Posts for June 24, 2017 (page 2)

I took an art class this morning
“How to draw reflections and shiny objects”
The teacher showed works he’d done –
A particular one, copied from a postcard sent in 1939,
intrigued me

I asked…
     “Was the moon in the original picture?”
He replied…
     “No, I put it in.”

“It’s art!” the woman next to me spat
   loud enough for only me to hear
   such distain in her voice.

Later, I said something complementary about 
her drawing, and was met with a stony silence

                I realized – she hated me –
                                    and
                I had no idea who she was

I’ll not sit beside her at the next class
Not that I’d recognize her if she’s there
Mean people have nondescript faces

But I’ll know her.                                                                                                                 She’ll be the one glowering at me.

Truthfully, there is no catch-all solution to life’s most cryptic riddles. Every so often, a stimulus wakes up from the riverbed that should offer some kind of comfort, like an other wrapping arms around you. Except the other is a ghost, the love is empty, and you’re little more than a spinning toy with no proven use. You know it and that’s why it hurts so much.

The best you can do with the pain is live, swallowing each day as it comes, whether it goes down smooth, burns the whole way, or stabs you in the neck like a really bad case of strep throat.

Find something to believe in. Doesn’t matter what, just believe it. Let it be a place you go to on the worst days. For me, it’s a bar, amongst friends. Let it somehow convince you that what you do have now might actually be better than what’s been lost. It’s nearly impossible to imagine a good wholesome companionship as being your worst enemy, but sometimes that’s the illusion. 

So live. The best you know how. Forward, backward, or lateral, just don’t miss a guarantee by getting hanged on a maybe. Live until life pays you back. Live until life shows you how to love yourself.

I had cancer when I was little. 

I have asthma. 

It’s not the same thing. 

It is sort of. 

But you don’t have a mark from it, do you?

We arrive at the dock ready
to ferry to Nova Scotia.
The next boat, the sign announces,
departs in four hours.
Cars pile up behind us.
Passengers look around in dismay.
Then someone gets out a chessboard. 
People gather around.
We have a tournament.
Share sandwiches.
We forget where we are going.
We pin our June poem to the hut.
We continue on the narrow road
into the interior
in no hurry to board
Charon’s ferry.

No one plays marbles.  I think we’re losing them.  My mother’s brothers, between World Wars,
gambled on their shots in a man’s game.  By the 60s we kept them for their psychedelic swirls
but had lost the rules of play.   The marbles that remain aren’t marbles.  Manufactured imposters,
plastic or glass, uniform size and shade, they inhabit floral arrangements, aquariums.   
 The marbles that were–evolutionary marvels–veined fusions of water and heat and rock
and time enduring, each its own swirling planet of color, a feathered blend glass can’t match.  

Take three old ones, found in a drawer.  Roll these Roman toys in your palm and hear them clack.
Put them in your pocket.  Which rolls now between forefinger and thumb? Is it the green one,
a milky ocean wave, churned up at dawn? Is it the plug of sunset, dark at the edge,
nicked, but not cracked? Is it the tri-color cat’s eye: chalky ball, grey- browed, violet- irised?
Spill them hand to hand–were they once cherished by some child?  Cock one in a thumb,
the way your thumb, that never flicked a shooter, an alley, a flint or a cloudie, still knows to do.

I say “lets”
When I’m talking to myself
As I make my way 
Across town
To be with
All the pieces of you

that everything, everything
you hate has a fanclub brimming
with enthusiasm equal to our admonishment.
Every Nickelback, John Tesh, and Michael Bay
didn’t make money combing parking lots
for lucky pennies; tickets sold out.
Every abhorrent brand, every Domino’s
and Fila, every Scripto transparent purple
easily breakable lighter is somebody’s favorite,
every rapey daydrunk Bukowski ripoff,
every anachronistic archaic throwback to ‘thou,’
and every catelogue of grievances sings
to somebody. Even a game of horseshoes
does it for someone. Even fishing. Even the computer screen, hovering alone in the darkness,
will attract it’s version of the moth.
Instead of looking for another dogpile to join,
tell me all about what you love.

i’m up before the sun has a chance to heat the water in this earth, and on these streets, and under my skin. 
birds speak a language i don’t from tangled phone lines and deep blue trees. 

i’m not used to the humidity my body can make in this southern state, to the dense white smoke that leaves my mouth only to adhere to the front of me. 

i’m still drunk from last night, 
still dizzy from man telling me he loves me
telling me he means it 
telling me he’s serious this time.

still nauseous from watching complexities under flesh,
from hearing them try to straighten themseves out of your mouth,
from always being made a fucking mystery.

i am not your woman.
i am not enigma crafted for you to solve,
not the object of your desire.
i am woman wrapped in denim and black, and i am wet hair and scarred skin,
i am mine, i am mine, i am mine.  

I’m shining skylights that come hurtling toward you,
multi-colored flames that fly fast, and burn at both ends,  

I bloom, decelerate, and explode into stardust when we impact,
there’s not enough time for shadows, or dark side of the moon,  

we multiply ourselves by the speed of light squared
because everything is chemistry plus physics.