Northwood. Maryse Meijer

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СКАЧАТЬ I drew you: as a tree, a fox, a stream, a dragon,

      a devil. I drew you as I used to draw myself, at first to make

      more of you, later to get rid of you, and now I don’t draw you

      at all, there are other things, and I never got it right.

      ADONIS

      We met once

      two towns over

      for breakfast. A diner. Butter

      sunk in the muffins. Two plates

      of bacon. There was snow

      stuck to the windows, a waitress

      in blue pulling at her stocking.

      We sat on the same side

      in a booth and I held your hand so tight.

      How strange to have you

      out in the world. Coffee. Syrup.

      the way you liked your eggs

      gutted on toast.

      What, you said, your mouth full,

      I kept touching

      your face. You brought it closer

      to mine, looked in my eyes. There was some

      promise there. Some bargain. A roach

      on the floor. Just let me look at you.

      The check came. We left

      in separate cars.

      ELEGY

      For a while in the wood I was drawing scissors. Before the

      dance, before your hands, I didn’t even have a premonition

      of you, no black mark against the moon, no bad dream

      folded into the sheet, it was just me, and that old table, and

      my model, lying in my lap. I’d found them in a drawer of

      useless things—snapped rubber bands, birthday candles,

      half a package of yellowed paper plates. Silver blades, brass

      handle, I tested the tips against the side of my finger—oh,

      they could cut, those scissors, but not there, no, you couldn’t

      chop a tree with them, or make a path; the wood wanted

      harder things, a knife, an ax. When I found a loose thread on

      my shirt I didn’t think of the scissors, her legs spread on the

      table beside the bed: I just put the hem to my lips and bit.

      INTAGLIO

      The striped mattress, how thin it was, the wire cot beneath

      biting into my bones the blankets

      folded double did not help.

      I don’t know what makes a person willing.

      One evening I ran out of ink

      and that same evening you brought me three new jars

      and we sat testing them to see

      if the different colors had different smells

      or if black was really distinguishable

      via a faint taste of licorice. We laughed like pigs.

      Showing each other our colored tongues.

      You put your head on my shoulder

      and knocked a drop of ink on the mattress,

      where it bloomed

      and darkened

      and dried. I got quiet, watching it.

      What, you said.

      I shook my head.

      I had stripped myself of every other longing,

      of every possible

      human comfort but in that moment, eating poison

      from the jars,

      how wealthy I was, how fragile, how strong, like the strange

      skin of a bubble that can resist so much and then

      nothing at all.

      I watched my happiness sink through the unmade bed

      where the blanket had been pushed aside,

      one stain among many.

      Open your mouth, you said,

      and I did,

      but it was too late, and the mattress was dry.

      LABYRINTH

      I drove looking for your house your car white I had never been inside

      license plate memorized it’s not this driveway this

      dead lawn No flags for you no cheap holiday decoration

      lashing the bushes you had money. Lots of land somewhere my car

      couldn’t take me. Miles of trees I cried after three hours circling

      the same mailbox out of gas. Someone came by with a can

      filled me up I could have fucked him/ didn’t. I saw

      the pictures. Your back door. The dog

      licking the screen the endless green of your kingdom your arms

      spread wide and the only truly cruel thing you ever said

       Darling, you will never find it.

      MOTHER

      It’s Christmas.

      I know.

      You have something to cook on there?

      Mom.

      What are you going to eat?

      I’ll go out.

      Where? There’s nothing СКАЧАТЬ