do you know
of the bones that grow cold in
the spring?

kelly didn’t eat because everyone at her school called her fat.

have you seen
the cardigan sleeves
that cover patricia’s skin?

she cuts because she couldn’t feel anything anymore.

and do you know
bruised knuckles
that shoved food up my throat
as I retched over in the toiletbowl?

No.

You do not.

I default
to
sentiment
when he isn’t looking
(I admire the curve of his
jaw
the slant of his eyelashes
the muddied footsteps of a troop of freckles across the
bridge of his
nose.)

He kisses me gently
And I push back
fiercer
unyielding .
(His lips are red like
the candy
he buys me on
valentine’s.)

There are fights
(shouts, screams, throwing of things)
but he never raises a hand
or does more than look hurt.
I pray for him to do just the opposite
of that
(bruises and cries and
promises?threats? of goodbyes) but he doesn’t.

Hurt me, I want to tell him.

Hurt me, and you will never have to know me
(and how I steal gum from the shop
of my before-bed rituals
of my illegible handwriting)

Hurt me, and I will have to stay away from you
(and not get my heart broken
shattered like glass
tattered like the afghan bedspread we share)

when I was a child
I would
wake up
in the middle of the night
and creep to the bathroom
to read a book under its yellow light

my mama slapped me and said
that I should go to bed
she took my book away.

when I was more grown
I would
wake up
to fetch my blade
hurry to the bathroom
to paint ladders red.

the girls at
school
laughed
at me.
they wrinkled their noses like
I was
****
and said I wanted
attention.

when I was married
I would
nudge awake
my girl and
kiss her *******
under the spray of water
under the lull
of love.

she left me, two years later
for another
woman
with bigger
*******.

when I was old
I woke up
and went
to the bathroom
except my legs were
weak
and my grip on the
sink
did not suffice
so I saw my blood drip.


I heard the doctors say I wouldn’t make it.


I didn’t.

rose had a jar of lime marmalade

and her grandmother told her not to put it in her hair

(she was only five, with an innate curiosity;

still, it ended up everywhere)

her sister kate made orange marmalade

(it amused her to know that rhymed)

kate was nine, and a big girl now

she used her marmalade on her bread-

where was the fun in that?

he paints me
reading a book in my faded nightie
lounging on the armchair with a daisy in my hair
huddled by the window looking at the cars passing by
he never lets me see them.

i write of him
padding around our apartment in bunny slippers and
blue plaid boxers
thanking the people who buy his paintings
wiping the lenses of his glasses with the hem of his shirt
saving the world
i never let him read them.

we share
a tiny kitchenette we don’t use because we don’t
know how to cook
bookshelves that line our every wall
snapshots of the city, framed in matte black
wood and macaroni, in the hall
we don’t invite people over.

our parents
don’t send christmas cards anymore
stopped paying for university tuition
and his sister helen gave birth to a baby we
aren’t allowed to see

(but helen sends pictures in the mail)


they can’t take away our love.