Walls

Seed widely on a different page,

pass it across the table to me

making a gesture at forgiveness.

The difference between us is between us

and is keeping us from falling apart,

is mapping us in blisters:

the sinner sight of the full moon.

We are waiting to be caught in the wind,

the crow cry gin gurgling in our bellies like black coals. 

The river bass shoals cup the Northern soul

into water held palms,

scramble egg whites and dig holes

to keep us from sticking together.

Until the end, when it was all said,

I am confused again.

Fragment

Thoughts worn thin by winter’s five o’clock shadow shaved off sheet layers of the moon,

laid them in muscle-string tombs,

the bare belly quake and stutter and stay—

Day light in the morning no more finds its way through the deep fog,

the languorous waver of last logger breath passed from mouth to mouth to mouth to

mouth to mouth to Southern doubt massive quadruple bypass surgery,

neurotransplant symbiosis achieved naturally,

weaving ivy leaves hold back the trees from the highway—

I can see them reaching underneath,

straining to find sky light,

the open hole in the canopy leaks in weak beams of twilight,

the Over-soul, the claster cold sinks eider-down and

alabaster kindly knits the fall to stillness stone in rock bed tome of Eastern grown fairy

tales, and moss-covered fairy stump homes, garden gnomes snickering right outside the back doorway to the lower bay dock, where the castle rock jetties spit knee kettle injuries at capable juries of our peers—

the learned fear of hearing what is coming at you before you see the whites of their eyes,

Paul Revere rides down the Nascar speedway waving beer cans and betties flash their ankles, getting skanky down to the bones—

I’ve come too far to be sniddled down by nitwit mummies and their dead booty

daddies clambering right outside the kitchen door—

the warm summer war pours blood out through our stainless steel two-tub kitchen faucet,

and we toss it out the window as we fill it up in pot after pot after pot after pot after Johnny apple seed threw Jill’s panties out the window of the pink Cadillac,

you got your hair pulled back and I got my seat leaned back, my right heel

kicked up on the open window sill,

in New Mexico, sunflowers grow through cracks in the road, crochet me cacti

walking for the water mirage—

Ozone warbles the horizon and the hot metal sky sits weighted on paper atlas shoulders,

fizzled out to whispers on the radio dial—

subliminal messaging system protected for and by the government,

the supplemental Patriot Act-slash-

minority trap the neighbor food mentality,

the questionable constitutionality of our every day life—

the wife, the daughter, the mother, the father, the son and the husband of holy and hope

for the fire to burn through the night:

it lasted forty days, and we found a lucky gold fish in the middle of the Mojave, salty

sand drying out our long cow tongues like jerky,

my hand was jerking at some thought lurking like a letch in the jeepers,

the sneak sneakers squeaking down the sinking Poe stairs in my cerebrum—

my constant breathing cleaves me like two rivers split from a single snake,

the garden rake battered on the young dogwood trees to beat October snow from their

branches green, inside before the storm, and now the bark is dry, cracked at the

elbows and knees and knuckles,

and eyes in the bark,

eyes in the dark tell me it’s time to shut up.

An Excerpt

—for hands and I also used to and still do imagine that I am hanging out with Mozart, and I play him music so he can hear what’s become of it.  He likes some things but mostly he listens,

one time it was when we would go in late to school for some kind of standardized test at like eleven and we had like twelve fucking people with us and we were all high as shit and we crowded into this booth at Double-T and we sit down, and there’s a pile of nuggs sitting there on the table and my friend Angela sitting across the table had a lemon wedge in front of her and I was like Angela I want your lemon and so she tossed it to me and I flicked it up in the air and it landed straight sliced onto the rim of her glass.

You’re fucking with me, that’s not real.

No I swear it’s one of those things that only happens when you’re that fucking high, like the other day me and Brian were up at Petsmart getting stuff for the kittens and we’re standing out front of the store finishing up our cigs before we go in and we see this guy come zooming into the parking lot on a fucking vespa, a powder blue scooter and he’s weaving in and out of all these cars and leaving fliers on their windshields, he almost hit his fucking head on a mirror, but he was doing alright like he didn’t hit anything.  I turn to Brian and I’m like I bet you anything this guy’s about to come over here and start talking to us and sure enough here he comes zoom, zoom, zoom-zoom, rrrrrt, doink, right there in of us and dude’s clearly retarded in some way like he had the fucked up teeth and everything and he’s like hey guys how’s it going and pretty soon he’s off rambling about something I don’t even know I could not listen at all—

like if you were actually able to do that, shoot fire out of the end of your finger, what if it worked, what would you do?

I probably would light the fucking bowl. 

Not even say anything, without skipping a beat, just hit it, obviously. 

Probably wait to see if you guys noticed or not, make sure I’m not seeing things.

December

Nature’s unbalanced rift divides the social strata down two wooden ladders

from the cold hammer attic,

the snap dragon,

the alpha mater,

the kitchen-cut potatoes boiled in the pot for dinner. 

The stolid winter crips in the window shivers,

the gold fish liver,

britches in the boiling pot,

the melting kettle,

the blue seagull feather on the rosewood dream catcher.

The Visit

The kindred rock skips down muddy river Umpqua, makes a wash of me white linen, hand-heeled down tin washer board, the running chord, the echoed brushfire—

Winter worry puts me on my knees on rocks riding shallows, bitter sloshes of holy goulashes in November, and I remember thinking, this exists.

Homesteader

Cadence claws its way back from reality,

storms with brief brutality, wrecks the deviled shore.

I thought before that I knew what life was.

Now I am starting over again

a requiem for peace,

reaching of the soul,

clutching it from our careworn natures

now and later, at the hour of our death

we shall fear no evil, for Love art with us—

Debate on the Patriot Act

My brain is on wire for an hour afterwards, lying naked under the fan and starting to cool off, realize my nakedness. I have no idea where I am except for this body—Scrooge, why do you doubt your senses? Cause I’m a nomadic tunes-woman, strewn from winnowed tree nutshells, the willow wander, the ebb and holler of the geese in Wakonda. I stop astounded at the softened conscience, tallow found from glass Orwellian make-up shops, and easily avertable pick up lines from wasty-face wiggers outside of Looney’s Pub in the summer and it was all easy; rather, it seems that way now, flexing back on it, hindquarters march this awkward limp down the cherry-wood hall to the powder room.

Gargle with Salt Water

Hinge as if breath depends on it,

if water deepened its breast tomorrow,

to reel it back in and swallow,

whittled down to totem poles that fit in your palm:

Pennsylvania sycamores rust, kAY-tee-dIds

buck this humming sugared November,

geese slip tender under my flannel sheets,

warn me that this cannot last:

harden deer-corn left to crack,

and fold under the stolid pressure of widowed stagnance,

the pale face of keep-on-fighting, even as we pack it in,

give ourselves airs but we ain’t fooling no body,

our hands wEAthereDim the evening light.

November

We have a brief chance at finding truth each morning, and if we pass it by falling back asleep, or staring out the window and wishing it wasn’t gray again, and raining cold as church on Monday, then the whole day is thrown over the balcony with the blanket and baby and the bath water, the dirty toilet bowl seat cover, the yellowed wall paper because that’s the one room where we can smoke cigarettes, it used to be white I guess at some point. I used to believe in what I said at some point, I didn’t question any of it because John was the only one who was going to read it, and I know he’s as utterly mad as I am so he’ll get what I’m saying. I mean if something really needed to be changed he would say it but we don’t get so caught up on these formal elements that everyone seems to be so on about; we use them as they come to us not because of what they are. We don’t get hung on much of anything, we like to hear language out loud as it was originally, so I speak and John sings and plays the guitar and it’s all simple. When I start bringing in other people they always feel a need to immediately give me their opinion, like, how bout I don’t give a shit a bout your opinion, if I did, I would ask for it, not write a fucking poem and bare my goddamn soul to you, take the gift I’m giving you and relish your own silence the way I look forward to being alone at the end of the day.

Domestic

Hypoallergenic beehives are my natural namesakes. I raked the tired stairs of red leaves, the garter snake eyes me in the crawl space, the garden hose, the sodden moss grows, grey blows a gristled craw-dad, Bay Saint Louis Mississippi sips the Southern storm: heed the weathered bird, string you from the corn.  Harford hay bales roll the hills for miles and I get lost driving to find myself again but this last time, I met the winter’s abject sunker, stalked me down like a deer.  I cannot hear my soul no more, jack’s unhooked, tied my keds together under the desk.  The auto-mechanic hits on milfs shameless, the pond scum, the rabbit, the cold wooden attic, the rooster’s hold, the widow’s watch, sister in the keep, and oil in the pan.

Down On the River

Storm has a little crack in his flue,

the night owls get in and make nests in the wood rafter kitchen,

ruffling a stew.

But he brews out the hassle,

harvesting beans as full as the moon,

knit splintered thistle into wool gray,

and dirt into cold boiled clay.

Beginning In The Middle

As soon as you think you have something figured, you lose it again.  There was a time we had a time when it was easy to hear it and it was because I was moving as fast as my mind, never stayed in any place more than three days and that was in Boulder.  Before that, we had camped out in the Rockies on Arapahoe Bay, the coldest night of sleep yet, after coming from Texas too, record heat all day, and there was a drought and all the grass was dead, the bottom halves of tree leaves would turn brown, fall off in the middle of August.  We passed a car accident on the other side of the highway.  A car was on fire and another car was wrapped around the front grill of a tractor-trailer.  A woman was screaming into her cell phone and another was directing traffic, we drove passed it with the windows down still, we had been trying to avoid air conditioning out of some idea that it would be better for the car, maybe it was for Ganesha, a sacrifice of comfort as it were—that lasted til about noon, when we were thoroughly drenched, Red shirtless, me with my shirt rolled up and skirt hiked up, covering the necessaries with the yards of fabric gathered down the middle, my right foot parched up on the window sill, and we realized that it was hotter in the wind, than in the hot ass fucking car.  At the next rest stop, we closed the windows, filled our camel paks with warm water from a ground pump and waited for the temperature of the car to level off.

[untitled]

red breast robin

storm the weathered cove,

the daffled whim,

the wary why

cold cough, and sigh glass

shudder silver branches

that scratch the midnight weeds,

the crippled eagle lurch—

spin the gypsy line,

reeling in the fishing wire

and each time, casting it again,

faster than thistle Friday catches wool

the wryly whistle blows,

heaves the gritty bastion,

storms the French Bastille,

the Harbor mist

hunkered under

Baltimore grist:

the gravel winter,

wisdom of shiver,

our hands red from washing pans

in the almost frozen river—

Amish, then trailer park,

ass end up against the foot pedal highway,

bent, the skyline

a rusted factory,

the old industrial glow of stability,

the rock chewn and fed tick blood belly,

for what seemed like years,

returned the fear

of sitting alone

a whippoorwill

in the backyard night,

silent, until we went inside,

and then the geese, they pass over

for much of November

the last ones from Canada

save the weather

for swallow,

woodpecker

and Atticus Finch:

Scout grows like corn stalks

hacked down to brittle hairs,

stubborn, but gives

an eastward bow to the sunrise

out of the portside bedroom

pheasants in their foul weather furrow,

black bears hibernate in cave dens

and we buck ourselves in,

stiffen glide the ribboned wind

over the balding farmlands;

the sycamores still breathe,

the maples shake their hands,

moss clings to bottom bark

and reds the wood like clay.

This proverbial main street they get so on about

Ladies don't talk like that,
don't walk like that,
swish they hips
side to side,
glide a magazine
down Broadway.
Keep beats tight.
In red pumps,
a metal
tongue ring
on eardrums,
throat lozenge,
evil cabal-maker,
auto-tuned
pre-programmed
baby maker
Easy Bake
Playskool
mother lover
hip pyschology
autobiography
of mass production,
sale seduction
the night maid,
the knee jerk
under the desk.

Hootenanny

I'll bring
the daisy dukes,
you wear
a big belt buckle.

Navigator

I think of you
as playing your guitar
on the floor,
tapping air
with your bare
Irish foot
and tonguing
them notes
like a kettle.
Trill riding
the riddle
of brook bends
the sole
of your hand,
a crook
to rest one's mind in,
davenport
in the den
of lion's ware,
backward stance
'gainst the glare.

[untitled]

Sonny sips
his tea fast.
It's better
that way
he says.

Nonsense
no cents
sentry
tents
make
shift
encampments:
firmament
foundation
poured
concrete
like wine
in the field,
daisy
haze
of poppyseed
enchantments,
dances
drop
the mountain top
like a stove pipe,
an oven whiskey blade
made a mockery
of me again:
an old man grins
copper,
Dennis Hopper
Jimmy Hoffa
Francis Ford Coppola
bells
shake
corn shells
winnow
kernals
in razor-backed sails,
ribbed rim-jobs,
Mama made
a fire
in the back den,
cuckoo hen jivin
brass bee hivin
Jimmy Finn
Mac Riley
Caughn
be highly
tread
be lightly,
often finds me
as a feather,
chevron
smoky
valley clouds
hung gray,
up-rooted
from the peaks:
sneaking
a glance
over my shoulder,
perched
on Old Boulder,
names
dates
chiseled
in beds
like clay,
cold in winter
is red rock
frost
rising like yeast
in to stay,
wishes well
in passing only,
as if to say
something.

Deviled Eggs

I found myself
foolish enough
to believe
I had stepped on
something permanent.
The ground stood
firm as Sherman's
line to the sea,
and left me
drowned
in toilet-bowl drudge
of mushroom
cow flop
in Farmer's Hill
drain pipe
of the last old saloon
kept yellow
in the wood,
carving out a little
space for its own,
a campfire
far from the beach,
the sea-breeze reaches
of the ruffian bank.
Manchester pines
bow break and fall
tautly sinew
tapered tall legs
level down to prawn,
leaning on the green
of praying mantises
mating on the garden hose.

Static

A humming choir
of crones,
twine burned bees,
in battled whimper
for the swollen
ghost October:
geese leave early
when snow comes early,
confused momentarily
and then, without
question, take
to the gray skies,
the pre-worn sweater,
the turtle neck dove,
the Ukrainian maid
in black and white
apron, bonnet,
lase chemise brazen
of lost manners
and proper table settings,
blades facing out,
start with the last spoon
and work your way in,
the farther reaches
of off-shore hen-houses,
cliffs so close to the road
that we might
pick up the wind
and flock with them,
easy as flurry,
hastily as Winter's Love
breeds out the Fall,
withers what's left of green
in our lint pockets,
to leave us empty
as froze puddles
in road pots,
air sockets in bread
leave room for yeast
to get a breath,
surface hump-backed
and grizzly
in the garden, wondering,
when did they get here?
The birds ship-in reply:
they don't ask why
we would rather
knit in silence
than play charades
and tummy-sticks,
speak fiddle
about the weather
as if it all "means something,"
when we stop
being fascinated,
white-eyed and bated
on tender hooks
in the horse and carriage,
afraid to be old
and lonely as Suellen,
kept up in the dank
trappings of columns,
darkly sung and swept
of leaves from the front portico,
the broad-side left to molt,
madly, over-looking the brook
that minds its own nonsense,
keeps quiet in the white
so as not to disturb
the elders, crucked
neatly in rows,
stitched,
hand-hewn
into a corn-husk wreath
on the front blue door:
gathered dust
from its attic hold,
traded for cold
clapped to lungs like irons,
and babies left
on the welcome mat
go silent
like Jesus save me,
swaddle me
as you once were
cared for, and of--
fearful for, and of this life,
and how it goes on
cyclical, mythic as Umpqua,
snow-covered boat hatches
chase Coos Bay
as lock-jaw manic mercury
slides down sinfully
its metal pole,
strip tease
onslaught of nether regions,
and fainting steps
tipped barefoot,
and light switches
flicked on for no one
to notice the trees
that don't make a sound
when they fall
without anyone around;
but, collapse calmly,
eidered down,
settled seeds
in the bottom cider jug,
stilling idly,
sour mash
on Marvin's Moutain
manly hides the brush,
stenching lust,
waits to crop-dust
the wrong gullets,
and stubborn car parts,
of which well-brought-up
young-ladies have no
parts in pissing on
over-heated radiators,
shimmying down
rickety rusted-on spare tires
from their car-belly
foot-hold up Diamond Ridge:
the coal-fire smokes out
the haystack house,
crawls crouched,
barely dodging the watch-
dog geese honks spot-
lightning us like prison guards
after a riot, where rape
after rape gets laughed
out loud, rolling on the damned
concrete, because,
he's a man
and he should take it
standing up
green bottles
at attention on top
of the kitchen cabinets
like wives,
prize turkeys
in the Scroogian window,
a ton-weighed pumpkin
at the 4-H Fair each Spring:
stepping in cow pies
and horse pies
and magpies haw haw
like they always have
at what's left of me, and us--
the us is left undefined--
and drops, rapid fire
flock shit
on my frozen windshield.

Reverb

Hack saw mountains

back into dusk,

skirt the husk

of old corn cobs

left to dry rot

on the stalk

stood still:

a 3-pinned wind mill,

a murder log drive

down Umpqua River. 

Fire up on the mountain’s

breast plate:

Pythagorean

digestive autocrat

on the black-ball rap sheet

taped to the Chapel doors. 

The metal wars,

the old tin-can men

straggling in the alley

like acid cats,

reefer madness

came in through the window

drafty as a bed sheet. 

Birth dates

are death dates

drawn like the lotto,

little paper slips

so unholy placed

on the television screen

like warning signals:

lonely lighthouses

on Carolina cliffs

beam down the dogged night

into a cavern of bats

and bogeymen,

the walking dead apparatus

of social-democratic dissolution,

the magmatic pragmatism

of sticking to your Latin innards,

and escapades

are SUVs,

and the View

is an apartment building,

of our own front wall

on the Western Front

stands battered,

lost cold

and mad-hattered

in the streets shambooking

for Friday fixtures

on the Greek mantle,

step pedestal,

soap box,

ottoman

Empire

to put my sock feet on

like Hawkeye Piece

is a leopard

is a lizard

on the rocks

along the banks,

naked pockmarked

in March:

the cold waterain

kept me jumping in

to save George Bailey,

the whole shit

gone over the edge of the map

and back again

to waiting for friends

to make themselves appear,

standing at the mirror

like a mad woman.

Fog Horn

This shakes my bones,

a whistle snap-dragon

in the wheat,

and thistle red

katydids

crickle in the reeds,

snicker soft,

easy as summer:

sly, sank dry

in the dust borne sand,

the heaving whelp,

drying cough

swelling,

sable harsh wailing

like a gun.

Decidedly

Bottle cold

in a glass Coke bottle

and shelve it for next summer.

Come the thunder

rush the Northern shoals,

the black-tar coal

a lock barrel man

makes in an hour

is wheeled out

in great metal crates,

passing through wrought iron gates

thru Mordor and McDonalds,

climb the counter,

the after-hour drafter

and two-bit paddy-whacker

toss a Jack a loan

pre-approved no credit check

or break the bank like Bonnie.

Ride the old train up

Tip Turn Canyon,

switch back

manic track

on the Tennessee trail.

Climb the stepped back

Smoky passes

like gallon water jugs

go for walk about—

ain’t nothing

but mosquito bait,

pale as mourning,

pink as birth,

masked humid

heavy dour in our chests

like clay clogs the banks,

and keeps at bay of its own

containments,

pauses for rain storms

on the back wood porch

covered, and shameless.

The naked plainness

stains Nebraska,

and rides the marshy inlets,

Cape Fear Caroline

and besides which

where is—.

You can live or lie on it

this old sin

of sitting on hands. 

Dust pans,

uprooted

cross-pollinated

potted house plants:

weary concrete  

crumbles bleary,

soaked and cheery

to be so cheeky:

frost bitten noses

and Teddy Roosevelt

bares on wooden steps,

crust fallen to dust bunny status

in the back bedroom,

window latches thrown open.

I wait til I get home

to take a shower,

an hour and a half from now

is half past the mile,

after while

settles soda in a can

alley taut a scowl at me,

stoic and grainy tin-type. 

A metaphysical relapse

unto the self

is secure in the knowledge

of love in the back bedroom,

the hatches thrown open

on belle country streets,

sing the streets, sing the bells—

the fresh water wells,

the Indian yell oh crow oh carry oh wanderer wary of winter and snow,

sit on the banks

watch the river slow

frozen crawl,

a white woolen shawl

on my shoulders. 

The more I get older,

I roll Sith old boulder

up the hill to let it drown,

crest and pull down

my crown to cover my eyes,

and rayon,

and lies,

from the back bedroom—

Cannon fodder

and big horses shod

clopping water

spout to mane

quivers a river,

stout as a train:

the whistle blow,

the thistle grow

a witches broom

all scraggly—

seagull rabid

on the jagged

rocks like knives—

broad-feather

wood-pecker

working through the snow,

digs the bugs and knows.

Filter

This building rumbles lowly

from its belly,

shoveling

shit, incessantly as oil,

minus the refining process—

can we adjust

the ever-rising heat

on our massive debt

fueled wish-list?

for active and patriotic

disenfranchisement,

uprooted matriarchs

sit quiet cloistered

in the  dark,

where the murderer

is locked inside

their heads,

and music keeps the ghosts away

fiending in the shadows

of the living room parlor

off the warbled foyer

that has nothing

on its eggshelled walls

with which to orient 

one’s self in space:

the broad range

of Texas white lines

on the highway,

stretching toward

that bigger Sun

fed on steak and greens,

reaching far

as the human eye

reckons to see,

past, shining before us,

a single light

cast from some figure’s face,

is a wind mill

motionless as a snake,

waiting on ratty deserts

to unwittingly ravage

like Bosnia:

the lowlife coffins

with too long names

that prowl the dirty night,

gleaning like guns,

dragging her by a fist-

full of matted hair,

and naked,

through the riddled streets all

bare bleeding is the night

that forgives not

the wareless wanderer

ensnared rabbit

in the grey wolf

council mounted

on high grizzly peak

of cratered communism,

to the ground dropped limply

and thups upon the pack dirt floor

that Mother sweeps

for pine needles,

and ghostly reminders

of things left for dead

in the annals of our damaged lobes,

poisoned, blotted blinks

in calligraphy

brain scan:

maps authoritative

response mechanisms,

Lou Gehrig, and alpha Rosie

of a different color,

an Emperor wasted

in another fairy tale

modeled after Hans

Christian Anderson,

masturbating

to stenographic receptions

of Emily Dickinson’s

lonely moaning

in her chambers,

the four-poster of dark wood

sitting in its white damask

aproned like a cherry

over its pit plum center,

hard as almond,

seeded in soil

over sand, over

complex granite

aqueducts—

as for falling willingly,

I’ve had my share

of white wine

and toffee

at the breakfast table,

humming,

drumming fingers

on the table top

and mopping

the corners

of my mind,

 a slurry

of cornstarch

and too much water

means you won’t

have to worry

about losing

precious

kimono—

yakking up hair balls

like a red tabby house cat,

champagne photolaughter

at the hordes milling on

the bull stride streets

uncanny and wareless

class of another habit

in the back den, the dim

drawing light through

the vertical blinds,

fence me in a bird

cage, white filigree lace

stitchings up the broad-

side of my neckline

waning bated mute

on the baroque mantel

heavens to marble

hearth wares

sortie fares

of mismanagement

and re-financing mortgage

mania in the handicapped

bathroom stall in the ladies

room at McDonalds:

we were somewhere

mid-Virginia, south to

Appalachia bound out of

town after town of white

window sills, and the

wood painted between

single glass panes

that shiver

when we shut them,

shuffle up them the rafters,

the attic banisters hold

the trees back, standing

at attention, planted by

human hands, they are

not where they would

have been naturally

by bees, and falling

acorns, fearlessly to the

foraging forest floor, and

the black beetles crunching

carefully between monstrous

hungry leaves, the mud

under-crust stuck wailing

alone in masturbatory

waiting lists,

and micromanaged

biological

warfare mechanics:

waging conflicts,

as opposed to the former

calling of things as they

were, stared down

the stark moon

of the Mall,

glaring in my ear canals

locked like Heaven holds

a baby waiting for its

Mother Mary

come to me, my

country tis of thee

am sw

Chimney Rock Farm Market
Piedra River
Los Pinos River
Spanish rock calderon
Colorado Arizona land
brush fire baby doll
four winds
Mesa Verde
Mancos 25
Cortez 47
con espanol
Jitters Java
Wildcat Canyon Liquor
Escalante wayside
cuff rose
Burger Boy Drive In
Jack and Janelle's country kitchen
High Mesa Designs
yellow and red
Pepperhead
Silver Bean coffee trailer
Navajo Springs
Teec nos pos
Tes nes iah