poems by rachel kellum
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Thank Queer Eye for the Recipe And Spray with Lemon
Halved, tossed with garlic
Bacon grease, salt and pepper
Brussels sprouts don’t fart.
Babylonian Bazaar
The striped vegetable stalls
of the mountain street market
aren’t full of home grown vegetables
but stones men find in cave pockets
to polish and suitably sell where people
don’t bother to brush their hair
or properly corral proud nipples
before wandering the town square.
Most Saturdays I come here to pause
over tables dotted with wire-wraps
of rose quartz, bloodstone, turquoise,
the solid, nervine promises of lapis
lazuli—muse of ancient blue glaze—
but my bare throat is no Ishtar’s Gate.
2019
Elephant Cloud Gallery
Crows and honey comb,
Rothko, faceless floating man:
Paintings can’t agree.
2019
First Throw
Red mud cup on the wheel.
Your first. Slice it off with wire.
It dries. Note the bottom crack.
Damn. Change your plans.
Feed it to electric fire. Shrink.
Think coffee size, get tea.
Glaze it like an earth or sky
With your sloppiest thought.
Only for your hands. This cup.
Tiny planter? Better. Tequila.
Drink from the bottom seep.
Dream wabi sabi silver seam.
2019
Invisible Dog
When the day goes grey
my invisible dog gets antsy.
No one but me hears him bark,
frantic, while I slip on boots,
smiling at his silly grammar.
I take him off leash. He knows
the eleven-minute loop
by heart, is actually walking me.
Twitching toward coyote,
mountain lion, wild cat,
domestic dog, brown bear:
holy scat. All to the nose,
none to the lifted leg,
are sacrosanct.
He’s no ghost.
This pinyon church
in which we live,
his scented domain.
God’s favorite dog.
When we return,
I appear alone.
My husband doesn’t know
while we watch the screen,
invisible, my dog sits pretty,
watching me, hunting my eyes,
tongue panting gratitude and hope
for another go. I don’t.
2019
Self Portrait as Hydra
I slash at my own heads.
One lost, two gained.
Always budding.
Beast of Hera,
Barely visible to the naked eye.
When Sun is in Cancer,
My heads are near.
If disturbed, I contract.
Cut me into pieces: I rebuild.
Never a set number of heads.
Some say seven, some nine,
Others one hundred.
Only one is immortal. Guess.
I reproduce on my own
Unless conditions are harsh:
Winter, poor food.
I reach out for a mate.
One man’s morbid task.
They called him Hercules
But killers are weak.
The strong man lets me live, finds
My singular immortality
Loving me.
I live forever under
The right circumstances,
See without eyes,
Sting in response to light,
Align with moons:
Charon, ferryman of
Forgetfulness.
Align with Nix.
Non-zero.
My tiny eccentricity.
Larger than Pluto’s
Smallest moons,
Smaller than Styx.
Invertebrate capable of great
Contraction, still I reach
Through fresh water,
Digest what is whole,
Regenerate.
Stopped up in one place,
I burst forth in another.
2019