Come on Gabriele, the gal that used to chew tobacco and Spit it into an empty beer can... The gal with the deep dark-ocean eyes... The maddog gal, grip that wine glass now. For Gabriele, you smile at everyone with meaning You are as together as a feather when a hurricane is in town, And when the hangover's over and your own insight has Fragmented you from a million pieces to a billion, My stiff polar bear arms Shall poke and not embrace. I sit back at this party I am hosting-- My back firmly pushing against the back of my chair, And my head and eyes cocked. You all are the performers this time... And Gabriele, you are the main attraction, Attracted, after this night, to the omni-present sense of your Smashed self; and me-- Sensitive little me in no man's land Where no man wanted to grasp me from... And no woman-- Mended back together in thy survivalistic polar bear image. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- - Becky's Demon "Something happened. i don't have those visions anymore." And you believe with a mind like Papa believed with When i told him i could see things Clearly before they actually Were. His back and forth pacing from those same two windows-- Which had been like a toy soldier powered on a human battery With a three minute's stand at one, and then the next, Suddenly stopped. For i was different. You anointed me And cast me out. i was alone. You caused me to hide Beside a pitchfork in the shadows of the corners of the barn. Yes. Papa stopped. His eyes moved. i'd never seen his eyes move Before. They stared down at me. My child's eyes Below--and he aimed his for them as a fisher for prey in clear waters. i backed up behind the pipe of the kitchen stove.. But with one stretch he reached his arm over Like a bear's paw that in force comes down like a Redwood. my knee aching as if broken, i crutched up From the other side of the room, beside the door.... Then, bending on my knees the next conscious second-- Feeling the blood of knee caps sticking to hay and dirt-- Seeing the sun poke like sticks through rafters and cobwebs-- Thinking i grabbed a hold on the sunlight which could Lift me Up like a rope; but grasping the pitchfork-- Raising the pitchfork-- Pitching the pitchfork-- After hearing the creaking and scraping of the opening barn door Plowing The top soil of the dry earth. Thinking: he would never kill my shadowy corner.