SHOUT(18)

to pack it in, give it up, and get out.

My existence insisted

on listening to the voices in my head distantly cheering my ambition

I tried a new thing—revision— and persisted, dismissing my doubts, risking my pride

demystifying a process that consisted of untwisting the trysting words in my brainpan and convincing them to behave

inspiration and craft slowly melding into this, the consistent beat of my words against the drum





if it please the court




the courthouse reporter was out sick one day so they sent me in his place, the defendant a plain white guy, late thirties, kinda small, cheap suit,

good haircut, charged with ugly counts of sexual assault, plus kidnapping he looked bored

She went to a party with friends, hey, nineteen, a good time; loud music and wine coolers the night warm enough for the crowd to dance outside, yeah, he was older but older guys always showed up invited or not. After dancing under the stars, she had to go home, but the girl who drove there was wasted and she didn’t have enough cash for a cab

so, looking bored, he offered to drive her home

a gentleman,

on the way he asked if they could stop at his parents’ house for a sec so he could let out the dog, a puppy she loved puppies

so she followed him into his parents’ house and found that there was no puppy, no parents

just a roll of duct tape

and twenty-four hours of torture as the police recited the details the rapist yawned

Defense lawyer did his job by attacking the victim

shouting that she drank, she danced, she dressed to look good

she wanted it, she followed him liked it rough

or planned on marriage or extortion as she cried on the stand, long blonde hair in front of her face, a curtain for her sanity, he painted her into a corner with accusations fantastical but just barely legal screaming lawyers objected counter-objected, sustained, upheld blind justice torn apart by jackals the jury confused that young woman shook so hard I thought the roof would cave in ever been in a fight?

fists like hammers, punches thrown rose-red bloom filling the room as your rage catches fire an exploding can of spray paint when you see that red

shit’s gonna get real

you’re gonna hurt someone or do something stupid

probably both

I saw that red, as the victim shook cuz she’d thought she was safe thought there was a puppy I saw myself crawling over the seats, leaping throwing punches, busting knuckles, breaking a chair over his head, the sweet sound of his teeth skittering across the floor my pencil snapped

me, still in my chair, notebook soaked sweat dripping down my face judge banged the gavel

BAM!

ended the day early

I stayed till the court emptied and I could breathe again,

told the story to my editor, who did the right thing for journalism

by assigning someone else to cover the trial defense lawyer negotiated a plea bargain, the rapist

sentenced to some easy time in county jail, a mild slap on the wrist

Years later, walking in the mall with my daughters tall and gangly I saw him again, that rapist only that time, he didn’t look bored because

he was hunting





how the story found me




An old woman rocks in my subconscious sending songs, hidden messages, spor— //record scratch//

I dream a lot in Danish

when I wake up from a danskdr?m I confuse the two languages

until the coffee kicks in,

this morning as I worked on a draft of this poem, I centered

it on the word spor

I said the old woman who wanders in the woods of my mind

who knits in the rocking chair of my subconscious she shows me the spors, the hints of what passed this way when I wasn’t paying attention, and what lies ahead in wait

except the word in English is “footprints,”

or “animal tracks”

the dashes left in snow by a frightened rabbit punctures made by the chasing wolf maybe she is future me, that old dame maybe future me sends my dreams /

mine dr?mme

to now me, or past me, as warnings/advarsler or advice/r?d, or maybe she’s just messing with me and cackling

my nightmares repeat over and over until I pay attention, pay my respects to whatever is eating

at me; one night, just as my oldest started middle school

I heard a girl sobbing, brokenhearted I jolted awake and checked on my daughters convinced that I’d heard one of them, but no, the crying girl was lost in my head and she wouldn’t let me sleep

because she couldn’t speak

and she needed an interpreter

so I started writing in the middle of that night the stream of unconscious eventually merging with my waking self, a year of scribbling mostly before dawn

turns out the mother word is spor in Old English, Germanic, Old Norse, and survives unchanged in Danish

pops up in modern English as spoor borrowed from Afrikaans in 1823

so I wasn’t as trapped between languages as I thought

and the hour spent swimming

in multilingual etymology

was its own reward

the first publisher I sent Speak to rejected it I never thought anyone would publish the story let alone read it

I am often distracted, diverted from my path when I explore old wounds it’s a defensive reaction,