Posts for 2020 (page 103)

I painted my fireplace with a pint of Silence.
Fires of previous tenants had stained its hearth
until one of them stuffed the damper with newspapers
       inked by reporters now long dead.

A Stygian coat disguised the firebox’s permanent char,
hiding the soot and creosote that still
occasionally fall from the flue,
       burnt remains from other lives.  

Converted decades ago to gas,
a fuel line snakes across the hearth,
poised to ignite inflammable imitation logs,
       pure fiction in the empty firebox.

The room seems brighter with its past painted over
but cold without the promise of fire.

We’ve been strip-mined.
Lungs seared, seams twisted & blown,
bones shattered and strata upheaved.  

When the heavy machinery’s done
violated earth gets heaped about,
daisy and coneflower seeded.
Curious bees visit.  

Reclaimed,
a tattoo over a scar.

She makes me feel loved,
and really, what else could a guy ask for?

Those two short little buzzes signifying another message
never fail to inject me with that cuddle hormone,

someone thinks I’m important enough
to share every detail of the day with

someone values me enough
to always ask how I’m doing or feeling,

it’s intoxicating,
to be cared for.

That doesn’t ever hit you so strong
as if you go so long without it.

I don’t even remember being anything special when we met
but apparently it was everything I needed to be

because she couldn’t get enough of me then
and she still can’t get enough now.

Gratitude cannot be measured
for all the ways she makes me feel appreciated, alive,

I feel seen, like I finally matter
and she wants the best for me as I do for her.

I’ve never been so blessed before
or completed than when she’s in my arms.

It’s her birthday today and I just had to share
with the world about how beautiful she makes me feel.

She makes me feel loved
and that is the only thing I could have ever asked for.

I’ll be cactus needle caught in orange rubber
basketball rolled over asphalt into the neighbor’s fence
then stuck in the knuckle bend of your right middle finger –
twelve minutes of tweezering

I’ll be day you got so angry you shattered glass
on the backboard of our driveway basketball hoop
then I’ll be bits stuck in the bottoms of your shoes –
dug in when you step back

I’ll be each muscle twitch, curse under your breath,
if for that second the rubbing alcohol sinks in
you just look at me

they say her creative energy
                   was swallowed by  the garden    

morning after morning
    the birds called her to join them                
                    while they dug worms

she would water, deadhead, feed and prune  

survey the spread
                      of the succulents and artemesia

kiss the wild blue phlox
          the emerging lilies,
                                       dark red with chartreuse centers 

rub basil and lavender
               onto her fingers
                             inhale 

after,
        back bent
        heart full              
she could not relate to the blank page

Remember when we picked Aunt Clara up
from the mortuary? She was in a lovely, understated
box made to look like burgundy leather.

You were unsure what would be proper etiquette
for the occasion — clearly, they hadn’t covered
Transporting Personal Remains in cotillion class.

Choosing to err on the side of caution, you fixed me
with The Look, by which I understood I should offer
my place of honor in the front passenger seat.

“Aunt Clara ought to sit in front,” I said, and opened
the passenger side door. You nodded and bent
to place the box on the sun-warmed vinyl.

After a moment’s hesitation, you pulled the harness
across and buckled the box in place, checking
to make sure the lap belt was secure but not too tight.

We both went around to the other side and took
our respective seats. You started the car and drove
home, the radio tuned to the easy listening station.

I don’t believe it was polite that neither of us spoke
on the way home, but I’m certain we were both afraid
we would bust out laughing, and that would never do.

One phone call can change everything.

It’s a sunny afternoon
and the curtains dance along with the rhythmic breeze.

I place a call to you to talk about work.
And we do,
until I head down another sinuous story that “reminds me of a time when…”
and lead us down a road of confession.

You talk about growing up country.
I talk about growing up city.

You are blonde and blue
I am brown with light brown and hazel hues.

You speak of connection
as we discuss our shared disconnection–
from our surroundings
from our co-workers
from our own manifestations of what we wish to be–

and yet I’m surprised
that you opened up to me
because you seemed so
self-assured
self-righteous
self-involved–

I’m glad you shared more of you.
This phone call changed everything I thought of you,
It changed everything I thought I knew. 

be forced to flee
so abruptly again.
I have found
a loving home
within myself
&
I have no reason
to run.

We sleep like children,
Becoming unrenowned.
The floor sticks up,
Like jagged mountain peaks.
We slumber in a valley;
Still the change is subtle.
We become visitors to our own reality;
How could vivid experiences be so cold?
And warm to the lost soul;
Yet we awake and forget.
Should innocence be so prized;
When not restricted to the unrealistic?
I am an explorer when I awake;
And others rest like children.
My eyes are open, but I am dreaming;
I fear that my friends will converge into a funeral party.
Should I escape so completely;
While still fully waking.
To be reclusive, to the strangest scrutiny so unrefined.
The poets fingers work like a weavers;
Bringing together the world and dreams.
So one does not have to fear the convergence of friends.
But in the haste, the poet can neglect that they are unlike all others.
And the funeral is in the brain;
And the body is still sleeping.
The greatest pain, in creating worlds;
Is knowing that it’s merely an escape into the brain.
Where you’ve always been;
Sleeping like children.

I met my neighbor
last night for the first time, late.
He was drunk and chatty.

He excused himself
to spit tobacco.

He said he was scared
of our late neighbor who passed
alone from cancer,

Joe who always joked
about tomatoes,

that he would steal some
from my garden if I would
stop growing weird ones. 

Joe wanted just one
tomato a year,

wanted to make one
summer BLT. Summer
wanted to make one

tomato a year.
Joe wanted just one.

Stop growing weird ones
from my garden. If I would,
he would steal that, some.

About tomatoes,
Joe, who always joked

alone, from cancer
passed, who, of our late neighbor,
he said he was scared.

To spit tobacco,
he excused himself. 

He was drunk and chatty. 
Last night for the first time, late,
I met my neighbor.