Seashells, miniature temples I crawl into to pray.
I dust each shell with fingertips, peek inside
the hollow, remember the white cry of seagulls.
Once I pulled a Florida Cone from a cat’s mouth
thinking she was hungry for crab meat.
Clean and unfractured, the memories spiral.
I remember the sun, but not the burn.
Don’t cry,
or your nose will get stuffed up
and you can’t breathe.
Don’t cry
Don’t cry
Don’t cry
A bevy of birds fly up,
a slender African beauty
glances up from her grassland mudhole,
Danger,
a single lioness stalks,
and then the chase,
slow motion legs,
soothing music calming.
Is that a church song?
I grip the arms of the chair,
feeling myself breathe.
Have I forgotten to breathe?
Don’t cry.
I close my eyes as the lioness
reaches out her paw,
claws splayed,
tail in equilibrium,
and in a dream-like state,
as she leaps,
I remember working that tooth,
back and forth,
savoring the pain,
blood on tongue tip,
and I cry,
a welling beast taking over me,
nose filling with snot,
I remember every one of them,
the miracle of hard bone breaking
through child soft flesh.
There is no tooth fairy, after all,
just me on a grassy plain,
gold rippling on Savage pelt,
and blood,
and sun.
She comes in with mask and gloves.
“Are you ready?” she asks.
“No,” I say, and laugh shakily,
“I mean, Yes.”
This poem is for the rabbit,
not the four starlings, perched
on the bare, electric wire
above it.
One starling flies down toward
the rabbit, and then veers
across the neighbor’s lawn
to land on the round, metal head
that feeds electricity into her house.
The starling enters a hole,
left of the metal, entrance feed.
I remind myself to tell her
to have her son come over
and get my ladder, a can
of spray foam that expands,
hardens orange, and will fill that hole.
This poem is for the rabbit,
as motionless as a white painted,
concrete lawn ornament,
perhaps bought by a flea market
bargain hunter to put in a flowerbed.
Eight starlings have lined up
above the rabbit. They are not
destined to be my poem.
The rabbit sits motionless, profiled
by the rising sun, casting its shadow.
I spy the white garbage truck,
approaching, brakes squeaking,
reminding me that I have not
taken out the trash. I go inside
my house and come out,
tying the black, tie flap bag.
I hand it to the garbage collector.
He points toward the rabbit,
unafraid, on the lawn, and says,
“You have a nice rabbit.”
“It is a poem.” I say.
The man looks at me, smiles,
and says,
“It’s a great morning for a poem.”
He tosses my bag of trash
onto the truck,
now become his white steed,
and rides off into the sunrise.
I will start this thing
and come back to it.
Dust kicked up from my shoes
the image there for an instant
smoky, settling between my toes.
I cannot convey
the sense of the words
drifting over like fog
waking me with a pounding heart.
This is important, it whispers.
My eyes filmed by years
light between the motes,
grasping a shape of truth.
Straining to hear a lovely voice
forgetting the last of the song.
goin where i go
when i’m feelin what i feel
tellin a tale
of dealin what i deal
no birds today
just this and that
just chit and chat
and disappointment
so
poeming this ointment
rubbin it in
and spittin it out
writin down letters
so i don’t have to shout
lovin a freestyle
makin it MY style
now comin to a close
cause the “race” is on
and i be LOVIN my shows!
*The Amazing Race
Could have counted on one hand
the number of Celebrities
with whom I’d care to sit down
and have a drink or two.
And now I’m really going to
miss that middle finger…
All paisley-eyed and brickhanded,
A relentless builder.
No less architect than anthill or Daedelus.
i.
Two cycles prior, I hid as minotaur in a great maze.
Bashing labyrinthine skull against a structure,
Less grandiose and more sturdy.
Stark in my purgings;
A beast worshipping a black steel crescent moon,
Curved as horns and blades.
A bloodletting heathen in a city of Abraham.
ii.
I’ve been heaven’s bulldozer;
God’s personal crane and hammer.
iii.
Nowadays, I build.
I build and build and build.
Paisley-eyed, heartshaped.
Slitherthick, slathered honeythoughts and bittersuites.
I would build a thousand cathedrals, one hundred thousand churches, if you would keep me stained red.
Agonizing arches.
I’ll build your house of the tiger,
If you only bless my bed of flowers.
No longer a bed of nails or hammers.
I wear a mask for every occasion
I’ve run from my own story
And placed myself conveniently in yours, and everyone else’s
Am I exactly what you needed or exactly what you wanted?
I pull a mask from the corner of your mirror for every day of the week
Who am I really?
And when I reveal my skin, will you still savor my company?
When I look you in the eyes, truly, will you know me?
The giant squid has eyes the size of dinner plates,
and you’ve got no plans for lunch.
A hummingbird’s heart strikes twelve hundred beats per minute,
right now I’d give it a run for its money.
Humans are born without kneecaps,
mine could go at any moment.
The koala sleeps twenty two hours a day,
last night I landed a solid three (maybe three and a half).
The rhinoceros has no sweat glands,
I think I might need to change shirts.
The bite force of a crocodile is roughly equivalent to the weight of a small truck,
and if we’re lucky I’ll know when to keep my mouth shut.
for D
She trembles as his hand strokes her belly.
She’s not pregnant — just fat. He adores it.
Her form — like the art of Botticelli.
She trembles as his hand strokes her belly.
They squeal like a puppy with a new toy.
He’s slim, white; she’s round, brown — but they just fit.
She trembles as his hand strokes her belly.
She’s not pregnant — just fat. He adores it.
