Posts for June 13, 2026

i’m fountain pens and feral cats

espresso that’s hard to dial in

odysseus, according to emily wilson

melville’s conclusions on the blanket

i’m learning to surf on dry land
and looking for a beach

this poem begins with harvesting –
a small section only
a narrow strip
taken from the outer thigh,
the upper arm,
some area of the self
unlikely to be missed

that’s perfectly fine –
dead skin drifts from me all day
causing a fine domestic weather
the body is constantly editing itself
deleting, replacing,
sending out revisions

so have this beautiful square of my conceit
cut clean from its climate
transferred, secured with sutures,
to be observed for signs of rejection

cells begin exchanging
their private information
the capillaries make their red arguments
the common mammalian denominator:
keratinocytes
and the body’s ancient willingness
to mistake a foreign wound
for its own

some grafts fail, of course,
sometimes an invisible border patrol
works through the night,
identifying every cell
that cannot account for itself
the republic of the body shining its raw refusal

sometimes a stranger’s blood
enters the prosody and the graft responds
nerve endings sing along
the skin acquires sensation
the poem lives somewhere you cannot itch

meanwhile the donor site heals over
and a new layer forms –
thin,
shiny,
slightly numb
as if no piece of me
were out there 
vascularized,
answering to a stranger’s blood.

You’re pure gold these days               
Ripe for the sick greedy steal
You in danger, girl

...but epigraphs when they are not short, ruin the top

                    I capture a moment

            Reading poetry tonight,
            I am reminded of the shortest,
            complete poem,
             rising up fom silence,
            temporarily lost:

                     I?

                 Why?

            Think about that.
            Feel those two words.
            To answer those questions
            can be personal,
            philosophical,
            religious, 
            but to have written them.
            was the definition of a poet,
            poetry,
            humanity
            for all time.

There was a time when I
Would have sawed off my own toe,
Trudged in a pool of my own blood
To fit into a pair of glittery shoes
Two sizes small, but on sale.

With time, I have outgrown this urge when shopping for shoes.

Now, if only I could do the same with relationships.

In most the high and palmy state of Rome,
when Eroica assembled the throng to the agora,
to the exceeding special cabinet of curiosity, in fact.
a scalloped-topped cream-colored cabinet 
to ensconce her shoes of tan and taupe
and her silks and muslin—they thrilled 
and sang it matched the buttressed archway to the room— 
a feeling both dark-Gothic and at once clinical.

Her bedroom was useful now,
where high design met the nadir of Hellenism 
and an assorted dash of Edgar Allan Poe celebrated
with her rare and radiant iPhone covered in rhinestones
that would tell the world, “nothing more”.

Very few beauties are gabby,
but for Sleeping Beauty and Maleficent—
& my phone’s been getting photos 
dozens on the hour through my chamber door,
those kind of godawful drunken interruptions 
make me want to grab a notebook
to set down each alarum distinctly remembered.
But I’d rather hear proclaim her crazed furniture
worship in Franco-Farsi or French, then Farsi,
no I’m not crazy about pixilated renderings.
I’m not crazy about silicon dreams cutting 
my coffee streams.

Give me a woman that talks the entire
time like my lady

                    who clamors, apprehended

especially useful
                    at such given moments.

These fantasies could be problematic.

old world elegance
a culture all its own
frozen in time
sidewalk cafe’
steaming expresso
delicate stroop waffles
covered in chocolate
majestic fields of tulips
a patchwork quilt of
crimson and heather
blue delft & windmills
spinning in grandeur
pancakes with whipped cream
art of the masters
Van Gogh & Rembrandt
remembering history
Anne Frank 
moment by moment
my very breath taken away
Netherlands