Elaine Woo

Word Babies

skin aflame    in dire need of dousing

needles lodged in pores       head a thrumming drum

emerging from the canal

out slide you and a swarm of siblings

a throng of reading witnesses    nodding their heads

newborn cells resurface injured building blocks

sinews unclench

Routed 

silhouette clutches hope

love ache routed asunder

song punctures    needle and thread the mind

lamp's glow      picked in slowfoot stitches

an exit gets recorded

Shooter

The tide retracts revealing a fair-haired boy

thorns embedded in his face

a gun poised--his

lips rat-a-tat at me

I net his bullets in my palms

melt them into lead for my poems

Elaine Woo's first poetry collection is forthcoming from Nightwood Editions (Gibsons, BC, Canada) in Fall 2014.