the bones | by Joey Gould

                              for July

Next to a ribcage she read
from the book of dead birds.
Maybe it was a whale jaw
& she read from a museum.
She’s a museum of tarot
a bookshelf of good advice.
No-one else stood a chance
next to those slate bones.
She could break bones, in case
of emergency break the glass
to summon her from tea,
from staring at a blade of grass.
Obliged like promising to keep
Sabbath: thankfulness. Obliged 
like waving pedestrians to safely go.
Oblige all the first-period students
to write an ode, teaching
Joseph’s dream to them stars,
all tapping anxious implements
on the laminate. When I forget 
how to poem she whispers: ulna,
femur, tarsal. Whip up some
sinews, gurl. She’s on a plane
clacking keys, she’s exhuming
rare tulip bulbs. Her greenhouse
like a snapshot of Flevoland,
windmills spinning, rows & rows
of flowers for bones. The glasses 
of water by the bay windows 
in the small houses 
clean & the bone chimes
toll in the distance.