trying to shelter them from 9/11
trying to teach them to live love instead of fear
what was wrong with me?
jealous of your hair your voice your strength the way
you spoke to my man
even as you gave me pastel thong underwear
decked with bows
and told me people like me should have babies
to make the world a better place
titania why
should i be surprised
at what happened?
even the greatest of cities have fallen
to their knees when fear rules
love
and they have been
temporarily at least
reborn
the face
at first your face frightened me
your face was the face of the girl
i’d always wished to be
your face
i thought wrongly
was the face of the girl who never felt pain
if i could have worn a mask
it would have been your face
if i could have had one wish at fourteen
it would have been your face
if i could choose between the gift of words
and your face
i would choose the latter
your face looked the way i felt inside
i understood gossamer and rose petals
light on shallow water
mossy glades and the stained glass
of butterfly wings
but my face was wrong
not mine
not what i felt inside
and you came up to me with that face
and i was afraid
and then you said, thank you
thank you for that story
it was the one about my botched nose job
my acne scars
my face-hate
you looked at me and your eyes had golden
rings like lakes made from compassion’s tears
you came to my house to write with us
you said you were a model
i tensed at the word
afraid of it as if you had said you were
a dog catcher or a cigarette manufacturer
but you brought gifts
bags of silk dresses
sea shells
cherries
your open heart
your wounds
they made you even more exquisite
you said sweet words
sweet as the cherry shape of your mouth
you came again and again
you said kind things to all of us
you brought cushions and fairies and goddesses
you called me part of your star
i look at you sitting on my couch
writing in your journal
your sheath of gold now twisted up
onto your head
with one flick of your wrist
cat eyes blink and kitten nostrils flare
fairy chin and cheekbones
a dryad’s petal lips and eyelids
thank you for taking away my fear
we are not so different little cat goddess
fairy woman
wood nymph
star sister
valentine
my friends stitched it up with golden thread
like a red
satin pillow they gave me other whole ones too
roses and charms and red candles
milagros to repair the real one
they told me i was no longer allowed to give it away
a pretty pin cushion
a piece of mexican folk art
a hundred beating poems left unanswered
like a thing to wear around the neck
they said you must heal we will protect you
but i sat weeping at the computer
forging ahead anyway
with the small stitched thing struggling in my chest
it knew that it had needed to be torn
so that it could recognize and receive
the hundred kindnesses
traveling across three thousand miles
at the speed of light
a storm of petals and beautiful words
and tiny hearts to keep it
company
the three graces
the three graces, sera, sukha and yxta, came to bless
my home
they lit one golden candle
made by brooklyn witches
and three black candles
made by midwestern witches
the gold one was to warm
the black ones were to ward off grief
grief had ventured into my house
tentatively and with his eyes closed
he would not sit on the bed but went instead
into the backyard
the lily pond disturbed him
though the roses were worse
and the picket fence made his skin crawl
grief’s face was calm
his beard was trimmed
he wore a black bandanna on his head
he looked well-rested and composed
though he had once held a dead baby
in his small hands
and fallen to his knees in tears
before another woman
but tonight grief watched me crying in the garden
and asked me to accept what i could not understand
and told me he needed his space
he waited until i said, go now
and then he got up and ran through the house
disappearing into the night forever
i went to my computer and emailed all my friends
help me, i said
he has abandoned me, i said
not realizing i had banished grief
sometimes i see him through the sliding glass doors
that lead from my bedroom to the garden
his profile drawn by the shape of the dark trees
the head of a satyr
but the black candles still burn
and the roses keep blooming irrepressible
grace dances with me in the front room
grief is not welcome
here
a half imagined history: for o
1970
you are born to a girl
a boy inside a girl
i am sitting in front of my teacher with my hands
on her big belly
feeling the baby kick
1975
you want a penis so much it makes you cry
i have cut off all my hair in a bad pageboy
i have braces and pimples
i am grinning as if i am happy
1982
are you starving yourself?
i am
1985
you are running and jumping
powering through so you don’t have to think
about what you are not
but it is who you really are
you just don’t believe it yet
just as i don’t believe i am beautiful
i am wearing pink and black creepers from london
my hair is bleached blond
i stomp around the campus searching for someone
but all i find are the bronze sculptures in the garden
1986
what have you lost, darling? my dad dies of cancer
1989
are you still in hospitals?
are you drawing out your sorrow?
my first book is published
i wear a sheer lace blouse and a kimono fabric skirt
my boyfriend leaps around the room flirting
with everyone
we will break up in a few months
it doesn’t sound so bad but i won’t kiss anyone new
for years
1993
you are in manhattan
i kiss a scorpio and move to the desert
1998
where are you now?
i am getting married
we will divorce a few years later
it’s worth it to have our children
2000
i have one
2002
i have two
2007
i am
