tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-78533634572056283932024-03-12T16:25:22.036-07:00Plain American LanguageReading the Districthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11635072700180534927noreply@blogger.comBlogger320125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7853363457205628393.post-11709560023620269392017-05-05T19:27:00.000-07:002017-05-05T19:27:26.075-07:00Untitled Short Story or Prose Poem?<br />
"I've been thinking a lot about refusal. Take a baby, for example: a baby refuses to eat, or go to bed, my baby, for example, when she eats or refuses to go to bed, she sits and thumps something or says 'I don't want it' and the 'it' that she speaks of, this larger 'it,' refuses to give itself away to meaning--it could be dinner or bed or the bath or the shoe strewn on the chair next to her bed. And that thump. The thump and the sound and echo of the thump, caused by the refusal the hard wood of the table or flooring or chair to break or bend or even give an inch, rings in all of our ears. It's almost like--it's almost like there's a refusal in practically everything we do. Even an agreement is a refusal of something.<br />
<br />
"Two hands meet in the air, pierce the space between, and meet, grasp, acquiesce to each other's presence, and shake. And for that moment, there is an acceptance of refusal: neither one will back away from the upward-downward motion, the quickness or slowness, a small social contract made sudden and true between two people. They push the air and make it move around them. They refuse to let that moment go undone. And in that agreement, they refuse all other options. They're one. For that twenty, thirty seconds or so.<br />
<br />
"There are moments in a person's life when refusal is everything. Your teenage years. Early adulthood. Or now. Now is the best time to refuse. That refusal is the one true thing you've seen in your life. It defines you. People tell you, I've heard people tell me, that if you only live in the negation, then you'll live in comparison and contrasts all your life. You'll measure yourself with what you will not be, not what you will. But how can that be true if, when I walk, I am constantly refused? That's what physics is: things keep in motion until they've been refused by some other force. Forces so strong, you never knew they existed. People call them walls, but I know better. I am the sum of the refusals of forces. There's been a wind whipping at me since before I was born and it refuses me. People talk about it. They philosophize over it. But all it is is refusal. I don't shape myself by saying what I'm not. That's already been decided."<br />
<br />
Don stood up from his chair and exited. His hands were dusted opal in the sun. Everything was a sharp breath in. And the first shot hit him square in the leg.Reading the Districthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11635072700180534927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7853363457205628393.post-14838037379316393052015-04-07T21:08:00.002-07:002015-04-07T21:11:14.602-07:00Day 7 (because no one needs to read Day 6's poem)<h2>
<span style="font-size: small; font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Thought Experiment</span><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">
Delinquent dinner, pesto mozzarella. I believe I have gone to the edge of the film, the firmament and gone back. This is in prose only because it has to be. Because the hour, the slow molasses of the bulge of my eyes, digs into the rock of the brick house, the plaster moulding and the possibility of hornets in the bright day of sunlight coming. I have visited the time. I have been ill. I have rested and sat up late, like now, and weasled away a good enough try. Have you taken the pill yet? Has spring bottled its smile and then opened it like a fire cracker or a buzzing rocket? Where does the question mark lay when it tires of figuring itself in the air? I am almost certain it is too late. I am almost certain that, in the moment when the lily pad, like an outstretched calla lily, bursts into tears--and it will only do this because of the morning dew in combination with the pellets of water careening into it from above--the sun will wake up again and feel its right arm flex, then its left. And it will be spring again. And there won't be any sirens, any longer.</span></span></h2>
Reading the Districthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11635072700180534927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7853363457205628393.post-56522419631171848622015-04-06T12:30:00.002-07:002015-04-06T12:30:54.465-07:00Day 5<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">The Ground Round<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Finally, in the effort and effrontery, in the wake of
ceremony<br />
and lack luster buster, thistle and thin, butt of the joke<br />
pickled quick, tickly wind: lift up the mouth and freeze the thought<br />
lock the effort in the colon: preface to the period, <br />
a jocund moment—where is the flyer, where is the youth<br />
of the mind, the minute difference between the infant<br />
and the toddler, the spring magnolia and the flower-petaled<br />
sidewalk—it is easily hide-able, a hyphen’d myth<br />
the disappearance of it is inside the between-space, the figured<br />
circle, the ouroborus of space and minutiae: have you seen<br />
the figure of it standing on the snout of the rock in<br />
the midst of thought—be bigger than thickness, round like<br />
a boast at midmorning, fingering the tingle between finger<br />
and thumb. I am gorgeous in the morning. I am a felt feeling.<br />
I rub the patterns of the index and lines of excitement wave<br />
frequently out of my mouth. I believe they are sentences.<br />
I believe they have rounded the corners and gone into the world.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
Reading the Districthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11635072700180534927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7853363457205628393.post-7736078642522769232015-04-04T20:39:00.002-07:002015-04-04T20:39:38.617-07:00Day 3/4<span style="font-size: small;">Sound Poem (33)</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;"><i>Passover, Night 1</i></span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: small;">Platter as a sound: trussed and spooned, three</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">syllables of meats, vegetables: what would be pickled</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">what would carrots amount to at a single</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">notice. I am careful to ring my finger around</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">the glasses, design wings and floating careful</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">things that composite like jellied candies</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">this meal this laughter like a clarified soup</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">beautiful the smell of pleasure and</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">ruffling conversation: a choice of two kinds of kid</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">and the questions of a child, of a child</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">of a child, of a child: all of these are the rolling</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">clicks and clatters and the ones that hang</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">above waving at us and calling us justice. </span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: small;">Sound Poem (34)</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: small;">Delivered again like the previous. This time faster. This time</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">I am searching for memories. This time pick</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">me up higher I am the child I am the wonder, fuller:</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">the crook of my arm the infant yawn sound</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">like the back of a chair parting the air behind.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">What beyond this: the crinkling of body of face little</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">arm like new plant and almond skin</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">pin me to this one pin me to this thin wonder</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">something newer is to come. To feel her:</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">to breathe breath of expectation, lemon in water.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">How like a tail this all feels. How like balance</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">in water: a ripple, once central, nothing single. </span>Reading the Districthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11635072700180534927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7853363457205628393.post-45323572554192972252015-04-02T20:25:00.001-07:002015-04-02T20:30:19.707-07:0030/30 2015: Day 1<span style="font-size: large;">Facing It</span><br />
<i><span style="font-size: large;">after Yusef Komunyaaka</span></i><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><i><br /></i>
I look into the bulge of my wife's belly:</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">there is no reflection, though there is one</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">inside: this pregnancy, this moon</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">with face and arms and kicking</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">in it, shifts me. I cannot</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">let it go: it shifts me. I turn--</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">I am contained. I turn once more--</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">still contained. I am flesh. Inside is flesh.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">My wife brushes her hair back,</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">licks the tips of her mouth</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">and her eyes are stone fires, golden</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">brown. She is my teacher, she shows</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">me how to hold myself, to hold</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">the belly. How we hold each other</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">like leaf in wind. How we</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">need to clasp against the other</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">to prop us up when one</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">chooses to fall.</span>Reading the Districthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11635072700180534927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7853363457205628393.post-45158165784985087932014-02-09T20:02:00.002-08:002014-02-09T20:02:10.553-08:00This is in spanish...by Antonia Torres Aguero<span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: small;">Hay una falla en el centro</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: small;">una fruta podrida al fondo del canasto<br />un rostro quemado por los agentes del horror<br />un rastro que supura bajo las vendas.</span><br /><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: small;">Hay un error en todo esto.</span><br /><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: small;">Una piedra en el engranaje<br />un mecanismo desaceitado.</span><br /><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: small;">Son objetos, cartas, llaves perdidas bajo la alfombra<br />basura, quebradas que esconden cuerpos bajo la cal.</span><br /><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: small;">No hay sagrado corazón que redima.<br />No hay oración que enmiende ni explique.</span><br /><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: small;">Hay un pinchazo por donde se cuela el aliento<br />un desastre por donde hace agua la embarcación.</span><br /><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: small;">Hay una grieta<br />una trizadura en el centro</span><br /><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: small;">Allí chorrea la comprensión</span><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: small;"><br />el alquitrán ardiente de la palabra</span>Reading the Districthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11635072700180534927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7853363457205628393.post-90937613556187408692013-12-09T20:10:00.002-08:002014-01-25T08:10:07.428-08:00Love Poem to Hannah<span style="color: white;"><b id="docs-internal-guid-2b892a75-dab2-0a2a-1ea4-0782c24e34cb" style="font-weight: normal;"><br /><span style="background-color: transparent; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"></span></b>
</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Pie and your countenance on my birthday, your hand slightly bristling</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">from the contrast of cold inside the bathroom against the heat of your body temperature</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">after sitting next to an open oven for so long, listening</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">to the flames wrought and cinder and caress and singe and melt.</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">It is almost glistening to think of how you will look at me</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">after I take one bite, after I will taste the apple that you’ve baked for me</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">inside a crust so luscious with butter my stomach ache will sing gravely and loudly</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">of the benefits and drawbacks of sugar--it will be glorious: you</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">will be glorious. You with your simple hair that leans back and forth</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">when you tilt your head forward and back, kissing me with</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">the eyes of your tongue, that bright red lipstick I love,</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">you are my birthday present. The crescent of your laugh, the chatter you bring</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">to the table and the bedroom, a sudden and gentle touch</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">on my shoulder that bewilders then calms then huddles everything close.</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Do you bring this much into the world as you give? Bake crusts</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">that envelope an apple like organ music? The hair on your sweater twists</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">and falls onto the carpet every single day. I’ve seen pieces of it twirl,</span></div>
<span style="color: white;"><br /></span>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">curls of butter on a hot pan called air. What other pieces of you can I steal for myself tomorrow?</span></div>
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Reading the Districthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11635072700180534927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7853363457205628393.post-38254372111269362902013-12-09T20:10:00.000-08:002014-01-25T08:10:33.495-08:00Similes<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Grief like cloves mistaken for honey, like a </span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">ship inside of a bottle, like bottled molasses,</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">like the sudden sharp knife of February,</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">like December, like March in mud season, like seasons</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">like the rapid vaporization of liquid iron</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">that seeps into the vein that marches on like militaries,</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">like militaries, like edges of quilts that</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">stack upon the smallness of the body of you,</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">like a million and one bricks smoldered onto one shoulder,</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">like one shoulder, like one initial tatooed</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">onto your eye, like an eye, like the iris that quivers</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">like cadavers when the morgue shakes with rage,</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">like the numbers of millions that moan</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">into the mouth of slavery, like mouths, like the mouths of babes,</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">like the equivocation in the voice </span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">when language is underdeveloped, like unfathomable</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">illnesses that scratch at the belly</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">at the rocks that empty out onto the toes</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">like broken windows, broken books, broken doorbells</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">unanswered mail, cacophonies that</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">do not dispel the sadness, the road that elegies walk on,</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">the yellow and dusty dirt that etches</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">an ink mark down the troughs of muscles</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">on the bodies of crying mothers, like blue and blackness,</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">like the emptying out of rivers, like the movement</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">of time on the body, like grown arms</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">and legs and lips and speech, like a pencil</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">or bell that both echo like footsteps.</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">In the ecology of personal suffering, the world </span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">passes by like a bi-plane, turns and gyrates and gives and gives,</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">thirsty like a philanthropist for its giving.</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">There is love and there is the hand that trembles like piano wire when the hammer strikes it, there is memory faded and there is memory that is a permanency, grafted onto the skin, a kindness like a beautiful body. Once I woke</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">and thought you had gained your body,</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">but if that were true, your hands would not be whispers</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">nor your whispers and smile drips of water on the edges of my eye.</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">This grief like a cushion I rest on, like a bread I dig into when I am thirsty,</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">edges away, returns and leaves. </span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">There is no distinct reason why a memory is like a caged crocodile,</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">but there it is: silent, motionless, mouth</span></div>
<span id="docs-internal-guid-35703b3b-dab1-c664-2daf-e4f5e6dce37d"><span style="color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">agape, breathing.</span></span>Reading the Districthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11635072700180534927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7853363457205628393.post-2734489393889456552013-12-09T20:07:00.002-08:002014-01-25T08:11:08.451-08:00<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Today the world is bright,</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">is drier than most other days: it is fifty degrees</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">in February, almost fourty eight in the shade--</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">the cool breath of the wind</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">so thoughtful on most days in springtime</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">whispers in haiku syllables</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">five, then seven, then five accounts of how</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">global warming will not end, that we will suffer,</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">and the glaciers will melt</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">and I will die and everyone will die</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">but we will be warm, and our shoes will sink</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">into the loving earth that cushions us,</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">cradles our bodies as we lie onto it,</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">breathing in the breath of eternal summer</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">and honeysuckles and disappearing bees</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">and bears kept in museums and poetry </span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">kept in museums, locked in glass cases like</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">so much fruit in the grocery stores</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">and the grocery stores filled with bright, beautiful</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">yellows, pinks, purples and oranges, <br class="kix-line-break" />vegetables and leaves will forever be green</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">and green will be the flag because there will</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">be no nations, there will only be earth</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">and water and the few people</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">who populate this world,</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">as we dangle our shoes over the edge</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">trying to remember what winter</span></div>
<span id="docs-internal-guid-143ade72-dab0-dff2-d896-e67ad694c898"><span style="color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">used to mean when it took us over in February.</span></span>Reading the Districthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11635072700180534927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7853363457205628393.post-26831504324638889742011-12-29T15:57:00.000-08:002011-12-29T16:06:31.730-08:00On the Bed, On Vacation<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:130%;">Sometimes I would rather not begin</span><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:130%;">by stating the situation in which I sit,</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:130%;">neck bent. Nightly, instead,</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:130%;">I will go to the pool hall</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:130%;">and play half-silently, admiring</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:130%;">broken fans that,</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:130%;">perhaps, cooled a great number of players,</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:130%;">cues in hand, important, blue chalk dusting off their shoulders</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:130%;">like drifting children; they tumble down</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:130%;">covertly, ethereal near the construction site</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:130%;">Oh construction site, in the town in which I was born,</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:130%;">you light up the as if you</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:130%;">were hosting a Hawaiian barbecue,</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:130%;">or perhaps celebrating Channukah,</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:130%;">though that is slightly troubling</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:130%;">as your candles are innumerable and scald</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:130%;">a fantastic after-glow</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:130%;">on the dashboard, dirt piles</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:130%;">and football stadium, drifting children. So, then,</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:130%;">the problem: light, being.</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:130%;">Beams beg for walking upon and</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:130%;">you are months from completion--</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:130%;">no night-watcher will touch</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:130%;">a foot on you, blue-black whale whose mouth glazes</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:130%;">open like candle wax,</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:130%;">except in the future when</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:130%;">children roll their fingers on your cavernous walls.</span></div>Reading the Districthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11635072700180534927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7853363457205628393.post-76011640139821865332011-12-29T15:50:00.000-08:002011-12-29T15:56:47.234-08:00Trains (completely unfinished)<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:130%;">Opening wide the mouth of night</span><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:130%;">light is not an oracular ghost,</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:130%;">rather factual: stiff as military starch,</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:130%;">a lampost</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:130%;"> trips the dark.</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:130%;">Morning you are woken with</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:130%;">clouds bombastic and purple night</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:130%;">a healed blister</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:130%;"> a wisp of cold aluminum</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:130%;">drifting downward from the sky.</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:130%;">A loud breath, the throat tightens</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:130%;">as the whip of an opposite train goes by.</span></div>Reading the Districthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11635072700180534927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7853363457205628393.post-41087738021676041072011-09-21T20:30:00.000-07:002011-09-21T20:36:43.058-07:00Not ReallyDriven like a nail through brick<div>stick dark as unstuck mud</div><div>on the boot left cleaved on the basement rug</div><div>a knife poking through a pumpkin</div><div>something like breath, a drachma unearthed</div><div>by a four year old, cloaked, </div><div>shivering: hexagonal, </div><div>seemingly gorgeous, a dream--</div><div><br /></div><div>the picture of horse, the faint upward motion</div><div>of coin bounced on the pocket's</div><div>inside, it climbs without bearing</div><div>right or left, thumb coolly caressing</div><div>its image for more than ten years--</div><div>time passes, as a pear. </div><div>In the thinning, subconscious night</div><div>light enters the room like a horse's canter.</div>Reading the Districthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11635072700180534927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7853363457205628393.post-76086875695436784742011-09-21T20:24:00.000-07:002011-09-21T20:30:51.908-07:00Not tomorrow but soon I'll teach my students<div>about nuance, nooks and crannies</div><div>like a young child's hands, clenched</div><div>and dripping with fudgicle sweat--</div><div>meanwhile the child drips, content,</div><div>accepting. I used to think that silence </div><div>among two people was awful--</div><div>not knowing how to move from one end to</div><div>another, thinking, then, about sex, attraction,</div><div>interlaced eye contact like gradations of </div><div>color. I was constantly adrift. Now,</div><div>when I think of things and am with someone</div><div>who blinks at me like crystalline winter,</div><div>which is her laughter, which is, sometimes,</div><div>cold, I don't mind silence: it is part of the process,</div><div>the coming up with the idea, the forming,</div><div>then the coming out with it: firestorm</div><div>of I think I love you or we're missing</div><div>soap in the bathroom. Transient night</div><div>in Washington, D.C., such transience in this town:</div><div>we are constantly disappearing, books</div><div>being written, only backwards.</div>Reading the Districthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11635072700180534927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7853363457205628393.post-48395895057794038242011-06-23T14:46:00.000-07:002011-07-23T21:47:43.708-07:00(no title) (i think this is unfinished, and could be added on to) (inspired by Arda Collins "Over No Hills")<span style="font-size:130%;">And in the deepest<div>sense, I am looking</div><div>for companionship, which for days</div><div>and, perhaps, all of March til May,</div><div>I had rationalized or</div><div>imagined as the recollected</div><div>amalgamations of the hands of</div><div>two old lovers--</div><div>I'm a bit of a cat-burglar in that sense</div><div>and freely admit</div><div>this at a coffee shop next to</div><div>an opened computer</div><div>finished latter and two strips of paper</div><div>curling around and over themselves--</div><div>I read through</div><div>so many of my old college papers</div><div>looking for something scholarly--</div><div>thinking of language and love,</div><div>now and then</div><div>thinking of the inconceivable </div></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 21px; ">facebook status </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 21px; ">(wintry,</span><span style="font-size:130%;"><div>porcupine-esque, desired, fulfilled,</div><div>scared, rounded out,</div><div>proud and reasonable, pencil-</div><div>thin, as a mollusk</div><div>climbing on thin blades of</div><div>grass, looking at pretty</div><div>girls) but punctuated--</div><div>I think I should not eat my words</div><div>anymore, I think</div><div>I should be putty on the wall:</div><div>don't you use it to hang</div><div>things, to maneuver and tear</div><div>into use for the pleasure</div><div>of making your</div><div>house a home?</div></span>Reading the Districthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11635072700180534927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7853363457205628393.post-663140898643190092011-06-23T13:48:00.000-07:002011-06-23T13:56:58.360-07:00The Unknown Bird (I saw this phrase in an Elizabeth Bishop poem)<span style="font-size:130%;">The unknown bird sits atop leaves<div>and leaves of green--jays, pigeons</div><div>scooting up against the windows</div><div>the swooping, leaving</div><div>imprints indicating: birds, birds</div><div>this is the oven of us all,</div><div>four hundred degrees we simmer</div><div>in juices savory with lemon and dill.</div><div>Summer bakes us and will never treat us well.</div><div><br /></div><div>~</div><div><br /></div><div>Beneath the daytime, people pass each other</div><div>on the street. "No one smiles back at you,"</div><div>my friend complained. "No one says hi." We</div><div>watch as the ladies and gentlemen in</div><div>seersucker and fashionable period-dress</div><div>cycle by--we snap photos, imprint our</div><div>eyes on each gaunt hat and they are </div><div>changes as wood drifting down the river changes,</div><div>becomes the last sign of life, entering the ocean.</div><div><br /></div><div>~</div><div><br /></div><div>If I can swing it, my next lecture</div><div>will be titled: For My Next Trick: Residual</div><div>Patterns like Electricity Buried beneath the Wood.</div><div>Each word will contain sequences,</div><div>like bath and both and bother,</div><div>path, pith, patter, late, loath, lover.</div><div>Judge whether the path in the woods</div><div>with broken branches that are stormy weather,</div><div>leads out or simply further. The way</div><div>gets dark. It is an unabashed lover.</div><div><br /></div><div>~</div><div><br /></div><div>The most extreme weather I can think of</div><div>is a tornado. When I was young, I looked</div><div>out at the tail of Hurricane Emily wagging</div><div>darkness and almost filling up the drain pipes.</div><div>To have ripped off the roof of a school, to</div><div>gauge out the lungs, veins, of trees makes</div><div>nature seem overlordish, though it is not, though</div><div>we are making it be this way, us, caressing</div><div>as two pieces of used uranium nestled in their bed of shale</div><div>forgetting, later, that they never had known other than this.</div></span>Reading the Districthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11635072700180534927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7853363457205628393.post-44085377513175998732011-05-01T20:15:00.000-07:002011-05-01T20:20:26.596-07:00Dating Scene (last poem of the 30 days, one day late)There is a box that I kept, cellophane<div>clear plastic sheet, blue exterior.</div><div>Inside, a brachiosaurus and water color</div><div>of the Hudson seen from Hastings-</div><div>on-Hudson. Where is the world you've</div><div>built--sapphire stones in groups,</div><div>dark seasoning on salads, apples</div><div>that break the silences of November.</div><div>I'm looking for a Jew, who speaks in</div><div>dialectics, whose hues range from green</div><div>to the browns around the pupiles, with</div><div>hair so curly it is its own forest</div><div>and she sings like glory-bound diaspora</div><div>like shapes and wavering trees or,</div><div>when June hits, dripping popsicles, </div><div>her power lies in electricity, her font</div><div>is Helvetica and the care she heaves</div><div>for the comeliness of things brings power</div><div>to this city, she is a glass building bridge</div><div>that frames an old post office</div><div>she is the camera, the typewriter,</div><div>the ribbon stretched across the park,</div><div>she slow motion, she is the tide,</div><div>she once was. I'm looking for a Jew,</div><div>a world to build; can you help with that.</div>Reading the Districthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11635072700180534927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7853363457205628393.post-72648562047318273932011-04-14T15:16:00.000-07:002011-04-14T15:28:18.279-07:00#13: Rain (rain rain rain all day long)A dance on the garden for three days<div>rain you are my Rubix cube of night</div><div>tell me once again why, on facebook,</div><div>your relationship status says single</div><div>when my eyes married the sky and</div><div>your blackened clouds. I expect,</div><div>in the middle of August, you'll</div><div>be gone--flightless fox of April.</div><div>Let light carry you away moreso than</div><div>sour memories of no-fun Sundays; let light</div><div>break you apart like exhalations</div>Reading the Districthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11635072700180534927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7853363457205628393.post-46393753884866696162011-04-14T15:15:00.000-07:002011-04-14T15:16:10.273-07:00#12: Rhyme (this was a lame-o rhyme...)Last night she Topeka<div>Tonight she'll tell her secret.</div>Reading the Districthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11635072700180534927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7853363457205628393.post-52617302068375781432011-04-10T20:13:00.000-07:002011-04-10T20:24:26.266-07:00#10<div>Knowing full well that the earth, lizard crawling</div><div>on a tilted axis,</div><div>would spin upon the sight of her</div><div>would that the earth would spin at the sight of her.</div><div><br /></div><div>She controls the pits of him</div><div>the riptides and pools of him</div><div>the entrails of him the trails of him</div><div>how they blink, would that they'd blink</div><div>and set wind lauding the bricks and windows</div><div>of city buildings, wings that spin circles</div><div><br /></div><div>City of spinning circles, would that you</div><div>Would, in light of love, int he light</div><div>And love would contest not</div><div>of its amber vision again,</div><div>that is to say, its amber vision is the power</div><div>that fills the canyon river and paints it amber.</div>Reading the Districthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11635072700180534927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7853363457205628393.post-60337235753152903412011-04-10T20:11:00.000-07:002011-04-10T20:13:43.792-07:00II (#9, written by people on the street who were kind enough to write something, and a little weirdness at the end)I would like a life<div>full of Love</div><div><br /></div><div>full of expectations, dreams</div><div>and hope above all</div><div><br /></div><div>with trees, rivers, dogs and rain</div><div><br /></div><div>In a world with trials and tribulations</div><div>I find myself searching</div><div>Looking for an answer</div><div><br /></div><div>There once was a girl</div><div>who had the whole world.</div><div><br /></div><div>My most favorite never</div><div>have what elephant</div><div>Butt: big crazy asophagus</div><div>Cherryblossoms, see.</div>Reading the Districthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11635072700180534927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7853363457205628393.post-85388422050509487392011-04-10T20:10:00.000-07:002011-04-10T20:11:56.753-07:00#8: Observations & Anomalies (written at 826DC)There's a musk ox on the crate!<div>Parasaurolophus--is anything more unnatural?<br />Free popcorn--brought to you by Jesus.</div><div>Laugh Out Loud: tiny dog, purple leash.</div><div>Colest day in April and eating raisin bran.</div><div>Do I jog or bike on a Saturday?<br />Speak Spanish, man, or take a walk; something!</div><div>That's my favorite song: Something, Something I Love You.</div><div>I don't have anything: bobcat. I don't have anything.</div>Reading the Districthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11635072700180534927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7853363457205628393.post-1880571424422120332011-04-08T19:34:00.000-07:002011-04-08T19:40:24.354-07:00Poem #7: The Charlie Sheen Poem<span style="font-size:130%;">Mother, I am full of Tiger Blood.<div>Get me two cigarettes: I've already</div><div>smoked the first so you might</div><div>as well get three. Have you heard</div><div>from the elders, they've found new</div><div>boysenberries, each tattoing a name</div><div>onto their shrivelled skin: mine.</div><div>Lover, find anything other than</div><div>wonder, you won't find it.</div></span>Reading the Districthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11635072700180534927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7853363457205628393.post-40888566469148081892011-04-07T20:46:00.000-07:002011-04-08T19:40:05.802-07:00Bone-Flower Elegy (After Mary Jo Bang & Robert Hayden)<span style="font-size:130%;">(This one's dedicated to my Aunt Riv & Uncle Josh)<div><br /></div><div>As him, in the dream, as her</div><div>as art is constant yet the destructor</div><div>of my wrists, I hold this:</div><div>I can't even remove my glasses without</div><div>not seeing, and that was what</div><div>I wished tubes were all we knew</div><div>brush past beds as lolling heads</div><div>whirred and clucked and snacked on</div><div>death crackers, dry and thin.</div><div>When I think harder, will you be there,</div><div>and what was worse back then</div><div>was thinking hard that you both in separate</div><div>coffins were not. Eyes dilate faster</div><div>what with the drops is the garden</div><div>blooming yet, reach to me your hands, I will check</div></span>Reading the Districthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11635072700180534927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7853363457205628393.post-84407101066168696352011-04-07T20:44:00.000-07:002011-04-08T19:39:49.352-07:00Poem #4, Response<span style="font-size:130%;">(I forget why I said this was a response...but)<div><br /></div><div>On through an eighty degree night, fact</div><div>of warming in the midst of cold April</div><div>breeze is blankets, though the sinus headache</div><div>and twinging uscles annunciate in my skin</div><div>felt hats felt in winter are for tomorrow</div><div>newspaper rolls across the street; heat</div><div>but the dark of it inside the new</div><div>flowers make spring finally here, as if it were</div><div>fall but with white instead of fire</div></span>Reading the Districthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11635072700180534927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7853363457205628393.post-11227974174264235862011-04-07T20:42:00.001-07:002011-04-07T20:44:24.913-07:00Guac (A Found Poem)(Here, I took pieces of conversation while at a friend's house) (Each line should be cascading...unfortunately, blogger can't do that)<div><br /></div><div>That's a lot of pressure</div><div>peanut</div><div>hospital</div><div><br /></div><div>About Ocean City</div><div>that one</div><div>that was intense lightening</div><div><br /></div><div>We can wash off the porch</div><div>We'll split it three way</div><div>Wasteland</div><div><br /></div><div>I should tell her to clip out</div><div>I should tell her to clip out</div><div>She's not clipping out</div><div><br /></div><div>There used to be so much:</div><div>He abuses strange materials</div><div>You think they'd keep that for next year</div><div><br /></div><div>So this isn't a documentary.</div><div>So this is a documentary.</div>Reading the Districthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11635072700180534927noreply@blogger.com0