shift

When
the light
hit it
just right
she saw
the keyboard
the N
the E the
S and
the A
the right shift
bar where
she could
almost
see
her thumb
print
having rubbed them
shiny
and smooth
Y the Q the {
and
the Z
still dull
waiting for
the bruise
of use the
proof
that she
had
been
there that some
one had
been there
like the cold window
full of
blank
in
visible
words I
love
you after
the steam
hit.

ride

She pedals hardly seeing red
yellow orange flowers smudge red
yellow cars broken glass
she swerves to miss
she remembers sneakers
peeled cedar bark high
above the yard terryclothcape
tied at her neck a frog
squished and dry a tiny bird beeping
in a shoebox the night
it died she
rides no hands
no feet
Xed
stretching up and out
riding
so fast
fingertips scrape doors lattice windows
toes
scuff loose gravel tree roots
broken curbs streetlights on
at dusk
marking to memory
to heart
these streets scraps music words
futurepastpresent all
rushing past her ears.

linen

Waking, she thought
she was dead
twisted
in damp cloth.
She lay
eyes shut, straining
to see
through her own skin.

The light inside
my tomb is red
she thinks. I am not
breathing; I am
not hearing; I am not needing
breath or sound—
I am light in my bones
waiting to be sifted
out
of some layer of earth
suspended
with all else that was
heavy above
but weightless
below.

The early sun bores
into her eyelids
eyes
her brain
awakens to twisted
damp linen
and she wonders
how she got here.