Jessy Randall
The Talking Heads and Sylvia Plath
Both just groan out
whatever it is. Just
what if the baby is born with a huge body
and skinny arms and legs and head?
the resounding
nnrrrrup, the noise
of the inside of your
thumb, the whir
of the spaces between
your teeth.
and what about musical talent? the child
should not have too hard of a life, nor too easy
There he goes
with his absurd
arm motions.
There she goes
with words that
hammer together
like clouds.
Anthropomorphizing the Salt
She placed the dish on the table, and the table broke
and then the dish broke, and other things broke.
The salt shaker broke, and the salt spilled out
like a ship sinking, and formed little pools
of salt, and she said it was as if
battalions of salt were rising up against each other.
But this is all a lie. She never placed the dish there,
and nothing was broken. She never said a word.
Metaphors
A duck is like the moon
because a kid can point at both. A house
is like the sky: both hold things. My heart
is like your heart because both are hearts.
This is like that because both are words. I am
like swimming; battles are like planets. You
are like spots on skin. Whatever I
can think of is like twenty million things
that have never occurred to anyone.
This poem is like a pillow. I hit you with it.
©2004 by Jessy Randall
Jessy Randall's two books are 
