Donna Kuhn
salted doll
u were always into religion, sex, death
not necessarily in that order
a skeleton is happy
like a rose is a cross, betty boop
is worried, im no other culture
no other salted doll
no fish woman peeking out
from beneath a burka
no high heels, no flowers in my hair
no digital copy fading in the sun
cookies over words, eyes
scraped from their sockets
your heart in your mouth
your mouth gone
fonted wizard
that astonished look
a stamped fish
a radio, pokemon, a career choice
why stamped over your forehead
and u still havent given me any
good reason
steal a smooch in the window
kiss your breast cancer
wedding face goodbye
cupid, angels, ballerinas
loss at a hotel, loss on the love seat
you know, like a couch
i am a stencil waving goodbye
red horses, blue dinosaurs
no answer why
im not tinkerbell
u thought u were sculpture
u thought u were god
u thought u were a broadway show
he hid in a death face, u hid in him
i am very tall with large green breasts
i hide my face in my hands
i left a book out in the rain
women danced across the orange sun
im not tinkerbell in your garden
im not any colour u want me to be
no labels no tape can fix this
patch up your own hole
go on a holiday, burn crosses on lawns
talk about cat death, talk about no choice
u can make a vampire smile
but u cant row a boat, rub a flower
rub a chicken, blow up a balloon
mow your lawn, handle anything
a blender floats thru the black sky
the washing machine talks about
peppers and sheep
theres no shoe, theres no hole
u can hide in, i dont want to go
to new mexico, i dont want to
go to australia, spiderweb, maze
my religion is stamped on tracing paper
the cat is upside down
i grimace at christmas
a forest falls off the page
i dont want to long for where i cant be
i have never seen u before
put the tea kettle on
wipe the dust off your antique heart
i carved your face in styrofoam
everyone said it was a mask
i dont like old things
let go of her hand
your rub-on letters dont stick
a long time ago u had a suitcase
and everything was pink
i cared about texture then
her blue face on the tv screen
a zebra butt, i was never meant for this
did u say the music hurts
then hide in your spiderweb
read the classifieds, enlarge a pear
be a martyr, make someone a hero or saint
then wallow in a bibliography in the back of a book
Lucky Charms
raise your orange arms under the flag
and a bear crawls up the black sky
its hard times, im not talking to u
what did u do, fireworks, war, ziti
band together in the lucky charms
a sad girl with a fish in her hair
i put a net over your head
a safety pin in your ear
he said office products scare him
i tried to leave sideways on a red horse
faster than lightning in a mirror
i need your big yellow pancake head forever
i ached but i was happy i was origami
kirigami, some kind of ami, the number 8
stenciled over an unemployed crowd
i ironed your face on a sock
i wont cut off my ear for u
im not down and out
im not a suffragette, when did u start
drawing guns, stop being peter pan
or a pumpkin, painted rocks
a widow, a political campaign
scratch the emulsion, keep her orange
keep her blue, stare off into the distance
with a tragic look, red bull sideways
float up to the sky, goat rock
raise your green monster hands
grow faces in your eye
put your face directly on the copier
over saran warp because of the oil
when u had red hair, when u had a sister
say hi mom, go for broke
porcelain doll please
youre the end of eyelids
i have onions over the behaviour
and its how the moon snows and vacuums
youre the end of the lords aspect
its the end of the horses sang
they sang about how lopsided bee fish
are in your dialogues, in radiation saxophone
yellow ink in your dignified why
9/11 in a box, pizazz is normal
im sorry youre casual, austin is
leafblowing and full of worries
austin, the sea is full of a hippie town
vacuum your weird snow
where things ended and nothing rains
youre the stage, your eyes cant think
i ignored the behaviour over the wrong moon
you're the end of eyelids forever
in his office youre his waitress
horses are smirky, a mean party
they looked lopsided and they liked the moon
the moon and snow in a box at the behaviour factory
the cattle are sorry by the sea
at the playground yellow ink held on
the playground became a fort
and ignored the clean sea
sorry birds were strange
waitress her eyes swim
full of overcoat worries, legs and food
lion and glare, your bedroom eyes
think about something like the sea steals this town
and it seems stupid that the moon feels the sky
folding back the sky
the tree trunks near my manicure are just silly
the tree trunks are displaced shadows
we put our arms through heart smoke
i was so free to steal sand and face u whining
the wind cried its shifting pharmacist
the blue around the brown hills, pollution cars
im not a nice girl folding back the sky
feed be the jigsaw puzzle of my dream bald
do not let it disturb your chicken laminator
cars feed and dribble down my face
my body knows the moon and her stars nostrils flared
our pupils are dilated and float birds
the nose is my spinal baby sophisticated
i will not say kundalini baby blackbirds
i will not say chakra chop harm books why fetus fear
power in flared day bus shadow, silver live
theres a window to this, shadows sour
i keep it locked, my mouth is a cup of tea
folding back the sky, the circle i drew on you
moon disappears; i am protecting my face
