to her master going to bed*

come sir, come all, who am i to defy

til i'm favored, by favors i abide

oh my america, how did you know

destiny manifest would help your growth

unzip yourself, for all your pantomimes

suggest that you can't wait long lengths of time

subdued, submerged in entertainment passive

numbs me: i see your glory, it is massive

with lighted screens as my own anesthetic

freedom i can deep throat, all apathetic



* based on a lovely poem by John Donne, found here!

suicide schmooicide

i remember your skeleton knuckles
black blown out lines
from heated hated prison hands
and shudder seeing your name

i remember your eyes that pierce
your self pierced septum
fierce as a hearse
14 gauges of metal
shoved through with cool momentum

the pop of skin from left to right
tensions breaking, blood blooming
on the day we both saw, nose raw
would be enough for most

malcontent, you slit your throat
calmly, like a shave
who found you exposed, i don't know
but they sure as shit put you away

your mind goes to the darkest places
racing to decay
i want to gather every mote
before you slip, lose your grip
and break like a china vase

hard morning

when I wake up, it's in a children's room
with rich purples and pristine whites and flowers flowers flowers.

pictures of them; dried framed ones; painted and stickered on walls; painted on paper then stuck on walls.
pom poms pinks greens blues.

i run my fingers through my hair and discover some wrapped in embroidery floss with a plastic bead, saying “s”.
also notice i'm wearing jenna's sweatpants, then pick plastic tape off my arms, pull plastic bags from bracups.

feel my head tighten and my stomach turn and my mouth smack with the dry thickness of a sunday morning in a room that is not mine in a house full of sleeping friends that are.

tired platform shoes/stations

Waiting for public transit
i sit next to a homeless man,
talking to a street performer,
playing spainish guitar.

He talks nonsense to him closely,
about space and war.
He plays, looking forward
with wide glass eyes.

The man loses interest in the musician and turns to me.
i tell myself to look at him
so i can hear what he says,
so i know what to write.

The burrito i’m eating is so poorly made
that i must perform cunnilingus on it -
eating it outright.
I hear about boys and girls on posters, i think -

My eyes unfocused, downcast.
He gathers his bags of newspapers,
but he does not wipe the phlegm from the corners of his lips
and i see his engorged left calf as he walks away.

mikey likes it

losing cigarettes in the people pack
while the hordes swarm
city hall dances too, swirling lights
the people gathered for eva's death
but then they knew not how to moondance
tonight, big haired girls stood smiling
limp plaid shirt men swung their bones around
and the city swayed with a long lost pop

retrieving records, rompers

there you were
and there i was
looking up
at your face illuminated
then not
and again and again like benevolent waves
backlit then apparition
always moving forward.

in the tedious, sporadically lit hallway
you rolled me past doors
that hide the precious and worthless
i look at you, feeling small
like a baby in a shopping cart
then we make all the faces we can
with our tongues and cheeks and eyes

pull the trigger

billy mays, a bearded dream
wants to sell me oxyclean
in a haze, I buy the stuff
tough on bluffs
is the washing machine

go go china

oh lord am i busy
learning about china
dissension hasn't caught on there yet, you know
the tallest nail gets hammered down

when they take over
you better burn your anarchist poetry
and say yes sir yes what can i do, memorize
you'll get the hang of it, we'll harmonize happily

oh oh castro

they televised your trial, you grew as viewers knew
locked you up, then to mexico you go
batiste, the capitaliste
trekked to the mighty mexican mountains
and nipped at the buds of revolution
but the weed of want is strong
and mud ate the machines of war.

if john glenn wayne
gleaned a skyburst
and waned with the moon
you’d be to blame

oh star spangled country
why did we try
to spray LSD on this guy?
or powder the mans feet
to make his beard retreat?
then it didn’t work when
they poisoned smokes and pens

so throw the proof away, CIA
and let Fidel be true today
the doves came to his shoulders
and they are here to stay

you know,

selling antiques is like selling street drugs
and selling your teats is like being in love
you have merchandise, and they pay the price
sure somebody's won. you'll know who when you're done
but it works like the roll of the dice.

last train, the forevermobile

end of the week
end of the line
and thats how it feels

tired feet
head heavy
and buzzing with the beat of the T

loud townies
yell to angry hollow metal
about failure


eyes like holiday marbles
they choke and scream on phones

then the blue voice of the baby boom
says they must leave soon

no rest for the wicked

late night experiments
make work hard
and naps easy

seafoam green discs
slip from under my skin
and into my room shimmering,spinning
flickering like an old projector

i wrapped myself in matts warm down
and you talked about detox,massages,lesbians,court dates
your voice fast, strong, needing something
the cartoon lines blown out and blurry

rolling my eyes to the sky
i set my alarm to four hours from now
anticipate a difficult and glorious shower
and drink down my tap

you will later take me
to draw circles of sleep
around tired eyelids

to jeffery amadaeus

soggy remains
after the rains
crows come round
adown on the grains

therapeudic sunday

i think
that, um
i’m getting
better, slowly
eating with family
and not wanting more
loving and talking at work
or too busy with work to chatter
nights are when i see some friends
not enough to be so reckless and messy
but enough to keep in touch and feel loved
i pet midnight on the head and plan out my day
then clean sean's bathroom and go antiquing for iron
or to diners where staff count change in lieu of filling cups
then, some red light racing high school boys in big white pickups
i hate to say it but i think i'm happy with it all and having some fun

the walk back, the ride home

i get just enough time in harvard square to keep me sane. the homeless vets humble and bad beatles covers by ponytailed jimmy buffets make me feel the strength of actual creation. i see fashions; ironic, real, incidental, purchased. books in windows, smelling soaps. yoga mats and meatless burgers, paying pretty pennies for strawberry smoothies. starts making me thankful for my humble home.on my way there via rickety red rails there are men that are now women with sneakers and nine west bags, blue haired lesbians with portly moms, the desperate, the tired. beautiful rich young things talk about picking out wedding veils and how homeward bound killed countless puppies in japan. privileged khaki men with button downs unbuttoned, drunk, talking about the value of time. all of this at snowballing volumes, clamoring, clashing, begging for a piece of my precious attention. tomorrow i will remember to charge my ipod.

donning dawn

good morning, mourning

good evening, awning

well-worn's the warning

pawned fondles yield spawning

typewrotwer poem

rivers don't have issues

today
i’m afraid
of the dark waters
and the inner storms

but my helm will not plunge
it will point to the sun
in sleep i await
tomorrow

Making A Great Nursing Environment Together

my father, the metal man
with millions of prickly particles
sometimes in every direction
ambivalent, unsure
sometimes in magnetic fields
he draws toward, assures

today a different magnet stirs
i'm pushed away for unknown days
no suitcase, just me
in my clothes, dirty
from worky
my ass thrown in class

hands shake, directionless
wanting the elements
to turn around and
dry, realign
my horseshoe head

classsssssy

lotus eaters
eating lotuses
with a xanax chaser

i will get old
i won't stay here

nonexistent, noneventful life
in provincial massachusetts
lends itself to chinese dreams

i will learn more
i won't know all

sticky rice
sticking sides
tasty travel tangents

sunday: family, drugs

old friends and too many cigarettes
you’ve gotten big
your little brother graduated
your nephew is going to preschool
your mom is the same, mommin around

i eat a watermelon with a fish knife and a broken fork
tell my little brother skin heads are fucked
not to get jumped like his friend
we smoke a blunt at the sea and skip stones stoned

tried to hit a pile of mud but never did
when he almost got it, i’d give him big flat grey ones as incentive
and saved cool looking ones for myself

no seaglass but there was a dead fish
what if there was the most beautiful piece of seaglass under it anthony quizzed
i still wouldn’t touch it I said
i know myself that well at least
maybe my fears will change with the tide, when we both get high

spectacles spectacle

in these glasses
i am not broken
cracked out
held together with sharpie and tape
like my old glasses

i am queen of the 80's scene
an inverted gender version of the breakfast club
is where i'm the nerd
geeky chic

in these specs
i'm not wrecked
i dont have holes from heels
on toes and balls of feet

i am full of grace
coo! shoes, doves replace
creamy arches, ankles
bangles of lace

i am the five hour steamer

sultry steam seeps into shirts
hawaiian, printed paradise

rehanging, refolding
reworking working.

redolent of earlier eras
where fashion was in fashion
and retail ruled

wet all day

third day, three showers
my first at the ass crack of dawn
with no hot water

i jumped back in bed in a flash
hair had the frothy hum
of two in one

two was after a long, messy sandwich
i grilled at work and ate on the grass
by the bus that I took home

blew drew my bangalangs
and let the wind take care of the rest
sky sprinkled, follicles followed

three was at the very very end
a hot forever shower
that washed it all away

let's pi picasso

dada, baby, i’m so many shapes
crazy eights, cha cha
through the gallery

obtuse but not obscure
acute when minds refined
multiplied demure
when our squares are aligned

chillest past time

picking up habits
concerning picking up
while picking up

jay with an eye for glam
i pick shiny human leftovers
from the earth, beach glass
softened by the ever ebb

short stop at the street corner
then up three stone steps
into the sand, crab carcass
splayed, crunched claws
or whole baby ones, belly up

former sea life is the peril i face
but it’s not like i can wait
for the spare albatross or mallard
to finish picking the shells off