Dorinda Wegener

Scene with Apparitions


I’ll-Cut-Your-Goddamned-Eyes-Out empties her tumbler to muddle
at your hip, softly arcing her olive branches, but do not fall for this
thigh trick, continue to Pull-Out-Your-Chest-Hairs, one by one,
with your forefinger and thumb, filling the sink’s metal yawn with
wires and cross wires until the shock of it all wakes The-Go-
Between-Child, who runs their tin cup across cabinets, rattles the
plates and mugs from their shelves — ceramics scatter on the floor as
carpals, metacarpals, phalanges,: you remembe a time — when the
spirit of who your mother was, but is not now, lifted you in her arms
and pointed to the door, said, See this, this is my blood, and this, and
this
, now under the halogen round the knives break into blade song
for they love this story with all their teeth. They riot their block,
want you bare-chested and blind, but you are done with ghosts.
You walk right out, leaving bleached flour on the threshold and an
anklet of crimson cord tied in nines around iron bells for this
sinner’s scene, this sweet recollection that cuts your conscious clean.