CAITLIN SCARANO
What You Killed, What You Thought
I’m a quartered moon curling your feet. Useless
prey. Yes, I guess a part of me
never wanted to be with
you. Build the house,
hew the house. Can’t
glue together
the splinters of bedroom with come and
crushed cranberry. Your mind now – legless
animal. I look at photographs of
us by those bodies
of water, your ripe mouth frown-stained,
like I was fiddling with that grandfather
clock built into your chest. There was a time
when I knew you though – face, hands, pendulum.
Now I’m undressing with my winter teeth. Chattering
snow and no. Please believe me: once, I glanced
out that kitchen window and saw our son
picking up sticks in a fragile coat. I never held
a trench knife behind my back, never
kept a poisonous lip up my flannel sleeve.
I was only mouthing mercy and an aggressive
thirst for you. The blue of my eye, you
could not name it. But I did not make it up.
BIO
CAITLIN SCARANO is originally from southern Virginia but now lives in interior Alaska, where she is a poet in the University of Alaska Fairbanks MFA program. Her poetry is forthcoming in CALYX and Fugue.