Run like Wildfire
Past keening claws in the hall of the house
that sprouted me.
Fangs drip turquoise.
Living room corner, wide chair and a half
where I rode my Daddy’s horsie, hand-built floor lamp,
spitting fluorescent bulb, an over-our-necks spy. Tight-shut
upstairs door, unforgiving mouth. Safety my belly flips,
I can’t
stay here. Whatever they are outside these walls,
lined up vampires,
women who cannibalize small children.
My skin heats hot, my heart
a stuck car, wheels spin, spew gravel, tires rut,
a revving scream lifts
me out of nausea. I float. Water’s busy fingers needle
between muscle
fibers, fusses away pain, anesthesia loves my thighs,
all those tiny tongues.
In the drought-garden early this morning,
bees swarmed
hose spray,
begging.
Shower sluices aches while New Mexico burns.
Ashes steam, smoke the mirror. I cough yellow.
Or is it gray? One gold earring clacks to the shower floor.
I grope for it, garnet gleams, an ember, shampoo-bleared eyes,
fingers knock it away, gem catches,
melts the lip of the sucking drain.
that sprouted me.
Fangs drip turquoise.
Living room corner, wide chair and a half
where I rode my Daddy’s horsie, hand-built floor lamp,
spitting fluorescent bulb, an over-our-necks spy. Tight-shut
upstairs door, unforgiving mouth. Safety my belly flips,
I can’t
stay here. Whatever they are outside these walls,
lined up vampires,
women who cannibalize small children.
My skin heats hot, my heart
a stuck car, wheels spin, spew gravel, tires rut,
a revving scream lifts
me out of nausea. I float. Water’s busy fingers needle
between muscle
fibers, fusses away pain, anesthesia loves my thighs,
all those tiny tongues.
In the drought-garden early this morning,
bees swarmed
hose spray,
begging.
Shower sluices aches while New Mexico burns.
Ashes steam, smoke the mirror. I cough yellow.
Or is it gray? One gold earring clacks to the shower floor.
I grope for it, garnet gleams, an ember, shampoo-bleared eyes,
fingers knock it away, gem catches,
melts the lip of the sucking drain.
Rachael Ikins is a 2016/18 Pushcart, 2013/18 CNY Book Award, 2018 Independent Book Award winner, & 2019 Vinnie Ream & Faulkner poetry finalist. 2021 Best of the Net nominee. She is a Syracuse University graduate and author/illustrator of nine books in multiple genres. Her writing and artwork have appeared in journals world wide from India, UK, Japan, Canada and US. Born in the Fingerlakes, she lives by a river with her dogs, cats, salt water fish, a garden that feeds her through winter and riotous houseplants with a room of their own. Frogs found their way to her fountain. Dragons fly by.