Pumpkin Spice

Someone once asked me why I hate pumpkins

and I said, “because Walt Disney hated Pocahontas

and watermelons never turned into chariots.”

Every Jack-o-Lantern has a shark-toothed smile

and there's a glass slipper at the bottom of every

Pumpkin Spice Latte.

Lines

Did they draw cages in the sand and say “she cannot touch you inside these lines.”

Did you laugh when I crashed through the bars like a tidal wave? I am not easy to love, I promise. But honey, if you wanted easy you'll find her in your wallet. 

Trumpet Bells

And the notes they stuck like so much dust—

—dandelion dust, fairy wishing dust—

in my hair and caught on the skin

behind my ears.

They tugged and teased my trumpet shell,

my dusty, disused, cartilage bell,

and snaked their way into my brain

and tap danced on my memory cells.

Hate

They came at me with crucifix horns,
Cinder-ella! Cinder-ella!
My glass slippers shattered as I ran,
White-cold shards bit my white-skinned soles,
And the shark-shards shredded my snow-white feet,
But I ran, I ran like a wild-fire streak.

They pinned me to an ancient tree,
They sealed my heart with an arrow of words,
to the age-old bark of the ageless sage.
Choicest they were, the woods they used,
As they let loose the ravenous flame on the lavender wood--
--but it was good wood,
it was wise wood,
old wood.

With my unbound soul I raped the skies,
And our bastard children let loose on earth,
Demons with dry wells for souls,
And I let them consume me, eat my flesh,
Their white-cold teeth shredded my softness,
I was wood, once again, burnt sandalwood.

Witch! they screamed, and tore at my hair,
As I fell into their pitchfork fury,
Metal fangs suckled my breast and my womb tingled
from the rancid passion; we were making hate.
Ardently and lustfully, we rode each others' malice.
The rotting, festering vomit of emotion,
settled in a putrid, acid curd.

When it rained, I stretched out my jaw,
and tasted the clean water, free of taint,
And I was melting, melting, oh!
My feet like hot wax glued me to the cleansed earth,
A tender peace, like translucent paper--wet rice paper,
fell over my face, and I could see,
The world washed out in whiteness, peace.

My fingers lock--a gridlock, stubborn gates,
My toes curl like hungry hoes,
And my wood-carved body's carved out again,
And now I'm a boat, a ferryman's bitch.
Men--many men--sit in my womb,
And I birth them with no pain, no gain,
When their journey is done.
They will not return to my womb.
I'm a ferryman's bitch,
A red-wood canoe,
not lavender, not sandalwood,
I'm ugly wood now.
I'm gnarled and knotted,
But I can still bear life,
And my unbound soul,
Still impregnates.

Demons

I fell in love with a Bible lover

and tattooed her name under my breast

like it was the crescent impression 

of her fingernail half-moons biting my skin.

"Your body is a Church!" my mother screamed.

"How dare you befoul the home of God!"

Oh mother, I thought.

I am an Olympus of misplaced Gods, a cathedral of contradictions.

There are demons in my Church.

Sexy.

I'm not fat. I live extensively in the space I occupy. Every bite of Thanksgiving turkey exists tangibly inside my skin. You call it fat. I say it's space well used. You judge my food. Tell me it's full of preservatives. I'm a preservative. I embalm every christmas dinner in the cavity of my body. You tell me I should slim down, look sexier. Where do you store your sexy? In the cradle of your hipbones? I store mine in every dip and valley of my skin. Are you running out of body? Send it my way; I have room for your sexy too.

Letters to my lover

 You keep asking me what's wrong. Honestly, honey, it's not that I don't know. I just don't know how to tell you: sometimes I can feel you grating against my bones like a second skeleton—you inflate me till I'm spilling out of my skin. And sometimes you're spider legs racing down my spine, some phantom shiver that might've been the wind.

I don't know what to tell you. I can't wait to hear your voice. I hate listening to you trying so hard to love me. I'm unlovable. I'm all thorns with no rose. I keep trying to tell you that.

You don't listen. Or you listen too well. I never could tell. Do you hoard my words in the closet corners of your soul or do you watch them settle on the hairs on your arms and pop like soap bubbles against your skin? I want to know what you're feeling every second of every day and I'm terrified that what you're feeling will burn me.

Is this enough for you? Is love just almond oil on wet skin and promises that die at 11:11? Is 10 o'clock our witching midnight hour? Do all our dreams turn to pumpkin shells when the clock strikes goodbye?

How do you love me? Do you wake up at 3 am and wonder why your tongue tastes like my name? Do you ride the crests and dips of my voice and trace the texture of my emotions with your fingertips? Do you hear me arch my back ever so slightly when you say my name? If love is just I love you, then I've loved and loved and loved my life away.

Sometimes I can feel you try to love me simply. I fell in love with the peace around your body. I fell in love with the air around your skin. I am the hurricane to your peace, the storm centered around your stillness. Did you think you could love me gently, like the rain? I will tear through countries to match your calm.

My love is ugly. It won't lend itself to caress, won't lay purring in your lap while you pet it. My father told me he loved me best from afar. My mother tried instead to smother me.

Michael told me my hair was unmanageable. You complain there's hair everywhere. I have hair that requires the use of both hands. That braids into both the hangman's rope and compliance. I have hair that will never let me trust a man who cannot tame it.

Did you think you could be my knight in shining armor? I was never the damsel in distress. I have whiplash in my bones and callouses on my heels. Do you pride yourself on being a warrior? My darling, I am the war.

You will never own me. I say “yessir” and we both laugh because we know. I will not come for you. I will come to you. Call me, beg me, coax me gently with your tongue. Lose control because you'll never possess the woman you've sworn your life to. Hate yourself for being too weak to force me. Fear that I know your weakness. Love that I cherish you all the same.

You will never convince me that I'm your princess. But dear god wouldn't I hate it if you didn't try.