Poor

And suddenly they were poor, their money
Evaporated. It was horrible and it was beautiful,
The sudden freedom of having nothing, setting
Aside all cravings, ignoring their credit cars
As if they were old lovers showing up drunk at their
Glittering engagement party.

They stayed home instead of giving in to the malls,
Settling for homemade coffee and tea, for reading books
Long neglected while listening to old records while
Nestled beneath old blankets. They were so poor
In this new economy they forgot how to be
Dissatisfied with last year's model.

So poor.
So poor.
So poor,
They almost forgot to be unhappy.

Ah

You were brought up in the forest

Of the forest and for the forest

And god you were beautiful

You had hair like fire

Your eyes clear fucking streams

And when you sang

When you sang

When you sang

My skull vibrated my head nodded

And yes, I wanted to dance.

There is nothing 

Wrong 

With that.

The Screaming Frog

The frog would not stop screaming

Even after we brought it home,

Even after we gave it whiskey.

Its brow was smoothed, its cage

Enlarged.

Still, it screamed throughout the night

Like some poor tortured thing so

We let it go, released it into the wild

Where it screamed even louder

Until some prowling preditor

Put an end to that.

I Dream of Wookie

Gangly howling beast,

Warrior of the Rebellion,

You are filled with the barely controlled rage

Of the mistreated, of the marginalized,

Of the forsaken.

You know your power, buried deep

In your hunter’s heart,

And you do not hesitate to harvest your enemies

With your crossbow of fire,

Their gleaming white armor useless,

Palpatine’s paper dolls.

 

You laugh,

Warm in your anger,

Your fur,

You are the mighty Chewbacca.

How To Go To Work

Slam that alarm clock until your fist bleeds and
Jump the fuck out of bed, ready
To conquer and don't think don't think
DON'T THINK!
Just get thy ass into the shower and
Drill hot water into your skull
And smell the soap and pretend the whole day
Will be this good, this hot and watery.

Get out of the shower. Remember:
DON'T THINK!
Get dressed. Get dressed for success, bitch!
Eat your corn flakes, make the darkest, most heartless
Pot of coffee imaginable and drink it drink it
DRINK IT DOWN!!!
And put things in your wallet purse briefcase and look around
Your house/apartment/domicile suddenly Paradise Lost
And walk out that door, hallelujah, walk out that fucking door
Don't look back DON'T EVEN THINK OF THINKING GODDAMN IT
Just keep walking
And riding and driving and then you'll be there.
You'll be at work and, sweet Jesus, may god have
Mercy on your soul.

Pack Your Goddamn Suitcase

Night is falling fast and yeah,
They're after us fuck
They've caught our scent and
If they find us,
IF THEY FIND US,
It won't be pretty.
It won't be like springtime in Paris;
It'll be more like where we grew up
All that mud,
All that blood,
And the cold rain, drilling through the ceiling.

The Burning Hand Festival

Have you ever heard the sound
Of your own flesh being scalded?
It doesn't sound that different
From wok chicken, or Sunday morning bacon
Hitting the pan.

You reach for something,
Feel that pain,
And pull your hand back.

After that,
All the cold water in the world,
Can't change the past.

After that,
You remember.

Drunken Rave #4

Honky tonk angel
Why don't you knead
My shoulders

Why don't you knead
Me?

Is it because I tripped
On my way to the bar?

Is it because I mistook
My wallet for a rat
And when I screamed and stomped
Dollar bills flooded out,
Looking for cheese?

Cheese!
Bring me some cheese!

Wild Things

They marched through the city,
Singing songs of lament while
Breaking everything they could
With their hydraulic hands.

We stood on top of the barricade
Watching them approach. A sea of
Torches lit the night, so many faces
Gaping wide.

They howled like their lungs
Had taken this all personally,
And wanted to attack on their own
Two feet.

They washed up below us, breaking
Against the boulders, the riot gear,
And when I gave the signal
The wild things caught fire.

We watched them dance, more beautiful
Then they could have ever known.
We watched their mothers fill the streets,
Beating their breasts.

At dawn, the street sweepers whirred
And all the trash men lined up,
Eye bright with the promise of overtime,
Their arms filled with silent refuse.

Halloween Poem

They came up out of the swamp with
Moss dripping from their shoulders,
Eyes gone and abandoned to time.
They staggered down our street,
To our house, and knocked on
Our door.

I asked them to please come in.
They sat down on the couch and
Slid out what was left of their legs.
I made tea, hot and black, and we all
Sat together drinking in silence,
Remembering the old days
Like they were somehow better,
Instead of merely different.

We sat for so long all the tea
Evaporated from our pores and soon
No one could remember
How we'd gotten there,
How all of this got started.

The Leaves Change

And here I am walking in the gutter,
kicking dried leaves, drinking from a flask.

The leaves snap beneath my feet like fine bones
Calcified unto the ages and then the stars come out,
Rendering the gutter ridiculous.

Beneath such an established crowd you can only
Confess your sins,
Say what you did wrong and when
You go home the night hums in your head,
Crackling like a fire that gives no warmth,
All coats useless,
Your skin stretched so thin
I can see through it, a map
To a world I could never go
Without losing my way.

I'll find you anyway.
I'll hold my flask to your mouth
And you shall drink a toast
To the cold path
That brought me hence,
Smiling with such idiotic certitude.

Fallen Bridges

I read today
That philosophy has chased its tail
To the end.

We have run into linguistic tangles;
There are no boundaries to Fantasia.
We started out looking for answers
And found only more questions.

Build all the bridges you want,
Make all the friends, allies and lovers,
But you will one day walk back to that wall
Which even the hippies could not tear down.

Pile all your stones, make all the heated,
Alcohol fueled arguments you want while all the
Bridges continue to fall like the sound
Of nails sliding down a dry easer board and
Every day someone great dies in New York City
While the sun slowly wears itself out,
Breathing heat into a vacuum that always
Wants more, wants to know why Socrates
Took that hemlock, eyes focused
On the stars.

Poems from the Foothills

"Where I'm From"

I'm from blueberry cream cheese
French Toast,
Home sewn clothing and laughter.
Motor oil, lilac bushes, and
Visits to the doctor.

I'm from grassy backyards,
Baseball, football,
Old tractors and even
Older men.

I'm from lakes and sweet corn
At the end of July.

I'm from books, lots and lots
Of books, read deep into the night
Until the world was silent
And you could hear your heart
Beating along with the sound
Of the train, rolling by
Just across the road.


"Postcard Haiku"

Boise desert hills
Silver sagebrush, dry creek beds
Shade beneath the trees


"Sounds"

The willow tree rattles
Leaves crackling like dried
Rice Krispies,
Bending like a reed
Before the wind.


"Ode to the Bullfrog"

O Bull Frog!
I cannot see you
Except for your dark beady eyes
Bobbing above the water
But your deep, car bass voice
Calls to me, as if you only want
A froggy hug, lonely as you are
In this desert pond and the mountains
Around you must seem very high
When you're caught at the top
Of one world,looking up
At another.

But O Bull Frog!
You're brave, dude.
You're brave.

Boise!

Lawn sprinklers pop out at midnight
In this arid desert steppe terrain.
Quiet neighborhoods (except the fireworks).
This is not where I grew up
Nothing like it at all
Except, well, it has humans here, too...

America is a big place,
You never know where it might lead,
And all of it home.

My God, how did I get here?

On Poetry

All poetry
Is nothing.
Like we are nothing.
Like the world
Is nothing.

And nothing,
As Janis said,
Is all we have left
To lose.

3 Poems Written During One Afternoon At My Temp Job (on yellow post-it notes)

The Desert

They were lost.
The sea had run aground
And they could do nothing
But get out,
Tighten their shoelaces,
And walk.
The sun in the distance
Like a coin waiting to be collected.


Cough, You Mutherfucker

Cough, you mutherfucker, cough.
Why not? You've been doing
It for eight hours a day,
Five days a week, for months
Now. You sit right in front of
Me and we don't even have a
Thin cubicle wall dividing us.
You heave, sigh, yawn, belch, and cough.
So go ahead and
Cough, mutherfucker, cough.


Cats at Night

The door opens and they bound out
Into the darkness, eyes wide
And noses twitching as they attempt
To take it all in, not knowing
There is no end to the night,
That all the curious smells will go on
Forever, that a legion of other cats
Guard their own backyards, streets
Running beyond this city to other cities
Running to the far ends of the earth,
Where all is grass, woods, farms.
The mice there sleeping safely,
Tucked into bed and dreaming of ocean.

Beer with Lemon

I watched the dark clouds gather
All afternoon long and into
The early evening while stationed
At a shared desk on the seventh floor
Of a gleaming blue office building
All glass, all windows. A quiet purgatory
With a beautiful, panoramic view.

Looked like rain all afternoon,
But the storm did not break
Until I had punched out, until
I had driven home my back tight
My stomach empty and sat down at
My kitchen table, pouring myself a
Beer with lemon while looking
Through my open window at the
Fresh green trees blooming outside,
So much sweet wind pouring
Through my screen window I could only
Bow my head, and consider the thunder.

The Widower

You do not remember this,
But I stood over your bed
Reading poetry as if the
Words on the faded page could
Outdo all we had been through,
The life we had shared over so
Many years, clawing earth together
As if that grip meant something,
As if we'd arrive somewhere
Someday, me taking off my hat
As you smiled and curtsied to
Something stronger and higher
Than either of us but tonight
All that matters is how, when
I reach for you, that spot is
Devoid of heat, and only
My own sweat soaked pillow
Rising up to meet my lips
When I try to kiss you
Across space across time
Across town, your grave simply
One among many, something for
Lawnmowers to dodge while they
Hum loudly to the open sky,
So much louder than poetry.

Outlaws

We drove
And drove
And drove

The sun crisp above,
Flat road ahead, and
The rear view mirror empty.

We'd quit our jobs
Freedom seeping through
Our bones so much
Money in leather bags
And I drove fast, but not
Too fast.

At night we slept in motels
Listening to thin walls weep
So much news so much ESPN so much
Pain.

In the morning we drank coffee,
Ate pancakes and bacon.
The morning paper was filled with
Bad pictures of us and when I read
Aloud you giggled and kissed
My picture in the paper until the
Cheap ink rubbed onto your lips
And when you smiled, your smile was darkness.

We drove on
Until we ran
Out of land to drive upon,
And at the end of all that land
We made love
Until the ocean gave way and
Let us walk on through,
Holding hands.

Pipe Smoking

If everything we did made perfect sense
And was perfectly healthy,
How would the dead find peace
Knowing that we were wasting
Our one chance at good living?

Perhaps, sometimes, the smell of burnt cherries
Should rise above us like a ladder to the heavens,
Begging to be climbed.