The Funny Man

if news could take a figure
it would crack me at the throat
split the dam like a dagger
cuts the jugular
scratch the blood out of me
till it spills in liters
a shattered faucet
i clutch to what stays of me
to the sweat that curdles
at my eyes
and my constipated heart

a voice cracks
on the phone splitting time
with its minutes of death
bolting me to this gravel
and maggot filled earth
with its icy command:
Stay and listen and listen and listen
to the cracks on the phone
the cracks as the body cremates

"Your Grandfather is dead."

and I can feel my head
tilting tilting tilting
off its neck

First Draft: I wonder....

I sit in bed and wonder who I am, and wonder and wonder
I can hear the thoughts of millions, the stories that aren't mine but that I so badly want to tell like a over excited child I track mud in and take before I think, dirty the jewels that someone else has so carefully polished
I am moved by that which sparkles but when someone tells me to find my own jewels I can only see mud.
Paw prints on the wall, a musty scent of week old odor.
I wonder who I am
Wonder like a child trying to find it's mom, who is going to hold my hand?
I don't really believe it when I see all those famous people doing famous things without holding someone's hand.
But they must be right?
Maybe the hand is hidden, cut out from the camera or maybe they forgot to tell it in their stories.
I'm starting to realize that I'm only as special as my mom thinks I am.
I can't do special things, just get pushed into special places.
I work well under pressure because my mom always has me under pressure, like her cabbage stew.
Or is it the other way around?
Her cabbage stew cabbage stew is always under pressure because it's always under pressure like me.
That sounds right and yet not quite, like sound of an empty house where everyone is gone except for one little girl or a desert rock at sunset that looks like a grinning face.
My mom is the special one and yet I'm the carrier of dreams. Everything went so well it's wrong and I am scared at night of expecting too much or being expected of anything. I don't want to break any dreams.

Something More Then Friends

I told him yes, but

it never came from the heart.

I told him I love you, but

it never meant anything to me.

When we broke, he couldn’t understand why.

I’m cruel to have him by my side.

I’m a monster to let him go.

I can’t find peace in myself,

just fear and frustration

and the want to run away.

From what?

From him?

No, he is not scary, but his hand is

 when it reaches around my shoulder,

A silent declare that I am his.

When he kisses it’s like a brand,

 I instinctively squeeze my lips

 to not let anything in and when

I’m done I wipe the kiss away.

No, he doesn’t scare me, but

being something more then friends does.

The American Dream

“Make America Great Again!” Trump says and the liberals scoff that America was never that great. But I wonder if America was ever anything or just a big fat lie. Surprise! We’ve hypernormalized and without a single dime, (though trillions went into marketing) we made virtual reality! No computers needed. You just have to buy into the Dream.

Lula, Lula why don’t you kiss me Lula.

Pay no mind to the black men dying on the streets. Or the gay bar thumping thumping thumping to the gunshot beats. Vote a clown into the office and ignore that glass ceiling. I’m sure it wasn’t there for anything. Buy the Dream, tweet, tweet, tweet to all your friends like it will make a fucking difference. American became a big fat lie when metaphors became the only language we could speak.

Don’t lie baby, you is color blind

Well, I don’t care about your identity politics, your ratios of skin. I’m too scared to say everything is ok and the only good news I’ve heard all week is that the water is safe in Dakota.

My birthday was yesterday and among the Happy Birthdays and well wishes was a call to rebellion.

“If your parents are happy with chu’ then you’re doing it wrong.”

The whole world is wrong, with every day making less and less sense. When did the internet become corporate fuel, when did nothing become the new norm. It’s like this whole country is turning into a black hole and no one wants to do anything but scream. The 1950’s are back again with the new big dream. Lula had a baby, and now we are back to Eisenhower, Ronald Regan, and the big fat lie that tweets.

And among all this the world is going to die. Don’t forget that clock ticking over our heads. China’s spitting gas like a smoker on a pack of cigarettes and somehow we still haven’t solved world hunger though it isn’t a problem with food. But maybe that’s too big a concept for your tiny brain so let's keep it #relatable.

#When my mama’s going to die

                                                                        #when the river is dry                     #i’ve got no food today                     #they took my gay uncle away                       

                                                                                                            #can’t go outside without gas mask                                    #outside trump tower                                                                         #too much gold to see

Will we still be tweeting when the world ends? Snap chatting our skin covered in ash and blood with a gun to our head? Will firestorms with Potus lead to death? Or will we all be hooked to the American Dream, IV drips filled with Mountain Dew and Opioids, jacked up on the new Call of Duty.

Feeling impotent but powerful.

“Fuck the American Dream,” someone whispered one day. No one heard it but that was more then we were willing to try.

A House of Snakes

-Dedicated to my mom

Cinderella lives in a house of snakes

The cinders come from her burning skin

Which festers and falls in flakes

From all the poison the house creates

Cinderella doesn’t sleep

The kissing tongues against her chin

Are laced with poison words to make her weep

As around her legs the snakes do sneak

Cinderella works in vain

Though the snakes are her new kin

They made her mother go insane

And locked her brother away in chains

Cinderella lives in a house of snakes

Lost in their lies but a will to escape

Badger

Light, love, life, relief

Sunlight streaming down the street

Burn the leaves, burn the light

Burn the girl too pure for sight

Hey girl what’s your number?

The teardrop leaves a shudder

Sight, shut, life, alive

Bottled butterflies again revived

Ask the hands, Ask the feet

Ask in a voice syrup sweet

Hey girl, lets get to know each other.

Run from that man who thinks he’s your lover.

In My Dream

Spirals form on a glassy green

Willows dip beneath the sea

And the dragonfly hums for me

The dry air cracks my hands and heels

Sun is hotter than what’s ideal

But the marble pagoda cools me

The voice of my mother whispers near

Birds chatter without fear

And the rustling wind settles me

Sweet lemonade and dusty moon cakes

Shrimp egg rolls, their greasy flakes

The sweet cookies she makes for me

The water lilies cared for so well

Jasmine from the teakettle

And the fresh breeze from the sea

Ars Poetica II: Orange Poetica

I’ve never eaten an orange

but I shiver at the thought

of seeing its

skin

peeled off

and all its juices leaking down my shirt

its bundled insides like

sacks

of flesh

being divided and divided again

and then bitten off—

it’s gross, don’t ask me why

I just think its wrong
to tear at an orange’s insides.

Ars Poetica I

A poem is:

            My foggy head,

            the struggle in

            the morning to get out of

            bed,

            wrinkled sheets and

            greasy bowls,

            the milky film that could turn into mold,

           

the cloudless sky,

            the burning sunlight

in my eye,

            the smell of bleach

            and soapy bowls
            the water that has banished the suspicious mold.

Sunken Bridge

The bridge flood and filled 

The moss untilled

The sight of something old

Adding ages to my soul

At Mirrors Edge

The water

The water

The water

Still as glass

Only broken by a fishes kiss

The world shines within

Glistening blue sky

A line of trees

The sun on their leaves

Day and Night portrayed

In one shimmering ricochet

The Fairy

She made her home in a mushroom by the bank of the moat and every morning dived into the glassy waters. She kissed the fishes that rose to greet her and danced on top of lily pads. In the afternoon, she would weave coats of grass and moss to be sold at the Sunday market and when her work was done she would harness a dragonfly and collect dew from the high most trees. In the evening she would hide among the rushes and sing songs with the frogs and crickets till the night was still and as she lay to sleep in her mushroom bed she would watch the moon and think until she with the world feel asleep.

X: Not Your Figurehead

A little poem exercise, influenced from a workshop I went to on Saturday. We picked a painting and then wrote from the perspective of some person, creature or thing in that painting. Here is my poem and the painting, you can try to guess what object I picked.

Don’t look at me

I am not to be desired

What you see as perfection

Is no more than the organic creation of nature

I am blemished

Though it is hidden from you

This body struggles to keep this posture

That you so worship

Let this body rest

I can feel the muscles aching 

The hand is shaking 

She wants no more

Don’t look at me

though I am as white as powder

this is not a sign of good health

Let us out of this dress 

I can feel the lungs screaming

As the mouth takes small gasps of breath

She is not a statue

She is not your figurehead

Madame X by John Singer Sargent, 1884 

Two Poems for World War 2

Zyklon B

The ghost that snuffed one million lives

That told one million lies

To the steady beat of the drum

Zyklon B

The silent monster that played like a cat

That preyed on its rats

I heard that is smelled like cheese

Zyklon B

The screams of children were it’s favorite song

All screaming for mom

Like the strings on a violin

Zyklon B

It took their breath

And in return gave them death

Laughing at their cheated screams

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Fear

As the men on the radio cried out for blood, for war

The boy on the carpeted floor looked up and saw fear

It sat among the wrinkles of his mother’s tender face

And slid through the furrowed brow of his father.

Will I have to be a soldier one day?

Fear said it all

The boy watched as with each passing day,

more men left the village

Wives stood at gated entrances,

baby in one hand

a small sad wave in the other

Why must they leave?

Because, said Fear, they had no choice

The boy grew he became a man

But the war had not yet ended

Dressed in his best, his mother watched him

Fear perched from her eyelids

Why must we fight?

Because, said Fear, they have to drink

The man fought on the Eastern Front

In the snow in the cold

He grew numb to sight of blood

That this country demanded so much of

He grew numb to sight of the loss

The bodies that pilled wall to wall

How can I live?

Because, whispered Fear, you have me

My Teacher

In commemoration of my teacher, who I recently found out had passed away of cancer this spring, I wrote this. You were my light Amy Fortune, and I'll never forget what you have done for me. 

I dreamed about fencing. I faced against my teacher and smiled because it was an opponent I know well. Back and forth we paced. I lunged, she counter attacked. Our swords clanged and flashed as our feet danced. I flèche, she twirls. On goes our dance. The strip on which we stand becomes our world. I learn from her. Her ways, her moves. I strike for her weaknesses and she marks mine. Finally our duet comes to a close. We unmask ourselves and I see her face aglow. We shake hands and as we walk to the end of the strip, I turn to her to say one thing more. But she was already gone from me.  

A Women's Pain

Pain, a thousand needles thick
Coming twice as hard
and twice as quick
Strike true against my stomach like a drum
A beat so hard and heavy
My legs go numb
I curse the skies, my blood, my very nature
For concocting such a feature
As bleeding out the remains of an incomplete creature.
Who knows how many silent things have met violent ends
Since the start of my body's labor.

Return...

17 years, a blank slate
Nothing known, nothing seen
Thoughts drift like clouds in a empty space
The clear sky reflects my mind
My emotions still as glass
Shallow enough to walk through
I carry no deep sorrow
No heavy emotion
Yet I feel frustration
Small tremors in my peace
Distortions in my glassy mind
Why?
Could it be?
That he...
No, not possible
My world is set
The globe cannot break
Yet in the distance I hear calling
Clouds come in thick
I cannot see
The horizon that seemed endlessly
Vacant begins to call a storm
Water laps at my knees
I am sinking
Sinking
Sinking
Into my emotions
The storm rages
I am electrified
What happened to cause all this pain
Ah yes, the accident
That he...
No
I must not think
In the distant I hear calling
I must swim
Swim from this chaos I called home
Swim from the dream I have seen
Him
Me
We loved
But then he...
Died
Now this,
I am empty
The ground I stood on has
evaporated
And all that's left is a endless watery void
Why?
From his death came my life
A violent emotion of pain
Return him
Return me

Time

Tick Tock Tick Tock

Time falls away

As the days melt into one

I find myself not remembering

If there even was a yesterday or tomorrow

My life is suspended in time yet moving so fast

Even my fallen time is limited by the decaying of my skin

Tick Tock Tick Tock

The days march forward

Yet I do not

I stay in a cycle

A routine of repetition

Nothing gets done

Nothing gets undone

A life in stagnation

A day I hold for million years

Till all I am left with is

Insanity

We walk like shadows in the house

We walk like shadows in the house

A empty container of once ourselves

We enraptured in our pain

Fail to see the meaning of living again

And if we were to pass in meeting

Not one would state a greeting

We are shades that see an empty house

We see nothing here, not even a mouse

But if some stranger were to pass

They’d see shades poring in mass

The Little Bird

The little bird sings

from its ornate cage,

His mother has cut off his wing

At a very young age

The bird does not cry but roars from inside

Dreaming, not wanting the freedom it could have

And then one day

The mother no longer wished him to stay

So she threw him out to the world

No sooner then he was thrown

Did he breath, gasp and moan

Dying the very same day.