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Two Poems
from: Hide, unpublished manuscript, by Teresa Ballard
I Am Thinking Of My First Deer
A doe, her legs spread open
in the back of my father’s truck,
her body a brown map near blue sky.
My father turns her over and she’s the color of earth.
She is warm and my fingers smell of sage
and blood. I piece her together in my mind
as my brothers remove her skin.
I give her back her body, the same way
I was promised Jesus would return to us on earth.
I am thinking of my first deer
because you are sleeping
and underneath your lids, your eyes are open.
My fingers smell slightly of things broken
and I realize you’re always afraid
of the way I open myself,
how I must swallow up every sadness.
I wonder if somehow I’ve always known you.
If you have returned in another from
leaving behind the fur of your death.
I Am Talking of Fever
Little light, little bird—
cup, by small cup
I’ll pour into you.
Here’s the way we begin
once there was a girl
there’s always a girl
sometimes there’s a prince.
Now give me your throat
bend to the wolf
this is easier really
than telling a story.
I want to be the wolf but I am not.
Neither am I the girl,
you’re always the girl
unless you’re the fever, red flush
over the field like fire.
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AI’m the cup. Here’s the story.
A girl carries the bucket to the well
but there’s no bottom, the water
follows her like a line, a road
she must travel.
I’m not the princess
hungry for blood. I want more
of the wolf, the hunger,
a smooth canine, a white mother.
The prince is not here.
The girls are adding
on to each other.
One is the water.
Note from the editors: The image accompanying Teresa Ballard’s poem is by Jil Evans. For more on Evans’ paintings, see Christina Schmid’s essay, “A Wild State of Mind,” in this constellation.
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