Books

Books make my mother feel wealthy.
She's an attorney, mind you, graduate
of The Yale Law School (which you'd know
if you'd ever seen her try to chop
a zucchini or read a poem, she'll
tell you they didn't teach her that
at The Yale Law School as she botches
the dice and mangles a metaphor), so by most
measures she really is wealthy.
Nice house, three well-fed kids, four
cats presently (maxed out at seven),
but it's the books, she says, that really
make her feel she's made it. So the house,
that nice house, is filled with them.
Many unread, most never again to be
opened, but every room has a shelf
and I found some good stuff boxed
in the attic too, secret treasure troves.

My books are my burden. Books make my mother
feel wealthy, and I have inherited
her habit of accumulating them, mostly
from discount bins and friends'
giveaway piles. I will never have
a giveaway pile. As any New Yorker
will tell you, this is madness: we move
constantly, and moving my books is not
entirely unlike moving mountains. My recent
use of the library gives me nightmares:
what if I am writing a love letter, the letter
that will determine the fate of my
well my everything, and all I need is
one quote, one quote from the perfect book
which I returned the library two days before.
I thought books were permanent. These new rules
unsettle me. So I buy more dollar paperbacks
for their title or tagline or because I think
I've read about the author before, and the books
accumulate and I try to keep up but the library
keeps sending books too, and if I don't finish
them fast there's a fee, and all told it's very
overwhelming. My books, my burden, my inheritance
is very overwhelming. I'm unclear on its permanence.

Wauwinet, 1953

Wiggle your fingers 

into the thick rubber

gloves.

Slide your feet

into the thick-soled

boots.

You will require help 

with the laces --

your newly chubby fingers

lack the dexterity

needed to tie a knot.

Attach the hose

to the security-seal

bracket.

Tighten the helmet

and feel secure beneath the

brass.

You will see differently

through the circular glass pane --

learn to swivel your shoulders

to compensate for a new

lack of peripheral vision.

Step off the dock

and try to wave goodbye --

the suit will make it difficult.

Turn on your headlamp quickly

or you will get lonely

in the dark.

2:30am on Saturday morning

Chicken pot pie
and I don't care.

Chaos begets Chaos

Fully acknowledging cop-out. Will do better tomorrow.

This week's left me feeling quite sore;
It's been heartache and let-downs galore.
At the end of this bedlam
I'd give two limbs and then some
to just catch a glimpse of my floor.

Veg

When sinking 

lower,

and lower 

into quicksand,

the mush envelops me;

swaddling my stretched

muscles, and lifting

the weight from my soles.

In a way, 

it's so relaxing,

I'd rather grab

a remote control

than a lifeline. 

TVs I grew up with

Tell me the first:

two nobs hand tuned

to fourteen channels

antennae like late station wagons

perfect

fake wood siding

for a Saturday morning

where remotes are still remote

like island life or HBO.

Tell me the second:

wobbling cathodes

lifted from a basement

of liquidated rental tapes

the firm grip of business 

dissolution wobbling 

on powder-painted black steel tripod

legs 

a silver box midair

at a great distance

the six button oblong brain

detachable

from the couch control

for the AA price

of batteries.

Tell me the third:

big glass black bulge

wider than my stubby arms

more buttons than the alphabet.

The end of trading up.

Each ever-bigger filter

for those signals

shielded in the plush

metallic hug of tangled cables

and cartoons and news

stretches to fill a slightly dusty world

with its powerless and distant vision.

Eyjafjallajokull

[This is likely part of my Documenting the End of the World series.]

Weeks ago smoke filed
out in billowing
columns. Airports closed
across Europe as the ash hung like shredded
curtains. Somewhere
a great bowl was overturned
and in a café in Chicago I watched
planes of light unsettle
the dust.
We slept uneasily,
buffeted by clouds of our
inconveniences.

-Bad air, you said, and we all
breathe it. -So, I said,
a conspiracy?
We didn't laugh.

The unpronounceable bowels of the Earth
scattered slowly
over the ruins
of our

civilization.
As if trying to
forget us.

Introduction

And this is your great
grandma, Mima.
No that's not her, she's
the next one over. Can't
you tell, she has
the family chin.
She was born in Oklahoma
Territory, before it became
a state.
She was born in a dugout.
Yes, a dugout.
Her father tattooed
all the children, in case
of an Indian attack.
The skin of her forearm was inked
with her initials.
No, her name.
Her family name?
I don't know.
Anyway.
Mima had a twin
sister. She was lazy,
let Mima do all the work.
Her life was unhappy,
but Mima married
a boxer nicknamed Big Six.
Six what?
Don't ask me...
Big Six died
of a head injury,
they say.
Mima became a
widow, gave food
to the poor, said her
prayers, raised
her children.
She grew old
watching baseball on TV;
planting flowers;
and playing practical
jokes on her daughter.
Like that one time, she dressed
as a witch.
It was a character
from the Bible.
No, a witch.
A Bible witch?
She came down to tea
with her daughter's friends
the pointy hat,
the warty nose,
the scraggly hair. Who
am I, she cackled
until someone
finally
guessed correctly.

Is it Foucault?

People don’t care about boxes anymore
Said my brother. Think of the Census.
Now you can be both
Rather than one or the other.

Windows

These white windows were never so open since the time I saw you last.

Advice

I’m not one to tell you when
to take it, or from whom, advice
being so specific to
its situation, recipient,
and giver, since the right
advice from the wrong person
or for the wrong reason is
just as right and the converse
just as harmful except when
it isn’t, really no advice
about advice can be said
to be universally applicable
since there is a universe
of moralities and another
of relationships but nevertheless
if I may offer one piece of
my own, it is the following:
Never take advice from a person
who tells you to be selfish.

Looking forward to Mediterranean food day at a lunch-provided staff meeting

Falafel.

Delicious,

beautiful,

brown

orbs

of fried

legumes.

Gently caressed,

by silky

ribbons

of liquid 

sesame seeds.

I long for thee.

How is it,

that on Fridays,

your name is

inexplicably typed

on my screen,

six hundred times

before lunch?

politics

[in keeping with today's oddly national theme]

politics is

rhetoric tactics and syntax
repetition strategy and anthrax

stroke my caucus
pull my lever
release my figures
from the polls
go and go
and go until

it is morning in america
and there is a low-strung star
spangle not what your country can for you
let freedom swing or try
(it's tricky with this slippery liquid handle)
draw surveils across the huddled masses
tap on liberty to see if she's hollow
but bate your rust-green
breath

save it for the crowd
because Auntie Sam
is cooking in drag
again
and it stinks in here

problem is
it makes you tactical and gassy
Auntie's abiotic wholesome eats

her meals proliferate
nuclear gatherings
causing a bawdy global belly swell
in the body politic

whoever took it out of the fridge
drizzled her melting salad
in the bowlpot and forgot
to plug the damn thing in
whoever never activated an appliance
whoever should know better by now

that the sockets of democracy
are not proprietary or to be shorted and burnt
as black as crocket's coon skin cap
tilting back to watch the night sky
and one last expedition crusoe with the eye electric

Uncle Sam is off this week
and busy with a tumbler
proselytizing some jazzy combination
of peanut butter and voting rights
while he stumbles on his long journey through the night
into the graveyard of empires

Workplace Rules

1.
Be safe, and
conscientious.
Keep your hands at your
sides and hum the National
Anthem.

2.
Remember:
the future of the office
and your coworkers
and the world
has climbed upon you.
Smile,
and stock your desk with snacks
and sedatives.

3.
Imagine everything as a Greek Myth.

4.
Work Hard.
Accept Defeat.

5.
Be a player in the dominant office
atmosphere.
Respect others and finish
nothing,
politely.

6.
Upon dying ask your wife
to drag your naked body
into the middle of the town square
to test her love.

Lament of a Fair Weather Biker

Blowing from the north northeast,
I cannot feel my ears,
This wind's so hard I barely move
In spite of shifting gears.

The lactic acid's building,
Tears and sweat are in my eyes,
I hate these fit, fast cyclists,
I hate their spandexed thighs.

Young again

She said:

I like your vibes. They sizzle my insides. And now that you’re gone I realize that my whole outlook for the last year has been outlined by failure. I don’t know if I lost 9 months or crossed the equator. I want to be beautiful for you, but the world is so open. Like a big sunroof. So this place…this doesn’t feel like home…and I need a place that feels like home, because I think I might be someone who deals with mild depression on-again off-again my whole life, but then again, maybe everyone has this problem. Our world…it likes to tell us we have problems. These large gizmos in the front of our heads have gotten us to the point that even empathy now can be sliced up so that it isn’t empathy anymore but something totally different…totally insignificant.

He replied:

We will have a home. And I like your vibes too.

Chocolate Vanilla Swirl

A true meeting of the minds
tit for tat
ying yang yogurt
pours out in an ever
narrowing gyre

Icke

Your corporations and your new

world order and your takeovers

and your thick skinned

bloodthirsty reptilian genomes:

the world failed to cough up all its

malfeasance in its hurricanes

earthquakes and volcanic ash

that drifts like snow

to cover us all

until we cannot see

how it ended.

Vomit Inducing

Rewrite of Tim's How to Start a Revolution.

A round tern

is revolting.

I start to....

haaaauggh.

Dove Promises

Smile.
At yourself in the mirror.
Smile.
People will wonder what you’ve been up to.

Find your passion: when two hearts race, both win.
Because: daring to love completely can decorate your life.

Listen and laugh and sing.
Uncontrollably. To elevator music.
Someone will dare to love you completely.
Listen. To your heartbeat. And dance.
Laugh. Uncontrollably.
It clears the mind.

Naughty can be nice, so:
Send a love letter this week
And wink at someone driving past today.
And go to your special place.

And let me make a list of your dreams.
Because giving in is better.
Temptation is fun.
I would know.
So Smile.
Before work.
Before bed.
Before sleep.
You'll dream better.


(This is my "rewrite." I decided to do a rewrite of Dove Chocolate messages instead of anyone's poem).

By Deaf, By Blindness Willed

Rewrite/cut-up of Ian's Van Gogh.

Starlight paints his face, and the bats

beyond the dark signatures of blindness paint

swirls in the city lights.

The oil swirls, deaf in the yellow haze.

A chair, of course, sat farthest beyond

the starlight. We all know absinthe,

and turpentine, and

if we all know Van Gogh we all know

his other half.

The bats swirl. The oil paints. The gas

limps into how we all know to describe

achievement. Attuned to his blindness,

we all know, we all know, we all

know how he willed absinthe to oil swirls.

How the bats paint yellow signatures.

How half by the beyond is but his other.

Neighborhood

The circle whose boundary marked
the edge of the world
held us within.

Outside the circle were the
dangerous places, raging
waters and trees so tall
as to touch the sky,
and sometimes the sky,
it fell.

Our particular magic in that circle
we called up with ratty pieces of
rope, and bits of chalk, a skip and a
hop, some scribbles, and
a high-pitched song
in a language spoken only
by the ones within the circle.

A loose woman leaves kisses

She slipped out each morning
before the men could wake and stop
her, leaving deliberate bloodstains
on their sheets as she kissed their
legs and necks on her way out
with her razor thin lips,
each nick announcing neatly
that these men should scrub out
the blood of their shame
the blood of their loss
the blood of their bodies’
deficiencies, and not hers.

Rewrite of TD's "Razor Sharp," if it wasn't apparent.

Schrödinger's Cat

Boy am I sick 

of the word

theoretically.

I have theoretical plans,

a theoretical life,

a world of theoretically 

endless possiblities,

which ultimately means

a world of nothing concrete.

At this point, my life

is in a box;

both limitless

and finite.

But, honestly,

I'm sick of having a 

carton of maybes.

Someone get me 

a fucking box cutter.

Cavalier

I didn’t see you
When you drove past this morning.

Did you see the kiss
I gave him on the sidewalk?

Whenever I see a car like yours,
I peer inside—
Though I don’t want to.

I have never seen your face
Through the windshield,
In the seat where I sat
When glass and airbag smokehaze
Hit me harder than your silences.

Oh, how fitting
That I crashed your car
A worn out metaphor for worn out
Words.

How fitting
That you fixed it.

Wreck

I didn't know the meaning of the word
until I was snapped into one,
or out of one and into another,
snapped into the jagged axle
out of the jumbled stupor
into my bruised shins against the dash
out of my loneliness
into my mortality
dashing out of the smoking car
into triage mode then, thank god,
out of the heart-grip of fear
into an insurance phone-tree
out of my wallet with my license
into the car of a stranger
out of my better judgment, in tears, but
into dumb luck and my borough and finally my own front door.
Out of the wreckage, safely
into the certainty of remaining a wreck for some time.

Three Ways to Fall Asleep

1.

Count backwards from

Tomorrow

Until you get to where you

Started.

2.

Write the list of

Everything.

Include: radish leaves, sublimely, and

Without.

3.

You

Are the world's

Mirror. So,

Mirror.

Atlanta in the Spring

The wind blows yellow.
We use up all our tissues
breathing in sperm cells.

Uneasy

There's a garlic knot

in my stomach.

And a sugar lump

in my throat.

So, yeah. I guess

you could call me

an emotional eater.

A Nature Poem

White birds
With softer wings than you
Have flown above these parts.
They say honeysuckle words are meant for beehive dreamers.
In farmer’s terms I’m trying
To say that nature isn’t for those who work it anymore.
Pastoral dreams belong to whitewashed cheeks
Not fences.

May Nonfiction?

Per Eric's amazing suggestion:

CAN MAY BE SHORT NON-FICTION MONTH?

Pretty please? I am so in love with this and don't want to let it go in two weeks.

Note from Tim: Respond in the comments with your thoughts on this. This is a different animal but could be pretty awesome.

I dare someone to use this for their poem rewrite!

Crickets chirp.
But it’s too late for me to care anymore.
My love-sponge is full of sugar
And my mind is on you.
Write a poem:
Fart-wind smoothes me.

You're gone now

Maybe it’s the loss of you
Or maybe it’s just the sky
But I’ve spent all day feeling blue.

In the new millenium

If only I could unfold myself
From this horror around me.
These 451s, these ‘84s. That’s right, I’m
Surrounded. I live like a
Rabbit. My eyes are
pink. My skin is fear.
Quick. Did you hear that?
Oozies on the rise. I’ve gotta get out of here
Or they might see my heart twitch.

Toppings

There's something I like about the toppings bar.
At a glance, one can see.
The kiwi wallow in the juices of their own envy
(strawberry is more popular, but only slightly).
Blueberries, the promise of summer.
The mochi's powdered face belies its simple taste.
Meanwhile, the cheesecake bites gradually melt
into one sticky cheesecake mess, the cranky child
of the bunch. The peaches are lonely.
It bothers me when the candied cherries impose on
the lesser fruits. The shy pineapple, of pale complexion,
finds itself drenched in flamboyant red.
Imagine the self-esteem issues of the pineapple.
I make it my job to ensure that each topping remains
in its place, weeding out any would-be crossovers.
I make sure that each bin is filled to the
golden rectangle amount, the one that looks just right
and makes someone who,
when they glance over, think, I appreciate this
sterile aesthetic, this beauty
that comes from categorizing a thing by its essence -
its color, its texture, its taste - I see the choices,
and I will make mine, scoop it up
with a spoon, and carry it with me.

Bastille Day

It started out well enough: the weather

wasn't cold or anything, and a wind blew

across the scene. You thought it was a holiday

in France. I thought about the first time

of everything. The next morning we will

forget what the well-timed word means.

A wind blew in France, and everything

the next morning wasn't the weather.

The holiday was cold and anything

you thought started out with the morning

and everything. We forgot the scene.

Safety

How funny that today, to network is
the opposite of working on a net.
The words that once meant staving off the threat
of falling or starvation now mean 'biz.

To network is in fact much more akin
to weaving, leaving knots in all your crop
so others can identify and swap
some unearned favors brought from where you've been.

The world of the word's first meaning seems unreal.
There was a time when humans ran in packs,
when loyalty meant life and home and grace.
Yet each day's disappointments do reveal
a wound still open, bloody from the pacts
I swear we swore, to keep each other safe.

REWRITES

Applause all around for the efforts thus far. But it's the middle of April, and that means people are hitting a bit of a slump usually, so why not A POETRY GAME. YES.

By Wednesday, the game/challenge/OLYMPIAN FEAT OF STRENGTH is to rewrite a poem someone else wrote this month. Drastic tone changes are encouraged. Post your new title as the title, and use the first two lines of the actual post to post the original title and author.

HUZZAH

Museum

I’m in a museum.
Alone.
Piece me together with your stucco walls.
Rococo villas could exist in some other world.

Exhausted

After a long week of work,

exhaustion hits you hard,

and even just after noon

you want to take a nap.

Sometimes, Sundays

are just there

to let you 

recharge.