by Lisa Cihlar

She Eats Me Out of House and Home
 
I met a woman once who was probably god.
She had black hair with bangs, she ate my spaghetti
with red sauce until there was none left in the serving dish.
Then she looked around, hoping for more garlic bread, I guess.
I was ashamed that I had none left,
but I suppose that if I am right, and she was god,
this was miracle time.
 
Too bad I didn’t consider that sooner.
Instead, I pulled out the ice-cream and caramel and pecans,
which I had toasted and salted earlier.
We made sundaes and she smacked her lips,
held up her bowl for seconds, thirds,
and ate until the cupboards were bare.
I have to admire such an appetite.
I wonder how she is with sex,
has she exhausted anyone to the point of death?
Maybe that is not possible, but hey, this might be god
we are speaking of here—anything could happen.
At least that is what the holy books would have you believe.
 
I suppose Salvador Dali could have written his own sacred text
and burned the edges of the pages and added a few droopy painted things
and fancy cursive letters starting each chapter,
and candle wax drips and there would be a new religion.
I am certain Dali would have liked to be god, until it bored him,
then he would have climbed a tree to sit in his chair and sulk.
I think Frida Kahlo would have made a wonderful god.
I read once that she was in a terrible accident and a metal rod
plunged right through her womb.  The lesbian lover of a friend of mine
told me once that she herself  had been in an accident and a rod was run through her
uterus, she would never have used the word womb—too girly—
but I am sure she made it up.  She was like that. 
 
Is it possible that my black haired woman dinner guest with bangs
cares about every bird and bug and leaf and me?
I can hear you laughing from where I sit in my armchair.
She keeps the watch ticking, and eats the world whenever she feels hungry.
She is a starving artist, starving god.
Pray to them both.
 

Keeping a Family Album

I could not do without them, him, her, us.
It is the messy room my father wanted me to clean.
Yeast bread, tame and wild from the air,
smells fill all the rooms in my brain,
like star magnolia, lilacs, lily of the valley,
and peony.
Fussy ladies, won’t sit under the walnut trees,
poison roots and bombs, green and worm ridden black.
I feel unsafe without my things around me.
Glass that I might drop and crunch into the linoleum
with my wheels. 
Linoleum curled at the edges
like the new leaves of tulips,
holding a drop of water refracting the red tip
to more than what it is in the afternoon sun.
Oh yes, remember the burdock, fuzzed with fine white
hairs that might be dangerous, or soft, who is willing
to take the chance with it?  And remember the worms
that chew the root when you dig it from the edge of your
garden?  We lived in an apartment, second story, over
an old store, with bow windows looking over the street,
and watched parades go by.  Fireman throwing candy,
tubas reflecting the sky. 
You understand him better than you do yourself, sometimes.
And you hate when he brings home Chinese food but
forgets the hot mustard sauce that makes your
eyes water and your nose run.
For two years now she had been on the verge.
So here they were now in the half-gloom
of red flashing hazard lights and cold,
so cold that she felt ready.
He planned to spend the day mending fences,
stringing barbed wire, and putting up birdhouses.
No matter how careful a person is,
when she has done something over and over
again, she feels she knows the task,
and that is when she cuts her hand off.