Words And Breath
WORDS AND BREATH
I: Suzanne
There is a story I tell.
It starts the summer you came to visit from Arkansas,
long-time friend of my parents.
You stayed a week, swam
in the river, clambered up
Battle Rock with me.
You and your woman lover.
That summer they say
the county sheriff beat
a hitchhiker to death, a thin
white man with long
hair and a guitar, then laughed
the work faggot all over town.
I watched my parents
grow tight and silent:
the word lesbian
hovered and fell.
Showed you
the muskrat den, the best
blackberry bramble,
wanted you to live with me
in my river valley.
You waited until our house slept,
milky way bright across
the sky, to hold hands, follow
curve of collarbone and hip,
voices so full of Arkansas.
II: Main Street
I left that valley, found
women in the city - touch
and taste, words and breath -
walked the streets as if
they were logging roads.
But when I go back to visit,
Main Street from the Laundromat
to Pitch's Tavern, past
the Kar Kare Klinic, called
the KKK, the women at the bank
still know me.
Their husbands
are fishermen, pull crab pots
and fill their boats with red
snapper and ling cod when
the salmon aren't running.
I watch at the post office,
pottery guild, Sentry's Market,
wait for a lesbian to walk in,
flannel shirt worn
at the elbows, thin
silver about her neck.
Once I went with friends
to the Two Finger's Bar,
an hour north. Sunday is
queer night, only the loggers
wanted a fight. We danced,
careful, not too close, tried
to ignore their taunts,
left after a single beer.
III: River Rock
Put an end to your wait: drive into
the rain-drenched hills. The radio
speaks machine gun fire,
two women, their double-wide
trailer, the metal walls speckled
with holes. Only one of them died. Drive
beyond the familiar clear cuts.
Find the logging town, rickety
as your own, where the woman
who bags your groceries
will smile and draw a map.
Trees gray green
in the winter light, you will find
the women you have waited for.
Faces worn and clear, hair spiked
short, old smell of red cedar
and garlic, they will lean into each other.
Stay a month, hike
the logging roads, split
firewood, and sleep alone.
Over dinner, tell stories
solid as river rock.
By Elizabeth Clare