"Shut up," he explains

By god, his mouth’s
on the truth box. Again

I don’t mind it. When
my veins knock like radiators
before landlords,

I hear a new
push and object: women
stuck in door jambs,

the squeeze of young
headbands. His rusted
wrists could cut out

the death of me until
I rushed it all away on

ourselves and a broken

vehicle. "Excuse me,"
he sighs and bends out
the want of it, "your body

is on the floor; and I am

tired because your eyes
do not burn but do not
get enough of me." The snow

is for looks, the heater is
in a buzz and will not still.

1979--A Trailer Park Snaps

Clothes hang on a tree,
upside-down skirts for all
the neighbors to see. A box
near trampled corn. I burn
our bread; he eats the smoke.
My flaking portrait, still
on his tongue. The window
swings open, half-light. We
steal thrills in the corner
mouths. Like split husks
at dawn, our hearts laid down.

Here Lies Nicole Kidman

She has failed us; she
had stretched brevity
too far. She had grown
so thin, we could only
catch her in the fiercest
spotlight. She moved
like a shard of glass,
kicked along wooden
floors. Her skin, a slight veil
between us and what will
come after. Her eyes,
green as the ring
around an exit wound.

Preserve us, oh Lord. Keep us
all in the hall below celluloid
and soil. When the great door
of her temple is rolled aside,
the world will smell of roses
again, a halo will find its way
to the back of our tongues.

The Defenestration of Juliette Lewis

See her plunge; see her
fold and unfold, a reticent moth.
Far be it for Juliette to be overworked

by the crowds that march
to her palace, by men who wish
to lie under her open

window. Her banshee wail
will break the stars apart
tonight. Her stomach

will ripple with the prayers,
pursed mouths, bare palms
of bystanders. But the sill is

a sliver between worlds; unbelievers
gather at the northern gates
when she steps to dancing

curtains. Below, dogs shake
and whinny, yes whinny, with
the promise of golden blood.

---

Heather Overby is a writer living in Somerville, MA.   She recently graduated from Emerson College in Boston, and is currently applying to MFA programs.   Her work has appeared in Gangsters in Concrete.