new poem

had a wonderful meeting with diane a few nights ago; the product being three (hopefully finished) poems.

this poem is the oldest of the three (i'll post the other two later) and probably still has some work left in it. we'll see. i'm not entirely satisfied with it yet, but it's getting closer.

HEART SWELLING TO THE WEIGHT OF AN ANCHOR

I am sleeping in a hotel in Pittsburgh. I am
remembering the first time I watched Jaws,
how terrified I was to step from bunk bed.
I let the phone ring, hear its pause, wait
for it to ring again.

The silence circles my mattress;
the sunrise crashes into my ears
like the Pacific, the ocean I visited once
but was too afraid to swim in.

When I answer, it is my sister’s voice
telling me Abuelita’s heart failed that morning.

And so it is that she bled
to death inside her own skin, the brilliant red
spilling from chamber to chamber, coating
each dark organ; heart swelling to the weight of an anchor
and that great predator smelling it the whole time,
her eyes darkening for weeks;

it should not have been such a surprise.

Yet even as the doctor’s words stalked us,
the we can just try to make her comfortable
a hammerhead swimming
the halls of the hospital, even then we waited
for something absurd as the Coast Guard
to save her, all those men in white
the shadow of fin and tail.