It's 9am, and the day is already over. 

What's happening tomorrow?

(Rather than post a complete poem, I might experiment with posting pieces of poems as they come to me. I might also go and find some older poems I haven't posted. Happy New Year!)

“LIFE IS SHORT. THANK YOU ANCESTORS.”

You know what I’d kill for?

A primitive Italian Madonna and Child.

In the meantime, I made my own:

2 gold leaf arches to frame my mother (dead)

and my daughter (bad girl)

2 strong women framing

me (little mouse)

between them – 

Where do you come from?

Worried people. The land.

Where do you want to go?

Pink potatoes. Apple core under

the driver’s seat.

Somewhere safe

where they will have me. 

HAPPINESS

Health/money/business/love

rainbow candle from LA,

once it’s lit you’re not supposed to blow it out

but I just made a deal each time:

little death wish

little hope chest

the quilt was made of patches

stuffed with pantyhose

our boyfriends were bad,

we needed to hide or run to the woods

arms spilling with animal babies

the Broadway thrift stores smelled like lotion

we discovered stretch and mesh

and 80s radio, mocha dregs in the bottom

of a holiday paper cup,

heater headache

hours and hours of

particle happiness

lost,

lost is a thing

you built yourself

branches that were papers

taped to the wall

then trashed

what kind of thing are you

to love

does it feel like a pin prick

a leaf caught in hair

is it ever assault  

cold water

clean --

NEVER BE SORRY

The easiest face

to draw

two lines, dots, then hair

again and again

like wall paper

smile to break

the room

a flower trapped in tape

old burger place your dad

used to take you to

never be sorry

PLEASE

because I wanted a fresh slap, a cut lined with honey that might stick to the walls as you passed them, maybe I’m looking to secure these certain germs myself, gestural promise that a wind that smells like coriander destiny isn’t all it will take to carry you off to the rich, green valley where the women are robust and lunch is a circle and I’m not invited or noticed or real

FIRST DEATH

When the matriarchs die

we pray that the neutral Gods

of clean lines, no centering

will step aside, swap out for their

rambunctious, aromatic alter egos

the un-hushed – 

old hospitality

parting gifts of

fish and flowers

(plus color)

let us sleep knowing

that everyone has

tried

OH LET ME LOVE HIM LIKE A STRANGER

In Hawaii-nei the time is nanea
just before you're awake,
after you've finished dreaming;
Like I am now, nanea, named and married with you
this delicate place of our mutual being

I make prayers from this place
to One, hidden face, who speaks in a voice like a whisper
Help me bless me too forgive --
I repeat Esau and David and Jesus, add mine

Oh let me love him like a stranger

I'm so sorry to clog up your airwaves with half-baked words plucked from the air.
I'm trying to get back on track
But quality can be a casualty
To an unyielding idea of
Powering through

It feels good
To bite your teeth down hard
On something that makes no sense
Is staring you down
In defiant cruelty
Or harsh ambivalence

Sweet sweet round and round
The big bush in the driveway
Circled in bikes with training wheels
A McDonald's take-out window
Dream big
A thicket dense and opaque
A pretend hamburger patty
tasted like nothing
And a plate of spaghetti was something to hide from
Under the kitchen table

Let's fold our legs up and press backs into sofas and chairs
To re-hash our stories
The snapping turtle in the crib
Stuck in the snow-mud on a spring day
In freshly cut jean shorts
Which one of dad's failed business ventures?
We'll protect each other (ourselves) from pricklier washed out memories
I know mine are:
A feeling of forgotten-ness
A vague dread of being in trouble spread wide around
And something too about not being enough

I've heard glimmers of yours,
But don't know them by touch
In the dark of night
And soon you might be too far away to ask.
But I never seem to rest my head on your shoulder
even  when you're near.

THE WAY OF SAINT ANNE

If Anne had been born into a basket

not rolled across Canada into the arm

of someone so lonely

if Anne had had brothers, sisters

if Anne had had daughters

 -- Anyways, Anne finds her way to me

(silver oval in the wet laundry

mystical cheap French church trinket

thank you whoever washed clothes

before)

Anne had sons, and was a gremlin woman

who also spoke sophistication fickle

like a dinner flame

and hated that name,

Anne

keeper of:

lace makers lost articles carpenters childcare providers

people equestrians grandparents miners mothers moving house

old clothes dealer poverty pregnancy seamstresses stablemen

sterility teachers

lonely on the cruse ship, lonely in the cabin

lonely watching for rain or sewing herself

to the cushions

someone said I looked like her

and even though she was beautiful 

I took it as an insult – 

Anne would have done the same.

HONEYMOON

in the flavored fog

there was blamelessness

before we agreed to

any transformations

I tasted metallic, right there

hands sticky with orange

halting the daily

spins

I miss us both

your arm out the window

as I ran

down the stairs

Recommence

Reconvene, slot into the other life
I don't hang out in locker rooms,
I barely shave,
don't know the rituals, I barely want the space.

Old men, splayed in the YMCA, friends gone,
towelling absently, it scans peacockery,
so maybe my mind isn't fully formed. The part that could be,
sloughed off in the 90s, feet still frozen, muddy knees.

I'm not so sure of men, sure of myself,
you know, codes and all that.
What am I supposed to say I don't
care to waste speak, dead air can just be that-
we're passing through so many places this month,
what am I supposed to be bringing, sullenly staring
out of taxi windows,
baroque beauty, just jam for the brioche.

Continental clutter, I appreciate it maybe
as a stoner gag, if someone reframed it,
for the locker room.

There's clever.
          Then there's clever.

99%

"How's your battery life".

He's a micro prepper, Myers Briggs Type: DEFENDER
fiscal conservative, long game, no spender, "I'll get there".

Eventually.

His kindness is material and now.
His knowledge is interface and iOS updates.

"What kind of phone do you have?"

He has two phones. One with an external battery case.
250% more battery life.

Perpetually.

I leave work carrying a lithium torch.
I am bad about keeping my phone charged.

"How's your charge, maan?"

Q Pro Tips

I forgot sea horses 

existed. 

I hope you 

haven't. 

They kind of look like 

ear wax. 

Which now that I 

think about, 

I am also grateful 

for. 

STOMPING GROUND

New York body, Godzilla lipstick

double Kali trucker hat

mind always blown so she

kisses crescent ink to forehead

to keep the stuff from oozing out

You boys have a good time?

stayed out a little too late – that’s ok.

I’m young. Full of energy.

Steam the milk, make the change

so long as spells don’t sour in replication

viral witchcraft must be a good thing, right?

Somebody rich bought a bunch of tan land

for spiritual purposes

the violet mountain pile

could claim any number of nostalgias

but her girl is my girl

so the air stays still

while you shout

Goodbye gown

Tim, son, brother, uncle, godfather, friend, classmate, obsessive Star Wars, aliens, and comic lover

self-taught breakdancer, armored car security guard, P-Town tattoo artist,

gamer, LEGO fanatic, collector, expert at whatever he set his mind to

took a breath, shaking, rattling in and out the tubes put into his throat, down, to his chest. 

He closed his eyes. They were shut for a while. And with eyes still closed, 

he stopped. That was it. Good riddance, tubes. Goodbye gown. 

Light

The lightness of 

a bird's body in a hand.

That same hand on my back.

And my question 

of whether I want it there, 

more than anything else I want

in that moment in the sun on the hill–

or not. 

How does it feel? 

The bird slept until the hand 

got tired and started drooping.

The bird still slept. 

Head deep, nestled into feathers.

Eyes far off, into the soft, 

downy place of its own heartbeat.

The bird flew–

the hand rose up, instinctively

without the tiny weight in its palm

to keep it down.