POETRY / JULY/AUGUST 2024
Love Letter to My Recent Poems
BY ELLIE SAWATZKY
Published 6:30, July 26, 2024
To whom I owe my florid Google searches:
bougainvillea, Ravel’s Bolero, heart anatomy,
Syros wildflowers, synonym for vulva,
cathedral. Cat years, goat symbolism,
theremin invention. I conceived
sinfully and you bluesed out of me
like triplet mutts, like a family
of four-handed brains. I fed you saganaki
and Nina Simone songs so you wouldn’t
leave me, escorted you to frescoed vaults
of historical pain where you each lit
a stick of incense. You: sage. You:
tobacco. You: sunburnt skin. And me:
black coffee. You wouldn’t sit still
during the vigil, bobbled like gasoline-
blistered water, shilly-shallied like liquored-up
kittens on a cruise ship. You refused to go slow,
close your eyes, sing. I had to hound you
down the aisles, apologize to the Reverend Lady
of Post-Christian Spiritual Pursuits before
a warbling congregation of pigeons, and retreat,
disgraced, to the nursery. I gave you
what you needed so you could stand
on your twelve soft hands, but you wanted more
from me. While I was asleep, sixty fingers
fondled the pages of my diary,
and I dreamed I was flying into the
CENTRE OF THE UNIVERSE—
white block letters like the Hollywood sign—
where my own mother was waiting for me. I’m sorry,
she said, for being ashamed of you. I was trained
to be secretive and lovely. I’m like any mother,
I love and hate you. You’re too pretty, too
plain, too much like me. It’s embarrassing
what I had to do to make you. She was crying,
I was searching around for a soft leaf,
then I started to belay back to my body, flicker awake,
many dirty fingers dabbing at my wet face.
I was trained to be secretive and lovely. I’m like
any mother, I love and hate you, and I want
to give you everything.
