Posts for June 2, 2019 (page 4)

I start to ask the old man with the moustache,
the expert mango picker,
to pick one out for me too
as I have no idea what to look for
in a mango.
But then I realize
I don’t know what to do with one
once I have it.
Do I peel it?
Do I slice it?
Do I bite into it?
Mango has been an artificial flavoring in my life up until now
relegated to slushies and bubblegum
and popsicles.
I have never encountered one in the wild.
My girlfriend approaches with her vegetables and the moment passes.
Someday, mango, someday…

There is a melon in the apple cart.
I start to replace it
but decide against it.
If it identifies as an apple,
who am I to tell it otherwise?

I must decide if I want my graham crackers
shaped like bunny rabbits
or shaped like teddy bears.
(My first choice, superheroes, has been discontinued.)
The teddy bears are fifty cents cheaper.
What does this say about the animal kingdom?

In the checkout line,
I want gum because I crave flavor.
I don’t get gum because it gives me headaches.

As I push my cart to the car,
I still don’t know what I’m really hungry for.

Onyx Mourning 

Wings against the wind
Unsettled flapping begins
Finding lift in Him

That night we went camping in Tennessee,
I wanted to be close to you. Tangling  

around woodsmoke, Elizabeth Bishop,
& star alignments, I forgot myself

when you started walking closer—the air 
tightening. & it’s difficult to unweave  

knots of desire once they tether to
telephone string, paper-cupped to the chest 

—inhale, exhale. She is not right for you.
& I forget which one I mean. And I  

keep thinking about the sound of your voice
when you stood next to me under the trees, 

close enough that I could smell the cedar
blush of your skin—pencils and apricot. 

What if I admitted that night I knew
your heart is a river that bends and bends, 

its rhythm surging to an open space?

In June  

The earth is a green goddess, hip and hair
cod and elm    deer and roe    iron and foam  

Petals daze   apples hum with bees
bleed splinters of pulp when cut  

Creep of wings    shriek of owl echoes
as she lands on a brace of branches  

The lark in the oak seems to ache
for the aerie amid shards of cloud  

Young bodies tat cartwheels in air
stir afternoon light into motes of shadow  

The harp-necked cob pursuing psalms
tugs at your ear with his sharp grunts  

Loon soars suddenly    pierces moon
with bill’s edge    the sheen of a needle  

The altar under the spire is bare
while cicadas sing a zing zing zing liturgy on the lea  

Even the halest person bays at the madcap moon
blesses its abyss of light  

We are reminded that we need more
than meat and shade  

We know that the covey sharpens in winter
that we will trace our steps in December’s mud  

Yet there is no gap in this bright oasis—
this month is a clove we pull from the ground  

slowly    its hot summer grass aroma
clinging to us     smudged knee and verdant tress

The fly behind the window pane,
Would seem to struggle free in vain.
She butts her head toward the light,
Restrained by our inventive might.
Leave her there and she will die,
Her search for food gone quite awry.
And yet it's not stupidity
That does her this iniquity,
But ancient mind and species power.
For if I want her to be free,
Th'responsibility lies with me.
And if I fling the door ajar,
I now become her avatar.
She my queen and I her slave,
She my column's architrave.
It's liberty for her or death.
The stakes for me but cleverness.
Could God have made a mind for me,
To make me serve, not make me free?
To serve both fly and old narwahl,
And creatures big, and creatures small?
They bargain hard, they bargain thus:
Face death of world or obey us.

Griping my bat

Longing for contact

Stirring up some dust.

Taking position.

Exhaling rushing nerves.

Focus.

The ball of expectations.

A serge of power

A prayer.

Momentary bliss.

Until I reach first base.

To be met with a tag. 

Memory is stained glass in a hurricane
and shock absorbers during an earthquake.
Shards caught between chasms jiggle and tear
through traumas like the fourth-grade field trip
and your mother’s lobotomy. Glimpses of ice cream socials.
Glass-cocaine tables
where sweat drips through your reflections:
Drip
            Drip
                        Drip…
Meeting with a silent image
too blurry to fully comprehend;
culmination of a life and lineage
all erased
when charged with the loss of your head.

Butter pecan syrup 
                         sits
                         sweet
Tonight
On my tongue
             taking
             time
             to
             taste each second

Yesterday was only an hour ago

I’m already reminiscing 

Emerald green, ruby-throated.
Drinking sweet nectar.
Wings humming like a jet engine.

pops Lindor truffles in her mouth 
like they’re her own.
Like we aren’t supposed to carry them out,
offerings to customers in cool cars in the lot.

Like her only wish in life is
to try every flavor available,
selected by the color of the wrapper.
Lavender looks better than sky blue

looks better than rusted orange
looks better than dark red.
No mind for flavors:
caramel and sea salt and dark chocolate.

Chocolate is chocolate, she says.
She carries them stuffed
in the pockets of her apron,
ready to be plucked with slender fingers

and placed in the palms
of other down-on-their-luck associates. 
They round out her wrinkled cheeks
as she tells stories about her daughter abroad,

lost in the thick jungles and dense beaches
of thailand and peru.
She tells me one afternoon,
as we load carts together in the back room,

that she’d like to take a nice vacation, a long one,
somewhere she and her daughter could stay together,
before absentmindedly pressing a navy wrapper into my hand
and trundling off to some other long awaited errand.