Karyna McGlynn The Distillery
The outside distillery of the mayflower sinking behind me
Months of someone's reincarnation--the deaf sea
shrinking-out from acidic observation--
a democracy of slight deflection--
its distance to the concrete a pronounced scar
the hours spit squarely in the backyard, mister
eminent moon
--and uprooting now dropped and now,
soon,
this slightly sight-laden-but-lid-closing
there many humans weigh and whisper--
bundles of relax, hum, mend and persuade--
bundles of swallow and throb and, still, confide
--fertile portent--tailbend at a velocity
too quick to hear--dancing in from the batting pulled inward,
flat-footed--
someone from above yanking the unraveled blossoms down
tightening their odd hems--the rough bone around them
soluble now
ending in iron and wadded
in order to tighten the loose ramblings of the six unrelated
scuffed and seasonless
blooms-grayscale soaking in when the flushed red clenches
the taste of a pair of greens
set loose from it, stagnant, but now deceptively
invisible-the red still meaty--musky--
while the two laces shrink light inside their silver caftans
Edna, Anne, Emily and Sylvia
Edna, after a stint of abstinence, pulls down her pants
beneath the apple blossom, though her mouth is dry
and puckered with alcohol.*
Anne, in the car, relents and hands me her keys.
She rolls her head across the steering wheel
and promises to wait a while.*
Emily, gripping the lip of her desk, begins to develop
cabin fever. She buys maps and dirty postcards.
Her hand gets tired.*
Sylvia, muscles relaxing, has something to say.
She will make zucchini bread and then she will
stick her head out the window and whisper it.*
And now it's time to play
light as a feather, stiff as a board:I have a stiffy.
(laughter)
It's important for a woman
to laugh with her mouth
open slightly.Not you. You're heavy.
I shouldn't be.
I haven't eaten in thirty years.I somehow remember this.
Look! Her bra is already frozen.
Warm water won't revive her.
Come away from the window.
I can't. My mother's coming
to get me.
I can't breathe in this fort.Here, finish off
this whipped cream can.I can't breathe, I said.
I don't like this game.
I've looked everywhere
and I can't find any of you.
Please come out.
When I put a pencil
underneath my breast,
it clatters to the floor.What does that mean?
She's not a real woman.Don't your parents
have any booze?We did it. She's floating!
Don't tell her that
we're letting go
or she'll fall and
break her neck.
Somebody get a camera.Why don't our hands
show up in the picture?Please, I can't breathe.
You'll live.
*
Should I ask them to spend the night?
Edna will feign sickness and her husband
will carry her straight home to bed.
Anne, in her anxiety, will fog up the bathroom
and change her nightgown six times.And Emily will cough and cough.
She'll remove her under things through the armholes.Sylvia, I suspect, will snuff out the nightlight
and smother me with a pillow.
Libretto Explained
A libretto is what exactly?
Do I need to see the Pirates of Penzance after all?
Does it have something to do with freedom?No, it's a diminutive of book--it means "little book."
But does it also imply amaretto flowing forth?
A pierced chin?
A dainty ornament to hold back the hair?No, it is simply the text of an opera, or a work of musical theater-
But is it still used?
Is it rather silly now like scurvy and absinthe
and outhouses and houseboats and rickets and moonshine?
Does the author intend to lie to his audience?
Do only scoundrels write librettos?Well, let's see. There was Debussy and er--Strauss and Gertrude Stein in a way.
But are librettos long?
Is there any pain involved?
It sounds like a sort of curly pasta.Well, it's an Italian word--
Did Liberace write librettos?
The plural is actually libretti.
But I want to glue together a libretto out of blue glass and lemon meringue.
I want to wear a libretto around my neck for future chastity.But, no, you don't understand. Here. Listen to Die Zauberflöte and read along.
I roll chicken inside my librettos and fry them like flutes.
My libretto laughs through its nose and wears a beret.But you must pay attention to the words, the fall of the accents!
No, I was right after all. Libretto does mean freedom.
Libretto is the freedom from the tyranny of exact translation.
Libretto is my infant child and she doesn't know whether my words have meaning--
she only knows that the sounds are true.
Relax love. I'll go put on some tea. Make us a tray of libretto and butter.
My Bent Spoon
--for my boys
I am not immune (ahem)
a woman counting the cards
of her flesh upon the table, tiny
smacks, spitty fingers,
birds nest slipping left
four four four
If I could pickle smirks
five today, maybe
twelve to go, overcast
spiders
where's your energy hidden?
one morning I saw two
blue caterpillars staring across
the covers at me. Forget
this I aged. A plow will
uprooting like this
always
and the bathroom door and
the mustard blood will rock
like undertow
it's a snail
shells and trails of us
leaking up the porch post
and the one noble
knighting a pet named
Girl
everything whips. Sleep
a bumper-car so
intimate, the taste
of electricity, teeth-
shake in the awning
against and againstI see still lives. Bend.
It's impatient to watch
the redness so want it's all
solitaire dusting the hair
the countless lose feet
like a canyonone spoon sage
the window
one spoon near black more
door; beeand the ears of a horsefly za-za
and the polite sneeze of women
who want to be womenI'm nervous
the grasses are alphabetized
and the universe mapped
in silver coil, stretching
our mouth with frictionmy collarbone
my shrub, my bent spoon
my woman darkening with the gravity
of the cards on her flesh
hold court to her boys
next will be everywhere at once
