to her obligations

you will have to excuse shayna for not doing her homework. she didn't sleep anywhere near her bed last night. she felt that double fisting hoegaardens and miller high lifes at a trashy bar in cambridge on karaoke night was of higher priority than her scholarly pursuits. don't worry, cambridge carried her home in the crooks of his arms, but only after she violently airpunch danced at a hotel bar and chugged rubinoff at a strangers house, which, we are pleased to report, had a dog in it.

we will keep you posted with any academic developments, but unless she finds her homework lodged in the resinated ends of her pipe, i wouldn't hold your breath.

shittiest time of year

the rains came down so the leaves may carry a slick sheen and they go in groups down the gutter, future fodder for dirt, rebirth

and rejoice with their possum brothers, who rest on water logs

the rains roll down onto shiny highways, batting packing peanuts on the head, and dizzying the dance they made with the wooshing winds from traveling mom vans

and condoms, milk cartons, cigarette boxes, and the rest of the artifacts of the flesh are battered into splatter on the asphalt, abstracting and falling out of form

and tiny earthworms open their mouth and receive the holy reconstituted pulp of cumberland farms receipts

and the rains fall plainly on the seeds who see the raindrops seep into their eyelids, rolling back through the rubble into somewhere more subtle where

the birds who host a garbled chirp may not find them but instead peck at the life left behind in the break down lane

i’ve stopped writing love poems. for the days are long and grey and i see the wet garbage on the streets and the blanched earthworms with their skin slipping into oblivion and my heart does not find me there

but know i will reap the joys of new life, seedlings seeking to be trees in fertile soil, toiling over in warmer weather where i will find a clever, better way to pass my days

for catie

good morning

would be a cursory greeting

the day is grey and your lashes stick together,

spider eyes

quiet

is a helpless understatement

for the silent cries ricochet, spread out sighs

that say nothing

bringing up the rear with the existence boulder

push today into tomorrow, ready for form transformed

but my hands stick to the mud, the memory

soft and corporeal, it can be molded

into a dress, an end table

an a in media studies

but be warned

against stasis

to whom it may concern

you'll have to excuse shayna for not writing a poem today.

she was not inspired by the way the sun shone through the trees on the highway in the early afternoon

or moved by the long ride to brighton, falling into old radio habits with old friends.

she got stoned and fell asleep eating ice cream sandwiches with easy rider on in the background again.

we will keep you posted with any developments.

as always, a day late.

beautiful soup

more than glad

to feed you kale

after all

we've been through hell

the biggie shirt was cursed

in the soft folds of white cotton

laid biggie

like a snuggle commercial filmed at the good will

triple x and airbrushed

laid biggie

like the cover of life after death or brooklyn graffiti

worn for glory, but

the biggie tent was

trying for dying

two occasions

the first

best friends big birthday

show up to the nines with biggie

just to my thighs

bottle of wine and some hash besides

but i was so busy preparing party supplies

that he forgot me to eat and the tumbler of vodka

wasn't to happy about that

equally unhappy was the kitchen floor

who got to meet the vodka, well

they call it tumbler for a reason

biggie stared at linoleum

like a dog that knows what it did

but maintained the puffed

lower lip of indifference

the second

an early night, the eve of halloween

test in portuguese in the morning

shot of robitussin, two tylenol and

a heavy head to the pillow

ready for next morning mayhem

but what really happened

was i coughed myself awake

awake just enough to chug the open

container on my dresser like it's fucking water.

fell through the loose linoleum trying to climb

to some sense, a shower, anything but the morning

confusions of waking up to hallucinations

biggie smalls looked away as i tried

to pry him off my mostly water body

but stayed through to see

if he made me bomb portuguese

surely cursed

a west coast hex

i jumanjied that shit

and like the whitewash over brooklyn graffiti

stayed biggie

airbrushed and x x x

like the socks forgotten by a dryer sheet advertisement

awayed biggie

into the folds of a white cotton oblivion

thank you klon, kati

see the red tomato teeter

brimmed with pins

it faults/aflutter

remind red tomato, steer her

be supreme

queen stitcher/cutter

another brooklyn

i can't clean vomit from the street but

chance pull a tan man an ambulance

brooklyn needs to brush his teeth

maybe with a power cleaner

i don't know about holy days but

see his hisidic piss is in an alley

brooklyn needs to wash his feet

maybe with a deep sea steamer

remember

the pinprick tickle of yellow rays

and the fickle ritual of warmer days

please don't stray from the weightless cadence

of bare shoulder radiance that passion plays

arh

r's are hard

or

important pores pour poor power for porn

if it ain’t baroque, don’t fix it

“what do you get when bach is reincarnated as twins? a pair of reboks!”

honey, stop meditating

it’s doing strange things to your shoe collection

the house is too placid and you know it

sweetheart, realize

that i like classical as much as the next guy

but concertos in the kitchen don’t get dishes done

muffin, i’d love to

with you one day pop out a few, but twins?

might loosen up the screws past the point of mend

lover, don’t dottle

on thoughts of running reboks, records, transcendent splendor

when the weather requires cleaning and domestic tender

shes always dreaming

never the master of domesticity

shes always dreaming of the city

and funding or fronting heap sums of money

until it is done and with good company

buh buh

boxy boxed bullocks lockboxed box

do i know 2

do i recognize this body of work?

some lines cut and crisp like bone

others wading through sky and water

rooting for unmistakable nipples

do i know 1

do i know i am the poem, the painting?

shimmering lines bursting from the cement

a body with a quiet alabaster shine

and a cherry blossom bosom

to a lovely couple

the tattoo ink came down like a rain that permeates the walkways until the worms forget the earth and air

and they become fishing hook fodder for local fisherbys.

the tattoo ink announced its arrival with the buzz of a permissive apartment door, then stayed to eat pork rinds with 40's and rosanne on.

actually, it stayed longer than that, it became casual friends with the soggy cardboard at the corner of metropolitan and union.

it stayed like the everyday desires:

ginger ale; clean socks; a haircut; a solid, uninhibited fuck.

sometimes, i would walk to the sofa (or bathroom floor) and try to rouse the tattoo ink.

"get up" i would softly whisper to the holes in his ears

"don't you have shit to do today?"

but he stayed, a forever reminder that free rent is the best rent, as long as it's you paying the price.

first night

the neighbors hate us

she said with a broad white smile

katie had the safe on the floor between her legs

and was pushing the drill into what may or may not be a weak spot in the safe.

the metal powder was shooting off the combination and got on her legs

bleeding into the floor.

martin and greg suggested crowbars and throwing the thing off a tall building

but really they meant that opening the safe with a drill at 1 in the morning

was a loud way to kill time waiting for a whiskey delivery.

they found the thing discarded in the street

and with a flashlight convinced themselves that the shimmer of a plastic bag

could be filled with valuable, precious drugs.

they found a baby in the street too, it had cataracts in one eye

and they named it baby

they taught it how to smoke cigarettes and

asphyxiate itself in the windowpanes

why?

why am i having dreams of your pregnancy?

i know absurdities come out in dreamscapes

but come on

you have never been a woman

you didn't bud, you dropped

the same night/bed

you perform fellacio on yourself

and i am nowhere near

the reccuring bullet shower

am i not with it/you before we sleep?

and when will the mornings stop resulting

in abortions and straightened spines.

hapiness

a family full tank

window down acetate

french david bowie

a downy highway

with laughter in the bends

today

got some leads

on the city

from a prof

of poetry

got some reads

on trout fishing

what goes down

is to be seen

stream of c

you made me realize. i know what love is. it is now. an eyeball refraction. fingertips tickled by split ends. you swallow me whole.

one time, i laughed so hard i fell out of a willowtree. i remember the pin, a bright red bird with powerful wings that emulated the thing that never knew about falling.

when i played with dolls, the dolls were stars. north, south, and every direction of the wind. the north star fell down one day and johnny took care of her and they discovered bodies in the galaxies and galaxies in bodies and bodies of galaxies and as a result, naturally, fell in love. but a man cannot love the sky, it is so vast he thinks its empty but the life is too big and varied to notice. he wanted to live with her but had way too many figurines.

to ER and LS

lemon squares

oh lemon squares

you are very delicious

and make my birthday very happy

lemon squares

oh lemon squares

just because i made you with another

doesn't mean i'm unfaithful

the poem you couldn't write

" "

tt's

enough looking back

the way you're going:

a pillar of salt

the biblical beards of yesteryear

play shows in cambridge but

lot he is not

seven and seven is love

she is heavenly, the weaver girl.

celestial red robes, then bathing naked.

i know you have to steal her clothes.

after years of aligning stars on thighs

and two supine new lives

she must leave, and I can die.

crying, you will pry me open,

peel the years off with my skin

and in my yolk hide your children.

her mother will come with the gale

stormily pull out her hairpin

and quivering, quill

a separating silver river.

now only annually family by

a pyre of tired pied magpies

melons have the heart to carve

glints of glisten from lovers eyes.

sniff snaff

i would be lovely

if i wasn't this stuffy

but other than comfy

your bed makes me feel comely

blues berry jam in a minor

do you really think

that every thing is

blue and pink?

do you really like

to get cotton candy from

other guys?

do you really know

if sugar flax is

made of snow?

did you really throw

away your sticky

paper cone?

color choices

hello love

i threw my naked self onto stage

and watched it invent spaghetti

have you held me?

blaber snigit

this poetry thing

it's a sham

i inherited these words

every one

came through their teeth

and leaked into passive ears

i don't even try to

make sense of it

just happens

whats harder

is hearing the nonsense

of words thrown together

like we know what we're

trying to say

remaining water remains

she likes the long silent driving scenes
where no one is a gnarlrocket
only heard is the serene
quiet trickle of serpentines

she thrived in the throws of the city
dance parties of vinylish bowieosity
clusterfuckerish sheets and last and first trains
but the joys of pavement washed off with the rains

the waters and waves moved so rapidly
will technology bring voyeurentity?
with the cries clicks replies
shes surprised to be done

count to craigenty
or maybe
caraigenty one
almost ready
she gasped into a plunge

elation! dinosaurs triumphant

no more gluing roofs to mouths

feeling all confused and queasy

dinosaurs lay silent, sleeping

and dawn cracks the egg over easy

run crew reflections

its the longest month of the year, which doesn't really matter in the theater because it's a 6 call, but on the drive i don't need light to the the houses getting bigger, in fact, it'seasier to tell i'm out of my neck of the woods because the houses of the rich have a glow, the dimmers never fully off and the lawn lights beckoning beacons. the show was wizard of oz. and i was their bitch to the enchanted world of costumes. the ceo of wb mason's wife was the tin man. another wife was named muffy. and the monkeys? they were actual flying monkeys. and what kills me is now how privileged they are monetarily, although that killed me too. not only did these people go home to mansions, but they knew henry. and his presence is a fucking county. my professor. their director. they worked so closely with him. one of the fourteen year old boys knew his boyfriend. i didn't. they broke up and henry dies. the two events were unrelated, only sequential. it was a quiet cancer that ate at him until the shell remained, and even that passed too. but thinking about all that isn't in my job description. i have to dress the munchkin inheritors of the zildjian drum company. tell the tin man she looks beautiful in silver lame while she laments her matte figure and chews ginger. i hear about the scarecrow's sinead o-connor phase at bates, and paint noses that are conveniently upward facing on future lions, dogs, monkeys. i could try to marry rich and procreate soccer playing, balleting spawn. i could work my way toward a scituate utopia, but the yellow brick road rubbed off the soles and the ruby red slippers, glued on glitter.

so so

dino-sore

riche

days of driving by the water

riches trickling in the brine

theres no lying by the water

when you're of a lower kind

exercise in futility

my chain is the thread caught in thoughted knots

unstitching stitches penelope forgot

styro dance windy day

styrofoam hit

dancing on the freeway

gaining glory multiplied

in car crashes and pirouettes

calm fallacy

a life that whispers to you in the technifuzz before sleep.

worry, haste worry. the puzzle pieces won'y make that kitten in a basket of flowers if you shake the box around. find the corners, outside first.

ozzy

seraphim, the song is thin

days are longer than the sun

got me groanin for seratonin

but rest well earned is a job well done

children found

isis: hear my plea

red tide

uncleared water

she shows
projects the puzzle box pandora forgot
kept demons locked in their swaddling cloths
please expound on the difference between
slut and enigma

a low yellow glow
her headlights are cloudy
trying to guide tired eyes
our fathers and her father
left no spikes in the tires

she sewed
a special spot, your name
lest she forgot her soul
was once big, shared loud like
a poor christmas crock pot

he knows
she subsided with a riptide
underwent the undertow
until all to see are
lowest common facial features

waters grow with the
click of the odo and
taps on phone screened

and he knows
the great distances
are ones unseen

vd

romancing the stoned
leaves lackluster bones

sick sickly

cracked is the word for the skin splitting sick that makes her cry mom when she's nowhere around

drown is the feeling of retching and reeling on ice tiles down where her brow found the ground.

best left unseen

your screen saver is randomly generated security cameras. and you have a big screen, so it’s hard to ignore. you say sitting in your bed seeing into a tiny worldwide window is better than none at all. i’d drive myself crazy seeing where i’m not. already in my minds eye see the house party in allston, the dance party in cambridge, the state college thespians at a tone deaf bar, and your moustache quivering down a somervillian sink. i see the places i won’t go tonight, although the details come in the morning with the sports scores. already i see where i could have gone without effort, but what if i tried tonight? what if i wasn’t so damn casual with everything. i doodle with the paintbrush he handed me. what if my weekends were exquisitely composed? friday nights an italian sonnet, french wine, german opera. what if my security camera captured my evenings. wouldn’t be happier. leggings itch, bathrobes don’t. the days ahead are long and numbered, and will not be measured by tagged pictures.

the blizz

the snow came down like turpentine

moving new england pines to sidewalks

and leaving up their absence

we skied with rubber under our feet

and the so familiar streets were

rubbed out in a wet young evening

buzzy bee

my darlings

you're are pushed to the side

until seams align

words sweet plaything do not forget

the tongue that rolls over you and curls into

the bowl that stills there

book stray not from the crooks

in these arms that open to you like question marks

still soft new if not ready

speak to the end of the line about clothing making the terrain

and turning great planes into the hills that haul west to

lick sequins off big queens

h

h

sb fp

ten ball boys

zoom

piss for poets
or this old shit

on your butt

tails tailor

tail tailgate

eventful sumday

running errands

is that what they call it these days?

when i drop trembling mustaches

buy devil horns

(i should have earned them)

see faces of christ in the neighbors bedroom

practice djembe

then back

to my neck of the woods

to disappoint with reluctant petals

and sew prehistoric eyes wide open

dirty geffy

round two for my late night bowl cruise

non functional 24 hour car washes, deux

moi, rein.

one day we can blaze in tri color foam sprays

hearing the sturdy woosh of an anal automaton

and rejoice

rice night

your brown eyes

were a fine surprise

tore down skies

for the pine was spry

c to zzz

too big downswing

to do anything

but breathe out a feeling

6am car crash

the pressing purple of fingertips bruised

are truly hues of the heavy blues

wheel turned on water

when feelings were fodder

what's odder, daughters who refuse fast and loose

truly new

i have nothing new, my socks have been washed countless times. i mean literally countless, because it's not only me that washes them. i abandon them under sheets or climbing up stairs, and a week later my lover will say, oh i washed these for you, like they're doing me a favor.

i shed layers as the snake does, leaving behind a sock, a book, eyelashes, the stray lipstick smudge, and i want nothing to do with it. if i can't have newness in my things, i want nothing. blooming like a flower, i swell and rise and don't dare look at the petals on the ground, the deadness that once was me but is no longer.

burn what you have of me and i will rise out of it, bald and bones, beautiful and unshackled. breathing and complete for my lack of anything else.

but for now, i stay grounded and give a smile and thank them, choosing for now to reuse.

RE: Meditations in an Emergency

frankly franky, i really feel you. i get the same itch, you know? even when i'm in the city, with anything to do, i want to scream

WHY DON'T YOU LOVE ONLY ME? I NEED TO GET OUT OF HERE UNTIL YOU DO

i know that you know that that's as silly as it sounds. you spread your love thin, dear, like a pristine gloss that fills its full into the curvy cracks of a finished jigsaw. while you're left in pieces, you hold your beloveds together.

i've had my heart broken, and it is a rocket ship. the atom bomb splits and i'm send in direction i am facing at full speed, zooming on to prove them wrong. i'll find my spirit animal in the dessert waiting for me and then he'll be sorry. he will never find a spirit animal in that dingy studio playing guitar or diddling girls or whatever. and i'll have cool sunglasses too, and harem pants. he will be vulnerable to sunrays and dust and god knows what else.

no one will see your eyes then. who cares if they carry the crisp waters of change, the ebb and flow of desire? no one, that's who. your color codings are beautiful and self invented, and your eyes the color of skies are far more unseen, for all i percieve of you is what has pulled through those eyes, processed if undigestable feelings on reams of paper, so i'll carry your letter till i know what it means.

have you seen me lately? i'm not on tv but i walk the streets like you and love the trees so long as we're sharing the same city full of unlovers full of beauty

the one jazz class

i see your freckles in my mind

give it some time and they're aligned

see your freckles in my mind

lively and supine

i see a week when we're on time

lived in late sin sheets yours and mine

see a week where we're on time

gives me peace of mind

i wrote this?

rain splayed on insane windowpanes

sheets of sleet like a bad refrain

snow goes where hatpins did blow and

sleep creeps up like wet sugarcane

ode to the big earlobed comely

man you sweat charisma

the smallest eye move tickles and the eye candy glistens

razors on your neck, ruins on hands, deep eyes with perhaps some light at the end.

you pierced me, but that's not the right word. you permeate, and crawl through my nose.

i see you everywhere, on shirts, pictures, even your grafitti when i'm taking a piss.

you wear all black, ready for your funeral,and it's a quiet miracle you're alive

i'm glad i know the breathing and present you, but i long for the man of his stories

haunting

ghosts moan with an open rumble and open doors

to sneak first into warm beds

i didn't see you, but he did, walking before me

are you a little girl, or whats left of bathroom epitaphs?

catching up

i don't mind

buying your time

in fish soaked in an oily brine

what i want and what i find

in water wouldn't be combined

you could guess

what i'd like best

warm rest from wildness in this chest

but what i want and what i am

compromise the calm and storm

nasty sax

one thing about these breaks, man. they turn you wild and screaming into the night. they let you loose into the jazz bar, and you're the only little white girl there, and you're surrounded by some dapper motherfuckers in suits. no syllabus to give a shit about, you are free to drink whiskey and wind up in some yoga instructors apartment playing twister, hearing her cry about how the man with cancer she's been taking care of has been bending some other bitch over backwards. how you ended up safe in your bed by five girl, is something you will never fully understand, but you know there was a man 12 drinks drunker and 12 years older than you smacking the shit out of your gps in the passenger seat. the memories twist and curl like a snarl around the edges, but they're not as fucked up as they could be and neither are you, but you sure as shit smelled the salty air on the brink and had a good look down before worrying about showing up to class again.

pan9

ain't got no bones

with jimbo jones

but he got a bone for me

phht,a found poem

the bartenders a mini faggot, and fuck vice magazine

i got excitable, big time...it's all over anyways

seriously,when i'm trying to dance, get out of my way.

the dj should have paid me

he put the wreck back in records

i should have put on the soundtrack of kansas to come

a ny morning, 1pm

brooklyn, i'm staying in

the doorway to the apartment is hardly conspicuous

i should take advantage

492 broadway doesn't have windows

but there's the glow of old christmas lights

nestled around the brocade mirror, record players

we made it to new york, i celebrate

with warm bare toes that curl at windows

in a 2am ghost town apartment

i feel trapped

but it's such a big city

with wet trash that stays

the dry kind blows through your thighs

AH SRY

sorry i wasn't there to care

to be fair, to be frank

you called about blankets

sorry i didn't phone but moaned

at the dial meanwhile

groaned bus hospital

i wish i picked up to console truth be told

but a holdup to dinner

is what would have unfolded

i'll see you tomorrow if you're feeling small, oh

muscle relaxers are hefty setbackers

so don't swallow all to follow all your swallows

le sigh

a clean house, i know now, is the ultimate sign of boredom

not only is my house immaculate, but my nails are painted

guh

lost my phone

but i'm too stoned

to figure out

if it came home

to no one

i'm too mad. i wasn't always worked up, i was just working on being me. then here you are, herefor the harvest. i was just getting started, being happy to be, being alive to be happy, making eye contact. at the end of the day returning home to collect myself, to read from a book or to call my father or to get to know the brother my brother is growing into. not living with my boyfriend or going and not returning for four days. i'm not a person of habit out of habit, but routine felt warm and satisfying. then you, asking for my time, efforts, love, company,and you know what? it felt so good i didn't mind giving it. getting caught in the joy of your warm dry hands, the way you look reaching for cigarettes on the coffee table. i lose days in you somewhere. i love that you care,but its not what i needed but whats worse it's what i wanted, to make my stomach twist.but the thing is, i'm no good until i can grow, and have room to stretch my limbs to the sun. the snow that blows from skyscrapers is lovely, but it melts, turns brown and stains my socks. i'm not asking you to do my laundry, and i'm not asking you to hide your jealousy. but i hope you won't be upset when i get up to leave. i just had a taste of what it means to be me, really me, i saw myself and i want more. you are better than good to me, but take this as my ride for free. i'm a lost cause if you crowd me with calls on the cloudy freeway back home. don't make sacrifices for me, you wouldn't get jealous if you weren't serious, and i wouldn't get mad if i wasn't wrapped in you. being mad stops tonight, along with feeling guilty for your jealousy.

bbaahh

the sofa goat of my dreams

wouldn't be green but a

mean sort of sheen

that dreams tend to keep

hny

i saw a lot that 4am

but nothing appears resolute

or sturdy. resolutions swayed

with the legs that carried them

high occupancy

head counts count in the hov lane

so don't give head in the hov lane

cleaned

there is something to a clean room

it can be cold or new or forced or empty

thereare clean walls of my drunk neighbor

who says his christmas is quiet

its a children's holiday anyways

and the clean floor and desk of friends

just visiting the room they grew up in

then fly home again

there's the dust free dwellings of people

that couldn't stand it otherwise

and the meticulously folded shirts of my great aunt

who had all the time in the world

my room is seldom as clean as tonight

but i breathe deep and see my life

as it should be, a framed piece

of sedimentary sediment

not sedentary laundry

cleaning

today i came to my soul searching 2 1/2 hours late, but my coffee and egg sandwich kept me there, i wouldn't help myself. tomorrow big armed convicts will detail my car, i will wash my clothes and feel infinate again. my soul will be cleaned with my things and i will sing songs with a windex squeak. i will coo over clean mats and swoon into soft smelling sheets.

pierced septum

greg had it

a septum piercing dangling there before the dip before his lips

a precocious reminder he wouldn't let anyone punch him in the face

another greg did it

he was just some guy to me, around harvard square

someone jim lived with, but they both got out of the shit, kicked habits

i asked greg, the first one

brand me, cut me, anything to leave a mark.we never got around to it

but one day in the shower, he carved into himself a beautiful oak

most lovers carve themselves into trees, not the other way around

but that was greg, and us

this greg, the last one

laid me down after he did it, fishing his needle through me like there was

something on the other side other than my left nostril. my face went white

he asked me if i was okay and i said i had a mixtape of his, for an erin in 1993

the scars were left unseen

nhxmas

maybe i'll get an accent

traveling next to a gps

eve

therein lies lies

in bells that chime

silent night! holy night!

sitting below them

on long wooden planks of childhood

they are whispering from flannel pillows

muffled low tones that put out candles with steady metal swings

sherrice is my age and she has a child

sean is my age and once when i sang the hymns i didn't know who they were to

oh holy flesh, but he lives with the organist now

and a happy festivus

a young dreaded man asked

would this hat make it to colorado and will it fit a girl with a big head?

you could put socks in it and most girls think they have big heads

i wouldn't trust her judgement

a young long haired man said

he likes art and i told him to say hi to greg for me please

he wrote it down and showed me his field guide to whale insults

it didn't stop my missing him

a young man i knew quite well

brought me a burrito in a plastic bag and tried on bellbottoms

and it took my mind of the men of my day, flinging fitting rooms

almost feeling the shopping season

ed

better my plaid was worn but the kiss was yours

holly wipes

don't look at me like that,

i'll write one

about being mowed down at the mall

no row, not now but there were enough angry people

for the boxing ring to seem less far away

or about slapping myself driving to stay awake

first a little pat then a stinging

i psych myself out so that i'm hitting me when i least expect it.

blizzard is heard

we warmed up all right
washing all the cold from toes
we were up all night
waiting for the snow to grow
wishing more for hot coca
waking up to eggs and toast
we saw brightness whitened
out our windows
blowing snow

last day of chanukah

he makes friends wherever he goes

so clear the dance floor for dancing with myself

at least it's not christmas shoes again

and at least lynne is here

and a really drunk liz that goes

"i'm goanna make a fire with my cordouroys"

then burns a pretty circle in jim's neck

arse poetica

at the bar, i tell them

i need to fart out this poem really quick

before i get too shitty

and after laughing and making raspberries

if they’re not too drunk they’ll ask why

and i say because today is today

and poetry happened

and if i’m not a dick

i’ll write it down

at the food court

it's all bullshit, you know

new england christmases

the covers of butter cookies tins are lying to you

they are cold, and even if you are a lucky fucker with a car

you still have to scrape off snow and wait for cold to grow

out of cyllinders

new england christmases

they are cold and mean and loud people yell at you

to slow down or go faster, no matter what you do

and whatever you do, it isn't enough

you're broke and you're only getting broker

buying wool socks or tires

and nothing at the mall says i love you

and you know it and you don't give a shit

jouissance, substance, gentlemen, when

I remember when I first saw cats. I was wrapped in a blanket, in awe of the airbrushed unitards. I remember the first time I smoked weed. I ate pumpkin cheesecake and was supposed to be getting supplies for my missionary trip. I remember my first kiss, it was under that same blanket and started with my nose

I remember when I had my beard for my stage makeup class, there were screams in the girls room. I remember the first time I drank beer. It tasted like my dad. I remember how I suggested starbucks, and you grimaced and took me to get “real coffee”, it became my favorite place.

I remember winning 300 tickets in an arcade crane game. I got a unicorn figurine and my two front teeth were missing. I remember the first time I dropped acid. I tasted purple and my head came very close to falling off. I remember being flattered and repulsed when a local white supremacist said he “liked the way I was built”

I remember when we had to change into our costumes for dance class, and I was the only one without a bra. I remember the first time I did salvia. I lit a microwave on fire and fell in love with a Brazilian musician, who became triangles. I remember how you tried to pick me up at work, but I really just wanted to get my sewing machine back from the shop.

I remember that art phase I went through where I cut off toy animal heads with a rotary saw and mounted them. I remember the first time I did coke. I talked really fast about tattoos and fell in love with the phrase “Barn’s burnt down. Now I can see the moon”. I remember when I ordered a multigrain bagel with butter because I missed you and almost cried at check out

I remember the first time I did pure mdma, it was at a spirit animal party I threw, and was on a lot of other things. I remember dreams where my teeth would fall out, picking at my gums until they stretched out onto the bathroom sink. I remember the day I had a pot full of boiling marijuana butter on the 87 bus (it smelled), then I broke my shoe and was locked out of my house.

I remember you helping me across the ice in the common. I think I loved you most then.

rest

i think

that thought

can wait

one naught

hoo

there's no such thing as bad breath

bollywood final

curry western

in a hurry

scrambling ramble

papers flurry

delighted writing

on the fly

eastern cowboys

lullaby

i'm trying not to yell

so it's like, i tell my mom
i can't have a car with a broken speedo
i look down, and no matter how hard i push
i'm not going anywhere.

my miles never grow, and i stay the same.
i'm idle on the highway anyway today
but i want to feel the bristle of bustle
progress you can't find on npr

so you can imagine my upset
when you know where i am
and i know where i am
and can't get to you in my stagnant distress

in the fridge

is your angel hair
golden a bowl?
is it getting cold?
does it save your soul?

are your deviled eggs
molding or old?
downhill with the rolls
or a sight to behold?

overlap

race track record playing it safe guard rail way ward in prison tattoo gun show down and out of luck be a lady gaga goo gone with the wind tunnel of love sick of your shit storm warning

salt assaulted

hey, i wouldn't worry about not being able to fill dive bars
like you did ten years ago, its time for prime college shoegaze to shine

if it makes you feel better, we can wear matching striped shirts
and strive to solve, imagine, create, or recreate crimes

just let's not crash the car on our drive to yell at burger kings
although i won't say no to go and get those dry free french fries

werd play

it's not
snot

sweat tears
sweaters

...

i got your man back
you got my back, man

stop it!

belly laughs ache and
they left us full

but it was a lovely night

i didn't mean to be me, a mean sordid sort without retort for what it means. to glean wet cheeks, to be sorry i can't be anything but in between, uncanny to have me but it's not what i seem or mean, for i love in a dream not your fantasy.

first snow

as scarlet o'hara cries by her life
we resort to older times
practicing most ancient rituals
with no petticoats assembled