- to Vanessa McGaughey

Streaked-hair diva, daughter of snowflakes,
It has been half a decade since I last saw you,
And still I can turn backflips and remember us
Dancing on the roof of your house like whorling

Stars: the six sides of your heart shine like spurs.
You are more beautiful than a field of cornflowers,
That dawning blue. We wave from the sky, you and I,
And do the Spanish flamenco flick of the skirt.

Once in a while, we explode into blinking filaments
And shoot across the sky. This is when our mouths
Fill with words and smiles, and when we spit, we spit
Out posies, we spit out catalpa leaves,

We spit out lucky charm hearts,
Fooling leprechauns,
Always fooling leprechauns.

If I were to tell you now, how the sky cut a hole
In it’s net from under my feet, how I was left
Half-crazed, half poet, half dancer, half star,
If I were to tell you…

Oh dear sister, I want to live!
I want to fall in love and
Swallow beeswax candles.
I want to spring like a butterfly
From the back of some boy’s red car.

I am the original pixie, should I eat apples? I am
A pixie, should I fake a lost slipper, should I
Wear a red hood? You, dear, dear, you are
An ice sphinx, you feed me crumbs of moonlight.

You tell me it is stupid, stupid,
For someone to swim in a mirror. I know, I know
You’ve been spinning my hair into trees
So if I fall, I may rock like a cradle.

This is wonderland, this is where cards walk
Around with real hearts on them. They bleed and
Amble about on two feet, and they too, dance
In a dark redness, in the stain of an abyss.