Dead leaves crumble on the ground
And June has been about
Keeping my shit together
Blood flows on the streets
And the culprits
Wear blue
My mask seems heavier and heavier
I think I may get a new one,
Seems like I’ll be wearing it for a while
I’m getting overwhelmed easily
And my paint is dripping
Into ideas
I may just be an artist now,
I’m not sure
I’ll probably change my mind when I go thrifting
you’re like pouring
the fifth glass of wine,
when i was drunk
after the second;
i don’t need it,
but goddamn,
does it feel
so good
The baby’s lips moved, forming shapes–not words
not letters, not sounds, but the shapes she’d need to make them.
She trembled, she focused, breathed heavily, adjusted:
upper lip, lower lip, tongue, chin and jaw. With success,
she flailed her arms and legs in elation. It was just practice,
it was everything she had; it was a matter of time and all that mattered.
Once or twice a week it happens
I’ll talk and they’ll talk
they talk more and I listen
I finish listening before they finish talking
and I look through them
trying to see the space behind
and ahead
I keep your mixtape playing
And hat sitting on my dash
I smoke the same cigarettes as you
And wait for your face to pop up
On my phone.
I replay our sweet moments
When I’m going to sleep
And when I’m driving around
The town we made memories in.
I’ll hold on to the thought of you,
And hope I get you back
Even as just a friend
Because you made me laugh
And you made me feel alive
I’ll love you always, “boodaloodaloodaloo”
–after George Ella Lyon
I am from Nottingham’s cobblestones still charred by the bonfire
that celebrated the end of WWII, from the grandmother without
a middle name and the grandfather who went every day by his.
I’m from the Norwegian immigrants only speaking English
to their kids born American in Minnesota and the grandmother
who had died in the room I was born in. I am from the father who never
ceased talking and the mother who never began. From Lake Erie perch
and suburban lawns, to piano recitals and pot plants growing
in the basement. I’m from chicken paprikash and dill dumplings,
fried clams and McDonald’s drive thru. I’m from “If you don’t have
anything nice to say, shut the fuck up” and “Let’s not talk about
unpleasant things,” from “There are certain things you don’t tell your mother.”
I am from Renaissance festival summers and Catholic school winters,
from belly dancers and paisley knitting ladies. I’m from a line of siblings
I do not know and people who either never move or never stop moving.
I’m from Glen Levitt and amaretto, from Law and Order SVU and Monty Python’s
Flying Circus, the spotlight and the dark closet, the questioning
and silence, the feast and famine, the praise and invisibility, the left
and the right, the foreign and the domestic, the believer and the atheist,
the elegant and the tawdry, naked and clothed, built and torn down, safe
and exploited. I am from the field where a dragon collided with numbers.
when we talk about it to others
most of us aren’t thinking much
on
process
from
rhythm
instead
we talk around
the burning cold memory
a point that makes even
his/her/their death
pale
that usually strikes out
in the deep silence
of an already
bad run
There’s no reason we can’t have nice things.
The camera was forgotten when Dad got a promotion that moved the family to Omaha. Could be it got dropped, or replaced with a newer model. Perhaps the son took it with to Vietnam, and neither returned. Things get broken, taken from us, no matter the care we take.
The puppy, one of six in his litter, got the name Roller from how he’d tumble while chasing s ball. He looks so big in Lilly’s embrace, but he was only eight days to her three years, his eyes not open to the world yet, still only imagining the source of a kiss. They learned quickly to love and care.
The little girl in this picture is 73 now, awaiting a coming great-grandchild’s fingers around hers, the large eyes, bigger smile. Time doesn’t ask if we’re ready for change. The puppy died when she was 13, and she cried uncontrollably when she came home from school to the unexpected news.
We just can’t have them forever.
