We Make Still No Shapes but Silhouettes

Katy Chrisler

 

From bed, what we hear is an imprecise ocean.

This place between sleep and fever keeps our table still.

I cannot feel your fragile bones. Dawn, again.

Still muscle beneath skin, masked by latitudes and when

it grows suddenly quiet we might then be generous to each other.

In me, I carry a road that snakes. Two different pale forms.
The paperwhite narcissus, a worn keeping of my maiden name.
Given what ritual wants us to do, how do we find our way?

I have a confession—all I think of are tombs. A map splits

away from the body. A physical object snags. Sharp tongue

of beige in the kitchen. A chair. A carcass. A room. Draw
together with me now. What wound can be decorated?

We’ll deal with much more than bones. All night

a still life of eggs and lemons waits for light.

 

 

 

Thieves and Friends

Katy Chrisler

 

Assembled quinella

a subterranean drum shift
sure nuff left jargon of

her seeming like you

her seeming partly keel

to backlash. Act accordingly
or adorably. We, naked.
We, idiotic and her seeming
like you. Only moonpulled
obstacles gather like

shape shaped things lawn.
This is different than

sitting in a graveyard

at night but not

by much.

 

 

 

The Future the Future and Doves

Katy Chrisler

 

I want to have my portrait done.
Myself alone, holding a mild pear
been spit from my mouth. I live
in too many rooms. In too many truths
told by habit.
              Sea                      corpse

      Loud            mouth
What frost would freeze
the fruit into bonewhite
heirlooms? A note found
in the garden. You and I
are getting through days
by accident beneath a collection
of roofs.

              Tree                      slip

      Moon            bulge
With stories of dirt, stories
of hunt behind your left eye,
This is how I want to die.
The drawn out sound
of my name. Until you are tired
what you own is never yours.

 
 

Katy Chrisler received her MFA from the Iowa Writers’ Workshop and has held residencies with the Land Arts of the American West and 100 West Corsicana. Recent work of hers has appeared or is forthcoming in Tin House, Octopus Magazine, The Volta, and The Seattle Review. She currently lives and works in Austin, Texas.