No hablo obligado, según pacere

or, Wow:
Six for Thirty-one. Such Logoyalty!
if only to
not mention
Just Moved Back In
With My Former Ex,
due to the skyrocketing price of independence
from Previous Exes,
who shall remain namelessly singular
(& already missing my subterranean getaway
[at bargain basement prices,
you'd think the spiders, sowbugs* & centipedes
would be extra] )
*yeah, you know: sowbugs,
the ones I used to know as silverfish,
except they're grey & their only connection to bodies of water
are dank basements &, Dank Sei Gott,
I no longer have to worry about such entomologies,
I'm above it all now, I'm a second storey man
with three cats to either
keep the upwards-of-four-legged ones in check or
just overshadow them in the landing
on their feet for attention-getting department.
Is this a poem?
I'll never know,
nor will the mouse that punctuated
the first evening before bed
in that other place.
But farewell anyway,
it's time to leave the nest
or coccoon, or whathaveyou.
I've got bigger webs to fry than bottles to spin.
Just because The Era of Canora is over,
doesn't mean that even greater harmoniety isn't
in the air
or the wings
(paper beats the rock I
crawled out from under,
& wings beat air).
I'm getting ready to like
a canary sing.
J'arrive, ma chere.
May we each fly, spanish
or otherwise,
vraiment!

the last day

Hey all,

I meant to write a final poem today...but didn't. I also meant to vacuum. What did happen was more than good enough for the last day of May and included clean laundry hauled upstairs, frivolous reading while supine, and a decent smoked salmon and caper sandwich in a sunlit cafe (feet up, feet up).

Also a nice hug or two when all was said and done.

Not to ramble on or anything, but I wanted to say how glad I was that the May Day Poetry Project got a second airing, that all of youse wanted to participate this time around, and that I had the chance to read and be read by such nifty poets.

Keep in touch, if you're so inclined.

If not, maybe I'll see you around these parts next year, eh?

Yours,

A.

CONGRATULATIONS!!!!

You guys are amazing! Sorry I wasn't able to join you for the last couple of weeks - it was fun for me while it lasted. Thanks to everyone for your kind comments and good suggestions!

I will try to make some more comments over the next few days. I hope several of the poems here get edited and submitted for publication. Would love to see updates here on any that do get published.

Congrats again and all the best in your writing!

Last post

Thanks so much for the great opportunity to take part in May Day. I enjoyed it, thanks for the comments, and hope all the editing/revision for everyone pays off big time.



Annals of May
(for Gertrude)


1. Write a poem about a flower.
2.
3. Write a poem about a flower.
4.
5. Write a poem about a flower.
6.
7. Write a poem about a flower.
8.
9. Write a poem about a flower.
10.
11. Write a poem about a flower.
12.
13. Write a poem about a flower.
14.
15. Write a poem about a flower.
16.
17. Write a poem about a flower.
18.
19. Write a poem about a flower.
20.
21. Write a poem about a flower.
22.
23. Write a poem about a flower.
24.
25. Write a poem about a flower.
26.
27. Write a poem about a flower.
28.
29. Write a poem about a flower.
30.
31. Write a poem about the poems about the flowers.

refrain


let's have one last poem
about gardens, another round
for all green and thirsty things,
for ideas in bloom and soil
that blackens our knees and notebooks

we'll write just once more
on may rain, final storm
of words before the month tucks under,
before those tentative shoots
of heat reach deep, sapping
ink and leaving pages
sunstruck and limp

we'll plant another handful
of stanzas to see us through
the summer, then find
a shady place to let our pens sleep


thanks to you all for a great -- and challenging! -- experience. the comments, comaraderie, and group energy really helped to see me through. nice working with you all! ~k.

Summer

Wet swimming trucks peel from legs, flip
flops slap-pitty-slap asphalt
as the ice cream truck plays its tired invitation.
Lawnmowers make their last rounds
before cricket reverb, sprinkler’s consonants
fan across the yard. Mosquito drillsaw
against the screen. Moths pour
like batter on the hot 60W,
no calamine for their itch.
The motion sensor strobes all night
as raccoons driveby garbage cans,
white-gloved. Red-eyes
begin their final descent
as birdsong pelts the window
with its gibberish.


---
My last post. Thanks for all your comments!! It's been great. I've caught lots of new poems that otherwise would have disappeared into couch cracks and fuzzy thinking. Wishing you all luck with revision! Till next time...

Another Year

OK, so birthdays are not
such a big deal to some people,
but yours I must celebrate.
Do you know your age
is the same as
the year of my birth? 51?
These little things
hold significance for me.
How could I know
at the age of four
you were being born
into the world and would
someday enter my world
and save my life?
If only I had a small window
to see your happy baby face
to hear you clap your hands
in patty cake when your mother
played and made you the darling
you are today. I would have
known to wait and be
less afraid of all the slaps
that were not play
but came my way.
I did not know, you were
already here, a short ride
in the family station wagon
would have brought me to your door.
But I would still have been alone
before we bumped together
all those years later,
joined in such frenzied passion
we were both amazed each morning
that going to work was only
an afterthought and I waited
breathless and safe for your
sure return. Bad things evaporated.
Do you wonder that I celebrate
each measurement of time
since the day you were born
and tie happy ribbons to each
minute of your smile?
I celebrate with more light than candles
the life I still manage to find
each day because you caught me
when I was falling from the ledge
I had crawled out on
to escape the pain of me,
and I have never left your arms.
Everyday is cake.

balance


you are steady, level
as these lines i write
myself between, tightropes
i nudge uncertain words
along, watch them wave at loss:
balance, confidence, reason

i am a stumbler, clumsy
as my own handwriting,
tripping over our margins,
scarring anything white,
inscrutable when i place
all my weight in your ruled care

Summer Song

The fan drones on in tonal circles
moving air as water pipes rumble
bass like, clarinet rubber hoses feed
assorted cheap sprinklers.

From another room
the ice maker clatters it’s frozen load
into a bin of cubes, then stirs
and whines a stream of water
into ice trays.

A fat fly slipped in through the mail slot
and is bouncing it’s repeated buzzing
off the windows in stupid confusion
buzzing and thumping the glass

again and again
in a comforting –
not for the fly –

rhythm, calling attention
to solid walls, drum-like
in percussive abilities
beating every hot sound
from in or out to shape
the heat of the long day.

A stray cricket is loose
in the basement singing
an odd fiddling refrain
from it’s dank confines,
serenading the power tools
and silent appliances.

With a little player’s luck
it will find a window cracked
and return to the main orchestra
for the evening performance
where night moths applaud
quiet in the humid hush
under the whispering stars.

A Map of Empire

When was the last time your shoulders felt relaxed? Somedays you wonder if there aren’t bicycle tires and mixmasters, a junk heap of shoulds walking the tightrope of your trapezius. And let’s not even talk about your neck, how you think it might be out of line and you’ve started to crack it yourself, even though you know it’s bad. Just like crossing your legs torques your hips out of alignment. See, you just did it again.

Close your eyes for a minute and think of all the things you let into the soft tissue of your body. Car alarms, exhaust, pesticides and additives. Learned habits and gestures. That thing you do with your hands, or the way you cough in the morning when you haven’t had enough sleep, clearly from your mother. Or how a memory of your grandfather can lodge can itself in your elbow. That first time he took you out play tennis, whacking balls against the side of the garage till your arm hurt, and you had to stop. He’s dead now. Cancer. Worked at the mill twenty-six years. Twenty-six years, you put two and two together.

He always said empires are built on our backs, our shoulders, our necks. It’s no wonder you’re tired and want to go to bed. Somedays it’s enough just to stand and not weep at the headlines, to take the recycling out. To keep open, so that you can let one more good thing in.


---
This is something I wrote for my theatre class, more of a monologue than a poem? Not sure if the title works, or if opening with a question is too invasive.

Nine months: sweet nothings

I am a balloon oily with fingerprints under the shirt of this season
flaccid from escaped sips of air the friction of fingers
and the string that connects him and me is these lines
is all the words sighs songs ever exhaled between us
and now lips to belly he blows bewildered endearment
as though you were the faintest orb
a seedpod that could be dispersed
with the least breeze
to me you are a series of wet sneezes
that bent me double a wet wheeze a huff puff
that could kill off any wolf at any door
you are the storm that blew in humid and stayed
squatting over all the corners
and corridors of my city
but between the slow moan of the balloon
and the consumptive heave of the storm
the knot neither of us has yet to try
is that sound the lilt the tilt of the head
is always more important than sentiment
you sweet nothing you

* * *

Speaking of ruts, here's another baby poem...but I suppose it's appropriate, in that art generally imitates life. I can't stop talking about baby, either...but then, neither can anyone else.

I'm glad May's almost finished, otherwise I might be forced to write odes to my recently acquired mu-mus.

Found

Rummaging through containers
of old seeds and garden twine
he found a pair of amber earrings
and brought them to her
in a small white swan,
some plastic wedding favor
from a distant cousin’s nuptials—

the opalescent swan
bending it’s pearly head
like a ride in a park lake
holding the precious amber bits
in the hollow of it’s back, a gift,

and all the delicious smells and
distant sounds, the shape of the shops
in that pastel Mexican village
where jewelry was purchased
come gliding back, leaving a wake
on the surface of time spent there
a vast lake of recollection

with it’s own depths and golden liquidity,
smelling like desert mountain air
corn and peppers and sugar
in autumn, the year they escaped
convoluted holiday suppers in the states

and hid in another language,
a feast far from turkeys
with mariachi bands
playing tunes while she wore
the novel amber ornaments,
honey resin set in silver
swaying in the garden courtyard
overflowing with tropical bougainvillea,
fountains flowing

and the two of them hiding
for a season
seemed so obvious,
a sensible decision

making it all right to wait
sleepy in the afternoons,

waiting for improved
timing to reappear,
as the amber earrings
have recalled.

sigh. another poem about the weather. i'm in a major, end-of-may rut.


matinee


clouds so low, so dark
they're grey blades
of a helicopter we duck
from, but watch warily

supple trees doubled,
afternoon crushed
by downdraft, scattered

we salvage what we can
grab, slide between fenceboards,
squeeze sideways from the day

i leave my gardening gloves
palm-up on the lawn,
two helpless hands
unable to cup the rain
we can't hear or see
inside the blacker day
of the movie theatre

bachelor buttons

the neighbour’s single idea
years narrowed by playing

the field, muddied feet forever sunk
in front lawns weeded in tantrums

keeps his brush cut head tidied
visits the barber on the corner

every two weeks, pays bills
weeks behind, trades clothes

in second hands, drinks beer
or cheap rye, the heart always

stronger than the liver, his last
date fourteen springs ago

every winter hungrier than the last
yet he keeps his blue more than the faith

that each year something good
will eventually blossom

Headlines

When a popsicle costs a dollar, we stop taking twenty out of the machine and advance to one hundred. Housing prices eat upward on their graphs; half a million dollars now a starter home. At the bus stop outside the ferry terminal, a teenage boy fists a bottle of pop. We still drink to dull the senses. Excitement slurs his words, all huh-huh-huh’s. Beside him, stands a girl in heels and a short pleated skirt. At thirteen, I wasn’t ready for the need that entered, loveless. My best friend’s mom calling to say it was time for me to wear a bra. Now there are girls as early as ten that want to.

In conversation, we repeat ourselves for emphasis. "A 64 year old bus supervisor beat up over a fare dispute, now he’s got liver damage. 64 years old. Can you believe it? Christ." What do we do with this information? An 11 year old girl abducted, then found. Six dead in an aerial raid. I can’t help but wonder if we store it in our bodies as illness.

People wait for their luggage at the baggage pickup, trust their belongings will be returned safely to them. A small comfort. The bus arrives. We fold up the paper and go home. There are bills to pay. Everyday, a little less certain, we can shop our way out of escalated conflict and one in four breast cancer rates.

summer snow


we wake up from a heavy dream
of summer -- so real we'd lifted
the window in our sleep to hear robins

the yard thick with a new snow
of elm seeds, round flakes
collecting in the folds
of tree-whipped porch screens,
like frost tatting windows in january

seeds gather in drifts, patch
the sidewalk cracks and catching
in the new blooms of iris,
blotting out forget-me-nots

we'd only just met the garden,
but we recognize its white absence
we expect to see our breath
as we stoop to pack snowballs
that disintegrate as they leave our hands

we rummage for shovels, scrape
the car, then stamp on the mat
tracking in snow that won't melt,
just wanders into the corners
and takes root, refusing
each pass of the broom

Crossing The Line

The broken fence will soon be mended
snaggletoothed slats all straightened
and realigned like a successful
dentist’s appointment, with only
a minimum amount of pain.

The city committee that calls itself
The Board of Adjustment
is making the neighbors adjust
the boards in their fence, after
the disarray of winter finally caught

the eye of some inspector. No amount
of good fencing will make these
neighbors good, but at least we
will be spared the sight of their

poor dog trying to squeeze through

in search of a yard where flowers
are allowed to bloom and wither
naturally, not beheaded in their prime
because they are staining the concrete.

from yesterday...

humidity


trees huddle link
elbows and lean
in a dozen feet at least
over your head
but still you duck as you run
airway shrinking the path
a slow strangle of green

you use your hands to rip
away thin tripwires
garottes of caterpillar silk

windless hot in that way
shade can't slake the morning
airtight your throat choked
with indecisive insects

tendrils of rain pulled taut
around you but wetness
won't register on your skin
already slippery with the steady
work of feet and heart pumping
either end of a two-man saw your body
its wake of spent webs and stumps

Eight months: the gathering

As lightning flares like high beams through our window
I wake grunting to a gathering of trains
and your father shuffled over to the far rail
so like a log in some already polluted body of water
I can turn and turn again grunt and rise
only gets louder evacuating deep breaths
that shudder the room

I turn to hold him so that you can kick him too
and you do adding toes
to the skin of this early morning
the rain the last of the lightning
the still sounding trains

A car outside honks as the heavy fingers of rain
hands on gates on windows sills on all the scales
of my plinking night time fear descend
but these are no solitary loon calls
to the edges of night to the few lights in the distance
they are tight and sounding every few seconds
these are not worms surfacing for the rain
there are men staring out into the train yards
men moving between pneumatic rooms
and sounding the horns

The storm breaks through the sirens
all the thunder of trains shaking themselves
until it seems the sky the ground is shaking
my spine bearing your travels up and down the body
on schedule but oh it is so late

Across the city the trains shake themselves like dogs
like horses impatient for their hierarchy
their coupling and uncoupling regimented
long before this barrel race
shudder against flies against cold or boredom
back and forth precise adjustments
unknown to the pinions the gears
but necessary to the men that move them
shudder and shudder until there is a flash of light
and I think storm and I think trains and I think storm

And I can’t see out except into sleep
into this darkened room his breath
and I am too warm misaligned somehow
but like the night like the first thunderstorm of the season
this too will end the lights will flicker but come on
the sand behind my eyelids the grit at the curb
will wash away

I sleep and sleep again and wake
to a car speeding down the alley
leaving a streak in the puddles
in the unseen smear of night
skidding on wet grit and concrete
police sirens trailing after the brightening sky
like all of this has only been the winding
of the day’s gears

At the window again I want to know
which effects were the slippery turns of the log
the shift between night and day winter and spring
gestation and germination
which were the fingers of bulbs down in the yard
washed free of snow mould crystal
and soapy expectation and which were you
trying at me again

Carnations

secretive floral planners
they achieve little

pay while floundering
in factories

or they knot in shows, cheap
chorus girls overworked

underpaid, bare-breasted
bodies trained to look

good standing.