Scrid
If magic doesn’t basements flood.
Avoid attaching,
warns my therapist,
when I predict flooding.
Instead,
observe your thoughts
which are like clouds, no?
In an exaggerated Maine accent,
she leans forward and says,
“If you don’t like the weather, wait ten minutes.”
*
My thoughts have a voice that is not mine,
a gravelly baritone, a man married to his pipe
who works a boat through winter.
On the water, says the voice of my thoughts
that is not my voice but are my thoughts,
you’re pulling pots in a spot of sun
when all around you, rain.
*
My thoughts can turn on a dime,
unlike opinions,
I tell my therapist,
who has a sweet face
and swears her grown kids love her.
*
One out of five children is hungry,
my thoughts say at 6:06pm,
clearly not fucking around
since I’m sawing a bloody ribeye.
And many homeless adults are kids
who aged out of foster care, now
don’t let that steak get cold.
*
Guns are the leading cause of death in children,
mention my thoughts in response
to getting stuck behind a school bus.
*
Some thoughts do not have the lobsterman’s voice.
Some are like a sudden smear of color,
a male cardinal at the feeder, gone as quickly as he arrived,
everyone who glimpsed him now acting
like they can communicate with the dead.
*
I wake every night at 2am,
clenching a bullet between my teeth.
Don’t clench! says the dentist,
as the needle sinks into my cheek,
Or consider this $400 mouthguard
that your insurance will never cover
and you will never wear.
*
The dentist drills while Bob Dylan plays from a tinny speaker.
My thoughts suggest Dylan was a bit of an asshole,
too busy eclipsing the sun
to wash his pants.
*
Everything’s frozen solid today
but will climb into the 60’s and hover,
unnatural for February,
snowmelt flooding basements -
but just think how good
the sun will feel on sallow skin.
Seize the spoils of war!
*
We’re just prefab houses, I tell my therapist,
dropped on crumbling soil,
manufactured following the accepted custom
of planned obsolescence.
*
I picture the windburnt man who vocalizes my thoughts
removing his vinyl gloves, tamping tobacco into his pipe,
hunched against the wind.
I see a wave coming,
he says, adjusting his oilers.
And it’s ‘uge.
*
Watch.
Stay curious.
Inhale, to the count of five,
exhale, to the count of five.
Hold the pause in between,
the tiny point of stillness
where breathing stops
and nothing suffers.
*
Sometimes you pull pots
under a single, livid cloud,
when everywhere else, sun.
Grace
Because grace shows her face at random,
with no foreshadowing, or prayer on my part,
I’m terrified of her, I tell my husband on a walk,
where we do most of our complaining.
It’s uncomfortable, to want something unpredictable,
like she shows up only when she’s bored.
But, he says, we’ve sworn to stop protesting the infillion
variables beyond our control, since we quickly tire
of our own voices, so let this lamentation be lightened
by a joke: “What is the Left’s favorite snack?”
But I’m in no mood since I’ve lost a thumb
to the punchline, and my digitally-privileged husband
should not punch down with his five-fingered fist,
and I’m complaining again, angry at an Ugly Sky
of Leering Gods, who make warts on noses,
rain for outdoor weddings, and anaphylaxis to nuts
and such, compels married men to whistle while
tuna casserole bubbles in the microwave at work.
But this poem is not what you think it is,
and it is not about who you think it is about,
it’s about how grace must fail more than she succeeds
or you would not sigh when things were better,
or ever imagine a benevolent god, instead this poem
is about how you must clasp your ironies
like you clasp your own hand, squeezing
your contradictions and anger and sureties
into a tight little fist that must
occasionally unfurl to receive, better
yet to give — and though we’ve been told
the binary is nonexistent, I inform
my husband, who I’ve silenced,
the heart beats in black and white.
Black Locust
Your fever comes on quickly, 102 within the hour. You shiver beneath the sheets of my bed, teeth clacking. “Snuggle,” you mumble, reaching a hand for me. I strip down to my bra and undies and you tuck yourself so tightly against me sweat forms at our seam. I rake my fingers through your hair until your breathing slows, then unstick you from my body. Crack a window. Fresh air will cool things off, I hope. But mid-evening, your fever spikes to 104, and I’m back in bed with you. Under a dim light I stare at the page of a book I’m too worried to read, listening to you breathe.
At 3am, you bolt upright and yelp, your eyes rolled white. Esmé, I say loudly, and you respond with a garble of grunts and half-words before your vision flicks into focus. The sight of me drains the blood from your face. Eyes wide, you swing for my head, then throw yourself from bed, rushing for the door. I hook your elbow, reel you in. In the cage of my arms you kick my shins before collapsing in one great sob. Tears splash against my chest and the fever dream spills forth: You've murdered me and can't bear the sight of my ghost. Girrrl, I whisper, scooping wet hair from your neck. I offer mundane details. You are in my bed. The window is open. The air smells like rain. It’s 3am on Friday, and surprise, I’m alive. I hold a saltine to your lips and assure you a ghost would care nothing for electrolytes, only spooking, and you nibble the edge. “I’m glad I didn’t kill you,” you confess, and wrap your burning arms around my neck before rolling onto your belly. Within minutes, you return to the choppy waters of fever-sleep, heat rising from your back.
I wonder if I should call your doctor, ask to add nightmares and sleep walking to your medical chart. Wonder if this is just another symptom of the diagnosis you’ve been given, which feels too vague. A best guess, the doctor said. The vocal tics, the outbursts to the sound of chewing, the way you can look without looking. The music looping through your head.
Sands of sleep collect in drifts behind my eyes. Around 5am, a city truck brakes, compressed air hissing through the open window, and I'm rudely exhumed. But you’re resting quietly, the top sheet unthrashed. I wriggle an index finger into your armpit. Your fever is down. I fall back asleep, palm on your belly.
On the third day, your fever evaporates and mine begins. When I stop on the stairs halved by a thorny cough, you’re feeling well enough to scowl from the couch where you sit with the tv remote and a bowl of frozen berries. "I'm thirsty," I croak. "I'm thirsty," you mock by repeating. Your screentime disappears and you howl, slamming doors. In my bed, I shiver under damp sheets, swallow Tylenol. Wonder if misophonia justifies this behavior - no, it can’t, the therapist warned - and sink into bitter sleep.
A few hours later, I shuffle to the bathroom to brush my teeth. I hear your door open, and you’re standing outside the bathroom, frowning at the toothpaste foaming in my mouth. Ugh, you grunt, disgusting, then scurry back to your room, slamming the door again. My neck blotches red. I can feel my fever spike. Relaxing my grip on the sink, I sweep my hair into a ponytail. Grab a scarf and head outside.
The plod along the trail behind my house is as dense as the wet spring day. Cold sweat blooms beneath my sweater, and I wonder what would happen if I died on this trail. A double pneumothorax, or a widowmaker. Who would find me? I wonder if I could figure out how to stiffen into rigor mortis while giving the finger. The thought makes me laugh - a deep, wet sound that scares a blush of robins into flight. Indulging the details of my death is a reminder that I’m slightly nuts. Makes me wonder if your crazy is a genetic variation of mine. It certainly can’t come from your dad, who’s so stable it’s annoying. Fresh guilt needles my lungs, and I’m halved by a fit of coughing. Crouched on the trail, catching my breath, I see her. A young sapling I’ve never noticed before, the wood of her trunk pale and smooth, with long black thorns ready to stick something soft. A black locust. Her beauty is piercing and bitter, like the tincture I swallowed for fever.
I admire her, then continue down the trail. Cut the walk short by a few miles, lungs burning. On the way home, I pass her again, pausing to take a picture. Still bald from winter, her bones show - she can’t hide her spikes. If the city leaves her unpruned, a few of her limbs will stretch into the trail by mid-summer. Covered in unremarkable leaves, someone might brush against her, feel her bite. I wonder if I’d warn them, or watch.
Back home, I can hear you punching the keys of the typewriter I bought you for your birthday a few years back, before you were given the diagnosis I can’t quite accept. You used to type out hilarious ransom notes, love letters to your dad, plot summaries of books you wanted to write. Now, I imagine you’re logging details of how awful I am, how I cough when I am sick and piss you off. I make a mental note to read it once you’re sleeping, then collapse on the couch to read more about the black locust. Her thorns are most impressive in youth, I learn. As she grows, you may not - without careful attention - even notice them.
Extra Dirty Dancing
“(I’ve Had) The Time of My Life” is on WBQQ
and I’m imagining myself as Frances Houseman,
soaring through the air, body outstretched
and supported by Johnny Castle’s rippled arms.
Like most Gen X’ers, I spent my youth
titillated by this iconic scene, the soundtrack
instantly unlocking my pelvis, making me sweat
and leaving me nostalgic for the original nose.
It’s interesting, I think, how not a single song
makes me think of that scrappy bombshell,
Penny, Johnny’s original dancing partner,
her pretty face streaked with tears
when she discovers she’s pregnant,
and I never recall Robbie, the Yale student
who denies knocking her up, since he has a future,
she’s working class, and it’s summer after all.
Like most people, I block Penny out,
refuse to think about the quack, the dirty knife,
the folding table and agonized cries,
her ensuing sepsis and near death,
and instead, soar through the air like Baby,
once sweet and naive, now hot as hell,
since the only way to perfect The Lift
depends on reimagining the plotline.
Meme Poem
sorry how i acted when there were multiple noises happening at the same time
was the meme shared by my most prodigious meme-harvesting friend
which I saved to my phone before returning to scroll and accidentally
landing on an enthusiastic ad for full-body deodorant with volume
maxed which sent my heart galloping and blood rushing
causing me to close my eyes in order to engage the breathing I do
to calm the fuck down vagally-speaking when the shower started
and the pipes shuddered and my daughter broke into song
‘World Burn’ from the musical ‘Mean Girls’ which is a song
with incredibly high notes she can’t quite hit but she reaches
with such conviction the walls buzz making my husband convulse
with worry that she’ll damage her vocal chords to which I snap
jesuschillshewillbefine recalling how I’d become apoplectic as a kid
when my brother switched the tv station from DuckTales to WWF
and body slammed all attempts at liberating the remote and look at me baby
I’m fine I’m fucking great I tell my husband who eyes me suspiciously
since my voice cracks the moment I attempt to lift it in song but he shuffles
away to another room to chill out by picking an old folk tune on the mandolin
which is an impossible instrument impossible to play impossible to ignore
and the impossible instrument he practices multiple times a day a particular tune
by Chris Thile who is eye-gougingly irritating and now I’m reminded of when
Thile took over for Keillor on Prairie Home I almost drove my car off the road
sailed it over the edge oh my god anyone but him and his pompous hairline
and in the center of this sonic chaos my body begins to quiver at a frequency faster
than any vibrator I’ve ever owned which is a thought that elicits the sound
brrzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzrr and suddenly I picture myself as a giant dildo
crashing around the kitchen like the dildo is human-sized with two feet
in roller skates and vibe maxed and this tube of veined flesh is flying into things
and breaking dishes which makes me think of a friend of mine who got so mad
at her girlfriend she gathered all of her vibrators and turned them on high
and tossed them in the claw foot tub which made such a racket that her girlfriend
cried out and in response she climbed into her truck and sped away cackling
like a patchouli witch with all the chargers stuffed in her canvas duffel
which makes me realize I should avoid washing knives for now
and instead flip on the garbage disposal to deal with the fruit flies
and after that I will organize the cabinet with the pots and pans
and stake my flag in this hellscape of noise which I’ll miss
with unequivocable desperation I’m told by two different women
whose irises went from blue to grey when things got quiet
Baby Hairs
You hate the downy hairs
lining your forehead with fuzz,
so you stick them back with wax.
Dressing for a birthday party,
trailing perfume, round belly
receding under a yellow crop-top,
I want to kiss the top of your head,
instead tuck my arms to sides,
and dim doubt from my eyes
when you spin to wave goodbye,
and I’m chill, bruh, totally at ease,
your overnight bag dropped
and you’re back for a squeeze,
my heart the pendulum of parenting,
gather, release, gather, release.
The Muse Is Not Visiting
The Muse is not visiting because she is dealing with a fibroid the size of a melon and a $5,000 deductible, so she is at home Netflixing and hemorrhaging.
The Muse is not visiting because she totally spaced it, though she did remember to get weed and sesame bagels, lol.
The Muse is not visiting because she is convinced she is dying and there’s a six month waitlist for a PCP who will eventually diagnose her with generalized anxiety and tell her she needs to lose weight even though that is not the cause of her anxiety.
The Muse is not visiting because at this point she’s only staying alive for her cat.
The Muse is not visiting because she is caretaking for her sick father-in-law and two school-age children, and on the weekends her husband needs to unwind since he works so hard.
The Muse is not visiting because she is a single mom and they canceled school again.
The Muse is not visiting because your balls are uncommonly hairy and she heard you say “mama” in your sleep.
The Muse is not visiting because she’s hiding in the bathroom, sexting your wife.
The Muse is not visiting because ever since the corners of her mouth began to wrinkle, she was told she could no longer be a Muse.
The Muse is not visiting because she cannot stop reading about climate change and is pinned to dread like a bug to a Styrofoam board.
The Muse is not visiting because they’re recovering from top surgery and just doing bone broth and Jello right now.
The Muse is not visiting because the stairs will creak and wake the baby, who never sleeps, so she’s in bed reading about sourdough again.
The Muse is not visiting because her boyfriend said no.
The Muse is not visiting because she realized that rage-cleaning can put her into an ecstatic state.
The Muse is not visiting because she is making her way through a stack of books about how coverture remains undead.
The Muse is not visiting because she’s working on outsourcing lightning strikes of grand inspiration to a team of gifted drag queens.
The Muse is not visiting because she’s busy being an inspiration to herself, gathering her lime green hair into many tight buns and securing mini-Koosh balls to the laces of her platform sneakers in preparation for a Bjork concert.
The Muse is not visiting because every single man in this establishment interrupts.
The Muse is not visiting because she has retired and is now part of a growing group of retired Muses who donate their time to help young Muses leave the performative business of being young, naked, and demure in an attempt to spark an idea in some old dude whose artistic ennui is inversely proportional to his ability to get it up for women his age.
The Muse is not visiting because she and the other eight Muses, lead by Calliope, have decided that they will no longer engage in the unpaid labor of inspiration. It’s been 2500 years and they done.
How to Heal
Sit naked in the sun.
Photosynthesize.
Branch hips.
Unfurl fists.
Picture every
yolk soft-boiled.
Wear shame
like fishnets,
pair with
pleather boots.
Deliberately
undress.
Recall the
perineum sits
between providence
and pareidolia,
the third eye -
a jeweler’s loupe.
Find the
hooked thorn.
Remove carefully,
place in tissue
soaked
with grief.
Burn that
motherfucker.
(Smoke is the only
honest prayer.)
Don’t stop
treading water -
there is no
bottom anymore.
Be sure to wave
to lovers
waving from
receding shores.
Kiss My Ass, I’m Going Dancing
my husband says arguing with me is like watching storm waves
crash into granite in that the waves never stop coming and the rocks
never move it’s all fascinatingly furious and natural
and I respond shit man, great compliment, the glory of female
rage is fuck off, unbuttoned my pants, mooned his round face
and latched his bedroom door shut just as his blue eyes flared
anyway, it was him that chased this big salt and he can’t pretend
he didn’t know how ready to pounce my nipples, he can’t pretend
he ain’t a groundhog who’d destroy the foundation in a single season,
and just the other day a patient told me that there’d been another shooting
up the street close to my workplace, and she warned me to stop walking
to work because it is no longer safe to walk to work
and I won’t stop but it seemed wrong to dismiss the wound she was baring
so instead I took a moment to explain how I’m writing a new poem
addressed to death titled, Kiss My Ass, I’m Going Dancing,
but instead of hearing me she seemed offended by the word ass
being tossed in a medical setting and began blinking rapidly
and it became clear that she wanted me to hold the burden of her fear,
she wanted me to feel scared like she was scared, so anyways, she said,
watch for reflections in the side mirrors of parked cars and shop windows
to assure you’re not being followed, I know this since I am from the big city.
The first lines of the poem are:
how the tongue of a dog
springs out enormously
the heart is incorrigible
and she grabbed my rough hand in her soft hand and said, cross the street
and cross it again and do not ever look down at your phone, stay alert,
and roused is my fear of sudden male fury unpredictable and cruel
which lives in my throat and under my collar bone and against my cervix
thickens in my endometrium and spikes the pressure of my blood,
a threat waiting to unspool - how violence prophecies violence -
and now thanks to this lady I’m picturing Tom Cruise
from the movie Legend where he’s trapped underwater
by sudden winter and a growing disc of ice
bubbles tumbling from his mouth and he is pounding the ice
kicking and panicking and it’s all caged fear and fury and nothing budges
and the princess is shrieking and the goblin hacks the horn from the unicorn
and now storm waves break across the granite crag of my ribs
arguments that are ongoing and incessant and don’t change
beating their foaming heads against an immovable stand of rock
Exposure to cold is important for many plants,
I tell my warm-to-the-touch daughter, explaining
that the numb seeds of primrose must wait for spring
Do you think you’re invulnerable, asked my sister
and though her care was easy what I heard was
Are you delusional and the answer is, Yes,
I am a superhero,
and tonight’s conquest is a dark bar with heavy chairs
and amber lights populated by people who are not drunk
but drunk enough to stop policing themselves and others
and there is righteous ridiculousness in the air
- Did you know Janet Mills is known for dealing coke? -
and I can kick back with a cold one and listen to libertarians
talk about their mothers and get confused by their own phones,
set my beer atop a pulpy coaster, lean a hip against the juke box
and press buttons that lead to furious bursts of joy
so is the dark wood the unlit trail the hidden path
the things and places you should not touch or go
the waves the crag the granite the ice the gun
so, aggrieved husband
so, big city lady
so, Tom Cruise in the movie Legend
Look up
look up before the scleras freeze,
look past the crystals forming
the heart a Torch a holy blur
dancing across the cold disc
of Death
Troll Vibes
When Mainers get choleric about late fall weather
and gripe about 40 degree temps - I’m not ready for this -
an odious part of me wants to say, So what are you fucking ready for?
It says other things too, the odious part, snarky shit, like,
Sorry you’re unhappy about this mild December day,
I’m personally upset I must touch pork to make a meatball.
This odious part, once it starts flapping its ugly hole,
shouts at trashcans and bitch slaps the wind,
overshares stories of mild personal conflict as savage traumas -
How my 6th grade teacher accused me of cheating at simple math,
How my period arrived on the trip to the pool and I was given pads,
How some parents prefer their pets to their kids -
But I never let troll entirely loose, and instead cluck along,
Oh yes, so hard, winters in Maine, and it’s just beginning!
then duly lighten the mood with one of God’s great gifts,
Gorgeous, how the dew bejewels stands of white pine,
Incredible, how the sun illuminates the last season’s goldenrod
but what I want is to write a feral poem about meteorological chitchat -
Shut up, you sniveling dick, North Atlantic Oscillation
doesn’t give two shits about your need for constant sun,
so how about you blow your nose in any direction but my fucking face,
and while we’re at it, your fleece is covered in so much cat hair
I’m expecting you’ll find a warm spot by the window where you can
watch for birds and lick your ass with your papillated tongue!
Once the odious poem has been written and troll is avenged,
I can brew a cup of ginger tea and wrap myself in goose down
since it’s almost winter here in Maine and it is fucking cold.
The Dishes
Everyone wants to do ayahuasca, but no one wants to do the dishes.
When that jackass from high school says he’s living the dream, shouldn’t he be honest and just admit he can’t get hard without Viagra?
If you never assume importance, you never lose it. That’s what Lao Tzu said, anyway.
Last night, a friend mentioned there was a person at Pride whose double D tits were covered in thick chest hair. Whoa! I said. Then, Eh, no biggie.
You know there’s someone out there, he said, lighting his cigarette with a baby blue lighter, who can’t wait to bury their face in those hairy titties.
The problem is, I told a different friend, is that everyone wants to bury their face in some big hairy titties, but no one wants to do the dishes.
Off the subject, she said, staring out the window, but sometimes I imagine my friends as babies, and then I imagine what it’s like to hold them.
Nesting Doll
she can see the growth rings
of the felled linden
behind the septic
concentric on the face
of the darkening lake
fish snatching bait
glass rings
like overlapping ohms
in evening’s class
unraveling the Russian doll
nested in her chest
breath paring layers
grandmother mother
mother into daughter
the center
a seed doll
lathed from linden
baby due July
embryonic
asana
back at home
onion peeled
grub removed
fish fried
pregnant for the third time
growth rings
of her face
showing earlywood
latewood
drought and fire scar
a toddler
clung to thigh
jabbering
ribbed dog
slobbering
husband strumming
tonewood
by water’s edge
melancholic over
the face of the lake
grandfather fishing
in tobacco cloud
hook without bait
cooler bare
memory pared
linden sapling
in memoriam
61 years gathering girth
the deep shades
of grief
stumped
now a map
to read
from center outward
and outward back
like too-soon contractions
in spring
every stone gathered
dropped heavy
in her pocket
remembered later
and flung across
the lake
seed doll sinking
glass rings
hatchet swinging
growth rings
behind the septic
concentric on the face
of the darkening lake
Wild Monogamies
Unorthodox monogamies is happy monogamies according
to The Book of All Monogamies which advises several Beds
and Bathrooms separate Duvets separate Nights of Play
His and Hers the His being Husband who unlike Many Men
if not Most did not after Matrimonies expect Wife to sing
like Bird in Cage in fact he never once Considered cage
- Absurd, a Cage! - and if He Husband had exhibited
captor Vibes she’d have yanked her trousers Down and Mooned
his pretty Face with her green anjou never Poached
by anyone in the loving Oven no thank you kind Sir
but moving forward not in Any Chapter is there Cage
only Birdsong short and sweet and long Song allowing
for Glorious breaking of Encrusted rules so brittle they snap
like a twig bent like a finger pointing and Hollering - Ho! -
god Forbid she dance Alone or Talk and Walk alongside Men
who are Not Husband anjou swinging To and fro Maximus firing
In Jubilance one Leg in Front of the other walking better yet Dancing
and pear is Hers and No One else’s like She is Hers and Husband is His
and after Walking alongside each other for One Hundred Sundays
they fight Less and Protect more the Other’s solitude like the poem
they take Seriously enough to recite Aloud such sacred Truths
if You want to be a Cow be a Cow be a Cow be a Cow
or Bonny Llama go have fun Bonny Llama and when you Return
I will be Here asleep He said or mooing or Spitting or On All Fours
up to you Heretic wife who Kicks and screams when Aspersions
are Cast who Refuses to extract the long Bones of her Legs
to fit the Molds of Tradition who daily dekes Death by Tedium - Ho! -
instead here’s a Great idea how about you Have that cigarette
if you damn well please and I will Not watch the clock until Midnight
when you get Home and Tell me exactly how you Want it
Oh is that right you Freaky bitch moo moo spit spit llama llama
or perhaps Tonight you rest your weary Head upon this Hairy chest
and we Song because there is only Forest floor verdant Canopy
to explore and the music of Bird who never knew Cage so why in Hell
would some Stranger why in Hell would some Hotdog Sweating
assume Bird seeks Cage - Ho! - It is Not because the cage is Righteous No
it is Never That it is Because they do not Imagine a future a Life a song Beyond it
Young or Dead
It helps when you are irate
with a beloved
to imagine them as a 9 year old
or in a coffin
it lends perspective
and other adult things
one must cultivate
to be direct and not a prick
for instance my husband
who oft drives me crazy
with his only-child-ways
prepared a perfect French press
one summer morning
after 6 weeks of rain
and when I saw the sunlight streaming
I almost stroked out with gratitude
shed a single tear of god’s good grace
when he started talking about fucking Bitcoin
but listen up people
when my husband was young
he was short never got the girl
and when he was 9
he put lipstick on
stood at the mic
and found his melliflous voice
grew into a man
a joyful father unafraid of eyeliner
a real tiger between the sheets
and though he pisses me off
if I picture him dead
everything is crystal clear
I am instantly a better human
I hug him and say
I love you in all your manifestations, baby,
and he says oh yes
that language is honey
to my tender ears
and the twinkle in his eye
is the welling of concession
since I’m a bit of an asshole too
and he is picturing me as a 9 year old
sitting up in bed
watching my father
piss in my toybox
he is picturing me at 8
setting aside a butterfly net
to tie laces caked with mud
or maybe today I’m on the side of the road
fingers stiff noggin juiced like a lemon
and you know what
that is one of the many
righteous ways to love
a clever trick to move the stone
from the tomb, baby,
so get up from the cold hard ground,
you’re undead, you’re alive,
so walk on out into the day and forgive.
Cave Lady UTI
I’ve not managed to find the time to research
how a cave lady might have treated a UTI.
I’m sure it’s herbs and plasters
or maybe the shamanic extraction
of a red demon
with a barbellate cock,
this ancient auntie and
her boggy bladder
squatting by a rock,
grimacing,
her pain
caused by a stick
wrapped in moss
to stopper monthly blood,
juiceless sex with
an impatient caveman,
or an entire season of rain,
her animal skins perpetually damp.
After 5 minutes,
a painful dribble,
warmth creeping
up her back.
*
Tonight, on my drive home
I learned that 7 million birds
perish every year,
bright lights
attached to
communication towers
warning human aviators
of their presence
disrupting bird flight,
sending them flying
into wires, buildings,
and each other.
Cargo ships passing
through the night
add 30 decibels of noise
to ocean water.
Human exposure
to this level of noise
would require protection -
ear plugs, says OSHA.
Humpbacks stop singing
when tankers pass,
orcas stop foraging,
cuttlefish change color.
*
On a Melbourne beach
piles of dead hatchlings
were found beneath
a mercury-vapor lamp,
baby sea turtles
understanding its light
as the bright,
watery horizon.
Even worse, I learn,
is the tragedy
of abandoned
beach fires.
*
The oven is suddenly
beeping and blinking,
indicating my eggs
are soft-boiled -
submerged any longer,
the yolk stiffens into chalk,
threatens to choke
the black river of my throat,
dam to the fish-body
of my tongue,
orange eggs
washed up,
desiccating
upon the stony shore.
*
Usually caused by e. coli,
-which she’d never know
since germ theory would
take 6000 more years-
the cave lady
turns septic and dies.
The impatient caveman
- the most important variable
in her death -
stays with her the longest,
in his grief leaves
the pyre unattended,
does not notice
the hatchlings
making their way
to what they biologically
believe to be
a bright future.
Sashimi
I was buzzed on sake when that gorgeously marbled hunk of otoro
slipped from my chopsticks into tamari leaving Rorschach on my tee.
“Diablo Rojo!” I bellowed, pulling my shirt flat, my friend, Victoria,
third Sapporo, slapping the table, “Yasss, you a sea witch, bitch!”
The stone-jawed itamae glanced at us from behind a cooler
of slick flesh, gluten-free white ladies interpreting tamari blot,
then nodded to a waitress who brought two forks, unctuous smile.
Back home, warm with sake, I called you.
You don’t eat sashimi, you reminded me, you prefer flash-fried oysters,
Kewpie mayo, rolls with cream cheese and cuke.
Tuna belly makes you gag, you claim, and daikon is gross
- somehow both bitter and sweet - your metal spoon clanking
against your favorite glass, vintage Burger King, Skywalker,
and your first love, Leia - your nighttime ritual of spinning
chocolate syrup into whole milk, favorite nightcap,
your boyishness beseeching pale pink suckers that line my groin.
Sweet dreams, baby, you say, but not tonight.
*
Fish flesh is unlike other flesh.
It’s tender, easily stressed.
The way it’s killed matters.
Spiked through the brain,
a thin wire threaded
through the spine.
If done right,
it shimmies,
rigor-mortis slows,
and later, otoro,
soft belly streaked with fat,
melts sweetly on the tongue.
*
Alone in bed, I dreamt
I was an underwater pop star,
a Humboldt squid
unfurling into song,
purpled pains
and fleshy joys
undulating
through shafts of sun,
when a lone bluefin
breaks from the shoal,
pupils edged silver
with devotion.
My tentacles are barbed,
baby, my suckers have teeth,
keratin beak a cold spike
through the brain.
Come to me,
I’ll do you right,
squeeze you tight
until you shimmy
into ravening dark.
a healthy marriage
hurtling through space
jet packs cinched tightly to our waists
I can barely see you
but when I catch a glimpse
I can see your scleras your panic
your bewilderment at the barreling speeds
the space junk that will crush us
the asteroids rushing toward us
watch out here comes one now
wait wait wait now thrust now
you’re in a Speedo that’s too small
me in a kneeskin suit we’re competing
in synchronized swimming
our thick heads of hair tucked into caps
we’re sculling water holding a water wheel
to stop swimming is to sink to drown to fail
your nose should not dip below the surface
I say with a look so you scull harder
nose rising defiantly like a snob
the water feels like jello or is it that my ass
quivering with exhaustion honey
put your back into it
our finances are a braided rope
to unravel would be to shake out filaments
like splinters waiting to stick our feet
we’re dragging a mortgage a car student loans
a weekly grocery bill that blooms
like a carnivorous flower
a child that says snack only more than nope
the rope is frayed pulled taut
to sever would be to send the ends flying
to opposite poles
my retirement relatively puny
my salary too I need your money boo
I’d take the house you keep your 401k
and where would your mother go
untwisting would be like trying
to separate a smoothie into component parts
the frozen fruit from the yogurt
from the fucking cookie you added
do you remember when our daughter
was a newborn you brought the Ninja
to the basement to blend your morning shake
it’s so fucking loud the Ninja
and the baby never slept so when she did
it was the last considerate thing I remember
perhaps we should buy a duplex and live
separately we’d be fake-together
your dirty laundry no longer at my feet
the dust on your dresser not on my dresser
we’d be unavailable to anyone
but ourselves part-time what a dream
I’m such a hoot to think such things
such a cutie
instead at night we collapse into bed
dream of losing each other
dream of someone sweeter easier more mysterious
someone who sits at the table in the morning
and doesn’t slurp their coffee
I can hear nothing else in the house
right now but the fucking slurping
WHAT you ask me big fight in your eyes
but you know WHAT and so do I
you’re disgusting and I’m an insufferable bitch
our distance much larger than where you sit
sullenly and where I sit fantasizing escapes
I’ll never again consider once the mug
is in the dishwasher and twenty other
emergencies need to be addressed right now
right now immediately right now
we anchor each other in our exhaustion
we pull each other down to ground
any flight any attempted escape
our love no longer aimed at each other
but with precision in the same direction
a moving target a child who sings and argues
and sings her arguments and twirls
in the spotlight of our attention
red cheeked green eyed exponentially energized
a storm cloud throwing lightning
and blinding rain we’re soaked
and electric ready for wonder
the rainbow she stretches overhead with ease
you're not supposed to do that
says retired people who forget what it’s like
you need to tend the embers of your relationship
you need to prioritize this and that
you spend too much energy on this child
who grows like a miracle
defies rules of time and tenderness
and then they casually mention
they’re with a friend on a stroll
or having a nice glass of wine
and they’re not sure what they’ll do tomorrow
they could do anything really why
what are you doing
what I want to know is if I’ll ever flush
with excitement at the sound of your car
in the driveway reading a book on the porch
catching your scent on the breeze
every cell in my body buzzing
with the need to crawl up your ankles
my mouth in your lap pulling you to my breasts
wrapping my legs around you extruding silk
from my spinnerets but you just got home
you woke me with the door come to bed
lay your soulless body next to my old carcass
rest your cement-filled head on the crumbling
bricks of my back if we stick it through
do you think there’s a chance we’ll bust
through this cage like animals instantly
remember our wildness smell the blood
and lop off hungrily to stalk our prey?
Revenge Capitalism
Perhaps you are a well-adjusted white man with endless interests and laser focus,
and perhaps you decide to learn investment strategies from a series of comprehensive podcasts
while handwashing vintage Pyrex bowls, and perhaps you have many resulting conversations
with your wife, and your wife’s friends, about solutions inherent to capitalism, really dig in
and explore how true capitalism is not the capitalism that fattens fortunes of the fortunate,
fucks and fractions bastards with less luck, no, not that one, the real one, the capitalism that saves.
Perhaps when your wife needs emotional capital after finding herself suddenly impoverished
by an unexpected event, say, a psychic house fire, and she believes, perhaps unfairly, that you
hold the capital she needs, that you will give her what she needs, invest in her, help recover
her losses, since you are her husband, after all, and capital that is yours is hers - is it not? -
but instead you offer a loan, set interest rates astronomical, do not blink at your growing hunger
for the profit bred from your supply and her demand, and not her tattered heart.
Who can blame you, really, for turning coin in the face of bald despair, and frankly,
she’s better for it, forced to solve her own problem, pay her debts, become a notable competitor
in an inescapable game, and check her out, she’s a better person now, cutthroat, invulnerable,
supplanting spiritual laziness with innovation, and with the help of her substantial reserve of friends
- the crones, not the cronies - she gained more ground than anyone expected,
and she is no longer impoverished but strong and good, and she grows like a tumor.
Then, unexpectedly, woefully, it was you who fell, an accident, say, a psychic wildfire,
your knees punched with gravel, eyes lifted in supplication, and in that wild need for grace
you are fortunate, for in her hands she holds what you need, for what is hers is yours, is yours,
is yours, and she is good and strong, and she regards you with growing interest,
a spider wrapping a fly, the machinery of her mind clicking and popping, her chest growing warm
with opportunity, and sweet man, newly fallen with your tattered heart and bald despair,
she will make you pay.
The Great Giving Up
I’ve repainted the room with the red stripes.
They’ve always bothered me, the stripes.
I used to paint dorms for summer cash.
Steady cut and roll, no drips.
No drop cloth?
I’m eyed suspiciously.
No.
*
I have a Master’s in Chinese Medicine.
Took me 4 years.
In graduate school,
I worked part-time,
practiced qi gong,
rolled organic tobacco.
After graduation,
a girlfriend ten years older
with a son in college
took me out to celebrate.
There are no salaried jobs,
I bitch, yet so much debt.
A bank would have refused you
a 100k loan, she says,
but student loans
are different.
Fuck, I say.
Yeah, she says.
Consider it your mortgage, hon.
I shrug. She buys me a beer.
In my last year of school,
I explain,
I learned the debt to salary ratio
was wildly skewed.
When asked about it,
the President of the college
gave a rambling story
about an old man in Tibet.
Fucking Predatory Ed, she sniggers,
private interest poisoning public good.
She holds up a dripping
shot of whiskey.
It ain’t gonna be easy,
but you can do it.
She clanks the rim of my beer,
throws the shot back, whew!
Buckle up, no whining,
be relentless.
Just kill it.
*
I call around for work, voice
laced with nerve I lack.
After 2 months, an interview.
I wear a red jacket, black heels.
$120 initial, $90 return.
My cut is $30.
Independent contractor,
no benefits.
Show up early,
look good.
Payment upfront.
Cash is king.
I wonder about the $30 cut,
say nothing, I want the job.
Rich ladies change
into white gowns.
They recline on tables covered
with organic cotton sheets.
I learn about the breathability
of linen,
the consistency
of their bowel movements,
exes and anxieties,
renovations, restaurants,
cancers, dogs,
and dreams.
*
I move home.
Open a clinic in a poor city.
You’ll never make it,
some said.
Too violent. Too sad.
Too lazy.
I provide group acupuncture,
quiet space, comfy chairs,
25 bucks, no questions.
People come, roll up their jeans.
There are so many types of pain.
Pain that floats. Pain that sinks.
Pain that evades language.
Pain that makes you mean.
What does acupuncture do?
they ask.
It opens windows.
Sweeps the stairs.
They nod.
They nap.
The jaw unclamps
when the body is loved.
Things that were stuck
move downstream.
*
I closed the clinic during the pandemic.
Seemed the right thing to do.
I stayed home with my kid.
I longed for my work.
My kid missed her friends.
We got a trampoline.
I was the best teacher.
The worst teacher.
My daughter cried.
I worshiped a red oak.
Crows roosted above our heads.
A groundhog ate my garden.
I stopped mowing the lawn.
Found maypop, wild sarsaparilla.
Mud froze.
Snow gathered.
I collected tinder,
burned a cord of wood.
From my phone, I watched nurses
enter hospitals without protection.
A local MD posted a video:
How to Sterilize an N95 in the Oven.
Doctors cried on television.
They begged.
A hospital in Brooklyn
ran out of body bags.
In April, a New Yorker died
every 2 minutes.
Liars, some people said.
The virus is a Marxist invention.
Some said it to the people
who kept them alive.
Some said it to the people
who watched them die.
*
A yoga studio advertised NO MASKS.
A massage therapist with children died.
A chiropractor said you wouldn’t die
if your gut was good.
ENTER EMAIL FOR WEEKLY TIPS
ALWAYS SOAK YOUR BEANS
HEALTH IS AN INVESTMENT
NOT AN EXPENSE.
Probiotics, $78/bottle,
10% MEMBERSHIP DISCOUNT.
My wife’s coworker got the jab,
A day later, BOOM, dead.
My nose feels like it might bleed.
I unsubscribe.
The email software gives me a box
to explain the reason:
Frequent and unnecessary
capitalization.
*
A colleague sent a group email.
The dying are diabetic, obese, or old.
We should not be forced
to suffer their sins.
They want soda, fast food? Fine.
BUT I WANT TO LIVE!
On Facebook,
she shares a meme
that implies she’s being treated
like Anne Frank.
The unvaxx’d are being FORCED
into concentration camps!
Ignore it, I tell myself.
Ignore it, says my husband.
Ignore it, says my sister.
I comment.
Anne Frank died in 1945.
Bergen-Belsen.
Epidemic typhus.
Infected body lice.
17,000 prisoners dead.
Fever, delirium, shock.
The slaughter of millions,
Jews, Roma, Poles, disabled, gays,
is not the same as a mandate.
When you make this comparison
I type, furiously,
hands shaking,
your rectum is indistinguishable
from your face.
She keeps it classy.
Posts a link.
Compilation of research,
published as a book.
Evidence of the harms
of vaccines.
About the author.
This was his second book.
His first, a guide to communicating
with extraterrestrials.
*
Ideologies of alt-right intersect
the Gospel According to Goop.
$2,000 Ouija boards, jade eggs,
LED lights in cursive font
for the vanity:
You are everything.
Blood libel. 5G.
EMFs, ascension.
Sex rings, Fauci,
fatness, freedoms.
Global paranoia burns.
Shrapnel of disinformation.
Grifters offer salves.
People die.
*
A friend of mine doesn’t trust vaccines
or pharmaceutical companies.
His daughter died of an overdose.
Fentanyl. She was 30.
She broke her femur skiing
when she was 15.
Family doc prescribed Oxycontin.
Thankfully, it’s not addictive.
She was an addict by age 17.
An uncle helped with that.
He talks about Purdue Pharma,
his ears turning red.
The fucking Sackler family
is inconceivably rich, he spits,
legal fucking firewalls,
corporate fucking immunity.
My daughter was gone a decade,
he says, fists balled,
before she was
gone.
*
I’m back at work
and things are busy.
I’m stuck, people say.
I’m empty.
Many are women.
Caretakers.
People who gave and gave.
Moms.
Not always though.
Some bagged groceries.
Some dumped cocktails in mason jars
handed them through windows
to parents desperate to slake
unslakable thirst.
Some cleaned hospital bathrooms.
Some processed the food we ate.
YOU STAY SAFE, I’LL STAY FREE
read the shirt of the unmasked man
in his 30s, standing behind
the elderly woman
who placed on the freshly
disinfected countertop
a sympathy card
Tic Tacs
politely asked for 20 scratch tickets,
$5,000,000 Ca$h Riche$.
You play too? he says,
incredulously.
Because of the mask
covering her nose,
the mask that threatens
to wrest his freedom,
she smiles
with her eyes.
*
Everyone shouldered a burden.
All of us are sick.
In a fit of stress my husband
called me a tyrant.
Excuse me? I said
extra ‘scuse.
Nothing is mine, he said.
It’s all yours.
Pain can float. Pain can sink.
It can detonate, make you mean.
I count backwards from ten,
feel a nosebleed coming on.
ALL CAPS FUCK YOU
FUCK YOU FUCK YOU
the bones
of the house vibrate,
he looks at me
and cries
*
My rage is deep
and burns
like an ember,
like a thief, like a wolf,
like a snake, like a woman.
*
The red room
is now green and gold.
I bought a velvet chair
and a potted plant.
I’m taking everything back.