lest she forget lest she speak without clearly deciding lest she let her hand slip & recoil, sudden turn of gaze faceless unnamed longing of shadowed dreams, impossible flow & always to bed in some strange hotel, familiar linens, feathered pillows & mattress pads

lest she forget herself, again

the poppies on the cross are contracting, & the stars.  she must draw someone into something, or be stoned.  there is a battle to be won.

oh she was a ridiculous ball of restlessness wrestling less than she should suddenly grabbing his hand across the transmission clinging out of consciousness while he sighs - oh - so that's what I imagined & dreaded, that difficulty, that complication

this then is how it will end

how will it end - in shivers or flames, her burning stomach & cold limbs waking always minutes before the phone rings

What's precious, Stanzie, what's the whip, what twist upon your sore & sordid neck would make or break or seep into the skin you break, that breaks you, what does it matter what color her hair or shape her calves or length her upper lashes, sick upon you, quick to settle when the light is out, pinned to the bed otherwise, heavy to rise?  Yes, you are probably, yes, you are right, & full & bloated & the night

will pass, some hour the night will recede.  On her lap a picture of the sun, rising in the desert. On her wrist & in the truck the wipers twist knock back rather clear rain & she thinks, I am a small girl, abandoned, a small girl in a big truck left in this back lane & someday I will learn to make things pretty someday I will be pretty someday I will be easily just so

Matthew, James, and John.

She cannot put her finger on.

The thing subsides, she quick derides

& trades the trick for gone.

Stanzie, scary, quite contrary,

how does your garden know

that you see shells and cotton spells

and little ducks all in a row?

Stanzie, fairy, quick and merry,

how does your baby grow

when you won't sleep or even eat

or try not to reap what you sow?

Stanzie was bored, and being bored completed none of her assignments nor did she take the tray into the kitchen again like she was supposed to. It sloshed white wine and mushrooms, porcini and shitake and button, thyme and chicken juices, dangerously near the floor. She stared into the fire, thinking how like a sauna it was, how lovely it was, how she hardly need go outside or travel to the southern hemisphere ever again. She had positioned herself, though, at the lip of the wave, and being born of salt composed of water was pleased enough to drown and not to drown, the thought of it, made her heart sink just a little. No, more than a little. The hours passed by and yet she did not venture

Heartsick, lovesick, sick of love, Shakespeare, poetry, food and wine