"Poetic Genesis"
I. God wrote all over me
in some code, years of it layered
like leaves, a book of transparent
meanings I wear like skin on skin.
None of it brings me shame
-from the sound a basketball
makes in my driveway,
to the bend of the Joshua trees
on the cliffs overlooking the pacific-
I could have put pennies on my eyes
once I’d seen them and forgotten all else,
their permanent lean, wind scarred
and wise, curvature of the rounded woman
I hoped I would one day be.
II. Don’t frown at me
from my past, I drank with you
and showed you all my best tricks,
melted into your crevasses.
I could have read you like a raised map
climbed you like a pyramid
I was willing to do that for you-
be the cone under your ice-cream,
the glass around your drink,
worlds collided when you lit your match
and I went up like sulfur smoke.
III. My life is like a cock-fight,
feathers flying, and the blood
pooling in the dirt over nothing.
The men make wagers, strut and scuff
as if they earned the purple coats
and the winner’s ribbons. All I’ve
ever done is sit in the back row
and take notes. I’ve never even
slammed my money down or called
attention to this emptiness in me.
I cluck away in silence clawing
letters, trailing puzzle prints in patterns
across a fine layer of sawdust.
© 2005 Lazarus
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