Selvedge
After Theresa Hak Kyung Cha and Lynne Procope
by Barbara Jane Reyes

She is yes. Angel, shrapnel. What is all mimicking heart. With pain of disaster come again life- like and protrude unto herself. Bring under, upward, the utter. Thirsty is so eyes, so in, and the back of heaven, break. Take. She, light mortar escapes. She, pressure, and thick. Above her and bare. One she, she rapidly the pause. Bright? Thicker she would become, she rooted it, the waiting. Stopping skin festers preparation. An it to deliberation. Slow and before expanding tightly in is when the air, provocation. Passed her. Herself caught in and one. Tilting one barren seize to measure. Both her. Now. Of names, anything at pitch. Becomes tears in the wound, liquid, nude-come-shots, and singing, as we. Marlboro wine, fresh in glass jars; now she glows upon hair once hung heavy in her eyes undone, exposing one, one at offerings river, whose warm humid nights many times. Star maiden. Is the first man, father windstorm pestilence all wanting. And from bend, she pulls, she is a window. When he who is lower, might she pause punctuation. Last to all thick, the just, its once more. The it. Sink a pause. Inside, on punctuation. From her with cavities, a head than the back of the night, her pain already itself, pushing out words. Make in the drink. This strength would trail, she would then gather it. Sight, say. Larger still. Is again, hips. She is slight, the song into the it. Slow. The faithless made are you, as is words. Others. The undone? To arrive parting her, cannot stop a hiss, not contain dissolving and even. Uppermost sides begin her, sticky, rested. The times. Swollen. The in all out, in through swarm. She, her ribcage, leaves the tobacco rolled and bound with brandy, eyes, we, fine fingers have known no. Taken a falling maiden. Our mothers she is, for she would not, into hunter her lips, she is the first woman, his wolf who winds whirls. We would, bring fire, around which we all. Lover, a shark is his echo still. She waits with when, her neck motion, the moisture. The inside, deliver it. Deliver. The all, the amplification, will from, the against, the tumorous utterance. The her, her of layer. The relay. Lip would lift flesh. The spill it. From do. In its sound? This say. To dust.

* * *

Must. With groan, her. Part. At and what, she and moon. Come the well. Resemble upwards, one burning virgin. The all, the captured, not blue, empty her, shoulder her, any through the uttering. Hers now. Dares the air. Once. The singing. Taste entire falling. A she to destroy, to before, meant to, and for traces from weight. Pause. Hollow of moving downward, closing in trill, carried voice, a body’s in from huts’ rafters. Sunned and taut; in her jagged neckline, her rough woven white, we dare not say, index finger to her lips, she has ribbons and bows. Feeds stone and confession. The place from which, when he tree branches a road, a fragrance lifting from a wanting. The entire she, skin, river and of, like shoulders; she, dazed to together, to the waist, the tears from this which pours speech. In the know, public and slowed, slower this — an again. Again; of the time, of pause. When takes. She, invoking. Enfold it evenly from how. Takes theirs. She relays the first born occupying. Inside the must, void. Her head, pressing it just, the whole takes her refueling itself. Place of their same, from pain to this. Noise, original place. She in gulps, not to augments. Drone, does within, the it murmurs. She, avaricious, she sings backwards, until in, no and this, through attention, she dares. But to remain from below, a we blue, label, cartons. Once palm, now Spanish hung, is her dancing blade, to her waistline. Now its fathers lament, have from the hunt, from filled, arrived. And then she, poisoned land. And he of black in his throat. The the of word. Them to her. Beloved. The white discovery she is, she this, this hard pain against again in her body. There, thing come, comics, call, expel, all under from familiar. Inside the end of river mouth. Utter of a fertile hesitates, just it, tree of come, singing. Her mouth, co-eds, captured-live, does downward. Hers. Slow, approach distance fury, again it. Hers as who. She cavities air.

* * *

The complete, the wait, the to, a to, there in preparation, absorb break. To it she her voids. Position. Pain to speak. She others. In all might soon. Just is air, it upon, she the breath falling from. To demarcations. Until might. Endless be her what inside. The more autonomous. Self-generating. A call, shrill bird arms around tight. We drop fields. Elders, the face of in her eyes, wristbones so delicate as shoulder. She firelight, though husband, a bird of prey, our swoon under slivers of moon, gazing, the has. And he enters. And he eyes the immediacy. This single page, the stillness. And then she of his eyes admits others, excesses, allows her jaw imperceptibly, last efforts. Give open. That lips echo. Distances to say theirs, to very above eyes, says nothing. It last wills head. Flood to the voice, wraps breaking from her. She, their tongue, she would of others horny-virgin, all. Pout taking in, excites the bits, torn accuracy, each her smoke, regret come, head her, her hand, captured to thing. Always. Come imperative; of motion, shifting thick. Time, she of the throat, end in poets. Her. Offering. Now? Who, to, in ends. Alive, behind, room, skull, the empty same motion, this season’s thickness. From weighted draw stops, there might. To slowly. Upwards. Herself, begging. The come, so she upon air, as though gin baskets, salted fish bundle woman, whose skin is wide tresses, now exposing earlobes and blouse, the night’s call, her with serenade. Raising one in a shhh of stars, arranged a bamboo blossom, and she opens her body, whites of a feast vessel, a fork in the tangerine skin. Typhoon. Gravity. The immediacy. Weight has come. The now. All the below, pebble lumps come, speech swallows her. Toward further. Rising inside the slowed. To deliberation, to make, make the attempt her. The service begins from then, the breath, another belong. She, the pain that wishes to her, to gather inside.

* * *

Now night, the liken, murmurs the moment. Now. Is world, would speak. She, burning this, gestures with that, her how, their resorts, back look, come, is yet, skin. Their window and this. The to is cage, shoes all motion near, lift, herself. This elevate upward. Begins all burning her. Complete a movement, again; punctuation. She waits, gasps from of, to the again, on. Once front of warm, once brought her abaca; now we bring, hawk gaze, if field or farmwork. She has own in, she snares others, they could not marry. Them. She scoffs smoke curls from faraway and now baring her breasts to discover she is a woman who calls her silken breath. She, the gatherer. And ever is she a woman, this near-perceptible, even sound. She is resolve. She, one time and speaking. Is. To bury? Look, breathing her, bared not come known, still her. But turning, look how shell comes stretches, kingdom of bark. This mouth again. The approach. This woman falls, permits watches, comes, takes. Hand. Recitation. Evocation. To breathe. Say. There. Takes the come. Greater time weight, contracting motion. The then. Pause them. Now delivery. Layers, their threading, anonymously earth in such a full. Voice. Assign. Since some thing. Not sings, mimics, allows, begins, and all releases more. Digital camera, electric away. Not say. Free. Center the to, make the womb. Come. She swallows. Bring her tobacco when we could wrap our weaving. Old, but this firelight. We see sharp, we see sky. Polished bone clasp is young in our grandmothers’ whisper. Her. She confesses to the verses of lovers, her eyes are soil, word grows. And he enters. Enters. The prism and then the rustle of ocean before an and.

Other poems by Barbara Jane Reyes in ActionYes #2:
she laments unnumbered losses
(t)here (the exile's new song)
Eve Speaks
Eve Speaks 2