in my downtime i watch prison shows on television
is it safe to say television anymore now that all my broadcast content is streaming over the world wide web?
i broadcast a signal each night i face alone to the heavens
i hope someday my kin come
rescue me in my desperate need
i am lonely on this planet
I am good,
You say “all we have is time”
I relax and stop worrying
I take my time watching how you move your hands while you talk
When I wake up, I lay in bed a little while longer
You say you’ll be 30 minutes late so I wait and read a book
I stop and take in every color of every flower
I drive slow and appreciate every story written on each house
Oh, how all we have is time
You say “all we have is time”
But, I stress wondering how I’ll get everything done
I wake up grumpy because I missed my alarm
The whole day feels gone
I rush to plan something
And everyone’s late
Now we’ve wasted our time in the sun
I forget to go visit my dad
And now I feel like I’m an awful daughter
I yell at you because you missed the exit
Oh… all we have is time
A kiss once given is never lost – Italian Proverb
Night breaks
Still
Cool
Slick
Black
Naked on my sheets a breeze
summons me to listen and taste
evening air.
The moon lingers…
I know his kiss.
*Kisses everywhere
We know we can talk about the weather,
no argument there.
But what if it were different?
What a beautiful day,
becomes a source of contention.
What kind of sicko are you?
Who’s standard of beauty are you using?
A well-dressed couple comes to your door.
We’d like to talk to you about the latest forecast.
I have my own forecast, you say
as you slam the door in their faces.
The talking head on T.V. gives his opinion.
Disaster Dan on that other station
says there is going to be a hurricane
like he knows about hurricanes.
If I say there is going to be a hurricane,
it’ll be the most destructive hurricane
anyone has ever seen. People say
I forecast the biggest hurricanes.
Everyone says that.
People fighting over clouds
People fighting over thunder
People fighting over rain
Maybe we should go back to talking
about politics or maybe religion.
It might be safer.
the children, but I’m so lonely everywhere
& this foreign place just amplifies it. I stop walking
along the pavement just outside of a closed down
convenience store, & I look up at the building across the street:
it’s a nightclub (I’m past my clubbing days, but I remember
them too well), but it’s morning, of course, people commuting
to work, & the club’s been closed for a few hours now.
There’s a dissonance to this facade: a few of the windows
actually have plywood over them & the sign is dim
& the smoking area looks desolate, uninviting, grim.
This place must’ve been so lively just last night—-
how has it changed so quickly? I never imagined this freshly unmarried state
I find myself in; the sex was such a minor part of our loving,
but all I can think about now is the way his body
would relax onto mine after he came, how he’d kiss
my neck, spread my legs apart & lick my cunt until
I’d orgasm oh so sweetly. I may never touch his body again.
My phone lights up with a message from tonight’s hook-up—-
I told him I wanted to be bound, spread apart, fucked so well
I went into an ecstasy that made me forget every past lover,
even my husband. Ex-husband. I look back up at the club,
forgetting how long I had just been standing there.
I reach into my purse to retrieve a cigarette, light it.
The club will open again later tonight, fill its doors
with college sudents, drunk & making out with new,
fake lovers. Breakups ached back then, but
you still had time to heal; did I have time to heal? But,
even then, must everything be rectified? Or once things close
their doors in the early morning, may it just stay that hollowed shell?
Must bustling life always reenter come nightfall? I stub out my cigarette
& continue walking down the street, looking for a cafe
just lonely enough to soothe my soul.
Sam, baby.
It’s over. It’s been over.
Years now.
A physical, literal, absolute impossibility.
When you wake up,
You may be tired…
You won’t shake
You won’t shiver
You won’t
You won’t
You won’t
Just go to bed, my love. Just rest.
What’s that raucous in the kitchen–
at the start of bewitching hour?
a little grey mouse
stuck in the wire garlic keeper
wasting no time,
turning, ripping the fragile pages
surrounding the monster garlic bulbs,
trying to finish the book
before being banned from the blue soapstone countertop,
Yet again, yanked up by its long pink tail,
blindly thrown outdoors,
landing into a fragrant clump of lavender.
I paint my nails orange
and put a transfer tattoo
of Wonder Woman on my ankle.
Seventeen, sunscreen,
Tab, Twizzlers,
and a transistor radio
go into a big straw tote.
I put on Holly Golightly sunglasses
and wedged sandals.
I jam my sister’s floppy hat
on my ironed hair.
In my polka-dotted sundress
I am a fourteen-year-old
headed for summer.
Try and stop me.
