page 214

Self Portrait With Family Tree

They pull my puppet limbs to twitching
back to the horse thief, the baker, the witch killer, the judge.
Panting from nipping the tip of my tail I hang my pointed hat.
They were the dog and they were the dog eat dog,
and some of them died virgins and some of them died trying,
and some of them ate nothing and said they were stuffed,
and some of them ate crow all night and woke with feathers
between their molars and hollow bones beneath their beds.
If this house caught fire I'd grab my red boots and the chess set
with the chewed-up queen. This morning my mother called
to tell me the one about the interrupting starfish but couldn't
finish as the punch line was her open hand,
palm and all five fingers on my face.