Goodbye Animal

She opens in a thicket. Lichen against her eyelids, 
the money-note ringing in her eardrums she sways 
with herself. Some branch, a brown thing sharp and smooth 
pierces the back of her knee. 
A whole being blooming in mold. Where                    is the steamship OK not 
Mine, but at least The.          Looks out over the lake toyboat toyboat toyboat 
toyboat how many can I string together. Enough for a necklace, a suit, a dress 
at least? A glimpse into the center and a long thread to pull back with me. 
Where
is the steamship? 

ii
She wishes they would be horses, but they're hamsters, if they're anything that 
moves.  "Hamster Blowout!" Hamster is to artist as _________ is to __________.  
Good. Now make the hamster sing.  Build it a voicebox and a little boat of its 
own. Da Vinci would have. For God's sake; Beverly Cleary did it!
But they're freeze-dried hamsters, like you might feed your Boa on a hot day! 

iii
She pants after the steamship, she sweats for it, moldy surface glistening with 
the nutritious moisture. Why bother? Why not hand the red kerchief and oddly 
shaped badge back in to headquarters? Until she remembers: headquarters doesn't 
even know she has the emblems. Little thief! One day she was feeling nimble.  
Hard to imagine now her mouth is too overgrown to even chuckle indulgently.   So 
postulate the steamship actually shows up and she is not reduced to writing an 
American letter to friends: "What a moldy gal I am!"  --
What to label it? What to toss over its side? 
http://www.feministsf.org/femsf/listserv/feministsf/weeklylogs/1998/log9803c.txt: 
"This isn't to take you to task, it's just that lately lots and lots of folk seem 
to be misunderstanding me." 

Iv
Not just A steamship, The Steamship You've Been Waiting For. It doesn't have a 
fruitfly problem. No doubt it uses environmentally-sound cleaning products. She 
began to sense this in the pit of her stomach, rubbing a leaf of poison oak 
between her thumb and forefinger.   The steamship doesn't cry. 

V 
Rocking on her haunches, she cries, head between her knees, heels sinking in to 
the sodden lakeshore, phlegm filming her throat.  How to transmit the sounds? 
[What a rich aural landscape she is suddenly!] She must not want it enough. 
That's why the steamship is nowhere to be seen. She has not electrified herself 
with Desire. 

Vi 
Unnatural bit of yellow catches in the corner of her eye and a little red 
bobbing.  Toyboat it's there.  She can't get on this thing! It's for the fleas. 
Maybe the fleas on the hamster. That's the size it is, little yellow stacks 
glinting toward her. Where's the power. Kneeling into the water she paddles it 
toward her, holds it in her fist her fingers close over it red keel and all. She 
pockets it, little stacks jabbing into her hip. Grabs the rope swing overhand 
and hurtles, legs tucked over thicket, for the water.

Maria Masha Gutkin