from Blackwater Quartet, selection 29

Twelve Non-Barbie Episodes

 

1

The correct answer to your secret question will be used

to unlock a forgotten password.

What is your name, your nickname, alias,

taking place likewise by barcode,

the beginning and end signals?

After Madonna planted false tracks from her new record

on P2P nets,

a prankster responded, hacking madonna.com

and posting MP3s of the entire album four days

before it hit the stores.

He said,

it will come again, it will awaken.

It may wear chains but it will act. He said, fantasy goddess,

the first initials were yours, both capitals,

and the second time

first letter caps then second letter lower,

then vice-versa.

Though of modest character, he had the art to calm her.

Here are the initials, he said this is what you came for.

2

Use the hard plastic body.

The lovely vinyl head, long brunette

rooted

hair in flip with possible original ribbon,

some top hair is layered but blends very well.

Vintage factory cotton print dress costume copy,

still very crisp.

Red lips, with open mouth with teeth and tongue

showing.

She still has blush on backs of her hands

and on her knees.

Black side snap shoes,

walking mechanism working well.

Blue sleep eyes with painted lashes, multistroke brows,

one slightly lighter.

Tender waist, moonlit night, perfumed garlands, meat and liquor—

glances shoot an arrow through.

3

Despite the apparent chaos,

we know whom we can trust.

The information, once decoded, is very basic,

and the triumphant plot twists inevitable.

My favourite characters tend to be female,

bright breast pixels and tiny outfits,

smart charcoal grey Prada skirt, a fitted white oxford,

delicious black cardigan,

black fishnets and ankle strap heels.

So exciting.

The corkscrew womb shot, big world weary sunglasses,

maybe a fake mole on her cheek:

the shimmering effect is formed by folding,

the lipstick blood based.

I can live with that.

4

Light exists as particles, the wave state

a suggested accumulation,

distributed across probabilities of where each particle

could be.

What is it, where is it now, this sunny day?

A woman with a birthmark on her face

approaches you, asking if you speak German.

You manage, nur ain bissen,

and she manages to convey to you

her papers have been stolen, her money.

A tourist, she says, looking dishevelled, but polite,

after every sentence, adding the German for pardon.

You know about the Mona Lisa Scam,

but the woman appears desperate.

The right thing, the Christian thing to do,

is to give her money, maybe all your money.

As if by coincidence, she allows you to see

her unique, handmade lingerie

giving proper shaping.

The birthmark seems unimportant.

Looking you directly in the eye, she produces

a gadget to photograph high voltage discharges.

She wears a retro gown.

5

My borders are diffuse.

I am invasive.

You may say that I will be removed,

and that you will make a full recovery,

that you are better for the experience.

In this womanhood, I am the scavenger, vigilant

for barbed wire and dirty needles, beating back

the smoke of rubbish fires.

Whatever crows left on the bone, I see it,

then I show it to you.

Here is the rock I pushed uphill, the one you called treasure.

Here are the men in suits

who broke into my house and chewed at my flesh.

Here are my bare legs and pelvis,

embellished with paints, the ones used to shade

my crotch, making my vagina look five centimetres

too far to the left.

Here are my eyes,

and the colours you never got right for them.

Here are my piercings, and my seventeenth birthday,

and the wall I sit against and the cup with coins in it.

And above my head

the thought bubble you drew, full

of personal regression, and your cock sliding

inside, coming to me, full of apologies.

6

The cigar thing was hot, a little non-flesh insertion.

I am not really adventurous about it,

but the Cohiba from my Cuban trip is something

I would definitely contemplate.

People collect souvenirs of their lovers all the time.

I knew a guy who carried around a fag end I’d smoked

and I never even dated him.

I have a couple of odd items like that, granted

there are no body fluids involved.

No matter how displaced we are, we are allowed

to lapse into our local accent when angry, or drunk.

The guy by the window, turning to you

slowly, saying, in this together, right?

He’s staring at a fat, naked woman

painting her toenails at her apartment window,

and you just know

she has something to do with why no one can sleep.

7

The image of me is from the late 20th century.

The photo was taken by the doctors.

I was quite capable of getting around walking on my hands,

but the doctors had different ideas.

I’ve been on this island so long

I barely remember what life was like before.

I see myself in a room, curtains blowing,

on the sideboard a broken ship-in-a-bottle,

insects, pigeon skull, waxed hydrangeas, twigs and rice paper,

in the ebonised oak frame

the image of me with the prosthetic devices.

I am the girl in pink cashmere.

Not long ago, the professor repaired the radio transmitter

using seaweed and oyster shells.

It was powered by bamboo bicycle, and filled the air

with scratches of static, voice fragments,

an army of ghosts.

When I first heard it, I heard it

the way the radio announces the weather, saying

sea air is wiping everything clean, the sky is turning,

and salt will stream across the sand— here,

where I am standing.

8

Away from the rowdy crowd, this corner

of the bar is my own confessional. My heart

is open to penetration.

From the way I sit, sipping my scotch,

I knew you’d find me.

No smalltalk, no pickup lines:

I can see you have a story to tell, your glance

cut into a million pieces.

Maybe the one about the hitchhiking ghost,

maybe the one about the bride,

the serrated blade through her trachea.

What you saw when you were three

through the keyhole, the past, warm slices of it

making you hate who you are.

Whatever it is, you can tell me,

because my heart is open to penetration.

You’ll recognise it,

wrenching upwards, a firework of blood, something living,

the way some people give other people roses.

9

You are beyond introductions.

You agree never to contact him

unless to meet in room 112, putting your lips, your tongue

across his veined eyelids.

In return, he agrees to reserve room 112

under his mother’s maiden name,

three days in advance of any rendezvous,

but usually a Thursday.

You agree that every sentence should begin,

If only…

You both agree never to lie to each other.

He said he would come back, he made a promise,

and you said you’d be waiting until the world ends.

Tailing him one night, you discover

he inserts himself secretly into another’s sleep,

into the legacy of her hair colour,

dirty blonde, come,

and the stronger smell of chocolate on her breath.

10

A train, more empty faces.

I am wearing my hair down today, the highlights

offset by the fake fur collar of my black overcoat.

The guy with the Clancy novel, leaning on the Hep C poster,

glances over to the station route map,

trying to make eye contact.

I maintain my daydream face.

I can sense him looking at my mouth, my lips,

the way I keep them open just a little.

My hand is tight around the handrail.

He’s thinking,

if he gave my hand a little kiss, I ‘d lose my balance,

miss my stop, somehow make everything his.

Like the moment the previews have ended, the screen

is black and silent for seconds

before the film starts, in those seconds

forgetting what movie I’m seeing.

On the firing range, the paper target silhouette

comes closer. Closer.

I poke my finger through the holes the rounds made.

You know, just getting the feel of things.

11

Two inch false eyelashes, droopy, sultry,

I had to tilt my head up to look in the mirror,

then realised that without half my visual field,

driving was to be done pre-lashing.

In my acupuncture class, the guy observing—

yeah, the premeditated phrases

and can name every Star Trek character by episode—

left the room, his Casio beeping to tell him

other needles were ready.

And A told me how they’d met.

He had made a big deal,

asking two women observers which male

they wanted to observe.

They both passed, not wanting to hurt his feelings.

He wrote a number on a piece of paper,

told them choose, odd or even, the other woman chose even.

He said, nope, it’s odd, guess you’re with me,

A.

We talked about how he never listens, interrupting,

insisting I describe my bowel movements.

I was wearing the lashes with my lime green skirt.

Mostly I was happy with the look.

12

In the queue, a woman with blue lips

whispered in my ear, can you describe this,

and I said, yes, I can, after these months in prison queues

in Leningrad, visiting my daughter, I can describe

the pain that is informed against,

and the whispers awakening from the trance.

For foreign visitors, other services:

the residence in an apartment,

the bodyguard,

the interpreter,

the automobile with the driver,

and the escort girl

waiting, couched in a pavilion above the waves,

her time spent watching the waves,

waiting for a ransom to be accepted.

She grows old in the house at Argos,

far from her own home, busying herself with her loom

in reverence to Apollo, the shadow of a smile crossing

the remains of her face.