Poetry by Irene Cooper

Narcissus

 

 

Leeched of

grace I rise

with ashes in my

mouth from

yes

 

pretty

thing sweet

fresh out of

sight put out

of mind your

manners-love

some body

might hear

 

a child offering

coffee and cakes to

a priest as

you slept

 

He emptied

pockets of coins and

guilt at the

table I come

clean

 

He laid

hands on

me as you

said no

thing

 

 

 

 

Demarcation

 

 

White lines striate my hips and thighs

scars left post puberty

post-partum

post-

peri-menopause goddammit

the

lines

just move my body grows

a child, two borders are drawn

redrawn (I am not)

endlessly elastic

 

Furrows in the mirror

awake if not altogether (the perfect)

present

years of carving lines and circles

(in) my face just busywork

geometry

is plain

 

 

Streaks down my wrist

vertical like what works I hear

cant confirm or deny

 

It was nothing (fireflies)

An act of valor my body fell upon the glass

that would have held them

 

Broken lines are infinitely

aspirational

(some of my best friends are)

on the move across territories

endless wide-eyed jet-fueled nights

of almost there

 

 

Splatter

 

Yellow sauce splatter, a bet on gravity and solid matter

no sole agent of this or any beauty

 

Michelangelo knew the limits of genius, Eve more David

s nonno or bachelor zio at Coney Island, sunning their red breasts

 

Nobodys perfect. Or everybody is.

 

Pollack, another mess, dripping bottle caps and ashes in impasto

pulling at green disparities til we look wholly

 

Between blue bodies is space more minute than the

nothing holding each of our 37 trillion cells together

 

We could pass a hand or any weapon right through us

 

 

Irene Cooper lives, writes, and cooks in a dry part of the Pacific Northwest. She holds an MFA in poetry from Oregon State University-Cascades. She is a fierce advocate for self-directed education, public school, arts curricula, college funding reform, accessible health care, any available toilet, and the popular vote, among other things. She believes that language is imperfect, and so, miraculous.