Genetics

My mother weaved the wheat fields blossoming beneath

the Caucasus mountains into my flax hair. 

 

I am a museum exhibition curated by magpies: sunflower seed 

carcasses, my grandfather’s crooked nose and 

 

protruding ears, crescent scars, snapdragons opening 

and closing like giant St. Bernard mouths. 

 

I broke my left arm three times. There is an impact

on the earth where bone met dirt. 

 

I count my brother’s freckles under anemic light, blood

streaming onto snow, half moons of currant. 

 

I am falling, tossed overboard, rain sinking teeth 

into skin. I pick at the bumps on my chin, unrooting, 

 

erupting. Asleep under an ash blanket for millenia. 

Wake up, the man shines a flashlight in my eyes, 

 

the clock glows 4 am, there are sirens outside. 

My mother plays Uno in her hospital gown, reversing

 

the depression with lithium pills. She comes back two weeks later,

I stay awake chanting кров кипить (blood boils) thrown under

 

the waves of the briny Atlantic. Womanhood is a staircase winding 

the x chromosomes entangled in bedsheets, 

 

so I stare at Buttons by Carl Sandburg because I once met that sunny 

man, shook his blond hand,

 

pretended that he wrote poetry for me, that I kissed his cheek backstage,

an ensemble girl giving status, never taking any for herself.

 

The peonies bloom for one month in May, 

so sit on the brick and bury yourself until they wilt. 

 

Redemption 

comes from tears and pleading and then a bowl of cut up fruit. 

 

Open the window. Let the chill air sweep in and the rain 

patter gently. 

 

Peel the skin off a grape, exposing

the inside, a quahog, a soft tongue, 

 

the womb and the blood. 

Remember.