Nesting, The Instinct

 

Angela R. Kelly

I told you lies that afternoon

About a baby shower for a friend.

I met this man in a cafe.

All my friends are pregnant now.

Worse than wrens with their

Twigs, twines and wads of milkweed

Stuffed up under the eaves.

All that damned cheeping, chirping

All that dreadful feeding:  worms for the gullet,

Insects regurgitated, the last fruit of the vine.

 

Even leaving the cafe

Out into the calm afternoon

On the arm of that man

There were nests being built downtown:

Along the girders of the city garage,

Wedged in lamp posts of the courthouse,

Tucked in the couch the homeless

Had claimed for their vacant lot.

   . . . .   even as this man  reached for my skirt

    a burst of finches . . . .

 

Because we are very young

 

Angela R. Kelly

In this picture

the first morning of vacation, we are chewing biscuits

at the kitchen table and as the camera snaps we open

our mouths full of bread,  we stick out our gummy tongues

because we are young  and delight in grossing out everyone.

 

 

In this picture

later that day, we are setting up our tents at the lake

the boys’ tent, Zion,   the girls’ tent, Eden, and we pose,

and because we are young, pseudo-warriors, we attack,

aiming tent poles, hammers and stakes against hearts and throats.

 

 

In this picture

the next day, Jenny has just learned to water ski, finally,

so we are leaping and dancing and because we are young,

we haven’t had proper orgasms yet, so this certain kind

of body happiness can still be wonderfully ecstatic and public.

 

 

In this picture

the last sunset, we are sitting on the dock, tigerish and tanned,

legs in the water,  filched beer bottles hidden behind pylons

and because we are young we think this night, and all others,

for the rest of our lives, should be kissing, kissing, more kissing.

 

stilettos

 

Angela R. Kelly

Three days before my mother’s death

I pluck through her vast closet with permission

        do not let this come to light.

Armed with black trash bags, I’ve come

to haul away things, to deposit evidence

in the landfill.   In another county.

 

I do this without siblings, for I, alone, forgive her.

I do not hate the faces we do not know

in photos she was unable to stop collecting.

The parade of men, her vanity in saving their souvenirs:

hat box from a Mississippi department store,

mink stole from a St. Louis furrier, a turquoise bracelet,

postcards from Niagara Falls, empty bottle of

French champagne tucked into a boot.

All those highways, miles, days without us.

I save only a cork carved with a poem.

 

Then, in a box collapsing with age, I find them,

the red stiletto heels.  I recognize them

from the photo,  New Year’s Even, 1958,

nine months before my birth.  In mint condition

the shoes are still deliciously fine, chisel point heels,

ruby straps of satin to criss-cross the ankle,

the rhinestone buckle delicate as a dahlia.

The man at her side is not my father.

 

voodoo for the other woman

 

Angela R. Kelly

You meet his wife in a good restaurant at lunch,

flesh and bones

not something that lives under a rock,

not a microscopic amoeba in a petri dish.

You share the same coloring,

apparently breathe the same air.

 

Furthermore, she is tall, elegant of limb,

her eyes indigo, her mouth a cupid’s bow,

hovering his jaw,  jugular,  Jockeys.

 

This is a stone hurled through your front window,

the view suddenly a bone yard, a crypt.

In the salad, you try to recover,

but look again for her flaw,

so often it is but a thin trickle of water

which divides the mighty rock.

 

        Her clothes last year’s fashion?

Yes, in her summer sheath, she’s a butter knife.

Not a curve in sight. And men like curves.

They love hourglass!   How often has he

clasped the porch swing of your hips?

Seized with both hands your heavy breasts,

doubloon of your nipples his greedy treasure?

Even now, swaying in your cleavage,

his amulet, a silver dove on the wing.

Then you are able to smile at his good wife,

nod good-bye.   She is guinea hen, you are peacock.

With the last crust of bread,

you wipe up the gravy of your plate,

the bones of rosemary chicken,

placed in careful compass:  east, north, south, west.

 

Under the white starch of tablecloth,

you cross plucked wing and breastplate,

muttering an invocation learned long ago

in Baton Rouge.   Bones crossed, then cast,

set the wish.   When she steps off the curb,

her ankle may snap,  or better yet,

the city bus rounding the curve . . . .