Look at me! Look at me.
I’m clean and shiny.
I think if I grew my beard out longer
you might mistake me for Moses.
I’m a good person.
You might even think I can save you
like those desert wanderers looking at Moses.
I’ve never parted seas
but I’ve crushed hearts
with the blunt end of axed words.
I once was so good I stood
at the top of a small mountain
at a podium made of soap stone
and like a guru with a microphone
I offered my advice on raising children
to my mother below
a pile of laundry and dishes and lunches
in a hut made of windows cooking for my sister.
I’ve never roused plagues
but I’ve destroyed women
with the pupils of my eyes.
I once was so in love
I gave my heart to woman.
There are parts of a heart
that have serpent roots that cut
through the earth and if you follow
their maniac winding
you will get to a quiet iron chest
locked with a rusted spy-hole
and when you go to look and put your ear
to the still heavy metal
and listen there will be—
I think she heard some kind of creature
sulking like a bull dozer
excavating God’s image off itself.
I think it stared at her like a beast.
Moses once lead the Israelites to a rock
with the people milling and raging beneath.
God wanted to give them water freely
and without guilt and Moses in a hot fury struck the rock
like he wanted to strike all the people
like he had struck the Egyptian long ago.
While he buried him in the sand
he could not save them.
I think the first draft of this was written on a Sunday in 2008 or 2009 in Amherst, MA.
Thursday, September 21, 2017
Meeting My Other Sister, Mary
Even though she is old now
my mother's womb still dreams
about her.
She is older than me and beautiful
like my other three sisters.
Mom still cries when she sees her.
She’s athletic, but somehow more serious
even more than Jennifer, who writes novels on Christmas cards.
She’s tough and honest, like Will, but can't tell stories
the way that he does. She joins in listening and laughing
sometimes until everything that is bad comes out,
like the rest of us.
She’s curious about God, like I was when I was a child,
and when she reads the Bible she is ferocious with questions.
She can’t sing as well as Katherine, but her voice
is like the creek where we grew up
calming and sometimes a violent lament when it would flood.
She plays piano like Will and I--not well.
Her and Jennifer are the closest. Somehow Maddy feels left out,
and sadder.
Above is the third or so draft of this poem.
Meeting my sister
Even though she is old now
my mother's womb still dreams
about her.
She is older than me and beautiful
like my other three sisters.
Mom still cries when she sees her.
She’s athletic, but somehow more serious
even more than Jennifer, who writes pages on Christmas cards.
She’s tough and honest, like Will, but still silly.
She’s curious about God, like I was when I was a child.
She asks questions.
She can’t sing as well as Katherine, but then, none of us can!
But she does play piano.
Her and Jennifer are the closest. Somehow Maddy feels left out,
and sadder.
my mother's womb still dreams
about her.
She is older than me and beautiful
like my other three sisters.
Mom still cries when she sees her.
She’s athletic, but somehow more serious
even more than Jennifer, who writes novels on Christmas cards.
She’s tough and honest, like Will, but can't tell stories
the way that he does. She joins in listening and laughing
sometimes until everything that is bad comes out,
like the rest of us.
She’s curious about God, like I was when I was a child,
and when she reads the Bible she is ferocious with questions.
She can’t sing as well as Katherine, but her voice
is like the creek where we grew up
calming and sometimes a violent lament when it would flood.
She plays piano like Will and I--not well.
Her and Jennifer are the closest. Somehow Maddy feels left out,
and sadder.
Above is the third or so draft of this poem.
Meeting my sister
Even though she is old now
my mother's womb still dreams
about her.
She is older than me and beautiful
like my other three sisters.
Mom still cries when she sees her.
She’s athletic, but somehow more serious
even more than Jennifer, who writes pages on Christmas cards.
She’s tough and honest, like Will, but still silly.
She’s curious about God, like I was when I was a child.
She asks questions.
She can’t sing as well as Katherine, but then, none of us can!
But she does play piano.
Her and Jennifer are the closest. Somehow Maddy feels left out,
and sadder.
Navigation
The vessel lurched. It had no reason
to lurch. But it lurched.
My eyes tended to one side
then to the other. They felt
like misshaped marbles.
The landscape strange, alien.
Night was no longer moon-filled
and star-lit. The sun a vague,
dreamy memory like looking
at a starling through a dirty puddle
mapping out the sky.
What was that? And though murk
and sadness enveloped me
a murmur penetrated my mind,
I am with you always,
to the end of the age.
And though my vessel remained
abruptly lingering the grip in my knuckles
loosened, the cramps in my heart went away.
to lurch. But it lurched.
My eyes tended to one side
then to the other. They felt
like misshaped marbles.
The landscape strange, alien.
Night was no longer moon-filled
and star-lit. The sun a vague,
dreamy memory like looking
at a starling through a dirty puddle
mapping out the sky.
What was that? And though murk
and sadness enveloped me
a murmur penetrated my mind,
I am with you always,
to the end of the age.
And though my vessel remained
abruptly lingering the grip in my knuckles
loosened, the cramps in my heart went away.
How My Father’s Belt Saved Me
The worst thing I have ever said to my mother was I hate you.
Not because it was this absolute infinite truth, but because I did.
Hate is a strong word, like love, of course we love everything now,
we love movies and sneakers and food and furniture and God
exactly the same way. But in this instance, I really hated my mother
like when I stubbed my toe and I wanted to punch the coffee table and yell at it
until it was bad at staying in one place and holding coffee and magazines.
It expanded deep within me that I should hate her for not letting me
have my way. This was the correct response! Yes! Hate will shrivel her down
until she can only stay in one place and I will go to my friend’s house,
yes, the friend who is waiting for me with legos and video games and a mom
who cooks better dinner and is always happy to see me. Always! My logic
was gone once I heard my father’s footsteps
downstairs he was home from a place made of iron. Its only language was steel
and I could hear his belt buckle unfastening. I think it was that sound
when I decided to love my mother for the rest of my life
and I wanted to renew my vowels and my consonants. I wanted to go
on the honeymoon again back before I was born when I was this lovely thought God had
tucked inside her little womb
and I had no choice but to love my mother, like Christ loved his Church,
and Dad was closer. I started wailing for forgiveness when I heard him enter the house
and he forgave me, with his belt much like a shepherd’s crook.
Not because it was this absolute infinite truth, but because I did.
Hate is a strong word, like love, of course we love everything now,
we love movies and sneakers and food and furniture and God
exactly the same way. But in this instance, I really hated my mother
like when I stubbed my toe and I wanted to punch the coffee table and yell at it
until it was bad at staying in one place and holding coffee and magazines.
It expanded deep within me that I should hate her for not letting me
have my way. This was the correct response! Yes! Hate will shrivel her down
until she can only stay in one place and I will go to my friend’s house,
yes, the friend who is waiting for me with legos and video games and a mom
who cooks better dinner and is always happy to see me. Always! My logic
was gone once I heard my father’s footsteps
downstairs he was home from a place made of iron. Its only language was steel
and I could hear his belt buckle unfastening. I think it was that sound
when I decided to love my mother for the rest of my life
and I wanted to renew my vowels and my consonants. I wanted to go
on the honeymoon again back before I was born when I was this lovely thought God had
tucked inside her little womb
and I had no choice but to love my mother, like Christ loved his Church,
and Dad was closer. I started wailing for forgiveness when I heard him enter the house
and he forgave me, with his belt much like a shepherd’s crook.
A Sense of Clean
When he told me about the surgery
the air of November sucked at my lungs
and I had a canker sore eating my lip.
He said the doctors had never seen organs
like his: something was devouring them;
chunks of tissue disappearing. After two years,
unconventional methods were tried.
He said no anesthetics were used,
so the doctors tied his hands
down. They gave him a piece of leather
to bite on.
He said when he felt the surgical ice
of the blade separating his skin
he kept blinking
in and out
of consciousness because the pain
was too much.
After they had wiped all the fluids away
and sewn him up tight,
he said his faith had never felt so clean.
In December I tell myself
God gives us canker sores
to remind us of how vulnerable we are.
I tongue the sore over and over,
wanting it to bleed.
The first draft of this poem was written in either 2003 or 2004 and was heavily revised in Adrian Blevins' Poetry II class. It has since gone through minor revisions.
the air of November sucked at my lungs
and I had a canker sore eating my lip.
He said the doctors had never seen organs
like his: something was devouring them;
chunks of tissue disappearing. After two years,
unconventional methods were tried.
He said no anesthetics were used,
so the doctors tied his hands
down. They gave him a piece of leather
to bite on.
He said when he felt the surgical ice
of the blade separating his skin
he kept blinking
in and out
of consciousness because the pain
was too much.
After they had wiped all the fluids away
and sewn him up tight,
he said his faith had never felt so clean.
In December I tell myself
God gives us canker sores
to remind us of how vulnerable we are.
I tongue the sore over and over,
wanting it to bleed.
The first draft of this poem was written in either 2003 or 2004 and was heavily revised in Adrian Blevins' Poetry II class. It has since gone through minor revisions.
Tuesday, September 19, 2017
Her Stress Rough Draft #5
The type of stress and strain that develops in human structures…depends on the nature of
the material, type of load that is applied, the point of application of the load, direction,
magnitude of the load, and the rate and duration of the loading. When a structure can no
longer support a load, the structure is said to have failed.
-From Norkin and Levangie’s Joint Structure and Function, 3rd edition
She starts to tell me the story, more cautiously this time.
There’s a tension pulling in her face
that’s hard to describe, a taught latex mask,
a twitching as if her very skin wants to speak:
The stars were out that night, a heavy curtain
coming down on both of them.
His young veins pumping with gusto,
and she had long legs and a long neck
as fragile as a swan. Her tiny structure
a mess of bones and beauty and skin
and little girl joy all strung together by tissue paper,
phonebook-doodles, and paper clips.
It was dark and he was holding one arm behind his back
like a magician. The anticipation crawled up her legs
into her smile. He got out his anvil and asked her to lay down on it.
She was shy at first, but even though the metal was cold
it would soon heat up. It was easier to shape her that way.
His voice a gentle vice cranked and twisted,
she became addicted to the pressure.
He whispered like a meteor ripping
through her atmosphere. His hands
she wanted to hold her, with his metaled fingers.
He asked her out again, this time with a coil
that he would latch around her finger
and twist the crank enough times to securely fasten it.
She was secured.
She could only take so much.
Depending on the nature of the material,
and the type of load.
Then the internal pressure a chaotic
combustion engine of wild beasts, clawed
creatures, of things pulling and prying,
gears bending, grabbing and gnawing, rods
spraining, tugging, her voice a delicious vice,
her voice with its long finger licking
its lips poking and prodding—
The structure is said to have failed.
But then I hear her in the other room,
her fingers minute dancers bending
to the keys creating a penetrating melody,
her voice, a strong current rising like the sun
beyond the fortress of the earth, a rushing astral river
rushing to the one who was poked, prodded, loaded, and deformed.
And then she stops. Her eyes are closed.
Her head droops. She’s sleeping.
the material, type of load that is applied, the point of application of the load, direction,
magnitude of the load, and the rate and duration of the loading. When a structure can no
longer support a load, the structure is said to have failed.
-From Norkin and Levangie’s Joint Structure and Function, 3rd edition
She starts to tell me the story, more cautiously this time.
There’s a tension pulling in her face
that’s hard to describe, a taught latex mask,
a twitching as if her very skin wants to speak:
The stars were out that night, a heavy curtain
coming down on both of them.
His young veins pumping with gusto,
and she had long legs and a long neck
as fragile as a swan. Her tiny structure
a mess of bones and beauty and skin
and little girl joy all strung together by tissue paper,
phonebook-doodles, and paper clips.
It was dark and he was holding one arm behind his back
like a magician. The anticipation crawled up her legs
into her smile. He got out his anvil and asked her to lay down on it.
She was shy at first, but even though the metal was cold
it would soon heat up. It was easier to shape her that way.
His voice a gentle vice cranked and twisted,
she became addicted to the pressure.
He whispered like a meteor ripping
through her atmosphere. His hands
she wanted to hold her, with his metaled fingers.
He asked her out again, this time with a coil
that he would latch around her finger
and twist the crank enough times to securely fasten it.
She was secured.
She could only take so much.
Depending on the nature of the material,
and the type of load.
Then the internal pressure a chaotic
combustion engine of wild beasts, clawed
creatures, of things pulling and prying,
gears bending, grabbing and gnawing, rods
spraining, tugging, her voice a delicious vice,
her voice with its long finger licking
its lips poking and prodding—
The structure is said to have failed.
But then I hear her in the other room,
her fingers minute dancers bending
to the keys creating a penetrating melody,
her voice, a strong current rising like the sun
beyond the fortress of the earth, a rushing astral river
rushing to the one who was poked, prodded, loaded, and deformed.
And then she stops. Her eyes are closed.
Her head droops. She’s sleeping.
Dad Poem #56: Father Evolution
What a fine day, he said flicking his tongue
against his teeth extra hard. He had been sitting
like a hard-boiled egg all day, just thinking.
His thoughts pink on hot electric waves wiring
through his hard yellow center, underneath
a still white shell. He was not dingy or dark
nothing cave-like about him, except the occasional
crawling. He felt claustrophobic. This morning,
I do not eat breakfast with my father. I eat three
hard boiled eggs. A bowl of cereal. My spoon
is in my right hand. My napkin is in my lap.
I eat slowly and carefully. I do not spill my milk.
He had grown up barefoot, tempering his crocodile armor
and ate nails for breakfast with 2% milk.
What do Dad’s fists taste like? he would often ask
and often found out, his jaw suddenly growing taste buds.
His mother’s gut was an oven.
My little loaf of bread, she would say poking his soft
center repeatedly poking, until his psyche began growling—
a low gurgling from the tunnels of his intestines,
the sound vibrations so fast transforming into electricity.
I pause eating. I hold one egg in my hand and crush it.
The egg shell pieces looking like the chain mail of a crocodile
and I begin to graph them onto my skin,
listening to my father, as if he were there,
not saying anything. Listening to the sound
of the hot kinetic hardening of my insides.
against his teeth extra hard. He had been sitting
like a hard-boiled egg all day, just thinking.
His thoughts pink on hot electric waves wiring
through his hard yellow center, underneath
a still white shell. He was not dingy or dark
nothing cave-like about him, except the occasional
crawling. He felt claustrophobic. This morning,
I do not eat breakfast with my father. I eat three
hard boiled eggs. A bowl of cereal. My spoon
is in my right hand. My napkin is in my lap.
I eat slowly and carefully. I do not spill my milk.
He had grown up barefoot, tempering his crocodile armor
and ate nails for breakfast with 2% milk.
What do Dad’s fists taste like? he would often ask
and often found out, his jaw suddenly growing taste buds.
His mother’s gut was an oven.
My little loaf of bread, she would say poking his soft
center repeatedly poking, until his psyche began growling—
a low gurgling from the tunnels of his intestines,
the sound vibrations so fast transforming into electricity.
I pause eating. I hold one egg in my hand and crush it.
The egg shell pieces looking like the chain mail of a crocodile
and I begin to graph them onto my skin,
listening to my father, as if he were there,
not saying anything. Listening to the sound
of the hot kinetic hardening of my insides.
Baseball
The game is on. My daughter, a recent pilgrim to this earth,
sits in the corner of her universe with her toys, oblivious
to the sounds issuing from the TV: stats, conditioner, steroids,
blood. Engrossed and sinking the couch envelopes me.
Athletes unfold
their physics behind a clear viewing glass, a living relic,
that I and others rarely kneel to observe anymore
but it holds my gaze, for now. In the background
god-like majesty drapes pour down the stadium in waves.
She pretends to be a fish.
When I was young I worshiped the game for the praise
it brought me for catching a ball or swinging a bat, while Frost
was out swinging birches; the volume of a city turned down.
She feels something cold.
The play continues on a diamond of no value,
except for those architects who shape it, keep it dry:
geometers of symmetry and chaos-destroyers.
She stacks rings around a peg.
Someone hits a line drive. Someone runs home.
Now, I see my daughter
eyeing a baseball on the floor across the room,
too big for her small hands and there are no chalk lines
to guide her there. No umpires. No stadium around her.
How she bends and folds
down to the ball. How she lifts the now holy object.
What love! What great caution! She tends
to its tracing seems, like pathways on a small
and disappearing world. Even touching her lips
to the leather sphere. Even meeting it with her tongue!
She caries the ball to me as if she has just emerged
from the depths of an ocean or some other galaxy
that is like an ocean with a pearl or planet
fixed in the space before her, priest-like she floats
towards me and she lets this precious pearl of a world
fall into my hands and she wants me to play.
The game is on.
sits in the corner of her universe with her toys, oblivious
to the sounds issuing from the TV: stats, conditioner, steroids,
blood. Engrossed and sinking the couch envelopes me.
Athletes unfold
their physics behind a clear viewing glass, a living relic,
that I and others rarely kneel to observe anymore
but it holds my gaze, for now. In the background
god-like majesty drapes pour down the stadium in waves.
She pretends to be a fish.
When I was young I worshiped the game for the praise
it brought me for catching a ball or swinging a bat, while Frost
was out swinging birches; the volume of a city turned down.
She feels something cold.
The play continues on a diamond of no value,
except for those architects who shape it, keep it dry:
geometers of symmetry and chaos-destroyers.
She stacks rings around a peg.
Someone hits a line drive. Someone runs home.
Now, I see my daughter
eyeing a baseball on the floor across the room,
too big for her small hands and there are no chalk lines
to guide her there. No umpires. No stadium around her.
How she bends and folds
down to the ball. How she lifts the now holy object.
What love! What great caution! She tends
to its tracing seems, like pathways on a small
and disappearing world. Even touching her lips
to the leather sphere. Even meeting it with her tongue!
She caries the ball to me as if she has just emerged
from the depths of an ocean or some other galaxy
that is like an ocean with a pearl or planet
fixed in the space before her, priest-like she floats
towards me and she lets this precious pearl of a world
fall into my hands and she wants me to play.
The game is on.
If You Were a Star I Would Be Your Astronomer
and dedicate my life to studying you.
I would spend my years gathering
your unique spectrum readings
analyzing if you were moving closer or further away,
deciphering what made you up,
finding out the specific speeds at which you were spinning.
I would write my thesis on only you.
In the winters, you finally leaving the horizon
to lay in the curve of the sky, draping your just visible light over me
I would go to my telescope
and spend my days adjusting all the knobs, dials,
and lenses and turn the heavy
observatory precisely to your position
to make sure I would see you most clearly.
And as the sun would burn away the day my excitement
and passion would be lit and burn brighter as the night fell
and I would crank the ceiling open and press my eye
to the telescope and look for you.
I would see you approaching
like a gowned bride gliding
down a long aisle of night
blazing past moons and suns and galaxies,
towards me. And I would climb
into the telescope, wiggling
my way through the labyrinth of optic organs,
tripping over gears, stumbling over glass
and I would crawl for miles
until I reached the very end of our galaxy,
standing on the very edge of it,
leaning out to where you hovered
just above and just below
light-years of space.
I would behold you.
Long to press into you.
I would then remove my space suit—first the helmet
so I could see you better—then unzip my suit
so you could see the deep, earthy matter of my heart—
then I would take off my gloves
so, with the tip of my finger I could touch you
and then, finally, I would remove
everything else
and push off—
and float into the very center of your beauty.
And it would burn
a little at first,
because beauty always does.
I would spend my years gathering
your unique spectrum readings
analyzing if you were moving closer or further away,
deciphering what made you up,
finding out the specific speeds at which you were spinning.
I would write my thesis on only you.
In the winters, you finally leaving the horizon
to lay in the curve of the sky, draping your just visible light over me
I would go to my telescope
and spend my days adjusting all the knobs, dials,
and lenses and turn the heavy
observatory precisely to your position
to make sure I would see you most clearly.
And as the sun would burn away the day my excitement
and passion would be lit and burn brighter as the night fell
and I would crank the ceiling open and press my eye
to the telescope and look for you.
I would see you approaching
like a gowned bride gliding
down a long aisle of night
blazing past moons and suns and galaxies,
towards me. And I would climb
into the telescope, wiggling
my way through the labyrinth of optic organs,
tripping over gears, stumbling over glass
and I would crawl for miles
until I reached the very end of our galaxy,
standing on the very edge of it,
leaning out to where you hovered
just above and just below
light-years of space.
I would behold you.
Long to press into you.
I would then remove my space suit—first the helmet
so I could see you better—then unzip my suit
so you could see the deep, earthy matter of my heart—
then I would take off my gloves
so, with the tip of my finger I could touch you
and then, finally, I would remove
everything else
and push off—
and float into the very center of your beauty.
And it would burn
a little at first,
because beauty always does.
After Reading About the Abuse of a Young Girl
1980.
When the scruff of his voice
scratched my face, I knew it was time
to hide behind my hair.
My thick velvety mop of a veil.
A canopy of solitude and compassion.
I made the most delightful observations
while excommunicated to my tent of loneliness.
In the evening, light will hold
a single strand and make it transfigure.
The slightest friction will charge
a long wandering piece of hair
and suspend it’s usual animation,
a transfixed snake, a floating rope
freezing it’s climb to heaven.
Then his hand, vice grip
of my skull, each finger a father
holding on to as much of me as possible
driving me down towards the dog’s bowl.
And I ate the food on all fours.
A slow churning beast of a growl
grew in my tummy.
My skin felt tight, like a mask,
the real me about to be ripped
into the light of day,
to melt me, shake me, complete me.
___
2011.
When the scruff of his voice,
pressed into the pallet of her cheek,
and she felt the hard hammered fingers
sink into the worn field of her back,
not gripping, but sinking,
as if they had finally given up,
she wanted to tell him that it would be OK,
that when she had blue hair
and chains and rings and men
were holding her together
for all those years,
and the straight-jacket, too,
that she had finally shrunk him down,
smaller than a shoe. She could squash him.
But she held him, propping up his virus body,
he shaking in all his broken parts,
she could not hold him together.
Five Observations
I.
Smoke. His pipe curls
from his mouth like smoke
or a branch waiting for something to perch.
His lips like two fists pressing together
or perhaps a wine press holding the bushels
of life's grapes, squeezing out the frustration.
II.
Waves. The tumult above my head now.
I sink beneath to feel the mini-tempest
massage my head. My knees slept
like two smooth stones in the sand.
III.
Rest. She’s like a lump of coal under a blanket.
Her geology about to spark. She’ll burn
for years: all of the compacted
rotting things raging.
She sleeps like a box of mexican jumping beans.
IV.
Father. A man who bit her head off
and desperately sought to sow it back on
but never learned how to sow. Her neck
the repair left wanting, so she covers
it with the mouths of boys creating an air-tight
seal. It will hold for now.
V.
Pelican. Rip and rage for fish and bones
beat the water with your wings,
take the carcass underwater.
The above poem is the third draft.
A Poem in Five Movement
Smoke. His pipe curls
from his mouth like smoke
or a branch waiting for something to perch.
His lips like two fists pressing together
all of life’s frustrations
or a wine press holding a grape
on the verge of popping.
Waves. Held the sun in tumults.
Sink beneath to feel the mini-tempest
massage my head while my knees slept
like two smooth stones in the sand.
Rest. She’s like a lump of coal under a blanket.
Geology is the art of time and pressure,
one spark and she’ll burn for hours
all of the compacted rotting things
suddenly raging
but not now, it’s sleepy time.
Father. A man who bit her head off
and desperately sought to sow it back on
but never learned how to sow. Her neck
is still healing, so she covers
it with the lips of boys.
Pelican. Rip and rage for fish and bones
beat the water with your wings,
take the carcass underwater.
No More Birds
My emptiness is a violated cookie jar.
My silence is an empty cookie jar.
My emptiness is a silent cookie jar.
My emptiness is my father’s hot face
moments after his fist let go.
My emptiness is a discharged bolt gun
my father’s thick finger
the cow’s body somewhere in the woods
it’s eyes still open.
My silence is an empty cookie jar.
My silence is an empty cookie jar.
My emptiness is a silent cookie jar.
My emptiness is my father’s hot face
moments after his fist let go.
My emptiness is a discharged bolt gun
my father’s thick finger
the cow’s body somewhere in the woods
it’s eyes still open.
My silence is an empty cookie jar.
The Smashing of a Carcass
The Smashing of a Carcass
It was the year when the ground hogs started infesting
our field, burrowing their mindless tunnels
until it was all nearly hollow. I’m a lot like that field,
Dad would drape the comment over our shoulders, my brother,
Will, and I felt exactly the same thing except Will’s neck
and face was full of autumn, the colors pushing up
beneath the skin; a warm, subtle soreness, so his feeling
was a little different. He stood a little further away
from the father but still swallowed the field whole.
It was that year when Dad taught us how to hunt.
How to be predators. How to be quiet and patient. Waiting
for the right moment, even if years passed, to strike and rid
the vermin. We would sit in the field for hours. Not speaking.
Waiting by the hole for the ground hog
to look for his shadow but only finding a bullet.
We would eat him later. I remember another year,
Christmas, Will and I got Critter Cages. Will transformed
his into a torture chamber. He had a library of tools
to burn, de-fragment, poke, restrain, crush.
I would watch him do his meticulous work. Watch him spray
the hair spray, light the lighter. I would watch grasshoppers
squirm in their exoskeleton segments as they burned.
My brother’s eyes plain and indifferent.
Sometimes he would laugh. I watched.
A year later he beat the ground hog
with a log then with a baseball bat.
Relentlessly smashing the carcass I watched.
A dog barked. We never told Dad about the ground hog.
We tossed the formless body deep into the woods
but the dog kept dragging it back out.
I originally wrote this in the Fall of 2004 while I was in Adrian Blevins Poetry II class at Colby College. It was during this year that I explored writing many autobiographical poems, many about my family. I have revised this poem many times.
It was the year when the ground hogs started infesting
our field, burrowing their mindless tunnels
until it was all nearly hollow. I’m a lot like that field,
Dad would drape the comment over our shoulders, my brother,
Will, and I felt exactly the same thing except Will’s neck
and face was full of autumn, the colors pushing up
beneath the skin; a warm, subtle soreness, so his feeling
was a little different. He stood a little further away
from the father but still swallowed the field whole.
It was that year when Dad taught us how to hunt.
How to be predators. How to be quiet and patient. Waiting
for the right moment, even if years passed, to strike and rid
the vermin. We would sit in the field for hours. Not speaking.
Waiting by the hole for the ground hog
to look for his shadow but only finding a bullet.
We would eat him later. I remember another year,
Christmas, Will and I got Critter Cages. Will transformed
his into a torture chamber. He had a library of tools
to burn, de-fragment, poke, restrain, crush.
I would watch him do his meticulous work. Watch him spray
the hair spray, light the lighter. I would watch grasshoppers
squirm in their exoskeleton segments as they burned.
My brother’s eyes plain and indifferent.
Sometimes he would laugh. I watched.
A year later he beat the ground hog
with a log then with a baseball bat.
Relentlessly smashing the carcass I watched.
A dog barked. We never told Dad about the ground hog.
We tossed the formless body deep into the woods
but the dog kept dragging it back out.
I originally wrote this in the Fall of 2004 while I was in Adrian Blevins Poetry II class at Colby College. It was during this year that I explored writing many autobiographical poems, many about my family. I have revised this poem many times.
Signal
Signal
You step to the edge like the gap
between synapses, and because it’s November
you shiver a little as you peer down
into the biological canyon some pink
or web-like tissue clinging to some
other connective tissue off in the distance.
You grip around a capillary and pray,
the brain above charging and recharging
and simultaneously wondering where the charge
first came from, almost a breathing or a pulsing,
though that is going on as well, and you also breathe,
beneath layers of adipose tissue
and so many layers of skin
and skin.
You step to the edge like the gap
between synapses, and because it’s November
you shiver a little as you peer down
into the biological canyon some pink
or web-like tissue clinging to some
other connective tissue off in the distance.
You grip around a capillary and pray,
the brain above charging and recharging
and simultaneously wondering where the charge
first came from, almost a breathing or a pulsing,
though that is going on as well, and you also breathe,
beneath layers of adipose tissue
and so many layers of skin
and skin.
To You the Tail-Gater
To You the Tail-Gater
This is not a party. I don’t want to roast hotdogs
with you in the back of someone’s truck
outside a large stadium (paid for with my taxes)
with large violent men inside who want to be violent
who we want to be violent but not too violent
because that’s not civilized
but we still watch for the crashes.
Did you hear that:
I still watch for the crashes.
No, this is the moment when you decide to increase
the sexual tension between your bumper
and mine, a little car-cuddle at 60 miles per hour
in a 50 stretch of country road our automobiles
puckering their lips so close; two fists are about to meet.
I’ve been scanning my rear view mirror
for some time now, keeping an eye on you.
If my daughter was driving and I saw you
reaching out to touch her bumper
the way you want to touch mine I might jerk
the wheel, smash into you and bury you
in the side of the road, put you down
next to the dismembered raccoon
and his flattened neighbor the opossum,
both left to think about what they’ve done
in their own blood and organs. Have you keep them
company awhile while you get to know the face
of that black-top real good. But it’s just me now.
Me and you.
Although, now that you’re this close
perhaps you trust me, me, with your life,
to not suddenly brake, to not suddenly halt
at life’s furious speed.
Perhaps your grandmother, in hospice,
is waiting for you the long lost grandson,
and your appearance will finally release her from this life
and I really need to pull over
Maybe I’m the only one
you’ve got speeding on this deathly ridge called life,
and it’s me you trust.
Thank you.
This is not a party. I don’t want to roast hotdogs
with you in the back of someone’s truck
outside a large stadium (paid for with my taxes)
with large violent men inside who want to be violent
who we want to be violent but not too violent
because that’s not civilized
but we still watch for the crashes.
Did you hear that:
I still watch for the crashes.
No, this is the moment when you decide to increase
the sexual tension between your bumper
and mine, a little car-cuddle at 60 miles per hour
in a 50 stretch of country road our automobiles
puckering their lips so close; two fists are about to meet.
I’ve been scanning my rear view mirror
for some time now, keeping an eye on you.
If my daughter was driving and I saw you
reaching out to touch her bumper
the way you want to touch mine I might jerk
the wheel, smash into you and bury you
in the side of the road, put you down
next to the dismembered raccoon
and his flattened neighbor the opossum,
both left to think about what they’ve done
in their own blood and organs. Have you keep them
company awhile while you get to know the face
of that black-top real good. But it’s just me now.
Me and you.
Although, now that you’re this close
perhaps you trust me, me, with your life,
to not suddenly brake, to not suddenly halt
at life’s furious speed.
Perhaps your grandmother, in hospice,
is waiting for you the long lost grandson,
and your appearance will finally release her from this life
and I really need to pull over
Maybe I’m the only one
you’ve got speeding on this deathly ridge called life,
and it’s me you trust.
Thank you.
Sunday, September 17, 2017
A Career
A Career
It has escaped me thus far
like a white deer
translucent in the morning mist
a soldier or child could not do it better
to vanish in plain sight.
Even with all the vivid longings
that come with becoming
a man
I cannot track her down.
First draft written on 4/18/16
It has escaped me thus far
like a white deer
translucent in the morning mist
a soldier or child could not do it better
to vanish in plain sight.
Even with all the vivid longings
that come with becoming
a man
I cannot track her down.
First draft written on 4/18/16
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)