See, I didn't plan this, obviously.
I'm just sort of getting the feel of the audience,
of see how much you'll stand for.
Then I'll just read.
Let's see.
I don't think I read this poem this well,
but it's an interesting poem.
I don't even know where it came from, exactly.
It's not that much like me, in a way, or like my work.
It was in this issue of Antaeus, anniversary issue.
And I sent in one that I thought was much better to go in there.
And then I realized, actually, this
was, because it was so different from what I do.
This is called "Salomé."
"I scissor the stem of the red carnation
and set it in a bowl of water.
It floats the way your head would if I cut it off.
But what if I tore you apart for those afternoons
when I was 15 and so, like a bird of paradise,
slaughtered for its feathers.
Even my name suggested wings, wicker cages, flight.
"Come, sit in my lap," you said.
I felt as if I'd flown there.
I was weightless.
You were 40 and married.
That she was my mother never mattered.
She was a door that opened on to me.
The three of us blended into a kind of somnolence and musk,
the musk of Sundays, sweat and sweetness.
That dried plum and licorice taste always back of my tongue
and your tongue against my teeth, then touching mine.
How many times?
I counted, but could never remember.
And when I thought we'd go on forever, that nothing
could stop us as we fell endlessly from consciousness,
orders came.
War in the North.
Your sword, the gold epaulets, the uniform so
brightly colored.
So unlike war, I thought.
And your horse, how you rode out the gate.
No, how that horse danced beneath you
toward the sound of cannon fire.
I could hear it so many leagues away.
I could see you fall, your face scarlet, the horse dancing on
without you.
And at the same moment, mother sighed and turned clumsily
in the hammock.
The Madeira and the thin-stemmed glass spilled into the grass.
And I felt myself hardening to a brandy colored wood.
My skin a thousand strings drawn so taut
that when I walked to the house, I
could hear music tumbling like a waterfall of China
silk behind me.
I took your letter from my bodice.
Salome, I heard your voice, little bird, fly.
But I did not.
I untied the lilac ribbon at my breasts
and lay down on your bed.
After a while, I heard mother's footsteps,
watched her walk to the window.
I closed my eyes.
And when I opened them, the shadow of a sword
passed through my throat.
And mother, dressed like a grenadier,
bent and kissed me on the lips."