Wrong Things

^{(from the suite STALKED)}

She tried to keep the house 
        from floating away 
              bought heavy furniture 
       carried in the couch. 

She thought she could 
            hold anything to get it 
                   from one place to another.

This is why she was covered 
        with bruises 
               and lifted anyway. 

She is so slim. She wears a long silken dress. 
       She handed me a poem, her first, 
          framed in Italian Byzantine. 

It read surprisingly well. The last line 
      said, 

            He finally had me, 
my cheeks pricked by tears 

I didn't know whether to 
       take up the word pricked 
             it was her first poem after-
                          all.

The blood from the swelling 
         on her right forearm dripped 
               in the shape of a tear 

wet with her first speech. 

      This is progress I thought 
            her finally speaking. 

The beautiful must be as vulnerable 
       as anyone else 
          for when I ask why she 

accepted his flowers 
           she said 
                 I wanted to feel alive.