You know those little blow torches chefs use to caramelize the sugar
on your creme brulé? That’s how you know a professional,
one who loves the stench of smoldering Lycra, knows just when to give it another blast.
It takes a steady hand to singe the little bow first, experience
to understand to start the straps early and back off any foam padding,
patience to get the underwires charred to just the right smoky black
that even Georgia O’Keefe wouldn’t mind painting.
It’s expensive, as a habit, and I suggest for your first time to offer a bra with bulky seams,
bad lace, elastic beginning to sag. That way, the snap of release
from the hooks will feel right; no regrets as you pull your elbow through one loop,
then the whole contraption out through your other sleeve. Look at it — dangling
between your pinched thumb and finger. How truly awkward
it is without you. How gangly and wrong.
The performance burners are another thing, not just about providing a service.
I’ve seen them use hibachis, fondue pots, gas ranges, a pack of cigarettes,
fry daddies, hot-wired electrolysis machines, crossed jumper cables, curling irons,
kilns, vanilla scented candles, university-owned Bunsen burners, a shot of brandy
flambé, magnifying glasses on a sunny day, even easy-bake ovens.
You might mistake a few as amateurs at first, pulling out a big red box
of kitchen matches like cub scouts building their first fire.
But when Janice leaves the bra on and presses the pink hot match tip to the satiny cup,
you settle into your metal folding chair, the sweat on the back of your thighs,
and watch the transformation, the delicate pointillism revealing a flower, the figure
of a real woman, your mesmerized face.
And the conventions of this poem, for instance,
the meditation pinned against the domestic
as the sleeves against the tee shirt shoulder blades
that never fit quite right but we cram
into a drawer anyway. The way slightly damp
cotton of flannel sheets should bring me
to irresistible truth, the coming together
and parting of two people holding the corners,
when in fact I fold most of our sheets by myself
in a hurried haphazard motion on the newly
cleaned carpet or bed, since he slows me down
with twisting his end in the play of an anti-folder.
I do not smile, except always on accident, to myself,
which is his favorite. Do you really want to hear
about his boxer shorts? Or what I think about them?
We could make them stand for just about anything, you and I,
or consider the sock wadded up in the pillowcase,
the tilting pile of clean laundry on the chair
onto which I will add this listing tower
of like put next to like for easy stowing.
It would be easy to fill each item with body,
mention the socks rolled into pairs that keep
their knees together, the bras that dry in the open air
no matter what anyone says and work it into a metaphor
of love and life together, a dream of the ordinary
poem that makes some laundry magic again
if not particularly moral or worthy of praise.
Take a lesson from Sister Mary who knew
seduction like she knew her own strong hands
could reach past hands. Remember what’s beneath
us shifting the burden of daily weight,
the ache in the heel’s core reminding us
of earth, of gravity.
Just your hand, back of his boot, imagine,
loosened laces catching his breath, his fear.
Tell him breathe as you peel down each sock,
ease his foot in the warm water, watch
dark hairs along the ridge down to the knuckle
rise up. This neglected
dream of cool lavender, the plush tongue
of the towel from tendon to arch to toe, its five
separate sides. Put your thumb against
the left foot’s diaphragm, the sharp grain of pain
to fix as he looks down. You knew, he’ll think,
You knew all along.
But be careful. Hold him past three minutes,
transfixed by the power of knee to gravel,
you’ll unfurl his soul so soundly nothing
will batten, nothing pin down the whip of his heart
as it streams overhead and the rest
of the fallen unravel.
Find your boots, the rubber ones for summer storms,
socks optional, and grab the clippers;
don’t worry about the screen door
when it slams. Under the branching yellow pear tomato
vines and vines, the Genovese basil you’ve forgotten,
the small white flowers: follow the stems right down
until you find the trunk,
the woody base.
Cut that,
pull the plant through gently
to keep the leaves from falling. Go in and fill
the largest bowl with water to wash the branches.
Break them off, clean them, set them down to drip dry,
Over a new bowl, hold
each branch by the top and run the other hand against
the leaf growth. They should
drop. Don’t worry over a stem here,
some water there.
Use a mortar and pestle to pound
two garlic cloves to paste with a dash of sea salt. From the freezer take
a scant handful of your stash of pine nuts; work them into the garlic,
add extra virgin olive oil, at least three tablespoons,
and half a slab of the best Romano you can find, freshly grated.
Pound the basil in by handfuls, until
the room is so filled with perfume
that you can’t smell it. Pack the pesto in a jar,
refrigerate, run a slice of bread around the bowl
before you wash it. Eat the bread.
When they would move out West, the men went first.
Great grandma Jessie’s dad and uncle left
to find a place to live. The women waited
for almost a year and then they heard
that they had land in Idaho. They packed
up what they could — Jessie was almost two
so she could help some — wrapped up the brand new baby
(that would be Grammy’s cousin, your great great cousin,
Olivia) and took the train past towns
and fields and desert. She tried counting cows
then horses, sheep then people at train stops, but it all
went by too fast. Then it got dark outside
and the train seemed louder going past places
she might never see, and people kept walking through
the passage. Her mom told her Go to sleep
but she was too excited to.
She closed her eyes but through the night her mom
and aunt were up rustling and whispering
about the baby. She was much too quiet,
so pale they thought she might not make the trip.
So Jessie lay there in the dark and watched
them pass the baby back and forth until
the morning came and she was still alive.
When the train reached their stop, they were so glad
to step out on the platform. It was summer,
hot and dry and bright. The men were there
and everyone was looking at the baby.
Then Jessie’s dad picked her up and they were all
together. Her uncle held a paper bad,
and he pulled out an orange fruit, round
and furry, which he rubbed some as he passed
them around and they bit through the pretty skin
to reach the sweetness all at once
and Gramma Jessie said it was like eating
flowers. Someone had planted trees out there.
And that was her first peach. In Idaho.
Why do we call them shades?
These ghosts that bump the heart
when it’s memory that fades
out like a station that plays
jazz as I drive through the heart
land, the flattest part.
Why do we call them shades
when it’s my voice upbraids,
my fear of the apple cart
upset. Don’t blame the heart
when it’s memory that fades.
My love would get good grades
for attentiveness. The art
of sketching a face by heart . . .
maybe that’s why we call them shades,
for the charcoal smudge, the grays
defining a nose, lip, arc
of an eyebrow, always darker
than memory, which fades
toward the blank edge of the page.
Though a world falls apart
each morning, gentle heart,
why should we? Call them shades
and it’s memory. That fades.
(Is it too late to trade
in the old for a new refrain?
In dark waters a heart
promises to hush
the snare and not to rush
the tempo, shark or no shark.
Strike up a new refrain
before the music fades
in its minor key. The crushing
silence. The bloated heart
still feeding. Begging: stay.)
Why do we call them shades?
You appear in a tinny, nickel-and-dime light, 271
You bid me try, BLUE-EYES, to try to write, 283
You cantilever like a Minotaur, 46
You have beheld a smiling rose before, 123
You little stars, can I cash my wishes in?, 203
You might come here Sunday on a whim, 1242
You, once a belle in Shreveport, indiscreet, 38
You quote are tired unquote. You ate red meat, 824
Your small hands precisely equal to my own, 2
You trompe l’oil terror from breast to anklebone, 136
You, violet, turn cruel when I add the “n,” 6
You would think the fury of aerial bombardment then, 1968
You yodel bubbles through a straw into my coke, 8
You zero to sixty panic in my throat, 61
Toys reveal the list of all the things the adult does not find unusual: war, bureaucracy, ugliness, Martians. . . .
—Roland Barthes
I was still baby blonde. We had a yard
with no fences, just a wall of trees
Mom said to keep clear of. Summer, I stepped on bees
with my bare feet and felt the fiery hard
stingers pierce my skin. I think that’s why
we got the pool. One day dad pulled it out
and put his breath into the plastic spout
so I could take the hose and fill it high
with water. I’d stay in there for hours: the hot
wet smell of plastic, the rough seams, the red
devil toy I’d hold under until he bled
tiny white bubbles and turned limp. It was not
torture. I’d replenish all his spirit
with my own breath. I never thought to fear it.
Here find the usual, legal disclaimer:
if I knew who our speaker was, I wouldn’t name her
and as for biographical delectation,
to persons actual, there’s no relation.
“Hi, this is weird, but I’m Paul’s second wife—”
“Nancy?” My mouth asks before I’ve time to think.
“Yes, are you busy? Do you mind that I called?”
“No” to both, I say, “I’m not busy at all”
and continue cubing the tofu with my knife,
slanting the board so the water runs in the sink,
“What’s up?” I ask, as if she calls twice a week,
though actually I’ve never heard her voice before.
I cut halfway through the white flesh of a leek
and rinse out the sand by holding the layers apart.
“Paul moved out.” “He did?” “About three weeks ago.”
Suspended in shock, I tilt the tamari and pour
a tiny pool in my garlic paste. “Oh,”
I say as I stir, “I’m sorry — I didn’t know.”
I say as I stir, “I’m sorry.” I didn’t know
she’d sound so familiar. My own voice echoing back
over — is it nine years? “I didn’t know
if you’d talk to me.” I stretch out all the slack
of the phone cord to reach the sesame oil
and pour some in my warming pan. Not pity —
not curiosity — prompts “Sure I will.”
I guess he must be crushed. But she says he’s giddy;
he’s been planning this all along. I remember
his face, his fingers, that flash toward freedom. “Oh yes,”
I say. “I know what you mean.” My words so plain
they’d carry any nuance. She needs a true mirror,
to hear the right things. She needs to change her address.
“He will hurt you again,” I say like a bad refrain.
“He will hurt you again,” I say like a bad refrain
in a country song gone schlock. No blues song, bad
or good, would go that far. And what we had,
or whom, was not the same. I should refrain
from assuming her hurts echo mine. We’re not
the same. Their marriage is Clinton era, blessed
with two writing careers, both well established.
Ours wobbled through grad school loans we barely got
in the early years of fellowship tax and marriage
penalties. We skimmed the glamorous edge
and sang the verses to Bobby McFerrin’s tough
song on poverty like the true devout.
And so I let her panic play the tune of
when we were married. And what I would think about.
When we were married I would think about
that study with the monkeys everyone learns
about in school. The baby monkey yearns
for food and love. A fur surrogate without
milk sits next to a wire frame holding a bottle
in the cage — and scientists watch him starve
to prove — what? Even when false, love reigns? It was hard
to understand why the monkey couldn’t shuttle
between the two, let go for his dear life’s sake.
In fact I was always sure that’s what I’d do
— to leave off clinging for a drink or two
and scuttle his whole experiment secretly
while he was out, getting a bite to eat —
outside, where any desperate thirst could be slaked.
Outside, where any desperate thirst can be slaked,
he will practice losing track of time
like a gambler betting minutes dime by dime;
his hands skim over the keys; his conscience aches.
Here’s deadlines, headlines, leaks. He’s wide awake.
The hovering fan, the hard drive’s erratic whine
buoy up the surface tension he’s refined,
each turn of the hour a promise to make or break.
But I’ve long left that room, that overstuffed box
of an apartment at Castro and Army Street;
she’s phoned from their place, north about 6 blocks,
repeating his new, expedient history:
“We shouldn’t have married,” his pinched-back voice reflects,
“I never loved you as much as I loved X.”
“I never loved you as much as I loved X.”
How strange to hear the words through her voice now.
X marks the spot where I stood once. Allow
the formula to grow, Y marks his sex,
and Z would be the woman after me.
Subtracting Y (he left her, pled divorce)
leaves unknowns when we solve for Love’s recourse.
Recalculate to find the sum of Z?
I wanted to think she got the better deal:
an opened door on the whiff of my recipes
redefined by her taste. She’d stride in, pleased.
I would have fed my jealousy anything
to keep it alive and supple, a living shield.
“Do you know he’s still wearing his wedding ring?”