I spoke the short language
Cooper Esteban

I spoke the short language
none of them knew --
miel, Prester John, el
pene --
while the sisters
teased their hair and old
men sharpened the oyster's
olate spines.
¡Basta! I cried --
se mejorará. But
still she curled over
the left foot, drawing
the anemone's eyelash through.

My blood, I understood,
was rosemary, oil on the neck
of the psaltery,
the ascending
note the wordwife plays:

de ventrum a pubis a cuello.

1996 © 2003