House, Garden, Madness by Cate Marvin from "World's Tallest Disaster"

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House, Garden, Madness

By Cate Marvin

Meeting his mouth made it so I had house again.

I called him garden and drew him so, grew

his long lashes like grasses so I could comb

them with my stare.  Some evenings a low cloud

would arrive, hang its anxiety over the yard.

Having his mouth at mine again gave me back

home.  The walls painted themselves blue

flowers grew larger than my head, stared

at me with wide eyes through the windows.

I was surrounded.  A cloud stretched gray arms.

His mouth and mine again built something back

up with heat.  The house was home again, wherever

I lived.  The flowers grew fat, fed on weeds

around them.  Ladybugs tucked their red luck

beneath petals' chins.  The cloud came home again.

His eyes were closed but mine kept swinging open.

I saw him in the garden, surrounded by its light.

The flowers cut their own stalks, handed themselves

over to him in bunches.  He kissed their bouquets,

and petals raptured.  A cloud lowered, dark with fury.

I pressed my mouth to palm, closed my eyes

to find the garden, then saw:  window shut in fright,

roots drowned, flower stalks broken, their heads dead

in puddles.  Startled, I looked around.  The cloud

descended, prepared to hemorrhage in my arms.

From:  "Poetry Daily", page 173

first published in The Paris Review, no. 158, Spring, Summer 2001

also from "World's Tallest Disaster" by Cate Marvin