Four Poems by Whitney Waters

Extraterrestrial

June bugs swarm the grass like a platoon
of drunk helicopters. Metallic jade,
oil slick. When their bodies ricochet
from my forehead, my chest, they fly
on as if we didn’t touch, as if one being
is the same as the next, all one swirling
cacophony. Alien ship, alien skin.
How unburdened they are
in flight. Behind the wing
of my shoulder, a recurring pinch, knife
that slices clean to the other side
some days. My only relief is for my love
to dig his thumb into the edge of the blade,
one pain alleviating the other. The muscle’s slide
and recoil. How badly we want to be pressed
into where it most hurts.
                                               Most days I cry
at little things— the Olympics, podcasts,
pop songs, the fact that night comes
on earlier and earlier as August closes.
I watch the women’s marathon—hours
of arms and limbs shimmering with effort
and elation—and when one woman bursts
forth in the last minute, dodges
the elbow, breaks the tape, I think
this is what it means to disregard
pain for flight, and I’m all teary as if
I’m the one who’s won something. Here
is my body— common, earthbound.
This world is abundant in disaster.
Drape me in iridescence. Make me that green.

*

Letter to the Daughter I Don’t Have

I don’t want you afraid of this world. I don’t want you to fear men or copperhead bites or AK 47s or dark parking garages or cancer. I don’t want you careful. I want the bad things of the world to ricochet off you like you’re made of steel. I don’t want you made of steel. I want you riverwater. I want you sunny 70 degree days. I want you oceans and orcas and hawksbill turtles and red wolves. I want you feeding the sea turtles salad. I want you reveling fresh-picked blackberries. I want you swimming through coral reefs and florescent blue fish. Did you know more than 90% of coral reefs are expected to die in my lifetime? I want you to call out of work to watch ducks dive and reemerge. I want you to quit your job. I want you to have truly great sex. I don’t want you to know you’ll never exist. That you had a chance to exist, but I eliminated it. Or how many other animals soon won’t exist. This is not an apology. Forgive me. I don’t want you small and fragile. I don’t want you suckling or tottering. I don’t want the bulbous belly, my skin pulled taught over your own. The morning sickness. My insides tearing open. The sleepless nights. The heavy breasts. I like my breasts as they are, small pale slopes. I want you to know you have a name, a secret name I call you in my head. And perhaps, I want you to tell me that it isn’t scary not to exist. That it’s not dark there.

*

My mother would have loved feeding you her deviled eggs

and you would have loved eating them— southern style,
insides milky buttercups sprinkled with paprika, cradled
in her handmade blue ceramic platter— how proud

she was of that platter, how it matched her kitchen.
She would have delighted at how many you scarfed down,
would send you home with all the leftovers—

potato cheese casserole, country ham and biscuits, asked
what can I fix you and you sure you had enough? She’d refill
your glass with anything you wanted, sweet tea,

whiskey, wine. My mother would have loved your appetite
for southern cooking, for butter and meat, everything her daughter
did not would not touch. She would not have to ask what can I make

that you’ll eat, because you would gladly eat everything
she heaped on your plate. She would have said so tall
so handsome those shoulders why didn’t you bring

this one home sooner? Sooner—the word that echoes back
at me, and I want to answer, longer. Let’s stay out here longer—
we’ll sit on the back porch in the suspended evening,

the hummingbirds will sip sweet nectar, the magnolias
will bloom, the September sky will be blameless.
My plate, still full. I’ve asked for too much.

*

Resourceful Woman

         She is also just a very good, plain, resourceful woman.
         – Sylvia Plath on “Lady Lazarus”

My mother was on the cusp
of forty, and I was ten when
I found her lying stiff
on the bed in the light
of the lampshade,
her featureless face, fine-lined, teeth
straight and full of fillings, vomit-stained
white bowl and bottle of pills
on the nightstand, her chest, rounded
and hard as a seashell—

I did not call
anyone.

I snapped shut,
crept back down
the carpeted stairs.
My father called her sister
and I overheard
an accident.

There was no spectacle,
just murmurings. I’m certain
he never knew I knew.

How many times had it been?

Married to her high school sweetheart,
the quarterback, did she feel trapped
as pearls clasped around her slender
neck? The girl in her yearbook,
a smiling, identical woman
in a cheerleading uniform.

She didn’t manage it—

not that time. And two decades later,
I’m sure it was an accident
of the heart. The machine that forgot
to beat for her. She was asleep and stayed
that way. This time, she meant to sleep.
No theatrics. No comeback.

*

Whitney Waters is a poet and educator living in Asheville, NC. She teaches writing at Western Carolina University and teaches workshops through the Great Smokies Writing Program. Her poems have been published in Penumbra, The Shore, About Place Journal, Twelve Mile Review, and elsewhere. She holds an MFA from the MFA Program for Writers at Warren Wilson College. You can find her on Instagram @whitneywaters.poet.