolly in pockets, a relaxed and easy posture. It meant being the only person to make her cry of happiness and sorrow, the only person whom she ever hugged without reservation, the only person of whom her father had approvingly said, “Those are the types of guys you need to be bringing home.” It meant having to say good-bye twice. It meant the worst day of her life, followed by a hundred beautiful Mondays.

She walked to her closet to get dressed. It was the first thing she saw when she opened the wardrobe: the shirt she’d worn the last time she saw him, the last time she’d hugged him. Over a year and many washes later it no longer smelled like him, but she held it close to her nose all the same. Almost. She could almost feel being close to him, resisting the urge to put her head on his shoulder, resisting the desire to watch him leave through the window, and failing miserably to see him wave good-bye.

She didn’t remember the way he smelled, but she didn’t have to remember. These memories were enough. Knowing he was there for her, still, in the way she needed most, was enough. It was enough, what he had given and continued to give her. It was enough to know it would work out in the end, for both of them, but not necessarily with each other. Where they were right now was enough. It was no longer too much.

Stay: Either way

I had to lay it bare today,
Own up to the things I say,
Accepting the long delay
Marked by words in black and gray,
My own I can't betray, decay, or go astray;
So leave behind this wrong essay--
this damnation I follow everyday:
From this I must turn away,
keep persistent tide at bay,
words in secret dossier;
If and only if, I pray,
I must and if I should obey
There is no h-i-m in "stay,"
I'll follow you, either way.

Snow Cones

Remember when we used to buy 

snow cones for thirty cents  outside the 

theater and then steal away in your car to 

cruise the boulevard? You listened for hours.

Remember when we'd sit in the park that summer, 

sitting on the swings, digging our feet into dark sand,

a sunset barely visible through the trees, the hill

sloping away into a yawning lake?

I went there myself once, you know,

staying until it was too dark to see,

until I didn't feel safe by myself, without you. 

I told you everything that summer

in a letter I never sent. 

Sympathies

My greatest sympathies to the 

Night, who must come after the

Day, and whose dark cloak gives her 

Ill name, while her mallumined corridors 

Harbor a heterogeneous heaven, but not

Unkind; 

Whose sounds signal sleep, the dreams we all 

Need-- yet whose shadows chaperon nightmares,

Steadfast steward to unrest, companion, friend;

Caretaker of the care-worn, playing

Host to deeds of Hate, unhappily. 

My greatest sympathies to the Night, by whose

watch we are healed, whose defamation breeds our

Noblesse, who does bear the cross before man's new

Breath, who turns our ingratitude to light--

Yes, my greatest sympathies to the Night.  

Stay: Who?

I dilly-dally my way behind houses and across lawns, the smack-smack of my flip-flops against the pavement providing the processional in time to an acoustic crooner. The melody is slightly flat. The harmony is a discord. 

The sun is kind today. It kisses the crook behind my elbow, the corner between my neck and shoulder. I shouldn't trust the sun, this temperamental tempter, dressing me in spring. But I don't care today. Let the sun seduce me. I've other temptations to worry about. 

Between dull chords and the chitting of birds an owl sends waves of worry through me with his question: "Who? Who?"

Silently, "I don't know." 

"Who? Who?"

The chords mold into bricks, the birds are swallowed in the soil. I only know a dormant tree playing host to this mocking interrogator. 

"You should know better." 

"I do-"

"You don't act like it."

His swiveling eyes search me. He shakes his head.

"You don't believe it." 

"I don't know what I believe."

"...Or what you want."

"Yes, yes, so you know." 

"And you don't."

The tree looked dead, but I knew it wasn't. I believed it wasn't. I knew when the sun decided to stay, it would kiss the tree's fingertips into beautiful buds of pagan green.

"Hmm... pagan... eh?"

"Don't you dare."

"I'm just sayin'. ..."

I take a moment to solidify my bones and the blood forming inside of them. When I know, I feel it in my bones. I need them strong if I intend to stay alive. 

"It's different when we get beyond all that flesh and muscle isn't it?"

"What is that supposed to mean?"

"Are you sure this isn't just the natural man breaking away your bones?"

"..."

"..."

No, I don't know. This is entirely new to me. I suddenly feel cold--from the inside. 

"Chilly? Isn't it?"

"Shut up you warm-blooded freak of an animal!"

"You shouldn't call yourself names like that."

"Who? Why!? More importantly: How!!??!!"

"Now you're getting somewhere."

Suddenly, I see a small kitchen crowded with bare feet and squeals of laughter.  We're dancing.

Then the picture goes blank.

"Now you're just going backwards."

"By going forwards?"

"You worry about the future too much."

I know there's no guarantee. Maybe I'm expecting too much, but the kitchen isn't much. The red front-door. The garage. 

"Ah, the garage. Too bad it's what came out of that thing that's gotten you into this mess."

"No, I got myself into this mess." 

I'd rather not talk about it. The tree gets lost behind hedges and a house, the door in a fence beckons me with it's hinges. I don't know who, but that's not a door I want to walk through. 

Stay: Reason to Leave

Just when I think I've made up my mind, you come knocking around my door sheepishly with that sly grin, as if you know I'm going to take to your trap. You flaunt another impossibility in front of my face, forcing the corners of my lips to my eyes as I press my lips together in another attempt to keep control of these runaway feelings. 

I try to convince myself that it's a platonic smile, but I don't present a very good case and the jury's still out. 

I rest my chin in my hand and sigh. For a moment you've made me forget; you're a smooth competitor. Then I remember, you're two sides of the same ocean. Too much.

I wonder if I can ever enter that water again-- the saying "You can never step in the same river twice," I think of it now. The river may not be the same, but I wonder, will the waters be just as lovely? Will they cool and clean and caress me the way they did? Or will they lap up on different shores I've never seen? Will they get lost in the ocean forever, home to bright fishes, covering coral reefs who hide their treasures, glistening under a sun too far west? 

Your words chip and chisel at my granite heart. They give me reason to leave.