terrible and good (2009)

everything was all at once terrible and good
because he was a mountain that you tried to climb barefoot
and when you reached the top you couldn't see the air with all the blood on the ground, all the blood in your hair that he wiped away with a finger and a concerned look
it was terrible because there was a fire and you couldn't save your dog
it was barking in the bedroom but the hallway was full of smoke
and you couldn't breathe well enough to move
so you just lay in the grass and watched the world burn down
you just lay in the sand and watched yourself drown and
isn't it lovely how the sky looks so murky when viewed through
rippling green waters that would have been cause for celebration
if they weren't the thing that made you go blind
in the first place
so you try to rub the dirt from your eyes,
you try to write a letter,
you tie a string around your finger to keep you from forgetting
but there is more dirt under your nails and
all the paper turned to ash
and it doesn't matter because by the time the knot is done
you've already forgotten what you'd woken up for in the first place

seaside

if i had a home to take you to

i would show you the lake where i learned how to swim

my father and i at the edge of the dock, my pink bathing suit

sagging at the crotch and threadbare

i would tell you how i shook, and cried, and  was so very scared

of the dark and glassy water

and how my father grew angry

i couldn't move, so he picked me up and jumped feet-first

into the icy cold where we bobbed like pale, bloated driftwood

and i screamed until he pulled me out

there would be the shore that we could walk along

not sandy, but pebbled and strewn with rotting kelp

we would stand and let the water roll up onto our feet

and through the fog we would pretend to see

any proof that i'm not still afraid

if i only had a home to take you to

you could know me better, and more completely

but i am more like a ghost than a girl

lacking history, defined edges, permanence

so when i lay on my back in the black of the water

you cannot tell me from the waves

i want you to unpack me as if i were a suitcase that you could fill with your essentials (a toothbrush, dull razor, a change of underwear) and lug behind you to your next destination.  i want you to unpack me and remove the clothes that have remained crumpled behind my pillow, under my bed, shoved into drawers and stowed away in the back of my closet.  i want you to remove the things i cannot remove myself.  i have become so full of time and trinkets, objects and reminiscing of past days that i cannot see the ground beneath my feet. i need you to unpack me.  i need to be empty so that you can fill me.  there is not yet room for anyone new, no space here for your hands, or your mouth, or the stories you tell me in slurred whispers late into the night.  on the train, you shove me into the overhead storage compartment and the door will not shut over my folded legs.  you push, and i cry, there is no room.  i make myself smaller.  exhale again and shrink my lungs into something more manageable; i fold into myself.  you shove again.  in a quick burst i tell you, i loved a man who fucked another woman, and there is space again in me.  i am smaller.  i tell you, my best friend died and i cannot pass his house.  i am smaller.  i tell you, i slept with a man who did not love me.  i am smaller.  i exhale, and there is less of me to store away.  you close the door, and in the dark, i smile.  the train pulls away from the station and i count the seconds as the wheels race bumpy over rusty tracks and below, you accept a drink from the cart and crunch the ice between your teeth.

at times, i feel like a pool of water.  behind my eyes, it is glassy and clear, and when i am still, and quiet, it behaves the same.  into that space a thought comes and it falls, plip, into the pool.  ripples move outward through my limbs and i can feel the tips of my fingers buzz and my toes hum.  my body is liquid, sliding under the cracks of doors and puddling up in the unfilled potholes on the road leading up to your grandmother's house.  but sometimes, in my head, the calm plip is not a calm plip, it is a torrential fucking downpour and water leaks out of me in ways i cannot control.  i want to build a boat.  it is not the simulation of drowning, it is the actual experience of drowning, your body filling up with thoughts of death that you cannot avoid. 

to speak the names of our dead

we are foolish fellows

we amble and trip

over the grooves carved by our sadness

deep ruts cut through hard-packed earth

your grief speaks quiet and low

and i see the way it paints lines

on the backs of your work-worn hands

and drops your shoulders down

to become like granite

your loss is whispered and you

have found places to bury it:

beneath backyard mud, tangled in tree roots 

sliced among pieces 

of fruit

the dead grow up stubborn and hearty

so i pluck and

hold them whole beneath my tongue

grind their barbed stems and

 bitter petals between my teeth

i will swallow all these ragged pieces whole

if it will let our grief fall mute

i will make myself

split open, ripped

pulpy flesh squeezed out onto sidewalks

ribs cracked raw and wide

but if these stripped-clean bones make the 

bird cage that you nest in ,

then where is the room for my shrieking,

wailing ghosts? 

take them,

loud-mouthed, persistent

let our dead learn the words to speak their names

to each other

and we will lay silent on green grass

staring up into endless, empty skies

lines from The Time Traveler's Wife that make me feel things

"I hate to be where she is not, when she is not.  And yet, I am always going, and she cannot follow." (Henry, x)


"I am suddenly aware of myself standing thin and upright in a Meadow where everything has flattened itself down and so I lie down hoping to be unnoticed by the storm which rolls up and I am flat on my back looking up when water begins to pour down from the  sky.  My clothes are soaked in an instant and I suddenly feel that Henry is there, an incredible need for Henry to be there and to put his hands on me even while it seems to me that Henry is the rain and I am alone and wanting him."  (Clare, 72)

then/now

once, i was a universe,
the expanses of stars and the intrepid explorer.
I was the newborn foal and the knock-kneed doe; uncertain, eager.
I was still, unblemished water, and long gulps of cool air after diving.
I was a dirt road, bare clapboard walls, rooms to be filled.
I was a phone call home, and the future wife, and the names of your children.

I gave it all.  I gave it all.  

Now, I am a filled-in map, no borders left unchallenged.
I am a burned-out light bulb and the fumbling that follows.
I am a picked clean, sun-bleached skeleton and the buzzards overhead.
I am feet encased in concrete and dirty bathwater circling the drain.
I am static, a dead line, the click and the dial tone.

I take it back. I take it back.

a poem about nick jaina

When he sings, his mouth barely moves

His mouth is a cracked slit, words eking out like

a secret he still wants to keep 

He interjects stories in between the verses of the songs he’s written,

and on this pressed plywood floor,

I am transported. 

We are standing in an alley. 

We are leaning against a brick wall. 

Our breath makes clouds in the air and he says,

quiet and self deprecating,

I don’t know if I’ll ever fall in love again.  

Sometimes I cannot sleep.  

I’m having trouble eating.   

I thought I was doing what men do.

And the music loops and his fingers slide and he is reading pages from a diary like we are all his closest friends. 

I do not feel like I deserve this. 

He sings, I have the same tattoo -   

Mine is black and hers is blue,

and I’m in Primary Ink leaning over with my spine exposed. 

Kai runs the needle over my back and I

hold my breath so that I won’t move. 

I hold my breath until I am dizzy, and the tattoo feels

like a slap on a sunburn. 

Jordan sits in front of me,

lets me squeeze his hands so tight his fingertips turn white and cold.

He kisses my head, tells me he’ll love me forever. 

He kept that promise until he didn’t have to any more.

Now I have the memory marked in my skin. 

Bold, black ink across my spine reads “Mea Maxima Culpa”: my most grievous fault. 

The voice at my back shouts, you are to blame. 

You are stained with guilt.

You are the one  mired in remembering.

I have the same tattoo - 

Mine is black and hers is blue.

And the music loops and his fingers slide and I

Do not feel like I deserve this.

first open mic in years and it's with something old and comfortable.

A change is coming

and it's good because i've been method acting

the sad mick on the corner selling

stories of my childhood 

to any stranger looking to be inspired for years

shaking my cup made of blank folded pages

waiting to hear the din of a city's bent phrases

picking up words off the asphalt dropped

by the drones skip jumping from one stepping stone

to the next, i'm just waiting for the right hand

ciggie burn, camera click and scene switch

i'm not alone here though, 

because two can play this game and play we have

acting the supporting roles in eachother's lifelong

tragedies but when painted faces and 

costumed days become the typical we don't quite know 

what to do when it's: good show, old friend, take a bow and take your leave

you were the one who first

pressed my spine to the sky and dusted

cobwebs off chakral catacombs just to see

what kind of bugs we'd attracted

and it worked out for the best because this

light never shined as bright as when your fingers

did the striking

i was dull and flickering when you found me 

 cross eyed and tongue tied

living in empty crossroad romances 

shouting over screaming tires into

blank universal expanses 

looking for a deeper meaning

in the psychedelic trance dances

with pen calloused hands you

pulled me up from the tumble down rabbit hole

alligned my body with my mind

rewriting the lines i'd been confined to for decades

and gave me purpose

since then we have been greek marathon athletes

running tag team through muddy streets living in

our shared racing heartbeats

we complete the pattern,

good things for good people

trailing behind it's your back that takes the most

familiar shape, but it's your back without the voice to tell

your feet to do the waiting, 

my soles met your soles on suede and soaked soil

and we're tired and battered but the race is

far from over

so we keep on forward, one foot in front of the other

chasing california dreams and sweet sunshine cover

until we can drop, bruised and sweat soaked

and be still for a while

in laying here, i could count your vertebrae

and write poems on your retreating

but this leaving is a burden, bone 

breaking and beloved and i don't know

how to spit when the fire from my lips only knows

enough to sink war ships

and i'm doing my best just to keep this afloat

it would be so easy just to let ourselves sink

join the rusted ruins at the bottom of the sea

but our need to breathe is greater than our

need to sleep

so fill your lungs and hold it tight

we have so much further yet to go

a change is coming and it's good because, 

for a second, this was a love song

one of those puppy dog eyes, sweating palm songs

one of those thick-tongue, can't find the words songs

but don't be mistaken, this is our swan song

one last epic testament to the babel tower 

we have built, rising it up from the muck and

the mire stretching stacked calendar days

 to the heavens and higher

knowing this prison of cracked bricks

and sticks is the best platform from which to jump

beyond ourselves

a change is coming

but please don't be scared, i know the gyres are turning

and we're counting down moon phases 

until the cities start burning

and the lesson we've spent the last ten midnight's learning

is that crossing our fingers won't stop the tides turning

this is happening whether we like it or not

so take one last gasp in, approach nirvana

in the inhalations

let that calm reach your head

reach your body

reach your lungs

pray for flight, blind leaping into the sun-rising sky

and until our colliding plot lines

decide to star cross eyes again

it's good luck, godspeed, goodbye

the lover is childlike

the lover is childlike

made more innocent and fearful

by the certainty she feels

she hides her tired face in his chest like

she once hid under her mother's skirt

clinging to her legs

the man will be the beginning

and the end of her

the definition of all things

so she throws herself to the wind

like only a child can:

reckless, limp-limbed, made buoyant by love

and faith that she can fly

• This poem was apparently written by an anonymous writer after hearing me read on KDVS.  mr./ms. poet, if you're out there...thanks for the homage, i am quite flattered!
  
  
  
  Homage to Ashley and Dr. Andy
  
  She, the Lady Godiva of the skit
  reads over the air waves lickety split.
  Grit verse voyeurs tune the broadcast, get it?
  
  Her censorship is inequitable.
  Candid eloquence is negligible.
  
  Hence, "Upon the very naked name of love."
  Riding a horse, on a deserted cove,
  the sole poet bares all, in the name of love.
  
  Bold, her breasts in words, yet taxed to inspire?
  Peeping Tom, verse voyeurs, brave to perspire.
  
  In awe of Professor Jones for his gifts.
  Presents, an array of poets, who don't gyp.
  Praise to the good Doc this is all a trip.
  
  Her poetry red in a Turkish bath.
  Verse voyeurs would steer off the primrose path
  
  let's surf the violet sky upside down
  kissing words, like a jester stealing frowns.
  Ashley! Tear off your mask you are renown.
  
  -- the anonymous poet

burning up like a star upon reentry
crashing headfirst into the ground

stone fruit

i came into season with the stone fruit 

swelling with the shortening of days

we lay under branches bent overwhelmed and heavy

mouths open to swallow whole what fell

still hungry, you tore your fingers into me

and i burst, too close to rotten to be sweet

or worth-your-while

i came into season late this year

so you spat me out

but sucked the pit till it was clean

not one speck of me remaining

found in a notebook, dated 18 february 2010

i thought i saw your bicycle
chained to a rusted fence post
but upon closer inspection,
i remember my hatred
(the one that i burned along with my pride)
and i carried along with my walking.

we gather in the backyard, in a graveyard of glass where soft carrots poke

their withered tufts through the packed piles of thawing dirt and discarded

cigarette butts.  a collection they keep.  talk in circles around a deep dug hole about

who they've fucked and how bad they felt about it. may as well be picking lice from their

heads, these orphaned children with dicks like divining rods leading them to water. 

they bend and stick their mouths to the ground suck suck suck but all that comes

is mud.  mud and grime between teeth and gums. on this night the rain arrives finally finally

with thunder so loud it shakes the house shakes bones under skin.  they open their mouths to wash

the grime from their lips but the drops catch ash on the air leave dirty streaks down acne scarred 
cheeks and they are filthy still.  scatter like cockroaches, burrow down under rocks, and laugh.

with the motherless gone there’s only now me the woman you the man -

unfit caretakers both middle split and shameful in our own rights

there’s only now a room of smoke and warm whiskey in a stone cup passed

back and forth between us.  we look out to the backyard, to the graveyard

of glass, to the collections they keep, and between

sips and sighs promise somehow to be

different.

some days

my legs work the way i want them to

and i can walk to the corner for coffee

without limping, 

or wanting to cry

on those days i am proud

my cheeks hurt from smiling big

i walk everywhere

carry sacks of groceries the mile from

the shop to my house

walk the greenbelt and down through the tunnel 

where, once, years ago, i sat with two men

passed a joint around 

and sang the blues until morning

walk to get lost, just to feel the 

blood rushing down through my feet

but most days i wake up

and my ankles are swollen and red

i take the stairs one at a time, slow and steady

hearing my bones creak and pop like dim, 

muted gunshots

i thought i could get by, going slow 

until i healed

but spring has come and with it the swarms of bugs

mosquitos and spiders starved from

months of cold

when i sleep, they come up from the floorboards

and feast on my ankles

chewing at a buffet of my flesh

i claw in my sleep and when i wake up

my feet and legs are pocked, open and raw

the bites grow so big they look like

hard, small eggs pushed up under my skin

and i scratch until i bleed

i cannot scratch hard enough

spring has come and i am crippled

trapped inside, steeping in this pain until

i am a tea too strong and bitter 

to drink

siblings ( a rehashing of old times )

The first time your sister pushed the needle under your skin

                                                                                                you were naked, smooth and white.

She bloomed color onto your chest and you exploded

                  blues and reds.

You cried like a baby and shook under the needle and clenched your toes and 

                                                                                                                                 whimpered.

                                                                                                                                                                       

She laughed when you moaned,

and begged her to stop. 

Told you to grow up.

                                                                                     Grow up.

You came into the shop a boy and left still a boy

(but stranger, less of the one I knew)

and when I peeled away the dressing and rubbed lotion on your broken skin,

I pitied you with love.

In the night, you leaked blood onto the bed sheets.

I didn't have the heart to wake you.

the hipster apocalypse

when the world ends,

there will be no vintage merlot

or aged cheddar cracked from

great waxed wheels

american spirits will become currency

-also accepted, coins pressed from empty pabst cans

and when funds run low, 

the only violence in the new world order

will be caused by a collective and universal

nic-fit

when the world ends, and the sun

is blotted from the sky

flannel will be repurposed to it's

orignal function

and beards will be required for much more than

to be, in some tired way, ironic.

the radio static will signal

every hour, on the hour

to anyone still out there, go North to Portland

we've got microbrews and moustache wax,

enough to go around

and from the great urban capitals, first to fall,

will come hordes of youths in plaid

kicking the rubble of their crumbled brownstones

and cursing a lack of wi-fi

when the world ends, there will be no

tumbles, flicks, or tweets

the hobbies previously used to buffer brew-pub

conversations

bee keeping, organic gardening, bicycle repair

will acquire sudden and monumental importance

and when the great migration from once-gentrified neighborhoods

commences, and the bearded, booted army

floods the forest on fixed-gears

we had better pray for clear bike-lanes

and someone waiting at the end of the road

with a camera

because even still, there is no journey worth making

unless someone is recording

and even though the world is done and we have been reduced to 

our most primitive state

they will still need something to blog about.

home, and the many definitions

i can still smell blood in the room your mama bore you

soaked into the wood panelling and flowered sheets

i want to lick the walls, but hold steady

fearing splinters, and the heavy choke of iron

at dinner, across the table, you drain glasses of wine

and watch birds fly low through the valley

while your mother laughs, teeth all too white, 

telling stories of your childhood I was never meant to hear

when we are in bed we peel the stickers from the ceiling that you

stuck there as a boy

and try to paste them to each other so that we, too

will glow like stars

but the backs are dusty and they crumble in our hands

like all your mountain relics, tucked away and left to rot

there are no houses for miles

only craggy rock and pine trees 

fanned out against the sky and bending 

with nostalgic weight, as if the branches could

arc down low enough for you to reach,

and catapult you to someplace newer, 

where your knees are less grass stained and

your father's more proud and 

you have something to show for your years

i am homesick for traffic lights, blaring car horns

hours spent pensively smoking on the fire escape,

a night barely dimmer than day

but we cannot leave, we are urged towards third helpings

you pour another glass of wine

i try not to cry

and all the while, mama laughs and laughs and laughs

salted

in bed, i chew my fingernails and 

spit half moon slivers onto the carpet

you pace the room

not like some caged beast 

or flightless bird but

very much like a man empty

handed, reduced to frantic

flapping

it's midnight going on

the morning after and we're still here

you with your low anthem moaning

and me with my fingers bloody-tipped

and raw

i ask if you want to fuck

because we're bored, and the room is

too small

you respond uncapping

perfume bottles, setting them on 

the edge of the dresser

and praying for a quake

my legs spread

your hands shaking and we are all

rough and open wounds

pouring salt into each other 

never licking clean

snow

after the storm he tried to be brave

and ran barefoot through the snow

so that i would have a path to follow

i watched his toes swell up frozen, black

and stiff and threaten to detach themselves

from his body

it was the first time i ever loved

something rotten

and i thought of all the ways i could carry

his weight

when the snow came again and threatened to 

bury us behind already closed doors

in the quiet i let a record spin long after finishing

and he slept to face the wall

timed his breathing with the rhythmic looping

and the hollow vinyl scratches

and i wondered how i could love a man

so broken 

who spent his days curled up fetal

and his nights crunching ice between his teeth

sitting at the kitchen table

stalwart, stagnant and sick

when the snow melted

i taught him how to walk again 

one arm around his waist and another elbow deep 

digging down into his chest to try and

reignite his want for movement

and i 

wondered how i could love him so.


**you used threatened twice, dork!