04.12.19
the auditorium seating is never comfortable
there is never enough leg room and the
angle of the seat back isn’t quite right
but I left the cafeteria dance to come
see you sing and felt VIP and ditched
my new boyfriend to see you sing and
I was so proud so proud I was so proud
you were busy so you didn’t see how proud
but I was so proud and max could wait because
he already lived in my bio a digital headstone that
allows me to summarize his entire life in order to pee
on him and everywhere around him so no one thinks to
go near him I left max in a circle of pee and I came to you
because I wanted to see you sing and figured that the tactic
was secure enough that I would go back afterwards and there
max would be in the circle waiting for me to return because when
you’re in someone’s bio you may as while slit your palms and press
them to each other because this is real true love we’re talking about
people the truest love the truest exhibition of love that anyone who
wants to can confirm in writing I left to see you play and couldn’t
even drive yet but it mattered that much to me it mattered a lot
and then later I taught you to ink screens and the motions too
that would cover people in cotton as they sway in the grass
and mud by the dog park or the napping hill the gravel lot
you were late but I love you and love for tardy is as real
as my love for max was I think because tardy sucks
and people who are tardy suck ass I put aside all
the time I could even without it I was supposed
to be learning I’m not sure you even would’ve
known where I was if I had not told you so
but I put aside the time because i want
you to see how proud of you I am I am
so proud of you I’ll leave whoever to
see you sing and I’ll forgive you for
leading me into thorn bushes that
take months to get to I will wait
for you to swallow that big frog
that moved into your throat and
probably died and maybe when it
died and started to degrade to bits
room forms to shake our hands again
and for a minute it was like leaving the
cinderblocks and laminate tiles where a
gap between bodies was mandated by a
man who lost part of his finger and a man
who called me baby it was like saying bye to
max surrounded by urine and hearing the song
all over again that’s what it was like even when
you knocked on the door and you were saying a
sorry for a dig that dug it was still a time to dance
then I’m alone on the sidewalk again but this time I
don’t cry or yell I just walk away and down the stairs
and over the bridge and I find a place to eat a burrito
outside and pretend you never came back at all and I
pretend that I never left max or the bathroom where a
woman was asking mom if I could have max and I pretend
i was never VIP and pretend there weren’t a lot of moments
spent excited about the work and I pretend that the three of
us are standing in order on a dock waiting for a fish show
04.05.19
Bryant Road Guard Rail
we loved the chance to
exercise the heist.
we loved to be somewhere
for an hour by demand,
and be elsewhere
to throw rocks into the creek.
to pretend a farmer appears after
we hold our breaths over the bump.
to scratch a bat-mobile and blame it
on a high school parking lot punk.
we loved to loop in behaved
to the heist way of life
and get ice cream and convert.
i wonder if they ever knew,
from the dirt on our jeans or
faces after insurance.
I wonder if they ever knew
and just let us
exercise
03.29.19
As long as I don’t die in an IHOP
paper walls that toes go through
And Julian Casablancas
Get you a clean cup
Cuz you seem like a clean pup
Sit on the bench
To catch your breath and
jawless dogs will calm you down when
Hedge fund guy is guessin’ your town
Doin’ your charts on the way
to the chart reader
multiple inks to suggest time
Look down if there’s congrats
wishing compliments were dead
There’s an energy today
You can see it in shirt patterns
you can feel it in your dry mouth
you can smell the cinnamon
And withstand the tingle
dry can come from busy
stop telling all the stories
when the mole pops up
You don’t have to whack it
Fancy matches make fancy fire
but a couch is a fancy thing
No matter the couch
Because of how we can
utilize teamwork
and be on it
02.26.19
When Buck wakes up there isn't a second that goes by before Buck is in neutral.
Eyes crunchy, moving like those goats who get spooked into stiffness and tumble, but Buck doesn't fall he knows this journey like he knows when the microwave hits the right ding ding.
He touches walls and dresser, passes hand over lamp thick with dust and a sneeze with spit strings in wind, he, Buck, he is sensitive to dust and he doesn't mix toothpaste for cortisol when he brushes and doesn't miss bowl when he pees and even leaves the seat down for Meredith, what skill!
Buck can feel the shirt color and remains very stylish and knows the inches from the bedroom to top step as well as he knows the volume on the remote control for his stereo system that he wired up to a preamp all eyes crunched, less for the sound quality and more so that he can say preamp in the retellings, but what really worries Meredith is that Buck gets behind the wheel.
She, Meredith, reminds him of windshields. She, Meredith, talks about camels in sandstorms. But none of Meredith's points, her points, land with Buck and it's proving to put a strain on their relationship, Buck and Meredith's relationship. Buck is good at what Buck believes he should do and he gets to work every day at 9 on the dot he can hear the second hand reach the 12 like he can tell if it's a roach or a spider's footsteps and he has never been pulled over by a cop and even works as a driving test giver at the DMV as his career and he did all of this walking like goats and feeling with hands and maybe also nose that his shoes are a set.
02.12.19
if rewind rewound right now
i’d be a happy cat,
but the tape is stuck
in the player in the minivan
that will later be totaled
by a deer with no will
to carry on the life of a deer.
and rafiki hits a guy over
and over and over again with a stick
it doesn’t mattuh - it’s in dee past
but it isn’t if the past has beverages
and decides to use fingers
in ways far less pleasurable
than the fingers that could
be utilized far more pleasurably.
if hitting a pal over the head with a stick
was an okay way to make the point
i’d do it over and over and over again
but not to a pal, just to the special cats
that think they can hang
when actually, if they are there,
it becomes apparent to me why
deer might jump in front of minivans.
but maybe deer have it better
without any fingers that can do
any harm after beverages tell them to.
but how much do beverages
really enforce anything?
the watering hole doesn’t get anyone
spouting out thoughts that they shouldn’t,
it just quenches the thirst.
why can’t beverages just
quench the thirst and that be the end of it,
and the tape can keep playing and not
be stuck reminding viewers that
things in the past can make deer
jump in front of minivans?
if we take the tape out now
the spool might bend and rip.
then we won’t ever be able to see
from the beginning credits again.
04.05.19
what's good?
welcome back to the world,
beautiful boy, we missed you while you slept.
welcome back to the world, beautiful boy,
the time spent without you tracked sand
into the car and I'm sorry for it.
I didn't plug the vacuum back in
after last time so it's not charged.
so we will have to wait 30 minutes.
I hope this does not upset you,
beautiful boy.
I hope next time you'll join us
at the box.
03.29.19
pressured into proofread
most of the stuff is made up
urgency especially
my urgency and her urgency and their urgency and his urgency
don’t spend time shooting hoops at the same courts
I had food poisoning last week and
Ordered pedialyte and crackers
Because anything can be ordered
And all the orders are urgent
I had food poisoning last week and
I ordered pedialyte and crackers
But the guy only brought the pedialyte
And campaigned for a tip on the app
Sometimes bed is the one to shoot hoops with for days
especially when depending on electrolytes to neutralize
there were days I wanted to feel like this
Prayed for it like mom tells me to pray
Pray away the vomit
Pray away the hate and away the thoughts she won’t hear
medicine’s unnecessary when you can kneel bedside
close your eyes and talk up to the stars
or look at a random page of the bible
and read it over and over again
like she suggested
til you understand
Or think about the government and how they’re involved
Maybe the government can reverse the poisoning
We made it through, we took a shower and carried forward and got the crackers ourselves
And then when someone tells you that they have food poisoning,
and that they are so sad and alone, you know what not to do
You won't tell them to pray
you won't tell them they're not alone
Because they and you are and were alone
so alone that you're emptying yourself
you’re even less alone with yourself than usual
there’s probably less of you
Whatever the end of the day is to anyone
pedialyte bed might do the trick
11.29.18
jump and touch the beam in the parking garage
to show how tall you are on graduation day,
jump and touch the sign for the train to show
how tall you are and maybe put a friend on your
shoulders for better access
to peel down their finding.
jump and touch the clock in the hall in the school to show how tall you are and how you own the hands or to scold the hands for owning you or to show the hands that you can shatter or snap weak digits.
jump and touch the ledge down the stairs to show how tall you are and feel the jolt at the front of a great fall and what it might be like to swing and miss but you'd never miss cuz your fingers are long enough.
you got snot on my cheek and your socks didn't match and i didn't care and i cried about rabbits or maybe pencils i wept in my head and i noted i jumped so tall i've run out of liquids to fund the next jump and the next jump and the jump after that and that's probably less desirable than obvious wetness because it seems like a lie.
a toothbrush is so tender especially between long fingers a toothbrush is something anyone can jump for no matter the height or the length because it probably wouldn't be stored all that high there'd be no reason.
01.29.19
pillows shouldn’t be under cars
I watched fingers set traps with
sharp teeth and didn’t stop them
and pretended not to see them
on my walk later in the cold
and I saw a pillow under a car
and wondered who might
find comfort beneath metal guts
above asphalt derm
feet shouldn’t step in traps when
eyes see ‘em get put in their place
under multiple trees
meeting someone on an
empty stomach and
being offered too much water
because of misdirected assistance
from a man who must’ve known best
and may have been a way out
if he hadn’t felt such a need to hydrate me
and I kept drinking it to avert my eyes
and feel the burning in the privacy
of the counter surface
Waiting at the Pharmacy, a poem for Jon Frier
Full poem:
I’m s’posed to know
All there is to know
About dyin’ cuz
Look at me
All bones showin’
S’posed to be knowin’
How many days passin’
Before the maggots
Start harassin’
I look like i am
S’posed to know
They tell me, they say,
They tell me, hey! You!
Tell me the best
Way we should lay!
I think about books I read
That might have told me
Explicity how to be dead
I know i had shelves, many shelves,
There were planks and brackets
And they held up weight
But no matter how hard I squint
I can’t seem to regain any fine print
What a waste to have spent
All that time with those books
If i can’t use the info
To verify my looks
The best way to lay
In the grave could be
On your back
Face to sky
Hoping planes
Might fly by
I hope that’s enough
Just a guess i am sayin’
But to my credit
It’s much more than just layin’