Where's the Museum

where we can hang the lute purchased unwisely on a driving trip to Italy, where we can shelve the bins of old movies, the heavy boxes like velveeta bricks chunked with slides of this campsite, that Easter, the roses again, new hybrids, new to our mother's gentle OhWalters, where some docent will placidly open the jewel box and unwrap the Purple Heart and the chamois with the rust bloodied bullet and show to the children see this small and it blew open a shoulder see it was saved it was morbid it was necessary it was this small just right for our museum

Call Your Mom, Ishmael

Fancy the caulking ribboned thick
The sails freshly stretched
The wheel plumbed anew
The captain experienced the limes wrapped neatly the weather predictable the mothers
not consoled

CROW GOLD

Out on a limb 
I might try 
to illustrate the world a little –
other countries
blah blah blah - 
this is how it is or was:
once I was a cat sitter,
the floorboards were
warped and dangerous,
I though I’d write dispatches
from the fire escape
but never had
the nerve or will.
On Saturday nights
my friends look heaven-ready
on the dance floor
I’m standing by the pole,
chewing on a lime rind:
waitressing dreams,
breastfeeding dreams,
breast dreams.
Would it be nice
to be as vulnerable as trash
knocked free by wind?
Crow-gold,
exposed and up
for grabs.

DRIVING DOWN MLK WAY

My station wagon shudders 
the dips and ridges 
of MLK Way,
oh terror-free life of mine,
vessel-bound, with headlights blown
and his last speech
tremolo despite the haze. 
We bastards of the West,
still scanning city tide pools
(magenta oils that mingle 
with the rain)
for some more pure 
reflection.

the pool table was slanted
but we played anyway
our first time as a team
playing against strangers
i made the first ball in
when you weren't looking

#inspired

Inspired to write of the delight I get from being around you
No one else has the effect that you do
Bag it up and sell it
Mami you are a drug
You got me lifted
Gifted
Feigning for you love
Wondering what it smells, tastes, feels like
I be like
Those addicts on 25th
Only breathing because it feels right
And I want you
Every last drop of your body
Probably
The liquor talking for me
Saying all the things
I'm too shy to say
You've been the bright

Lecture

Celestial sciences sour me, make me less
Pope-like which isn't a problem as I
am a woman and was hoping
to be a mystic.

However I would be a great Pope,
a corrupt magician type, the cool kind.
Am I immodest? The worst
thing about magic is

it's all treasure-hunting,
which is for boys.
What, I get recipes?
All these gold word-blocks
and the demons don't
solve math or teach computers;
which, pardon me, I'd
love to find feminine.

I don't care about treasure
but I would love to see
a cavern of gold automata
like I heard a French guy
who became Pope Sylvester the
(I can't remember numbers,
that's what demons are for)
did.

peanut butter

sour stomach
thoughts of
peanut butter and
banana toast,
the smell is sickening.
thick honey in-between my fingers, teeth
life is nauseating.

THE KATELYN FEELING

I’ll call it the Katelyn feeling

dark, saltine

approaching tidal

somebody I love is

opening up

away from me

I can hear the soft sound

see the soft shadow

of a bright, fresh happiness

choosing him

KI AND PI

Ki and Pi.

Combined you represent

my greatest loitering times.

Double Libra to balance out

my double braided mess.

With you all I am a wrapped up column

expired lust morphed into

something better – a sister of sorts,

a good right hand man.

Ki and Pi.

The boys in black

with small slant script.

Pioneers of loathing, certainty

and I’m the loudmouth driver here.

Ki navigates with daisy gestures

and Pi just says “this way is right”.

Combined we don’t 

stay lost for long. 

COUNTRY SONG

Wanna know the feeling

of waiting for a girl

to come along

and make me better  -

the paper flower plant

is curling like onions

the rain is back

and making songs

as comforting as rice - 

wanna know the feeling

of never being ready

until you are

Crowd of Crows

Why say murder when crowd contains the bird?
Honeys do, yes, and honeydews don't
Rusty hearts need rest apart
This here cat is purring across the scars flapped on my chest
Even after years padded by,  a cat's weight is an iron clamp
A reminder you are gripped, some choices gypped, and a greasy
love will scour the pot.
Crows settle in the live oak.
  They aren't looking for us, we are no bunch.



(Thanks, Shakespeare)

Fare thee well

Drizzling rain, a song and being together.
Called for a birthday wish, and here I thought
it was condolences. Twenty years of chemicals,
and all the better for it, feeling powerful, oh January.

Such things I ate tonight, the thought of it astounds.
The sauce and regretfulness, not doing enough
relaxing into and because of dread. A glass of wine,
optimism of destruction and television, smiling scientists.

Sung with my small voice, infinite exponents
of nameless women washing which I do not.
Who to call back, so many and without time
or the right kind of it, quite, oh January.

Poppy

I always liked my grandfather
who lived in Florida the best
He didn't have arthritis
His house didn't smell like smoke
He had a pool
and a beach across the street
He always hugged
and kissed me
and let me sit on his lap
He always smiled
and laughed
and made jokes
He didn't make me say
my prayers at night
And his wife would always yell at him
for letting us stay up too late
He'd glance over and sneak us a wink
in between the lecture
then tuck us into bed
with a kiss on our sunburnt cheeks
I was the saddest when he died
We never had a funeral
Just hung his military flag in the yard
When I got older I learned why
my grandma divorced him
Poppy cheated on her
when they were much younger
Poppy wasn't a good father
because he wasn't around enough
Poppy drank too much
But to a little kid
none of that matters
if he's good to you
You love Poppy

Bus rides on Harlem

I've decided 

That from now on

Every time

Any time

I am met with unwanted stares of passerby 

Be it curiosity, bewilderment, adoration or side-eye

I will smile

A small defensive action of grace

For them 

An opportunity to save face

Who knows

It may be exactly what they needed today. 

-jsc 2014

Sent from my iPhone

Waist Deep with Muddy Pete

The cadence of stories our children never tired
of  songs that fell out of the mouth rounded
plunged in the drinking fountain
drunk only as a word friendly with skunk
a lived life a loved wife a leg long enough
to balance, a horsey ride for
an invisible Pete too small to crawl
and the father , two griefs to carry.




(Pete Seeger, Sr., d. 2014
 Peter Seeger, Jr., d. 1943)

Venus

tonight i fried an egg
and finished a carton
of ice cream i can feel
venus moving and something
loosening inside me
like shedding, stretching
like maybe you could shake me
right out of my skin

Living a Better Life

I know of half a long life well-lived that seems the more so for being half
but a whole life well-lived might indeed be better, if a whole-life can be
considered to exclude being a child, when one cannot live life well for
fear of never learning. There's always the possibility of being killed by a bug.
Ssssh, watch out, one day it's the heat and the next it really is a killer
with a metal leg and a sad backstory. When I was a girl the door to the attic
locked from the outside but always unlocked by morning with the cat
looking hunched and fatter in the dark. Looking forward from there,
which is toward the present I could include some sex stuff,
which is also half of a life well-lived but could kill you. Matt has two
pairs of bellbottoms from different phases of life lived differently
because they are different sizes though neither is tight. In a way
having bellbottoms that are too big is both about sexuality and its opposite,
which does not exist. I believe that people around me pretend to
have opinions about penises that they do not actually have, though they
may, under some circumstances, have the penises themselves. This is
the result of a request to write romantically in the midst of writing
fearfully and about death, though the thought to write about death
has more to do with celebrating a long life. It must be such a relief to say
"Ah, I get it! That was it. That's what happened." I think I fear
death more because of how you can consume a whole series at once
now if you're a genius who uses the internet. I used to want only
to be a genius which keeps a person (me) from making plans.
Keeps, kept. I thinks keeps, let's stick with it. I'm not smart enough
to use the internet to fear death so much because of watching every
series I can at once but I am enough of a genius to know that
historical re-enactors make bad money. If, in keeping with the theme
of a life well-lived or half of it, I note the redundancy of "bad money"
I will be less radical than I think. What have I got to throw at the devil,
bellbottoms? Can tight pants kill you? When my grandfather died I was
wearing a periwinkle blue sweatsuit and, standing on a concrete slab, was small.

How to teach kids real good

Welcome to your morning session
We mean your norming session
Here you will become test grading robots
Take a number
You will now be known as grader #176
This test is not subjective
We must all grade the same
You are professionals

The dissenters speak up
And others yell to quiet them
Get off your soap box
This isn't the platform for this
Do what the man tells you
Don't get caught protesting in this room

No electronics
No music
No eating
No drinking
Just grade
And keep grading

This is what we call American education
The best education system in the world
American education
The best in the world

I don't hear your red pens moving

Mid-Winter

I want to go to a warm place
in February

I want to see the beach,
walk on the sand,
lay in the sun,
and swim in the ocean

I want to take my 9 days of freedom
and make the most of it
soak it up
and feel happy again

Don't want to get trapped
in this cold heart of a city,
staring at the television in my frigid apartment
or crammed into the subway car
in an attempt to do something

I want to get out of here
but I don't want to go it alone.

8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29

YOUR BEAUTIFUL MOUTH!
THE SNOW!
THE BEACH AT NIGHT!
THE MOON ON YOUR FOREHEAD!
THE BEAUTIFUL NIGHT!
THE MOON ON THE SNOW!
THE BEACH ON YOUR FOREHEAD!
THE BEACH ON YOUR BEAUTIFUL MOUTH!
YOUR BEAUTIFUL MOUTH ON THE MOON!
ON SNOW THE BEACH MOUTH YOUR BEAUTIFUL!
THE BEAUTIFUL SNOW BEACH MOON BEAUTIFUL MOON BEACH BEACH!
YOUR THE THE THE THE THE THE THE THE THE THE YOUR ON!
MOUTH AT ON NIGHT ON ON ON MOUTH MOUTH SNOW THE!
YOU YOU YOU MOON SNOW FOREHEAD MOUTH ON THE ON BEACH BEAUTIFUL MOON MOUTH FOREHEAD SNOW NIGHT FOREHEAD NIGHT SNOW MOUTH!
YOUR BEACH MOUTH SNOW FOREHEAD BEAUTIFUL THE ON!
BEAUTIFUL FOREHEAD YOUR SNOW MOUTH!
BEAUTIFUL BEACH YOUR FOREHEAD!
THE MOUTH BEACH SNOW!
YOUR MOON!
YOU!
YOU!
YOU!

Back To the Farm

The apple you snuck me
still lives on my lips
when I dream I feel
the rough fence-posts
and the cold wet surprise
of a cow's nose.
(Silently I laid an oat-stalk
against the electric fence
YES sudden shiver YES ELECTRIC
hiding that throb of new
knowledge behind your knee)
Hey Papa, what'll it be?
Something more than do
and don't Something like
YOU? YES INDEED
come on, here's a hand, let's go
back to the farm
of my memory.

Bone & Feather

I say what is it
You say hummingbirds

(squeak machines dizzying heights

territories furious summer & winter;

now the male dives to impress, 

metallic noise, how he wins her)

Could I be tiny I say
You say sure

Could I be fearless Could I sing 

mechanically

but still be bone & feather

13

Thirteen again 
thinking into the funnel
in front of my forehead
pattering around in borrowed
socks, walking over futons
to get to things I need
Jenny made a “ball drop”
for the millennium
and no one noticed
my top was covered in
ancient script and supposed
flattering seams

ROOSEVELT HOSPITAL

With all the different kinds
of getting clean
is it elegant geometry,
a curse, or just the tiny world
that my old love
strung-out and far away
is banished to those same
bright hallways
of my start.
They say that I
was ten-pounds-plus
and quacking, a bloody mess
that hot may day,
that someone had to call
to find my dad, at Mogador
same spot we’d linger
those broke and happy
winter afternoons
years later, 
pooling tips
for sweet mint tea. 

Baby Makes Three Sorrows

The sorrow of repetition, of vital, infantile patterns,
Of weary long mornings, o brother, another cotton square,
And the sun in tender eyes.

The sorrow of the alien, boxed in and boxing out.

The sorrow of older sisters, of sudden slapstick displays,
Rolling along the floor, clinging to mother's tired legs,
The slow shock of displacement, Claire's fierce growls of love and loss.

1/25/14

i can't even write the title of this poem down
but you probably know what it's called

i open my email to find pictures
of caribbean islands
little green gems in a turquoise sea

one is a photo of you squinting
a weight lifted from your face
we have the same dimples

in conversations i am measured
giving thoughtful explanations
but i dream of screaming at you
and wake up with my fist balled
against my own jaw

the other day i was parking my car
like you taught me and took my keys
out of the ignition to sit watching
the streetlights turn the fog a sickly orange

and here we are this mundane
heartbreak this particular ache
a thing i didn't want
you to teach me

whatever i'm doing it's not forgiveness
it's scraping the inside of a jar
with a spoon 

Vices

i gave up some vices
for a while but got tired
of keeping track and let them back
into the dusty rooms they stay in
in my mind, banging doors
i say it's just the wind and we all
pretend, that i'm drinking less and
sleeping more, and not writing your
name on pieces of paper to burn
ceremoniously in rituals that won't stick
i have a friend over for breakfast
we drink dark coffee and bare our souls
just let them out for some air
then tuck em back into our pockets
where the seam is pulling away from
the seat of our jeans, wander down
the street the sun is out look at this
blue sky who cares about your drinking
and your tired heart it is shimmering so
sweetly and the air is full of birdsong
you can almost hear the green things
rustling, under the cold earth

night light

sensing obstruction
turn on

through vague things
a high small window of bumped glass, two white nylon sheets
light

gathered without pull

each day there's enough

container the projector

perhaps

and why glow blue?
to go on longer
to hurt the night eyes less

Winter in NY

#dearnewyorkers

(Natives not transplants)

Stop acknowledging the weather as if this cold was unexpected

As if winter was a lark only spoken of in fairy tales

You knew it was coming

Don't act surprised

Nor be unprepared

Break out the goose down and strut yourself wherever you please

Because one day you'll wake up

And suddenly

It will be spring

-JSC 2014

Sent from my iPad

Cupid doesn't work here

I'm back in the internet game again,
she says
Boys checking me out
telling me
"You're so beautiful."
"You're funny. I like that."
"I'd like to take you out for dinner or drinks."
And too each one she responds
And somehow, still no date

Home Office

Quiet of many days down poisoning the house.
Advice to "walk" is never wrong, easier to tip the lid.
The more possibilities for health and renewal, the longer the list,
the longer the list the fewer possibilities, etc.
Improbably, it was really at the DMV that I felt best,
Resigned to sitting still with others sitting still.
When everything was perfect, the milk and the sun,
the list was longer, graphomaniacal, impossible.
Snow, then, is a blessing and a direction, as are all
clear things but to clean, which is too much of the heart.
Also, to bend over and stand back up is unacceptable to me.
Quiet of many weeks lived in the chest, the stomach spared.
In between the weeping like peeing or eating toast.
There is no shoe without a flaw, and all advice points foot-ward.
Leaving the DMV is for another errand, not for a slow drift home,
but a slow drift home it is, or was, the time unclear past dark,
though it was light and still morning. When, in success,
with enough money for asparagus and beer, the condensation
breaks the bag. Glass so unpredictable, an imp of a vessel.
The sun making it harder to get up, which is new, for before
I blamed the window or the lack thereof or the exposure.
The last time I remembered the feeling of really dancing it
complicated the list though didn't quite make it longer but
somewhere in the closet is a sweatshirt to mail and in the fridge
a pile of dregs. Quiet of many hours spent without breath.

Ride-Along

Mom you stupid beauty
abused. Shied away
from meaning. made the most disgusting face
I've ever seen when looking
at your own body.
Mom you stupid
beauty. Always trying to see me
naked as if you could peek
into another world
where no hurt was done.
You stupid beauty.
Now I hobble the curb
of you symmetrically,
like a fated partner
or a mail-order bride.
Like a paid partner
for the Christmas UPS driver,
Your ride-along.
Stupid blind beauty
making me run rampant
on shards and into thorn
bushes, gruesome realities
you made me answer the door to
so you could sleep.

RRRRRRRRRRR

I'm jealous. I know because I feel
an angry jangle of silver bells
upright in either lung ashaking.

Also lungwise,
a lungful of lust
and a desire to climb you, bright boy,
oh la la, look at you,
lux of the angels,
red of the devil,
toast of the town like here's to you,
You comedy athlete,
the simple game you nail down.

Didn't we try?
Twice or so. You were terrible and I felt surprised
at your fail, starkid,
awful to me twistingly,
twerpishly, like let go, idiot,
let live and like live.

hey

Don't touch me. It's ouch, nearly.
Get me liquor-ish
and kish me, crush a thought
into a joke,
reason out an affirm
from my ovalled mouth
and make out 'til you check out.
Check you later, how 'bout.  

Drummer

Here in the damp basement

walls slick with mold

is the old drum set.

A broken cymbal hangs 

at a festive angle, 

and the punched-out bass drum 

's encroached upon by dilapidated boxes,

their many pressing bodies

urgent with decay; brown, boring

but for the way they're full up

with photos and filmy memorabilia.

You used to sit and say "my throne"

and beat the skins so hard 

we had to dance. We laughed.

The sodden stacks of cardboarded images 

and failing snares 

can't tell that story.

How I've missed you now, for so long.

Mysteries Abound!

Ease your child into the world of playground,
Ahem, the world of semi-supervised playground,
With a simple series of charming disclaimers.

Taking too long on the swing?
Practice whistling whilst casting your sights to the heavens
When the chains are grabbed, shout, "Threat level Orange!"

Ringing bells during an excellent game of Splicing Dandelions?
Run to the picnic tables, duck, and cover
When hauled out, protest that Room 8 is the 99cents!

Cornered in the corridor
By a teenager with a backpack and a big gun?
Bring him the good news that Mysteries Abound

you do it very gracefully

cinnamon
rose buds
honey
toothy smile
florescent lights
you:
      doing hat tricks
      eating subway sandwiches that drip onto the table
      wearing more layers than I thought possible
me:
      reminding myself to look up, talk to you
      low bun
      feeling antsy beyond belief.

MAKING A SPACE IN MYSELF

making a space in myself.

not a whole room but a portion

that’s ready. a place I can go

to rest or remember no matter

where I find my body went.

a stillness that could hold something

if something came along

that I wanted to hold.

I could fill it now with wine

or magazine articles I read once

that told me how to be some other way.

and I know one or another of my worries

would happily pay the rent

even month-to-month

but I think I’ll wait.

needles and pins

a change of plans
a swift
strike of the hand and everything
smells all salt/butter/burning garlic.
I've  potted and
re-potted
and re-re-potted
every plant in this house only to
notice how when afforded more room, roots
just keep growing deeper.

a list of things to do:
fix backpack
finish library books
clean mold off window
turn down the tea kettle

I am
engaged in thoughts and ideas
so dirty as to
make like sand boxes and build
them all up too high with the knowledge
that they will all fall down, as
everything does. Right?
I ask my mother
my father
my sister
but in the end it
was my brother who told me the truth.

My Famous Poem

Miley Cyrus sticks out her tongue..again-
So Angelina Jolie can squint as she bites it,
And that paparazzo is there to capture the moment through his flesh-tearing lens,
And Justin Bieber's voice squeaks with Canadian  pre-teen angst,
Because he fears that his time and attention are more deserving.
A Kardashian tries to keep up with this traveling tragedy,
So, she walks around in a scant outfit and cries foul when her momentary lapse of fashionable judgment is plastered across a glossy magazine with headlines reading, "Kim's Binge Eating Scandal."
An ordinary woman finds these scenes spread across news stands and chastises herself for her own binge eating.
We all revel in self-doubt,
Because the circus is in town,
And that paparazzo wants us all to buy a ticket.
He wants to distract us from the real show happening around us.
Popcorn, anyone?

The speed of winter

Slow.
Winter is the slowest season, by far.
It's cold creeps in beneath the shining sunlight.
Even the snow falls at a tedious pace, at first.
Slow.
Winter is so slow.
It seems to pace back and forth, leaving grey skies and the remains of snow clouds in its path.
Winter.
You are so slow.

A senile moment

I seem to have misplaced my happiness.
Have you seen it?
I just had it in my hands...
Really, like 2 seconds ago...
I...
It was...

Are you sure you haven't seen it?
It wears a content smile and it has a full heart.
Are you sure you haven't seen it?

I guess I misplaced it.
It's around here somewhere...

good morning

woke refreshed
sun shining in brightly
through the red curtains
thought about the talks
we must have today
and the day seems so hard
and I feel so tired already
time to go back to bed

Sorry/not sorry

Delusion breeds suffering, our limitation

Love, the answer, yes - we know this

Travel among poles

Magnetic beasts of virtue

Be there baby bear at the center

When it's over, before it began

That peace, all we have to know

To know and to love myself

Learned behavior for the forgetful

Ask me to be more than what I am

See what darkness stirs

Stop looking into my eyes

You know me so well.

to wax and wane

We have infinite opportunity
to connect on the level of
my primordial heart. My
animal body
somewhere else, eyes sting
from the
baths of crushed mustard
                              anise seed, He
cries out
for this rock rose, will open as
my legs my throat an
infinite connection like when i am all
colours. All dust. Like you
have your hands
rest lightly on the valley that is
the small of my back
                              my infinite back rolling
hill crests
of a coniferous forest, pine cones
all littered about.

PEELING

Commit to a courtship of investigation.
It’s a thrill: I get you getting me gotcha.
Inside your walls was wallpaper.
Ads for everything. Racist tabloids.
A stack to carry around.
Gold dots and pink shadow flowers.
You told me you were a stone, a silly rock,
a drifting sock - so I'll peel back, 
or hodgepodge something over, 
empty out the Ziploc bags
of  salvaged strips and bark bits, 
glue you down
for now. 

RIGHT NOW

the rhythm of a manual transmission.

the cat drinking long and hard from the fishtank.

the sun sanitizing the kitchen through an open door.

beeswax spilling through a crack in the tabletop.

hands weathered and dry from the constant washing.

waking from a dream, slipping in again to find something.

coming back to stand in love instead of falling.

it's so cold...

today
it's so cold
that
the kids
you pass on the street
are wearing swimming goggles
to keep their eyeballs warm.

The Courier is our paper, and the paper says...

That villagers are incensed that the less well-to-do may soon
live among the more well-to-do
The villagers are awash with fear of fire
The fear of fire is less than the gasps from the police blotter printed each week
And this week there were two burglaries via doggy door,
and both in neighborhoods where it may seem the dogs are ignored,
where the hubcaps get more polish than seems practical,
given the proximity to the freeway, overhead, scraped by the giant pepper trees
in the backyards,where the pets hunker down for a scratch,
when they're not jingling crouch through the rough-
edged flaps at the back of the houses where the inhabitants
just might be packing to move up to the condos in the Northern neighborhood
where there are no doggy doors because you never know, you never do.
The fires may come, but not at our backs! We have tattooed the ears of our pets
should they flee.

OF COURSE (OLYMPIA)

Standing in the doorway, I only see your face.
Of course you live in a black house
painted dark inside and out,
black floors and walls, no lights
just your floating head and hand, beckoning.

Out the window is the grey bay,
upstairs, your closet bedroom.
Of course there is a little rabbit body
draped across the coffee table
and bones, and furs, and ancient light bulbs.

Of course, of course
the beauty being that everything familiar 
becomes so funny as we age away 
from all the other bedrooms
of our life as friends. 

DRIVING ALONE

Scanning stations
passing trucks
skating circles
Miley in abrasive pixel cursive
coming to the Tacoma Dome
reminder of
my crisis tumble
monotony ache
but the driving feels good
the radio right
same song twice,
first acoustic
then later and loud
motel 6 twice
going there, then back
perfect for something
illicit, just enough
out of town
remember to write
that down.

Do or diet

Caution to the wind,
Hob Nob shoveler,
crumbs will wind
into tile crust.

NONNIE’S DESK

If boxes are secrets
and secrets are graves
Nonnie’s desk is an old, fine cemetery 
held within the body of a noble horse: 
tapered legs that carry great weight, 
soft smell of dust and rubber.
Before the desk was mine
I only touched it when I helped her.
Now I wake to it, golden in the grey,
eleven drawers, four cabinets
two of which are sloped like backs
of perfect sleeping women.

Lonely Band

One gal, her voice hers
One fiddle, amped to reverb
One machine, enslaved to repeat
It's a band! Charismatic, Solo-Width...
Crapshoot over, Shulamith would get it

Two hands, count ten fingers at birth
Two x's, genetically diverse
Two is the new million, irreducible
It's a baby! Putting up witcha crimes against feathers
Gotta shoeshine cloth for drool-shiny leathers

SHUSH

we leave the city looking

for silence

but the hum grows louder

step-wise, sideways, in intervals.

I have played music but this

is different.

everything is alive and trying to sing.

five thousand feet

from sea level and countless miles

we’ve come looking.

torn between calling out

to announce our arrival

and slinking in on soft feet

to see what happens

when we’re not expected.

at home

Home late
can't eat a thing
open a beer
the neighbor comes by with cookies and dulce de leche
from Argentina
then runs off
The heat is on
but you're still shivering
cover yourself in a blanket
covered in cat puke
Too cold to care
and you can't go to sleep
because you haven't finished your beer

HEY RC

Hey RC,
I miss you. I'm so tired of analyzing everything I used to wonder about.  I like a peach wall in a quiet bathroom.  I like the thought of things that can't be explained, but still shirk at Matthews and Marks, also those who claim to know "the truth."  You and all them always say I have a way with words but let me ask you, what kind of things are they to have a way with?  They aren't even things, really; no spaces in between, just some outflow of noise & juice; blood, saliva, pumping, teeth, a human music that struggles nonstop to connect the body to the invisible. I like William's elephants holding each elephant's tail, the circus-won't-find-the-park and all that, especially the diagram on the diaper changing station where the mama elephant is looking at  baby and daddy elephant is smiling and looking forward.  I like believers & their heaven, sometimes.  I like a patient and boundaried people who will get us there (who are they again, my friend?).  I like the mixed upheaval that breaks open into meaning.  Come back to me, RC.  I miss you.

in an A

In an A
there isn't much I regret
living among nastursums
only what wasnt shared
A letter cried
A lover
A June that too quickly
became September

In an autumn
prepare to be sad
I share with dry grasses
salt we had
A train came
A headache
A window too large
for the empty space

In an afternoon
there is only regret
living for phonecalls
A morning is
A start
A lifeline
or just a lark

In an A
I once broke a heart
there isn't much I regret
living among nastursiums
only this

Old Boys Doing Better Than That

Alumni association hit by a googly: head is a bit of a cider old boy, swapping charlie

with his woodbine - morning after sharing cigs, burping -

escaping vapour steeped in whatever gunk is left

when saliva evaporates and gets caught in mouth droops.

i dont

I dont want to learn to make croissants
because some things ought remain marvels.

of wood

Scrape away layers
in ringlets
and revel in the hue of red,
read between the lines
of winter
years of drought and rain.
Hundreds pass in inches
beneath the plane.

Fain we forget
or become illiterate,
unknowing paint new barriers
over the grains
of history,
pave ourselves instead
into prisons of present-tense.

Or fain we recall mere tables trees,
when forested, fade
the streets and parking lots.

I understand
your passion for wood.

After all
the splinters cut and pullings-off
of bandaids
show we too are red.

a nother

cold in spheres is
restless
or like a child in tantrum
[shakes]
upsets her mother and her chair
slips down
blanketing north america
in ice
[shaking our heads]
who is to blame for restlessness or indignation
when no open stores
have gloves to steal

a late and ever poem

Crooks shelter bridges of noses
damp & dripping embraced in condensation
Some say its endearing
others times its gross
and while we give priority to pedestrians,
deceive ourselves into happy hour
supposing our sweatshirts be separation enough
like banality, a simple choice
Do you take cream or like it black, babe?

Crooked glance bounces once on the glassy bar top
bridging the embraces
Damp eyes bring in more tips
and its pretty gross
how we think we're special
Other times its endearing
Are you feeling tipsy, boo?

We tip discriminately
like Robin Hoods
in hoodies
roam ruins of our fathers
conception condensing on our foreheads
and florescent hums stilling the hazy night mind
the path smells of the slew
We bed not under bridges,
strip off our black armor
like cotton privilege of condensed critique,
nuzzle nose back into crook
Are you sleeping, dear?

5:00

Distinctly working or not working is not gonna happen.
"Am I working?" my grandmother wonders;
Do I work here? Is internal, "Do I work here?" is tragic.
Do I work, here?
Sick at the sound of the phone; all night long my mother gulped and gasped,
"Quantam Leap" was working, then, for her.

Little by little

Too many periodicals,
would rather be the unaware affected 
trickle-downed and not be frumpily tracing its lineage,
hearing thought monetised  
before it splits off and multiplies -
- but the beach hotel, on a cliff eroding would sooner flop into the sea
before wonder comes and 
shows us all up in the face of wonder.

Sour grapes

The real shame of it is that I will write love poems for you until the sun rises in the west and sets in the east
In a fickle attempt to turn back time
And unmake these oceans I still shed in silence
every day
As I watch the gap between us ever widening
With growth spurts and short skirts
I chase empty love affairs to fill the canyons you left
Captured in Polaroid image
Their faces fade in record time
Recollections of names get mixed in with memories of our early days
Heinekens & Jameson shots,
Dancing in the dark
Tangled bodies
Cigarette breaks without ashtrays during 8 hour marathons
Like
The first time you said you loved me
I lived until I died at your hands
Yet still I will write you love poems until the sun rises in the west and sets in the east
Until am young again and a woman you desire
The woman I aspire to be is the one of your dreams
I slave away for you
Chained to a greatness too huge to hold inside me
So I birthed it into reality
For you
Only for you
I died a little that day
Sacrifices what was meant to be the best of me
Of us
Because you said it was necessary
I selected the worst case scenario
Believing it was best for us
Because you said it was
Because you said it
You loved me
And left me
To be an eye
Peering through the looking glass of hindsight
Makes perspective skewed
Cause I still write love poems for you
I celebrate our creations
The joys of life
Kissing boo boos
hugging colds into oblivion
Battling Lego robots on snow days
Anything for a smile
Giving all I have and finding what I don't to provide security &
Comfort food
Painting trails hoping you will follow
And find me home
waiting for the sun to rise in the west and set in the east
Writing love poems for you.

-JSC 2014
Www.artlovesher.com

Should be done

Projecting projected adulthood,
pre-empting thin air and what we think we've plotted on charts.
Tinfoil ejection blown out of the fighter jet,
spoiling around the service ceiling,
the instinct to be burning the yoghurt pot to find its original form,
skinning,
cling film for the adult to creep about without a youth to dull.

Utility shelved, I'm tired of myself anyway,
could just as well be tired because I dittoed. 

Prank call

everyone asking questions at once
the end of class
scrambling around the room
cleaning up
before the next class enters
"Say hi to my mom"
he says
his hand is already against my ear
I listen for a moment
confused
then turn my head
and see a hand shaped
like a phone next to me
the realization
followed by fits of giggles
yes, you got me.

YOUR GLORY IS UNSURPASSED

Light shaving the top of Seward Park like the handsome half of a man's face
Seagulls caught by late-evening yellow-gold, sparks flying off the flint of Mt. Rainier, bright as airplanes
Contrails and clouds running wild horses to the western sun out from the one dark fulcrum of Issaquah
I-90 over the waters floating cars on its arced belly like breaths or spirits
Whole sky cinching like a glad girl about to see her father
Sweet smells in the wind hint shouts of banana, pineapple, mango---
Who are you what have I done to be here---
Your glory is unsurpassed

re entry

Re entry

Reentering the atmosphere

Cascading lights the length of my arm

Envelop the infatuation I have with life

She sits at the table

Stillness of the dawn

Held fast the commitment to change

Motor running the teens are content

With friendship and silly laughter

A red blur flying past me

Today is the day I tell her

When the sky is clear

When my lungs are filled with radiant light

When my heart is true.

kraz

jan 22

Faces on the Metro

Faces on the Metro

###   )w(      !!!!! 

{* *}   [',']     {*+*}

Only three passengers today

It ain't Spring

No cherry trees bloom

And it's not raining

Not an Ezra day