old


At 4 a.m. I waited for him
in the vacant streets
the wind whipping and
digging holes into my skin
so sharp and quick that
the Styrofoam box
of old food
almost got taken away,
ripped from my tightening
hands in the dark.
The obscure crowing
of some distant machinery
like a rapid moose in pain
made me wonder
where this old town goes
at night
and how sleep deprivation
makes you more keen to
weird happenings
but mostly just a hell of a lot
more paranoid,
more rusty
and creaky like old hinges.
I felt sick
enough to vomit,
I nearly did in fact
but I held back
and only shivered
on the curb
because I knew he
would come for me
Like he always does
because he knows
what its like
to be this unhinged,
because he loves me.

popsicles and eggs


These days I rise
after the bare minimum
of shut-eye
and feed you too much
cheese and eggs and beans
like Mexico.
Even as memory
begins to fade
My favorites bring
me ease
like pina colada popsicles
eaten too fast.
Like all that chamomile
tea and arguments
over nothing,
or taxi drivers whose
favorite game was to
rip us off
and laugh over their
chorizo grease
at how naive Americans are,
how the light-skinned
women bitch too much
drive their men nuts
then run off and fuck
a tourist because
it's spring break and their tits
are perky, they're entitled.
But those days
we got so skinny,
living off the land
and Pedialite popsicles.
Now I find myself
sipping cold coffee
that smells like
old almonds,
writing down my life story
in the blink of an eye,
only a minute or twos worth of
strange photos
and a voice i hate to hear
as my own.
I may not talk much,
or talk about it
but
I have this habit of
lying in public bathrooms
face down on the
cold, smudged tile,
waiting for a miracle
Or maybe just
a gas bubble
to work its way
out of my weary system.

The skeleton with the needle


For years when I was younger
I feared sleeping.
I hated being alone
but loathed
the act of sleeping
even more.
I could only drift off
if my mother scratched my back
for at least ten minutes,
usually more like
twenty.
I would awaken every night
without fail
around midnight,
usually a bit later
and I would flee my sheets
and run for cover,
across the shiny tiles
to my mother's room
on the other end of the empty house.
I always imagined
a towering skeleton
was chasing me,
holding a hair-thin needle
between his
bone phalanges
And with cracking strides
and snapping jaws
hot on my trail
he would hunt my hide
all the way until
Mommy's threshold,
a mere few inches from
overtaking me
before i reached the
safe zone.

Blank Pages


I am so tired of this carcass.
These plain slates and
Broken thoughts,
Scribbled as pounding voices and
Heated like microwaved lasagna,
only to become chewy. Old.

Lately I drink paper instead of tea,
sleep against hormonal imbalances
Instead of a strong back,
White light of computer screen
sheltering me.

My skin is dry and cracking.
I am so needy for nothing.
Hungry on empty,
for a deadpan quiet
Instead of glazed expressions.

Mouths tight and closed
Begrudgingly
Because it's harder to keep the space,
but easier to breathe the stench of silence.

Such a risk, the truth we say we seek out
The confrontation of
Reinvention
like the tremor of some wooden ladder.
Hollow steps toward the sky.

Blank pages of stretched skin
with veins like margins,
Blank pages speak to me.
Louder than fire alarms and
the fear of spreading earthquakes,
Louder because I am a coward.

Into the oven like Sylvia Plath,
Mountains of cookies and
Blackened pans,
Ignoring that wretched howl within.

Death by Bug


I thought my boyfriend was choking to death
I thought his throat was closing in.
He gasped, stopping short mid stride
Halfway between home and the library.
He hacked and spit and gagged, bent at the waist
And still his face turned redder.
I was afraid and patted his back,
Slightly bewildered and
shoulders tensing.
Uncertain of the cause of such purple cheeks,
I saw no evidence for his sudden distress,
Only unexpected asphyxiation.
The culprit was too quick,
Apparently. Or maybe not.
It was a pleasant sort of day and
Thankfully we were merely deterred
in the fresh air,
Not stuck in the parking garage
That bat-shit cave of a place
But my poor boyfriend, nearly retching
Chest heaving thickly and quickly
Could not free himself of his assailant.
An hour before a poetry reading,
His voice was made hoarse
by an invisible corpse
Because a bug flew into his mouth
and died there.
But not like my boyfriend.
He did not die at all.

german poundcake

an old poem I found




I cooked German poundcake last night
instead of studying for the two tests
I'm going to fail today,
with honor.
Her favorite comfort food
to help soak up the vodka in my mother's
gastric juices.
More like spongecake
I guess.
I'll put some candles on it tonight
I considered a morbid black,
but settled on
White.

A Happy Death for the
Birthday Ghost.
Maybe it's too much like
living in the past or being in denial
But she asked me to,
Something to accent the two balloons
for the turtle pond I think.

Today will be one of those days-
constant indigestion
with a mouth sore from getting too impatient and
burning myself,
I keep tonguing it and
pretending there is no irony attached.
She's already flitting around, busy tasks,
expending nervous energy
and then there is this sinking
Like the childhood dismay of watching the last of the warm bathwater
swirl down the drain or
Waiting until the last minute until suddenly
there are none left.

Last night I dreamed of spontaneous disco dance contests
after being rained on,
being hunted on the playground,
trying to hide from the afro-man with closed eyes
while the audience watches knowingly.
It's an epic playscape, and I'm quick like a pixie
but even with shut lids he finds me every time,
typical.
Needless to say
I was disappointed,
in myself and in my subconscious
for giving me such shitty lingering sensations upon waking;
trying so hard to live up to expectations
and leave some sort of impression,
Like every pursuit is a contest.
So pale in comparison to
past nocturnal themes
that I wish I had stayed up all night studying
like I used to do when I gave a damn about school. Sort of.


Maybe then I could have aced this German test
and given her a reason to smile at me from oblivion.

december legs


Lace-edged panties
Fit just right
And we string gaudy lights along the Douglas fir
Artificially glowing
And aged,
Your legs tight for miles and your laugh like bells while
Through wine-stained teeth we exchange ghosts.
Our stockings rub soft beneath the covers
And against one another
We lay the past down
Like men beneath the bounce of breasts,
You, gasping mouth hot against
And I, always searching
Beyond the dawn
The birds cease chirping,
Some unspeakable heat that rises in winter
Claims each quick breath as its own
You convulse beneath
Skin slick and blood of rose oil
Shaking so thickly through
Doll hands and dark eyes like glass,
Your chaste highlands curve wild
Rounded nipples and such limbs,
Unshaven still smooth
And soaking
Upon the stretch of coarse quilt and
Under torn Japanese lanterns.
The tamales grow cold in the fridge and
The dogs lie uneasily at our feet,
Tuned and unblinking
Toward the muffled cries.

blue of my blood.



Rojo
Flows more freely,
Whipping through its neon tunnels like the
Burgundy sugar
of expensive Mexican cokes
in disguise.
The women here, such protruding bellies and
Red eyes from ancient dust,
The crimson of allegorical whims
and a culture refined by
Despair, at best
Matching her side-swept hat
French, maybe with cigarettes or
a vest.
Too young for this.
Spoken moments that dissipate
into the skirts swirling high, bunching
into wind-knees
Perhaps there is still baby fat to lose.
And I may claim
The sway of skeleton earrings and
Bloody noses,
yet they are stains of an
Impoverishment
that is not quite my own.
The lights burn hard here,
rugged and powerfully enticing
So I will lose myself again and again,
the oldest city in Texas
a lot like him
Sweet to the touch and
Soft—
to the tongue.
A relic to savor
Lingering before the swallow.
In this same abyss such beloved memories
Devour and cherish me
Whole
Our feet will trample the recognizance
of our own
Such aches and flashes, they reside
in rows on command
And these years we've grown
Urban city sprawl
Like the McDonald's done in columns
and red brick walls
Next to the 5 and Dime near Market Street
where Daddy took me and Sister for
a quick round of treats
We stood on the hotel balcony
and threw jellybeans down
upon passerby,
Littering the gutters with our laughter.

garden man


I stopped smoking
Your gun
and I am pressed tonight alone
Against the blade of
Tight sheets
With the stench of old sweat
Your masterpiece
Those keys, tap tap tap
near your legal pad
Touch me
with such burning care
fierce and
Stumbling passion
As the evening churns
to misty emptiness


And oh,
to be a fly on the wall

the weight

the pills slide down the ledges of throat
and spill into the acidity like too much coffee
vitamins like small rocks
the distance skipped measured by
notes the band plays out of tune-
they go unnoticed
and you wonder if there are
enough quarters
for a few loads.

and your strange habits...
only seen by gnats that flutter, mock
the mindless movements
the lack of interest taken by your hands,
who would rather press themselves
against pen or brush
sugar or water or dirt and sun

what appears mysterious
is really only cyclical
just another thing you don't quite know the purpose for
but embrace anyway
and you sigh as the day pulls tight
and seems to halt
if only momentarily
you feel the exhaustion set in
before picking your feet up
and turning up the southern rock.

warmth of true sleep is most evading
right before spring breaks through the earth.
respectable people eat their free bread
warm butter and cracked skin
smile at passerby
as the wind creeps in faster
and they may lie to their loved ones at night
but their waste is still swept away
time, always the time

sometimes things are so true
that it's easy to forget

your circulation stumbles
such small breasts
will round themselves
into an assigned meaning
that fades with the onset of evening
and the pounding of drums in the distance
thickening, thickening,
and thickening.

tonight

My mind is like an orchard
Clustered in frozen portraits
Of blossoms that bloomed so fine
Just to drop from the vine
I've seen them all tonight
Could keep it silent and tortured,
Or shove it unto the floorboards
A rusty heart starts to whine
In its tell tale time
So free it up tonight
Life deals a measly portion
Light on good friends and fortune
It's chipped you away inside
And drawn all your blinds
Concealed it all from sight
Could cut that final corner
Charge the void no quarter
Or skip to the final line of some
Suicide note well publicized
Or give it up tonight
Kindly reverse the order
Of the options you've laid before you
The needle, the dirty spoon
The flames and the fumes
Just throw them out
Tonight
The time that you've been afforded
May go unsung, unrewarded
Some nameless you cannot know
May be coming to show you
Unbridled love and light
Should you grow in an orchard
Covered in dusty portraits
Of blossoms that bloomed so fine
Just to drop from the vine
Oh, listen up tonight
Don't keep it silent and tortured
Or shove it unto the floorboards
Your busted heart will be fine
In its tell tale time
So give it up tonight

just a glimmer, they say.
the glimmer of a sledgehammer,
the sharpened and shiny edge of reason
in the meaty middle, the warmth of the season
one and one and one and the same.
on into the heart of it all.
the beginning.
the pulp and core and
fusion of strength and terror.
there with the shaking, the flowers, the aching

once in a blue, full moon
and a mere three moons into the newness.

the day comes
and what was meant and done and right
are all so separated and perfectly interconnected
that you could almost laugh,
but those bells
they toll differently now.
there was never a plan or design that flowed quite right
and now?
it is all strikingly beautiful
yet nothing that fits seems fitting,
beauty that makes you cry out in the night, fists clenched



not alone but far away. but. but.
suddenly is sooner than you think.







inside.
and suddenly, i know nothing else

it's when you open your mouth, and nothing but dishwater comes swirling out.

everything washed in but nothing came out quite clean enough. water spots and smudgings of unknown substances.

you'll call bluff but the dish washer, he's not to blame. he's just doing his job. the water, it likes to wander, it has a mind of its own. and right now, its mind isn't on doing the dirty work.

i am the unspoken body language you could not understand. i am the white quiltings of morning snow, empty and silent but lasting. i am the memorial balloons that endure the sting of rain. i am all of nothing and nothing of all. i am everything you rage for and everything you turn your back to. i am the nondescript red stain upon your clean clothing. i am the sweaty sheets. i am the burn of tea against the roof of your mouth. i am branding. i am the strange loneliness written off as mere emotional excess. i am the unbound hair that irritates yet frames your vision. i am the hidden dirt road. i am the exhausted dinner dialogue over rapidly downed wine. i am the pitcher of your favorite holiday punch. i am the constant trickling of fish tank mysteries. i am split custody. i am Christmas morning pre-breakfast cookies. i am post script ramblings. i am sodden shower breakdowns. i am steady ache, and i am the absence of ache overall. i am nervous stomach twists. i am war paint. i am your hatred of conflict. i am your addiction to antiguity. i am your wanderlust. i am the hidden pangs. i am your self-cut, jagged bangs. i am the rumble in your thunder. i am the best friend you lost, and the one you thought you had. i am between the lines. i am electrical warmth, gently hypnotized. i am blank. i am full to bursting. i am strength and i am loss of structure. i am echoed and i am straight lined. i am all the stereotypes. i am the golden branches that stretch far and wide. i am the loss of grip. i am the river between two parts of a whole. i am the separation, i am the completion. i am the creeping morning. i am the too-big bed. i am the screaming kettle, too full of steam and hot for release. i am the congregation. i am your childhood haunts. i am your sleepover stories. i am your gleeful laugh and your perfect cry. i am the glue between earth and sky. i am your sigh, i am your settling skin. i am every hole you buried old memories in.

i am rebuilding. i am reaching. see me, feel me, hold close and let go of pride for pride.

Marsh/mellow Mornings

She stayed up late to spite herself.
Obligations and necessities were unnecessary,
and so she stayed up
and instead made cup after cup of tea,
eating chocolate until she felt she might vomit.
She stayed up late,
because she loved the feel of writing just because she could.
She stayed up late,
imagining him fishing in the cold,
maybe with a huge thermos of hot cider,
or the very least a beer and a head clear and writhing
with the cold blue light of moon.


She laid on her stomach to feel grounded to the earth.
She laid down in that stolen favorite fleece coat,
belly to carpet,
to feel solid again.
She laid flat to feel the pressure,
to surface the drifting chasm of uncertainty.
She laid on her stomach, occasionally rising to turn on and off the heat,
absorbing and holding and remembering everything.


She built silence.
She built it all around her in pretty little rows,
built it in his honor and with his name on her chapped lips,
unspoken.
She built silence,
and beneath the sheets of it, found only herself,
listening to the hushed murmurs,
the crafty drafts of energy melding in the next room.
She built silence,
and in the heart she became nothing more.
Simply there and simple quiet.


She was less melancholy and more marshmallow by early morning,
late night,
And the sound of his breathing somewhere
softened.
Around and
somewhere the sound,
then everywhere the curl of purple sparks,
and so she brought him harmonies
in the dead of
livened sleep.
The hush-hush of filmy-shaded dreams.