Natasha Murdock

Poems

 

 

 

On Tuesday Afternoon I Put Joni Mitchell on Repeat

 

& I am bawling with affection—it pours

into my hands like snot, like haboob, all blood boogers

and open windows,

and I don’t know what to do

with it, with him or her, whichever, or you, either.

I try to say it’s like eating the sand the exfoliates your face

but it comes out all wrong like bubble-umbrella-watermelon-runs.

So then I get depressed and when I get sad for reasons I cannot

explain, I buy lamps. I buy lamps and fill

them with 100 watt bulbs and I turn them all on

and I look straight in, as though a challenge—you

are not the sun and you never will be

but you will do. And then I know how to say it:

a shine is different than a reflection and from here it’s all

refracted light, even when the dust comes home to stay.

 

 

 

the acquisition of language

 

i. because to desire him is Latin

 

for you to desire me is to lift my skirt to find another skirt

 

to desire me is to look for a fish in the cat’s water bowl

maybe you will find fins, blood, bones, a scale or two,

a dangling eyeball looking right at you dead as powdered wigs

 

to desire me is to tongue-kiss a mirror

 

to desire me is to be late

 

ii. because to desire him is to eat a no-fuzz peach

 

for you to desire me is to travel to space-time where

I am a dum-dum don’t know better

 

to desire me is a cold full sponge in your mouth

 

 

 

Dear Mr. Blue Eyed Jesus Christ of the 21st Century

 

They want to wrap you around their necks to keep warm.

You, their tender scarf, the messy bun atop

their tender heads. You, the oversized sweater they slip over their swooning heads

to picnic with you. And you, you’re not even trying,

not licking around the air for admiration, no, not you—

You are too humble, so you blush, and they know you’d never do anything

but tuck the hair behind their ears, blow far away kisses in their direction…

You walk the way angels walk: fly. Your wispy sideburns, wings.

You’re the local, raw organic honey in their throats, and the throat,

that’s you too—the red flesh clicking your praises. You’re the wrinkles

in your own corduroy, your own hands in your own pockets.

Your face, clearly a miracle of twinkling anglo saxon eyes…

Even my slouchy, hip, caramel boots are you, but when you see me

traipsing down the street you call out to me,

gently, a: hey you. I raise my hand to wave and instead bow my head

to scratch a raising eyebrow

 

 

 

The Chimera

 

His eyes give it all away in difference:

once a twin turned receptacle for the fullness

of a dead embryo. Once a body turned for absorption

and at times still a fire breather—a snake or lion

warning of storms to come, volcanoes to erupt,

a half hearted cry from underneath singing

about shipwrecks as though he weren’t

the wreck, as though his own words didn’t

crisp the edges of my hair leaving a stench

asking for reprieve. His body pieces together

sometimes a goat, sometimes, part child,

sometimes even a sun setting on a water planet

going cold and heating up too fast at the same time.

And what can I do but listen for the sounds

of the child lost inside the man,

look in both eyes and look past

what his mouth is telling me, look past the fire

pouring out his throat, and look for the wound

find it and treat it and find it and treat it

saving my own gash to lick another day,

what can one do in front of a myth

but bow,  lean  in to the sound of flame

to put rose in my cheeks, never mind the thorns,

never mind the smoke—I only evaporate

and descend, again, and again—so the chimera’s warning

becomes a myth a monsoon maybe even a prayer

until no one knows what came first:

the fire, or the rainstorm, the thunder or the child. 

 

 

 

I Thought You Were a City that I Wanted to Live In

 

But that city is on fire or maybe it’s better to say underwater or maybe earthquaked, charbroiled, whirlwinded, or just dead—but whatever it is, it’s not good, not ideal, not the best living conditions. It is hard being in a city of one especially when part of that city is made-up and part of that city is angry and part of that city is totally bangable and part of that city is just a long list that goes on and on and on.

 

But living in this city is sometimes like a hot bath or an exceptionally well chilled slice of brie with an unoffending rind. Sometimes I can lie for hours in the city’s middle and soak up the it’s long slices of moon light. Sometimes I want to do this forever, telling our fortunes, tracing the maps of your small-town hands, but I never forget the fire—the burning turned so quickly to ash.

 

 

 

Natasha Murdock currently lives in Gilbert, AZ. She is currently completing her MFA in Poetry at Arizona State University. Her work has been published nationally, including such magazines as So to Speak, The Cobalt Review, and 4Chambers Magazine. She unashamedly loves Harry Potter, experimental feminist poetry, and Macaroni & Cheese.