mary kelly.
sweet petticoat thing, blade swinging
near your feet. he orders:
"now girl, keep your tongue 'tween your teeth
and be so silent, as silent as the grave."
no time to be leaking secrets, my fair lady,
there is a wolf at your door
and blood on your ceiling
as you sleep,
as you dream
of dust
of
...manila...
thin as the skin off this
fruit he's been peeling, you may dream of manila-
of fresh lemon sliced and of tricks or of dice or
a pane cracked like ice
that lets him in, wide-grinned,
stolid like blade.
now a lissome and quartered thing, unrecognizable.
a deconstructed
piece of meat, ringmasters will
open you to observation.
revolutionaries meet
in the elevator for the uprising, mary, in
some unknown time
as you thicken and seep,
art stretched on the canvas.
but stained
and one-gloved you began to
flee, not on blue-veined legs
but mentally, incoherently-
beneath the scythe
and you said
"must be off somewhere, yes,
off to sea
must be sailing off
to the philippines"
to sleep,
then to dream
a gust
then
