"The year of waiting on rooves for August to end" by Anne Marie Rooney |
I was the name of nothing and I moved like a god
with my tongue. I was everything to everyone
and I sat on my stoop with my hands on my crown.
I wore a little dress and little else. I was astral, no other word
for the shining plunge of me. When stars crashed, I bent my neck
to any boy’s dank mouth. I was a pigeon, I was a flat
tire. I was everything! Small storms crashed about me but I did not
mash kindly under them. When the worst cloud
came I steeled myself like a rusty timpani. I was thin--
but the sound! From then on, I was convinced of nothing
but collision. That summer, I knew only: sun; salt:
so I slept with only: sun; salt. And so my gills
were always heaving. When I tired of float and burn I lay
against the beaten cliff and let the little sand men
revere my beauty. I wore a cowel but I was not
a cowel, meaning: wherever I traveled, my home
traveled too. Not like I didn’t know the warm plank
of terra firma. Like any woman, I could bend
to good wood. This was the month’s slow
ship, hard as an apple. And my teeth, incising
where no knives should ever. For a year I filled my pockets
with this air.
with my tongue. I was everything to everyone
and I sat on my stoop with my hands on my crown.
I wore a little dress and little else. I was astral, no other word
for the shining plunge of me. When stars crashed, I bent my neck
to any boy’s dank mouth. I was a pigeon, I was a flat
tire. I was everything! Small storms crashed about me but I did not
mash kindly under them. When the worst cloud
came I steeled myself like a rusty timpani. I was thin--
but the sound! From then on, I was convinced of nothing
but collision. That summer, I knew only: sun; salt:
so I slept with only: sun; salt. And so my gills
were always heaving. When I tired of float and burn I lay
against the beaten cliff and let the little sand men
revere my beauty. I wore a cowel but I was not
a cowel, meaning: wherever I traveled, my home
traveled too. Not like I didn’t know the warm plank
of terra firma. Like any woman, I could bend
to good wood. This was the month’s slow
ship, hard as an apple. And my teeth, incising
where no knives should ever. For a year I filled my pockets
with this air.
