Two Poems // Rhett Iseman Trull
Instructions on How to Leave Me
Tell me again about that dream where,
in my lace skirt, I'm stealing your blueberries
faster than you pick them. Tell me how that day
for decades has spread its sweet dark stain
inside you. Remind me of our feet swinging
from the church pew, good shoes knocking together.
Any old memory will do: my Indian-head nickel
flattened on the train tracks, the bad
haircut I got to match yours, you winning me
the onionskin marble from Rush the Crusher.
Or our panic every time we couldn't find
Bob, your dad's retired firedog
that Crazy Miss Robins used to take into town
without asking, letting him ride shotgun,
buying him cheeseburgers at the drive-thru.
Tell me the stories the grown-ups told on porches
as they shelled peas and we organized
our army men, adding up our casualties
in little piles of pewter soldiers. Kiss me
the way you did that first time
in Dr. Harper's office after hours as we waited
for your mother to come out crying with the news,
so sure we were the snake was poisonous
and you were going to die. Kiss me like that,
as if to say you're sorry you're about to leave, sorry
for the unpartnered square dances, ungiven presents
of kittens and decoder rings, undedicated
late-night radio songs. No. Don't
say anything. Just look at me the way you did
that first time you thought you had to go. And go.
The Real Warnings Are Always Too Late
I want to go back to the winter I was born and warn you
that I will flood through your life like acid
and you will burn yourselves on me.
On my sixteenth birthday, I will use the candles
to set the basement aflame and run out laughing,
wearing smoke like a new dress. With a pocket knife,
I will try to root out that life you so eagerly started.
I'll dent the garage door with my head, siphon Crown Royal
from your liquor cabinet, jump from a gondola in Venice. I'll smash
my ankle with a hammer, drive through stop signs
with my eyes closed, cost you thousands
in medical bills. Forget about sleeping.
I'll dominate the prayers you keep sending up
like the last of flares from an island no one visits.
For every greeting card poem, I will write four
to hurt you. Some will be true.
Other people's lives will look perfect
as you search the house for its sharper pieces.
And when they lock me up I'll tell the walls
I'm sorry. But these warnings will come like candles
after a night of pyres. I already know
how you will take one look at that new life screaming
into the world, and open your arms,
thinking, if it looks this innocent,
it cannot be so bad.
Tell me again about that dream where,
in my lace skirt, I'm stealing your blueberries
faster than you pick them. Tell me how that day
for decades has spread its sweet dark stain
inside you. Remind me of our feet swinging
from the church pew, good shoes knocking together.
Any old memory will do: my Indian-head nickel
flattened on the train tracks, the bad
haircut I got to match yours, you winning me
the onionskin marble from Rush the Crusher.
Or our panic every time we couldn't find
Bob, your dad's retired firedog
that Crazy Miss Robins used to take into town
without asking, letting him ride shotgun,
buying him cheeseburgers at the drive-thru.
Tell me the stories the grown-ups told on porches
as they shelled peas and we organized
our army men, adding up our casualties
in little piles of pewter soldiers. Kiss me
the way you did that first time
in Dr. Harper's office after hours as we waited
for your mother to come out crying with the news,
so sure we were the snake was poisonous
and you were going to die. Kiss me like that,
as if to say you're sorry you're about to leave, sorry
for the unpartnered square dances, ungiven presents
of kittens and decoder rings, undedicated
late-night radio songs. No. Don't
say anything. Just look at me the way you did
that first time you thought you had to go. And go.
The Real Warnings Are Always Too Late
I want to go back to the winter I was born and warn you
that I will flood through your life like acid
and you will burn yourselves on me.
On my sixteenth birthday, I will use the candles
to set the basement aflame and run out laughing,
wearing smoke like a new dress. With a pocket knife,
I will try to root out that life you so eagerly started.
I'll dent the garage door with my head, siphon Crown Royal
from your liquor cabinet, jump from a gondola in Venice. I'll smash
my ankle with a hammer, drive through stop signs
with my eyes closed, cost you thousands
in medical bills. Forget about sleeping.
I'll dominate the prayers you keep sending up
like the last of flares from an island no one visits.
For every greeting card poem, I will write four
to hurt you. Some will be true.
Other people's lives will look perfect
as you search the house for its sharper pieces.
And when they lock me up I'll tell the walls
I'm sorry. But these warnings will come like candles
after a night of pyres. I already know
how you will take one look at that new life screaming
into the world, and open your arms,
thinking, if it looks this innocent,
it cannot be so bad.