Digging

In the rusty pages of Gray’s Anatomy
in witchcraft and chewing gum
on sundays
I have sought you in the rings around oak trees
on each of the twelve moons of Jupiter
on Harlem streets
peeping up at the secrets pregnant women carry
like a swollen threat
beneath the flowers of their gathered blouses
and under the breasts of a summer night
smelling of the kerosene and red pepper
my mother used to frighten out bedbugs
hidden between my toes
or was it only dream beads of sweat
I suffered
before I could slip
through nightmare
into the patient world of sleep
vanishing like a swallowed flower
and for years afterward I would wake
in August
to the left-over scent
of a child’s tears
on my pillow.

In the stone machine
that smells of malachite and jasper
of coprolites undercutting and crazed
in the stone machine
twirled green dust burns my nose
like Whitsuntide fire.

I send you a gift of Malachite.
Of Amber, for melancholy.
Of Turquoise, for your heart’s ease.

In the stone museum
ancient tapestries
underline sense
with an animal
touching the organ’s place.