Separation

we never sorted anything out
things just happened
and then more things
until there was a great pile
arranged
like stratum
until the only thing left to say was “I think it’s over”

we cried like infants not because we thought it was the wrong thing to do
but because after all of these years, it felt like we were siamese twins being torn apart

in time, I began to excavate
the things we piled
when I’d had two more beers than usual
and the shovel was handy

but the earth is always hard when you need it to be soft
and soft when you need it to be hard
and even when you do come across something
nothing will make sense anymore
I promise you that.

cat at the window (early morning poem)

The cat converses with the outdoor world

beyond the sliding door

buzzing and chirping

as if to say

I see you sir

A truly fine thing you are this morning

far better than the black sleep I just did

As if it were all of a piece

All one being

to acknowledge

to greet

as if everything outside spoke with the same voice

and it said

come

For the best (poem)

Sometimes I think every poem

no matter how fine

no matter how ready

should be deleted unsaved

and begun again.

 

Cemetery in the woods

In the considerable patch of woods

between the condominium complex and the outlets

up on a hill

a small graveyard

we sometimes traveled to as freshly barmitzvahed boys

linked

one body after the other 

though I can’t remember now if there was a trail

my friend Joey would have been in front with a flashlight

my hands on the shoulders of the boy in front of me

 

the graves were a mile or so from where we entered 

and they

bore the names of our Long Island towns

Hewlett, Merrick, etc

the oldest read 1789

 

 

in those days we were too busy scaring the shit out of each other to concern ourselves with history

 

I remember once one of Joey’s older brother’s friends

 

lying down on a stone marker that had been toppled 

 

I watched him light a cigarette after he sat up

The Woman Holding the Brightly Colored Vase

Sometimes people posed for pictures with her

sometimes they ignored her

sometimes they copied her sour facial expression

sometimes they touched her breasts

sometimes the really small ones cried over her

sometimes they rested their drinks on her

sometimes they talked to her as a joke

sometimes they talked to her not as a joke

sometimes they looked into the brightly colored vase she was holding

sometimes they puzzled over why she was holding an empty vase

sometimes their silent four-legged friends peed on her

sometimes they simply looked her over

sometimes they gave her a back story

sometimes they touched up the paint flecked over her body.

sometimes they left her things by her feet

A Big Love (A Fiction)

Many many years ago

I worked on an oil rig nine months out of the year

I had a big love during that time

this girl I saw for three months when I’d return

this went on for eight years

almost all of my twenties

—

I would come back to my place

after all that time being away

and she’d be waiting for me in the living room

her lavender scent kissing the air

we’d make love fiercely and quickly

and just the once

not like you see in the movies

but still pretty swell

—

we’d end up tiring of each other about 10 weeks in

and so we were quite content to let each other go

when it came time for me to leave

—

though 7 months later, I was chomping at the bit

to see her again

—

one year I returned to shore

and learned she had died from typhoid fever

I never went out on the rig again

—

My waking life for two years after her death is blurry

I frequented a lot of book stores

and some coffee shops

and took great walks from one end of the city to the other

I lived off of my meager savings

—

The girl wasn’t completely out of my life

I saw her in dreams for many months after she died

we played in the ocean

fought alongside each other in some kind of battle during the middle ages

met each other all over again as strangers in a delicatessen in Philadelphia

there were difficult times too

other men

other women

she killed a man in some kind of botched drug store robbery

she moved away across an ocean

I moved away from the city

—

of course, two nights after an incident,

she might return to me as if nothing had happened at all

the night after she cheated

I remember we had a very pleasant stroll

through some blooming garden with sunflowers as big as bowling balls

—

it was an odd way to conduct a relationship

but we made things work

as we had once in real life

—

then my dad died

and it was as if one tragedy erased another

I stopped dreaming of her almost completely

—

Three or four time she resurfaced

—

Once we were running some kind of race together

side by side

we weren’t talking

only running

sometimes I’d look over and catch her looking in my direction

—

Then the dream changed

and I was on the oil rig again

except rather than ocean we were sailing over

a vast desert

when we came to a small body of water

we panicked over how we would get over it

and that was when I woke up.

A Pair of Black Garbage Bags

At 2 am

Mom woke us up in the middle of the night

gave my brother and I a pair of black garbage bags

“Put as much winter clothing as you can fit inside these bags, when you run out of warm clothes, you can begin with the toys,

then meet me downstairs.”

this was not the first time we were given this instruction

so Edgar and I basically knew how to proceed

but it was never easy

Edgar was only 6 and he had great trouble accepting

that he would have to give up an action figure

in place of a sweater

a nebulizer in place of a lite-brite

when we were done,

we headed downstairs

where our mom held out her arms to both of us and we all huddled together

Dad had not beaten her up in a number of years but Mom still made us move every time

she spotted his car in the towns we lived

he didn’t approach us anymore

it was as if he just wanted to be in the vicinity

I had seen him a handful of times from the backseat of Mom’s car

in Temecula, he was helping some people move a sofa into their apartment

in Tahoe, he was putting on someone’s snow chains on the side of the road

in Spokane, he was up on a ladder working on a faulty street light

when I was little

he seemed like a pretty nice guy to do these things

but mom said

he wasn’t doing it out of kindness

it was how he “stayed afloat”

the night she told me this

I dreamt my dad was on a busted-up oil freighter on the high seas

running around patching up all of the holes

just as he plugged one another would open

“Boys we are going north to Canada —

what do you know about Canada?” asked mom.

“The capital is Ottawa.” I said.

“It’s cold,” added Edgar.

“Very good.”

“Will there be snow, Mama?” queried Edgar.

“More snow than you can imagine in that little mind of yours.”

There was a big smile on Edgar’s face now

and my mother made her face look like his once she spotted it

“Mom why can’t we go back to Los Angeles where it’s warm?,” I ventured to ask.

“You know we can’t ever go back there, hijo.”

I did, but it didn’t stop me from asking the question every time.

“Okay mis hijos, my loves. Time to go.”

And then the three of us went out into the cold

or what we considered cold

because a lot of what I thought I knew back then

we left behind in that house.

Poems I wish I had written but sadly did not…Part 3

For the 3rd edition of this blog feature, I selected 5 poems for your reading pleasure. Some of them are funny, some are sweet, some are sad, some are clever, some are about oral hygiene, and all of them are “poems I wish I had written but sadly did not…”

—

1. The first is a poem I only discovered today on the blog Ole! Wailsome Emu. It’s written by a British writer, and it might well be the very best poem ever written about flossing. I loved every inch of it!

 

Oral Hygiene

 

Before you floss your teeth at night,

I taste your day in a close caress;

the second hand smoke of others, the bite

of the vowels from your early meeting, the cress

from your lunchtime sandwich, and the stale

breath of the dark, gaping tube tunnel.

You yawned through an inbox full of junk mail

at five, catching flickers of light from the screen.

 

I watch your reflection in the mirror

as you root out the debris, pick your woes

from the space so we can share a kiss cleaner

than after-storm rain,

                                away from the sunlit

hours that imprint on your mouth.

                                                  For a frank

exploration, you come to me deliciously blank.

— 

 

2. This one’s from the blog, the great power. The poet is also a musician who often posts lyrical poems as well as the songs in which the poems appear. Wander over there when you can; you’ll be happy you did. 

—

our bestconversations are in our sleep

 

i was having a dream he said
you and i were walking in a city where we had never been
it’s still there somewhere
i’m going back to find it
then he pulled my whole body closer
as much of my skin as his could touch
and slipped away

—

 

3. “Palms” was one of the first poems I ever “liked” on wordpress, written a few months back, over at Jenni Kay Writes. It is a startling, lovely poem, isn’t it?

 

Palms

 

A clap in the night

And I have caught

A brown apple moth

In my bare hands

 

My palms can be a prison –

Anyone’s can.

 

–4. The fourth one, by You, With Your Words (a very fine writer as far as I can tell), made me laugh and sometimes that’s enough to get you a much sought-after shout out from this blog :).–#Sigh

Long day teaching kids,
Feeding cat, groceries.
Yeah –
I sit down in my chair.
The man chair
The man of the house chair.
‘Darling…can you do something?’
Do something?
‘Can you get me some cling film?’
The cling film’s right next to you.
‘Yes dear,’ I heave myself up.
Cling film sorted, I wander back to the chair.
Back to my poem.
My great poem.
‘Can you help me with something?’
What thing?
‘Can you mix this. It’s really stodgy.’
Damn.
Mixing sorted, I wander back to the chair.
‘Babby, can you pass a cushion please?’
Mmmm. No.
‘Coming dear.’
Cushion sorted, I wander back to the chair.
In which the cat sits, smugly.
The cat chair.
The cat of the house chair.
Damn.

—

5. This one over at the intriguingly named blog Close of Play is a clever rhymer about a peeping tom, written from the perspective of a neighbor who is doing a little peeping himself.

—

Mr. Larcombe’s Ladder

Mr Larcombe’s ladder
Is only six feet tall
I can’t bear its stupid frame
Smug against the wall

It can’t reach the gutters
Or get the windows clean
It is the most pointless thing
I think I’ve ever seen

It looks like it was made
By children of short sight
Or by dogs with gloves on
In the dark of the night

Bits of wood and plastic
With nails at every turn
Building pallet fragments
And logs that wouldn’t burn

Oh, here comes Larcombe now
I make my curtain twitch
He skips across the grass
Like Elvis with an itch

Picking up the ladder
Back past the garage door
Glancing for his wife now
What will he use it for?

I watch him move quickly
Down to his neighbours wall
Here its fit is perfect
The best ladder of all

Mr Larcombe climbs up
His grip as though he’s glued
To see his neighbour’s wife
Sunbathing in the nude.

Poems I wish I had written but sadly did not…Part 2

 Today I thought I’d feature 4 poems.

—

The first poem is by A Collection, who’s gorgeous word jumbles usually culminate with a beautiful phrase, such as in this one…

—

ID

I want a new face, a different

mailbox. Some other

person’s dog.

—

The 2nd poem, by Posed and Written, brutally sad, pays tribute to a forgotten city dweller  

—

Graffiti

He added his name to the wall.

To the back drop of a city that didn’t want him.

To back-beat, railway rhythms.

he offered his name.

Among the many, painted bearings of young hearts,

young poets, artists and old soul’s calligraphy pens,

leaving their marks.

Laying his contribution,

his only possession,

the best of him, against stone so that it would finally feel solid.

Supported.

Held up, side by side with those larger than life buildings

with their skyscraping signatures.

His name with the likes of them.

Held higher than the streets would have him believe he was worthy.

His name, painted reckless across heights, waiting for someone to see,

hoping that someone would notice.

His name.

—

Poem #3 I found over at Reowr’s blog, where my online self can often be found loitering and gawking at the pieces this writer displays.

—

Hopping Mad

There once was a boy
Who went hippity hop
Everywhere that he went
With a bippity bop.
He’d hop up the stairs
One by one with a “bop”
And down stairs he would “bip”
Every step with a hop.
He loved to go
Hippity hopping along
While singing his
Bippity boppity song.
Even at school he would
Hop in his chair,
And his bips and his bops,
Though quiet, were there.
His parents would ask,
“Why must you hippity hop?
And the bipping and bopping
Must lickety stop!”
And though he was busy
With bops in his head
While hopping on one foot,
He heard what they said.
“Fine! Then I’ll take all of
My bippity bopping
Where no one can tell me
To be lickety stopping!”
And so he went
Hippity hopping away,
But where he is now, bip,
No one, bop, can say

—

The 4th poem is by Haiku Streak, a writer of ravishing haikus.

—

Evensong

night comes, we start

the dishwasher—it groans,

scrubbing the day clean

12 wordpress blogs I am thoroughly enjoying

I have been on wordpress for less than two months now. In this time, I have happened across some really fine writing penned by folks who have been kind enough to return the favor on occasion and read a piece of my own. And sometimes, my favorite bloggers are folks who don’t even follow me at all. But alas, I am a strong believer in feedback —  and showing enthusiasm for those who are doing their thing creatively and doing it with gusto.

So, without further ado, here are 11 blogs I am thoroughly enjoying right now. These are in no particular order…

1. A Story A Day – Exactly as it sounds. The twist is that the guy who pens them always takes great care to deliver something compelling. My favorites of the ones I’ve read are Poltergeist, Hatchling, and Mr. and Mrs. What’s-his-face

2. adventuresinloserville– a site revolving around a self-professed dysfunctional lesbian couple from Australia (if I’m remembering correctly) that is frequently very sharp and funny.

3. anelephantcant – A very witty dude who takes his blog handle very seriously, but as for the rest of life, not so much. My kind of guy.

4. fictitious fishes– Someone who I just started reading who wrote one of my favorite short stories in a while, called “The Spectators.”

5. Weekly Flash Fiction – I’ve only read a few short stories by this Nashville writer, but I have yet to be disappointed. His pieces are everything my own strive to be but don’t quite yet achieve. They’re dark, weird, and always compelling. For a taste of what I mean, consider his most recent  piece, which revolves around a guest who shows up, shirtless and hairy, out of nowhere at his house and who may or may not be his dog in human form.

6. What Happens to us – A really strong nonfiction writer who writes with aplomb about everything from his dating life to his father’s experience during and after the Korean War in “Excavating the Thousand Yard Stare.”

7. Storyshucker – I don’t read this guy’s stuff enough, but he’s probably one of my 2 favorite nonfiction wordpressers out there. He wrote somewhat recently a piece about magic markers (back when they were still considered magical) and family dynamics — and it was expertly told.

8. Keely’s Graffiti –  Keely is a new poet seemingly interested in preserving the daily unseen and oftentimes unconsidered events of day to day existence. Choice poems include “Backfire” and “Abeyance.” 

9. Reowr – an old fashioned poet! I say that because much of her poetry is of the rhyming variety. I especially love the poems she writes for children, like Sneaking time, and A Wish

10. 300 Stories – Another story a day dude who I read and enjoy. Here’s one of his latest, which I loved.

11. Michael Alexander Chaney – Reminds me of one of those brilliant English professors I had back at college. I understand about two thirds of what they’re going on about, but the two thirds that is landing for me, is enough. Choice cuts include Stop Saying Like — A Dislike Button, Writers and Rejection, some thoughts on motivation, and his latest —  a diatribe against fall that you must go read right now.

12. Radioactive Eyeball– I am new to this New Zealander’s blog, but I have already read a few pieces of flash fiction that have intrigued me — here and here — so I’m sure it’ll be a regular destination of mine in the near future.