A tangle of rattlesnakes stirs
in my womb. I gnaw on a wishbone,
ignore the rustle and hiss, the flicker
of ink tongues. Hush, snakes. In the rocking
chair in the pastel nursery, I soothe
my snakes. The clock chimes never.
The sun slinks in, a tongue of gold
parsing the dust motes into glyphs.
I heard you open the door, felt your eyes
slide across my face. Don’t ask me
why I’m still singing. I lost my dreams,
watched them fall like dull pennies
into a fountain of murky water. Hush,
snakes. They twist inside me so fitfully,
I wish I was a statue instead of a woman.
I wish I could be stone. I would be stone.
Let me be stone.