Undolled
BY TANYA GRAE
Some lives are so twisted in the belly, throat
blue & airless. Corset-bound,
I have no arms left in your repackaging
to hold back cellophane, the walls. Boxed.
Your memory trails the way of an elephant, oversized
for a single room. So I am strung out, hungry, awake.
Hunger is entropy—ever after. I swallow the night,
I swallow the left side of the bed
& pull the pregnant covers over my eyes
of biding with you. Because it is too much to swallow,
because yesterday’s special is today’s
leftover. The tongue diagrams the taste.
I keep diagramming the same years: spoon & cup,
ocean & blanket. We have no bones,
though I drag you with me. There is nothing
to say now. I remember your hands
calloused & all want—the whole is
a fractal of everything. I can see
the pieces. I see mine coming back together
with arms.
little wekiva river
BY TANYA GRAE
I want no evidence I am dirty.
All the fruit I picked, a dress full,
I let drop—
heavy shoes
on the heart pine floor.
Purpling under the skin, all
I thought I wanted:
the house with its backyard river,
swing set & sundial. Enough wild
bougainvillea sprang to be kept
overlooking the gate. Until now.
Sun falling behind the live oak,
gnomon pointing—
me, stepping out of the dress.
