Thank you for standing in that liminal space between child and adult and telling us we had no say in our bodies changing into women, but did have choices about what that meant, how that looked. That our futures must make space enough to hold our pasts.

Let the Charmed Ones keep fighting,
let the stars burn bright, you’re just
sitting there shelving books. We’re all
just sitting there shelving books.

Sleep mimicked abandonment,
a voluntary act of release
into which she could not succumb without sedation.

The Vodka family grows with flavors galore
vanilla, orange, lemon, strawberry
and of all things cucumber
But in a Bloody Mary delish

These days I listen to the tones more.
Some days are lovely little blurs
with sun shedding itself through the windowpane
then the curtains then the bottles then the dishes.
Sills are where the whole damn home is.

Marjean says I have a relentless optimism only a Disney could love, but she thinks I’m out of my mind for devising a scheme to rob the organ donor bank, even if it is suitable preparation for next week’s tournament.

I live most days now
with the ghosts of the Pacific.
Point Reyes opens and closes
my doors, eddies and crests
on the second floor.

The corner bar’s air-conditioning has energized the crowd, a giddy respite from the sticky heat, everyone seems to be laughing when a loud pop marks a caesura in the din, everyone jumps and puzzles, a champagne cork? a pricked balloon? when the bartender leaps over the bar and races into the street where two cars have just smashed into each other.

boys will be what they are, hands and teeth, dead and loved,
villain and half-grown.
our matched chromosomes appreciate the silence.
i built five houses in the corner of my mind.

Shattered step smokers slanted
Their heads upon noticing my ivory
This nose pleasing, lung diseasing, scent
Reminded me of mom’s lingering peace sign fingers

You said you wanted one time for someone to tell you you had a
beautiful anything other than face. For the record, you were. And you did. You
asked me to teach you how to get men & I realized I didn’t know how, & maybe
didn’t even want to, that they were taught to chase me & I was never taught the
word no.

but both woke the next day knowing
that she and the other, mother or not,

were kept equally awake, afraid to split
and bleed into the unholy dream

If storms are tumult—so much more than
cataclysmic, every one,
even the soft rain in sun showers
that washes dust rings onto windows.

As my eyes leave the ceiling,
I think to move, wondering
if my legs will hold me
like they always do

If you pass The Conjuring scrolling
through channels after midnight,
the choice is not whether you should
watch a little bit. It’s whether
you should sleep at all.

and in the morning I’ll wake up, brush my teeth
do my make-up and say good morning, honey
I made coffee, I put it in your favorite mug
blissfully unaware of the night before

bad relationships
spark good poetry:
stir my emotions,
mix words inside me.

And
yet, I couldn’t ask for a better
batch of badgers to share
a festering wound with.

I have the profanities
for all eight occurrences
of Emily.