Circle (CRAB ORCHARD AWARD SERIES IN POETRY) - Softcover

Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Auszug. © Genehmigter Nachdruck. Alle Rechte vorbehalten.

TO WANT

To wait is to want more.
Or to think you want more.

Take a look backyard for the stitches
that seam everything together.

It's unruly back there, yes, but
when there is time, weeds

want and want, an infinite
accordion-to want what they

cannot have, no mirrors
to show them how they look or

lie. How many toys
do children need? For my home,

a rug, yoga mat, clear wax
candles, bath rack with bubble

crystals, a man. You are not for sale,
but other women do not

know this. You do not bother
telling them. I am tempted

to dial each of them up, to inform
them (because of my compassion)

of their safety violation. Wait.
Dig a garden. Eat only junk food.

Buy a strange pet with short legs.
Always pick up the phone when you call.


HONG KONG FLOWER LANGUAGE

They say fat finds the female
brain, while the heart remains thin.
And it was as if the waitresses
knew my plan to win him from her,

or at least to test him out. I blamed
my lack of progress on the waitresses
(pushers of carts). They returned,
a finding-lost-money obsession.

Glass of water? Chicken feet?
Pork bun? As if to say, help, we must
extinguish her. I wanted him to tell
her about our autumns in Vermont

(well not really, but close enough),
the autumns in his mind of Vermont,
or the Vermont in my autumn-
any combination to avoid lines,

the shopping mall of men. And it
didn't matter that I recently had
my stomach pumped of cheating
ones, the spraining-of-the-heart kind.

Who said good habits pay off later?
They just left me on the couch
alone, watching the best
of the new season, the hottest gadgets

and ab-crunchers. Your skin
is the only suit you'll have
for a lifetime. Mine, the darkest shade-
darker than the fish's eye.


EDWARD HOPPER STUDY: ROOM IN NEW YORK

The woman's finger hangs
above the F key. She always
wears the same red dress.
The man's hands cup
the newspaper edge, his face
ashen, half-edible.
The woman's back
to the man, head down,
her arm, dairy and bloated,
long before men preferred
peeling brown shoulders,
the midriff. She can't leave him,
doesn't know how.
How many times have you
heard this? You will hear it
again and again, like the F key
that in a moment will
glaze the room with its
throbbing mouth.


THE GOAL

My father's body curled like a fist
as he perched over the pavement,

unhandsome with manuals and parts,
brackets and backboard. He was lost

in the alleys of his city, where genetics
still mattered, and alleles meant pair.

One dusk, the backboard mounted
against the moon, against crickets

working. I tossed the ball, watched
the net open its walls. Each night,

I barreled to the net with ease, found
the unfindable opening, until the pole

shifted in the mud, like my father's eyes
when he knew I was getting too good.


SEVEN CHANGES

At night your growth rate doubles and each morning I spot
yet another Chang

in the newspaper, staring at me with its dull lamps. I limp up
a mountainside

towards a growing opal. Oracle, is this the way up to the little office
with orange lights?

Let's not argue this time. For the last time, we argued
over the arrival

of another Victoria Chang. Changed from Valerie to Victoria
and now my ruin,

for she, a track star, runs faster than a seashore. Shared bunks
were never favored by me,

a has-been-girl or even worse, a not-yet-girl. And don't even mention
the others-

faces smashed against the door, Helen Chang, Heather Chang,
Hilary Chang.

And with each new Chang, the shock of the world goes down,
drawn to the next eyeless eel

or the one-legged constellation. The next seven Victoria Changs,
all victorious,

in rows, each a little taller than the last. Their fevered footsteps persist,
fist me into midnights.