Dreams

I was an ice baby. / I turned to sky blue. / My tears became two glass beads. / My mouth stiffened into a dumb howl. / They say it was a dream / but I remember that hardening. // My sister at six / dreamt nightly of my death: / “The baby turned to ice. / Someone put her in the refrigerator / and she turned as hard as a Popsicle.” // I remember the stink of the liverwurst. / How I was put on a platter and laid / between the mayonnaise and the bacon. / The rhythm of the refrigerator / had been disturbed. / The milk bottle hissed like a snake. / The tomatoes vomited up their stomachs. / The caviar turned to lava. / The pimentos kissed like cupids. / I moved like a lobster, / slower and slower. / The air was tiny. / The air would not do. // * * * // I was at the dogs’ party. / I was their bone. / I had been laid out in their kennel / like a fresh turkey. / This was my sister’s dream / but I remember that quartering; / I remember the sickbed smell / of the sawdust floor, the pink eyes, / the pink tongues and the teeth, those nails. / I had been carried out like Moses / and hidden by the paws / of ten Boston bull terriers, / ten angry bulls / jumping like enormous roaches. / At first I was lapped, / rough as sandpaper. / I became very clean. / Then my arm was missing. / I was coming apart. / They loved me until / I was gone.