Mary's Guide to Divination and Fortune-Telling

[YOU WILL MAKE HEADS TURN]

Perplexing that you walk at allwithout seeing the cavernous mouthsof the people who feel themselvespass by, if not through, you.

[LIFE IS TOO SHORT TO HOLD GRUDGES]

I ran away from home when I was six years old, angryat my mother. I packed my baby doll and saltines to avoidhunger. When baby began to cry, I went home. If God had leta bitter child die, what kind of God would this be?

[ONE IS NOT SLEEPING, DOES NOT MEAN THEY ARE AWAKE]

You have stopped sleeping because there is too much else—you fold laundry and watch zombie movies on TV and I stay upwith you because I'm afraid you are asleep behind your eyesand in a dream-like state you'll rememberyou are human, turn on the stove, burn yourself.

[WHEN THE MOMENT COMES, TAKE THE TOP ONE]

In the middle of the night, a camp counselor woke meto ask if the boy who wet his bed could share my bunk.In the morning, I saw his drooling face there, rememberedwhat mom once said about sleeping with boys.When she picked me up from camp, I cried the whole way home.

[BIRDS ARE ENTANGLED BY THEIR FEET AND MEN BY THEIR TONGUES]

I cracked open a cookie that looked likea vagina or a bird's beak, ate onehalf of it, postponed the lectureI had come to give you.

[YOU WILL KISS YOUR CRUSH OHHH LALAHH]

Standing sideways before my bedroom mirrorI sucked in my stomach and became a sheetof paper. I thought about kissing on the mouth,forced my lips into some shape a boy might find suitable.

[YOU CREATE ENTHUSIASM AROUND YOU]

Your face might be made of plaster. You might bea floppy little doll, a doll that bends in halfat the waist. This is my interpretationof what the people whisper as they look away.

[SOON, A VISITOR SHALL DELIGHT YOU]

I convinced myself I was pregnant and told no one.I asked myself several questions, notably, ifI had had sex. I thought I was a virgin but my stomachgrowled and ached in unordinary ways such thatI knew there was someone else inside me.

[LET THE DEEDS SPEAK]

If a child is anything other than parasiteI would ask my mother to speak now. As the un-intended consequence of a deed, product of a uterus, I feelI must not use my mouth for anything other than apologies.

[OLD FRIENDS MAKE BEST FRIENDS]

When your body is forced to invent creative waysof feeding itself, it ages. Only months sinceI last saw you, but you have aged years. A fetus,too, grows wrinkled in a matter of only months.

[OUT OF CONFUSION COMES NEW PATTERNS]

Standing sideways before my bedroom mirror Isucked in my stomach and wondered whether the raisedknoll had been conceived through my imagination,God, man, or eating for two: myself, and you.

[WHEN HUNGRY, ORDER MORE FOOD]

The beauty of a fork is its willingnessto bend and not break. No matter howmany times I allow food to pass through me I worryit will get stuck along the way, take hold, growinto something God herself could not digest.