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lamcilroy@comcast.net

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October

Somewhere in central Florida
my father lies buried, and with him
a fair part of my changing heart
milling restless in the soil
of that hot state, its crab
grass and sand so unlike Pittsburgh -
leaves ripe with the will
to scatter and fall

If I could, I would bring him home,
back to the chill morning
that hoisted him up telephone poles
as a Bell lineman, hovering in a harness
above the street, leaning against
the sky like a casual visitor. He knew
which wires to cut, where to find
a weak connection.

At night, beneath an old Plymouth
he would work, slim and angular
with scoured blue eyes, skin rugged
and worn as I stood still in the damp
garage air - the smell of oil, the backward
silence of the October night claiming
its place between my breath
and the concrete floor. Dressed

in pajamas and without prayers,
I held the caged lantern light
so he could see, his knuckles
chapped and scraped
as he forced a piece of metal
into place and waved me closer,
greased the base of the thing
that would make the car run.
Then lighting a cigarette and wiping
the grease from his hands,
he slipped the denim jacket over
my shoulders, shut out the light,
wandered off to a warmer place.

October was first published in the Eclectic Literary Forum (ELF)

The Lottery

Five cops, five of them,
converge to frisk the black boy
at the checkout. He's fifteen,
maybe sixteen - corn-rowed hair
and baggy jeans - the look
on his face the same I wear
going through airport security
when my steel wing tips
set off the alarm,
like this is just the way things are.
Except he's not flying anywhere
and no one likes his thin-eyed shrug
when they tell him to step away
from the register,
spread his legs, his arms,
like a dark pigeon
in a public square.
And I wonder if he's caught,
if he knifed someone, stole a fifth,
if the sharp silky angle
of his cheek bones
might cut me, if he takes
what he wants.
Is he thinking about hate,
what he could do with a gun?

I've got my copy of People
as the manager points
and the cops with their pants
tucked in their boots, come up
short. He's hiding nothing.
No knife, No gun.
And it looks like he's paid
for what he's got: chips and pop
And the girls - maybe his friends,
his sisters - just keep talking,
roll their eyes when the head cop
mutters a warning and onlookers
look away, search for Advantage
Cards, pay with a VISA.

And the cashier,
a black woman
who never once looked up,
she's watching as the cops
follow him out.
I'm watching as the cops
follow him out.
Everyone's watching as the cops
follow him out.
She shakes her head, I smile
and bag my own stuff,
keeping my change in hand
to stop and buy a lottery
ticket on my way out.

The Lottery is from the chapbook, Gravel.

The Shrinking of Pittsburgh

I'm waiting for the day
I don't love you anymore
and I suspect it will come
quietly, the way we
stopped calling
and just looked away.

I've seen you walk
up the wrong side
of the street and I've
walked down the other,
showing my indifference,
hoping you'd notice.

I've heard people say
that Pittsburgh is a really
small town. It's getting smaller,
I swear, each time we pass.

Siesta

I do errands early
on a day this hot,
putting the groceries
away before noon
cutting lemons,
arranged on a
plate like a sun
burst. I wear my wide
brimmed hat and tip
it back with the first
shot of Cuervo.

In this wooden
chair I read thin
books, the flat boards
of the porch
scorched and dry,
the way I imagine
it is in Arizona
or New Mexico -
there, the heat is un-
beatable and young
men grow skin
like leather to protect,
squinting occasionally
at the horizon
between swallows
of beer.

Now it is two,
and three lemons
are left. The line
of sun cuts the tips
of my toes, makes
my eyes crackle
like two thin leaves.
Turning the page
I find a note
in the margin
about forgiving
and rise to brush
the salt from my lap.

Love Isn't Enough

All around the city the girls are starving
and the boys nap through dinner in bar
room booths. The clatter of platters echoes
as mothers serve heartache and the dog
gnaws her paw in the pantry.

In back, the fathers mount up, saddled
and sandwiched with bits of dried meat
in their pockets. Parched to the spleen
they fill their canteens with just enough juice
to keep their lips moist and hearts dry

on the hard ride to the home of the mistress
and her bony children waiting for beef jerky
and a taste of family life. "It's all gone spoiled,"
the woman says to her therapist on the verge
of a breakthrough, "And I'm hungry all of the time."

"Love Isn't Enough" was originally published in
The Emily Dickinson Award Anthology, 1998

Big Brain

This extra twenty pounds
is my brain getting bigger
everyday - things you can't know
in your small-boned frame. Slim
is not a word you would use
to describe me, though I can fake
waif on call, like a doll
with three answers for everything:
"Yes," "I will," and "It's my fault."

I take off my shirt and you say
my breasts are much larger
than you imagined. Just imagine
if you could open my skull,
what a heap would fall
in your lap and anchor you
there till I was done talking.
Boulders of rebel thought
weighing you down, an avalanche
of fantastic reason that could
bury you alive.

Truth is not this heavy,
but the seeking of truth
is like a grand piano on the back
of a stooge, wavering, balancing,
moving forward with pain
and awkward gestures
in a comedy of elephants.
Even I am laughing as I stumble,
my neck quivering beneath
the ever-growing load
of day-old wisdom.

And therein lies the beauty
of this big brain o' mine.
No hat can contain it,
no beast can tame it.
It is fat with acceptance,
bulging with desire,
refusing narrow spaces,
the walls of skin and bone.

Goodbye, Valentine

I have begged the angels
to appear, calling
out through fevered
skies, sins revisited
and halos half-cocked -
I can hear them whispering
that this is only practice.

I have asked them
to come on Sundays
when loneliness
takes its bath,
emerging clean
and vital. Naked,
a little girl, she drips
and picks the scab
from her knee;
like last week
and next week
it bleeds again.

Today Michelangelo
says a prayer,
alone on the scaffolding
high in the air:
when the angels rise -
flushed cheeks
and open jackets -
that he might put away
his red paint
having finished the heart.

"Goodbye Valentine" was originally in
Another Chicago Magazine, 1997.

 All poems are from Rare Space.
© All Copyright, Leslie Anne Mcilroy.
All Rights Reserved. Printed By Permission.