(or, cypress calling home~)

the way it happens is the weight of the wet gray sky landing all in my hair making it so it is all i can breathe of the air backyard woods beneath the three galant ladies triumph tulip poplars ancient mama owl face mother night she prays and prays ladies wet me w sky mist i may not know i know it yet but i’ve gold danced the tree line to the west dances up and down gentle flourish like a whisper pause then rush quiver like lightening bugs in the hours before midnight in june. damp spirals in and out again, warm washing light. so gray it disrupts the tree line with its swath, cuts above it in and around and round and inward, a frenzy dark grey plummeting heading south. settling in my hair so i see it all at once bay bridge tunnel and the harshness of the grey battering out to sea. all at once i am the gyre, trauma body dancing toooo much for meee for this bodyyy standing with them pledging our love wet as nor’easter whips us all around. all at once it is 1995 I am 18 braless shoeless running a betting game creme bleach white hair purple black lipped carny on the pier you want it i got it one dollar punk. baby mama on heroin the night we find out it’s a girl baby mama on heroin the night we finally go away after almost four years being mommy mom kel to four kids baby mama on heroin. at least not him. in my recovery meeting i am reminded what addicts and drunks who don’t use or drink anymore but aren’t working on the inside stuff are like. curse the alcoholism in my blood the zillionth time it makes no difference if i only have today or look back transmitted irish poverty transmitted irish extremism transmitted irish religiosity transmitted irish shame, forked tongue the irish in me here today curse the night just for today and at once a zillion years old. holy mother sacred mother she prays and prays. we get back to town and that afternoon jess texts about the aunties in an online queer mag and that is how i know, tidewater chesapeake country cypress knees cypress tannins cypress black water, cypress calling home

don’t let anyone, ever, make you think less of yourself.

they speak to me. in 2008 at the end through 2009 i lived along the river midshore river the river choptank choptank dark waters choptank velvet heat and catfish dinners just a dirt roads walk from them cowrie shell glasses and and

again, chesapeake christens, chesapeake too much phragmites chesapeake too much nitrogen chesapeake too much algae chesapeake speak

heir land land back back to the land

? the great cypress swamp wants YOU too
speak/
sacred mother blessed mother she prays and prays some more roots savage wildry ancestral gravesites dreams

mother night,

& more