"I have big predator eyes on my wings, aren't they scary?" asked the butterly. "Yes, very impressive," said the frog, whose laughter made the butterfly meal go down the wrong way. His face couldn't turn red because it was already green. his companion frogs politely looked the other way as he spat the butterfly into his napkin, like his mother had taught him.
.....The singer touched her perfectly manicured fingertips to her cherry lips, and blew the crowd a kiss. Her long dramatic black hair streamed out of the window of the limousine as it pulled away from the curb, and some strands blew from her head to the ground. The crowd ran to catch them, knocking down security guards, letting go of packages and children's hands, falling to their knees in the street, twisting the precious strands around their fingers until they were bloodless. Some hid their treasure, so no one would steal it. long after the limo was gone, people searched in the street for glossy black hairs, and then gravel that had touched the hairs, and then stones from the rest of the street and the streets nearby. the traffic backed up for miles.
.....The singer was tired when she reached her hotel. She hung a DO NOT DISTURB sign on the door of her suite, placed the long dramatic black wig on the night stand, and went directly to bed.
Your mother never sings you to sleep.She never hums lullabies,or tells you bedtime stories about princes and princesses, dragons in need of slaying, and happily ever after endings.
And so you never drift off to sleep with visions of fairytale beauty playing in your head (like your schoolmates on their Ethan Allen beds).
Your nights are not for dreaming.
Your nights are for clutching the pillow and your teddy bear with the left ear torn off and sewn back on again, the fuzz worn down, a grape juice stain down the front, and a burn from sitting on the radiator too long drying off.
For holding them tight -- and doing battle with the darkness you have been afraid of all your life.
For worrying about the monsters in the closet, crouching there in wait under your Sunday clothes, with teeth sharpened on centuries of children whose mothers never sang them lullabies.
Monsters who've grown long gray beards, and complain about the arthritis in their seventy-seven finger joints, and play bridge with the monsters crosstown on alternate Tuesdays.
And although they would eat you with excellent manners, saying "pass the child, please" and "thank you", you do not fall asleep and wait for them to dine on you.
Instead, you have a secret pile of rubber bands under the pillow, and you shoot them through the crack in the closet door where their eyes are gleaming.
And you eat all your vegetables at dinner (even the green ones), and learn combat from comic books and horror movies and playground fights.
And you can almost reach the light switch if you jump really hard.
And one day,very soon,
you'll laugh when the other kids at school bring in their china dolls and music boxes for show and tell
As you finger the piece of monster hide in your pocket, and wait for the chance to show it off.
Freeze Frame
In the third room
down the corridor
my grandmother clicks pictures
from a family album
faster and faster into a movie -
motion for statues
gestures for frozen hands
a favorite story for silent lips
my mother kicks inside her belly
wanting to be born to eat
meals with carefully guarded
secret family recipes
to wear velvet gowns
with the scent of exotic oils
to learn the lush
curve and sweep of a forgotten dance
the reel ends
spun out on the machine
a grandmother's skin becomes
an heirloom garment
gathered and draped too big
or a white sheet
pulled up over quiet bones
she is leaving in linen
and the smell of strangers
Once there was a little girl but then she grew and became a big girl. People said how tall she had gotten over the summer. Then she went to school and her teacher told her she was bad for not learning her times tables. Then she was a tall bad girl. But then her cousin came and was the same age but even taller and she played with her cousin and was good and got a lollypop so she was a medium-sized good girl. Then she went back to school where she was a tall bad girl and played on the monkey bars and made friends with susan but not with doris and susan liked her and doris said her dress was ugly. But then recess was over and they went back into the classroom and the teacher asked a question and the little big medium-sized good bad girl raised her ugly pretty hand because she knew the answer.
Once there was a little girl whose parents took her to the sea for the summer. On their last day there, she found a beautiful rock on the beach. It was as smooth as glass and as colorful as a rainbow. She put it into one of her mother's empty earring boxes, so it would not be damaged on the long journey home.The next day, back at school, the teacher asked the students to tell the class about their summer. When her turn came, the little girl talked about her stay at the ocean, and remembered the beautiful rock. "It's as smooth as glass and as colorful as a rainbow," she said. Everyone wanted to see it, so she promised to bring it in the next day for show and tell. The most popular girl in the class even ate lunch with her, and went home with her after school to see the rock.
They sat on the bed in her room, and the little girl took the jewelry box from her suitcase. When she opened it, she didn't recognize the stone inside! Its colors had faded to grey, and it had become so brittle that it had chipped from being shaken on the journey home. The popular girl laughed at the ugly rock, and went off to play with her usual friends.
The little girl went out onto the lawn and threw the rock as far away as possible. Then she played by herself until a storm came, and her mother called her inside. The hard August rain washed the rock into a ditch and down to a small stream. As the water soaked into its pores, the stone's colors began to return. The stream became bigger and bigger until it was a river. The wild water smashed the rock against sticks and other stones and debris, pulled it under and back up a thousand times. When it finally reached the sea, the rock was as colorful as a parrotfish and as smooth as a pearl once again.
old people's faces have places to hide
little elves playing in the folds
- jowl for a swing,
pocked chin for a foothold-
they pull down on the corners of the mouth
climb to the top of the nose and slide down
nestle into the eyes at night - these elves
pull the delicate browskin over themselves
& dream of lumps and bumps and folds of skin
to play in!
We were walking along the Grand Canal in Venice, on our last day there. I was wearing my grandmother's red dress coat, in the 40's style with the cloth buttons. He wore a black trench coat and a gangster hat pulled low over his eyes. Someone snapped our picture from a terrace as we walked hand in hand, the watercolors of the sunset on the harbor ahead, my hair and his coat like black banners behind us. I wasn't aware at the time of how picturesque we looked. I saw the postcard at a gift shop, when I returned the next year, alone.
stillborn
We were curled in the womb of ocean
her salty warmth surrounding
twin creatures locked in primitive embrace
rocking gently to the rhythms of moon
but carried on an early tide
washed on the shoreline gasping for breath
among shells of creatures who had lived
and kindred bones of creatures born too soon
we are written in the memory of sand.
back to top of page