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Crossing
XXXVI
A
green-streaked
sentry flanked
by thistles
on
every town common
is more explicit
than
any boom box.
Please, my darling,
please
don’t
let carnal memories
expire between
us.
I
set forth at
a disadvantage.
Ribbons
of baby oil.
Snaking Chinese
dragons.
One
flesh, lagoons.
Trembling like
the wind
in
shrubs and flowers.
You chained
criticism
on my Academy
of St. Martin
in
the wallpaper,
provoking blatant
spice factory
peppers
and cinnamon
misrepresentations
of
common logic,
as if you were
running for
office.
Without
proper camouflage,
there’s nothing
to repulse
destitution
overtaking military-issue
fortifications.
Crossing
XXXVII
Please
don’t panic. Bullfrogs are
crooning,
thanks
to you, and I am misled
in
directions to the Garden
State Parkway.
Oh,
my darling, we are blown
grain by grain
toward
ignition each time you intone
sonorous
folksongs or decisions I’ve
come to regret.
At
last, swallowing how terrifying
it must be
to
awaken in one day no longer
a girl but a woman,
I
accept your tearful morning
phone call to Brooklyn.
Against
all odds, you punt me into
another
prolonged stretch of involuntary
celibacy.
We
vowed we would never resemble
our parents.
Once
I believed our compassion
was absolute and original.
How
could I have disregarded
all the ways
hand-woven
Irish linen curtains obscure
lusting?
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