Out on the balcony, Helena says
she can see every star.
I'm fine, reclining
on the coffee table.
Watching it light up her face
We are getting older, and I am tired
every day.

I would like to offer her a sweet, dark cherry.
To which I have an allergy, and can only
balance, on the end of my long spoon.
Against her thin face in the distance.
Her mint and rosemary, breaking
their promise, falling
back into the soil we bought on sale.
Almost holding hands.

You'll ask me if I've framed our paradise,
of Napa, in the placenta of summer.
In the careless way we choose for each other.
You have a nice photo face, have your father
Spackle that for you.
Find eternity in the rosey cheeks
of your sister's new baby,
and peace in never again turning around
in my driveway.

Helena has been to that Thailand
you talked of.
Before your return to Wisconsin.
With her eighth-note eyes, her stories
are lullabies to the sky, her bare feet
never stop rubbing against each other.
To spark a second life, to nurture
our entire universe.

The survival rate in this house
is starting to echo.
I have diagnosed myself.
Helena says my breasts are satisfactory,
they are just sleeping.
Once in a while she'll wave for me
to come and hear the pulse of the
stars as they tumble and growl
in their playground.

Pitted fruit doesn't impress her.

10/20/2005

Posted on 10/21/2005
Copyright © 2024 Kimberly Rhode