Category Archives: CW

Dangerous for Girls
by Connie Voisine

It was the summer of Chandra Levy, disappearing
from Washington D.C., her lover a Congressman, evasive
and blow-dried from Modesto, the TV wondering

in every room in America to an image of her tight jeans and piles
of curls frozen in a studio pose. It was the summer the only
woman known as a serial killer, a ten-dollar whore trolling

the plains of central Florida, said she knew she would
kill again, murder filled her dreams
and if she walked in the world, it would crack

her open with its awful wings. It was the summer that in Texas, another
young woman killed her five children, left with too many
little boys, always pregnant. One Thanksgiving, she tried

to slash her own throat. That summer the Congressman
lied again about the nature of his relations, or,
as he said, he couldn’t remember if they had sex that last

night he saw her, but there were many anonymous girls that summer,
there always are, who lower their necks to the stone
and pray, not to God but to the Virgin, herself once

a young girl, chosen in her room by an archangel.
Instead of praying, that summer I watched television, reruns of
a UFO series featuring a melancholic woman detective

who had gotten cancer and was made sterile by aliens. I watched
infomercials: exercise machines, pasta makers,
and a product called Nails Again With Henna,

ladies, make your nails steely strong, naturally,
and then the photograph of Chandra Levy
would appear again, below a bright red number,

such as 81, to indicate the days she was missing.
Her mother said, please understand how we’re feeling
when told that the police don’t believe she will be found alive,

though they searched the parks and forests
of the Capitol for the remains and I remembered
being caught in Tennessee, my tent filled with wind

lifting around me, tornado honey, said the operator when I called
in fear. The highway barren, I drove to a truck stop where
maybe a hundred trucks hummed in pale, even rows

like eggs in a carton. Truckers paced in the dining room,
fatigue in their beards, in their bottomless
cups of coffee. The store sold handcuffs, dirty

magazines, t-shirts that read, Ass, gas or grass.
Nobody rides for free, and a bulletin board bore a
public notice: Jane Doe, found in a refrigerator box

outside Johnson, TN, her slight measurements and weight.
The photographs were of her face, not peaceful in death,
and of her tattoos Born to Run, and J.T. caught in

scrollworks of roses. One winter in Harvard Square, I wandered
drunk, my arms full of still warm, stolen laundry, and
a man said come to my studio and of course I went—

for some girls, our bodies are not immortal so much as
expendable, we have punished them or wearied
from dragging them around for so long and so we go

wearing the brilliant plumage of the possibly freed
by death. Quick on the icy sidewalks, I felt thin and
fleet, and the night made me feel unique in the eyes

of the stranger. He told me he made sculptures
of figure skaters, not of the women’s bodies,
but of the air that whipped around them,

a study of negative space,
which he said was the where-we-were-not
that made us. Dizzy from beer,

I thought why not step into
that space? He locked the door behind me.

Summer 2001: Another Dangerous for Girls

I, too, remember that summer
what I was doing when I heard the news
I cannot remember.

Chandra Levy went missing,
Five boys drowned by their mother in a Texas Lake,
Aileen Wuornos would be injected.

I know I quit teaching that year
exchanging the chalk for a Bible
that never really helped.

The cold, leather cover cracked
whining as I opened it,
looking for answers I couldn’t find.

I fell in love for always,
one last time we camped Lost Bridge West.
Our beer got stolen and my shoe
melted slowly in the campfire.

My creative juices are sluicing out research papers.

My creative juices sluice over the sides of the damaged dixie cup of my mind.
They spill onto the pages of research papers that have ne redemptive value.
My thoughts spill out in cyberkinetic ink on pages that don’t exist in the real world.
They print in black on white paper spitting out from a laser printer. That can’t be good
for the environment that already overflows from trash and refuse.
No refuge for the academic. No respite for the mentally exhausted. No sleep.
Ideas slip chasm over chasm, rapids in the river of dreams. Slipping, sliding
smashing my ideations of a low-carbon footprint.

Cherry Tomatoes
by Sandra Beasley

Little bastards of vine.
Little demons by the pint.
Red eggs that never hatch,
just collapse and rot. When

my mom told me to gather
their grubby bodies
into my skirt, I’d cry. You
and your father, she’d chide—

the way, each time I kicked
and wailed against sailing,
my dad shook his head, said
You and your mother.

Now, a city girl, I ease one
loose from its siblings,
from its clear plastic coffin,
place it on my tongue.

Just to try. The smooth
surface resists, resists,
and erupts in my mouth:
seeds, juice, acid, blood

of a perfect household.
The way, when I finally
went sailing, my stomach
was rocked from inside

out. Little boat, big sea.
Handful of skinned sunsets.

Green Grapes

Little eyeballs
Tiny membrane bound fruits
Seed-bearing orbs

Father’s Day
by James Tate

My daughter has lived overseas for a number
of years now. She married into royalty, and they
won’t let her communicate with any of her family or
friends. She lives on birdseed and a few sips
of water. She dreams of me constantly. Her husband,
the Prince, whips her when he catches her dreaming.
Fierce guard dogs won’t let her out of their sight.
I hired a detective, but he was killed trying to
rescue her. I have written hundreds of letters
to the State Department. They have written back
saying that they are aware of the situation. I
never saw her dance. I was always at some
convention. I never saw her sing. I was always
working late. I called her My Princess, to make
up for my shortcomings, and she never forgave me.
Birdseed was her middle name.

My Father’s Daughter

Forever known as my father’s daughter—
so much less than royalty. How do we
communicate? In tiny sips spilled
from chapped lips and dreams
shared but never realized.

Wind whips my hair and skin
and guards drop when winter stops.
Would be killed birds
rescued by you
and written by me with bad pen
into a new situation.

They dance, you dance, we dance
and break convention. You never called
me Princess, but you always forgave, and
gave birdseed.