Split
dont break my heart
you need not dirty your hands
with that responsibility
i’m more than capable
of doing it myself
I spent so much time and
energy picking out the most
beautiful set of dice in the
perfect shade of purple, her
favorite color, that I never
stopped and thought about
if I should. My dad took
one look at my lilac acrylic
present and pointed out,
Why did you get dice for
your wife? She doesn’t play
games with you. My face flushes.
I burn red-hot because I know
he’s right. The dice won’t
forgive me either unless I
break a family rule, Never
take back a gift you’ve given.
They won’t see play. She doesn’t
gamble, doesn’t role-play, doesn’t
need them. I failed as a gift-giver
because I forgot the rule most impotant:
Think of the person you’re giving it to.
1)
Snap the brittle bones
of a long-since-dead willow
and feed them to flame
2)
My rotund belly
Growing and shrinking each meal
Like Funhouse Mirrors
3)
Mother Nature aches
Heart breaking for her children
Consumed by violence
Hammock Tanka
Here I lay weightless,
cocooned larval butterfly,
content in the woods.
This, the final peace I know,
my last bastion against greed
In late September the load of coal arrived
Open wagon drawn by two draught horses
The drayman backed up to the coal chute
Gently coaxed his huge beasts
Climbed off the seat and swung open
the iron coal door which produced a loud clang
just like the sound effects from a radio mystery show
Grabbed his shovel from its place
Slid it into the coal on the wagon
Pulled back and swung it through the air
The coal flew into the opening
Tumbled down to the coal bin in the basement
with tempo perfect bursts
The wagon now empty it was time to pay
Ma counted out the scarce dollars
I hovered behind her wanted to go
close to the huge brown horses
She had managed a team like that
at about nine years old
I thought they were the most wonderful
animals in the world better than noisy tractors
Mister Reemstra climbed back up on the seat
Shook the reins and whistled softly
They clopped away and I wanted
that important job when I became a man
New Patient
I am feeling it again.
Goosebumps on my skin.
Pouring sweat,
then I’m cold.
This shit gets old.
Sleeping becomes a sport
moving my legs,
stretching,
contorting,
praying I can get comfortable.
The knot in my stomach
is now the size of my fist.
My joints and bones ache
like someone is pounding
a nail into them.
Throbbing.
Throbbing.
My mind races
even when I’m sedated.
I pray
my new clinic can take it.
A beautiful sober life
I have built for myself.
I was just trying
to get help.
But that’s okay.
I pray
my new clinic can assist.
Anxiety rings through my head.
Becoming a new patient again.
My old clinic
made me complacent.
When I reached out for help,
they said:
We can’t replace it.
The one substance
that assists with a disease
I’ll live with
for the rest of my life.
I’ve felt it coming
for a while.
It’s time now
for my new clinic
to help.
Leaving Some For The Future
It always seemed magical,
When into the forest we would go,
We’d scout the darkened hollers,
Where we knew the plant would grow.
In the deepest darkest sections,
Out on the northern slopes,
We would begin our searching,
And twas here we’d feed our hopes.
We’d search for Seng Pointer,
Also known as Rattlesnake Fern,
The long central leaf’s an arrow,
Pointing the direction we should turn.
Then we’d look uphill in search of benches,
Towards the biggest tallest trees,
In their limbs the rising birds,
Took refuge from the breeze.
With luck they carried the red berries,
On which they had dined,
The seeds would fall beneath those trees,
After having been scarified.
Perhaps they would have sprouted,
There in the deepening shade,
To form the forking man shaped root,
In the cool and lonesome glade.
Our eyes would scan the greenery,
Covering the ground,
Virginia Creeper, Poison Ivy,
In abundance they were found.
Our mind would feel the tingle,
Which anticipation brings,
Our step would become lively,
As if we tread on springs.
A funny feeling would come over us,
A feeling that IT’s near,
As if the plant would call to us,
In words only we could hear.
And then beneath an ancient walnut,
Around the gnarled wizened roots,
I see the first golden leaves,
On the straight and golden shoot.
Five leaves in each cluster,
Grouped together on four prongs,
So stately and proud it’s growing,
Exactly where it belongs.
I know this plant’s an old one,
One rarely found these days,
With perhaps the man shaped root,
For which the most is paid.
I think to myself of scarcity,
Ecology and such,
I think of the fun in hunting seng,
That I have loved so much.
I think of all the berries,
This plant has given to the soil,
And it seems a shame to dig this one,
It seem something would be lost and spoiled.
I shake my head at my silliness,
And curse myself a fool,
I break off the telltale golden top,
And bury it with my ‘senging tool.
To protect the root from others,
Less sentimental perhaps, than I,
I know there will be at least one more crop of berries,
From this aged plant by and by.
Watch how she unmakes
the body he ignored,
as if subtraction
were a kind of wealth,
or the empty hand
held more than the full one.
She enters that arithmetic
of burning,
and the months lose count of her,
each day a leaf
the season strips
and does not number.
She leaves the palace
to walk barefoot in a forest
that does not know
which ghosts are watching.
Her breath stops
and stays stopped,
suspended
against the wheel
of the south.
Holy men creep close
to watch a girl out-suffer them
and go away unmade.
The heat that leaves her spine
is not a prayer
thrown upward
hoping for an ear.
It will arrive
the way solstice does,
having traveled
the whole long sky to get here,
the way the north star
does not knock.
He feels it now —
the sum of ash and hunger,
proof she can be made so light
she outweighs a god.
And what comes for her
wears snakes,
rains cinder
from the burning-grounds
holds poison at the throat
and will not let it fall.
