DROOL

Sounds of Silence

Sarah is breathing. If a metronome were made of cotton, it would be her sleeping beat. The balcony is behind me and the long blue curtains, and below that, cars on the cobblestones, and closed-down shops, and the last dog-walkers of the night. Sarah just whispered something, sounded like "delinquent" or "did he quit". The pipes are dripping water somewhere. Everything is louder in the dark. I want to know about being alone. About relationships. About columns, and their arches, and their strength and their balance. I want to know whether my breath matches my sister's in the night, how the room sounds when no one is listening. Today I heard "The Sounds of Silence" played by an Ecuadorian street musician, in Rome. I recognized the tune as it came up the hill to where we stood over the Forum, looking out over that field of ruins. Carlos sang along in Spanish. I want to know who stole bricks from the Colosseum and where they are now. There are holes in all of the ruins, where bricks used to be, empty little altars, homes for pigeons, cloaks from the rain.

Dear E.K. Daniel,

Why does the universe need a cause or explaination?
How come God can exist without a cause or explaination
and the universe can't?
Eff you,

Ruth.

Mother - rough

She holds the milkman's hours
on her eyelids, five thirty, six o'clock
in the creases of her palm.

Does the early kitchen fog
remind her of Ohio?
Does the pressing coffee remind her
of her father's cream jugs?

A gray damp newspaper
creases under her elbow
and the radio voices glimpse
like birds at the feeder.

She's shaped her windows like his.

TO DO

More like: DOODOO.

Secrets

I can hold my cheeks
and shut my eyes
and be a fog horn.

Packing Tea For David Hall (rev)

Dearest Donald Hall of Kensington, Massachusetts,
I packed your tea today.
I watched every leaf and stem
roll like dirt and stones
from a corroding mountain.
I imagined how they would open in your cup,
and how you would think of words to describe them,
such as "flowering" and "rain-wet".

Mr. Hall, perhaps
my tea would appear
in your poems!

I filled your bags delicately,
all of those hearty Keemuns,
and chest-heaving Yunnans -
What are you doing
drinking such dark teas,
Donald?

I was going to copy down your address
(and I’d be the most gentle stalker)
when I noticed that you are a David,
a painter, a carpenter, a businessman,
a Massachusetts man with no relation to Donald at all.

I imagined you finding tea at your doorstep
in the morning, and brewing it in the late evening,
smeared yellow oil on your cheek,
a hammer in your back pocket,
your briefcase tired and opened.

I hope you find the Christmas cookies
hidden between the pages
of your receipt.

Ode to the Old Ringer (rev)

Title?

There is more than conversation
in Bogart's hand, his cigarette teeth speak
to substance, and his eyes can almost see
the operator’s cheek, that curves
like a wave of sound.

It is no longer
the lattice edged ring,
not the ear against heavy black.
It is not the same grip, or weight.
There's really not much
to hold onto
at all.

There is no pleasure of waiting, anymore
no "expected" call, no magic
in the science of wires, only

Why aren't you answering your phone?

I'm calling you because I'm on the bus
and my phone is in my hand
and I have nothing to say.

Tea Person 2 (rev)

"Just shows you the boss is listening", a shaking referral to the rain and God and our complaints. His teeth are everywhere, leaning in every direction, swinging when he speaks. An unintended force behind his language.

Light is coming between his ear and balding skull, from that place where magicians find quarters, handkerchiefs, rabbits.

He finds the perfect Assam, like a king, pointing, chin up, summoning forth each tin, too fat, too skinny, just right. He smells it tenderly, Sessa, over and over, as I count up his change.

When The Polar Ice Caps Melt

The night is underwater
and the globe doesn't mind,
it is spinning in circles, as usual.

The people are puff-cheeked
and wide-eyed, an ending that is neither
epic or romantic, just a little goofy,
as we doggy paddle toward each other
and attempt to express our last minute love
for one another, that kiss of life - with the violins
and the death-drop background - is impossible.
Any embrace would be too heavy
to float.

Cutting Weight

He sleeps in trash bags.
He runs in them, too.
He's collecting his sweat
in glass jars
and sending them
to his mother.

Thank you for the fat,
I used it, thank you.

Packing Tea for Donald Hall

Dearest David Hall
of Kensington, Massachusetts,
I packed your tea today
thinking you were Donald Hall,
esteemed poet.

I watched every leaf and stem
and imagined how they would open in your cup,
and how you would think of words to describe them,
such as "flowering" and "rain-wet".

Perhaps my tea
would appear
in your poems!

I filled your bags delicately,
all of those hearty Keemuns,
and chest-heaving Yunnans -
What are you doing
drinking such dark teas,
Donald? ... David?

I was going to copy down your address
when I noticed that you are David Hall,
perhaps a distant cousin of Donald's,
a painter, or perhaps a Massachusetts man
with no relation at all. Whoever you are,
I gave you a few Christmas cookies.

College Applications

i know my own name
and my social security number
and my address (permanent and mailing)
and my parent's names
and the name of my high school
soooooo well.

A Poem About Cell Phones?

(Brainstorming the things
you could be doing instead
of answering my phone calls)

1. Killing someone
2. Painting someone
3. Making a sandwich
4. Lost somewhere

It is no longer
the lattice edged ring,
not the ear against heavy black plastic -
Bogart's ear, and his cigarette teeth,
and his eyes pointed down suspiciously.


It is not even
the same grip, anymore.
There's really not much
to hold onto
at all.

There is no pleasure of waiting
by the telephone, no "expected" call,
no magic in the science
of wires, only

Why aren't you answering your phone?

I'm calling you because I'm on the bus
and my phone is in my hand and I have nothing
to say.

AP Biology

Explain your body, held
in its own hands -
Who does it need and
how does it occur?

Father is cooking

"I was born in a house with Thelonious Monk on all the time."

Places That Are Difficult To Find

I don't want
to call your skin
transparent -
it is less glass
than tracing paper.

But I do imagine
finding things
in your veins -
dogs or candy bars,
such things as we find
in clouds.

But let's forget
the familiar -

What can you tell me
about the brownish corners
of my lips, that look
like the syrup residue
of a hot chocolate?

Self Aware Poem (cut short)

Hello you are reading a poem starting now,
Do as I say.

Write poem on your index finger:
Po-knuckle-em.

Hook the thing around your belt loop on the side,
and stand with all your weight on that hip and just
stare past the man walking by who wants to ask you to dinner,
you know, just ask yourself to dinner.

Take yourself home, too, flatter and flirt with yourself.
Push your own breast into your own chest.
Push this poem into the soft hair of your genitals,
and curl them around this poem, let them learn it.

HamburgerRuebenChickenSaladSquash!

kind of wanting a fixed gear.
kind of for the snob appeal.
but also:

"I still feel that varable gears are only for people over forty-five. Isn't it better to triumph by the strength of your muscles than by the artifice of a derailer? We are getting soft...As for me, give me a fixed gear!"
--Henri Desgrange, L'Équipe article of 1902

i kind of want to be that guy.

then again, may be dangerous.
especially considering that
all i think about while biking
is food.

Fame!

looklook magical gianna drew mah character:

Sister

Sister
I can't wait to see you
and remember how our brains fit together
like snuggling,
I was just thinking about how we would share
new writings with each other
and know just
what the other isn't remembering
to think of.
Twin! I missyou.

Am I Too Far Gone? (College Essay Intro?)

We are taking our senior class picture: One hundred and fifty kids on the front steps, arms thrown up like a roller coaster ride. But the reality of graduation is stuffing the screams, for me, it is all muted. The let-down of our "legacy" is holding fast the camera's clicks, wrapping the school bell in a silent ring.

A ring that is a mosquito stuck in my skull, as a mideival torture device, a bell rung in an ear to drive one mad. Or, it is a ring that I wear in marraige with this high school experience, a heavy and permanent reminder, as the coffee ring on the table, from hours of reading and drinking and reading, looking up to see the ring around the moon, the day gone by.

(ring --> city)

You see, the city lights spell out truths at night. They do. I've stood on rooftops reading them. They say: "It is all in here", "it is all elsewhere". In a constellation, they spell the words of Robert Creeley: "It is, rather, that there is no relief, no solution or ending to come to. Only place itself can offer a place to be, a chance to recognize the world with whatever one has brought to it."

You see, the city lights reflect a thousand twinkling moons into the river, enough little moons for us all to drown reaching for. A person can pay their whole body and mind for that thought. And a person can drown in it. The secret is to stand firmly in balance, frame wide, and to begin and end with questions.

he is god.

Susan M. Williams, Nashville, TN: Robert Haas, what is your favorite word?
your least favorite word?
What turns you on?
What turns you off?
What sound or noise do you love?
What sound or noise do you hate?
What profession, other than yours, would you like to attempt?
What profession, other than yours, would you not like to participate in?
Finally, if heaven exists, what do you expect to hear God say when you arrive?

Robert Hass: What is the necessary word?
What are the least sufficient words?
What turns you in?
What turns you out?
What species of New England bog berry do you love, regret in the pulp and the sky ashy?
What animal insolence, what bell of what round in the contest between anguish and delight provokes you?
What feather of the winter cardinal would you like to attempt?
What taxi cab meter, measuring the fare uptown toward coffee con leche or the hurt dance of recalcitrant marionettes would you not like to participate in?
Finally, if poetry exists, what do you expect the grass to say, Susan?

Crazy Trolley Man

Singing a throat-throbbing dry song, veteran,
your faded army cap shades your eyes, watching
your index and thumb, so poised in space,
a ballet trigger practiced stillness,
pulling the invisible string of a chord
along in the air

Now, shaking cracked hands, you know both ways,
a loose pleading gesture, up and down
as if you're centering a pot - but stone,
not soft mud and clay, never in those hands,
always the rought, sedentary edges.

Lean back onto no pillow,
lean back into space and sleep.

For Love of Sleep

I started to study,
already read a few pages, so,
now I know more than I did before,
and will do better on the test
than if I'd done nothing at all.

That is logical, for love of sleep, yes, sleep.

Do You Taste Organic?

I'm only writing short prose observations of crazy people right now. what is that about? im really accumulating a bunch of them... "crazy veteran on trolley", "blind flute lady", "ms. tired eyes", and on and on. i suppose i am putting my people-watching skills to some good use, but... good use? really? what does an observation peice matter? what does it add to art? does everything have to mean something? Answer: No, no, no, some things are vegetable broth, some things are duck soup. Remember? Yes. I remember.

School related stress right now. That's no good. I really don't believe in it. I can't wait until these college applications are gone gone gone. Maybe this warrants a blues tune.

This morning someone was blasting Hendrix in the hallway at school. A stereo plugged into the wall just sitting there by my locker, didn't seem to belong to anyone. It was there when I left, all untended and loud. Did you know that I listened to all and only Jimi Hendrix for a good few years of my life? Fact.

Today some health food nuts came to CAPA and gave a huge bag of apples to each advisory. I stole the bag for advisory number 304 and ran around the lunchroom throwing them like money. That felt good. Except they weren't actually apples, they were bags of sliced apples that had some additive to keep them looking fresh. Amber said "these don't taste organic".

Oh, and: Pomegranates are native to Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iran, and North India.

Tea Person 2

Shaking words, "just shows you the boss is listening", referring to the rain and God and our complaints. His teeth are really everywhere, leaning in every direction, swinging when he speaks.

The light is somewhere between his ear and balding skull, coming in to shine in my eyes, in that place where magicians find quarters and handkerchiefs. It is blinding his face from me. Maybe he is Jesus. Might mistake him for homeless outside, but here, he finds the perfect Assam, like a king, pointing, chin up, summoning forth each tin, too fat, too skinny, just right. He smells it tenderly, Sessa, over and over, as I count up change for his fifty dollar bill.

Tea Person 1

A curled old woman, skin flaking in drops from her chin and nose-tip, eyes so glassly, like she's about to cry. What is this condition, disease? A charcoal line on her eyelids, a perfect curve, as she looks down to count her dollars.

get pumped.

(I'm going to try to post pictures of my bruises later.)

(i got into 2 bike accidents yesterday.)

Short Story in Jumbles

My hair sticks to my cheeks when I whip my head around,
trying to watch all of my sides.

A shopping cart flies across the parking lot
as if posessed, a great hand of wind and rain tricking it into the side of a van,
whose alarm sounds, threatening the thief, the rain, the shopping cart,
all turned over and shaking, now, wheels spinning.

A blurry man with a beard and a stuffed car asks if I need a ride.

This strip mall, a few hooded figures running between their groceries and their trunks,
trying to keep the bread dry, perhaps, trying not to crush the eggs, trying to keep the ice cream
cold. It would stay cold, this night. My shirt soaked straight to my skin, pink and satin,
that felt like a cut, and the rain stinging its walls like peroxide.

A pencil grey cross hatch surrounding everything. A bus in the distance
taking so long, it's name and number like a fog light,
orange, casting sickness across my face.




ALRIGHT, feel bad for my sorry ass.

LONG AND ROUGH (is how i like my poems)

Jessica's breads in a tin foil bundle,
the banana candy insides, all wafting upwards -
Do smells disappear?
Do they land on the shoulders of boys,
who carry them so far as the swimming pool,
and later, so far as the locker room shower,
and still later, to the ocean's edge.

Or do they separate and fade, like couples,
continents, the words of a poem.
If so, then, where are their graves?
My grandfather's cigarette train,
my sister's vanilla garden,
Cara's basketball sweat embrace,
where do they fall, where can I go to visit them,
with flowers and stones?

----

**and then maybe this additional bit:

I remember the passenger seat of our dust blue Nissan,
the straps pulling at my neck when I'd ask
my driving mother to please explain the science in everything.

Do smells disappear?

She told me to keep a notebook of questions.

**and somehow get to:

Many poems are only questions,
many words separate and fade,
many words stick to the pockets of my jeans
through the laundry, through the walking of three days,
and rediscovered..

**what?

Running Water is Also Evil

Reed interview today - went well. Probably because I danced for a good half hour beforehand to Taj Mahal. He really brightens up everything, I always have a good day when I listen to him in the mornings. Anyhow, me and this Luke person talked about biking and poetry and gentrification and West Africa and it all felt good good good. I was really happy about the interview. He encouraged me to to send poetry with my application, and said that they'd rather have a great, interesting student who looks mediocre on paper than a bland person who looks perfect on paper. Word.

Also: Looking at chocolate bars at Penn Bookstore Cafe beforehand. One of them had like.. chocolate related astrology things? "Aries: Will eat the entire bar on the way home from the shop." And I did just that. (Sarah - the Libra one said: "Will buy two bars, to share with someone." You punk.)

Now for the homework.

(Afterthought)

What is there to say about four women,
strangers to each other, sitting together, staring
at computers.

I wish we would stare with that dedication
into each other's faces. To learn them.

Isn't that what this is all about?
Making things less strange?

(One of us throws her hands to her ears
when the construction machines sound,
it is such a fearful, immediate gesture..)

Revision - She'll Be A Church Lady One Day, But Not Today, Today She Has A Son

She is thinking about the expression:
"cling fast", as if holding on
is something that happens quickly.

The low waver of the church organ
radiates from her forehead.

Her ache sits still
between her belly and her thighs:
Her sun in half-sleep, fingers curled
around her braids, that crawl her back
like spiders, tickle her skin like
tall grass. His laughter hangs
from his chin like spit.

Folk Song Remix

When there is no more paper
left in my house, no scraps left
to write upon, when my walls
and floors are black
and my ceilings,
and the backs of my hands,
when my arms and thighs
are covered in script tattoos,
I will peel off my skin,
I will pile all the papers,
I will pull down the wallpaper -
those long thin Torah strips -
and in one cardboard box,
box big as a house,
I will send it to you,
the whole of it,
and this poem will be a letter
taped on top.
When you read it, you will understand
your duty to unpack.

Prayer 2, or, Angst Galore

God, I am naked
and all the water in the world
is too shallow
to cover me.
I've been robbed,
what shall I do?
I am here.
Can you hear me?
You have robbed me.
What shall I do?

CMON EDDIE LEMME SNEAK THIS ONE BY

ARGHH

i can't get any new books out

cuz i still haven't returned James Tate

(he is the shit. the depressing shit, but whatever.)

MOTHERFUCK.

College Essay Attempt #10,000,000

(On the blog because the library won't save your files.)

We've just taken our senior class picture: One hundred and fifty kids on the front steps, arms thrown up and screaming, like a roller coaster ride. The reality of graduation and college is muting everything - I can't hear the screams, the camera's clicks, the schoolbell ringing.

I remember road trips, when I was younger. I used to gaze out of the window, and the blurring trees and traffic symbols, and plot out my imaginary farm. Draw the plans for my future community center, my cafe, my bookstore. Awake, I could dream forever of college life. In these fantasies, I was my best self, curled up in a chair with a book, or involved in animated conversation with friends, discussing Locke, Kant, Shakespeare, Homer. I imagined class discussions: A bunch of students and our proffessor, searching together for the essence of some subject. This would be - not the life - but life itself. Living. Living is in spirited conversation and meaningful texts. I couldn't stop dreaming.

That living is where I wished I was, it was what I imitated when I skipped school to go to my favorite cafe and read.

I've hated high school. I've felt under-educated, uninspired, alienated. So I didn't try very hard. I was impatient. Early on, I began to believe in self-education, the way a scientist believes in Carbon. (See Exhibit A. **I made a collage of some notes I've taken in self-education, quotations from different books, graphs of plots, things from my notebooks, if you've ever seen my notebooks.) I read poetry, literature, philosophy, anything I could get my hands on, and researched a LOT about education theory and alternative schooling.

And oh, conicidence! Two women sitting across from me are discussing where to send their kids to high school. "Don't do it! Don't send them! Let them roam and study what their hearts desire!!" I want to tell them, "High school is an oppressive institution, it will ruin their minds, it will devour their inspiration, it will turn their thoughts into badly analyzed numbers." One of them is wearing a shirt that says "American Woman". Yes, this is correct, public education is an American problem.



And then I really begin to ramble about how shitty Philly schools are, and the causes (capitalism, racism, classism), so here I stop. Thoughts? Should I not mention skipping school? This is just a beginning, but it's the best version I've written so far. Also - should I mention how I am friends with the security guard at the library (above mentioned - Eddie)? And I need to work in how I left Masterman because I hated their philosophy, but how CAPA hasn't fit well because their standards are so low, and how I've been trying to work this education thing out my way, by taking classes at Rutgers this year, but it's all still so UNSATISFYING.




No college will ever accept me.

Revision!

His voice was once a silver trumpet -
all the pride of the shining band
was in his air song,
was in his dust stomp.

All gone to the mice,
to the blues, now, to Georgian heat
on the killing room floor.

The clock in his cab says
11:15 in the dazzling afternoon.
It says that. Though it is 9pm and raining.
It lies like that. All spelled out clear, in red digital dots.
Like the constellations in city lights this night,
that spell out line drawings
of the mythical heroes of America:

Wave-riding cowboys, freight-hopping vagabonds,
with bullets to spare.

This is not a voice to be won or lost, he thinks.
No, it is only to be dampened, to be moldy, a loaf of bread
on the sidewalk this night. It is only
to thin out like an old flannel nightgown,
to scratch last hollers to the moon.

i love the word "vagabond"

His voice was once a slick trumpet,
shining in an outdoor band.
His throat has since been scratched out
by malevolent mice, this killer sickness
that crawls through his cab, hides behind his wheel,
stares with him at his digital clock until three am.

All of his old Nigerian air song, gone to the mice.
Just blues now, just Georgian heat
on the killing room floor.

It is dark and raining, though his clock says
eleven fifteen in the dazzling afternoon.
It says that. It lies like that. All spelled out in clear, red digital dots.
Like the constellations in city lights at night,
the line drawings of the mythical heroes of America:

Wave-riding cowboys, wet vagabonds, with bullets to spare.

This is not a land to be won or lost, he thinks,
no, it is only a song, to be dampened,
to become moldy, to thin out like an old flannel nightgown,
to scratch last hollers to the moon.

Song 1

Hell is in the back pocket of her pants,
folded in a sqaure, a little letter to a man.
Hell, hell, hell in the pocket of her pants,
when I grabbed her ass, it burnt my hand.

My Brain, Your Brain

This is for my brain:
1. Wake up
2. Get dressed
3. Use MOM'S bike, not YOURS, or you will DIE from not having BRAKES
4. Go to school
5. Go to Mr. Meketon
6. At 2:30 meet Keith and Bill and bike home with them
7. Force them to fix your bike
8. Meet Phil - Jobs for Justice Dinner (DON'T BE GRIMEY)
9. Go to Tosh's house
10. Drink some wine and sing some songs
11. SLEEP

This is for yours:
1. Do you hate waking up to alarm clocks?
2. Do you think about what you wear?
3. Do your brakes hang low, do they wobble to and fro?
4. Do you think that school is oppressive or liberating?
5. Do you have a wonderful mentor?
6. Do you think that bikers are cooler than regular people?
7. Do you think that my bike is fixable?
8. Do you know what Jobs for Justice is?
9. Do you think that Tosh is good people?
10. Do you think that wine and singing is a sophisticated way to spend an evening?
11. Do you love to sleep?

in my dreams i have facial hair

look look! there goes ruth in her house boat!!

The American Shrug

I hate the American shrug,
the American whimper, pout.

Why don't we wail, why isn't wailing encouraged?
Why don't we shave our heads in grief?

If we did, we could take all of that hair,
and burn it, and smell it burning,
and rub the ashes into our skin.

Mysteries.

1:46pm:
Homeless man carrying only a remote control and a rusty saw passes by.

1:57pm:
Same homeless man walks back the way he came.
Still has the saw, but instead of the remote: a blue lighter.

Two Good Arms

She has these two arms
made of marble mirror.
They hang like a string of glass
beads, these arms
with infinite joints, water arms,
that trail behind her chest
like ribbons on the handlebars of a child's bicycle.

She presses through the wind
as if they were thick waves,
her forehead is the bow of a ship,
It shines with a high ease.

We are the deranged homeless, treading
with our stick limbs, light thrashing from behind buildings
into our eyes, landing on her skin
in oval scapes, in pearls of warmth,
blessing her arms, blessing them.

And We Kept On Living

There is so much to be DOING, god
it took me an hour and a half
to read ONE ARTICLE
im going to have to learn to read faster or else
how to stop time, or else
college is going to come after me with its paws
and destroy me.

Last night was really nice, though -
Read poetry with Cara at Cafe Mocha for like 2 hours,
and then Tosh's house with the children (my friends).
His momma's gone to California
(and then the Caribbean for GOOD)
so we all drank chardonnay in the backyard
and me with my guitar
and miles on the harmonica,
and tosh on the beat box,
making songs out of the air.
Very nice. I was singing. You wish you heard my words

James Brown is on NPR. he is excellent.

WHERE AM I GOING TO GO TO COLLEGE GODDAMNIT?!!

Airport Notes (Revision)

A computer voice
turns harsh degrees on Ts,
pronounces the world
just like a real man would,
a real person with a mouth and teeth and children –

The computer voice calls for
"Hose Dell You Gas"

but everyone is watching CNN, and cannot listen,
because Brad Pitt has Jury Duty, and
a monster truck has run over a crowd, and
a woman in Pennsylvania has strangled a rabid raccoon to death.

Jose Delugas is watching the grey squares of rug
beneath him, whose details blur away and return,
as a night sky, the roof of consciousness,

the TV is a running hum on the back of his neck,
and "Sex tapes of the Stars" sounds more to him
like the erotic mixture of gas, swaying in tune to the universe, far away,
than some blond-haired movie star
thrusting his pelvis.

Bikes in Poems!

I am biking forward, toward an illusion:
The long building, all phallic (dick-like),
could be the Washington Monument,
could be a spear, the image in my textbook
of some savage flattened by a white man,
could be an extended fist and arm of victory,
always against a cloudless sky, could be
a flat road before me, high hill I'll have to push
my body up if I ever expect to get home.

Isaac Prose

Isaac is spitting blood onto the pavement. There are all of those little stones in the pavement. I keep thinking they're his teeth, I am all hunched over looking, like when I was eight or ten, I chipped my tooth at the ice skating rink, hunched over the same way. Looking for the white pebbles of lost teeth, like lost children, like chipped ice, that melt into the pavement before you can find them.

Something About Masculinity

I could hear Ben's dog pant, feel
his dizzy temperature in the air.
The push in his stomach
as he willed his heat out.

Do you know that push?
The breath-holding push,
that men don't know is like
a birth giving push, willing
the heat out, a moan out,
a pleasure-pain push.

I'll Call It: "The Fiction Peach Boathouse"

Dad and I are talking about fiction and peaches simultaneously.
"In the 21st century, it will have the ability to create social change."
Which item is he talking about?

Unless you've talked to me in the past few days, you don't know that I am completely obsessed with a new fantasy. I want to buy a houseboat. And travel the rivers and lakes of America all summer. Yes. I'm saving up all my paychecks all year (forreal) and it is going to happen. And then at the end of the summer I'll sell the thing. Or give it to mom. So I've been studying for my boating license online nightly. You don't actually have to touch a boat to get your license - kind of ridiculous. But really. This is going to happen. It is. Really.

Four Hours

There was one guy with hair that stuck so thick, if I knew his name
I might have asked to pull a comb through it, just to feel the raking.
He had thick glasses, too, (thick glasses and a skinny frame) I thought:
maybe he has perfect vision but prefers to see things blurred.

When I fell asleep last night, some old words blurred into my dreams.
I found paper in the morning to write them down, and stuck it in your shoe.
Maybe you'll put it on without noticing,
and your heavy heel will grind my words like pepper.

Pittsburgh Fudge

Woman on the Bus

Her yellow shirt clings to her brown skin as
her luck clings to itself. She is thinking about the expression:
"cling fast", the way "fast" is used, as if holding on
is something that happens quickly.

Her ache sits still
between her belly and her thighs
Her laughter hangs from her chin
like spit. Braids crawl
her back like spiders, tickle
her skin like laying in the grass.

Monday

Monday morning in the yellow kitchen. Shhh wind in the trees, the crickets and birds all like maracas. NPR - Nixon was a drunk? My nose still running! I'm allergic to summer. My sister so far so far away, what time is it in Rome? What is she doing? Walking on cobblestones? "What did you feel about Nixon?" Dostoevsky is waiting for me and my pen. Ugh.

Bottled Butter - Loose Haiku

Smeared on her upper lip, still
as the splashing milk
of cereal boxes.

Zero

Two girls watch
an iced tea form a ring
on the wooden table
in the dining room
of a marraige.

Their hands are cupped in a shy way.

There are rings under the eyes
of an un-coupled man who is driving
rings around the rosie
for parking.

The girls curl their ringlets
which hang heavily, rounded
like potholes, which might hang the same way,
strung together in a mobile,
playing with the yellow gas
that rings the sun.

SARAH DONT LEAVE ME.

i am going a little bit crazy. but i have a new planner, so it should be alright. everything.

i have to work off a lot of debt for my mom, but i hate being around her recently, because all she does is tell me how im ruining things.

i have to read two books for school, they're both fat.

i haven't seen/talked to my CAPA friends in a good few weeks. i don't know what they think of me, now. i went missing without telling them, i don't have a phone, i don't have any way other than the internet to find these people, but i could if i made an effort, but i don't know if i want to make an effort. im pretty sure we're only friends because we get high or drunk together. im afraid that's all we have in common. i was thinking about having a potluck before school starts and inviting lots of people to come eat together and dance and be jolly. and then i realized that most of my friends wouldn't come because it would be a sober party. do we enjoy each other sober?

i just want to do things my own way and make plans to do things that i want to do and make art and be around art and feel free.

this all makes me feel very alone.

Here/There Us/Them

"You are a stranger of two exiles
so take me like a thirsty bee
and hold me in the inbetween world."

Our/Their words mingle and detach
like the distance and embrace of boxers.
You/I've always been here/there,
on solid ground, in August density,
in sinking sand, in white night,
my/your face illuminated by explosives
or the red flashing of fighter planes
like boxing gloves, slowly soaring through
the night sky, here/there, searching
for a jawbone to break.

Train Cars Sleep Walking

Train cars sleep walking,
dragging their wheels in dreamed
mud steps, hauling moans
like whales over their shoulders,
each foot a claim, staking land,
detaching rust in clouds
that flutter like stars.

Sleepless Little Stories

The bedroom light that won't turn off, that nudges the electrical bill small inches. Ten Little Indians on my bookshelf that I finally stole back from Archie, who wanted to start reading things, but never did. Except for Saul Williams - he liked that. The old baseball that just fell into my laundry basket, that Dave found at the beach in Erie, and let me have because I thought it was so cool. And we tried to play stick ball, but all of the sticks broke on contact. (I've never missed anyone so much). The sniffles that I have, that came with this summer cold, that makes no sense to me. That sounds like crying on the phone and I have to explain myself. The being awake at 1:34 AM considering the subjunctive history of gay boys with accents.

What I Can't Say

Laying on the hardwood floor, footsteps are heartbeats.
My ear to the great chest of the apartment - the world -
whose heart murmurs and falls out of rhythm. (1)

I can still feel the wild illustrations he drew in my goosing flesh,
his fingertips that needle a soft, impermanent tattoo.

The night found deep green in his face. Now everywhere, the mellow blue
of morning. Everywhere, the plump toes of sleeping boys.

His body behind the curtain is a floating ghost.

I found in his chest a thickness, in his hair a soft grease.
I found on his neck poetry, I found beneath his earlobe
a small stone, attention to sensation, sensitivity to touch.

"This is a new language" - I want to say, and can't. (2)

The only way to feel human
in a dehumanizing world
is to touch.

(1) A doctor might ask the globe whether its gravity is in order.
(2) "I am certain I speak a new language, as is always the sign of a new age." - Saul Williams

Airport Notes

A computer voice rounds his Os,
turns harsh degrees on Ts, pronounces
the world just like a real man would,
like a real person whose job he stole,
a real person with a mouth and teeth
and children -

The computer voice cannot pronounce
"Jose Delugas", comes up instead with "Hose Dell You Gas",
but no one is listening enough to be insulted,
Jose Delugas probably isn't listening, just watching

CNN, engulfed in a world where Brad Pitt has Jury Duty,
a woman in Pennsylvania has strangled a rabid raccoon to death,
and a monster truck has run over a crowd,

or just watching the grey squares of rug
which blur away when he loses focus, and sing
into perfect detail when he concentrates.
The TV is a running hum on the back of his neck,
and "Sex tapes of the Stars" sounds more to him
like the erotic mixtures of gases, far away,
swaying in tune to each other,
than some blond-haired movie star thrusting his pelvis.

Heightism

I cannot reach the storage bin above my seat.
How many cloud-eyed flight attendants
get turned away every year for being under 5'5" ?

Indy

Sitting on the sun porch, right after the rain. There is probably chocolate stuck in my molars, I think I can taste it. I am trying to find ways around moms, so I can see a boy. Is it so scandalous to see a boy? Every body that walks by, I think is my sister - I hear she is coming home tonight? I'll hear her voice before anything. She is my favorite human being on this planet, I hope I die first. Blogger just autosaved my draft, what a relief. I spent a lot of time on the phone today, on hold for a Southwest airline operator. I got Cindy.

Revolutionaries.

Revolutionaries eat chinese food pizza chinese food pizza orange tea, hoagies on special occasions.

Without a cell phone, I've pretty much ostracized myself from my friends and the night life. Billy's the only one who's been trying to contact me, which is sweet I guess, but... He's Billy Ash. Invited to go trash picking tomorrow night, but I don't think I will, seeing as I'M GOING TO PITTSBURGH ON FRIDAY! Can't wait to see my Dave and my Katherine and my Su Lu and my people who care about living, who want to spend their time creating things.

Shit Poetry

"Thick rain, today, all smushed
in the moss purple of the sky,
all sweat shine in moons on foreheads."

His old eyes blink behind thick lenses,
and under a black cap, bent to the measure of the curve
of his hand: Old Willy Baptist,
holding my shoulders in experience as my feet
slip to memory.

I am sitting still in the way
his eyes are still in their sockets, still
floating onto my shoulders.

Distance

BAYM (Student Union's summer program: "Building A Youth Movement") is going incredibly well, I know much more about all sorts of oppressions and how they work together to keep the lower class separated and dehumanized so that they can't rise up against the beourgois. Yep.

After today's workshops, I went to the Last Drop with Amber and Ben. We only bought one drink for the three of us, which I'm pretty sure is considered loitering. Kept running into people, which is fun I guess, but sometimes I don't have the energy to be genuine and end up smiling and saying "yeah" and "what have you been up to?" in a really shitty way.

This is the one I miss:



I need help getting to Pittsburgh for under $40.

come my way

sittin next to my sister on the dock of the bay
(the couch in the living room,
the room you live in)

yes, one of those moods, the tired goof ones,
a shade of delirium, too tired for sentences to find ends
or capitalization. woozy with
unfinished dresses
and folks i miss in pittsburgh
(miss you too much to have a long conversation)
who can meet up because they have cars
or whatever it takes to meet up.

watching the tide roll away
sittin on the dock of the bay
wasting time.

First Prayer

Night, my crawling onto the half-roof
(above the porch, not the roof roof, not the top of much, but)
shining at the stars and the half-moon
and taking a cigarette, avoiding the wet pools
that - if I forgot, my socked
feet would sneak to -

my thanking the wet leaves for drooping so.

Night, the feeling of words rushing to your mouth
with no one to catch them but an idea
named God, the feeling of letters
that crash upon finding your lips closed -
fall to grains, and melt down your esophagus
to your stomach -

where they were conceived.

A Little Bugger

More importantly: He’s got seven trash bags full of American vintage clothing down in Amarillo that he intends on selling in Berlin, one day - “Don’t you think the Germans would go wild?” Maybe his brother will drop him off at an airport, like he dropped him off in a corner, in Philadelphia, no hard feelings, just - “Go ahead and fly solo, if that’s what you want.” This kid is so interesting. And sleeping on cardboard really isn’t so bad.

Even more importantly: I lost my cell phone and now the world is a little furthur away than it used to be.

Even more importantly: A little bugger is on this screen, crawlin around like it ain't no thang.

Sunday Mourning Notes

The mountain of everyone’s laundry -

Even dad calls it “the mountain”,
pulls nature from stripes, checks,
the line drawing horse
that rushes wildly off a yellow chest,
the white plastic number twelve,
the inseam falling to threads.

The faded patches of earth below:
A double wedding ring, quilted
plot circle, hardly visible
under the brambling ragged underwear
and mismatched socks.

I fold them into the earth, carefully
creasing and facing buttons skyward,
treating each collar as a pinch pot from wet clay,
each pant leg as a grave
molded from the backyard earth
for a dead mouse.