ISABELLE DOYLE


                                     



ON THE ROAD




When we get our periods, what comes out are moths black as plums. They overwhelm the skyscrapers, eat all the fruits and vegetables, strawberries and rutabagas, storms and seeds, blot out the sun. We have to keep changing cities, bumping in covered wagons across cobblestones overrun with moss. We hide paper money in bonnets, tuck coins into berthas, travel past beargardens and spiderwebs hanging like canopies from magnolia trees. Crumbs of moonin our bright teeth. We eat salted bread,suck stone flowers. We wear white socks and watch the rain wash away the tracks of the wolves who follow the moths crawling and leaping through shining thighs, wash away the tracks of the dogs who sing and foam in the wake of our weightless bodies. When we open our mouths there are toads crouching on our tongues, pronouns falling like feathers from our lips. We drink stone water from stone pitchers with stone sips. We’re all silver, sleeping in the street together: we areall wrapped around each other, each hair on a body a piece of armor for another. When we stop to rest, the fog crawls down. We skin the pigs. There will never be enoughmeatto sustain us. We will never reach our final destination. We will crawl on inelegant knees into a sugar-free twilight, until our hips exhale light, until our skins quit quivering. Until we feel right.





TYPO 30