Poems of Annie Blake (Part 1)

Die Sunde by Franz Von Stuck [CC, Wikicommons]

FELIX CULPA

for Annie Rose

i kiss her hand / i hold onto her reeds for she weaves me when the water falls / her body loosened by men / discernment and her sacrifice / she has taught me there is no such thing as loss / she unroots in the forest / thick incense on a white horse / the red horse and the blooded skins of indians / 3rd archon of the winds / she will reign for a thousand years / he won’t open his seals until she is able to come from his mouth / 

blackbirds rise like a word from a hot hovel / satis house and her letter / and her first wedding gown / fires blank and face clocks / my hands / their spell / swelling the mouth of a match / the stone thrown into the sea and circulatio /

i see the devil in my room / my mother always told me he would come / my cross and the antichrist / one thief is the serpent / the other is the dove / as many feathers / tongues swollen with forgiveness / her lips / the afterbirth / parallel and larded like the tracks of carriages / sirens ring red / his hot colored eye / eupeptic syzygy / body from trees and / how i sunder for my people in clay

WE THAT ARE YOUNG SHALL NEVER SEE SO MUCH, NOR LIVE SO LONG

for my children

my cloche in the lake / waiting for him / with a feather and without a father / will the wind sail green / i’m on the pier on a summer’s day / i was in sweden / or switzerland / snow and summer make spring / a door i have never walked through / her body floating like a boat / she was a girl with a beautiful voice / and articulate / which was rare from where i came from / and how we read king lear in class / doll stuffing clouding the lake / the lining of cordelia and the rise of the third reich /

boats like funeral jackets / air like sails / i’m wearing a sailor blouse / kick-pleat skirt and ankle length / i’m not young anymore / theocracy / my god / bars across my window / my knuckles white / my face is strained wet / but more silent than when i was in childbirth / the skin of my body / tafetta or velvet and a coffin birth / my father hitting his head against the wall because that is the only way he can tell me he is frustrated and doesn’t know what else to do /

emendation / anacoluthon / shotgun window / where is the sky / burning lilies in the forest on the moon / there is a man there / i remember him from somewhere / he kicks a ball a long way off in the field / and gold and red sulphur to the sun / that is his answer to me / my children are handing in their ballot papers / i lay them like a map / on the table / the lake is green / a glass meadow / the boats serene / unleavened bread / how they are rising for me /

it was her that day / a mist of breath / single flaw of a feather / joseph of arimathea and the sabbath / i am a mother / he gives me another wedding ring / i fly through my shotgun house / my skin is all cut out / a basket made from a poplar tree / hickory lacing / for my son

SOTERIA

for Annie Rose

people are divisions / the shrinking wilderness / house lots / backyards / fenced and gated / so i’m viewable from the city / she sang and she dribbled / we kissed / danced ballet / because she was so infantile i carried her and helped her bend her legs /

my bedroom chair / i flew around in it for seven days / the wishing chair and circumambulation / nigredo and albedo / seven round planets / turned around / to show mourning and how the light is coming / the chair / shell motifs / curvaceous vase-shaped back splat / horseshoe seat / chairs have knees and cabriole legs / the dragon’s claw / the ball is stuck in my throat / a cat / guilt like loose string / i ate a mouse /

i want to wear the crown on my head / like osiris / his atef-crown / chairs can crumble like sucked bread / i penetrate things like men do / fly through glass / i stole her crown / she was a queen / eve and my mother / poison apple / redback / riding in the wood / chewable stone / virgin well / fountain of consequence and the cleaved sea / wings a cross / i followed her / until i touched her cloak /

the little girl asks / why doesn’t the ghost come / and when he came he was black / sheer voile curtains / mounts the dawn / i had just risen out of my bed / he sniffed my hands / holding a pomegranate and splitting seeds / and told me i was the devil / my mother was there / and told me to scrub myself clean /

our church was profound but the wind left me too separate / cloistered walnut shell and a sacrificial table / i struggle to lift my children from deep water / breathe them from the caves tucked high in their arms / when i can’t find air / their bodies dark water / 

knees rise instead of mouths