Post with 5 notes
SOMEWHERE, THE ASPIC OF HER BRAIN
Somewhere, the aspic of her brain
finally warms enough to register
the arrow in the fedex logo
the pattern in the gum spots
the grey on the president’s temples
the old letter in the bulk bin.
The woman, having just opened the letter
from an old friend who died
shortly after sending it
is panicking because this means
she has to write him back.
The foyer light’s flickering
but she has forgotten about that.
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HOME IS A CONDITION, IMPROVEMENT MIGHT BE AN ILLUSION
does our home need improvement? I’m asking seriously
because i feel the strain on this place like a condition
there’s no dsm code for paranoid skewed carpentritis
or its milder form, deteriorative masonic empathy
but something’s less right about the door frame
or pulling apart the floor boards, and i’ve been
waiting for the ceiling, tired of putting up
with all my nervous gaping, to jump me in bed
that would be one way to go. I might also choke
on new wallpaper, or just accept
old things getting older.
Post with 2 notes
OUTSIDE THE TRAIN STATION
On Sunday, the station closes up at ten
and you can’t sit in there until six again
so if you’re laying over from Chicago
it’s Coffee Time.
Once I realized my card worked at the ATM
I called my dad at two in the morning
because this was the first time I’d ever
been that lonely.
I must have walked those two blocks ten times.
It was the first time I’d ever been that lonely.
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HOOKIER DEMANDS
I don’t have ice I do not stalk this earth
these blocks in sunglasses, willowy, walking
The breeze has some effect
the sun, following
And I slide forward
like a slow streetcar
like some guy in a band
before he was quite famous enough
to trot like a big bouncy fucker
when he could still
just coast and wear shades
to outrun the hookier demands
of everyone everywhere
I would just love to sit down and write one more song.
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A WOMAN IN A SEBRING IS FORCING BLUSH ONTO HER CHEEKS
Tonight I counted the car dealerships on the way home
Twelve, like you could miss even one, with their daylight-hot lots
The strip malls are ziggurats, jagging heavenward
on tanning saloons and spa tub shops
A woman in a Sebring is forcing blush onto her cheeks
A homeless couple in their seventies are having a reasonable conversation
My cousin moved here four months ago to find work in the music biz
The radio’s seeking There’s no lonelier place
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ALL EX-SUPERHEROES
Ever lower dips the day
I’m the last to see this one
guttering out, out, as a whale
long in the baleen
moans a coda, wrapping up
prehistory and future
in the distance, leaving us
with a quiet shudder.
It’s a far cry
from when we used to stand in the shower
and pretend the water was
a hail of bullets, bouncing off
our chests.
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THE BATTLEMENTS EVERYWHERE
Don’t we just walk along up the sidewalk
past all the garbage cans, still full of hope
at this late hour? Someone had a fireplace going on this block
and the cars were parked close enough to each other
that you couldn’t squeeze in.
Who says we don’t live in a fortress? Every evening
the guy who looks like David Crosby wheels his bag inside
right before dark. And with him go the others like him, hiding
all that’s good and sweet and warm, waiting in windows,
should we ever set too long on the wrong stoop, ready to rain down arrows.
DRUG STORE SHAMPOO IS THE SMELLTRACK
Drug store shampoo is the smelltrack of
morning commutes on the Dan Ryan.
It harbingers air travel, too, and it is the enemy
of whimsy, the killer of music and art, sitting slack
and sweet and comfortable in conference rooms.
It is my sister my mother my father
Every day of their lives; it will presage
their deaths. For blocks around
the sausage plant, remember how they
pumped out that maple syrup smell—
or was it mint, or was it Prell?
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THE EGON SCHIELE ROPE TRICK
As a man made of cord bundles, I can
braid my legs and arms up real tight.
In school, I routinely drew my chest
ten percent wider as a mea culpa.
My dad’s battle stance is the hunchback
and I never felt right taking up space.
I will say that I have admired tranny balls
the way they can just tuck right up in.
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DOV IS ALL RAGE
At night, Dov is all rage. He is pure, acid spit, because nights are shit. Nights put math in his lungs. Nights, full with zeroes, empty with negatives; they’re a fucking vacuum, relentless nothing.
In the morning, soothed by the music of neighbors fighting over money, he sits on a box of books, sketching out a business plan for a candle shop, across the street from his ex-wife’s candle shop.
In the clean light of the storefront, holding the FOR RENT sign, Dov is humming. He wants to do things. He is an entrepreneur.
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