4 Poems

Honeycomb Brocade

after Alexander McQueen

             I am wearing a dress
of bees
                          there are pockets
             pockets filled with
smoke                            and ash
             from which
             peaches are growing
                          trees are            growing
from my body
                                       turning me
into ghosts of smaller
             & smaller suns
                                       they won’t stop
getting older               the bees
are where they are supposed
             to be
                          sewn into my
shoulders                      can you even
             see me
through the smoke
                                       do you think
             I look like a tree
             you could
                                       climb
& keep                          climbing
             while everyone
you love           the animals
                                       of the world
wait patiently
                          below

Saw You Pray to All

Take a look at these hands. These hands are not my hands but they are my hands look at them. I think they could hold things. I could drink water from them. I could build a house with them. There would be birds inside, and bees. I am so afraid of bees but they would be inside. I wouldn’t be inside I would be in a flower. I would be in a dress of flowers. I would be in a flower of dresses. Take a look at these shoulders. This collarbone. They aren’t mine but they are mine look at them. They came from mountains I think. They came from bears I think. At a lake they disappear. When the water touches them they are knives. The sky is in danger because of them. They would never hurt the sky. This body isn’t mine but it is. This body isn’t mine but it is a dress of wind. This body isn’t mine but it is in the sun but is the sun and that is where I want this body to remain.

I Am a River in the Body of a Person Drowning in a River

I am a river
in the body of a person
drowning in a river.

There are knives buried
in my mud.

There are people buried
in my mud
& I am holding the knives
in my thousand hands.

A girl is cooling
her own hands in my body.

I am a boy
holding her hands
with my river

& the knives are melting
& the people are going
back
& they are clean.

I am given wings
to replace
all my severed hands.

A jaguar is swimming
without a care
in the world.

In Which God Shows Me Their Dress

             Hair reaching into the wind
which isn’t you
             but something
you possess                             and your
                          throat             its
apple hidden in the dirt
which isn’t you
             but something you
                                                  grew out
from                how it permits
             you to hold the many birds
you breathe into
                          like song
                          like bleeding
             here in this field of sunflowers
you would let me                  die
             here in this ballroom of moons
you would let me                  walk
                          there are beasts
                          in these woods
             with paws capable of more
noise than yours