When I entered the book of myths
in your sandalwood room on the granite island,
I did not ask for a way out.
This is not the century for false pregnancy
in these times when myths
have taken to the streets.
There is no more imagination; we are in it now, girl.
We traveled the stolen island of Manhattan
in a tongue of wind off the Atlantic
shaking our shells, in our mad skins.
I did not tell you when I saw Rabbit sobbing and laughing
as he shook his dangerous bag of tricks
into the mutiny world on that street outside Hunter.
Out came you and me blinking our eyes once more, entwined in our loves
and hates as we set off to recognize the sweet
and bitter gods who walk beside us, whisper madness
in our invisible ears any ordinary day.
I have fallen in love a thousand times over; every day is a common
miracle of salt roses, of fire in the prophecy wind, and now and then
I taste the newborn blood in my daughter’s
silk hair, as if she were not nearly a woman
brown and electric in her nearly womanly self.
There is a Helen in every language; in American her name is Marilyn
but in my subversive country,
she is dark earth and round and full of names
dressed in bodies of women
who enter and leave the knife wounds of this terrifyingly
beautiful land.
In the book of myths that fell open in your room of unicorns
I did not imagine the fiery goddess in the middle of the island.
She is a sweet trick of flame,
had everyone dancing, laughing, and telling the stories
that unglue the talking spirit from the pages.
When the dawn light came on through the windows,
I understood how my bones would one day
stand up, brush off the lovely skin like a satin blouse,
and dance with foolish grace to heaven.