Winter 2001

 

Molly Peacock

REFUSAL

A fleecy blanket, a furred protection
those balconies of bacteria became
--  my right by my election
transferred to my wild teeth, becoming tame
not through hygiene, but its opposite:
beloved neglect.  (Like an unmade bed,
all soft ridges and warrens, or an unknit
sweater in plush unraveling.)  "I said
I would!  Right now!"  I yelled from the bathroom sink,
but I could not enter my mouth with the brush
and the false freshness of the paste's tubed stink.
It was homey as leaves beneath a bush
you could crawl under and play house in;
it was my mouthhouse, my inn, and my in.

MOLLY PEACOCK's most recent book is How To Read A Poem & Start A Poetry Circle. She is the author of four books of poems, including Original Love, as well as a memoir, Paradise Piece By Piece. Contributing Writer for House & Garden, she is also co-editor of Poetry in Motion:  100 Poems from the Subways and Buses.  She is Poet-in-Residence at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine and serves as Co-President of the Poetry Society of America.

 

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