Poem-A-Day #275 : Cum

Cum

How does evolution

Here the pin prick -
The drop of electric wires
on your chest

A stew of self bubbling away

You want to eggwhite it
but it's not even true

There is a vanilla here

The pus of it

I cannot swim but look at this go

Poem-A-Day #273 : Myth of the Mother Virgin

Myth of the Mother Virgin

I want to talk about bare arms - the pull of gravity on a mother's arms - the feeling of the flesh and the darkness of stretch marks

How shamed we make them - these arms

I want to take your hand and tell you that I abhor your politics and your husband but your choices are your own

I am tired of hypocrisy in all forms - Melania - I want to talk about the fact that you wore an identical dress to the one that Michelle Obama was shamed for - the one her arms hung out of - and you sat and talked to her and we both know she noticed

Your body is identical to this one - we cannot accept that we share parts with the ones we hate

I look at my arms in the cold light of late November and I see that I am ugly

I am certain that you have looked in mirrors and felt this

Certain that you have made yourself a golden nest and that the universe is appalled that it hasn't been so lucky

What do shamed arms look like

They are covering themselves - they do not allow the hang to show - they pretend that nipples are the color of cotton candy and the size of dimes - they imply that labia is to be only seen when it is sexual

Shamed arms are unable to carry the weight of much

They find the black and white photos of history and color them in acid colors

I feel for your nudity - I worry it - the universe has discovered that breasts exist and that even the most visible of women might have bared hers for money

And it has recoiled - retreated into the arms of childhood - wandered into the woods and retreated into the forts they built themselves - Get Rid Of Slimy GirlS

There is a pile of snowballs - a sort of pitchfork in the gut

Poem-A-Day #244 : Of A Broken Wheel

Of A Broken Wheel

A broken limb -
               the eye - a wheel carrying you towards that gas station over there -
          not that you are on empty but you never know...

                                                               There is the impulse to lake - to
                                    find the tree this thing fell from - to
              rub the bark across your chest until it reds

The aesthetics of clouds -
                                                                            epistemology of algae -

                                                                 There is a greenness in both - the wheel
                     of the car kneecapping the day - the Emily Dickinsonness of
a broken wheel that is also an eye looking at a broken wheel -

Here death -

                                    Everywhere the sound of cicadas -

                 How both are ticks along a carved piece of wood -

Poem-A-Day #199 : Instructions for How to Engage with Art

Instructions for How to Engage with Art

The canvas wants you to touch it
to run your fingers against the raised strokes

Feel the ochre burnt and otherwise

It wants you to lose yourself in it
to become so encased in its universe
that you will not escape unchanged or at all

It wants to yellow wallpaper you

All of this is contingent on the artist
understanding the canvas well enough
to reveal the need within it

All of this requires you to step closer

To press your chest against the Mona Lisa and to search for her pulse
Take your clothes off and jump into The Water Lilly Pond

Be naked and covered

Poem-A-Day #155 : Wood (Part 2 : Invocation)

This is a real long poem. You can find Part One HERE


Wood (Part 2 : Invocation)

There is a breeze and it smells like fire : I'm keenly aware of fire the desert demands it : last night there was a storm and the lightening struck all around the Jemez and all I could think about after the burn in my retina was if there would be smoke in the morning : the signs of fire are all around us the dryness of us the parchment of our skins :

And skin is a kind of bark : the old man selling ristras on the side of the road has skin like an old leather couch it crinkles and has become creased forever in the corners where so many asses have sat on it and this is maybe an odd way to describe skin but it's true : his ristras also look like old leather except they are red :

I walked into these woods for a bit before we met : honestly I've been here for years : the fallen tree that crosses the path a little ways back is where I've sat and eaten my lunch every day for over a decade I count the blood-red flowers dripping on their stems along the path they are heart-shaped but remind me of rain drops :

Drops on the old deck : a swelling occurs they say you must seal against this swelling that the rain brings that it must be sealed : the spots spread from the bell-shaped center and the darkening radiates until the entire expanse is the color of water : in my knee this takes the form of a deep ache that takes days to work itself out in others it becomes death knocking :

Only some people begin to look like tree bark and leather as they age: others become gauze : the ephemeral nature of their skin allows them to walk through walls : ghosts before ghosts : I am reminded of the end of that cartoon David the Gnome : he and his wife wonder into the woods and become trees after saying goodbye to their fox friend Swift they die on the mountaintop :

In many cultures you leave the old to die on the mountaintop : again don't worry I'm not here to kill you you will have to make that choice at your own time : there isn't smoke today though so I don't know why we are talking about death : a friend lost a dog yesterday she buried it today and sat for hours with a cat staring into space thinking about fur :

I guess our nature is to project outwards to the end : a tree at the end of its life will stop producing fruit it will perhaps leave its limbs bare in summer as a nod to its coming winter : I imagine these trees as naked people wondering their towns and cities daring anyone to comment on their clotheslessness :

Poem-A-Day #78 : Underwear

Underwear

Bands of elastic gray and cutting fabric
under your ass cheeks

          I am trying out this jockstrap
          trying to see what the big deal is about

That floss bit that they talk about
is more rope more floating finger of gentle pressure

          Someone told me that they were the height of sensuality
          that wearing them was akin to constant turning on

The ass is not so much raised as gently tightened
and the balls are compressed

          I don't buy the story being told
          this isn't terrible this isn't amazing

It's perhaps more about knowing what is on
under the clothes the nudity in the dressed

          It's certainly less sweaty certainly a kind of freedom
          though the cheeks become red