Two Poems

this morning I pulled a picture of my mother from my mouth

You confound me every day. You are not who you look like. You are not you. Look at your tiny eyes and lips. Look at those cheeks, apple-like. You hate apples. You eat them-entirely, skin to seeds to stem. What are you doing there in my mouth with all those teeth, that tongue? Are you building a fort? Mining for gold? You never liked small dark places: the crawl space. the attic. the outhouse. You made my father go there with you. Made him climb inside. But you could not both fit in my mouth and now it’s you with your hair all wet. Oh how you hate to be humid. Do you hide behind the molars? Along the long ridge of gum? My mouth is sore, tired, full of paper cuts. Your sharp edges. Yes, you confound me. Every day you are not who you appear to be. I pull you again and again out of my mouth, hide you someplace new: my old rain boots. the bottom of the magazine rack. the crisper. You return each knifesharp dawn and oh how we hate for you to be in there.

Letter to Myself at Age 12, July 19, 1991

I am sending you this letter from the future.

I am sending you this letter from the future but it is not a future in which we can teleport and eat whole meals prepared by a computer or a robot.

I am sending you this letter that is not about the future at all, but about the present where you are.

I am sending you this letter. You will not believe it.

I am telling you to believe it.

I am telling you:
                    pay attention to this moment:
                                        look up at the boy with whom you dance, at the fine adolescent hairs that
                                        darken his lip; touch the seams of his shirt, beneath which his solid shoulders
                                        slope away; lean your head against his neck, his pulse against your cheek.

                                        He bends his head to kiss you.

                    This is the first kiss. This is the slightest kiss, the lightful kiss,
                    the kiss to which you will compare every other.

I am telling you:
                    you should not be thinking about, but cannot help thinking about:
                                        the deer tick exploring the universe of your summer scalp
                                        the single pine needle stuck between your fourth and fifth toes
                                        the gravel biting at the back of your legs

                    you should be remembering to breathe, if you forget to breathe you will be dizzy
                    when he is done kissing you.
                                        I want you to forget to breathe.

I am telling you that life is an act of collection.
I am telling you that you do not understand yet how important this is.

I am sending you this letter because I have just come from kickboxing class, where the instructor yelled leftfootout-jabjabcross-hook-uppercut-kneeswitchknee-roundhouse and I did my best to follow. And then I was tired and sweaty and after class I bought a packet of grapes and cheese to celebrate my burning muscles.

I am sending you this letter because today, fifteen miles away, he is learning to use a fork all over again.