MARY ROSE MANSPEAKER

on distance


i’ve kept the yard barren a whole year now  
             hoped with silence something would regrow
                           decided not to check for progress

though i glance that way daily             home
                           a place they sieved a body from the riverbend          

where engines whistle through the distance                could be anywhere

when it was common ground             
                                                                    we trampled it
             washed imported grass seeds off with rain    
whoever purchased uniformity here has more

    pennies positioned on the tracks

we kicked up flowers
                                                      picked bouquets of clover      

& bluebell named them                         daisies
                                                forgot
                                                                                                to collect
the spoils
the sudden recall
a body crushes into yours

                                                     **

the two pennies                                                     displaced we skitter through the tunnel dark

our knees touch as i grasp the subway’s metal rod       from their seat this stranger
                           offers pizza to a stranger          flips the cardboard lid
                           compliments cracking paint                  on the other’s nails               

a cop looks askance                   *                 the frame forcefully readjusts

here                   our stop’s fluorescence cleaves through fiberglass

               light                 has not come from within

Audra State Park


Through a series of turns:

limbs shorn by lightning, waters
drowning roots free & loose—
the signs have rusted off
or spun clear about.

But it’s a way I know
even after the mud
grips the wheel & permanently
jacks my alignment. We park,

grab the bottles, the smoked turkey,
the buns. We skirt the water
up & down cliffs for hours,
for miles.

Past all the spots, clear
river & rocks,
to the one
that I know. I can

walk on water
here. When the river is
right & the rapids
grate moss off the rocks.

My feet skim the surface, moved
with conviction.
Even the places not made
for me must hold me, given

time to adjust. I wave
my arms to the other shore:
Look! No land!

& one more step;

I would gladly lie to god.
What is interesting about relaying a truth?

I’m saying you should hold me as I sun-dry, laughing.
I’m saying I would give up knowing.

A truth: I have allowed myself
an arrogance

grounded in ownership. Footprint
in pliant moss. What was not made

to hold me, must. In ownership,
an arrogance.I’m saying I would hold you;

the tires spin, slip
deep into the mire;

Convicted,
the river continues its rush.

Rictus


We face each other.
We share one couch
each with one leg
bent & dangling from the knee
in the August heat
watching Shark Week on a CRTV,
sparks fizzing up from the bottom.
Never enough

hammerhead footage, you say.
They say the only bones sharks have
are the teeth. The only shark bones,
I say, are the teeth
but the teeth are useless without the jaw
& the jaw without the teeth.
That’s why, I say, our teeth
our jaws rot so easily.
What remains, I say.
Where, you ask.

I feel a storm in my bones, I say.
Do you think, you say
it will stay there? A cage
holds strong against an onslaught.
Foam sloshes onto the vessel above.
One of us stretches experimentally.
Will it matter, you say.
I say, I’m trying
to watch how sharks
watch out for men.

You kick me
lightly in the ribs.
I glance up. You say
Where’s the evidence?
Are we doing anything?
I say, Right now?
Enough for anyone, you say
to know me.
What happened to us, you mean.
Where we came from
& where we ended up.
Will they see that much
I say, in my teeth?
& grin.

Mary Rose Manspeaker was born and raised in West Virginia, where they are currently an English PhD student at WVU. Their first manuscript, Vernacular Geography, was recently named a finalist for the Akron Poetry Prize and a semifinalist for the Pamet River Prize. Recent poems appear in Poetry Northwest, Dream Pop Press, & Western Humanities Review.