Breaking the Sacred
Poetry by E. Florio

60 pages, perfect bound, with a laminated cover

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Elizabeth Florio
P.O. Box 1330
Boulder Creek, CA 95006

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Summer
for craig

One memory-
rotting fruit on the ground
horrible, sweet infection.
Your job-
forge into the yard
armed with a Hefty bag
and gloves
(your mother's dish gloves
to be precise), to remove
the menace from the grass,
smeared peach brains and
thickets of tiny flies,
every time
at least one of them
sucked into your mouth from
gasping at how easily
your fingers slid through
those humid skins.
You hated that job of
gathering death, that sick
wetness, that whiskey reek.

What did she want
in that drink?
The slick curve of
pool below her
bare feet
gripping the water
marked soil
gown of faint purple
gathered
around her legs
the sun giving hang
through her hair
through grasses
that hiss to her
the lie of love.
What did she want
in that reflection
seeing those
eyes circled by a
madness that must
keep her if she is
to do this fall
away from betrayal
out of the heart's
cruel clawing and
into the invisible.

Woman whom no god could touch,
rage-bent like reeds in tidal floods.
fated to do this act by a husband's
selfishness and lust. Oh lost sister
how I grieve what you made, the
death your hands left on innocents.
How I wish you had turned it on
him-- perhaps, catching them in bed,
making them beg for your pity and
forgiveness, making them cry out,
but you fast-killed your own, slaying
the two sons he loved more than her,
screaming out long-held rage at the
turning sky, taunting the gods to
undo your decision. You Kali, took
your flesh and created the worst
payback, the filthiest hurt, the
absolute sweetest revenge possible.

Page last updated 9.20.02