lost in los angeles
running from the green-eyed lady
i got lost on the freeway in l.a.
i saw the mexican markets
i saw the train tracks
i saw the old bridge and the cement river
i saw the vast expanse of grayness
leading nowhere
i saw a dog zigzag thirsty
i thought of the woman with her eyes
like cold green glass
and her smirking smile
how she tried to eat my boyfriend and my mentor
and my house
i thought, what has happened to my city
with its roses and angels?
i thought, what has happened to my boyfriend
who was bowling with miss green eyes
just the day before?
after she ate his heart
he handed mine to her on a china plate
just like the one she used to serve him meat
in my vegetarian kitchen
and then left
so i dug in my purse for my cell phone
and i called my friends
sara and sera and maria
and they looked at maps and told me
which way to turn
and they helped guide me home
it is good to see the sadness of my city
without roses without angels except the ones
disguised as your girlfriends
it is good to get lost in her
it is even good to let envy hold your heart
in her mouth
but if you don’t give in to her my darlings
she will release you
she will spit you out
toxic blonde
you are those little craftsman houses decorated
with strings of lights and candles in paper bags
lining the path to the backyard where beautiful
lesbians live in silver airstream trailers and bonfires
burn and old dogs try to steal the macaroni and
cheese and cookies off the table you are forgotten
kings of the punk rock scene wearing circle jerks
buttons and speaking in scottish tongues and you
are hot loud-mouthed big-breasted blondes in pink
fur coats and fetishistic shoes taking photos of
everyone and making them laugh and you are
guava cream cheese pastry bakeries and movie
theaters with golden egyptian gods and the
hospital where i was born and where my dad was
treated for cancer and you are lights tumbling
down the dark hills like bits of crushed glass and
you are shoe stores called lush selling four-inch
cork-soled metal-studded round-toed suede slip-on
platforms that will certainly this time make me feel
beautiful at least for one day and you have made
me feel like shit all these years when all you loved
were your blondes with small noses and big boobs
and you have made me cry countless times because
you were synonymous with death by car crash or
melanoma and you have made me feel like a freak
writing poetry in a land of actresses though now
i’ve found your poets and they invite me to their
gatherings and ask me to sign old copies of my
books and if i had been in new york i would have
been one of a million neurotic jewish women
writers i would have not learned to forgive myself
in a room full of girls with perfect tans i would
have not learned to walk on such high heels i would
not have found my ex-husband and therefore my
children who can’t be mad at you because they
know nothing else i would not dance outside under
the almost invisible stars i would not be thinking
so much about plastic surgery i would not have
burned my skin to blisters in your sun i would not
have been able to write forty-five poems in as many
days and i would not have been able to say i have
been able to write them because of this fertile
flowery toxic blonde that is how
media queenz
we liked winona because she seemed intelligent
and sensitive
with good taste in men
and a bit of a goth sensibility
julia annoyed us we didn’t trust her voracious smile
natalie too perfect slightly cold
nicole, salma and gwyneth breaking our trust
when they donned fake noses and eyebrows
boned up on their suffering
to play our saints
though we loved angelina
in spite of the fact that of all of them
she had the most potential
to destroy a woman’s life
it was not the careers so much we envied
not the rich and famous men
(except perhaps for johnny
who tattooed her name but left anyway
to marry a french model)
it was not the chance to portray all kinds of women
on a giant screen
it was the doe eyes the big lips the skin
fine grained as porcelain
it was the dresses shoes the grace
the way our men said, “i used to want a movie star”
turned away from us in the drugstore
to stare at magazine covers
even while we were buying condoms
even while we were bleeding
where were our pradas? our pouts?
our captivating glances?
only later we would grow up
and realize that these women were just women
they ran from the altar they stole
someone else’s man
they shoplifted they got loaded they tattooed
the wrong name on their bodies
then we could be grateful
we are pretty enough stylish enough
we are unscrutinized
we are loved
duty: for sofia
she was a princess of the holy wood
her parents brought her to a jungle
when she was little to sit
at the feet of a prophetic madman
when she was older she performed on the stage
the crowd put her in the stocks and threw vegetables
at her da vinci face
her brother the prince drowned in the sea
she married
a man everyone called genius it seemed like paradise
she wept
alone in her villa while he flirted with actresses
she made
art won acclaim and her husband’s jealousy he left
she wore
only short black or white dresses
some full some slim and elegant black flats
was named best dressed on every list smiled quietly
and like a cat
told a story about marie crowned queen at nineteen
dressed in magical shoes
showered with jewels and cake not loved properly lost in a castle
of gilt dreaming
of the natural world making babies finally beheaded
but this princess keeps dreaming her next dream
she has a lot of stories still to tell
she knows that in times of danger it is up to the girls
to overcome humiliation and grief even decapitation
and
