List poem, 12/28/2007

These my unedited goals
my list
my accomplishments
not yet started:

Step 1: Grow a spine towards friends
do not bend so easily and
when their kisses disgust me,
push them away.

Step 2: Laugh when I am amused,
not when it is appropriate.

Step 3: Avoid sex unless I want it.
Badly.

Step 4: More vegetables. Less sugar.
Less meat.

Step 5: Do not be so forgiving --
I didn't ask for it.
Is this Step 1 again?

Step 6: Fall in love as much and as often as possible. Keep two or three at the most -- don't lose contact with them.

Step 7: Write like a madwoman
and don't let that boy
get in the way of things.

Step 8: Stop missing Michael.
Just STOP.

Step 9: Finish this book
before I land.

Unmasked

We have been friends
for 4,020 days.
Lovers for five.
And everything should've been perfect,
but you, like all others,
are a signal misinterpreter.
And you say that I
am playing you a pawn
in my games.
As if 4,020 days was not enough
to excuse you from playing.

You have confessed, too,
your manipulating sin
as if I am some young,
unknowing, foolish churl,
as if 4,020 days wasn't enough
for me to read you
like lines on a page.
You say you are never wanted,
no one likes you:
it is because you are,
in truth,
unlikeable.
And you have hid,
I have watched
for 4,020 days behind a mask.

Darling, the strings fell long ago.
That mask has become your face.

static

Too many poems in my head
to actually write down
I am abuzz with sex
and I am feeling dangerously pretty.
I don't know.


I love you.

Family Matters

Amid Christmas wrapping
and bitter coffee
(two cups a mistake, I am jittery again)
My mother and I are breaking
we are crushing the shadows
of an adult-realised heritage
letting out the secrets
Unpenning them carefully
and narrowing our eyes cautiously
shot guns at the ready
We are tearing down the house
our ancestors built
with deliberation
and planning
This is no chaotic invasion.
No terrorist bombs
No government sanctioned war on privacy
Just us.
Careful. Quiet. Unseen.
And when they see what we've done
to these maddening generations of
shadows and lies
They will know
they were wrong
and they, too, will embrace the sun

Polaroid Portrait

She is wrestling with iTunes,
and it is late.
She is glancing with longing,
and fear,
at the boxes littering the floor.
She is tired,
you can see it on her face.

Her hands are tensed.
She is listening
to a ghost's voice
and a ghost's guitar.
She is remembering
what it meant.

Similes and metaphors,
a body wrapped in literary vomit,
a body kissed by ink.
She is thinking,
dear body,
I hate you.

She is world-weary and exhausted --
you can see it on her face.

horrible, stupid rhymes.

Little girl blue,
so tiny and frail
what could she do?
reflecting on her thumbnail

taken in by sweet dreaming
the autumn is gone,
now winter's night gleaming
on the marble of a pawn

so take heed, little girl
don't be tranquilized
by his fresh, filthy hands
on your lily-white thighs

no, he'll get you dear
with lips of strawberry lies
sickening and sweet
plucking roses from your eyes

he'll taste so good
but those kisses are fake
but his precious pills --
to dream, you will take.

Love Poem for ? - Aaron Kapin

So, I don't know what love is.
I can't define it.
Love is a cloud of fog:
when it's near you,
you can smell it.
When it's thick,
you can't see beyond it.
But rarely can you really know
if you are right within it.
The boundaries:
nonexistent.
The density changes every minute.
I don't know, ok?
But I can't see when I'm around you --
just some glimmers of sun.
And I can't breath around you,
I can't walk or run.

For Nora IV

I'm going to explain to you, Nora,
what's going to happen now,
Nora.
I am going to stand on the top
of my roof
and breathe deeply
filling my fluid-filled lungs
and I am going
to scream.
You! Nora! Nora! Nora!
Your precious face unseen for months,
Just a name on a screen!
(and barely there at that)
And FUCK THAT, Nora!
I did abandon my poems,
but I can't keep apologising.
I saw your name again, Nora.
The doctors are afraid that I won't recover
this time,
my ribmeats splattered on the wall
and my heart on the floor.

un grande mur

A part of me still misses your stupid face
the same part that misses the whistle
spouting from your lips two a.m. Wednesdays
"are you coming home tonight"
a question prefaced but you always knew the answer
was yes
the same part that misses your morning smile
accompanied by too weak coffee
"when will you learn to use the french press"
a question prefaced but I always knew the answer
was never
the same part that misses the plane rides to my home
the car rides down to Oregon
"didnt your parents tell you not to"
a question prefaced but we always knew the answer
was I don't care

A part of me still wonders what would've happened
if you hadn't left for the frozen north
if he hadn't tried to cheer me up with a date
if you had just listened for once
if I had followed promises through
I remember how light that ring was even now
I still feel its phantom weight pressing
as if waiting for the return of a commitment
we couldn't commit to anyway

A great part of me died by your hand
brick by brick I am filling that hole
with pieces of other men and my own spite
Even when its finished I will leave a flaw
just broad enough for you to break down
should you ever decide to return my last call
"i can't leave it like this,
it's not right"

renga

I will undoutedbly
write poems about you
until we are both dead

simple morning dreams
tangible taste memories
and your lips on mine

when I reach heaven
I will write your name
in clouds across the sky

Faith

I went to Mormon Church today
with a fever
and a wretched wracking cough
armed with cough drops
and the knowledge
of my own prophet's prophecy
that I am She
and She is me.
I bore witness to testimonies
given to the one true church
the one true god
and the true prophet
and his temple on earth.
They spoke of family
two families
biological and spiritual.
The church takes care
of the church,
it is sweet.
Their communion has no wine
but holy water instead
though I presumed
its holiness.
When I entered my home that afternoon
I thought how lonely
my own faith was,
so few of us now
how scattered we all are,
how our scripture cannot be written,
our testimony and sermon comes
in visions and deep dreams,
how we are given
in selfish selflessness
to other worlds
of ghosts and trees.
I thought of the ringing bells of christmas
and my anger at them.
I left my home and stood
in the cold rain
against the trees
watched my breath spiral upward
and I felt how lucky
I was to know my gods are me
and I am my gods.
Lucky in that my quests require
no conversion
no donation
just myself and my soul
entered into the great equation
that is the balance of the universe.

Give me no second family,
no flesh and blood of god,
no martyred sons,
no churches in foreign lands.
I walk upon my gods
and the very breath I draw
is all the prayer I need.