Two Poems|Claire Williams
Put On A Record Darling
until now i thought you’d be a god come
to rescue me out of my life. now i turn a stone into
anything i want, and i no longer have to practice
pausing mid-chew to let the bite of flesh
dissolve secretly in my mouth.
i never asked to be a happy woman.
i asked for retribution to be swift. what i got was this
whale song. something in between the two?
my wisest friend suggested and i fondly love her for it, even
as i doubt, and set the needle back again, drink the wine red
sea with my tongue, my sore and swollen eyes.
As If Someone I Trusted Were To Come Up the Small Path and Knock Unexpectedly On My Door
you lay down a lot of brick i love you you sore
and salty and burnt i love you you dark and soft
and wondering i love you you picnic you adventure you
gate you ghost i love you. you steam—thick mist—
tangled nightdeep driver – from here and self i love
you you bare armed crest chested wide lipped
mistake maker i love you you falling poise just
you i love even terrified yellow light or violent
what becomes becomes becomingly: i love you tears,
ink, dirt, regret and all: what else can i do?
a hundred other things. but what i wanted to do was
make it here, to be with you who i love just before i
was never here you belonged to yourself you had
nowhere to get stuck you gave up the shape they
caged you in and i love you shifter, looking first with
this eye then the other the solstice came and
then the eclipse didn’t it, see everything that needs
to happen with your hands is about to be happening now.
Photo by Brett Jordan on Unsplash
Bio:
Claire Williams works as an archivist and writes poetry and prose in the in-between. She moved from California to Vancouver, BC in 2015, where she now lives and works as an uninvited person on the unceded, traditional, and ancestral territories of the Musqueam, Squamish, and Tsleil-Waututh peoples. She is a pushcart prize nominated author whose work has been previously published in online and print journals such as The Knicknackery, Bombay Gin, sparkle + blink, Poetic Diversity, and Word Riot.
One Response to “Two Poems|Claire Williams”
Megan
These are wonder full Claire!