Rotting Offerings
Alysson B. Parker
1.
well, it never seemed to me that it was worth much
these efforts like women’s work
cooking cleaning children or not
but I look with my developed eye, jealous
of the bare bones of life
the I can’t afford milk for my baby
but the gods can have a feast.
you take the essence and leave me the substance
that is enough for a fish to eat and not get caught
and wrapped in banana leaves to roast
and melt and expire
in someone’s evolved mouth.
2.
swim first, run fast
climb cliffs, but come and show me
your beautiful one
then I would dance like driftwood
limbs locked in hatred
wanting to drown with the seaweed faces of all my memories
I will mislay you under the sea
and you will move back to the old neighbourhood
a place I never go
don’t dare me
although I did find your address and was tempted to post a letter
where I’d tell you what a bastard the religious bloke is
him with his rosary and his priest brother
him: he screwed a tree once,
its branches possessing a crevice he found delicious
stick it right in
he told me all about it
relished in the telling
but the pictures of the others (trees, girls, alive for awhile)
were cut out with a razor
so neatly precisely
like a plan to seduce
and it’d be just my luck to fall for it.
3.
there’s a certain fish that swims into shore with the tide
but it’s so vertically built that when the tide leaves, it’s stranded
washes up on the beach
waits until dawn
when the motivated insomniacs come and retrieve their winnings
fillet me
flay me
leave my essence like an odour
because no ants will crawl on my substance and devour me
like I’ve got some fancy flowers
or I’m coloured like fruit
or I never had a temple or a celebration
to die for
and I have enough money to feed my own baby, if I had one (which I don’t)
but the parading continues and the rituals are sustenance
never questioned,
just there because that’s the way it always is.
