Like you I no longer trust the world with my face !100! its relative loudness
like river water worrying over rocks
the toppled vessel of my mouth !50! which keeps forgetting
what it was made to carry and where
in the valley of safety all the men wear low hats !50! and women plant
themselves like concrete !50! like you I am more fearsome
when I am able to be still !50! like you I have mostly
watched from a quiet perch
my decades ripen predictable as fruit !50! statues of women
are useful for marking !50! the planting of things: root vegetables and
bodies and serrated knives !50! bodies of women are useful
for planting !50! for the small violence of seeds !50! from inside I force
myself to rest my eyes !50! on the kitchen counter with its empty bottles
of wine !50! or on the table with its empty bottles of wine
or anywhere else but the tablets of your breasts !50! grown heavier
beneath the drawn shade of your face !50! like you I am limiting access
to the new bloom of my lips !50! anymore even the minutes file
me smooth !50! in the valley of men all the safety
wears vestments of honeybees and knuckles forth words like a fist
and stitches a new woman !50! into her unlined face