DEBBY MITCHELL

SIGNALS

they migrate to the edges of the man-made lake,
standing like withered elders, lone figures,

sandhill cranes appearing in the early morning,
hidden by the tall brown grasses because, like me

the subtle noise of dawn wakes them.
stretching their yellowed beaks towards the smoggy sky,

bellowing their clackety-clack bugling sounds
echoing for miles and miles, defending their territory,

signaling danger to any who would hear.
Their voices almost primal, haunting to the air.

I am remembering this sound when the nurse,
injects the ultraviolet dye, needle pricking pain,

my distress at the sting distracted by the drive
by the lake, under early morning light, to get here.

At the medical center, I listen now to the constant
clanking and banging of the magnetic resonance x-rays

nowhere to hide, ultraviolet poison flooding my veins
painting its patterned pictures like spider webs

silken threaded drawings of my brain.
Behind my eyes, the tiny tumor, ready,

whispering, a constant humming
this silent inner tone, signaling danger.
 

COLLECTION

"Why so hard?", the kitchen coal once said to the diamond.
"After all, are we not close kin?"
     —Nietzsche

The blue-blackness of the evening
pulls the moon behind the car
like an eye squinting for a closer look.
Music rattles the night wrens from the trees
as grandma rustles rent-due papers
like white-lit leaves.

She pushes me to the door
little blondie, red-bowed hair,
she knocks knowing.
"Say your prayers," my grandma whispers,
shape-shifting into landlord, bill seeker.
"Collect, Mr. B., it's me, Ruda,
the first, payday, remember?"

Shafts of whiskey light the doorway.
Mr. B. looks at me,
I feel his eyes like fingers on my throat,
"I ain't got your money."

Breathing hard, soft as a rabbit,
my grandma gives my small hand a squeeze,
presses her body behind my cotton dress,
scared fingers smoothing my ponytail,
"Collect, Mr. B. It's payday. You got the money."

His gnarled hands grip a glass of ice,
coal eyes staring into my blue,
voices from the rental piercing
thin-walled papers of occasional minimum wage.

Wavering in the cigarette rings of a flattened evening
he hesitates, disappears
returning with $80. crumpled with blue language.
I stare at the screen door holes,
tiny patterns on my shoes.

My grandma, lips creased
pats my hair, folds the cash into my hands
pulls me down the broken sidewalk
to the gray street, to the next stop.
Collections fill my pockets.

Other children are sleeping,
reading comic books,
doing children things.

I am the detached smile
facing wooden screens,
my feet wearily following my grandma,
each knock discordant,
a record, scratched and bumping
the diamond needle scritching
between songs.

Door to door taking grocery money,
cookie jar money, liquor money,
angry rent.

Until each bill flapping
in the evening is paid
and I can climb back in the Ford,
cash box filled.

My head against the cool window
watching the yellow moon
eyeing the distant sleep.
 

NIGHT OF THE ELECTRIC BUTTERFLY
 

at night you can see them
their luminescent wings glowing

in the moonlight the monarch
butterfly wings, electric yellow

pulsating with pesticides
insect junkies fed on perfect corn

in iowa the stalks of green grow
warm under the silent sun

butterflies float from leaf to leaf
fed on transgenic corn pods

their veins flowing with altered dna
floating in the mid-air like a question mark

while farm-fed babies fist
mouthfuls of super foods into their bodies

farmers sign agreements
not to save seeds from year to year

this secret foods supply from the U.S.
sent to third world countries

anger protests, arrests in India,
Bolivia, Mexico, France, while

frankenseed lint falls
the roots soak in bio-tech chemicals

super weeds growing resistant
antibiotic strength watered in the rainfall

soil sifts in scientific alterations
feeding the systematic food chain

while the quiet flight of the monarch
flutters to the end----
 

Debby Mitchell was born in California and has lived in Arizona, most of her life. By day, she is an educator, by night, she writes. She has been active in the Creative Writing Program at Phoenix College for two years. She is married to a musician and has two sons and four cats.