Copaiba Eternus

Her children were birthed
directly from her vena cava.
Sometimes she felt as if
she alone had created her babies.
In blurs of motion
they grew up around her
while she stood still, unchanging,
like the copaiba tree
shielding the back of the house.
In midsummer, the stream dried up
and the last of the children had gone.
Minds large with knowledge,
they sought challenges
only the educated could have time for.
A week later, she found
the copaiba tree uprooted in the yard.
She took it as a sign of nothing.
Stoic, practical,
the old tree became firewood
and she began to age like newspaper
until the new babies arrived
in her children’s arms.
The old songs sparkled again
and she delighted in second motherhood,
barely changing,
until a great wind swept her away
and carried her though a tunnel
that had been inside her always.



Shoebox Depths

Every now and then
I slip into your twisted panty of home 
uninvited, subliminally witnessed,
sleep in the charcoal of your oven,
finger the crumbling grate of your cheese.
It is my lone ability, this power of absolute grey, 
given to the bitterly lame, 
stolen intermittently by glove-handed dilettanti.
I rub the bristles of your toothbrush over my eyelids,
vanish the purr from your restless cat
juggle the humming circus of your sex toys
set your entire world slightly askew
just because I can.
In the bright define of solarity
you will see me, but not notice
that you’ve spilled a little coffee on my head
as you blindly throw a few coins
into my familiar shoebox depths