the fan is nothing but background noise.
like your voice, gravel that grates
upon delicate ears.
you were an impression

left too long on unwashed bedsheets.
the maid forgot to come again,
and an air of stale memories has settled
like a layer of dust on the mirror.

i inscribe your name on my stomach,
in the fragments of memory.
i had washed you out, i had extracted your nails
with bleach but still, you clung,
you held on with lies and rhapsody.

sometimes pain refuses to die
a respectful death. bittersweet frissons
of yesteryear have molded themselves
to the rafters, stretching like cobwebs
from one corner to the other-- invisible
traps for unsuspecting swathes of skin

wrapped in swaddling clothes.
i had unearthed you;
dug you out with pens and needles.
the dirt had been brushed away intricately
(i always took great pains with you...).
but still, you clung,

as though to mock the ineffectiveness of
the pleadings under my fingernails. my keys
no longer fit the same doors, my sheets grace
different beds in seperate rooms, but there's
a scent that haunts the pillowcases. i lie

awake, unable to break from the demons.
my eyes are button down, they unravel one by one.
breathing has become a life challenge,
each rise and fall marking one more decade that
you're still breached
i plucked you from my womb

and dangled you the way a curious child
holds an insect by the wings, at arm's length.
your legs flailed so that you seemed helpless,
but i could not have known that your eyes
carried a poison impossible to eradicate.

10/26/2003

Author's Note: we've done it again! ROFL. mainon a schwartz and i birthed this piece, and well, the second time was far easier than the first. my god. i started it this time, she wrote the second stanza, and so on. the ending was all her. i tip my hat.

Posted on 10/26/2003
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