Untitled - December 2007

"Death will give us back to god just like the setting sun is returned to the lonesome ocean."
-Conor Oberst

/ /

After my brother's death, my mother and father retreated into the separate countries of their grief, observing the strange customs of these new lands in the wake of untimely loss. I can say nothing so eloquent about myself; I watched a lot of television, mostly things my brother would have watched.

It was 1968, and my brother was a hero in the way only war makes heroes, and I could have been next but I wasn't. I was fourteen and struggling with so suddenly becoming the oldest and the only. At the funeral I sat with my cousins who dropped baseball cards into the casket and talked too much, looking lost and getting high behind the funeral home.

In the months that followed everything was dull down to the knives at dinner, so when Mom left and the screen door slammed and shook against the house I didn't care until my father sat down at the kitchen table and cried.

The men in my family do not cry. This is not a personal choice but a biological irregularity, having less to do with tear ducts and more with brain receptors and whiskey. The sight of my father at the table with a sob stuck in his throat like a chicken bone that won't go down brought a strange kind of fear to the surface of my brain, and I realized I did not know what to do. My father defied biology and sat at the table and cried fat tears of shame and humiliation.

His wet eyes shone with embarrassment and failure, his hands trembled as he lit a Lucky Strike on a kitchen match. I remembered after a football game where I had fallen and sprained my ankle, my father dragged me upward and punched my shoulder, called me Pal and brought me a root beer. So I punched his shoulder, light and quick and because he was crying the unfamiliar sting of tears harrassed the backs of my eyes and I punched him harder, each meeting of fist and body asking Why have you betrayed me, Where is my mother, Why are we crying in the stark light of this room with the light swinging and the moon so silent above us? Why do you look at me with failure sketched on you so undeniably written and so obvious?

But my father did not have answers for these questions left unasked at my tongue, he only had tears and the sloppy sounds accompanying them, stupid smoke signals I could not decipher rising from the cigarette perched in his stupid lips.

Old Writing (late 05 thru early 07)

out of doors
the world drips like an oil painting
on its side
rain falls down onto the roof
no end in sight

//

this is growing up,
the inconvenience of changed voices
and new bodies we don't
recognize
new terrain
strange to the touch

//

specks of dawn
in the folds of your dress
creeping down your back
slow insects

//

10/17/05

winter creeps
from its hollow-tree hiding place
and wraps its pale, glowing arms
around the landscape
in a blue embrace

//

there is daylight on the water
there are remnants here

//

your 3am eyes
look up at me
they are caved in and your
voice is cracked
witching hour has passed
and we are left alone
with the burnt out candles
and spells finished and cast

//

He was a creature of habit, as all old men are, brought up one certain way and then continued in the path of habit for so many years that to be anything but habitual would be alien, strange. For years, even before the death of his Alice in an accident that kept him from riding Ferris wheels at the state fair, Henry would wake early and in the darkness of morning jog the two-and-one-half miles that led to the graveyard. There were always graves to visit, bred from the long association with unhappy people eager to take the first available train to somewhere else.

//

We are parked on a street, the name of which I can never recall, the world closest to us visible only by the meager offerings of your headlights, and we are watching the lights on the pier shimmer in the ocean beneath them.
Your hand is cold, you unbutton my sweater and struggle with the ties on my blouse in a fumbling first attempt to touch me. I let you.

//

don't look at what they took from us

//

her wrists are fragile, made of air and wood and glass. in time, she will become a memory, as cold and colorless as the tide of the tropics remains to me now

//

It had been a few years. Karen wasn't entirely sure she remembered the number, or that the phone in the booth would even work. It would be characteristic of god to knock down phone lines or cause a black out in order for her call to not reach home.
Two quarters in the slot and trembling fingers dial a number remembered from the darkness of past years. Hesitant ringing, quiet prayer to a god not entirely believed in. A familiar voice, rough with age.
"Hello?"
"Daddy?"
Silence on the other end. Hope that the line has not gone dead. It has. A click.
Karen hung the phone onto its receiver, leaning back onto the glass wall of the booth. It's dark in Pittsburgh, darker than any darkness in the suburbs, where every corner is guarded by the harsh yellow light of a street lamp, keeping kids safe from the unforgiving choices made by Death. Here he sweeps his victims swiftly as if they never existed. Being here, it is possible they never did. It's darker than the corners of the school Kevin took her to make out after the football games, still sweaty in his uniform, pushing her pleated skirt higher up her thighs, tugging at the Tuesday panties she wore on Friday.
She had been class valedictorian, she had won scholarships and science fairs and the hearts of every boy she passed in the halls. She gave it up for Kevin, followed him out to Pennsylvania because he said they had a life together, they could have babies and a picket fence and whatever she wanted. She said she wanted garden gnomes and little babies and flowers on the window sill and a kitchen that looked out on a garden where her babies could play. He said Sure thing, babe.
Kevin had friends with money and a place to crash, so they stayed with Michelle and Jess for a year and Kevin worked delivering booze to restaurants.
Karen thought about this and looked at her watch. Counted the hours since Kevin threw her out on her ass. Three hours of unfamiliar streets and the kindness of strangers with a few bucks to spare.

//

all the news reports recommended that i stay indoors

well, if you're feeling sinister

girl, fragmented 2005
he was on the verge of the atlantic
where the coast is lined with small
hotels and families on vacation

when he met her: smiling girl
with sun-browned limbs and
a curious, lopsided smile

he remembers her now only
in words, adjectives, snatches
of descriptions used in retrospect

("blue eyes" or "sand-colored hair")

he feels he might be able to form
a picture, part of her face or
possibly a more crude vision,
girl bent, fishing for a dropped
object in the waters of a hotel pool

spine prominent,
swimsuit white,
and wet,
nearly too small

and, if not in words, he remembers
the scenery surrounding them: palm trees
balmy night-air, ugly tourists with veined legs
and ugly swim caps

he remembers saying goodbye,
the way she squinted through
dollar-store sunglasses to maybe

catch a glimpse of him
in the backseat of his father's car
because he was waving

hoping he might embroider
upon his thoughts or eyelids
her image
but only remembers

"hand on hip"
"waving lazily"
"yawning, i think"

//

2005
a cautious journey
of your fingers begins
as they stumble
through the heat
and your hand chases
mine
through a bright
desert of castle ramparts
and tickles the sand
sleepwalking
through the sunlight
echoing off
the chrome
of my father's car

like a stranger in the city of myself

tripped up
the stairs
on
my
way
down;
over shoulder
comment to
everyone
watching:
"i'm
just
a
bit misplaced"

//

she dreamed into me
filling me
with the ghosts
& memories
that still remained
tenants of her thoughts.
sometimes
i think i have a chance
of catching her
and then i hear
the faraway sound
of a dj
giving me the date
and time
and a top 40 hit
comes on the radio.
good fucking morning
to you too

always the wrong way

i couldn't wake up today

7/26/06
i hear the twang
of someone's sadness
played
on a steel guitar
somewhere
down the street --
i am followed
by the music
like
a dog trailing
in the wake
of my travels
following
at my heels.
but the song
is not in my head
for it evolves
constantly
into newer music
into newer misery;
i am not capable
of holding such sadness
i remain an observer to it
only someone who
has known a great deal of things
can take such melancholy
and twist it to make sounds
so baleful
and i have learned very little
despite being taught
very much

//

5/4/06
i go there still
if not to dream of you (and the time before)
then to pretend that i am
to see daylight glint off
the faded manes
of the carousel horses
to cup my ears
for the sounds of children's
laughter
that sometimes still haunt
the place
like gleaming ghosts
and i watch the horses' eyes
cast to the sky
to make silent remarks
on the shapes of clouds
and their brighter outlines
do i think of you
when i think of childhood?
to think of you so silver
young & gleaming
of the brighter days
before the war

//

3/14/06
it is nearly spring --
the promise of warmer weather
and rain
looms like the last impatient notes
of an interrupted song
and i am ready this year
my hair is dripping with melted snow
and is waiting to be wrung dry
bones ache for the warmth of april
winter-cracked skin
preparing to bronze
and freckle

//

wind
wind teases hair
breathes salt air
on skin
as we set up chairs
in the sand

//

"this is the difference between us"
she says, putting her hands
over mine
to trap them there
the way i have been trapped;
to anyone else
we are talking about the weather
and it is raining
but we smile like the light
is pouring in for the first time after winter
in the days where you cast off gloves
and can feel someone
holding you
for more than warmth
"you want, and i need"
and it is raining
and my gloves
are in my lap

//

2005 #1
chills run their fingers
down your spine
until your skin
is a forest of bumps
and shivers break like waves
across your limbs

//

2005 #2
the wind
screams
a
hollow tune
to the air
which carries it
outwards
and
transports
the
sound

//

2005 #3
this renaissance
does not
come
lightly
but it does
come
and with it
brings
redemption

//

2005 #4
there is a certain sadness
reserved for loneliness
which presents itself
through boredom
and empty,
rustling fields
under a drowsing,
lunar eye.
gradually, as one
removes himself
from the city
the streetlights turn
to stars
buildings to burnt trees.
the low rumble of
aircraft
is rare and fantastic
like the yawning
of a giant
in a small boy's dream

summer

6/23/06
each summer the last summer. -denise levertov, "living"

each summer the last summer
the only remembered summer
in retrospect
the one so eagerly
anticipated
& then so uneventful
like a puritan striptease,
a withered erection,
the kentucky derby:
Each summer the summer
most sacred
Each summer the summer
it did not rain so
much the summer before
because Then is turning
to accommodate Now
with small movements like
the fluttering of birds' wings
& every night the world
ends
the way scientists warned us it would;
what is it about
summer
that is so evanescent?
each summer
the last summer.

//

a summer calm laid its soothing hand over everything, like death. -sylvia plath

//

6/7/07
there is daylight
on the water
there are remnants here
of gods
who have gone
before

today is wednesday

6/6/07
"goodbye" she said
falling back into herself;
i watched her fade away
like i dream i would forget
upon
waking

//

1/16/07
i dreamed of you and me
not climbing
but settling in the belly of
a mountain
settling for years of rest; hibernation
like bears
but we, the two of us
are not fierce as bears
though we would like to be
and pretend to be
we are not truly brave
you and i have no bravery
we are too kind
despite what we like to believe
we will always be too kind

//

8/27/06
her hands
are workers hands
hands that have produced
art
have held many
a crying face
to soothe the
trembling of a lip
and kiss crying eyes
hands that have
held other hands
have stroked skin have
pointed to other hands
and waved in greeting
have produced art:
sculpted faces
in clay, chiseled
and brought bodies from stone
eyes blank like the statues
in athens
her hands are mother's hands
are farmer's hands
plunged deep in the garden
returning to the earth
what she has taken, rows
of vegetables and flowers
her hands are sturdy hands
wrists turn to palms
turn to fingers
more stout than they were
but not so they are
no longer beautiful
her hands are rough hands
are red
are calloused for they
have learned a day's work
are chapped from wind
and wrinkled
and weathered by time
as time time changes all things
the ocean changes the sand
rushing until nothing is left
but the memory of a beach;
a photograph in
her hands

put out the fire boys

don't stop, don't stop