PART 2. (see below-)

The "(1)" are meant to be superscripts.

The Electric Birds

The creamy slips of
the Sunday ads
spilling from the dollar
Gazette remind me
of Bisquick pancakes
and raw alkaline
cores
of peaches forced
passed the tongue
like cold cough
syrup spoons.

Wires grid air
into new Enumeration
Districts, electric
birds
trapeze singers
welcome me home(1)

-where in the closet behind the stale wool coat is still that plastic bag stretched out like a faded tank top. Tentacles spill from the hems of scrap plaid cotton the same starch texture as the first time I wore a strapless dress in the mirror behind the door and then in the reflection of his red hatchback that could have been stolen from a funhouse, and he liked that dress so much it ripped under his snarky foaming smirk I misunderstood for a smile.

(1)The first summer I
lived alone in the
city I wore nothing
but old tank tops
and underpants on
the hottest weekends
of July while the oven
heated for Bisquick
biscuits I kneaded
with my own
agile fingers made
for pens. Peaches
were a commodity
then that I didn’t
have to swallow
with the charcoal
biscuits and tablespoons
of dollar
marmalade
while watching cars
parallel park
from the sitting sill
of my bedroom window.

I’d listen to the electric
birds on wires strung
parallel from each
other, cutting the air
in shallow slits
and the birds take
steep plunges, spilling
into the street
below.