https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/1028513
DENISE LETO
MYTHICAL MAP OF A ROOM (an excerpt)
How long have you lived inside this candle?
I have lived inside this candle since you left.
It was cruel light in her mouth when they kissed.
Touch can be seen or unseen.
I will make you a desktop that looks like the night sky.
Your room will be a greenhouse.
I will keep you constantly under mist.
Feed your hands with my hands.
I will make things for you.
The skin just above your hips.
In your green eyes gathering.
Here are the oil paintings I made for you.
Here is the chair I carved.
And the opera I wrote.
I sewed a blanket for you.
I designed these shoes for you. Soft. Leather. Aubergine.
Black stitching on the tongue. Put them on.
I painted a room-size ocean for you.
I held you when you jumped into the bucket of snails.
I drew a turquoise cave. Your initials in the overlay.
You will never be cold.
I will make things for you.
I will make things for you.
I made this for you.
***
ELSEWHERE: A PLACE
The time her eyes looked like doorknobs
and once like sand crabs.
Count the poison dandelions,
pretend they are locks of hair.
Take your shoes off, your blouse, your cantilever.
Play the broken part: apart.
Needles, bottles, brother.
Future, tender, liar.
Hello bone urethra.
Hello stellar coroner.
Hello chipped nail polish.
If and if and then.
***
THE ARCHAIC FRAME OF BODY
Bone as an exhalation of form
glass stained by glass
Time as a mirror of negation
no help in the heap of surrender
Home as a parlor of fish
the yard in your world in duress
Words are unfavorable to infinity
we could not have known what leaving would mean.
***
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