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Teresa White
Fall 2008
Death’s Kit Bag
Of course, it’s black.
I carry it eagerly,
a midwife hurrying
to a birth.
Inside is the bell
that tolled for me,
the cup you kissed,
the necessary coin.
I step over the brim
of the world, stand in line:
a never-ending queue
of dust and light.
I’ve paid my way with
everything but gold.
When you come,
please find me.
Listen for the distant bell
I will be ringing,
ringing.
We Never Give Them Names
Begin with cows:
dumb and big-eyed
and slow-moving.
Pigs are alert, bright
and suspicious. They know
the ramp means no exit.
Who cares about chickens
with their non-sentient
feathers and beaks?
Fish come willingly
shimmering with scales.
They hardly feel the knife.
(first published in La Petite Zine, Fall 1999)
Bio:
Teresa White is a Seattle native now living in Spokane, Washington with her husband where they rescue abandoned cats, see they get necessary vet care, and find homes for them. Her work has appeared widely in electronic journals and print, most recently in “Eclectica,” “The Arabesque Review,” and “7 Beats a Minute- here and now.” Teresa has been nominated twice for the Pushcart prize including “Doing Jack” published in the fall 2007 issue of “Mannequin Envy.” Her second full-length collection of poems, “Gardenias for a Beast” received a favorable endorsement from Billy Collins. For more information visit her web site: teresawhitepoetry.com
Fall 2007
Doing Jack
When Father visited
out came Jack
Daniels and I’d match
him shot for shot
until this imposing
broad-shouldered
stranger with the space
between his front teeth
couldn’t hurt me anymore.
His brisk military questions
asked with an Andy Griffith smile
would roll off me like soap bubbles
until I was feeling so light
and empty inside
it almost felt
like love.
After Reading Camus
I keep my head tucked under
my arm at night so the orchestra of words
won’t go dashing off like quarter-notes
into the chamber of this curtained room.
Sleeping, I pluck nouns, hoist verbs,
gently lift adjectives into wordplay,
not yet a poem—a little balloon of light
with an idea not fully formed.
I am an existentialist without an axe to grind;
faith only of light and air. Someday
I will write a poem to save the world
just like you.
And our poems will rise in the air,
a resurrection of alphabets strung
like stars across the galaxy. Today,
I’ll vacuum the floor, clean the windows
forget for a moment that anything I say
will ever matter.
2006
There, On The Tarmac
Your plane touches down.
Much has gone unsaid between us.
The lark was high in the singing tree
when last we spoke.
All we have in common
is our fractured childhood:
Father gone for years at a time,
Mother ruling with her polished nails.
I was always the good girl
while you snuck the keys
to Mother’s car for yet another
joy ride, got fake I.D.
so you could go to bars
with your overage boyfriends.
We love each other,
we hate each other,
that is the way of sisterhood.
Let this visit be different:
I want to be your friend.
I promise I won’t talk about our past
for the years go, they go.
Easy
I am prone on any surface,
flat or steep. Location doesn’t matter —
cars will do and music helps grip the mood,
Beethoven or the Blues.
The tertiary stage
is a slow turtle to desire.
Peaking, I seek younger men
with fire and a stick to rub.
I never knew Mother did it;
never saw her bathrobe fall.
She was Barbie, polystyrene,
without a seam.
I admit it’s spring and in the back yard
the foot-high grass is green as peppers--
bends over backwards
when I stretch out on it,
jumps back uninjured.
Says lay me again,
lie down on me again,
this season is so brief.
I Wish I Knew The Latin Name For This
Tinfoil in my teeth,
the scrape of a Popsicle stick
when the sweet ice has gone —
daughter, you bring me to this.
I cringe at the sound of a fingernail
across a blackboard,
your boyfriend’s rage at 2 a.m.,
the ominous twinkling
of a squad car with its blue authority.
I have one weapon and even
this loses potency—that you love
me or did or might have or could.
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