a long and soft forever
Heartlessly fulfilled
What a plentiful wasteland
And so I stand here in a desert
Flat but golden
Shimmering even
What is this?
A laughing, taunting goodbye?
A jeering show of rejection?
Some kind of jovial dismissal?
It is, it is
as truly as a violin weeps
as certain as a saxophone mourns
it is a pleasure to close the door behind you
a fuller breath of oxygen to inhale
for now, tangibly relieving
may I watch the horizon capture you
Disappeared then
in a long and soft forever
Nothing I Know
Line in the sand
It’s drawn there like a…drawbridge
It’s a hard line, for walking or for towing
But drag it in front of your friends
because you’re tired of them
Line in the sand
This one’s elastic like…expectations
It’s a bendy line, for pulling or for stretching
So drop it at the front door of danger
because without love, what is there?
***
Pacified then,
I had other plans for this one
But
Something’s happened
#pushing-away-friends-who-are-kind-without-condition-and-becoming-too-available-to-people-who-come-with-conditions-for-being-friends
#you’re-dissatisfied
Gone Girl
The Irish goodbye
A frequent maneuver of mine
Communication without any
I appeared
Vanished
Consider the move intentional writing
on an invisible page
Like suicide,
it has nothing to do with you
give you my word
How subliminally selfish.
You concluded your purpose
with the daintiest of handling.
Fucked would be my word.
Enjoy your university, man
I’m high anyway
I’ve got my vo-cab-er-net
say.it.aint.so
Look
I think you know
I may remove my products from your shelves
Because I don’t care about getting a profit
And the cash I’ve made
feels counterfeit
I’ll just be constructing a barrier
that’s the length of my arm
You walk past where my fingertips would land
It’s not your fault
Anyway, when I recuse myself from others
life reminds me
that I live a valuable currency
This has to end not because you’ve done anything wrong
But because I’ve already left
The Scrub Jay
Found amid dry lowlands
along the Pacific seaboard
where no one ever doused the sand in sunflower seeds
during mornings bereft of peanuts,
when it rained water and
not snacks delivered by an Instacart driver,
this natural bird persisted
Despite an absence of lazy 11am cooing
couched in obscenities directed at the family,
the California scrub jay did not go extinct
it perched on
the Norwegian brown rat, however,
also known as the roof rat for its keen ability to climb
burrowed beneath the sidewalks
and emigrated to a nearby neighborhood
as soon as
pellets of store-packaged handouts disappeared
in an apocalyptic event
that the scrub jays could only describe as
…some other day
when that lady wasn’t there
serene (the cotton candy float)
this
has a taste
like the color of an echo
rafting at a waterfall
illuminated,
the texture would be
like the scent of snow
inside a hologram.
if you could puff
a milkshake
of butterflies,
you’d know it
Mr. Mallory
Just like lawn mowers machete over innocent grassland,
the trains in Mr. Mallory’s city grated along their metallic tracks,
tearing through all atoms of stillness to set a pace for the day
Standing on the platform
Mr. Mallory rested his arm across the length of his flappy leather satchel
and analyzed the concrete
We have a fat fish
We have a fat fish
Right now
he is wedged under a piece of pretend wood
at the bottom of his aquarium
His extremely tiny mouth is opening like
a heart valve, again and again and again
In a rhythm making life happen
I’m waiting for him to die
Because he’s not really fat
He’s actually sick
About a week ago our other fish,
the one who had a crooked back,
floated to the top of the water
and didn’t move his mouth anymore
Then this guy just puffed up
His body, his stomach, has stretched out
Like a ball of sad is stuck inside
Before this, he swam around
Now he stays in one place,
either at the top of the tank
or down in the fake flora
I just went to look at him
At this moment, he’s resting on the rocks
Tail and fins still as a skyline
Only the mouth moving, opening, opening, opening
He looks like a horror movie
When his friend died,
I looked into the tank and saw
that the eyes had gone white
Cloudy
The little gills weren’t pulsing
So I scooped him out with a ladle
and buried him under the maple tree outside
After I put the dirt on,
I was afraid he wasn’t ready,
so I dug him back up
To make sure he was fully finished
He didn’t move
He was covered in soil
I buried him again
Poured some water on the tree
Told him he was a really good fish
Oh my god
I just checked on our fat fish again
He’s caught in the plastic fern branches
The little mouth is panting still
His black eyes are enormous,
glossy and half silver and pleading
I drew a heart for him on the glass
Where he is facing
Now I will wait with him
Play music as the night goes on
Because I think tomorrow he will not hear it
I will bury him at the maple tree too
Plenty of Fish
Setting Sail
In a perky white sailor hat, I waved goodbye to the shore
Smiling and cupping my hand like Little Miss Mermaid Lagoon
Waves crashed and soared around my tiny boat
Following my heart across the Atlantic
Heart, Half-Awake
There was a big red heart on the couch
Some scissors came and cut the whole thing out and composted it
So it spent the night in a spinach-and-paper towel sleeping bag
Under an aluminum tent top
It spent the whole night there, being sad
Being like a big, cut-out heart in some garbage
Trash that slowly decomposed
Heart kept dreaming all the time, half-awake, half-decomposed
Not knowing whether to wake the dog
Or the girl
Only sure to stay alive
Water
The grass at the park is all lit up
I told you before that when it rains here, it’s not like normal wet
Our water sweats its way from the shoulders of trees
to the shoes of anybody on the sidewalk
All the leaves twinkle like foliage turned astronomical
Wasn’t Even December
I think that snow guy from the claymation movie may have come in here yesterday
to clobber me awake
The Island of Misfit Toys?
Yes, I go there
Oh, that’s how he found me
Mandolin
There’s a global mandate for isolation
It’s insisted I dust off my guitar
Sequestered as it was, against a suitcase and a wooden wall in the shed out back
We’re together now, instrument and me
Harmonizing
You’re Gonna Miss The Island When You Get Home
Here we are along with the entire world
Asked by global governments to stay home
Look at us, in our living rooms, at our kitchen counters
You aren’t sick, are you?
Aren’t you home in pajamas?
A Landfill or Never-Ending Boat Ride
Into my asparagus, I cried a new vinegar
No one knows this salad
Only I make it
At the world’s smallest table
Like a lunch vault
There is no room for more
Failure is full
Violent Health
At work I plant hemlock trees in the swamp
My pencil rolls off the desk, lodges in the carpet and grows lead branches
Staples slip through cracks in the drawers
Then there are little metal lily pads
Pens develop spiny leaves and turn the water dark
I flick erasers off the sides of my desk so there are white magnolias
My shoe splashes under my chair
My elbow nudges a stack of post-its
They scatter into a hundred hot yellow paper ducks
Every day I take a canoe and the birds help me row
Silverlake
There’s so much to cry about
I’ve decided to join the tar pits
So my sadness can be immortalized
With the dinosaurs
I’m just so full of tears
Like a trillion bath bubbles for my eyes
And ouch
I’d rather sit in mud and become a statue
Besides wooly mammoths are probably warm
so cute
But this is adorable
Like, put a button on it
S.O.S.
Call the cabbage patch committee
It really is baby alphabet
cloud n blanket
goose down
uhmm…
yo
if you’re not a stuffed animal…
you gotta leave the toy store
splash
When you arrived
I poured disappointment all over the table
Drowned the doilies
Drenched the dandelion greens
The frenzy was silent
But the overflow soaked the silverware
It flooded the restaurant
I promise
That bottle got knocked over by accident
Carlene
When you speak, Carlene,
it sounds like you’re electrocuting time
In the car, your talking turns thick,
like you’ve smeared it all over the tires
made your voice gargantuan
Carlene,
you rival nature in self-contained story
with a sound of cawing birds or buzzing flies
now glued here forever
to silently gnaw at my memory
Mercy…
Mercy…
The golden days have gone dark
Stuffed into the past
Two years of glory gone
An era extinguished
It was an era of unity, when time transformed
When standard public practice paused
and societal expectations evaporated
Rules crumbled
Collaboration constructed a new reality
The world was brand new
read more…
roachlike
as nature’s crowbar cracks the morning open,
do I crowd midnight’s remnant corners?
am I to be found fawning at the back of barren cupboards,
daring time for one more unseen hour?
is the hollow where I burrow destined to be uncovered
at the next gash in the moon?
as the universe is clobbered into halves,
am I as well?
or perhaps I flutter simply, darkness harnessed, contrary to the roach
Far from the Avenue of Bars
I remember the night I met you
We sat on the porch and smoked cigarettes
I asked you about music
We understood each other right then
Today, thinking of you, I remember that life can be war
Unrelenting
Crueler than humans one by one
It’s an onslaught, unforgiving
You knew despair, you told me
You were a songwriter
In This Dream
In this dream, we are all together. It’s December and I miss you. I am not going to believe I won’t see you.
Tonight, you’re just outside the front door, I can hear you. You’ve got on that tweed coat, the one that’s almost yellow, with the thin black lines, and you’re smoking. You’re so elegant out there on the porch, talking in between exhaling, waiting for dinner to start. You say something self-deprecating, make that sound like a “tff,” you’ve dismissed something you just said. You laugh while you set down your drink.
this pen is not for sale
This pen is not for sale
It’s too active
Going places, and quickly
This pen is not replaceable
It’s gilded in experience
This pen only arrives as it will some of the time
Intermittently
Reluctantly obliged occasionally, only briefly
Unavailable for meetings
Won’t respond to All
See You Soon
welcome to the highway you walk on
i’m not sure you have the right supplies
i see you packed your book. that’s good
you brought a pen. that’s great
did you bring anything else?
clearly forgot the map
This is me trying to keep it short
Here are my five words:
you
gave
me
no
choice
Sledgehammer
Hey you,
Hey sledgehammer,
I lied to you as much as you lied to me
What a fucking stunner couple
I told you to come over anytime
Window always open
I promised that you came first, even if it put me last
See You at the Library
Ohhhhhhh, I see
There’s a dictionary definition
How clever
You looked it up
There’s a real way to explain disappointment
Forward Isn’t Fast Enough
For now let me say
Without hope or agenda
I thought you’d be back in the writing room
Oh, Tiny Hand
When I watch my hand writing I say, “Oh, tiny hand. You vomit so often. You open that
mouth you keep in that pen and then you lose your guts.”
When I watch it scribbling, foaming at the mouth all rabid and unbridled, I say, “Fucking
thank god for you. I’m so glad you give me back all the nutrients I put into you. It’s like
we feed each other.”
World’s Saddest Furniture
It’s so clever how they set up these beds
With little bars on the sides
A man arrives and puts it together like he’s done it 10 trillion terrible times
He’s young and probably working for his family
Drives all day to set up and take down the world’s saddest furniture
Quitter
I don’t want to be the only one climbing the mountain. You need to have your pick axe out too. It’s practically freezing up here sometimes and I worry that one of these days you’ll carve a ledge for yourself and build a fire and a fort and a whole home. You’ll want to stay there. Halfway up. Halfway down. No more climbing.
Bad Boundaries
The sun has set but I can’t yet
I haven’t got what I came for
Just one more
I come in here because
The booze, the boys, the buzz
Unorthodox
Up on the jukebox
The sun’s got a curfew
It turns off before I do
taste of a dreamless frontier
I dare say the poetry’s been kicked right out of me.
Done broke the legs off
Smithereens
I collapse
Forfeit with dust between my teeth, taste of a dreamless frontier
Manifest in shambles
A pioneer with a wagon, destined for shelter, found and counted
I dare say the sheen on this life has just about done me in
Been shattering
I’m ruined in the palm of safety
as the sheriff
the man’s been sliced through three times
— and with reason
aloof is not a free pass
still he walks like the sun is just rising
I wait for the signal that’s coming
a hand shifting to his holster
a motion calling his horse
so, as the sheriff, I haul him to the station
before he’s stopped smiling
read him his wrongs
slam the cage shut
it’s just a fact though
the man’s a stag
he extends long legs in his cell
I keep expecting
to see his boots kick up dirt in a proposition
reminding me who runs this town
but the man is not trying to duel
he’s forgotten his hat and his drawl
and this badge will stay mine
i’ll continue to patrol 1881
not noticing
until way later
that he smells like a new frontier
washed ashore
good day for a dip, i think
neck deep at least
tangle my feet in the boulders beneath
probably slip all the way under
drop to the bottom of eternal sadness for cover
sink and wonder
a swim through the swamp of woes
where the vast nothingness roams
cast a net for those crumbling dreams, or…oh
nevermind the dip, i’ll splash in my tears
it’s familiar here; getting wet never felt better
enter my give-up era
Best Party Never
There’s no depot here, if you’re looking for it.
It didn’t burn down or go out of business. It just wasn’t ever built.
Trains pass through, but they won’t stop.
Hi.
This is where I’m from. It’s in the middle of nothing yet.
Maybe something is coming soon.
If you need a taxi to the next town over where the trains stop, you’ll have to keep walking. Or maybe you should run.
This Is the Wednesday Night Saloon
I’m here
I said to the ladybug next to my fist
then took my hand from the bar
dropped my hat onto a stool
unfastened my holster
I started to yell that I was a butterfly
The bug fluttered, walked away
I poured a beer anyway
slung off my belt
turned down my brim
Now that I Write Country Songs, Things Are Looking Up for Me
Well, it got hard, I’ll tell you something, it got rough
The list of disappointments was finally enough
The road was surely rocky and the finish line so far
But I grabbed my things and left anyway and found myself a bar
Country Song
Out there again, here I am, you can see me
Glass is half full, and, you know, also half empty
Back into the unknown, where I’m the star and the show
Maybe that’s the way it always is, though, you know
Pulling up my own sheets, getting the dogs outdoors
These are the things I used to do before
I can light my own smokes, keep myself well and fed
Play my own lullabies, find a place for my head
Riot
Something has run away
It’s my train
The one I ride in
So my whiskey is mixed with tears
Maybe my train has sped off with the fork and spoon
But it’s gone missing and it’s WANTED
Wine for Dinner
This is my specialty
I call it Delicious
Bridget Jones
Bukowski
It is a glass of excuses
Tastes like glitter
I make it like this:
Open
Pour
Recover
This Is Just to Say
Those pens were mine
Before I stole them
Same as the files and paper clips
Just because you are cheap
Does not mean you won’t pay people what they’re worth
You’ll just have expensive enemies
Who simply take without asking
Has Yet to Build a Raft
I slipped into a river last night
My hair was wet
My clothes were soaked through
Bramble hooked into the current
Water sopped down my back
My head lopping heavily
Some dreams just keep going
Waking up is only slipping into the same river
Never
Never, never drink plum brandy
That’s been sitting unscrewed in a bottom cabinet
Since the holidays
If you’re that desperate for a good time
Go find one
Furious
In the brown of Bakersfield farms
Where the desert is the freeway
Desperation took to its feet
Kicked the 5 to dust
The windows blistered
From the anxiety inside
Because unemployment doesn’t create anything else
On the highway, desperation grew into even more
It was discovered that shame has a physical form
And it’s furious