Bobbi Lurie


felt hat with veil

worry more too frail and foggy not to spend each fear like a clutching between doors windows ceilings architects known to commit most suicide i heard or was it dentists poets i heard live less time than prose writers no fooling heedlessly i rush toward the she in me which even though gaunt loves a lot and can still wear shimmering skirts bracelets and scarves never a daughter had though was but never a mother really yet not a daughter sons yes and the geometry of that in the extended family i do not have for they love me not and i refuse to rot in that bare wood shame of unlove i slipped against it most of my life but now refuse its abuse all those that demand positive attitudes the tends humps in bed blinking into mist are not the ones i long to meet nonexistent are the ones i need to speak to and therefore all the more i write realize there is no one reading this but me blown like twigs in a murky eon of mistakes everything foggy my thin legs late evening

this never happened and yet i tell myself it did each morning

i watch my mind not wanting to touch the vanished rusty notes remain objects of consciousness heaven and hell inside us each moment birds fly through mental speech dark garden rain olive green cool breath of betrayal siempre mixed with greed awakens jagged-edged-scary-people cruelty sadness tiny pieces of kindness such gratitude for sky unable to believe saying this never happened but remember memory outburst left alone siempre if only been clear to him hagp[p;; tra’k pk trlj [tri;u the wjp;e es’eroemde wotj wotj ammoe if only

don’t let the failure of beliefs lead you to charlatans

the company you become and keep is your own mimic if you wish you are merely a mime to tearstained society that vague luminescence beneath your skin is bright enough to catch another eye but not to keep it incessant rain is not a complaint merely a condition and a steady stream of snow is comforting to think how out of control whether deep in fathoms or cheap in bad screenplays the idea of fleeting time and flee being fled by are real enough to believe in

smitten in an inner place
     for Paul Celan

take it like an amulet like a jewel like a tulip filling up the expanse of green the volatile view from within your thin wrist you write into manuscript for the hand is a map with but grasping still it is but a like two palms like a we are bearing these layers of lovelessness we are hovering with fear the closed kitchen painted yellow and the food always the food to keep alive these bodies in endless procession these bodies and needing embellishment i painted black inside my closet to find a basic dress the secrecy is enormous but the new things hang unused and to wear a beautiful blouse in regular weather to embellish with necklaces and avoid the horrid loss through appearance for the elements of speech are carried in the air arranged in their respective places but the traveler’s animal corpse without language memory leaves without the chemicals of sight we pass the arc of trees without seeing which picture is important this view from the bridge and the lack of sympathetic protection is what led you to the water curved like a strand of hair in your hand and the weather’s damp blue and your mind locked in your walk repeating steps seeking colors without names without language memory leaves

Bobbi Lurie has two poems in issue eight of Otoliths.

 
 
 
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