Merely Words


They are light switches, illuminating the dark of things,
or the withered tips and handles of things.
Between the fermenting dough of desire and the dry bread of facts,
they are an array of flames slanted in the furnace,
carving peaks, passes, and fissures on the dough’s surface.

Some words lie docile like the fur of beasts under stroking hands
trembling variegated stillness, others arrive unannounced,
as fragments of an exploded whole,
unable to reassemble the original cause or glaring force.

Not even Pygmalion’s or Midas’ fingers
could soften or harden them.
They bring the mysterious breath of all existence,
a life we’ve never lived,
even the people there cannot escape death.

For example, when I arrange these words,
the osmanthus tree outside the window grows taller, for example,
a student’s leave request note from a long-ended semester
somehow kept in my drawer, stating:
“The organization has important matters.”

And as a drained structure, it always reveals
on the damp bed of a ditch a snail’s slow confidence.

Today

-

I can see my own uncanny face reflected in the
computer screen as I write.    Who is that guy, looming in the background
behind these words?    I’m learning to tell the truth,
like Balaam’s ass, learning to face the truth.
But really the truth is such a small thing.    It’s no big deal.
Once I stole this Bible from a motel in Idaho, in place of it I left a
note in the drawer that said “poopy pants” and in another drawer I left
another note that said “still poopy pants.”    The poor cleaning person.
But I’m sure there have been worse things left in motel rooms.
This poem is starting to be about motels though I meant to
write about today, and truth, but today’s yesterday, and
tomorrow, and truth is a white bird    in the blue cage of the moon.

 

 

Poker Face

 
Now with lines
& day-old stubble
how your face
has learned
your heart’s language
better than your tongue

The quiet of your face
quells lips that shape
words into lies & shouts

Voice a relic
that tripped you
on the sidewalk
years ago & kicked
every time you spoke

A Message from the Poetry Tourism Bureau

 
Let poetry be public
And written in the streets:
Throughout this vast Republic
And wherever poets meet.

In synagogues or churches…
In mosques and Buddhist stupas.
During late night food fight urges
Over Mexican chalupas.

In city parks and country farms
May poetry be written.
To light the dark or raise alarms:
And heal the great grief-stricken.

The time for prose has ended.
The time for verse is near.
We defend the undefended:
Give out poems as souvenirs.




Unsent Love Letter

 
Your eyes flash brighter than any coin—
And your smile makes me feel
Like I’m part of an underground economy.

This hamburger heart has softened into tenderloin
And though there is still much to conceal
The poems I want for you defy all modesty.

But I dare not write everything down:
The curves in your dancing lips
And the white flash of your bare teeth.

I want to be the verb to your adorable noun
And no disapproving frowning can eclipse
This final myth we may never complete.

Yes, for now, all of this is mere mythology.
No river, my dear, has yet been crossed
And no fearful vow has yet been spoken.

I am a vehicle with no more velocity—
A meaningful shiver where there is no frost
And a damn door that cannot be opened.

Unless you care to knock with your considerable charm
And behold, it unlocks as you enter on your own accord
And find me there willingly disarmed:
With no more shield and no more sword.

Swallowed Up In Room 18
Second floor
just left of the wooden 
warped and rotted staircase
creaked even when it was bone-still
always knew when someone was coming
paranoia settled in behind the blinds 
of 18
The one chair
with a flattened
lime green cushion
round Formica table
overflowing ashtray
all the paraphernalia necessary 
to keep us in
while the sun sprayed such vivid
hues through the cracked blinds
On cold nights
the furious wind howled 
under the bloated moon
that ancient 
splintered staircase
squeaked and groaned
as you sat in the chair
and I perched on the edge of the bed
high to the point of tormented 
and sickly
we gulped water from the bathroom faucet
When the drugs were finished
we crept down the steps to meet the dealer
and rush back
to hole up in 18
for another week of wreckage

My friend

Bobby used
to cut himself
when we
were kids
now he
sells life
and auto
insurance

wondering daily
which is worse

my friend
Abbie teaches
college intro
to fiction
and poetry
classes she
says she
fails anyone

who wants
her to read
their work
says it’s better
they learn early

my friend
Andy spent
20 years
in the Army
reserve he
deployed
to both
Iraq and
Afghanistan

and now
carries a
handgun
even in church

my friend
Jose is
an orphan
who lost
both parents
to drug overdose

he celebrates
the Mexican
day of the dead
by throwing
stones at
their tombstones

and my
friend Michael
was the youngest
of thirteen
children who
became a
Catholic priest

he says
he can
help save
any of us
if we
would only
listen.

Enlightenment


After making fun of Tony's
Tears and his whimpering in
Pain upon each urination,
It was decided that penicillin,
Rather than laughter, may
Actually be a better medicine
To cure his clap.

One At A Time

 
Melvin will soon lose both feet to diabetes.
The surgeons have already started on the left:
one toe at a time. He’s seventy years old.
Can still walk with the aid of a cane.
Can’t drive anymore because of his eyes.
His son Batman takes him where he needs to go.

Melvin heads straight to the candy dish
whenever he comes to visit.
You know what, Andy?
What? I ask.
I don’t care what they say about you,
you’re alright with me.
He laughs a toothless grin.

Melvin beat drugs and alcohol
years ago, he claims.
Now the sugar’s got him.
He chaninsmokes because they don’t allow it
in the hospital. Only pleasure I got left.
Less you count memories.

Next week they amputate his right little toe.
He thinks he’ll still be able to get around with a walker.
Otherwise Batman got to carry me to the wheelchair.
VA’s gonna gimme one of them electric jobs
cost 20 grand. I’ma be one of them guys you see
on the side of the road, flying the American flag,
drinking a Pepsi, smoking a cigarette.
Anywhere I wanna go, he says. He twists
his lips up in a knot. Rubs his eyes.
Getting old is hell, Andy.

“The house I grew up in”
 
belongs to someone else now,
and I don’t know
what colour the walls are
anymore, or if the basement
still leaks when the rain rambles
about its great grandfather
nearly drowning Noah,
or how I can’t forget getting drunk
in the kitchen with my mother
when we drank all the Christmas Eve beers
we bought to offer guests,
but I am quite certain
that the beers taste different enough today
to admit that the past
is all we ever truly own.

I squashed this bug
I squashed this bug
out of existence today
and I felt like an asshole
because who am I to
complain about my life when
I'm at the top of the food chain
and not just crawling around
waiting to be squashed