Primordium

My mother has a TV
on for noise. So does her mother.

That dark morning feeling
of a substitute, rain at school--

the pull begins here, logged in a cabin,
when she goes out to sweep a grave.

She talks to us as audience,
I muff my ears.

When the power goes out,
our mother screams.

We are slicked back and taste like jam.
We are not given her name.

The absence keeps us quiet, covers us
to our chins like a blanket would.

Her smell, burnt Turkish coffee, face cream,
wrapped in a robe. We’re twirling curl brushes

in our front yard, our side yard, a field.
Our mother of a few ghosts.

Our mother of the garden.
The heavy gardenias for each child

exist beyond the transplanted soil.
Our mother cries at airports

and at the Mediterranean. Barefoot.

We already mourn, hear her footsteps in the grass,
the sound of a steaming iron.

Her role. The soft hum of agreement.

Varun's Kitchen

You and your beautiful eyes looked back at me.
Good, I like company.
 
Wrapped in a floor length towel, fresh from the clawfoot bathtub,
my hair dripped soap water.
 
Catullus said, “ours is an ignorant and tasteless age!”
We’ve gotten younger.
 
Got you to agree to your first day with me. Saturday.
I removed my hat when I saw you. Placed my head against the wall of yellow roses.
A hug, as if reunited, tight, rectangular, for a minute, or so.
 
Older than Plath
ever was, at a country’s edge and angled heat,
 
we stopped to smell every rose.
You, a gladiator, cheered on by honey fragrance, the garden was an arena.
Pointing to Mt. Tamalpais and dark yellow yolks for breakfast.
 
I gave myself a written agenda on a folded sheet of paper,
tucked deep in my pocket, I didn’t need it.
 
There is a word for this.
 
I’ll find it. The kindness emerging from your chest, against the wooden walls.
Bracketed slats of light over unread pages, the wind-up bird and glass whale.
 
An inch of light over you.
It held me upright. The rich cream and towering fennel.
Do no math just lead us forward.
 
Be a green plant. A palm tree in the square.
A little whoop in the night. It was needed.
 
I once came here in an American Apparel crop top.
 
Topless at the diner, eating a pie, 2013.
I thought I could change everyone around me.
 
Until the wine bottle was emptied, I laughed out loud
to myself in the bathroom. I lied. I continued to do so until the following year.
 
This time, I dip my head underwater, a Marilyn Monroe kiss and romance.
A panel of glass against a tree. I couldn’t see my reflection
on an hour long walk while you slept.
 
Does someone good like a thank you from
me? A bowl of sugar to look into?
 
I asked, will you call me?
I soaked the deck with my excess love, a piece of quartz.
Alone for a moment,
 
in a home,
 
not the shared recycling, the rancid, craven, unclean, invert I know.
There’s the clementine peel you’re carting around.
There are the loud teens,
 
the organic wine you didn’t drink.
The no-nonsense dish soap and wet jars dripping.
 
I want you to be wrapped in a silk scarf. Want a bouquet thrust in your hands,
candle wax dripping on the banquet tables      we could have it all!
The kitchen was meant for dancing.
 
Sped up, you found the one line I liked and kept it going.
 
It’s a bummer, back home, I had to stay. The inert atmosphere I couldn’t leave.
The sea foam like snow. The storm cloud closer to us.
I made you close your eyes and walk down the mountain with me.