How To Live With It

In love with the idea of love,
the girl with the papier mâchè heart
says sometimes I see only what I want
then adds another chipped plate
to her collection of broken things.

She dreams the vagina dentata
beneath the arrows of the night sky,
imagines cutting off a breast before shaking
out ashes, dry leaves.  It’s in here, she says,
holding up a locked box.

She will tell you anything,
give over her assemblage of facts:
the moon is an embryo playing guitar
and all the stars have teeth.  She doesn’t
know it’s after midnight — you are trying

to sleep. This rain-bellied girl takes your pillow.
Where is that freshwater pearl? she whispers,
igniting her spleen. Tired of extraordinary things,
she will ask to hold your eyes.  She will open
her hands and swallow them whole.

The wooden corner of her room holds a closet
where she keeps all manner of quiet things.
It smells of shoe polish and sandalwood. It casts
the echo of an antique mirror.  I know how to take
down my kill, she will tell you, begging to be prey,

holding her breath until she’s covered you with words.

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Shannon Carson’s poems and stories have appeared in The Portland Review, The Suisun Valley Review, The Smoking Poet, and Caffeine Destiny. She’s published an essay in an Oregon anthology and lyrics for a Bay Area jazz musician. Originally from San Francisco, she now lives and works in Portland, Oregon.