Memories and Repcruussions 2

Memories and Repercussions

All my faces I burned at the your door, stepped
over your threshold blank as the first piece of paper
slid from a newly opened ream.  I fanned the ashes
of self into your dogwoods and lilacs, but they filtered
in through the poisoned earth to remind me who I was
before I met you. Those shadows, though immolated
in flames, still dance in dreams.  Every day a new face, old
as its tortured scars, blossoms from the blank visage
I donned for our wedding.  One by one, I claw
them off and they scuttle like rats under our bed
to screech and whine for my attention.  They interrupt
the soft touch of your hand on the curve of my hip
during the long wakeful hours as I listen, helplessly,
to their squabbling and pronouncements. So many
of them pile around our rooms, like wadded
and rejected drafts, that I can no longer find the unblemished
self I tried to give you. For your protection. And mine.
Nor can we find each other now among the heaps of drooling
faces, the raging masks that bury and drown us both.


Mary Stebbins Taitt
For K
090720-1254-2, 090720 1st