You've found use for your head in these long days
Banging it against the wall, and keeping in time with the hands of the clock
When the battery runs dry you will use your imagination.

Five powerful privet hedges formed
a fence in our front yard in New York.
My mother planted them for some
reason, known only to her.

The branches grew sparse and suffered.
Failure to thrive.  Knee high to my
twelve year old body, it never bloomed
in that yard of green weeds and dandelions.

It was meant to keep the
dogs away.  We had feral cats
in the yard.  My brother and I
were feral.  My mother bred us
into the wind of 1940's Chicago.

So that was that for her.  She
retreated into madness from
Chicago to New York to
South Bend.

Fences, like my mother's
addictions, are not always seen.
They crawl up your leg like
flakes of hate.  They keep growing
until your eyes are holes in the
twigs.

A fence so thick you think
only prayers will let you out.
Easter Sunday blooms in
the trailers and filaments.

No relief.  They scratch
on your so small soul.  White
privet petals crawl into crevice
and crease.  

I no longer itch but
tic with the rhythm
of the seasons.


Caroline Shank

Where I live people tear garbage
bags apart and look for gold.
They wait in hordes along the road for safe passage home, and the sun torments them and the dust alike.
(Here) We are all somewhat cruel
No one leaves any gold to be found.
We wave and call out "goodbye" to homesick faces.
We mock the sun.

Dearest?
I peeled back my eyelids, and
belted out the sound that beasts make when giving birth to their young: a hollow, ungodly groan reminiscent of the time you set this place on fire and remembered that I was inside.
Now we are to break bread and speak. I say the sweetest things when there is someone to hear. Cover your ears, that would be best

I see you in the sky
Hammering your one glass eye
And trading stories with the wind
We fit in wherever
Feelings are placed timidly
Back in their cupboards
Libraries of humbleness
Mumbling in their dreams
We’ve barely remembered
That the embers are still burning
Hymns of confession
Each have a story to tell
So we teach it to the children
By the rivers of yesterday
We trust our bodies to fight disease
And drink from streams of light
To see the sky can be insightful
When longing to stay
Becomes more practical
Then running away again each spring
It means belonging to the daylight
Though before you've arrived it seems
That you’ve already learned
How to stay awake
Until it speaks to you in your dreams
And according to her
We are unconsciously treading
On the seams of everything