I nod.
He sits & with shaky hands pulls a cloth with pills
hiding between the folds from his backpack.
He puts two pills into his palm & takes them without water.
They remind me of seeds
& I worry they won’t grow in the way he needs them to.
His eyes close tight. He shakes his head & looks at me again.
He has a tattoo where his neck joins his shoulder
& a necklace that looks like it holds herbs.
Sani, he says softly. So only I can hear.
Moth, I say softer.
Sani’s dim eyes squint at me. Shakespeare?
I squint back. Midsummer Night’s Dream.
We both tap while the bus jumps
& the flowers bloom as rudely
as they always do in summer.
Sani offers a thoughtful glance.
Moth.
It works.
I like it.
SAME STOP (SANI LIGHTS A CIGARETTE)
Sani: Your parents must really love Shakespeare?
Moth: They did. English professors.
Fancy. Did?
Don’t want to talk about it.
Lonely?
Meh. You know cigs are death sticks, right?
I am aware. From around here?
Nope. Then why smoke?
Is it bothering you? I am from New Mexico.
Yes. Hot.
I know, I’ve been told.
Hilarious. I mean the weather.
Sweltering. Why do cigarettes bother you?
Why clog your lungs when fresh air surrounds you?
I like having a choice.
Isn’t nicotine addictive?
(long pause)
Navajo Nation.
Black. My grandfather’s best friend was Navajo.
Really? That explains it.
Explains what?
Nothing.
Nothing?
Do you ever stop moving?
Hearts always beat.
Do you ever start smiling?
I try not to.
You don’t want to talk about it?
I don’t want to talk about it.
Where do you live?
With my aunt (Jack), five houses down.
I live with my mom (Meghan), that way, five houses down.
For the summer? How do you even get the cigs?
Maybe. Magic, Moth.
Really. Magic, Sani?
Can I call you?
No phone.
No phone?
No phone. Just an iPod.
Right, okay. Bye, Moth.
Bye, Sani.
MOTHS
Blossom in four stages because they are very good at poker
& don’t want to show all their cards at once.
egg (harden)
caterpillar (grow)
cocoon (rest)
moth (live)
This is how it goes.
Egg is nothing special—we are all an egg at one point.
Then caterpillar, spotted & furry like a mustache snatched
from a face.
Cocoon is the miracle.
When the caterpillar literally melts, sticky & soupy,
into slop & reassembles itself into a moth.
Imagine stepping out of the pot as Medusa.
Imagine your DNA holding the secret to snake hair & stone men.
Imagine being prepared to die
just to fly for a few weeks in the sky.
It’s like you are doing so good at living small.
Almost mastered reining in your ravenous joy,
then a boy with lava hair
& a poet mouth
swaggers in,
wanting your number.
He smokes when he shouldn’t
& always taps,
keeping time with his hands,
which I imagine are softer
than the mist that hovers
at the tops of mountains.
That is what I imagine as I fall asleep
the night before the last day of junior year
& for the first time in a long time
I am not breaking in half, in the back of a car.
For the first time in a long time I feel my ancestors
& I think of my gray-bearded grandfather
& the magic he taught me.
I DREAM OF MY GRANDFATHER (ROOTWORKER)
It’s fall break & I am visiting my
gray-bearded grandfather, who says,
The long magic freed our people.
His hands plunge wrist-deep into the damp soil
beneath a willow
that weeps for our ancestors—with our ancestors.
We are in a sacred place, our feet cradled in powerful dirt:
a crossroads in a graveyard near Nashville.
Here the living & the spirits can match fingerprints
& lifelines can twine & untwine.
I remember, I am ten & as scrawny as a vine,
as wispy as the haunts my gray grandfather chants to—
thanking them for their wisdom, praising them
for their crafty ways & their perfect plans.
It’s a long prayer, longer than usual—
desperate & outlined in hooded notes,
thunder voice & haunting hope.
Grandfather is old; when he is done
my scrawny strength
helps him stand over the hole
he creates in the dirt.
He pours
the best
whiskey onto the thirsty earth.
Moth, you must remember this work.
You must grow in it. You must live it,
Grandfather says, dusting his hands on his pants.
What conjure is this? I ask as the graveyard breeze
pats my chapped cheeks.
Grandfather bends down again,
digs deeper into the soil, places my cut nails,
a tuft of hair & a photo of us in the small pit
along with two tiny seeds & a crisp white feather.
He blows smoke
from his cigar into the hole.
This is long work. A finding spell,
for roots destined to twine.
Oh. Tell me about how the magic started again, I say,
smiling into the breeze.
Grandfather covers the womb of a hole
& lets the magic get to birthing itself.
He starts: There is a tale that those who do the Hoodoo work know.
There is a boat that has a belly
that sags into the sea—it gorges on brown bodies.
It cuts the waves like a razor through lace.
Boat docks & there is an auction block & souls are tossed
like pepper across the Southern states.
A new god paler than salt is named & a whip sharper
than black mamba fangs is threatened, but the ancestors,
the ground & the roots work the same.
We hide hope inside the folds of the Bible books;
offerings are added to tip the odds.
A rebellion, an uprising in the spirit
right under “Master’s” hateful nose.
I help Grandfather stand again
& he leaves his work.
At the gate he covers his face
so the spirits won’t gossip
about his private tasks.
But a year later my bearded gray grandfather dies
& Mom leaves her magic when she migrates north to
New York.
I remember the stories, the roots. Not the work—not the dirt.
Maybe that is why my family is cursed.
My grandfather was a great conjurer,
but even the greatest rootworkers
can’t raise the dead.
So none of his spells are useful to me.
In my head I hear Grandfather chanting—
The ancestors are with you, Moth,
> you are never alone.
Taught you. You have magic in your bones.
Open your eyes, open your eyes,
I would never leave you trapped—defenseless.
MORNING RITUALS (LAST DAY OF SCHOOL)
When Grandfather died & drifted
to the other side, he left me a box
of herbs & roots & soil & candles.
He left notes tied like prayers
to the dried roots & even though
I am mad at the ancestors
for letting the car split in half,
I could never be angry with Grandfather.
So I practice Hoodoo still,
because that is what he taught me
every summer in South Carolina
for two weeks.
My mornings go like this:
stretch, mantra, offerings.
I have a makeshift altar
in my closet with crystals,
roots, photos & candles.
Each morning I place breakfast
on a white plate so the ancestors
can partake.
Then I brush my teeth, wash my face,
powder on blush & glide on lip gloss.
I pack my secondhand backpack,
dress, chew on bravery & spit out
a shell around me.
FINAL DRAMA CLASS: STORIES
I don’t know why, with timber trees for muscles,
Sani picks Drama over PE.
Blond & crimped butterfly (Ashley)
is telling the story she tells all new kids
about how the left corner of the stage is more than just shadow
& crushed-velvet curtain.
It’s where our very own phantom hovers during shows.
Sani’s mouth inches up. His bun is tight & neat today.
It’s a traditional Navajo bun.
I know because Grandfather taught me.
His traditional bun is not as tight as his blue jeans, though.
Ashley asks Sani, Do you believe in ghosts?
Sani taps his foot slower. He is always tapping
like he wants to awaken something in the ground.
The line of his mouth seals shut (again).
Whatever, wolf boy. (Ashley) stomps away.
I like that he tapes his mouth to her.
I’d like to un-tape it—I want to hear his ghost stories.
Grandfather taught me that Hoodoo has tidbits of Native
American magic laced in it. That our beliefs sometimes whispered
to each other, like Grandfather used to whisper & chant with his
best friend.
The teacher releases us into the hall for “trust exercises”—
instead I origami myself behind the soda machine,
with my headphones closing me into a shell.
We do “trust exercises” because you can’t act if you can’t trust,
just like you can’t conjure if you don’t offer something.
I can act like my back is an octopus leg & my arms are conductors
of the waves,
but my reflection in the side of the soda machine says:
the guilty girl who lived.
Grandfather’s voice rattles in my head (again), so very close—
(Moth) I would not leave you trapped—
you are not defenseless.
But I am not my grandfather.
I am not magic & bone.
I am littered
with scars
& limping through years.
I have nothing to offer the dead
that they don’t already have.
THE GIRL WHO LIVED
I am sure that is what the newspaper articles said.
I can’t know for sure because Aunt Jack
kept all the newspapers out of the house.
But I imagine the article read something like:
Tragic accident,
an entire family except one
bright, brown-eyed girl taken away
on a highway.
Lucky the girl lived,
because she was known
for sucking the juice
from the sun.
So graceful,
Juilliard was eyeing
her at ten.
Lucky that girl lived,
because she wove rainbows
with her fingertips.
She always licked
the chicken bone—
almost glutinous.
That’s probably why
she did not die.
She really knew
how to live.
Maybe if I didn’t gorge
myself on life,
there would have been some
left in the car
for Mom
& Dad
& Zachary.
SUMMER SONG
I sit with my notebook balanced
on my bony knees.
I don’t eat much anymore & it shows,
so I hide it under big clothes.
Each summer my brother (Zachary) & I would write a song.
Just the two of us. Something to pass between us
on car rides & vacations.
When it was winter & we needed the feeling
of sun on our skin, we would sing our song.
I can’t play guitar.
Zachary played the guitar.
But I can still write, hum
& if my heart is light enough, sing.
I write my first lyric of summer:
A gift, an iron
to smooth the creases that wrinkle up your spirit.
I don’t know where the song is headed,
but that’s the best part.
The dog days of summer decide the lyrics—
as they should.
SANI SINGING IN THE EMPTY ROOM
From my hiding place a voice
creeps softly to me.
A voice low & gruff
& hungry
& hopeless.
I have to follow the sound
& I find Sani, at the piano
playing
& singing
& my feet turn out,
find first position
before I can stop them.
It’s not a song I know.
It’s a song I think Sani wrote.
He sings, his voice cuts
like lightning through thunder clouds.
It’s hard to be what everyone wants
when living feels like haunting.
Mother worries & flinches all the time,
Father busy healing & praying.
Stepfather hates that I was born,
he wants to erase me.
It’s hard to be what everyone wants
when living feels like haunting.
Sani looks up,
sees me eavesdropping.
He frowns,
watching me
as I fail to string
together an apology
for hearing his song.
He stands,
hesitates
for heartbeat
& leaves.
I FIND SANI BY THE VENDING MACHINES
Sorry, I say.
It’s not polite to hover.
Sani raises an eyebrow.
Side effect of my name?
I tap my fingers.
I like your voice.
I like compliments.
Sani laughs & tugs
the trust exercise sheet with five questions
from his tight jeans & says, Shall we?
He (Sani) answers first.
What is your favorite color? Earth.
What is your passion? Sometimes music. Usually nothing.
What do you miss? Nothing.
What is trust? Meh.
Coffee or tea? Neither.
I (Moth) answer next.
What is your favorite color? Black.
What is your passion? Music & movement.
> What do you miss? Swallowing the sun.
What is trust? My gray-bearded grandfather.
Coffee or tea? Both. With honey.
Sani pulls out a pen & adds another question.
Coffee with honey? Are you writing a poem?
A song. Yes, with honey.
Sani writes another note.
I play guitar & piano. Maybe I could help.
He scrawls his number.
I don’t have a phone. (I answer with my voice.)
Find a phone & call me, text me? Please, honey?
Penance for hovering & listening to my song.
(Sani answers with his voice as soft as fall leaves floating on a lake.)
NOTE SANI SLIPS INTO MY HAND
Verse 2:
a bundle of beer, a bouquet of clichés
because it’s almost summer & it feels right.
His number is scrawled there (again).
I add:
I hear you never come empty-handed in the South
& I am nothing if not polite.
Then I roam into the woods behind the house.
I beg the ground for the first root Grandfather taught me.
Next I slip back into Aunt Jack’s house.
I slink into her purse,
borrow her iPhone
& replace it with the most important root—
High John the Conqueror root.
I leave courage & cleverness behind
because I am nothing if not polite.
EGG
I run upstairs with my prize.
I re-shell when my bedroom door closes.
Safe & hardened.
I pace.
Sometimes in silence
the heated hands of hell reach
up through the floor, ready to pull me
down
down
down.
Like they forgot me when they took everyone else.
Me (Moth) Page 2