January 12-19, 2004: Rachel McKibbens and Sabrina Hart

Rachel McKibbens and Sabrina Hart

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Bio (auto)

Rachel McKibbens is originally from Orange County She has been on the Long Beach/Orange County poetry slam team for three consecutive years After getting hitched, she hightailed it to New York where she resides in Brooklyn Heights with two rad kids and an amazingly patient husband.

The following work is Copyright © 2004, and owned by Rachel McKibbens and may not be distributed or reprinted in any form whatsoever without written permission from the author.

The Pacifier it soothed and mocked my shape as a fever rang through you like an angry bell, and you sucked that mother-hoax my breasts, too hot and suffocating, hardened, full of abandoned milk I tried to pluck it from your mouth when your eyelids seemed still enough, but your arms would startle into reaching, your jaw clamped young and strong it had been years since a breast hung above me, heavy and desperate for my mouth I imagined my mama, lying on her side that first night teetered by so much milk as I rolled her body down to my ankles and stepped into this world father told me how she’d tease, rubbing her nipple across my lip until my head whipped toward it she’d pull back and laugh as I wagged my empty mouth, rooting for her tough, sweet skin sometimes it wasn’t a nipple at all; she’d graze my cheek with her knuckle or a lousy finger, haunting my dumb and helpless face that’s how I learned the difference between women and mothers that’s when I knew what I wanted to be.

Sabrina Hart
AspiringVenus@aol.com

November Visit I have her memory in November Undressing in her closet Showing me her spine When she is naked She pads unceremoniously to bed Teeth chattering or hissing — I can never tell Complaining of the cold Half-covering her body with her hands I imagine us years from now Not nearly so modest in our undressing When she strips, it will be with her breasts to me, And even then I will be unable to keep my eyes from falling to them Time will work grooves into us Instead of telling her that she is beautiful, I will ask her how work was She will shrug into bed and offer me her back to scratch We will be words without sound I have yet to decide if this is Love Or being too comfortable with someone to know the difference But I’ve got a memory of November Her undressing in the closet Unceremoniously stepping out of her panties To sleep beside me naked It is Love now, I think, And I haven’t forgotten to admire her beauty out loud Phone Call “I made myself come twice,” You confess to me daringly Talking of steam and our initials On mirrors in the bathroom You write for me and read it And it is only testimony to your greatness For you are so much more the poet Than I will ever be We laugh over these lines of long distance And there is a lightness in your heart I have not felt in a long, long time Something that tells me just maybe We’ve got the time to do it all over again This is a new start Like we were a new start Beginning again with the lessons we’ve reaped We could brave a million things this way –Trial and error, you know– And it would be fine What is all this rush for? I have to ask myself in the shower Stepping out to find I’ve left our initials In the steaming glass Where it occurs to me that I know exactly How you came and why That there should never be anything more important Than you or I or our bodies This love for one another and all those things We lose when time pulls our priorities backwards And I’ve got your voice on a long distance line Telling me you came twice in a bath We’ve been together For longer than we think