I was your wife for Halloween.

I wore a wig of spitting firecrackers,

packed a sandcastle to my chest,

lacquered my stomach with honey,

wrapped my hips in sliced fruit,

twined alphabets down my legs.


I knew your bedroom closet

bulged with vacuum cleaners

stomaching the dust

you sucked from stars.

You knew I was a risk.


I walked a lady’s coat upstairs,

lifted a vacuum, ran outside—

almost to the forest. You caught me

dizzy in the lemongrass, a cracked filter

in my lap like a honeycomb

throbbing with silver bees.