title

also by alison malee

shifting bone

be brave. the day is ready for you.

this book is a small bird fluttering outside a window. i want you, dear reader, to be the hand. the opened latch. the wide eyes. the please, stay awhile.

for the wild dreamer,

let these words sneak up behind you.

let them tap you on the shoulder.

let it be the most unexpected surprise.

for the lost and stumbling,

let these words be the language

you needed to breathe again.

for the little girl i once was,

let these words make you proud.

let this honesty be a sign of forgiveness.

for you,

i have saved all of these moments.

some sway like untouched ghosts,

some roar and spit and rattle.

some, drifting lilies.

some, like clay in the wet, wet burrows of earth.

for the family i never knew,

i want you to know about

the things that have happened.

the people i have been along the way.

the world as i have come to know it.

for the people who

have always held my manic heart,

i hope you understand.

contents

unmovable things

a restless pause

prayers like exhales

index

unmovable
things

never

nothing about love is easy.

we are always too loud,

sometimes too soft.

always too caged,

sometimes too free.

no one ever told me

that love is the teeth

that bite your lip

without apology.

the blood that runs.

the first aid kit.

the alcohol, the gauze,

the sting.

the mouth that

kisses, k i s s e s, kisses

it better.

or the mouth that tells you

there was never

any wound at all.

will be

in this way, the undertow

is only a metaphor for surviving.

do you understand?

the currents only exist to explain grief.

so when i tell you i am drowning,

i mean that, today,

the loss sits on my chest

less like a paperweight

and more like air turned

carbon monoxide without warning.

the earth spins consistently.

most days i am ready for it.

and when i can breathe, i am floating.

the ocean swallow is a sometimes. you know?

it moves quickly.

but see the sun through the rippling water,

the light, it is close. do you understand?

do you understand now?

i am telling you i have been injured

by an unknown thing.

injured but not conquered.

i kick. i fling arms through salt and crash.

i fight my way to the surface.

in this way, though i am not now,

i will be fine.

both of us

this heart and i

spend all day

wanting.

(it eats us up like wildfire.)

alone

i look for you between time-thickened shadows,

in the one open window. beneath moth-bitten lace.

at the outskirts of town. in the deep end of the public pool.

at the country club somewhere in the midst

of dollar signs and tightened skin.

i empty the ocean. peel sand from the fins of every beast.

i try to gargle salt for you just

to see if you exist between molecules.

but you do not raise your hand or speak

or pull yourself from the inside of a thrift store baseball cap.

so i write you instead.

i write you into morning eyes, sleep hazy in the corners.

into froth and sip and burnt tongues.

into honey-coated berries, ripe from nothing.

into some meadow, high and above it all.

flowers pungent as they weave between breaths,

breaths humid and silent as they

brush against wax petals.

most days i write you into things that disappear.

sometimes i write you into concrete.

i am either not alone or impossibly. nothing lingers.

right

good, they say. good, who deserves love, really?

why should anyone be loved, really?

isn’t it better if love sugars only the hands of a few, anyway?

not you, anyway. never you, anyway.

and maybe i am just as rage driven and envious.

maybe i do put my hands on the wheel only to crash.

because when you leave, all reason leaves with you.

suddenly i am aching teeth and blackberry limbs, only.

i inhale. inhale. face bloodred and salted.

scream, take me with you.

and it is so big in such an empty space. it echoes on.

i think i hear the walls whisper,

they were right. they were right. they were right.

and the floors groan and laugh with them.

but the windows stay closed. the doors stay closed.

still, i am a puddle. waiting.

maybe they were right. maybe love is an escape room.

maybe i am the thing that needs escaping.

it is a growling tickle in my stomach.

this knowledge, this coaxed truth:

it did not stay like i thought it would.

not for me, anyway. never for me, anyway.

citrus

anger makes it easier to say

the lemon words,

the swollen sentences.

makes it easier to throw punches

without the memory of bruised skin.

you lick your lips and i

come away infuriated.

we will wake up tomorrow

sore and sour.

but i will empty the whole

ice tray into my water glass

before you make it

to the kitchen.

and i will leave lemon slices,

tart and lonely,

around the house.

and i will let

your cheek blister purple

before i ever admit

to the taste of citrus.

mountains

big, unmovable things:

like mountains,

like desire.

stand still

your voice leaves me quiet.

it echoes. (again and again.)

i want to tell you settle down.

i want to tell you there is no need

for all this loud.

forget your restlessness.

but i say nothing.

so the cobwebs

stretch and weave

with vigor.

the muscles stop

their clench and unravel.

my throat grows

blue-black icicle veins.

my throat becomes its own island.

my throat does not flag down

the rescue team.

my throat sees help and

stands still.

every time.

strange thing

this heart is deeply, deeply hidden.

like an old wooden box under the bed

stuffed with secrets.

mostly, love notes. though also, postcards.

handprints. glimpses. people who don’t belong

anymore but are. just are, still.

and i find it like i find the universe at dawn. quietly.

like it is still groggy from all the dark hours.

hungover from sleep.

i sneak up carefully and try to pick the lock.

it bites at my wrists. chews. spits in my eye.

it is a strange thing.

a fickle thing.

yet i come again. try again. bring better keys.

sometimes it opens. sometimes i stand around waiting.

sometimes i am missing fingers before breakfast.

it is a strange, strange thing.

a good thing.

vicious but mine.

in the air

i am reckless.

i go out in spaghetti straps

and pretend winter arrived

only yesterday.

or i see my breath dancing

outside my body frantically.

have a good laugh

at my own expense,

and throw my bird arms up

like wings for good measure.

i let the frost eat at my sandals,

readjust my skirt till it

sits above my knees.

and when they ask about the cold,

i will tell them, like i’ve told you,

i am gasoline.

i am, more than i am not,

fire fuel skin.

i am burning.

but i swear,

it is just

something

in the air.

obvious

what could i say? i tend to lean more toward

roses than bloodied palms, but okay. i say, okay.

(still, it seems like too much, too obvious somehow.)

i take all of the ache and hold it in my arms like sandpaper.

i smile until my bottom lip splits right open.

the skin on my hands scratch, scratches

away over time but still i hold on.

no one explains grief like this.

how you can be here in one moment.

and then crushed beneath an enveloping roar

at the back of your throat.

how it is, at first, so quiet you do not even notice it is there.

how it wakes you up in whispered (screaming) heartbeats.

how after it becomes less of a tolerable tickle

and more of a bloodthirst there is no immediate cure.

once, i spent a whole day holding my breath.

i thought it would cling to my ribs like muscle.

but it was too free to linger, and my nose let it all escape silently.

i admit, some days i must do this.

because 1.) am i still living? and 2.) how can i exist in such a way

that i never have to question this again? you know?

i don’t have the answer yet.

see, what do you say when someone gifts you agony?

i say, okay. okay.

(i do not want it. take it back. take it back.)

but, okay. i say, okay.

and somehow it still seems too obvious.

does it

i don’t know how to close a door

without the windows shattering, too.

this heart is slam and stomp and rage.

once, a lady before me in a checkout line

told her son that it was time to leave. he tossed his head angrily in answer.

avoided her eyes. dragged his feet along the tile.

i wanted to laugh but i knew. i throw the same fit. every time.

only i yell louder. drag my feet harder.

the woman does not even bat an eye, says,

everything comes to an end.

and somehow does not seem saddened by this.

but i run this through my mind for weeks.

because even when i stare at a door

with the knowledge that it should remain closed.

with the knowledge that it most likely closed for a reason.

even then, i am trying to work out the best way to pick the lock.

everything ends. everything ends. everything ends.

but my heart still whispers, does it have to?

unwanted

in my dreams, i do not search for you.

i see you and light a match.

i see you and put my finger on the trigger.

i see you and run a marathon and write three books

and tell you how i have been better off without you

and i mean it.

i see you and do not note the way time has aged you.

i see you and do not wear grief.

i see you and hang grief in the closet

on an old wire hanger.

untouched, unneeded, unwanted.

i see you and do not stay in the closet.

do not think about the leaving.

do not think that maybe i am

the untouched, the unneeded,

the only unwanted thing in the room.

redlined

fact: we remember what we wish to.

the rest gets redlined, clean slated, washed and

neatly folded in the bottom of the sock drawer.

fact: i never said i needed you.

i only ever call because i am lonely.

or it is cold out. or i am lonely.

fact: nothing about you stuck.

fact: even if i remembered how forest fire bright

your eyes are, how flickering and wild,

(which i don’t)

i would not write about you.

fact: see, i write only about important things.

the kind that make your chest ache,

or your knees rattle. so,

fact: this is really more about me

and how i am forgetting you slowly

and how frustrating it is that

the sun is high and i miss you.

fact: i still haven’t made any space for you in the dresser.

the memories are all stacked on the bed. piles and piles.

and i will get to them soon. someday soon. really soon.

fact: usually, i am up well past midnight

folding and unfolding.

trying to get the corners right.

trying to figure out

the best place to keep you hidden.

nerves

my lungs cage restless moths,

frail little creatures.

too big and yet too fragile

to be moved.

too wild to be plucked out by the wing.

they are 3 AM dancing.

and somehow i am shoes in hand and anxious,

the only one with a curfew.

all i have is earthquake breath,

it rattles the doors like knees without bone.

and i have become terrified to say anything

that might pick the locks.

wanting

the sky in its dark, brooding midnight black

stretches out before us like a spool of twine

unwinding around the stars.

and when the day is quiet, when we think no one is looking,

we reach up our arms like maybe

we can grasp just a strand or two,

like maybe we, too, can be something bigger.

what is it about humans that always leaves us wanting?

we wonder what it’s like up there in the clouds, in the endlessness.

if being so high up makes breathing easier or harder.

if we will ever find out what it’s like to fly and if we do,

will we spin around and around the moon like giddy kids

or will we hover and contemplate what we left behind.

but then we find some other thing

to grab our attention.

we are such flighty birds, such utter romantics.

we will kiss each other on open mouths

and breathe promises into existence

and when we fall asleep,

we will both dream about

the white feathered backs of wings.

temporary

gravity never quite drew blood from us.

we spin, dizzy.

we keep our feet running.

not away, only forward,

they say we are only dreamers,

but in dreams

we become something more, don’t we?

we joke that we are limitless

but we mean it.

we have decided on freedom.

and so it isn’t that we know nothing of staying

it is just that we believe in casting

a wide enough net to touch

everything even if

only temporary.

picket fences never mattered, not to me

your breath,

mimicking my

own,

is an orchestra of

plump fruit.

pears. peaches.

something juicy and running.

warm bread rising

somewhere.

the blessing of being.

i don’t need to tell you

that the ceiling leaks.

the floors have been gutted

and cold mornings make

frost dance on every glass surface.

but honey,

the raven still sings outside

our crooked fence,

and autumn sighs with it.

so i strum the soft skin

of your chest and

know it is my chest, too.

like glass

how prettily everything

(everyone)

seems to flutter around

her delicate features.

and i wonder,

what it would be like

to not be so ice

and blunt and brutal?

maybe i would float

like glass after an explosion.

maybe i would be soda pop and love letters

or sticky-sweet like syrup

oozing from the bottle.

maybe i don’t really care to be all light.

what if i put boulders under my tongue

and in my pockets on purpose?

maybe i do.

maybe

i don’t care at all.

playing cards

it is okay not to know,

or to know and be okay

with inconsistencies.

there will always be those

who trust and those who question.

but

some things are meant to be stories.

some pages are ripped out

and lit

because they tell the truth.

this is learning which

kind of faith

you hold.

do you need to know?

do you need to hold facts

between your fingers

like playing cards?

or does the knowing

undo the believing?

gain or lose

there is sweat on the neck of his shirt.

the sun is not high today,

which means he is nervous. he should be.

he smells like the inside of a car

that does not belong to him.

the kind that keeps perfume

and chewing gum in the glove box.

he hands me sunflowers and soft handfuls of poetry

but there is still dirt under his nails.

as if he bent down in my front yard, my own little garden,

the one i tend and water.

stole only words he thought i would not miss,

but i spend my days observing the almost invisible details.

i miss nothing.

now the petals will curl with age.

the metaphors will peel back one by one

until they all sound more like apologies.

he looks at me as if i should be grateful.

i see only things that once

belonged to me presented as a gift.

and i think, does this mean

i have gained something or lost something?

i cannot be sure.

forging

we forge whole worlds in the pits of our stomachs.

nestle vines between our palms.

urge them to bloom but only if they do so discreetly.

we live stories. live wars. live wars that become stories.

become indispensable in our homes.

(yet always feel dispensable.)

and i want more for my daughter.

i want more for any woman who spent the day wondering

how to be better without taking up any more space.

wondering how to become permanent fixture.

wondering why no one listens to her flower tongue

unless the words sound sweet.

meaning, why no one takes her seriously.

wondering how to breathe softer.

make less noise. make more money.

make someone else happy. accept defeat when asked to.

do, bend, break. because she is woman.

we create from nothing. we are sisters, mothers, friends. all.

and yet, still. still.

we spend lifetimes trying to undo our own spines.

uncertainty

mumbling over

my own tongue,

so fat and full.

like grapes

never plucked

from the vine.

my tongue is

alcohol spilling;

time drunk and burdensome.

every word tastes like uncertainty.

like tar black midnight

in the quiet of the afternoon.

truthfully, i just want to say

i love you and

have that be enough.

insistent

i have known this heart

to be brutal in nature.

frenzied as a starved beast

at the first sight of love.

somehow i am always, at once,

standing on solid ground

and

teetering on the edge

of this insistent

heartache.

if i love you it is not because

you have always been

irreversibly mine,

it is because you

have always been

irreversibly drawn to

light

in a way i do not

understand.

sometimes

growing attached to / all of the soft / that hangs

off your shoulders / a freshly washed sweater

we are coming undone / and it is

for good reason / sometimes / i wash my coffee

down with what we used to be / even before

the tender of you / forgot what it is to be tender

tumble dry / low heat

the shoulders hang wrong / tug off skin / soft but

not in the way warmth should be

there is a small stain in the

left-hand corner / red wine / or blood / something

unchangeable in the fibers / it is having a hard time

letting go / and i think / it looks a lot like us

love letter

this is a letter i will never send.

or a letter i will put in your mailbox

every morning until you read it.

(i haven’t decided.)

a thank-you card that does not express gratitude.

a love note without any feeling in the pages.

maybe it should be an apology.

as long and sprawled out as a novel.

written only in ornate declarations.

but it isn’t.

no, this is a letter just to say,

like something stuffed into a jar,

there was never enough air for me here.

learn

the garden is all stars tonight

and each one is named

after a woman who walked away.

i hope i learn from them.

moment

it is not enough

if when love comes

i am able to keep it

only for a moment.

my heart is too loud,

too demanding,

for love

to greet me at the door

and then disappear

as if it were never

really there.

only a guest

that did not make

reservations, after all.

unsteady

out of these hollow parts,

that voice dredges up the birth

of something like a dozen monsters.

the sound is unsteady.

or i am unsteady in its presence.

like i am the edge of a moving ship

or an amusement park ride

that should have stopped but hasn’t.

and when it ceases,

i have to admit that it is partially my

tight grip on the railing

that leaves the bruises on my palms.

i spend most nights arms open.

i spend most nights fingers curled,

but empty as the whirling wind of a drum.

empty as the glass with the bottom cracked.

empty as the vowels

in the back of your throat.

churning, churning.

in the end, i would not know

what to do with full hands.

one after the other

here, this is for you:

the story of rage stolen from

the center of a storm.

gifted to a human.

have you heard this one?

heard of the hands wringing

themselves dry in stairwells,

snapping joints one after the other.

heard of the pacing. the hunting. the desperation.

the anger that left everything red or red turned ash.

heard of the candle burned down to the wick.

(what we do for such

little measures of peace.)

heard of the greed. the rampant jealousy.

the fruit we ate and hoarded.

even now.

years and years and wars

and wars and

no one has managed

to give it back.

mistaken

you, a car crash.

me, a blade mistaken

for a flashlight in the dark.

i think you have mistaken me

for a flashlight in the dark.

i think we have, on our worst days,

wounded each other.

on our best days,

spent too much time searching.

the best kind

we are the worst kind of strange.

the prowling ghosts that cling to the edge

of rooms they are not sure

they should be in.

the kind of kids that

think of fireplaces

yawning open before breakfast.

but we don’t mind.

we hold hands with each other

on the playground

or behind the bleachers.

(let everyone believe

what they want to believe.)

but when we lie out on

your trampoline past midnight,

we always say the same things.

no one knows

dreams like we do,

do they?

you make this day

feel like dreams

met with open arms.

a restless
pause

walk

we bloom and it is harmless.

or sometime after midnight

we unfold our wounds like silk sheets.

or the night refuses to let go of us.

or we refuse to let go of the night.

or we make temporary homes out of each other.

this is how artists break their own hearts.

or something about your skin feels familiar.

like a memory, like a window

in a building i’ve stood in before.

or we teach each other a new language after all.

or this?

this is how we learn to walk again.

mine

everything is waterlogged.

we meant to jump ship. we did. really.

but i bite my knuckles and

you never stop me from second-guessing.

some people just don’t know their way

around storm clouds, do they?

then it was splinters and screaming and wet.

ocean and new and foreign land.

we make our homes where we can. we have to.

no one teaches love before survival anymore.

secret: mine has always been in you.

so when i pick your weeds out of the concrete

and pretend they are wildflowers,

i mean to say that even in this wreckage

you are wanted.

language

we communicate

with hands and eyes.

it is our accidental language.

we learned it clumsily,

but i think we will keep it.

empty space

you told me you can either be bitten

or swallowed by love.

but i had already tucked away my heart

like loose strands of hair behind cold ears.

i was already open mouthed and screaming.

you said, let it go. you said, when you hold air

in your lungs like a crawl space in the attic,

soon enough it is bound to be

more kidnapping than inhale.

but a shovel makes the same sound

burying you alive as it does setting you free, does it not?

maybe i was just making a bad habit

out of romanticizing pain.

sometimes love ends. i suppose it did not have to stay.

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