January
what’s my body
but a collection
of tiny hairs
i grow out
my nipples
preparing each
morning a thermos
of coffee and microwaved milk
the white bits float up
so i pretend i can’t see
sipping heat / my body
the back that whines
loudest, tired
of sitting
and standing
in equal measure
i get high alone, watch
movies / every angel has
a ponytail, tornado,
toilet bowl
any good thing
pretending my sink
isn’t piled with dishes
feeding cold cupcakes
to my friends telling
them to ignore
the wrappers
my feet
gardening through
winter
lips dribbling
what i never said
plant food
i stole, unused
to have sun,
and water
Offering
hips a basin
for pooling harm
certain movements
a valve / releasing
gentle hiss of bone
you are not what
you were born to
the immutability of
chromosomes / dissolve
there is a broader ontology
of queer passage
what you had to do
wasn’t yours
it was anybody’s
and no one did
come after me
if i say too much
i leak / wholly
The cloud that selects us
my baby / brittle
i carry your pelvis
in a backpack
for years
i write to you about
transformative possibility, nightscapes,
by hook or by crook, absence, flesh,
al-anon, sestinas, linkages,
how spicer said things don’t
connect, they correspond
being as an effect of
encounters / what
encountered us so
close to the floor
we could slap our little
heads on linoleum
and shriek
my baby / saw but
a glimpse of you grown
driving the car of a ghost
giving out sandwiches / supple
Drip
i hold her ass while
she does the dishes
i wash the catholic
from her body with
my tongue
she renders notes
of clear air
it’s warm / singing
weird and new
a fleet of cars
the nuns keep
we watch them
come and go
kissing
***
Photograph of Emma Brown Sanders courtesy of Emma Brown Sanders.
