early valentine for my father

especially radiant today,
on this first afternoon
of springtime sun,
are the splendors of you,
echoing--triumphant!--across
the road map
of your face.

they are
a celebration, perhaps,
of the time you have seen,
long shadows and
golden mornings both,

or a recollection of
the things you have
given
to the place from
whence you
sprang.

#14 (oops, halfway)

oh, terror! then shame/lessness, cold cut teeth, an inability contracted when small.

the prairie still exists, i would rather watch house than monk, rather do laundry and read magazines, an image of blown bubbles. i had a really long rest too, a rest too long to be anything that was comfortable in it's skin, once really horribly so.

shaky bones, oh, terror! of not losing the sleepover safety theme, getting up, or only being able to stay. then tired, cool-headed attempts, a sewing class, a doubt.

(#13)

a red dress over a blue dress, sleeve lengths exact, worn to swim in a river.

a mountain straight up out of the water, weirdly small and round, a hump.

sunshine exactly enough to not exhaust, and crooked teeth.

(#14)

sparrow
mountain
labor day
crush

Gina's

A fleeting place to lay
Is the greatest present, see
I'll miss you room
we fought but
I forgive you.

Alphabet Soup

served up hot
under her nose
she's rosy smiles
for every bite
give it a few years
she won't eat anything I cook.

date night

we ordered 2 beers and got to spin the wheel of doom
jello shots, spicy shots and irish car bombs galore
then we had a hot dog
and the vendor told us all about the man who dropped his dog after ordering the works
as we walked away you fumbled yours and caught it on your arm
covering yourself in ketchup and mustard as i laughed so hard
payback came to me though as we walked to the train
i stepped in a crack in the sidewalk and went tumbling to the ground
i gathered up my dignity as we laughed some more
while a woman stood there staring at us looking completely abhorred
a hug and kiss goodnight
i rode the train alone
i couldn't keep myself from laughing
at the clumsiness we endured
intoxication reached its peak
when the pillow touched my head
awoken by the jingle of the message you had sent
wait, you had fun and you want to see me again???

Behind a bathroom door

She's taking a part away.
Yours is down the middle
and she wants it different.
All the same you want her -
scissors in her hand or buzzer.
You look past the mirror to a time when
you are:
waiting for her outside the bathroom
in the library trying hard to look at a book
to think of something to say next
trying to run your hand through your hair
along the side
or down at the nape
wanting to be natural like the pee coming from her
on the other side of the door

On this side of the bathroom door, in this day you want
to know
Will it find its way back to the way it was?
Will it know?
Will it drop on pillows strand by strand?
And on whose?
And?

purple

I am hazy, lazy eyed and buzzing.
Staring slowly at the ceiling hoping
I never come down.
Arnica and lavender rise from my skin.
This. this is purple I'm sinkin in.
Strains of music float around me,
enveloping, endearing themselves to my form.
And in this moment my breath is reborn
swirling in and out of dust particles,
drawing circles like sandcastles.
pulling sandcastles to tide.

Couple

she's
bloodied with money
he's
poor as a seagull,

he's
had six holes
she's
buying a dildo.

They
can't get out
of her queen-sized bed
and press colors of mouth with thick tongue,
a saturated pleasure sponge (ugh).

Reminds me, all bicycles,
all bicycles that
fall over in an airplane hanger
all complicated, spinning.

SEVENTEEN

With sufficient sweat
and intuition, two people
can reach the point
where one hears the other say
"I feel like an E-flat"
and knows he's not entirely upset
that his heart has just been broken.
Friendship like this is something woven
from worn out t-shirts shredded to strips,
an act recorded to play back
over and over on the wheels of memory
though behind each carefully preserved phrase
lurk a hundred scrambled dawns
spit out like grapefruit seeds
by slack-jawed time, and the groves
grow thick between them.
What happens to the hours of practice put in
to a friendship that's past its final run?

The Excursion

We built a room inside
the living room
and covered it with a tarp.
I'm sitting in it. I'm an
electrochemical
phenomenon.
It's not winter
and I'm not in Queens.