There is no word for Spring’s delay –
just torture until it arrives.
Wrapping ourselves in sheer dismay
March winds whistle through us like knives.
Hope does not do justice, either.
Nor bitter desperation.
We grasp each feeble ray of sun
seeking earnest supplication.
Author: katkarney
Trimesters
I.
ultrasound
hope
borne through waves of nausea
a heartbeat flutters onscreen
“there’s the little troublemaker”
II.
braxton-hicks
the abdomen expands
to accommodate life
agony’s thumb edges
down the center
an unseen hunter
pares the womb
with the blade
of her electric knife
III.
for my daughter
i do not yet know
how to write you
the language,
still nascent
writhes violently,
kicks at my ribs
i trust the words
will be born with you
Palmistry
uncertain,
i study
my left palm
pinching the teal dot
of graphite lodged
beneath my love line
still there,
though the accident
was decades ago
gently,
i squeeze
my fingerbones
with the
opposite hand
uncertain
Thoughts While Drinking Sparkling Water From a Red Wine Glass
what if it were not the liquor
but the shape of the glass that got you drunk?
if fine fluting transformed ordinary properties of water?
jesus christ, i whisper
Electric Blues
high tension lines
strung high
sizzling, snapping
cicadaeqsue
beneath blue november skies
thrumming, aching
jolting through
my high strung
high tension mind

Nightmares
how to meet the hat man
sleep fitfully on the sofa
your back to to door
plagued by dreams of moths
in a house of illness
sleep until his deep voice wakes you
and you cannot move.
“excuse me, ma’am?”
his tall frame curls into the corner
his neck cranes, hat scrapes the ceiling
no light reflects from his face or hands
featureless as a shadow
he watches though the night
and you cannot move.
“i’ll be right here if you need anything.”
when i was a skeleton
i had not the foresight
to fashion a skin for myself
from discarded trash and tarps
the ache whistled through my ribs
my bones dried in the winter air
withering once whitehot marrow
into frozen despair
cold medicine blues
the dogbody of midnight
sweeps past
my ankles
i wake
on the
shitter
Abecedarian in a Dive Bar
any-
body
can
dance
extroverts
frequently
gather at
honkytonks
introverts
just
know to
lie low,
mouse-like,
nibbling
on scraps of
possibility
questioning the
revelers who
swing
toward
utopia
vexed, the
wallflowers’ very
xylem
yearns to
zoom
Grandpa’s Dream
during the great depression
we climb a rotten maple
we shimmy up a rope
i glide back to the ground
while you sway, unafraid
in an army flight jacket
a single living sliver
supporting your branch
What Is A Weed? (For Aldo)
i’m not too keen on yardwork
but i am strong in my own way,
stubborn
mowing strips in my little lawn
with a silent manual mower
raking
the fallen leaves into large paper
bags that the city picks up on
tuesdays.
sometimes the older male neighbors
will give me advice for a purer lawn
mistaking
the unholy mob of broad-leafed plants
for something to be vanquished – oh no
not here!
how else could the barely blushing fleabane
eavesdrop, their heads resting on windowsills
watching
my hands as i set the table for dinner
laughing at the men who fear
us weeds?
The Art of Bathing (II of II)
venus, stepping forth from her porcelain shell
the cream and maroon tiles
of the mid-century bath
are lit by two candles
a great swelling
of peace fills her heart
hot rivulets of water
pour down her shoulders
soaking waves of wet
hair, cast to one side
one hand cupped
to her breastbone
her belly a rounded prayer