The Wardrobe’s Best Dressed: My Tarantella by Jennifer Martelli

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Anniversary

A mouth just bloodied.
—Sylvia Plath, “Poppies in July”

1.
A year ago this summer, I grew
Genovese basil in a fake clay pot I’d move around my home to follow

the arc of direct sunlight. I’ve thought of Kitty Genovese for a long
                time: her mouth.
How easy it is to open a mouth

anywhere, to split it & split it. I can’t love what I don’t fear.

2.
For my “Plath’s ‘Poppies in July’ Party,” I bought fake rubies shaped
                like pears,
wore a red skirt, hung lanterns

from the maples in my backyard. The skirt=a poppy,
the lanterns=love, the pear-shape=eyes or a womb. The rubies?

The first time I was slapped in the mouth.

3.
A year ago this summer, I saw
a man wearing a silk-screen t-shirt: Trump that bitch.

Hillary’s mouth was a red slash.
                I saw a woman wearing a silk-screen t-shirt: Trump that bitch. So I
knew it was over.

After the solstice or before the equinox.

4.
I thought of Kitty so hard, I was afraid she would manifest, smiling—
in the dark corner of my laundry room, from my closet hook where
                belts hang—

I thought of her so deeply, it was like sex, far up & slow &
violent. And then I became unafraid.

I knew she was gone.

5.
This is how the Queen of Night tulips toppled: first, their lips
let loose the dark petals:

they puddled like a silk gown. Then from the dug-up dirt,
grow four rock cairns, high as my knee: beach stones gray

with white veins stacked.

6.
I still can’t love what I don’t fear.
Even though I’m throwing a party, we all know

there’s sadness underneath the flagstones.
It’s a farewell party. We’ll leave claw & bite marks.

In the future, someone might know what we meant.

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