I Will Not Be Rescued

Can you rescue me
from demented outbursts?

My fragile lexicon
is not getting better; it's getting
worse, so much worse.
I do not fully
understand the aesthetic
of the obsessed. I am not yet dead
and yet and yet, I am ready
for the transition: be it brutal, be it gentle.
I conjure a mop ( a map)
that will cleanse me, deface me,
rescue me, oh finally, ah, kindly
from the curse
of continuity.

Saviouress

 If Oskar schindler could save
one thousand Jews,
surely I can save you.

Swan Girl

 Your Boleyn neck
stretched until it could withstand
no further torture.
Like an impossibly long-stemmed
tulip struggling in deep shade,
animal-vegetal metaphors
undid you until death
arrived, bloodless, polite
and without a hint of rancour.

Girl in the Green Spring Coat

 It had to be
in May when the grass
could never be greener,

not even in gentle June
or lush July
I saw the girl in the green
spring coat.
Only a child model
in that intoxicating zone
between homely and divine
as crisp as celery,
as dangerous as absinthe.
No matter who is posed
besides her, she will never pale
although she is paler than a garden variety ghost
a hidden scheme, a shameful scene, a spurned dream

no one left to derise her.

Unknown Forest

 in whose forest
did you get lost?
was it at dawn
or was it at dusk?
Did you nibble on treebark?
Did you repose upon moss?
Were you a gone girl
or an invisible guest?
No matter, no matter,
You were killed by your quest.

She Threw Me

 to the hybrid dogs.
She threw me; she threw me.
Her cheshire cat face
as silky as milk all the while.
Did she know

that she threw me,
or was it a case
of deserved disgrace?
Begone ragged misfit.
This is not your place.

Two Chairs

 Are two chairs
indeed better
than one? Yes? No?
Perhaps a divan,
a settee, something
one could use
or even own?
If I furnished my hovel
with mismatched seating options,
would that make me a designer
or merely a nervous squatter?