by Melissa Leto

dervish; wolf

melissa Leto | APR 2024 | Issue 32

dervish; wolf

the feeling of killing father lived in her body, it made her take a breath smooth as moon-
shine, feeling lived as a great cry and roar along the worm of her throat
digesting its way to song

she thought of killing her father
it made her feel like she owned her own body yes
that was it

the first poem she ever wrote wasn’t a poem at all: premonition, prophecy, end of bloodline
that feeling again, fuck that feels good, she shivered, like the thought of the woman in the forest
whose attic was a room she half lived in, real drug in her body, rapture of skull

her body jerked and her cunt clenched
you must leave a trail, they’d told her
you must do it in the night, you must leave a trail for them into the forest

she could use the knife he gave her as a child, the one that cut the poem,
that map, into her thigh, she snort laughed the irony of it then laughed from her gut
then came a scream that threw her shoulders back made her salivate

his was the only head belonged to a wall: no stag, no grizzly or lion or whatever dead head men
desired it was so soothing to think of she fell asleep there when the moon rose
the poem scarred into body lifted up like silver birds and a wild azure coat flooded her frame

her canines, her whole mouth a flock of daggers dropping from the sky
she knew to go to him that way that he would lull against the scent of her fur
elixir of moss and tonic of girl smell twisted into every hair with a spit of honey

upright sleeping he snored in front of a fire bones clean on the table, a bottle empty
her dazzle her glitter her spell so quiet and steaming hazed the room as she came in
through the front door no trap men were so fucking stupid believing

everything they did would go unpunished only her grin stirred him
vein of his neck thumping and fermentation of his breath just barely escaping his parted lips
so pathetic so sedated so consumed she would feel sorry for him in another
story

to eat him alive was to take her own blood back into her body
she circled him like a feather drool pooling out of her mouth too easy, too soft
to rip his throat out too wasteful no she knew

to consider the soil, there were ways to leave trails that erased bloodlines
men had to be unmarried from earth in that way of blood and dirt, their thinking
of ownership would only loop story into nations and wars, blood on battlefields

she couldn’t do that.
and yet, there was no real erasure, anyway, as matter goes
so she had to find the line to nourish—

thought of killing father
thought of woman in the woods
feeling of wolf flushed her entire body what is this? breath breaking surface

people can go without noticing the wolf in the room
they don’t all stir, wake, realize, confront, fight, desire the head on the mantle
some are absinthe sleeping they feel their jaw in the jaw of a wolf and turn to nuzzle

they don’t care the warm thing has them by the throat, the smell of girl breath sedates
all reason even when girl becomes woman becomes neither becomes wolf
even then they’ll die dreaming of those mouths

she pulled him first through the laurel trees
blue of her coat calling to water following the path in the air
dislocating his shoulder somewhere in the quaking aspen

through beech and the river birch before nepenthes, before the sound of mother body
before offering his body to origin, she did it bit crunch taste
her own blood back into the vessel of her very own mouth

she offered him there and the water did not wake him, not as it wet his face
or soaked through his clothes, not as it began to rearrange the limbs of him
the morning birds still sleeping, thinnest line of yellow rising still undreamt by the day
as the water took his mouth without permission, filled it like a boulder and carried him away

Melissa Leto, *through the mouth of nepenthes*, mixed materials, digital photograph, 2024. Courtesy of the artist.

Triarch

inside the body of the lapis wolf is the body of a girl a woman neither, but running
coat of lightning bugs blinking cerulean running to Dervish, the scent of her lighting the way

and from inside Triarch a Monterey Cypress hallowed into home, Dervish smelled
the cunt of the wolf Faa: ocean laurel hemlock fur blood swirling

inside the body of the lapis wolf the mind of a girl a woman neither was running to the woman
in the forest whose attic was an alive place they lived, real drug in their body, rapture of skull

Dervish would lick every drop of blood from their body she didn’t think something ridiculous
like poor thing she knew as soon as Faa crossed the portal into Triarch they’d be limbs again

electric she could see the cleave of Faa’s ribs against their chest could feel the scream of them
could feel their need to change realms from so many miles away: that power

Faa came in shaking the blue out of their coat, the fireflies,
scent of quaking aspen Dervish could see flames magenta sun swirling

under the skin and knew where to touch Faa first dragged her own copper claws
along the inside of Faa’s elbows along the vein slamming the wall of their neck

they didn’t want to be kissed wanted something sharp, deep drag, scent of iron
the only way they’d feel each limb its own ecosystem within their body

one side of Faa’s body wouldn’t rise without a raking
one half of Faa’s body couldn’t snake unless elsewhere bound

thumbs to vertebrae Faa pressed their palms together lifted their elbows
wrists cradling skull yes breathed against the moon of their ear

first knot triggered salt in the body pull of falling into hands, goodbye
girl self woman self neither self wolf self goodbye form

open your eyes they kaleidoscope into the slit realms of Dervish
hypnosis of blue seeking yellow begging for green pink mouth

opening the only thing Faa could see Dervish’s mouth around the words
we are going to put the kill somewhere else in the body now

then gravity
gone like light

+

you want to know how a girl can become a woman become a wolf become neither?
everyone always wants to know the details of the transformation, how the layers
prism now, how much hair they’d grown or shed, in harmony with what softness?
people can’t imagine without spectacle when it comes to humans
Faa knew it ended in consumption, murder, or spectacle pick an era
look under the microscope and whose eye is describing recanting deciding what the ear can
handle? as matter goes, Faa licked their chops, they didn’t prefer the taste
of men just the head cradled in their jaw pressure, taste
as Faa carried them to the mouths of nepenthes.

Melissa Leto, *acrylics in cinnamon lens,* paint and poppies, cinnamon, and mugwort on manuscript draft, 2024. Courtesy of the artist.

nepenthes

all they’d known about pitcher plants was endangered and sell.
all they’d known about pitcher plants was slip and drown.

but Faa was what they called crazy or what they called
nothing left to lose the only, what they called survivor

that’s who they wanted: people beyond origin story
people who knew what they needed to carry.

no, the world was not fully burning down, yet
yes, there was still what they called time

but who owned it? no one remembers the first man lost to pitchers,
because no one was there to witness you know what they say

about trees falling in forests
about men falling into forests the sounds they make there

so easily lured by scent
honey hay sweat some memory of grass, sun

she wouldn’t have known what to do at all
had it not been for the hemlock, the rabbits.

Melissa Leto, *paint and petals,* paint on manuscript pages, flower petals, stone, digital photograph, 2024. Courtesy of the artist.

hemlock

oh, come on Faa would never put hemlock in the stew, too obvious,
it grew so fast, especially as Faa’s song prismed as she multiplied, trifecta’d
first out of the gown of girl skin scent of lilac dirt blood

then into and out of woman skin which seemed to take an awful long time
how many moments she could have unzipped herself climbed into the earth
pulled over her body a blanket of mushrooms and let them spore her

she never wanted to die there only embody crescent
away away from the sound of him brick of him steam of him edge of him
she kept the hemlock small so you wouldn’t notice unless you were a rabbit

unless you were tens of hundreds of rabbits willing to graze they didn’t need sanctuary
they didn’t need Faa but the exchange was difficult to turn from
they said yes when they wanted to they decided the pace, their own last meal

on the way to his: bite by bite she enjoyed watching it
she felt no shame desiring the kill none. it quickened her pulse
she steadied her breath, bit the inside of her lip waited for the taste of iron

knowing his whole life was collapsing herb by herb she shifted her legs
under the dinner table to run away meant to be looked for, postered
to stay there once it was done no she’d bedstraw sepal burdock away

+

oh, i know, it’s such a perverse thing for the word daughter to want to kill the word father to rip its face
off to shove its cock in its mouth to chop off every toe every finger this is not a case of wrongdoing do you understand me? not a matter of forgive-
ness that’s a story for people whose families haven’t been killed by father
she had to put each body in the ground
she had to put each body in the ocean
holy trees she wanted to set him on fire for all he had done
she thought all of this watching him chew the hemlocked rabbit you aren’t having any?
i ate while cooking what does it mean to put a plate in someone’s hands
what does it mean to say, here taste?

+

Read dervish; wolf 2

Melissa Leto, *D;W process*, manuscript draft, tarot cards, digital photograph, 2024. Courtesy of the artist.

Melissa Leto makes art near the Salt River on Hohokam land in Arizona. Her/Their work has appeared in Bloody Funny Zine, Shrew Lit Magazine, Tom Maxedon’s Word! podcast, and Write On Downtown. Their wordmaking weaves joy, grief, and trauma while infusing the interconnectedness of alive things on planet earth with queer love in realms of hybridity. They have an MFA from Northern Arizona University, are the lead facilitator for literary arts non-profit Revisionary Arts, and an editor for Rinky Dink Press.