No to the elixir's sting & the star of not
here, I've been bored of myself for years
& once night goes pale it stays wakeful
— & once
that star
made good
— it rested
in the quick
look
of the mouth
& left gleeful stain
— but once
you are old
you are old
& long ago I was close
to one
pit
night — you
can suck at a pit
a long time — be
an intricate
hole in the sand
& who cares
what lasts,
it is not
this
body,
& who gets
to stay long
on the night's
burning ridge
*
but do not say squander, brother
— do not say squander, do not
make the first lost
stay lost — do not
say squander, do not
say squander again
nervous moon in cupped hands
let the night lead itself where it might want to stay
it is asking too much
a body can only hold itself still for a duration of so many eyes
night is half here always
and who leaves with the salt-altered seconds
sunlight who stumbles on a trampled hem
forget the fire I named afternoon
who will be so serious
as if we live always in the first alert
as if hands were not made of dusk undoing
itself among other things
day, if first blue were not a color
refrigerator groan in the bluedark
we meet late flick of late
so much for what we thought of
ourselves. so far we are less than we wanted
I wanted to be someone who would not need
to reach in her bag for a star of pleasure
you will have to renounce pining
but you can do what you want with your mornings
let day then be crafted from its own broken tools
stay, little flick of straw half–anywhere
let the stage go peopled with dust
sleep took itself to mean what it wanted
a rasp of February and its salts named daytime
why wait in the on flick and off named a world
one day the fruit in the fridge is covered with mold
the window harboring keys
where do I put my face to the inside
of thinking
if I want that anymore
if a day is something to peel
all its weight from itself as it tangles in later
sleep does not settle
for days: I don't want to talk anymore
we are still here even if late
sometimes the lateness
does not settle for days: I don't want to talk anymore,
freak day
I thought I had kept for us a core of peace
but the house smells of ache and lily,
silly wanter
run in the lace of your tights
run forward huffing through the chilly late morning
come where the body
is a block and broken
white is a day to gnaw on
let air go to air if it's tossed
let me stay naked in the house
which is the site of faltering.
let me search under the desk
a little longer for the rare charter.
who came trundling,
whoever
are we allowed to make love in the room of maps
should the day stay as wild as it once was
should the day stay as wild as the first time
open the door naked to a crack of cold
the month of harsh melting
is free and what then
years are more slippery
than we asked for.
voices don't lose their soaked–in–anything
I handed my youth as a lily
away to who–asked
smeared in vermillion pollen
might hours say
who started with hours.
streets were once slung into
mouths of street–cats
murmuring won't keep itself
much longer without your
sanction.
days topple.
I want to sit along the roadside
by myself. let anyone balk
and let anyone
crumple, snifter of daytimes
how I said half a glass to hold up to nothing
in this age everything's wayward
and thought is a loud steamboat
I have nothing to say to steeples
nothing to say to small bowls
once–asked–turn–away
listener is the name of no one
out in what suburb
when moon is wracked with itself
don't speak in that year if you don't want to
now that day is only half what I'll bear
I'll ask you all then which torment
was enough. which bottle of anything
would you drink without trusting
I want to know what you think
as if we haven't marked enough
on the scratch boards they handed out
what to make of day
then what then what
that hand can be its own scolding
to have scrabbled the world–surface cultivating
love. but now day has run down its art
and what do you say after green grows
worthless and where do you go
* * *
what is a room
if no one can confirm the start of answers
and does it have walls
and is a wall a safeguard for something
else? air pledges its jitters to nothing
and no one needs to be there in the room
but what leaves us was careless
to start:
Shamala Gallagher is the author of a chapbook, I Learned the Language of Barbs and Sparks No One Spoke (dancing girl press, 2015). Her poems and essays have appeared in Black Warrior Review, The Missouri Review, VOLT, Verse Daily, The Offing, and elsewhere. She is a Kundiman fellow and a graduate of the Michener Center for Writers, and she lives in Athens, GA, where she is pursuing a PhD in English and Creative Writing at the University of Georgia.