Mrs. O

wears sex on her lips

hot pink smile

perfect chiseled teeth

hair bombshell blond

wrapped in a long scarf

like a forties starlet

took me for a ride

in her shiny red convertible

with tan leather seats

the wind knotted my hair

which rose up

rebelled

treated me to a shake

sure my mama wouldn't mind

and called me pretty

I stared at my tan legs

on the pale leather seats

of Mrs. O's convertible

as the shake went down

cold and smooth

and my hair flew out

like snakes

Why does she have to talk

to other women's husbands?

my mother mutters

peering from the window

The bad habits of Mrs. O

become the subject

of dinner arguments

my father her defender

She is observed

to date several men

and have unruly sons

a bad influence

When Mrs. O asks me again

I don't know my voice

and knot my fingers together

so tightly they hurt

because I want the feel

of leather seats on my legs

I want her twanging voice

white-blond hair

and blood-red nails

that could mean danger

I was so in love

with forbidden Mrs. O

her lips like cherries

suckled by summer sun

Lucy Simpson

Seattle

6/21/2007, revised 5/29/2008

Blood of My Blood

Part One, a Fairytale in Which the Mother Cuts her Finger

The blood passes from mother to daughter

recycling, cycling through veins

the water washes away the who

she was, how she sliced her own

finger to the bone

a cut unnecessary

to bleed for her loveliest love

the daughter she pushed forth

sixteen years prior

when there was color of pinks

still left in her cheeks

and her womb was apple-full

The daughter has menarche

in the mother's menopause

She loses her mother,

or so she thinks

She loses her power,

till she gains her own power

through the bones

of a horse,

which is also a type of mother

Part two, in Which the Poet's Mother Dies

Mother, you would not have cut your finger for me

or did I miss it when you did

and placed the stained cloth near my heart

It felt like it was either you or me

sinking down in the river

and that you pawed my head

to keep your own head lifted

You did not want to die

while I began to fancy the river-bed

and the crayfish scuttling the bottom

I began to weary of the struggle

when disease took you

from inside

You had taken on too much wine

and you sank down

though in my love

I tried to hoist you on my back

and crawl with you to shore

Part III, in Which My Daughter Breathes

How it aches this love

between mother and daughter

a deep womb-heart soreness

I will spare you the histrionics

of taking the boning knife

to my finger

I can feel you

were you a world away

as if an umbilicus

stretched across briny seas

I wish to tell you

of the unfaithfulness of others

both women and men

to be wary the one who rides

with you,

who carries envy inside

cyanide capsules

I wish to warn you

my loveliest love

that you will bleed more

before you die

When I am long dead

my face as bare

as the horse's head

hung on the gate

I will enter your dreams

and the dreams of your daughters

a bit of gauze in a river

floating up

to say I am still here

My trace of blood is in you

Lucy Simpson

Seattle

4/2008

A Heaven for Marion

If God’s engineers were to construct a heaven for Marion,

it would be a parlor of impeccable taste

nothing “too baroque.”

When she left her body, she would float up

to salmon walls and be enveloped in that skin

She would fall, soft crush, into an umber sofa

to contour her spirit's bottom

The piano would greet her

as the ghost of the living daughter

played Brahms

Her eyes would fall on each

of the possessions she never had

the Turkmeni rug, woven by women

in a land far from Maryland

in a land far from Ireland

A Chinese scroll would fold and unfold itself

revealing the sage scholar

and the adoring pupils under a tree

always under a tree

insubstantial as fennel

She could walk to the window

raise up the sash

and gather ripe honeydew melons

tomatoes and shellfish

from a magical hedge

Babies would float in and out,

the ones she lost, her Virgil and Christopher

my brothers will not cry or demand,

only smile, laugh and let themselves

be dandled and caressed to nubbins

Then when she wished to read,

they would float away in their cloud

bassinets and return on cue

Pixies, adorable and never grousing

would brush the rug

polish the wood floors

and never get underfoot

She would not have to leave heaven

Nothing would disturb her

Her TV could be on and she could

live in the soap operas

without the attendant miseries

involved in such lives

5/24/2006, Colorado Springs

revised 3/2008 Seattle

Lucy Simpson

August Convalescence

I wake tangled in sheets,

wet with my skin's sweat

August air presses thickly

through the open window

I had craved excitement

crashing open of a placid sky

now, a fragile veined dawn on the horizon

through the gauzy curtain,

is tentative, then blushes pink

yesterday evening,

dusk had fallen oddly,

like a bruise on a face,

purple blotch against whiteness

I did not wish to sleep

strange smoky bodies crept walls

as night came on, a plum ripening.

febrile dreams, chased by a giant spider,

“I am your mother. I only want to hug you.”

eight hairy legs twitched to embrace me,

the daughter who ran.

ache in my head

tiny people in my skull with hammers

repairing damage

cricket sings on the windowsill,

far off cars roar continuity.

mother comes in with a coddled egg

image of the soul

with its interior sun

safe in its own little cup

with the red rooster on it

Lucy Simpson

Hyattsville, MD

1999

revised Seattle 3/2008

Lucy Simpson

Cat's Eye

Step on a crack

And break

Your mother’s back

I skipped along

Still dripping from the pool

Thirsty and hot

My Mary Jane shoes

Finding the cracks

Because I wanted you

To fit in my hand

I needed to pull

From you

A love

Solid and true

valued marble

cat’s eye

of my desire

a woman's glory

I watch her

brush her hair

one hundred strokes

she is faithful to this

only this

not bathing

long after loss

of love and mind

she brushes her hair

one hundred strokes

each day

to make it shine

Lucy Simpson

Seattle

1/2008