The way light slides across a wooden floor
I struggle w/ a hangnail making it worse
the blue cornflowers
in the rug at my feet
Remind me that Friday is just a day &
no one owes me anything
Category: Poems
Damen und Herren
Dumbass move of the day. Going into theladies’ room here at Neue Nationalgalerie.Went into DAMEN for some unknown reason(I’m an idiot?). Came in and an older lady (55)was washing her hands. We conversed in themirror. I was like, “What the hell is she doingin here?” Then she said something. I said, “Sorry?”I was still thinking … Continue reading Damen und Herren
Acer Rubric
When he shook
the once-sand bottle
what was left made the sound
of a maple leaf growing
It is not possible, he thought,
and it would not be appropriate
for me to shake hands
with a leaf’s three jagged hands
Who needs leaves anyway?
Nothing but the fruited conspiracy
of seed and soil repetitive, hogwash
But the aging leaf in the bottle
interrupted him saying,
Leaves run their veins in all directions
hoping to report most sun
They are green when they need to be,
and red in their rest allegiant to none
but the season
When he finished drinking the leaf
he searched for a sunrise, any sunrise,
his head tilted back,
in sun-loving obeisance
Shark Fishing
OK, pop,
paw-naw,
maybe if it weren’t
for you I’d be in that
ocean of debt, with
all the other sad fish,
fending off collecting
sharks, looking for
deeper water, where
I’d make my black silhouette
plain against a white sky—
too visible to the supperless
yellow eyes lurking below.
Or, maybe you’re the
cage I’m in, making me
a tourist, a sight-seer. Oh,
look at the sharks, paw,
they look hungry. Gee, they’re
gnawing on the bars of
this cage, paw. And then I
give two pulls on the line
and you reel me back up
and ask me what
I thought of it, and whether
I have a job yet. Still
looking, I say.
Or, maybe you’re the
boat, and you take me
deep-sea fishing, and
we catch one of those
sharks, one of those blood-
sniffing, two rows of
teeth, rough-sided,
cartilage-thick scavengers.
We fin ‘im for soup—
a delicacy I’m getting
a taste for— & then throw
‘im back over the side
and throttle off, you at
the helm, me at the bow
drinking a rum drink
and listening to
Jimmy Buffett on my
iPod. Take us into
harbor, pop, I yell
into the wind.
Let’s go have mom
cook us up some of that
shark fin soup,
maybe watch the ballgame,
knock back a few local brews.
Or, maybe you’re the
land. Maybe I’ve never even
been in the ocean; I’ve only
read about sharks in books.
You’ve got a big shark’s
jaw in your office and I’ve
reached up to feel the teeth—
so sharp I slice myself. When
my finger bleeds I suck on it
so I won’t get blood on
your office floor. Later,
when we go to the beach,
I won’t even go in the water,
though you tell me it’s fine.
Dad, I say, I’m not so sure;
sharks can smell blood from miles away.
But you reassure me,
honestly believing that sharks
don’t come in this close; that
there’s no food for them
around here—no seals, no pups,
no sea lions / no unlucky bastards
without you to go in first, to
give a leg, to sake them on
your back of blood, your scalp,
your good name, your trust—
and anything else I can get
off of you before you’re gone.
A Natural History of the Indoors
let me check my e-mail
real quick
an eclipse of time & temperature
—you’re right.
It was in
Graham Greene,
Our Man in Havana.
If you don’t think I love you,
then I don’t
We Saw Brightblack Morning
by Adam Edell Need to get out to the desert this year. New Mexico? Arizona? Nevada? Sand, arched wolves, a full-bellied moon, eclipsed… They touched their instruments like sacred objects,notes floating upon an ashen incantation.What I heard was "yeah, yeah"but what I saw was my father at my age,a wife and a child on the way.Saw a … Continue reading We Saw Brightblack Morning
Thermocouple
In winter our stucco housefalls on its knees to the cold,spilling our hidden secret of heat.But we have nowhere else to goso we crank and pay the gas co.
Walter the Red
Are your pillows fine I asked them & they said yes untilthey started to complain about the way I spoke: muttering dust into air, apparently skewing the TV reception. Dust? I said, Where? & they said, In the dirt, with the iris and the pupil; … Continue reading Walter the Red
Laclede the Artist
He is at home in this match-book town warmed by the nuclear power brewed out west (though he never calls on it (the gas neither.When he runs out of ice (commonly, I’m afraid he just walks down to the river and hacks off a chunk or two. ‘Sea ice!’ he boasts to guests, ‘Never have a better drink in all your life.’ Sea-hattans he calls … Continue reading Laclede the Artist
Line for Billy
How are we gonna
heat our house this winter?
One mourner has a stove
but it eats a lot of wood, he says,
standing in a line
barely any light left and ten degrees
behind an IGA
and no place for parking.
A great loss…
A great tragedy…
He sold me mulch…
He sold me flowers…
He taught me how to hunt…
We hoisted one together.
We followed The Dead.
Here we all search for understanding
on our feet for how many hours
at this crowded Northfield funeral home.
It’s not like trying to find a lost watch.
It’s not like re-building a house.
We know the faces
(but some of the names escape us…
He’s bearded,
no tie,
his hands folded for the Lord’s Prayer.
I can’t pretend I knew him
but plenty of other people did.
As I’m writing this a multitude pays its respects.
I’m sitting in a rental car drinking a beer.
For him, I say.
All’s I remember is the maroon Corvette
he couldn’t get started after JB’s funeral…
Continue with this poem...
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