Chitin Diaries

 
 
The kitchen full
of babies roosting
on high shelves
like cups for punch
one by one she
pinches their cheeks
sinks in the glossy
mud of their squall

*

She has a pen pal
who doesn’t write
back each time
she sends a letter
the top of the mailbox
grows more jagged
last time she swore
she saw a tongue

*

One time she
spun a revolving
door all afternoon
a fishbowl
leaking light
brass ring around
her neck the sidewalk
a leaping comet

*

After a bath
she is a hollow
egg the doorknob
sticks like wet
wool a spool
of moss down
the hall a velvet
vest of mold

*

In elevators
she pictures cables
rising like sap
in the dark
buttons slip
from the door
to orbit her hands
a flock of pocket
watches hovering
between floors

*

She was baptized
in the skinny wrist
of the river
by the interstate
popped fuses
of pine trees
her arms coiled
like water moccasins
fractured loop
of the on-ramp
their mouths soft
with spores

*

They come to her
in her sleep
each step a key
in the counter
a series of periscopes
in the morning
she picks bodies
from the bathroom
sink her face
in the mirror
a nicotine smear

*

One day last winter
she stepped outside
onto a small
bird huddled
by the door’s edge
its bones fizzed
through boot and shin
to settle on scalp
a calcium crown

*

Summer sprang
serrated wings
a prism of winds
she steams
in the bedroom
bound by cabbage
worm silk
fog crawls
over the carpet
up the stairs
the backyard flush
with weeds
her hair falling
from every nest