The stark raving teakettle wails
on the stove of a house leaned into itself
hunched from some old injury
never healed—

not this house with its rose-papered
walls and bright yellow trappings a house
it would be unthinkable
to wail within.

Her hand wraps the kettle
handle lifts it from the burner exclaiming
at a blister raised on a once
unblemished palm:

the bubble swells
to preposterous size a cartoon wind rises
the daisy crown carried from
her head into

a tunnel's painted
mouth untwines. She left but not soon enough
traveled but not far enough.
The blister bursts

under the tap releasing
into the newly tiled kitchen the deep blue
heart of the Marianas her
wide frightened eyes

those of deep-dwelling fish
hiding in the folds between Mauritius
and Reunion the TV on
as loud as it will go:

"It's always rabbit season"
Elmer Fudd declaims—which she knows
to be true her heart beating
in the weeds

the black mouth
pivoting her way her mother pounding
the wall when god how
much longer—

not quite all folks...
the storm stuttering oaths lapping
the frail coast of a continent
as yet unravaged.