You have left your hat but I do not trust it

December 2003 | back-issues, Kelley Jean White, poetry

You have left your hat, but I do not trust it.

Maybe the sky should be stormier, its color the color
of my hair. There is a door. There is a doorbell. You
don’t ring it. I could not lock the door against you
but I have let you hold a key. Perhaps there could be shaking
at the foundations. Perhaps some plaster could fall.
The windows are stuck but I have not locked them.
I pulled the shades down but they are broken and torn. I have
cut the phone wires to your house now. I saw you push
them back through the wall. I have turned to sleep
but I hear you pounding. There is lightning. It was thunder.

Midge

October 2003 | back-issues, Kelley Jean White, poetry

Midge show me the one that leaps that spirals that plummets that rises remains is lost is gone Midge show me the one that leaps that spirals that plummets that rises remains is lost is gone Midge show me the one that leaps that spirals that plummets that rises remains is lost is gone Midge…

If I have a chance I’ll show you this one thing

August 2003 | back-issues, Kelley Jean White, poetry

to peel an orange in one continuous spiral
one perfect careful stripe of orange with just a fingernail
and thumb, lay the sweet fragrance onto hands
and into the room, put the fruit
one segment at a time
into your mouth, then rewind the peel
into a perfect globe, each edge remet and fit
to its brother whole, hollow, yes, emptied, but perfect still

Handmade

August 2003 | back-issues, Kelley Jean White, poetry

Handmade Golden light on a square of overgrown grass and dandelions. I pull the shade. Yesterday in the damp night I shattered china on the porches on the walkways on the railings on the doorways on the thresholds Since I could not speak I wanted to bleed. Now that you have taken away the key…

Brickhouse Blues

August 2003 | back-issues, Kelley Jean White, poetry

Brickhouse Blues See these men out shooting craps up against the brickhouse wall, these men all shooting craps up against that brickhouse wall, hear them dice click on the pavement, see them dollars fall. Here come this little man bouncing his basketball, along come a little man, bouncing a basketball, hair all done up in…

Kelley White (2)

May 2002 | back-issues, Kelley Jean White, poetry

stones
river mud
salted straw

still I don’t grow
lean

I have a deck
and every card
is the Queen
of Hearts. I deal
my own hand
on the bedspread
solitaire
every face up
card is her
and every back
your hair.

control through feedback
-your mother-
turn into a thing
spittoon crankcase bag jug
overshoot and undershoot
bitchgoddess pantywaist
give it a name whore

S. told the guard she had been hit with a chair.