Spread
A muskmill, this room that rents
for sixteen dollars an hour with
its ghosts of slap-lip, torn slip, the
bulletsnick of a zipper. Only bonepocket,
whiskey stagger, a bruised
leg keep her from slipping
digitalis in his drink. Pout. Click.
And he knows a woman worn
on the wrist like a wire hanger
can be sweet-centered—
blackberry jam and loose custard
in a warm spoon.
Pull focus: kohl eyelids, glossy tongue, her
thumbpressed spine. Shell-pink
panties draped on the dusty lampshade—
Subject: that dark blade pressed to
her exquisite clavicle.
Object: the bluish skin of a woman shaved,
a skinless pineapple, photoflat
and pixilated in a red merry widow.
Exhale if you want. It’s your dollar, your fist.
(originally published in Zygote in My Coffee, #103)
continued...
Alice is back from the dead
to uncoil a bullet from your cowheart.
To flex her wild legs, stealing
weeds from your coat
pocket.
She serves you an egg, poached in red
wine to mark the month
of thorns.
Fingering smoke rings, she
sleeps in your
teeth.
See the retinal spotting in daylight? Arterial
branches reaching for optic space,
this eyeshelled
maiden—
a house knife clothed in hot emeralds
and twisted genomes:
XX. XY.
Postscript: these prison
sheets, a violet
room.
Here: a stone, a girl,
a stocking
throat.
Take This Medicine On An Empty Stomach
Can’t we share your prescription?
The mechanism of sleep eludes me.
I tempt you out of that cannibal
jacket with the hard red welt
on my watch-strangled wrist. I think
you are baroque and broken. Smoke-
drunk and glistening. Can’t we find
the value of absolute zero? Handcuffs
and cigarettes are the system (or the method)
for disintegration. I need a man who is
ambidextrous, musically-inclined.
You fit the bill. Undress me.
My point is this: I like it
this way. Don’t look. It only hurts
for a minute.
(originally published in KillPoet #4)
It’s like this:
You buy her a rare steak, hold
your breath when she blows
Virginia Slims in your face.
With those fishnet tights
and cat eye glasses
(in your head, you’re screwing
a hot librarian), she thinks
Chlamydia sounds
like a pretty flower.
Later, she brings you
to climax in a burnt
orange room,
nicks your wrist
with her incisor.
Friday night, dirty
sheets, that languid beat
of a bed against a wall.
Susan Slaviero lives in the scintillating suburbs of Chicago. She has a BA in Creative & Professional Writing from Lewis University. She hopes to someday land a job holding the giant question mark at Trader Joes. In the meantime, she writes. She also designs and co-edits the online lit zine, blossombones. Her work has appeared in Fourteen Hills, Wicked Alice, Arsenic Lobster, Thieves Jargon, YELLOW MAMA, Zygote in My Coffee, and elsewhere both online and in print. Her first chapbook, Apocrypha, is forthcoming from dancing girl press in January of 2009. You can also visit her via myspace.
Last update : 20-06-2008 12:16
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