SATIN RIBBONS

A strobe spins light on the girl's black velvet skirt and high heels. She stands in the middle of a ballroom, listens to Lorraine talk about the man who used to tie her up with satin ribbons. And she's amazed at the design the wrinkles form around Lorraine's eyes, like snowflakes. They remind her of her mother's eyes when she was dying on the sofa. Mother picked up a high heel, threw it, put a crack in the plaster. The girl stood across the room, looking at the lines on the walls, at her mother's wrinkles, and listening to her moan. Father would not wake up. Satin ribbons, satin ribbons and wrinkles. (Smoking in the Twilight Bar 1988)

 from FABRIC REINS

       one of a series of revisions of "Satin Ribbons"

 And garments of vengeance while the sun stands still and the moon keeps a bird's eye-view of the upper room where men talk. My waters are bound up in their thick clouds even though I have lot my children and am desolate with this unprofitable talk. The only thing worse than being talked about is being born into trouble—he comes along and ties me on the fringe with a band of blue. Some girls die young, couch as couch can be, easier to pick up, harder to drop, like a low shoe or an eye for an eye: what every young man should know, neither written nor spoken—if at first you don't, you will always know how they cry and throw dust into the air. If he wants his dreams to come true, he must wake up and fill me with wind. Some people wake up and find themselves female. Others wake up and find themselves late. Or a pretty package just for Adam and his ribbon of blue—(Love Makes Thinking Dark 1995)