I'm not a smart man and I don't know what love is.

Boy, don't you know that I'd like to be smarter.

Smarts are like marbles;

my friends have brown sacks full.

And they pitch 'em the way you might imitate fire.

That line makes more sense if you pretend I'm

smarter

or

if you could see what I see

when the thumb pops the cradle

of pointer, curled around like a small

monkey

tail

or a flashy thumbs up, but that's even dumber.

And if I can't illustrate a simple thing like

pitched marbles,

then I'd at least like the bliss that goes

with it.

[far and away, my most dangerous pastime]

Far and away, my most dangerous pastime

these days

is reading in the

dark.

I'm ruining my eyes, Jacob.

I'm giving myself headaches, Paul.

The drinking is confetti in a glass of cold milk.

It's my father's face turning the color of birthdays -

pink and then pinker (guess he hated milk),

a non-issue is what mom is Trying to say.

It starts to get bold and text during the day,

but I pop the belt, send it under its bed

until I nudge at it at

night

"you up?" I say

and those three dots start to wiggle

and I just know that I'm in fer a

whoopin'.

But at least I've got a lid on it, Ben

ja

min.

At least the idea of birthdays (read: aging)

ain't completely pointless to me

yet.

Some creative liberties taken - I was probably wearing boxer briefs.

Of course I didn't kill him.

He killed himself. I watched him do it.

From the space between my fingers

I could see the bald ones

soar.

We were home one night

watching the History channel,

and I was feeling like fly paper

and he looked like

permed hair

so I asked him to wrestle -

no fists just

grappling.

And neither of us were in shape for the shit

but the weight of him holding me down like some

rape fantasy I'm not allowed to talk about,

the feeling of throwing him off like a pinup

in a three dollar bill's college dorm,

the thickness of our breath as we wondered aloud

if we could survive

anyone

else

he caught me with his elbow

by accident, of course

and before he could spew his apologies

I took off my panties and told him to keep

going.

I didn't kill him and he didn't either.

Bad genes might have done it.

Good beer may have, too.

Or years of apologies I never had time for.

Years of putting our love in a headlock

until it called out for the uncle who taught me

everything he knew about

wrestling.

a shitty acupuncturist

I'm taking cues from the back cover of Leon Lemartin's book.

"lustily ransacks" is my new favorite word pairing

and I'm going to tell you true

but largely useless

things.

One:

I miss my husband. I miss his body. I miss his face.

I miss his voice. I miss his dick.

I miss the sounds his voice made while I did things

to his body, dick, and face.

Two:

He is dead through no real fault of his own.

He was afraid of missing work, he'd say.

Rehab is for the whites. And for people without jobs.

He didn't want to risk missing work and now. Look.

Bastard's missed three months

so far.

Three:

I am so goddamned sad about everything that

it kills other

people.

I have proof. Read numbers one and two again.

Every awful thing I ever said was a pinprick.

He needed help and I said things that were true but largely

useless.

Every comment that he would die needlessly felt like

a needle in my shaking hands.

And do you know what that makes me?

Vogelsong

Brandon Boyd is singing Wild World while my son

thirty minutes into bedtime is talking

talkingtalkingtalkingtalking

King Diver this and Great Heron that

and he's the smartest person in this whole house I bet ex

cept

he's pretty clueless when it comes to bedtime

but then

here I am  drinking

coffee

Johann Sebastian Bach, he says

but the words are like cat butts

midpetofthetailsoI

assume it's a question and call from the tub

"Different kind of bird!"

[NASA revealed new images]

NASA revealed

new images of

galaxies and stars and

remnants

of

the past.

And they all look like nipples cause

of course

they do.

Deep space explorers, like men lost at sea,

must imagine they hear women screaming

as they

Swallow time's freefloating bits of whathaveyou.

Expel like a siren in singsongy

waves.

Flick o' the wrist, eh Captain? Eh, wot?

You sawr what I sawr?

A super airy oh la!

It's no Wonder they've DisCovered water, Herr Hubble.

S'prob'ly been there since that first mayday call -

more accurate to say, "S'salty as all get out,

but it makes us see colors."

Spacetime's only riddle

is how a man handles

his

thirst.

dreams like open boxcars

you were there

having traveled, how you must have pestered

Peter, how you must have perturbed Paul,

and you were with me in the way brisk air

is with all things un

sheltered

it didn't look like me, but it

most certainly was, it was me

be

cause

I watched my mouth squint tired eyes

to make (you) out, to make you

(la)ugh

my love

my love

my love

my love

I'm fashioning

a

bindle.

two things

i.

Your face is lost.

Indistinguishable as chaff in a mouth gripped by hunger.

Oh you, now you too,

crush the bird December's holding -

it is the floral scent of silence signaling this

final

loss.

Resolute, old friend.

Resolute is what they'll call us

(should anyone remember

resolute is what they'll

say)

ii.

How then to honor the whiteness of our dying?

I'll paint you a picture n' call it,

"Duck Hunter Starts

Bar Fight"

In it, the certainty of death is portrayed

by a flannel clad huntsman who holds us by our

necks.

Or probably a flipbook, so I can give life to

the moment he cracks us

together.

Like bottles, we break with a song halting POP,

and what remains frightens and hurts other

people.

beau-ring

Is there anything more boastful than a garden?

Christ.

I want to tell you how I feel.

I do.

But I don't know how to do that without

throwing in shit loads of

towels.

I FEEL gardens are fingers in

the eyes of those of us who have

failed to nurture living

things,

resulting in their

deaths.

Look at me, they say.

Look at me bearing fruit.

Look at me with plenty of bees thereby

having all the bees'

knees.

I am afraid

but of nothing so dull as a

fat caterpillar

or hard

winter freeze.

I've got both legs up on gardens

there.

Arctic Berryman

Forget that other stuff.

Let's talk about my obsession with Red Bull.

This is me.

Opening up.

To you.

I'm told recovering sad sacks of shit do this.

Open up. To you or

whomever.

Red Bull.

Not so much for the taste or even

the harmless fire it lights under my leather seats,

not even the burn exactly, I'm pretty

sure I could get that

with Marlboros or

coke.

I don't know what, exactly.

But I had two dreams last night.

One -

I was falldown drunk on my parent's porch

and a car pulled up in front of the house

and it was night

and I was sure

they were there to do me harm.

And rather than reach for the door

tough guy me reached for my

knife.

Two -

I bought two 4 packs of Red Bull yesterday.

That's not part of the dream.

But I bought these packs

and I dreamed they were breakfast.

And here. This very moment.

Winter Edition (shortened attention s)pancakes.

the December poem

Now then.

A young man with the presence of Leon Lemartin

comes square dancing in (the way tall men do)

and snaps his ladyfingers, sending sparks into leaves

dead.

wet.

December.

leaves.

Watching this, I remark

the niceness of his

chin.

Prob'ly couldn't take a punch,

but smart guys don't get hit;

If he did, he'd likely die

and what a waste of chin that'd be.

He runs his fingers through his hair.

More sparks. Same cold wet ground.

I say out loud that it'll never take

but the ghost of my husband balls his fist

anyway.

shit-filled Blauers bring hose showers

I'm making some of you un

comfortable.

I know.

Probably I'm missing the funny mark

because my best friend is dead

and I am

not

and I am scraping the shit

on the curb like my people

spread cement to start laying

brick

but the tread on these boots was made for scaling fences;

memories can't help but

sti(n/c)k.

Always Fresh

You pulled back on that last one, reader.

Out?

Back.

Steak.

House this for funny -

nobody can tell me what the point of living is,

only that dying

isn't allowed

so

forget it.

And those that Really know me

point their pistols at my

son.

HE is the REASON you keep GOING, you yuckFUCK.

WHY are we Talking about THIS.

And it's funny cause I gave that speech to my dead husband.

Cept I'm pretty sure I called him a

fuckyuck.

Just not the belly button. 

It's not like I can't see the funny.

My best friend/father of my child may be

DEAD,

but I'd gone looking for videos

cause I missed his

voice

and the best ones I found

were of us

having

sex.

And if that isn't funny, you'd just have to hear how

his voice goes grunge muppet

when he says that he's

cumming,

and "Oh fuck,

where do you

want it?"

[there isn't any poetry]

There isn't any poetry.

Let's you and me do something else.

What do you wanna talk about?

Music? Art?

Do you want to know the shape my mouth takes

just before I turn down

a cigarette?

Bootsy Collins made the only Christmas album I can stomach.

Paul Cezanne did as much for poetry

as he did for those chucklehead

cubists.

I bite my lip; I really only want that first drag,

but smoking with a friend may as well be having sex -

it's impolite to finish faster

than they do.

Squeeze Gently

the November poem

I won't pretend this is poetry.

More - journals falling with style while poets

with high(ly) de(a)f snapshots of

modern day living

flex feathered nuts and fly south for

the winter.

I am still in love with November.

Saturn eats children in piles of leaves /

on a street lined with trees

colors scream; I can hear them.

At summer's funeral, fall sheds everything but tears,

and I wish to high heaven (or deciduous hell)

that I could be more

like that.

Feathers

You've been gone nearly a month and I

am still checking your Facebook page

for gas station girls you are newly

in love with

(so I can curse you under my light beer breath

to the effect you never knew

what love meant

anyway).

Or maybe you did but I didn't deserve it.

That's possible, after all, I stalked

those chunti broads on Angle and Long.

And it isn't their fault.

This isn't about them.

It's not even about you, it's a

genetic

flaw.

You are gone yet jealousy sits on my chest

funny, but not funny

ha-ha.

It's because I'm not crying about Alex Trebek.

Why am I crying about Alex Trebek.

The man was 80 years old.

Had Stage 4 Pancreatic Cancer.

Had lived, by all accounts, a good and decent life

bringing knowsomes and humor to sick kids n' teen truants,

grandmas and grandpas and

exotic birds

alike.

WHY

am I

Crying.

Did I believe that he would live forever?

Did I believe that because I loved him enough

he would Endure this earth until I was ready

to go With him?

Did I Believe that our son would at least get the chance

to know him as a friendly face

if not as his father?

I know why I'm crying about Alex Trebek.

Obligatory November 7th Poem

I miss the days when smart guys spoke cylindrically.

Some guy would unfold his soft hands at a party,

clear his throat and decide to address the large crowd -

servants and slave girls and rich men and prophets and

bums within earshot

and

drunks s(l)inging

songs

they'd all stop to listen to the guy with the hairdo.

AHEM

"A man who believes he is wise is not wise.

A man who believes he is not wise is more wise.

But a man, such as myself, who believes

the impliability of belief impedes

the bending of one's ear toward true knowledge - well he

is the most wise of

them all."

And people would lose their fucking minds

while one-legged ducks swam

in circles.

It's Neo and Me and Herbert Makes Three

I've just ordered 42 dollars worth

of antiseptics,

sting wipes,

and bandaids of

varying sizes.

I'll have 192 smalls I can't use

and 8 large ones that he'll later compare

to the airplane stickers

I keep in my

purse.

This must mean that winter is Looming.

And my son is allergic to Something.

I used to think it was flea bites, but no,

or probably flea bites too, but somethin'

bit him on the leg yesterday, and now

it's angry and swollen

and warm to the

touch.

And I tell you, I hate

Everything.

From the bugs in the yard

to the birds in the sky

to the leaves that look like nothing at all

till you touch em and feel fresh hell birthed

in your

hands.

The folks at the social security place

are supposed to start calling

(once a month or

"whenever")

to see how I'm spending

Herb's checks.

On bubble

wrap,

I'll want to say.

"On thicker socks"

I'll say

instead.

the October poem

turns out

October

can go to

hell

too

Emilia Edgar James Ortega-Tijerina

We talked about having a daughter.

I'd always joked that I didn't remember

the night that we conceived our son,

but I remember thinking

"What's the worst that could happen?"

He didn't want kids. I don't think I did either.

I felt pretty sure we'd be fine either way.

At worst, I thought, at absolute worst,

I'd carry our child

and he'd leave us someday.

So then. This is the worst thing that could happen.

Yet still,

I envision

our daughter.

She would have looked like him, I bet.

He was beautiful, for a boy, I mean.

A fan of dresses and painted nails,

they could have done each other's hair

while Herb and I

wrote songs.

'Drunks...' minus the stuff about recovery

It's the anniversary of my Wella's passing.

The birthday of my uncle who died

a year before my Wella died.

The uncle who never read McCarthy

but died like maybe

he did.

It's the day before my husband's memorial.

And two days before the anniversary of

when we left and he made up his mind

he would die.

(I'm pretty sure he read

McCarthy.)

It's a lot to write and you don't have to read it,

but if you choose to continue, I'll tell you

the truth.

I don't know how to conduct myself.

I've assigned unfair significance

to people and places and Titans and beer brands

and nobody asked, I'm quite certain of that,

so how then to TOP OUT and

undo it?

There is call for dissection. Bat shit surgery.

But it's hard to know what to think/how to feel

when the guys in the aisles

shouting the next step

have all, without doubt, read

McCarthy.

I'm not firing the cheerleader, but I Am stealing her pomme-pommes.

I dreamed I was tending a little rock garden.

My lover, some cross between

iron and laughter

(and 10th grade math teacher,

which was weird, but

whatever),

threw rocks in a pile while I

sorted out

the colors, the textures,

the weights, shapes, and sizes,

what plants could survive there /

what food we might need.

I mentioned potatoes and that got him going.

I woke up mid grin but took swats at the thought.

It's Red Ruby thinking

against the brown russet facts.

In France, they call them apples of the

earth. Which is another example,

albeit a cute one,

of the skewed views I've harbored

and need to let

go.

The body knows nothing of intimacy -

least as it pertains

to me.

It drifts towards the warmth of a hundred-year lamplight

but sleeps near the storm drain

where bloated strays

Clog.

It's my Thoughts

unrivaled in hope and

small pebbles

that need to accept how they smart

in my

shoe.

quick rock for the lobsters

Well enough of that shit.

Where was I?

Oh, right.

Lobsters.

They never stop growing, you know,

or at least

the rumor gets spread, but

nobody can prove it.

They keep eating each other

so nobody knows.

They'd probably grow forever if they

could stop eating each other.

But they can't. So.

Who knows.

And the girl lobsters,

they fuck like

loose change.

It's a paternity lotto, but the species

continues,

and nobody shames them,

or maybe they would, but

they keep eating each other

so. Nobody knows.

Something about their big claw made for crushing,

the smaller claw for rending

flesh

somethin' about it

rang a bell at the table

where I sat, married to man still growing,

or so it was

rumored.

Who knows.

The One That Gets the Ghost

I'm avoiding the issue.

Blaming gas on the dog.

Standing by while the buck runs away

without dealing.

I'll need to explore what you mean to me

with the kind of sobriety

forced upon

flightless birds.

To say that I love you is useless. Means nothing.

Spring grass makes me itchy. Sunlight makes me sneeze.

The truth is the truth is the truth and that doesn't

need to be said often

for it to stay

true.

That I love you is not what warrants exploration,

but Where I believe it is stored.

15 days ago, my love for my husband

hid inside an airbag

wrapped around my

tongue.

When he died, it deployed and it took my speech with him.

For a week, my voice rocked atop

t-t-trees.

So where do I think I have hidden our plastics?

(I say 'our', but I wouldn't presume

equal gayness)

Is it stuck somewhere near the octopus trap?

When you die, will it ensnare my squid?

I don't doubt it's surrounded by ocean life;

cleaner shrimp lick their lips like it might be

for them.

It's The Fear.

Someday you'll be gone and I'll handle that poorly,

so I don't need to know the Where so much

as I need to explore the

Why Bother.

Is it worth it to me to build towers of feelings

knowing death will someday tear them down?

Fear and doubt circle them like a hijacked emotion.

For one night, I let that scene

play out.

Why Bother takes aim,

spreads its arms like a plane,

and crashes into them with

sad slumped shrugging

shoulders.

The towers shiver, but our stories remain,

n' what's the point of Why Bother

if it can't melt

steel beams.

another rock for the garden

Is there some strange expectation that I

will write THE WORDS that get THE GHOST

and then people can stop pretending THEY'RE HERE.

They aren't. You aren't.

And that's nobody's fault.

It's so much easier to pretend things don't happen.

And if they do, they damn sure never happen to us.

You're here?

Alright.

Let's talk about death.

It is unpoetic. Anyone who says different is dumb.

This entire city is haunted

with kisses and driveways

and venues and stop lights

and kisses at stop lights

and venues and driveways.

There is nothing to learn now.

He is gone, and so are you.

This isn't THE POEM;

(we're) not even close.

putting rocks in my pocket

Now.

How tough do you feel, Brit.

How glad are you

to have stayed so angry.

How thick is your skin.

How cold is the tub.

You almost deleted those picture, but

you changed your mind.

Maybe he'd come back.

He died. He's dead.

You're alive. Go you.

You're fucked, you know.

Tough guy. Strong arm.

Big tough Brit

growling at

everyone.

"Not everyone. Just the guy that died."

That's right.

Just him.

He did bad things

and you put rocks in his pockets.

You did bad things

and he put rocks in his pockets.

He's gone now. You fucking moron

he's gone.

Where you gonna put all those stupid rocks now?

To my son, when you are old enough to understand.

Today is October 11th, 2020.

Your dad passed away yesterday, just four days after his 37th birthday.

My brain has been a shipwrecked mess,

but the hippocampus, my Elephant Brain,

remains largely intact.

You are four years old and, at this very moment, playing in tia's room, which you have dubbed 'the jungle'. I want to tell you about your father. Everything. I don't know how old you'll be when you read this, but this is everything I have to give you, and I hope to God I don't leave anything out.

I met your dad when I was 19.

It was 2007. I'd been working at the Guitar Center on Hulen for about a year when he walked in for an interview with the department manager, Jon Vanderveer. He walked over and was dicking around with one of the most expensive and impossible things to sell in the store. Dress shirt, dress slacks. Shaved head.

He got the job.

And by the way, for not knowing very much about musical gear coming in, he managed to sell one of those ultra expensive impossible to sell things. Twice.

I remember that I didn't find him particularly attractive, and that was a huge relief to me. I was having boy troubles and didn't need some new guy gumming up the works. It wouldn't last long, though. His personality would quickly make him the most attractive man I'd ever known.

One of the first things he did once we started working together was walk up behind me, stick his face in my hair, and take a huge whiff. He was like that. Sudden but not alarming. He kept me on my toes. I quickly learned that he communicated using a complex system of movie quotes, music lyrics, and something that would be trademarked as Nick T. hints. A Nick T. hint was a hint about the hint about the thing he wanted you to guess in the first place.

We grew very close. Even after I left Guitar Center, I started hanging around with him just as often as I could make an excuse to. We started a jam band - Lesbian Stole My Radio. He lived in Saginaw at the time with his cousin Daniel, and I spent almost every day or night or both going to see him. He was not a great musician. I know that's going to be a controversial statement. Some people are going to tell you he was a talented musician, and I hate to burst that bubble, buuuut he was just okay. It didn't make him any less passionate though. He so desperately wanted to be good. At anything and everything. I would be remiss if I didn't mention his Battle of the Bands accomplishment, though. I wasn't with him at this particular Guitar Center Christmas Party, but he, along with some other Hulen coworkers/friends/musicians (Kris Landrum on guitar, Chris Hill on drums, and Phil Hopper on guitar, your dad played bass) played Corrosion of Conformity - Albatross. And won. They freaking won. It was the first time at that point that the Hulen Store had ever won the Battle of the Bands, and your father was part of that. So. I take it all back. He was ridiculously talented.

We spent much of our time just driving and talking. Laughing. Always laughing. Always going someplace new because he was comfortable and familiar with everyone and every place. We were driving around one night and I remember telling him, "You know, I think we'd be alright together" and he smiled and said, "Unfortunately, I think you're right."

He was slow to call us a couple. I remember we visited his friend Fernando and, for the first time since we started spending so much time together, he introduced me not as his guitar player, but "this is Brit. She hangs around with me". It was close as he'd ever gotten at that point.

The first time he told me he loved me was on his birthday. I wish I could remember which one. But I was working at Best Buy and had stolen him the entire House Party collection. We spent so many nights in that Saginaw house. The first time I told him I loved him was after that. I was crying on his bedroom floor at the Saginaw house. My family was going through some rough times and I didn't know what to do. Your dad had a drum kit in that room. Slept on the floor. As I sat there crying, he got up and sat at the kit. It was late. The whole house (his cousin Daniel, Daniel's wife and kids) were asleep. He sat at the kit and did a rimshot gag. It startled me. I turned around and he pretended I did it. He leaned over and gave an exaggerated "SHHHHHH". I knew right then and with utmost certainty that I loved him. We officially began dating in November 2009.

We spent virtually every moment we could together. I learned to speak his language, and thanks to him, we now enjoy Primus, spicy pickles, and The Dallas Stars on the regular. I learned of his distaste for The Left. Anything on the left was gross, he said. Unsanitary. He'd always turn his left sock inside out. I'll try my best to quote his reason why:

"Dude, it's fucking genius. See. You turn the left one inside out because the left is gross, then, when you pull your socks off the left is right side out and the right is inside out. You wash them like that and they wear evenly. It's genius!"

It's important to note, while that's an essentially accurate quote, it's also much too direct. Your father took Great liberties when explaining anything. When he spoke, I saw his words being typed in my head on a ticker tape. And when he'd make a point or stray from one, I'd put a mental pin in the tape - color coded so I'd know to go back to it as he continued to veer further and further from the original story. Still. He'd always Somehow manage to tie it all up in the end. I honestly think he had an undiagnosed attention deficit disorder, but it certainly didn't impede his life too greatly if he did.

He didn't like chocolate. Loved cheesecake. Loved adding salt to things that were already plenty salty. Insisted on putting mustard on blueberry muffins. When asked why, he'd widen his eyes, look both ways as though someone might be eavesdropping, and say, "Dude. Have you tried it?" There was a stretch where we got to play house for the first time in an apartment that my mom and sister had already moved out of. It was only for a week or so, but we'd go to the corner store across the street, load up on Combos, Hot Fries, Pickles, Pistachios, Corn Nuts, and Bud Ice 40oz. We'd eat junk, get drunk, and practice on an Endo Board (a plank of wood balanced on a plastic drum) until we passed out together. He was an excellent billiard player. The best I've ever played with. And billiards, I'm sure you know, is something I take very seriously. We spent many nights in pool halls. Whooping each other's asses. Whooping other people's. We made fast friends everywhere we went. He was a radiant personality and I did my best to shine as bright as he did. 

His absolute favorite movie was Jurassic Park. Every other movie he would say was "tied for third". Field of Dreams made him cry. A League of Their Own made him mad and sad "Dottie dropped the ball on purpose!". He had such a good and terrible taste in things. He loved Primus. And Wu-Tang. He always joked that The Grateful Dead was the best metal band of all time. His tastes in things were so incredibly diverse that it would be impossible to list everything here. But that was part of his prism personality. He loved his own inside jokes. The explanations for them were always classic Nick T.

"Bruce Dern! See, cause be right back, brb, is like Burb. And Bruce Dern was in the Burbs. So Brbs. Bruce Dern!"

We both loved playing with words. "meating" instead of "meeting", "wetting" instead of "wedding". Spoonerisms were another favorite of ours. Oh. And m'initials. I almost don't want to explain the origin of that game because it's kinda racist. To be fair, your tia made the game up, so it's not like we invented it or anything. Anyways, if you really want to know, I'll tell you. But the point is that the game evolved into putting an m before any vowel sound. For mExample: "mAccessories, you've got a customer here with some mAmplifier questions".

And your dad's personality was so infectious that everybody that hung around him found themselves doing the same things.

He loved and hated sports passionately. Said strikeouts were fascist. We cried when the Rangers lost the World Series. Twice. He even got to see the Stars make a run at the Cup this year. They didn't win. But he was all too excited about it, I'm sure. Oh. I need to explain the Nick T. Jinx.

Your wella does not believe in The Jinx, but I'm here to tell you that I personally witnessed your father, on a dozen occasions at least, jinx the outcome of a sporting event. After spending so much time with him, I eventually picked up some of that jinx. One of his favorite jinxes to bust my chops about was a particular Rangers game. I'm struggling to remember the circumstances. We were pitching and I said to him, "Do you know what I like about baseball?" CLACK. Homer. I'm pretty sure we lost that game. I was going to say something like 'do you know what I like about baseball? It's that it, at any time, is anyone game. You never know how it's going to go'. And there. Right there. If we were leading, we lost it right there. Your dad jinxed sports constantly. One could argue that he jinxed the 2011 World Series. He certainly kept the Cowboys from winning anything in his adult lifetime. He knew it was a power he had though. And he loved it and he knew that I loved it too.

He was a good golfer and a good bowler. He did so many things barefoot and it tended to perplex the people he was playing with. He'd twist his right foot almost totally inward when he shot pool. He'd nearly knock himself over bowling. But he was money. He was a boxer when he was younger. You'll have to ask your aunt Lena and uncle Nate more about his childhood. I knew he was a salsa fiend, but they'd have better details. He could dance better than he let on. And oh God, how could I forget. He was tone deaf. And if he wasn't tone deaf, then he delighted in pretending he was. It was pretty convincing though. The man couldn't carry a tune, but that was okay. I had the better ears anyways. You can thank your lucky stars you've got my ears, Herb.

An excellent driver. On a few occasions, drove through a fast food drive thru backwards just to flex his abilities. When he'd parallel park in a tight spot, he'd always exclaim, "Check the skills, biiiiitch!" Or sometimes, we'd order, pull up to the window, then switch seats. Nobody ever noticed. He could park anywhere and could always find out where we were and where we were going. I intentionally tried to get us lost one time. I blindfolded him and drove with absolutely no direction for about an hour. I stopped at a gas station convinced I'd hopelessly lost us. My son, I tell you the truth. He stepped out of the car. Took off the blindfold. Smelled the air and said, "It smells like we're by the lake." And he got us home with no map or directions whatsoever. He was never really a car guy, but of course, the cars he liked I thought were hideous. Loved El Caminos. The one he loved most, I'm ashamed to say I can't remember. It was ugly though. Good golly. Some little lego car. I can't believe I don't remember. I'm no good with cars. He'd worked at a car dealership before getting his Guitar Center job. I guess that's where he acquired his boxy tastes.

His favorite colors were pink and purple, though of course he loved Victory Green and Ranger Red. He'd let me paint his nails and, me being the non-girl I am, would always make them look like some sort of murder scene. He'd wear them anyways though. He loved being adorned with handmade things. Bracelets. Necklaces. Rings. He was like a walking dreamcatcher. He loved dominos. And chess. He actually beat me in chess on a night I'll remember forever. I was fully expecting to wipe the floor with him, but no. He pulled some kamikaze type shit and stomped me in the end.

He was a P1. Listened to 1310 and 96.7FM The Ticket for most of his young and adult life. He never said he hated anything. He didn't like plenty of things, but he never hated. He caught a fish when he was a kid that he was real proud of. He loved his family. He loved everyone, I think. He was patient and rarely lost his temper. Very little patience when it came to trying to teach himself a song, but all the patience in the world when it came to people.

The problems were evident though. We drank a lot. I was young and tried to keep up with his drinking, but I sometimes found myself being left behind. We got our very first apartment down the street from his job in 2010, I want to say. I don't even think I had my museum job yet. Or maybe I'd just started. I was part-time, but rent was manageable. It was a spacious one bedroom apartment. Our very first. He spent that first week out every night without me. And it's not like I was perfect. I was going through my own emotional things, mental wellness things. Your dad's patience was never more evident than when I was having an episode of rage. He never yelled. He'd often sit quietly and let me work through it however I needed to.

There were always good times, though. So many Rangers and Stars games. Even a Cowboys game. At a particular Rangers game, we were sitting right behind home plate. It was the closest to the field we'd ever been and he suddenly became convinced he caught a guy sitting a few rows down stealing signs. He got very serious and wouldn't even say it out loud. I laughed but he insisted that we needed to be careful. He said something like "People put a lot of money in this stuff, Brit". He was superstitious. But always logically so.

We took our first and only out of state trip to Flagstaff, Arizona to check out a planetarium. Your father loved history. And space. And geography. And I took great pleasure joking that I didn't believe in any of it. We saw Saturn (what I would always tell him was a drawing of Saturn), and he even said then that the trip was special because we'd get to tell our future children about it someday. We spent five years in that apartment. They were five of the hardest, but most wonderful years of our life. We fought a lot. Always the drinking. Always the drinking. He'd decided he was going to quit and start getting stoned instead. We smoked one night and sat on the balcony that overlooked the busy street by the Walmart. Drunk Nick was sloppy and withdrawn. Stoned Nick, I learned, could recite every single detail about the 1999 Dallas Stars.

Oh. I left out the part where he started growing his hair. It was back in the Saginaw house. He'd always kept it clean shaven. I don't remember how I got him to grow it out. I feel like it was on a bet, but I can't remember what the bet called for. I'm pretty sure that if I won, he'd have to grow his hair out. And if he won, I'd have to cut my hair like Lori Petty. Oh! God, his appreciation for Point Break. And his unhealthy affection for Lori Petty... Anyways, his hair grew up before it fell down, resulting in a strange and beautiful little afro that eventually gave way to the long hair he'd keep the rest of his life.

His voice was boomy. I know I'm going out of order now, but these are things I'd like you to know. His voice was deep and strong. But goofy as all get out given the words it was saying. His hands were large. He had piano fingers, or accordion fingers, I guess. I'd always compliment his lips. And hands. And face. He had such a sweet face. He couldn't grow a beard, but I think that was the Native American in him. Largely without body hair, except for his legs. Could grow a mustache that didn't connect, and a pretty solid goatee. You didn't get many of his features, I know. But that mole above your lip? That's Nick's. And your long straight hair? That's his, too.

He smacked when he ate. He'd blame his farts on barking spiders. Or someone stepping on a duck. I don't remember when you were conceived, but I know it was in that apartment. Don't worry. I'll spare you the details, but.

It was 2015. Late. End of the year, I think. We had tickets to go see Primus with Tool in Dallas. I was late. My period, I mean. I was late. I did not for a second think I could be pregnant. I just thought it was my cycle waiting to ruin my time at the concert. I was so annoyed at that that I decided to drink an entire bottle of wine by myself that night. I was so in love with Nick that night. We watched Primus open, then walked out on Tool. That was him, man. He'd tell anyone who'd listen that Primus sucked. And we stuck to it.

The next day, I still hadn't started. I took a pregnancy test and found out that night that I was pregnant with you.

It was a shock. I'd been told that, thanks to my cyst covered ovaries, getting pregnant would be very difficult if not altogether impossible. I showed him the results and he said, "Now what?"

My son, I must tell you the truth. We considered terminating the pregnancy. We weren't ready. He was still so entrenched in drinking. I could barely take care of myself, could barely make my end of rent sometimes. It's not that we didn't want you. We just knew that we were getting into something we were nowhere near prepared for. Obviously, I prayed and our hearts changed and we kept you. And it is the single greatest thing he or I ever did with our lives.

Oh. Damn it. We got married on 4.20.2015. We got a dog in 2015. All that before the positive test. I had always told him that I wanted to get a dog first, then a family car, THEN we could have a baby. We didn't plan it at all, but that's exactly how it turned out.

We got Liam, the Nissan Murano. We got George, our first dog. Then you came along.

Oh. I need to tell you the Tit Van story. Not long after we got the Murano, he got himself a Nissan Titan V8 Pickup truck. It was a very nice truck. I don't know why I said it. It was on par for our usual silliness, but I said something about rearranging the letters on the Titan. TIT VAN 8. Your father lit up like the fourth of freaking July. Excitedly, he told me that those letters are only kept on with 3M tape. He ran outside, pried the letters off, rearranged them, and from then on that truck was the Tit Van. This is just another example of the silliness your father exuded. He loved being silly. Facetious. Ridiculous. Weird. Unpopular. Never hurtful. He wore his quirks and personality the way most people only wish they could.

The wedding itself was not so spectacular, but I'll tell you anyways. I was coming off of a midnight shift. I was still dressed in my commissioned officer uniform. It was early in the morning and we went to the Guitar Center on Hulen. Where he still worked and where we'd met in the first place. Brian Miller, our mutual friend and Operations Manager there, married us by signing our sheet of paper. Just me, Nick, and Brian. We signed. He signed. We were married. Then we watched parts of They Live on Brian's phone.

Things get rough after this.

2015 was the last overwhelmingly happy year for us.

And that's nobody's fault. That's just the way it worked out.

You were born in August 2016. Four weeks early exactly.

I was so miserably pregnant. And I love you so much, but that pregnancy was so brutal. My hips had begun to widen prematurely, which made walking a near impossible task at times. My mom, your wella, was over doing laundry. It was August 17th. I told her that I should go ahead and have you the next day. Nick would be off. Dad would have time. It would all work out. We laughed and went about the day.

I had to work a midnight shift that same night. I was laying down for sleep in anticipation of it. Getting into bed was so impossible with my hips as bad as they were, but I got in and covered. George laid by my side. I moved slightly and felt a sudden flood of warm liquid. Your uncle Johnny, who stayed after my mom had left, can attest to my first and only words.

"Uh oh. Uh oh. Uh oh."

I waddled to the restroom, leaking clear fluid all the way.

UH OH. UH OH.

My brother came and I told him my water broke. He called Nick and my family and we went to the hospital.

You were born the next morning. 6lbs. 7oz. Exactly four weeks premature. Born on the exact same day Nick's father was born. His father, who struggled and succumbed to his own addictions when Nick was a kid. It was a miracle, Herbert. You were from start to finish a miracle. Nick cut your umbilical cord and they put you on my chest. Honest to God, my first words were, "Holy shit". It was a very smooth delivery though. There was no screaming from anyone. We all took it like pros. And you were so immediately beautiful. Some kids have to grow into their beauty, but you were beautiful from the start.

Your name, Herbert Orange, came from an obscure conversation we had when we weren't even married. Dating and drinking in that Saginaw house. We started talking about how cruel kids could be. And how when we had a child, we'd have to give it a name that couldn't be made fun of / a name that didn't rhyme with anything. Orange. We had Orange right then. Herbert is a sort of play on his father's name, Elbert. He loved his father and the fact that you were born on the same day. It seemed fitting to honor him in this way. Did we not think that you might get made fun of by kids calling you Orange Sherbert? Yes and no. Hopefully you forgive us for that, but it really is a beautiful name.

Nick appeared to transform. He was so tender towards you. So tender towards me. He took care of so many things. Picked up so much of my slack. Spent so much time making sure I was comfortable. We had to spend your first week in the hospital. Your bili levels weren't going down. You weren't wanting to eat and that slowed everything down. It was a frightening cycle that you eventually pulled out of.

I cannot tell you how wonderful your dad was that first month we had you home. I was so amazed. And so in love. We moved to a bigger apartment almost a year later. I think you were 10 months old. We set foot in the apartment after moving everything in and set you on the carpet. That big open living room. We set you down and you crawled for the very first time. Your father was so unyieldingly proud of you.

We weren't in that apartment very long. Nick had been offered a job on an oil rig. Making dramatically more money than what he was making at Guitar Center. It was a big risk but with big reward. He didn't know whether or not to do it. He loved Guitar Center so much and had been there so long. I encouraged him to take the job. The truth was that I was so afraid of his drinking that I thought he'd be too tired to drink on that job. And that was true. He left Guitar Center and worked for that rig for exactly one month. Then the work dried up.

If there was one thing your dad needed to live, it was work. He couldn't stand unemployment. And even though he got to spend more time with us, not working was eating him in ways I couldn't understand. He finally got his job back at Guitar Center, but he had to start at the bottom. The drinking came back and got worse. I left Nick on November 1st, 2018, the day after burying my Wella.

We spent the last two years separated. One of the last things he did was drop off an orange guitar for your fourth birthday.

He helped pay for your drum kit when you were two.

He was so proud to see you on that drum kit.

He loved you so much. He just didn't know how to love himself enough to get his drinking under control.

I got the call from his brother on Friday, October 9th. He passed the next day.

I have carried so much regret in not knowing how I could have helped him. But I'm not writing this to tell you all of my shortcomings. I'm writing this so you know your father. THE definition of loveable goofball. He loved you so much, Herbert. I think he spent his entire life giving everyone he met what he couldn't give himself.

That's the end of the timeline. I'm going to attach random stories to this and I hope it gives you more pieces for your puzzle.

I love you, my son. I hope that you understand and I hope you don't house any anger or resentment towards me or your father.

I spent the last two years housing those feelings and it is the single greatest regret of my life.

mank tentality

I remember what I wanted to say now

about those lobsters and fish tanks and all.

I wanted to say that,

a lot of the time, it's

a real dirty feeling

wanting anything

at all.

Chewing

on salt licked fresh

ly from my

glass,

remarking to myself that I

shouldn't be so incensed by where

people hide things

like

eyeglasses.

What kind of lunatic wastes two poems on that?

What kind of uninspired pill

would rather make eyes at

the lobsters?

tank mentality

My thoughts have been all disjointed lately.

I wanted to tell you about the lobsters

and how they appear to swim backwards

and how I thought that looked stupid.

Well why did you think it looked stupid, Brit?

How did you think lobsters swam*?

(swum?

swim-swim-

sala-

bimmed*)

I guess I thought that they moved like bad nerves.

A flat hand with its fingers splayed

shifting its mettle between thumb and pinkie,

twinkling octaves as it scuttled along.

well.

WELL.

The man with his prescription glasses

hung

on the BACK of his shirt -

THAT GUY

looked pretty fucking

stupid.

And I wasn't going to mention him

except to say that my thoughts have been

like them

in that

what I

want to say

feels like it wants to swum away from

my face.

the September poem

I am never more aware of my literary shortcomings

than when asked

why I dislike

September.

September, with its dark roots imbedded in summer,

-like speargrass barbed inside raw cotton?(no)

-discarded butts fencelining cat litter?(no)

-coals hidden under a cedar deck?(sure)

It is the tightly girdled Yin

to

November's

gelatinous

Yang.

It is a funeral prayer from 1996

unimportantly kept next to nude

playing cards.

"Why?" Why.

If I could tell you that,

I'd have fallen asleep hours

ago.

Steady Forward

I have known your eyes my entire life.

I have known their stillness, and the life in that stillness;

I have known the feeling

of treading dark water,

feeling the earth shift beneath

coiled bodies,

serpents whose teeth cast

the shadow of

Christ.

I have known your eyes my entire life.

I have known the invisible wars they are charged with

observing, knowing

nothing makes the

report.

I have known the cries of the dead inside kisses

wishing to God they belonged

any

place.

I have known you my entire life.

The black matter that gathers in globs in our organs.

The earnestness with which we have Tried

to make

love.

It is someone else's party. But.

I have known you

my

entire

life.

And the heart that survived despite

lifetimes of ruin,

it bursts at the seams

at that

fact.

Rewind

I never talked to Dr. Warren about what happened.

In fact, I've never really talked about any of it.

It's a door I've run away from since

I was 3 years old.

I joke about it now.

I joke because I can't face the other thing.

I make jokes about juries and dolls and my penchant

for older men, my detachment from sex.

I act like I've got myself real figured out

while never letting my father

be alone with

my son.

Never letting any person

not myself or my mom

be alone with

my son.

I never talked to Dr. Warren

so I can't point to what happened.

There are no drawings, but there was a doctor visit

where I told my mom

there were sharp playing cards

turning in my butt.

There was a report card my Kindergarten teacher remarked

that my demeanor had shifted.

I was distant and unexcited.

Maybe I was tired, she wrote.

There is a night that I can't wipe from my mind

where I was sick

and had thrown up

white stuff in a pan.

And there he is.

My uncle Dan.

And I clung to my mom

but there he was

showing us some new

card trick.

Surround Sound

My father is eating corn.

He sounds like a distrustful horse

being led into a haunted wood

where some witch is rumored

to eat horses like him,

and he knows it,

so he's snorting

that he don't

want

to go.

The corner of his belly keeps pushing the TV tray away.

He is flipping back and forth between

Agents of SHIELD

and the RNC.

I can smell how much he hates everyone/

how much he loves

himself.

It is a smell like butter soup with bits

of corn thrown in

for show.

His hair tells too well

that he sleeps like a baby.

And I might not be bothered if I slept

half as well.

Land Matters

i.

Today is a bad squid day.

My mom likened a nasal swab

to resetting a toy

with a pin in a

pinhole.

And I'm not sick, really,

but I've seen the Kratt brothers.

I know squid are the cats of the

cold-blooded ocean.

And the brain is a box

where the squid thinks he fits.

And there's a door at the back

that he keeps poking with

his stupid,

claw-protracted

paw.

ii.

I text his uncle

after turning around.

He sat with a beer

and stared straight at the sun.

I text him,

"If he kills himself,

you'll need to hide your weed.

You can't trust

Anyone

these days."

iii.

The deceased text me later

to say he'd been stung

by wasps, but he wasn't allergic.

THANK.

GOD.

iv.

Speaking of God, I've been feeling so

hopeless.

I saw him hanging by his neck.

I heard his ceiling fan scream

at the top of its rungs

that he couldn't face me

again.

I saw his drunk uncle struggle

to see 6 for a 9,

forget which number is supposed to come twice

end up dialing the 6

three

more

stuttered

times.

v.

He is not dead.

On a scale of one to dead,

I'm much closer to dead than he

ever got.

vi.

My son, I'm not going to tell you these things.

If you've found this piece

and you wanna talk after,

then say the words, "Call an ahm-

boo-lahnce!" and I'll know what

you mean.

vii.

I don't even know what I mean.

The squid gets jealous

when I cry for

land matters.

And boy, have I cried

a river's worth.

You would think that would make him

less jealous.

My son turned four yesterday;

We stayed in,

he ate cake,

played with his new model

airplanes.

I picked him up for the last time.

No.

My son turned four yesterday.

We stayed in,

he ate cake,

played with his new model

air

planes.

Mom and I sobbed and watched our

K-dramas

while I avoided looks from my

phone.

No.

My son turned four yesterday.

We stayed in,

he ate cake,

played with his new

model air

planes.

I hid and he did not go looking.

He is young and does not think

to look.

No...No.

No, no, no,

no.

My son turned four yesterday.

We stayed in.

We ate cake.

And together, we laughed.

After I'd iced my shoulder

and washed my red face,

my son and I played

with his model airplanes.

Coffee. Black.

I tried it again.

Coffee. Black.

And not that I found it so

Undrinkable,

so much as I knew

there was noth

in' in'

nit

for me.

No grinning mechanic.

No two ten buck purse.

No dares. No dogs.

Not even new hair on my

chest.

Adding my cream and sugar, I thought

about the missed call from

ex-husband.

The glow of the notification icon

toeing the dirt with its hands in its

pockets,

and I, some never-meant-to-be Moe with

a fistful of collar and homie's

loose

change.

A call that came in broad daylight!

A call that I sidestepped with such

crowd-pleasing non

chalance, e

ven

Pedro Romero

would have blown me

a kiss.

A cube of sugar in a text reply back.

Creamy reassurance that I

Rarely. Answer.

my

phone.

bioloomysomething

A friend says that women

need love like the sunlight

prah-mist to clean,

east-facing

windows.

And I want to exclaim that

the most striking creatures

create their own sunlight,

bio

loomy

something.

But he knows that I only

know that because watching

pub-lic ac-

cess TV

makes me sound re-

hearsed.

Like how I act like I'm not freezing,

compulsive nothing cleaning

west-facing win-

dows just in

case.

Fin(e)

I'll give this

to Pooh Bear though,

he's the only man

who ever said the word

without getting piss drunk

first.

I can always google the Northern Lights

Truth be known, I think that Pooh Bear is lovely.

He reminds me of places that I've never been,

places I might like to see in my lifetime,

with him or whoever, but prob'ly with him.

And look at Me,

single mom

actin like I got some choices.

He wants to get to know me de-spite

having heard my

voice.

If that isn't a miracle, then I

just

don't

know

what

is.

Still.

We were getting on the train one time

and he asked me where I'd like to sit.

And I said toward the back, by the

emergency exit

window.

And he thought that was silly,

and I thought that was crazy.

And that's why I don't think

I'll ever leave

town.

seeing read

Pooh Bear doesn't love me, but

he thinks he'd

like to

try.

Staring at his text, I feel like

ugly oranges

no one

picks.

A carnival mainstay he's only Just decided

isn't

rigged.

He doesn't love me, but

in time,

he thinks

he prob'ly

could.

And I haven't replied

(glass bottles are like that),

but those little balls keep bouncing like

he wants

another

throw.

He knows that I am capable

of love because

he reads

my stuff.

And that's true, I do

knowathing'er two

but he's a tourist, see;

a just-for-now

specimen.

N' more important than That

is the part where these poems

that sigh as they wake up

alone,

these poems that want to be held

so damn

badly,

they are born of my heart, but they're

not about

him.

taking up arms

It speaks to the smallness of my mind that I

can't focus on the shit shape earth

is in or hearse it's heading

towards.

The world is a place that I don't understand;

people are a science incalculable with two hands.

I want to understand it but

I'd rather love you

more.

I'm not so gifted as to retrain their minds,

not so slick with the wit as to retrain

their hearts.

It is someone else's duty (ha).

I'd rather love you

more.

the coincidence poem redux

There are two

schools of thought, I will

try

to

ex

plain

them

both

-

One school says coincidence

is a mathematical given.

That the links between people,

the cosmic strengths between lovers,

the crazy lines between figures, and oddness,

and happ'nings,

they are words made of numbers

made of random

made of nothing -

the universe, equation language,

tossing errant sums

our way.

The other school says it doesn't

understand why things

dissolve.

Why when someone walks away

from them, their

distance grows

discordantly

to how long they've been

gone.

either way

Suppose I'm not dying.

That the squid is a construct,

some imagined beast mani

fest from dis

agreement.

Or since the separation,

maybe love is

to blame.

Or I was born with a bulb

that grown men gave

a heartbeat.

Suppose I'm not dying and it's all in my head.

I'd still look at peace like

whites only pie through

a window.

Cephasia

The squid is up to something new.

I feel his elbow pressing hard against

my skull, as though to hatch himself

from his stupid, skull-shaped

fish tank.

He's also got two arms in my ears.

I cup them now

to let sound figure out

how to scootch past those

suck-covered

sound-squelching

sluggers.

Do you suppose that I'm dying?

Should I switch to my

left hand?

And if we're releasing animals,

shouldn't the canaries go

first?

everything is like everything

I consider my relationship with my family and think -

each of us are limbs

affixed to the same

nomination.

A body that moves strangely when we fight.

A body that glides calmly when we don't.

I consider my relationship with my friends and think -

each of us are strings

vibrating at our own

frequencies.

A chord humming with straight white teeth.

And those fuckers I get along with

despite only liking them

half the time?

they're the jazz licks that tumble down stairs,

and I think -

everything is like everything;

I'm no closer to knowing

anything.

And love? Love.

Love, love, love, love.

Well.

I consider something that love told me once -

it said ayahuasca is the most powerful psychedelic

available to the barefoot alchemist.

But that the ingredients themselves are

harmless on their own.

That it isn't until you combine the two

in a most

particular

way

that one is then able

to visit

other planets.

And I consider this and think -

love is probably

like that.

strip (e)m all

He might ask about the drinking though -

Dr. Warren.

He might ask what I felt the relationship was

between drinking and these letters of

bored

resignation.

He might ask why I felt I couldn't say these words in public.

And if I could, then did I feel the alcohol was

a shield

against someone who might say he

didn't love me the same

way.

Of course not, I could say.

I was drunk, I

didn't mean it.

His office is still there -

Dr. Warren's. I'm pretty sure

I saw it driving back from

an ice cream trip with

Herb.

And I've considered dropping by

without first making an

appointment.

Just to see if he's worked at all

on the things that bother

him.

Theragrimace

I sound like I'm crapping on Dr. Warren.

I don't mean to.

I didn't use to drink in those days neither,

you know it?

I can recall nursing

my very first beer

to impress a boy made out of

climbing rope.

And I was several years removed from therapy at that time,

so when this boy got familiar

and asked how I felt,

I did what any grown man would do

n' I called him a fag and

dumped his beer over

the balcony.

I wonder what he'd make of me now -

Dr. Warren.

If he'd say I'd made meaningful progress in accepting

my feelings, and that women are

otherworldly when

in love.

Or if he'd point out my drafts

festering in faggotry

and tell me we had work

to do.

They're not real, so they'll last forever.

The very first therapist I ever saw

was a bug-eyed ironing board working out of

a strip mall.

If you haven't noticed by now,

I don't much believe in anonymity. Not here anyways.

His name was Dr. Warren.

Dr. Warren said I seemed to have trouble letting go,

moving on, accepting that whatever thing

may or may not have an answer, that so many things just

don't have answers.

He said I had a tendency to hyperfocus

and neglect everydamnone and everydamnthing,

especially mydamnself, I mean,

that's how I ended up in his yard stick presence

in the first place.

I didn't use to cry in those days either.

I didn't even feel I was bottling things up.

They'd just

disappear

the way oil stains on

concrete

do.

Mostly, but

not really.

I mean.

Those colors never really go away I

guess.

And I won't tell you what cracked me

what thing that weirdo said

what tactic that unbendy straw

used against me. But.

I cry for everything now.

I cry knowing problems are endless.

And I cry moving on to the next question.

Incolore

Not everything is about love

and I can prove it.

Look. Are you looking?

There's a possum in the staff lot.

Or a cat who scoffs at

gentle cycles

or

a plastic bag with teeth and feet

glued to the

outside.

Are you looking?

He's walking slowly.

Or it's a she?

Could be a she.

It is after sunrise and she is clearly unwell.

Or if a cat, then dimdamdandy,

or if a plastic bag, then Surely

jetlagged.

A possum in the daylight is like

a poem with no feelings.

Oh.

It has a tail.

Probably not

a bag then.

Mont Blanc

Not everything is about love.

I've been picking up midnight shifts at work,

and they require me to be asleep through the meat,

then wake up mid-

potatoes.

And I'm old enough to struggle making sure they don't touch,

so I've been drinking to make the days feel like gravy -

the cream kind nobody feels

Too fat about.

I take the juice my son likes the least

(here lately, it's the V8 Splash),

and I flatter it with vodka kisses

until I find myself kneeling

at one memory's feet.

This small, cloudy marble.

Why I've kept it, I don't know.

We'd just finished fucking, ex-husband and I,

and we were young, not even dating yet,

so we kissed, got dressed, and picked up junk

at the corner store where that one cute clerk

kept trying to get in my probly-Nick's pants,

and I explained that the brown guy pissing loudly in their bathroom

was someone I wasn't dating, but

I'd damn sure wanted

to.

So we'd gotten our corn nuts and 40s and bubblegum,

and he drove us to a spot on Main

where downtown looked the way I imagine

a flatland's wet dream

might.

"At any given time", he'd said,

"I'd rather be doing

Anything

Else."

And I didn't think about it at all at the time,

but Now, daydrunk on hard V8...

fucking that clerk might not have been

the Worst thing.

Star Candy

I know, I know,

I keep talking to you about these Korean dramas,

and you don't watch em, or you're here for

some Other

confession of momhood, well,

suck an egg.

It's five in the morning

and I can't stop watching

this scene at the end of the episode 18.

This man, he stands

statuesque in a window

and this woman marches in with

heart-hurt things to say.

He has loved her and she's had to pretend

it meant nothing.

The end of the world is upon them and now,

he, who has loved her so fiercely throughout,

must abandon his feelings

for the good of

mankind.

So there he stands,

and she marches in,

and she's fit to give an earful,

but here's what she says,

"I love you.

I love you. I love you so much.

I love you."

His face goes from stern to edging on tears.

She holds him,

"I love you"

She kisses him,

"I love you"

"There's no turning back," he warns.

"I love you".

And he kisses her like

it's their last night on earth.

And I watch it because it speaks to my nature -

the poet wants to add and disguise how she's feeling

by throwing in pictures where they don't belong.

But those three words in that earnest order,

they're all I ever want

to say.

Battle Noir

Not everything is about love you know (of course it is)

I mean, it isn't (it is)

sometimes, it's a man

with a Polaroid camera

(it rarely is, but), sometimes it is

a man with a grin hidden beneath

four layers of impenetrable

cotton

(ain't never been, but might could be

if it really

wanted

to)

and I like writing poems

to remind you I'm not pining (I am)

over the same coleopteric guy (I am)

all (all)

the (the)

time (time).

Adam's Apple

I was seventeen,

and this guy, he was my age,

n'he had invited me to go walking

through TCU

some Friday night

And we'd got to a spot with

purple pansies and long ivy

and a bench nestled inside the humid

heart of a secret

garden

and we sat on the bench

cept he laid with his head

face up in the palm of my

lap

and he told me to talk cause he

enjoyed my lips

then he reached up and gave me my

very first

kiss.

Two nights ago, that guy - married,

two sons and one more on the

way,

asked if I'd sit on his

face.

And I cannot tell you how funny it is

to know he was telling

the truth.

2210 - 2300

"A turtle goes?"

Slow.

A turtle goes slow.

"A seahorse goes?"

Bloop.

"A starfish goes?"

Bloop.

"A whale shark goes?"

BLOOP. BLOOP-BLOOP.

"A hippo goes?"

Herb...

"A HIPPO GOES?"

CHOMP?

I guess he goes chomp.

They've got those big square teeth

and they kill

so many people.

"A giraffe goes?"

Geez, who the hell

sees a hippo

and doesn't flip a bitch

and tear ass

the other way?

"A GIRAFFE GOES?"

Herbert Orange,

it's time for bed.

"A koala goes?"

To the free clinic, son.

Now please,

please please

go to sleep.

donde duerme tu corazón?

My body adopts the negative space

between my son and the edge of the

flat turtle

earth.

He curls himself into a shrimp cocktail comma

before straightening

and placing

his heels in

my ribs.

He sleeps inside my hammock heart;

I rock him with my tree trunk arms.

Next to him, my mother sleeps.

My mom, I mean,

'mother' feels wrong.

Mother feels like

someone who doesn't text me,

and if she does, it's to ask me

if the doctor

called.

Mom texts just to tell me

she thinks that I'm awesome,

and that she loves me, and if I love her back,

then she loves me even more

than that.

Donde duerme tu corazón,

mi amor?

There is room for you here.

I keep room for you

here.

p(o/ath)etic

He teeter-totters over; dumps his punchlines at my

door. His lazy lips like wounded soldiers

bloody, crawling on all fours. And I

wish things with us were different, but

it's late and there's the bell. He swi(n)gs

a can of hope maybe I don't

recall things very well. Is there

a chance I'm pro war effort?

He can spare some change for luck/for yucks/for

Christ's sake, I have never felt

so goddamned out of

love.

Pot, Kettle. Kettle, Pot. 

I can't find the can opener.

Earlier,

just a little while ago,

I found the comically large can of pineapple juice

and saw that I had just enough rum

at the bottom of the jug

to wash the Father's Day grounds out of my mouth.

"my guy" she'd called him -

MY son, "my guy".

Where's the fucking can opener...

It isn't that I hate her. I don't.

I prob'ly don't.

I don't even know her, nor does she know me.

That I want to call her things like

bitch

and

skeez

and

goddamned ass licking devil bird

is absurd.

I know it is.

I'm not going to use a knife on this thing.

We've got a dozen can openers. I only need one.

Did she ever ask WHY "my guy" was in my care?

Why her flammable fuck boy hadn't seen him in

a year?

She wouldn't care.

Women don't care.

A man will tell us in broad daylight

that he's not worth the trouble.

And a woman will tell him

it's okay

he can open'er.

So I read this comment and I see my son's picture

and I am angry, boy

I am some kind of

furious.

Moreso that she doesn't understand his depravity.

That the bastard would sit

in the closet by his phone

jerking his limp prick

in failed attempts to

sober up.

The desperation of needing it.

And needing it.

And needing it.

I'm going to throw this stupid can

off the stupid goddamned roof.

Where was I?

Oh, right.

Depravity.

well.

I'm learning about myself.

I'm a mask down - sip - mask up kind of

girl.

I'm learning about other people, too.

Not a single person

in this fucking bar

is wearing a fucking

mask.

well.

Not over their mouths

anyways.

The bartenders are shameless, but that's got nothing to do with

the virus or riots or

fact that our country

is having its teeth pulled out without gas.

well.

Not the laughing kind of gas

anyways.

No. These bartenders are shameless

because Sydney got fired

n' Syd held the keys to my

fave'rit marga

rita.

And they don't know the mixings,

but they're pretending that they do.

Society is being fucked by a righteous

cry and a moan that has been a

long time

Comin'.

But these bartenders are sullying

Sydney's perfect drink.

And that somehow makes them worse than all these

maskless cucks put

together.

Tap on the Hexagons

I like talking to you in the Now.

right Now,

my son is laughing his ass off

as a dissonant chorus of half-beat off Elmos

instruct him to tap on the

hexagons.

right Now,

I'm finishing the last of the Big Red

and rum and rolled up

homemade tor-

tillas.

I am snarky with him sometimes.

When he gets upset or ignores what I say,

I say shit that I shouldn't,

I say shit like,

"Son,

if you're going to keep ignoring what I tell you,

I'll have to assume your ears are purely

for framing your beautiful

face.

Do you know what they'd go for

on the Body Part market?

Probably not as much as

functioning ears

would."

But he is a child,

albeit a large one.

He doesn't understand and I

sound like an asshole.

Sharing this with You, though

makes me feel less alone.

Like you are only in the other room,

and you know that I don't really

mean it.

a few of my favorite things

I like ribbons tied around trees.

I like that tying a ribbon around something

means that it must be a gift.

Tie ribbons around all of the trees, hell.

Tie ribbons around all of the birds.

Tie ribbons around them, but make sure they are equal.

Or tie ribbons around them, but exclude the bluejays.

To hear them tell it, they are born wearing ribbons.

I like dogs without leashes.

I like that something bound

can be freed.

A tiny act - dropping the rope.

Loosening our wedding rings inside

the belly of

a Whale.

Tie ribbons around all the dogs.

Tie ribbons around the newly

nude.

Just.

Don't leave them tied

too long.

I like that ribbons can be undone.

With a gentle pull.

In

Any Direction.

New Horizons

I haven't been writing.

It's not that I haven't heard. Or seen.

Or felt, or feared, or

wondered where

my voice resides in all of

this.

I just.

Haven't

been writing.

Instead, I've been playing a little game

where I live on an island

and dress cute everyday

and plant gardens and find

hybrid blooms without

trying.

I haven't been writing cos I'm too busy

there.

It's wedding season

and there's a reindeer who likes me.

And he doesn't drink. And he remembers

my birthday.

And if he fell in love with another girl,

he'd probably tell me

in person or by letter

sobbingly written

by hoof.

in the form of a question

Tonight's Final Jeopardy category is

America in the 1700s.

Jason sends a well-meaning text,

but it's late and so I read it in

someBody

Else's

voice.

"You're smart," he says,

"and smart girls can't stay

away from love

Too long."

Q: "Every state shall always keep up a well regulated and disciplined militia, sufficiently armed and accoutred" is in No. 6 of these.

That doesn't make sense, I think out loud;

Smart girls are busy scissor-

ing,

besides,

who says I'm out of-

Oh. I know. It came up when

I sat in the Venn-center of

a troub'ling dia-

gram

-it is a serious virus and should be treated as such

-we can't afford to stay locked up

-Big Brother licks his teeth as he

determines 'greater

good'.

Articles of Confederation, I text.

"What?"

DAMN IT.

"what are"
I add.

to be birds, do this

It is. And simply.

Certain like the End.

Sure and in

no hurry.

What lonely architects dream their little

sketches might grow up

to be.

It is. And constant.

In the same tiny

tree

where mom and I kill things that hurt while

Herb counts

singing

birds.

There is no why

or how long

or what if.

Or 'but Brit'

or 'gee whiz' or 'I

can't

let you

do this'.

It is. And has been.

Unconcerned, yet

all involved.

A whale's song as it returns to

an unmarked grave back

home.

Supp(r)osin'

My sister asks what the difference is

between Poetry

and Talking with

line breaks.

It's a good question, I tell her. I

don't guess

I

know.

One Girl, Two Cups

At the time of this writing,

I'm using

two cups.

I feel like I've wasted my beer drinking years

on copper piss water (whatever-you-call-it)

light as a feather

stiff as a slug

come-in-a-40 oz.

Bud mud.

Twenty fleas, by the way.

Twenty fleas in the other.

It makes me burp ugly. The beer. Now. It does.

Fills me up like cold turkey;

take to mean I should

quit.

Is it weird that I feel compelled to time their struggles?

When they hit soapy water,

they freak for eight

seconds.

By the time they hit bottom, they're

brokenheart

still.

Prob'ly if they learned from

the deaths of their brothers.

Prob'ly if I valued taste over cheap

keggers.

Prob'ly if our fathers hit us less as

children.

This particular moment might look

very different.

I might be asleep

next to someone I'd hoped for

'stead of muting my burps n' calling

times of

death.

Whale

My shoulders feel the way metal tastes.

The squid swirling around my brain

has thumb tacks in each arm n'he

spreads himself catcher's mitt wide

and twirls as though dusted in snow

wa(i/n)ting

dumbly

to be kissed.

What does it matter.

There are people, people, people

and they are dying, dying, dying

and twice as fast, a child takes

its first breath on this earth.

Some won't make it much past that.

Some will grow to be grumpy or old

or convinced of menacing aquariums

too small to fit the worried looks

of loved ones as feelings become

blue and in need of

air.

Whore Lever

This will all seem pretty funny, I guess,

when love, God bless wh(o/ere)ever they are,

finds me on this day

writing THIS or that

at five in the morning

after watching two movies -

Beautiful movies. Cheesy movies.

Back-to-ugly-crying-back.

Me, who struggles to sit still during movies.

Me, who's seen so few that I tend to

treat them like I treat most

everything

else

(find some that I like

and learn them till they're wrinkles

in the corners of my eyes and in the cups of my

palms)

And he'll say something revealing,

like, "I was up that night.

I remember because

it was five in the morning

and all I could think about

was how I'd never shared my body

and feelings at the same

time"

And I will know him then.

And I will love him first.

And this drunk five AM movie bullshit will seem

pretty goddamned funny,

I guess.

Tent City Starbucks

It's like being at Starbucks

I guess

this chair is cutting into my thighs,

but it's right by the outlets, and

if

I

didn't like this song so much,

I'd be swaying less /

massaging them

more

hell

thiz'izz'izz-Actly

like Starbucks,

there's

too many people

for me to relax,

and though they seem to be

*unbothered by me

*read: asleep

I know that they're really

wond'ring how somebody

whose thighs are asleep could be breathing

so loud.

I am currently drinking

a mason jar of hot coffee,

and wearing my son's shorts

on my head.

I'll tell you why later, but for now

just be with me.

There are frequencies haunting.

Do you know what I

mean?

The oven light. The coffee drip.

The muted struggle of my

head

to fit inside this

tiny

waistband.

Don't ask me why. Just stay with me.

When he sings - my son,

when he sings,

joy is liquid.

Concentric circles place wreaths

on my

heart.

When my mom says 'good morning'

or laughs at me trying

to prove that the elbow

is within tongue's reach,

the sadness I carry - that sorry, still water,

it cycles through patterns.

It kaleidoscopes.

So why coffee? Why midnight?

Why shorts hiding haircuts?

It doesn't matter.

You are with me.

Therefore I am

pufferfish perfect.

the near birth of a manifesto

It was 49 degrees a few days ago.

Today we'll be sniffing the sweat stained sheets

of the upper

goddamn

80's.

And you know,

it's not so much the heat

as it is the things

the heat

brings.

Wasps. Ants. Roaches. Fleas.

Fleas. Fleas. Fucking.

Fleas.

As I write this, my bright white chicken legs

are basting in coconut

oil.

Someone mentioned the fleas hate it and so

I am sitting here, pawing new welts,

gestating a

solution.

When I am king - no more living things.

No more things that sting and bite

and kill and hurt and crawl into

your fucking bed as you try to sleep /

dodge toddler feet

in the muggy middle of the sweaty

upper 80's

night.

I start to make a list of things

I'd wipe clean from the earth.

I start this list and find it has

a Lot of people

on it.

I get Exactly this far along

before saying it

out loud.

When I am king, no more living things.

And that includes

most people.

I laugh and hold my hand over

the birth of this idea.

I place my palm across its mouth

and pinch its nose and squeeze

real soft.

And when at last

it quiets down,

I return to my

oil.

사랑해

I think love has to be the funniest problem

any ne'er-do-well ever encountered.

To be unafraid of death or death's friends.

To play cards with the shadows that influence men.

To be terrified, then, of where love wants to sit!

Next to you? Out in public?

In between shoulder blades

where elbows aren't designed

to bend?

Where fingertips graze the nausea of not knowing

what you ever did

to

deserve it?

I tend to consider myself a lo(a)ner,

though I am almost never

alone.

So if love is a nuisance to those who don't want it,

then, for me,
love is more like a red-headed child.

Adopted, of course,

though I'd never say it.

n' if it started to notice, I'd chop off

my

hair.

a nod to the Hawk before bed

He was unfinished wood and the smell of soft purples.

His hands were thick ropes, but

sometimes, they were feathers.

Sometimes they were stencils.

Sometimes they were knots.

Sometimes they were ice chips

and I labored

long.

When he'd touch me,

his scent would blend in

to

a

dark roast.

When he'd kiss me, his hands would explore like

dropped

marbles.

We were not in love, but God,

how I loved that.

No sadness - just his song sweetly

in my

throat.

[citation needed]

Don't look to me for poetic retellings

of this Thing permeating

the streets.

Looking for homes without blood on their doors...

I don't know, man.

I don't know.

I've been dreaming disasters and

large crowds of people.

In the midst of my fever, I dreamed I was working

the top floor of a fancy

hotel.

And I could hear the place groaning.

The walls doubled over

and complained of sharp pains in their

guts.

Ah yes. The guts. They were going to burst

and flood the whole place -

some dozen floors worth.

And my phone was ringing

so I turned to answer,

but I didn't, cause suddenly There

he stood.

He - a perfect example of why

I'm no good at poetic

retellings.

The groaning increased.

There were sights to behold.

The foundation shook

and the smell - God, the smell.

But I cannot describe those things to you.

There he was.

For whatever reason.

And I cannot describe much from there,

just the smell of his clothes

and the shape of his lips

as he asked, in regards to my still ringing phone,

"don't you need to get

that?"

In Revelations, John is chosen

to record the visions

of

End Times.

And thank God John could focus

and thank God for you poets

far more gifted at this thing

than I.

Ursa Major

I live in the city.

I'm not downtown or anything,

but I live near the schools

by QTs

off

the freeway.

And I say that to say that, for some wacky reason,

at my house, I can see

stars.

Clear as crystal dinner bells.

Bright as soft watts before dying.

I don't sit outside as often as I'd like,

but that I can see them,

that I can come home and see them,

that I can sit in my driveway,

and look up,

and see them.

I think it could mean I don't know what I think.

Or that things that I think might not be what they seem.

There's no fucking reason

to see stars 'round these parts,

but there they are! Twinkling!

I can see them!

And I say that to say that,

maybe,

we are like them.

My son, I think we are

like them.

When can I see you again?

Something about the body, I tell her,

something about the body worn

like missing paint on storm cellar doors.

Something about the savvy of hands

that know many ways to (mis)handle books,

but having bent many, and displeased with their shapes,

know Now that it is best to keep

one hand cradling the spine

while the other softly divides

pages.

"Ew", she says

and I laugh because

at the ends of these nights

the question always comes

not long

after

I

don't.

And I feel many things

fore'n'after readings,

but "ew"

about sums it all

up.

'tell me how you FEEL'

I leave.

On my worst days, when the cloud cover is viscous

when the air comes down to choke me out

when the freezing wind falls,

hangs low like the earlobes

of a man who spent just one year being

tugged in love's

direction,

I leave.

And I can never get lost, but I get lost enough

and I park and don't give second thoughts

to my mom, who only ever does

wonderful things for me

to my family, to my son

my son

who makes me cry for beauty and how ugly I can

be.

I never do, though.

Leave, I mean.

More often, I hide in the tub

fully clothed n' kinda cold

and I look at my boots

and am glad they're holding up.

And I look at my pants

and wish I had another pair.

And my hands, I'm glad, are empty

be

cause

be

fore

long

he

knocks

Mama?

You in the potty?

There is no getting lost for me.

You could launch me into space and I

could swear I hear his voice.

On my worst days, I think I wish that I

could be more like his father.

His father, who spent a year with him

and never heard him

cry.

'I genuinely miss y'all...why I drink to black out'

Forsaking all others

is the funniest line

in those vows neither of us

wanted to take.

I picture every woman

who danced through your inbox -

a conga line

of corrosive punani

leaving trails like hot snails

everywhere.

Forsaking all others

is near violent in wording.

I see every one. Beautiful, and not me.

I see you palming their skulls like

basketballs.

I picture each one

getting dunked to an airhorn.

And boy,

does it make me laugh.

Hoveround

My son ventures outside to play;

I try not to hover

but do.

He is gathering acorns and I am picturing animals

attacking him out of nowhere.

If I could reach for my knife in time or if I'd

have to rip them apart

by hand.

He takes his acorns to the foot of the tree

and arranges them in textures.

There isn't much traffic on our street,

but I hate every car just

the same.

He points to his creation and flashes a smile.

"It's beautiful" I say.

He smiles again

before squinting his face

and sneezing

six times

in a row.

I imagine my fist has tiny fists of its own

and so on and so on until they're small enough

to punch pollen right out of

the air.

these parables are tarable

I'd started this out about a cow.

A real cow.

Not those things my son has in the mornings

when he asks to skip breakfast - 

but he doesn't so much ask as

Demand

that I release him into the frozen wild

to rip the throats out of many

popsicles

And they will call him Gabriel

And they will know his horn

Anyway.

I'd started this out about a cow,

but

it feels a little silly

now.

It's just

I like when things behave the way

I understand them to.

A duck lands in the museum pond

and quacks an unforced quack. 

A cat, who does not care for me,

purrs against her kitty will

when I reach down to pet her.

A cow moseys along and finds me

sitting by

a gate.

I am sad and wanting badly to

curl up against

love's chest.

I spend so much time acting tough

for my bosses and family

and popsicidal son,

that I forget I used to want things like

love and warmth and

nearness.

She stops before she passes me

and lets out a strong

mooooOOOOOOOooooooo

I feel a twinge of jealousy, but

I don't share that

with her. 

moving to mars

A friend says he read an article

about people who don't experience

that 'little voice in their head'

people who, instead, experience abstracts -

a sort of inexplicable wetness

of thoughts without vocalized

echos.

"It's crazy," he says

"I assumed everyone

had some play-by-play guy

in their head."

I chew on this as I sit at the piano.

When he speaks, I hear the ocean calling

for the ashes of the man he was the winter

we taught ourselves

how to read.

He asks if I can play this song,

then plays a bit on his phone.

It feels cold, the melody.

Not lonely,

just

cold.

Distant and lilting.

I hear the index

and middle fingers

walking up shivering

shoulders.

I place my hands over the keys

and map the shapes of stars I see.

He smiles and says, "That's really close!"

The tide gives me a crashing wink.

There was a time he would have kissed me for

being so damn impressive.

I think this, but

nobody speaks.

I can visualize the man in the booth,

but his mouth is always

full.

Monster Astronomer

I can dress this however you like.

I can say

you are a celestial being

wound(ed) by stars who gave you their hearts;

stars who, in death,

sent your heavy head spinning

like a four-sided

top

and I, space-time,

get dragged along with you -

the wooden giraffe,

the paper doll,

the wagon with a

screaming

wheel.

Or.

I am the dwarf

and it's You that I'm

dragging.

It's hard to know when we explode like this-

poetry throws unscientific wrenches

in the spokes of things we'd never say

anyway

the monster astronomer

bares his teeth at the poet;

the poet,

now quite dense,

smiles

back.

ferris wheel catastrophe kills five

If it's easier for you,

I can take out the in.

People confuse me.

Surgically, my confusion

nests like a tentacled lipoma.

Anatomically, my confusion

has has a snout like Orwell's pigs.

Religiously, my confusion

believes it is a

basilisk.

It is more accurate to say that I confuse myself.

Or rather, I am confused by my inability

to let anything just be what it is.

So if it helps you, I can take out the in.

It's hard enough being loved by your family.

It's hard enough loving them

with soft teeth and strong hands.

Shoulders like bookshelves there still isn't room for.

Arms that only ever hold

everyone

else's

stuff.

It's hard enough feeling

like you don't get a say

in whether or not you can stomach loving them

back.

Take out the in if it feels less intense.

I'm in love, but I don't

have to be.

So what if this ends badly?

Ex-husband will be coming over tomorrow.

Sometime in the morning, he says.

I have spent the day fitting

my teeth with cork pieces

and finding thick socks for my

hands.

The maddest I ever got, I think

was when I'd started to move out.

He was drunk and I was looking for

a picture from my Wella's funeral.

And it wasn't where I kept it

so I asked where he put it,

and He, in his wide-eyed

tasmania

retrieved it from where he'd stuffed it and it

had torn up all

to

hell.

And the thought of killing him where he stood

flashed across my face like cliche

lightning through the windows of

a dark and empty house.

At one point, he even asked me to do it.

Said he didn't see the point in living and that

I should do him

the favor.

And I considered how in love

I wasn't.

How it couldn't be a crime of passion

when there was never any passion to start...

Why did I tell you this story?

Oh yeah.

The question crosses my mind when I

consider how I feel about You.

And I don't have any answers except

if you ever got drunk

and destroyed the last picture

I had of my deceased grandmother

well,

I'd probably kill you where you stood.

In short, I watch you sleep.

Nighttime likes to grandstand like

those miserable pricks at the bar back home,

and it picks the shittiest soapboxes, ones

whose paint litters the ground

(of course the past has dandruff, of course

nobody sweeps the

floors)

It is a thing like any other thing.

(it hates it when I call it that)

I'll tell you what deserves more poems.

It's not the night, and it's not the moon-

that lovesick cow-

how many men have stuck their

stupid flags in you, then gone back

home?

It's not the stars or winds or storms.

It's the perfectly placid state of my

sleeping son's

forehead.

It is!

Not a worry.

Not a single

crease.

I smile warmly at him and the love

covers our

ears.

Murder

The cat is watching a squirrel outside

through the patio door.

This particular cat gets its ass beaten often,

so it's probably just as glad for the glass

as the ignorant tree rodent is.

I am crying my face off for my son.

I think he might be autistic.

And I don't cry for that so much as I cry for

the person he needs me to be that I

am struggling to

become.

He's also got something on his eye

that looks like a chuff strayed away from its engine

and setup shop below his

window.

The squirrel is hip to the cat now.

Shaking his tail and making small noises

that seem to suggest he is winning.

I am blowing my nose for ex-husband.

It isn't that I think he dodges bullets

so much as I see him get hit with each one

and continue on

like nothing is wrong-

takes a drink and all those comic little streams

coming jetting out of his guts.

The cat isn't even moving its tail.

You know, that dumb little twitch predators can't conceal

when their bodies are flooded with desires to kill.

I am a blubbering mess for my family.

We are a ship taking on steady cannon fire

and I am a bucket and 31 rolls of duct tape.

And I am patching and scooping as fast as I can,

and the shoreline is real, but I'll never get there.

The best I can hope for is to die and stiff quickly.

Even my living face re

sembles

driftwood.

The cat's ears finally signal

that something

has happened.

I look and see another cat,

undoubtedly here to take our cat's lunch

money,

noticed the squirrel and wasted no time

slitting the ghost right from his throat.

It is a good lesson in a time like this.

I cover my mouth to cry

softer.

facing the sun, chasing the fun

I am drinking.

I don't like the eyebrows on bartenders before noon.

That dumb little 'if-you-say-so' wiggle

as my yellowbelly exercises its only right.

Boobytrap the bartop if it means so much to you.

You only scare off bums with that kind of jewelry,

and I, with exactly $27 for the occasion,

don't mind keeping my elbows off

the table.

I am drinking alone.

I've reached for my phone a dozen times.

Husbands. Fathers. Men that mean the whole damn world

to someones I'll never meet, or worse,

someones who consider(ed) me their friend.

Men who wouldn't know what it meant to protect

if their dicks were billyclubs and their wives were

mouthy thieves.

I start to text a nice boy who would be glad

that I thought to invite him

but

there is nothing I hope to achieve.

He isn't a drink or 27 more dollars.

He is smart, but he isn't Too smart.

I mean.

He wouldn't understand why my elbows must stay

off this get-a-job table.

I am drinking alone and my body is a library.

There's a gross misconception that I'm educated.

That my library houses all of the greats,

and wouldn't I like to discuss them.

No. I tell you now that this place was curated

by someone who must have had to bury a spouse,

or a child, or a parent long before their time.

The books that fill my body don't resemble

anything anyone'd want to read.

Unless you'd like to know the exact moment when

I realized I loved (you) so

completely.

There's a whole wing dedicated

to that.

Coal

I entice his compliance with dark chocolate Kisses.

Did you know they sell dark chocolate by

the percentage of which it is gross?

Over the course of his young Gimme life,

I've gotten him up to 75%

The kid thinks he's slick, but the joke is on him.

He'll be eating coal by the

end of it.

Anyway. He is happy with his mouth

brown as hell.

He stands still with his arms ready for me.

I strap him to my chest like uneven sticks

of, now, giggling

dynamite.

I take a deep breath, straighten my back,

stare at the TV,

then

squat.

The guy on this show is

crazy good-looking.

The vowel sounds of his skin.

The flatlands of his face.

The shower scene that reminded me I

used to have more going for me than

my ability to bribe, now,

hysterically laughing

toddlers.

Three.

I get three squats in before he's laughing too hard

and my knees start laughing

with him.

I let him go back to playing with

his trucks and trains and things.

The show is over now-

so many things feel over

now.

Tell Me

I dream that I am holding you -

your teardrop face at

10 and 2

9 and 3

your lips like languages

long lost,

slain lovers

un

avenged

8 and 4

7 and 5

I dream that we confuse the two.

Pronounce silent letters like a righteous

eulo

gy

6

I dream you trust me with

your mouth's Rosetta

Stone

6

I dream new words are formed,

their strange articulations like

ribbons around our

tongues.

Hands off and I wake slowly.

I taste something like blood.

I return to my life wond'ring

which one of us it's

from.

no longer fireworks, they are just flowers now

I catch myself talking to the dog.

Stern, like an asshole who speaks sternly to dogs.

I catch myself angry.

I say things like

Hey!

You're a real eyesore, you poor balding bastard.

Why do you insist on laying

by my feet?

I could trip on you! And then you'd be hurt.

And it would be your dumb fault because you

never

listen.

He is old and does not move his head,

but he is polite and so

twitches

his ears.

Agh, you dog.

Must you leave you

everywhere?

The cat doesn't shed

and I hate the cat.

But I would trade you for her in a

twice hurried

heartbeat.

He gets up and moseys

to a pile of flowers.

I'd bought them for my son,

but it seems that he's grown;

he doesn't feel like smashing them

anymore.

The dog knows. He knows.

He knows like I know.

(none of us asked

for this)

He is to me

what I am to him.

And so on and so on

and so forth.

He lays back down

on the prettiest flower.

I think of new mean things

to say.

My Relationship With You

I can tell you the truth here.

Here, I can look you in your many eyes

and speak love and loss

into your many ears.

I can kiss your many lips and promise that things

might look warmer

next Christmas.

I can hold your many hands,

tuck them inside my

only pocket.

Ask you how your many mothers are doing.

I (always/never) did

like them.

I can hold your many faces

and tell each one

I'm

So

Fucking

Glad

You're

Here

And I can mean it, I swear, I

cross my only heart and

all-too-often

hope

to die.

writing with Herb in the room

It is 8:50PM.

I am listening to Harry Nilsson

blow his emotional load

over a down-feathered composition with

heart swollen vio

lins.

I am frighteningly sober

and my son is awake.

He is awake and quick to point out that I

am doing something not involving space

or minerals or dinosaurs or freight trains or numbers

or alphabets or colors or shapes or

well,

I guess maybe this Could involve colors.

And shapes. And letters.

And sentimental dino

saurs.

But try explaining that to Him.

I feel all the more sober

by

comparison.

a lullaby before I go

Somewhere, we are curled inside

the inner ears of

lovers.

My words sing quiet, simple tunes;

your words shoot guns without ear

plugs.

They hear us like the elephant

hears of its own hugeness.

A silly thing, but no less true,

we are

a thing

people

can feel

from

very.

far.

away.

Why then can I not curl myself

inside the bowl of you?

You scour. I'll cower.

I am not an adventurous person.

Bridges scare me

the way knowing I'll never

live alone

scares

me.

Water makes me feel the Worst kind of weightless.

Helpless,

the way space could make me feel

if I lived somewhere

I could see it.

Mountains are the dogs across the street

people keep saying are okay to pet,

but I have seen what they do to

squirrels not in the know,

and I am small and scared and indistinguishable

from the tails littering their

graveyards.

I am not an adventurous person.

(I don't envy people who are)

I read about cruise ship disasters,

plane crashes, rogue waves,

loop de loops that stop

mid-de

and there are any number of things

likely

to do me

in.

My heart might break so badly that

the zoos release their

elephants.

My mind might disappear, I might

forget I'm scared of

You.

I might get old and die alone.

I won't. I mean,

if I thought I could,

I'd probably be less scared of

bridges.