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.