NaPoWriMo 04/13/09

WHEN SPARKS FLY

When materials oxidize and react to make fire, it's chemistry
And we stop hiding behind our collars and our beers
When sparks fly on Friday night, it's called electricity

Let's meet down at Coney to forget the week's perfidy
And to find someone fine who later we'll fear
When materials oxidize and react to make fire, it's chemistry

The whine of her grinder is an aggressive sort of prosody
And I find myself drawn nearer and near
When sparks fly on Friday night, it's called electricity

Toward stammering salutations her performance is prodding me
I'll break the spell of her headlight on my deer
When materials oxidize to make fire, it's chemistry

It's a bit of late night intoxicated trickery
My odd combination of bravura and cheer
When sparks fly on Friday night, it's called electricity

I've never quite learned what behavior is worst for me
I can't quite say how I came to wake up here
When materials oxidize and react to make fire, it's chemistry
When sparks fly on Friday night, it's called electricity

NaPoWriMo 04/12/09

MIDNIGHT CONEY ISLAND AVENUE

Saturday skips across midnight
and here we are: I miss Mark's
porch, but it's one good night
at a time: good night Coney
Island Avenue: good night
Old Carriage Inn: what will
the East Side say when we
say "Hello?"

NaPoWriMo 04/11/09

SUNSET: PROSPECT PARK
(END OF THE LINE: MARK REILLY)

Prospect Park is on golden fire
through the tint of my Cadillac
in conveyance to Mark Reilly
on his birthday: what apocalypse
harbinges Ocean Avenue,
so cool & slick on this Saturday night:
the pointed roofs of Windsor Park
poke menacingly at the evening:
a police escort with "birthday boy"
written on its armored fender.

NaPoWriMo 04/10/09

DEE DEE RAMONE: TEXAS AGGIE

Oh magnificent Seventies,
when golden tones fudged
at the edges of our senses
and dinosaur punk rock
agriculturalists roamed the land.

A Dee Dee was a Texas Aggie
was a black shirt was a guitar
strap dangling a slicktastic bass.

My one-year-old mind
was textured with thumps
but now it's smooth and slick
from Queens, NY to College Station.

NaPoWriMo 04/09/09

Uncle Charlie

Uncle Charlie sits at the back of our brains,
a Phil Spector haunting our memory
from the wall where he is projected
with his funny and menacing gun.

Some of us, this is all we have
of Uncle Charlie. We have Uncle Charlie
and a curtain of brunette hair brushing
the air, hiding what may be a smile.

A cigarette and a beer round out
our inventory: a cigarette and a beer
and a faded denim atmosphere
producing mystery, fun, and fear.

That's all the camera tells us,
and maybe that's all Uncle Charlie
wanted us to know: as his picture says,
he has ways of making us not talk.

NaPoWriMo 04/06/09

Sunset & Vine

The sun is going down
down in Texas, while
the vines are growing up.

The human fact
of a powerline moves
horizonwise across the sky,
man and plant in tandem
defying gravity.

Here on the ground,
I can feel my feet,
but my intoxicated head
is up there among the leaves.

My camera and my eyes work together
to keep us there for our version of forever.

NaPoWriMo 04/05/09

Born Raised

The raised marks on my skin
show me home: a map is a memory,
and my marks are equally for my mind
and for yours. Find me on my skin:
Texas is to the right of a stray freckle;
you are here: don't forget, but if you do,
I'll remember for you.

NaPoWriMo 04/04/09

Eggs

Intrepid egg hunter
and cousin Ollie
discovered a number
of eggs today.

It is a banner day
for egg hunterology.

In his right hand
is a stegosaurus egg.

In his left is the egg
of the dreaded eggeater.

Watch out stegosaurus!

NaPoWriMo Two Oh Oh Nine!

Candor

A twisted hometown
is knotted up
over a dead Canadian:

the candor of his neighbors
echos off the supermarket tile
into his mother's ears,

and down here
we're talking openly
about the way he lived,

some of us know,
some can't imagine,
but we all shake our heads:

what a shame, what a
waste, what's the latest
from your hometown?

The Properties of Tacos

Don’t touch this taco, it is
the property of me. The primary
property of this taco (as far
as you’re concerned)
is that it is my property.

Some of the other properties
of this taco are: tastiness and
lettuce. Also “picante”
which is Spanish
for “spicy!”

What I'm Doing When I'm Not Writing Poetry

Some words just pop into my head whenever I come to a point in a poem when I have nothing to say but when something else still must be said. Sometimes these words manifest themselves in the poem, and sometimes I resist these words; I tell them there is no place in the poem for them. Some of these words are "taco," "teeth," "homuncular," and "and."

Freakish Deaths Are Rarely Forgotten

The long scarves of memory
wrap around we who have forgotten
what we never knew --
what the century was like
long before we were born;
we talk about the Twenties
as a time of twelve-hour nights,
when bisexuality was not uncommon
in Hollywood, before
American culture coded itself
into a comfortable corner.

We can remember almost anything,
and what’s the difference, really,
between remembering
and being told -- veracity
or deception are in both available.

So a long, delicate, handmade
scarf wrapped around you,
and I can see the beautiful day
and (what kind of car was it)
the Italian car.

And, when everything
got so freakishly twisted,
how the motor hummed, how
the silk spun, how
the pavement hit.
How do we know;
no one remembers anymore.
We’ve only been told.

From High Above the Surface of the Earth, Denver, CO

My old friend Taryn writes this impossibly cute blog about her new life in California with her husband Matt.

Matt is from South Boston and, until Denver, he had never lived anywhere but an apahtment. He had never had a place to pahk his cah. He had never even had a yahd!

Now he tears ass around the Rocky Mountains on his bicycle with his lovely lady.

Soon he'll even be pronouncing his Rs!

My Teeth & I

Porcelain plumbing sits quietly
in my apartment; outside,
the industrious are building
a building. My block is changing;
where there were fifty households,
there will be one hundred and fifty.

Five hundred or so will wake up
for work, while the five hundred
and first will sit thinking
about his own plumbing
and about all the potential porcelain
of the people around him.

The sky and the streets of Brooklyn
are gray. In between them
are invisible dotted lines.
This part is yours, and this part
is yours. This sink is mine,
so much brighter than my teeth.

Rhode Island Route 138

A stone fence, a field.
The headboard (as Katey
would say,) the headboard.
An old twist on taxidermy
(your twisted animals
are caught forever
in their favorite poses --
a smug impala; a screaming
possum.) They'll spend forever
not walking around upstairs.

Tong me out of the cold fire,
grandma, the night's terrors
have made me tired.
No yachts will sail
the small bay today;
my throat hurts;
our common dream
of a big body of water
of our own will feed us
through another morning
of another winter, quiet
so far.

New review of Never Cry Woof by Scott Glassman!

The issue is this.

Cause You Look Like Sugarbear

A soul on the Classon Ave. platform
today said to another soul (both souls
were young black kids) "CAUSE
YOU LOOK LIKE SUGARBEAR!!!"

A current of feet trickled by
while I wondered how much the word
"fecund" is the same as the word
"sexy," and why someone would say
"coverings" when they obviously mean
"lids."

I was sorry to see the full souls go,
but Sugarbear is still with me,
and when the evening has ratcheted
into Saturday night, I'll trick my tail out
with clean blue jeans. My face
will be so fresh tonight.

September is National Poetry Month!

Mr. Manners Afoot in Manhattan

“Excuse me,” is what I should’ve said
to the person I clipped on Sixth Avenue,
but now it occurs to me that chivalry’s not dead,
but it’s old, and if old things are to die,
it’s said their time has come.

If you turn around to say “excuse me”
to someone’s back, are you an asshole?
Not “asshole” as in “jerk,” “asshole”
as in “guy who just wasted his time
because he turned around for nothing?”

I don’t know why I’m worried --
I waste time all the time.
But no one likes to be wrong
about things. Chivalry’s not dead;
it’s retired to a warmer climate.

Amanda Burnhamism

Here is Amanda Burnham's awesome new website. Amanda illustrated Never Cry Woof.

Shukert? Damn near killed her!

Thanks Rachel Shukert for enshrining me for the ages at BAP. Thanks Reb for doing the same.