Spor a dic: n[o].
Love poem
after A. Van Jordan
Rinse v. 1. To cleanse by flushing with liquid
(as water): Shrubs, low houses, seventeen year olds; the kitchen window is just
taller than my head if I stand in June evenings crossed through with shadows, rinsing dishes, ham grease crusted on.
2. n. murky: You, your bike, passing
in the rinsed light: pass twice, turn, pass again and then with one finger you’re raising goosebumps on my neck
under my hair, 3. to remove (dirt or impurities) by washing lightly: rinsing me with kisses: kissing: it’s
like standing in a direct spot of sun, or me a white shirt after bleach, back
to clean-so-clean and flapping on the wash line over the hedge(s) n. 1. a fence or
boundary formed by a dense row of shrubs or low trees; barrier, limit: all the
neighbors use to keep their dogs fenced in; you kiss me like a mower, you
flatten shrubs and open gates then 2. encircle: you reach forward and you’re hedging me; I turn and I’m hedging you 3. a means of protection or
defense: we’re a small neighborhood in revolt, we’re sharp with thorns, 4. A
calculatedly noncommittal or evasive statement: and we’re in your car with the
ripped seats and I’m asking where to? And you start hedging, did I like the book about, you say, when you know I mean
which state, let’s drive, I say baby let’s drive I say I feel shut in, I’m
thinking how I’ve never seen a desert but then we’re necking and it takes me
weeks to learn 5. to protect oneself from losing by a counter-balancing
transaction: I’m here in case your girl-friend leaves; she doesn’t, and I’m
laundry left in the rain long before I’ve learned to hedge,
yes it’s long nights on the telephone talking like a see-saw again adv. 1. in return: back: and I woke up this morning and wanted you
to turn again to me, because my
dreams smelled like your soap 2. another time: once more: anew: though there
is, (and I know), no way to begin again
even if you turned. 3. on the other hand: And then again I know better than to have what I’ve already captured, and 4.
in addition: besides: again I know
your lower half, your heart-tooth’s rotten root, so yes knowing better, I think
of you spo rad i cal ly adv. occurring occasionally, singly, or
in scattered instances; fitful: (yes, I think of you) and I’m fury without
generation, watering my houseplants over the sill leaving splashes, pools as
when, after infrequent arguments, my body found its way across asphalt to the
park’s near entrance where rain met still water in starts and fits, and hands
handled touch-me-nots, made to open—sometimes—when touched roughly or softly,
springs and seeds bursting in all directions, parts to all of the plant
exploding under my grasp into green fireworks of shock, scattering bugs in rinsed light, leaving you never knowing
just which parts of me were freed, or how, or to where.
- C. Wilding
