"She offers her palette like a heart, paints fertile earth.
Green vines and leaves spring from her womb, her heart,
while blood drips into veins that take root
in the soil in front of her.
She nourishes the Earth with her body, the woman with her body.
She feeds the Earth.
Second one-- darling, earthling, soil, love,
she holds herself above her, lowers
herself feeding folds and folds of fertile gorgeous earth.
She smiles, 'you are sweet, and Diego, too, would like you.'
And she drags her down, rooted to the soil, stone, spine,
vagina fused to the throbbing earth,
sunken, fucked, the feminine Earth lit
by Rose's body of a woman, fire, future in your darkening
theater proscenium of night.
And you smile, mutter not in any known language,
'I am eating the Earth.
I need the Earth in my mouth now,
a rose opening, chucha, perfect one, unbroken.
Put it into my mouth now.'
A tree grows inside you.
I have seen it.
Leaves sprout from your veins.
Your blood nourishes the Earth.
You drag your sexual entrails to the sacred place,
drawn to the swirling, this final place of fury and desire.
Your tears are nails and paint, abyss of birds,
ruined spine, leg--
No, no, blood shall be shed.
One good leg, kiss me again.
And she is furious, a fury flailing, screaming, tortured,
then replenished, hung upside down naked
and tied in an attempt to strengthen her spine.
And you were left in the end with all that pain cannot take
from you.
Many nights, she hung upside down
from the bed's canopy, the blood rushing to her head
while the women sat and whispered,
prayed, 'pray, come to me now down
the dirt road, my little one.
You remind me of a little girl I once knew
at the prepa, smooth and perfect before the accident.
And you sit laughing with all that pain cannot take.
And who could refuse you, your dark dares?
You're outrageous.
You're flagrant, your stare.
If I could carve with thorns, Diego, into you--
allegiance, fidelity, carve wild fidelity, my blood sport,
my art, paint pulsing, paint flowing, beauty,
beating like an injured thing.
If I could carve my pain, draw blood--
'look,' you say, pointing to the little deer pierced by arrows.
'Its head of a saint, its head of a cursing martyr,
its leather corset, a grief-induced,
hallucination a sex-induced or pain-induced-- look there,
the open fruit, the lacerated melons,
pomegranates revealing their juices, juicy,
just a little skin pulled back on that one, pulpy, hurt,
and splayed.'
She is arranging and rearranging her long black hair and earth,
the trinkets in her hair, the arrangement
on the dressing table.
She looks at the woman in the mirror, slowly
applies paint, radiant, radiate, free.
She stares and offers the heart-shaped palette world
tonight.
Men ascend double staircases looking for you,
but you are not there.
You are out painting.
You were watching the eclipse.
You were balancing fire, arranging and rearranging,
outlining the shape of a woman and gently filling her in.
You were nailed by roses now and gently fastened
by the girl to this extraordinary world.
You are in the midnight garden spooning earth,
devouring gorgeousness, because I miss you with all my heart
and my blood, Diego, heart and blood, solemn.
Feed me slowly tonight, filling my mouth,
all the assassinated friends, votive, devotion,
light tonight.
And she remembers just a girl.
Opening, she draws a door, and her death opens.
All is river of light, and her father photographs
her, river of, sublime tonight.
She loves the sun clanging, and she's drawn, child tonight.
Lighting a small votive, she watches
it float out on the river, river of, smooth and perfect
thigh tonight.
A third thing in the dark, stars,
are rubbing all over with earth and leaves.
Furred lip of the open fruit, she
reaches from her palette the way color--
'let me live,' she begs in pain and dread.
She is desiring, devouring, time,
and there's a fire in the earth where you lay.
'Swear, my Linda, swear, my juiced up
plum, my little goose, my gringa.
Swear, you will, swear.'
And she is drawing all the fruits
of this world, hurt of the earth, convulsive, beauty,
bride tonight, free, free of that odd exaggerated step.
No blood, no blood, and pain is a rose beneath your tongue
dissolving, and pain is just another way there.
You walk.
The road of tears is broken.
So love me again until we're left
for dead, exhausted, unmoving, bereft.
She opens one eye and laughs like a wild thing,
bats her lashes, takes the little spoon
from around her neck, and feeds the earth.
She writes, Diego, my love, all over my body in mud.
Mischievous one, she writes, 'viva, viva la vida.'
You write, Diego, all over my body, and as night approaches,
you write, luz.
You paint light and fury, and she
is devouring everything, everything, with her eyes.
'I beg of you,' she whispers.
'If you want me to go, take my sight.'
Once again, desire has made a ruin of us,
a pile of loamy soil, a dome or a concave, a grave,
and sweet pain as a tablet in your hand dissolving,
a host beneath your tongue, a sugary skull, a rose.
Where does your life go?
No, no, no blood, no blood, no blood shall be shed,
no blood shall be shed.
You are walking down a dirt road, your people, body,
broken, no blood, free for a moment, a little free.
No blood shall be shed.
She presses me up against an earthen wall.
World tonight, line tonight, smooth and perfect,
you are walking, knife through the succulent melon, knife
through.
She closes her eyes and touches my unbroken body,
my smooth and perfect thighs.
She trembles, whispers, bites my ear but gently blurs,
'Take me to the other side.'
And the workers singing working songs,
and the women singing freedom songs,
and a woman outlining an image of herself
with extreme care, tenderness, and filling it in.
No blood shall be shed.
Love me gently this time.
No blood shall be shed anywhere in the world tonight."