cuttings

for lilla

the top cut off a pineapple
sitting in on the windowsill
for weeks
and you waiting for it
to take root
not just one time
but over and over again
and each one rotting away
under its stiff green leaves

the golden pathos
stretching its arms around
our apartment in st. paul
so far across the walls
that it had to stay behind
when we left
and when we came back to visit
six months later
you went to get a chair
from our old neighbors apartment
and i didnt go in
but you told me later
how you had seen the pathos
dying in their living room

the succulent i gave you
as an anniversary
that we have left behind in pieces
maybe two years ago by now
and us never knowing
how long it would take to fade
but it grows and sheds its leaves
and starts tiny green buds
where its not supposed to
and still looks ill somehow
and every time i see it
i see the same tired struggle
of growth and decay
i see us turning to each other
looking to see how far the roots
have dug themselves
into the soil behind our eyes.

transom

it is this man
looking in his empty mailbox
for bits of skin and teeth
folded up on paper
skin he can touch
teeth he can feel
clamping down tightly
on his collarbones

he pretends to pull the letter
from the box
tears it open
and holds it in his hands
unfolding it slowly
creasing the folds backwards
so it lays flat
but as he tries to read it
he sees only his hands
held out in the air
in front of him
trying to feel the weight
of the paper
they are supposed to be holding

his hands become agitated
pretending to fold and unfold
and trace lines across a page
that isnt there
they move so quickly
with such force
that the man realizes
they are no longer his hands
they are wild birds
tearing themselves from
the ends of his arms
and flying though the transom
over the front door of his building

the birds fly north
loud and black
with wings the wrong size
for their bodies
and the man rushes outside
after them
shouting directions to them
an address in minneapolis
a name
and something else
that by now
they are too far away
to understand.