i'm not familiar with your cooking.
::written in response to Richard Nelson's dry-point print #6 he said he was a cartographer. he said he was respectful. he said he knew my father well, and my uncle, too. “that’s strange,” I said, they aren’t familiar with your made-lines, your smooth skin & sharp pen, your mother’s mother, Fran; they’ve never mentioned her, neither. he said he was my first babysitter. he said my favorite food was peas. he said my favorite color was orange. “that’s strange,” I said, i’m not familiar with your cooking. i’m not familiar with your eye color, or your ink-stained hands, the graphite on your palm, the sweat on the bridge of your nose; it smells. he said he knew how to dance. he said he would dance with me, like this; like when we were kids at the lake when mom wasn’t watching and he could splash water in my eyes and we would kiss. he said he was a cartographer. he said he would take me to the lake. he said he would marry me right then and he said my skin was smooth. he said my hair was soft and then it was down and then it was long and in two years he’d cut it short for a project for his grandmother. he said he was a cartographer. he said his eyes were hazel, but they were really just brown. and he was really just a fisherman – who wrote poetry and played lots of characters. he said he was a babysitter, and a brother, and a father, and a uncle, and a dancer. but I never really cared to dance or to fish or to map – whatever that meant, really. but he said he wanted my hair, so I let him cut it.
