of fear without hope,
in great aspirations,
of trying to cope,
in sad limitations,
of coming apart,
in untouchable things,
of losing my heart,
in tree stumps and rings.
the ones who know
this is for the writers the photographers
painters and filmmakers this
is for the dancers the singers
the artists the children
with fingerpaint
throwing tantrums this
is for the ones who know
that to be born inside a thing
to live inside to breathe
inside a thing you have to care
enough to die a little death
and i’m sorry if you aren’t
nodding please feel free to walk
on this it’s not about you this
is for the ones who know
the spark that sets the fires
blazing causing squirming
madness causing all
the little deaths in pain and doubt
and fear the everkiller fear is ever
present with the spark that is
as well the only road to light
in life worth living by
and this is for the spark the one
you sometimes wake up feeling
leading you to doom and this
is for the wanting this
is for the writers the photographers
painters and filmmakers this
is for the dancers the singers
the artists the children
all of them half mad and hiding
in piles of props and clothes
their vanity and fear the ones
who know the weird and ugly
broken fat and thin the handsome
sad the stunted storytellers
they who are brave
they who are strong
of will enough to ride against
themselves to catch a glimpse to make
a glimpse of beauty this
is for the ones who know
but don’t believe
they are beautiful.
on slowly losing my grip
in hindsight our petty troubles
always appear overblown
(i’m hanging on)
and with a little perspective
we can smile and make jokes
of our foolish anxieties
(with sweaty hands)
responsibility rides a bicycle
a man glides down the street
on a bicycle
holding a short leash
a golden retriever just barely
keeps pace with a big grin
in my head i take a snapshot
and label it happiness
with a slight frown
i walk to work.
Drink
“What are you?” She asks again.
I pull on my cigarette, exhaling smoke in a low, expanding cloud. Christ, what a question. I’m the latest success story in a long line of champion-caliber sperm. An improbable moralizing animal on the crust of a flying rock. A single speck of matter in an empty and expanding universe. I’m being shitty and I know it. She looks perplexed by my silence.
“You know, like, what do you do?” She asks, rephrasing the question. She seems genuinely curious. She hasn’t touched her martini.
“I drink,” I say. Her eyes widen slightly, surprise or anger I can’t tell. “What are you?” I ask.
“I’m regional sales manager for—“ I cut her off with a wave.
“Drink,” I say.
for you, with the changing of leaves
i was fine before you
i wasn’t but didn’t know
i wasn’t, you know? i knew
life was a winter then you
dropped a spring in my lap
and like that it just melted
away laid bare all the hidden
love to a love and green grass
grew here and a tree, a tree!
yes, i was fine before you
i wasn’t but didn’t know
i wasn’t my winter was free
of the dream of your spring
and a tree of my own.
My Dear Friend, Take Heart
I recall an autumn morning in a small town where the leaves were changing. The weather was growing colder, but winter had not yet arrived, and the world had a brisk crispness to it. I sat outside in the cold sun and drank a cup of coffee. You were there with me and had a cup of your own. We sat together and sipped our steaming drinks. It was nice, I still remember it.
You will tell me, of course, that I remember this wrong, and perhaps that’s so. But I prefer my version to yours, so that’s how I’ll choose to keep it. Memories, after a point, become choice. This is one of the beautiful things in life. We are sparks, mere flashes on the scales on which we exist, scales so vast and so tiny we cannot comprehend them. Yet in that flash, we are everything. For that speck of time, our lives become existence and we ourselves something fantastic.
On that autumn morning I described to you a huge, placid lake. I said then that for the vast majority of existence we are simply the atoms composing the water of this lake. And in that, as a part of this magnificent whole, we are beautiful, though we lack the capacity to realize it. Then something happens. For some unknown reason, by some phantom hand, we are pushed upwards. And as we rise, we coalesce, we take shape. As we near the surface, a face appears, eyes open.
Then suddenly we break the plane, burst forth and open our mouths. We gasp, one giant frightful gasp of air, and our wide eyes are granted sight. We see the lake beneath us, we see the sky above us, we see life around us. Finally, we look down and see ourselves, separated somehow from the universe. And it is beautiful, beautiful, beautiful. But things change.
We begin to thrash about, claw at the water, try to propel ourselves beyond the surface of the lake. We lean on other gasping faces, shove them back down, attempt to fly. But water cannot fly. The momentum from our push thrusts us out, our heads, however briefly, crest above the surface. Then the arc continues, our momentum fails, and we slip back down. We return to how it always was, how it always will be. When we return to the water we lack even the capacity to lament what we’ve lost. There is comfort in this. We go home.
And we sat and drank our coffee, on that cold autumn morning, and we spoke of this. And on that day we first heard the news, of the rise of the end, though you of course will dispute the timing of the announcement. But I prefer to remember it this way. We finished our coffee and our talk, then we heard. Memory, after a point, becomes choice, and I shall exercise mine with a smile, for as long as I am able. So goodbye my friend. I regret nothing and neither should you, for we have been luckier than we could possibly have hoped for. Luckier than the moon, the sun, and the stars. Please, don’t be sad. Though we won’t know it, we will soon be home.
if the world ends again
If the world ends again
on us i hope it’s raining
on the soundless ripples
of a mountain stream.
I hope the water flows
down the weathered slope
to a village time forgot
where ancient wrinkled hands
that woke in pre-dawn darkness
will rub our backs and sing to us
in long-forgotten languages
(we’ll drift apart in lullabies
lost in socks and sheets).
If the world ends again
on us i won’t go riding
off to war i’ve had my fill
of flame and salted earth.
This time the air-raid sirens
will hold their breath
with me and hope
it’s just the sound
of rain it’s just some
huge and lonely thing
crying giant tears
on the soundless ripples
of a mountain stream.
healthy, growing boy
When he was still little and proud
of his new stature his parents
kept paper dixie cups with floral
patterns hanging in a plastic
holder above the sink.
One day their parents were out
and the boys had a girl
babysitter watching them play
outside and when they came in
to get water his brother still
tiny asked her in mumbles
and motions for a floral paper
cup and she said, “No. They aren’t
good for the environment.”
In hindsight she was probably
right but when she turned
there he was drinking
from a flowering cup
and he felt her looking at him
in that uncomfortable silence
for them both and he knew
then in his little heart
something was coming.
reaching and reaching and falling
this one is for the lovely
ones up all nights killing
themselves with the worry
what’s left with how many
more are left before it sets
in before some doctor
says the words what’s left
for the ones who can’t sleep
without that last little bit
for the morning for the ones
who can’t stop the ones
who are trying to grab it
the ones who once cared
enough to wonder and dream
still alive somehow breathing
within it and despite it
this one’s for the lovely
that the lovely ones die
for and you maybe you
over there if you’re there
and you’re listening.
like a big beautiful rainbow
the gifted child screams
in rage and sadness and frustration
at all the people there to help
the lothario with a limp dick
sits back on the pillows lights
a cigarette and watches the smoke
the artist cuts his meat in silence
at an upper east side dinner
table full of suits and money
and tomorrow we will all begin
again to fail in different ways
all the broken roads of life
fanning out in arching rays
spreading colors through the sky.
of love and the UK border control
there is a voice that winds
the tightness in my chest,
that whispers over all
the reassuring smiles, all
the sympathetic offers of,
“you two will find a way.”
there is a voice that whispers
louder than the gust
a passing locomotive leaves
at the platform louder
than the distant rumble
of turbines on the tarmac,
it whispers cruelly winding
the tightness in my chest
to a point of pain
and of the silence seated
on that leaving train,
and of the shaking quiet
in that moving plane
it whispers,
“it won’t be okay.”
mosquito-dreams of blood in tanzania
i had a dream from which i woke
bitten badly foot and ankles agony
this dream i bare of chest and foot
and dark of sun and dirt had reached
a place i thought of reconciliation
understanding all and here my friend
with me filthy garbed was throwing
coins up in an alley in a slum
upon the empty balconies of the poor
who struggled here for why he asked
in silence did he have so much
and they so little i as well appealing
reaching in my pockets found some bills
some small and one one hundred
saw a man half-blind with lesions
leaning on a cane went up to follow
his example giving up my bill at last
i faltered there and couldn’t choose
between the bills but the hundred
had already been seen and avarice
lit his leprous face and so it spread
from eye to eye infectious in the street
and all now gazed upon my hand and skin
gone milky white again they saw and so
i gave it up of course but void of joy
did i then learn a coin is something else
and as he leant to press a leprous kiss
upon my brow i in lonely falseness
stripped of personhood reduced
back to bitter turned my cheek away.
the path above the stars
(ask the elders do the math
none return along the path)
land laid fallow moving on
to the brink and then beyond
pack your bags desert the base
set a hard line ‘cross your face
pass the oceans skip the earth
leave the land that lent you birth
walk the path above the stars
slip yourself between the bars
maybe there for all your talk
you’ll lose the track of what you stalk
and drift in darkness lost for good
reaping what you sowed and should
or maybe in that distant place
you’ll chance upon a lonely grace
and come triumphant from those lands
with something cupped between your hands.
Pilot
I should never have come, I knew that now. Peter wiped his mouth and broke the silence. “Start-up costs, that’s where they kill you.”
“Mm” I said, forking up the last of my salmon.
“You think you’ve got this golden idea, and you’re not wrong. But then you realize what it takes to get it off the ground. The loan, the building, permits, everything.”
“Do you feel that?” The ground was shaking.
“It’s just a plane taking off.” He gestured. “There’s so many it makes your head spin. Most people you meet are dead in the water and don’t even know it.” I could see the water in my glass vibrating.
“I dunno, Peter—“
“Pete, please, you’re the only one who calls me Peter anymore.”
I sighed. “I dunno, Pete. Seems like you have to take the risk, these things never happen on their own. I mean look, you’re paying for this meal.”
”Sure,” he reflected, inspecting the end of his tie. “But I’m different, I’m a predator. I kill to eat.
“I guess ,” I said.
“You have to understand that.”
“Sure,” I said.
“Where is she now?”
“I don’t know.” I didn’t want to say that. I didn’t want to be here at all. I looked down and watched my water shiver in its glass. He was wrong of course, I understood that much. Planes have pilots; planes take off. The earth shook and the windows rattled in their frames. I could feel it. It was coming straight towards me.
empty mountain dwellings
i said, to all the hidden sages
of humanity, i said please
do not despair
of humanity for in all its ignorance
and great disaster there is still
potential
and though times may be bleak, please
do not despair
of humanity for there are still those
who are true if only in private
and mostly thankless ways
oh, hidden sages of humanity, i said please
i beg you
do not fold in on yourselves do not
withdraw from your mountain dwellings
and fade to myth
for there are still those
who are true and those
who are willing, oh
hidden sages of humanity
for them i beg you please
do not despair of humanity, i said
and then i waited
and a cold wind replied.
half moon circle dirt and shining
there are only ever circles i recall
summer standing upright still
humming under wind and clouds
and skies and light and underneath
my grin my foolish face a half
moon circle smile i remember
winter losing fingernails
to frozen earth to make myself
a place to live and lie and hide
and rest until i had the strength
to move my hands and pull the earth
back down over half moon humming
over all the dark skies dimming
over melancholy over
nothing then i took a breath
and lightness found me there
are only ever circles i recall
lying empty down there still
on my back and looking
upwards with a twitching rising
half moon full of dirt and shining
all across my foolish face.
the colors of the dawn
my memories smeared together
and the words i promised myself
to remember those good words
that got me through the night
became slurred and fell away
so i took my solace in the silence
and the colors of the dawn.
The World is Going to Eat You Up
The sun came in through the blinds, causing him to stir. “A.C. wake up.” He groaned and shifted his weight. “C’mon, wake up.” Little hands pushed at him. He opened his eyes and looked at the boy sitting on his bed. He wore a fluffy, oversized robe and a serious expression. A.C. waved a vague hand in his direction.
“Yeah, Luke, I know. I’m up. Just give me a minute.” The boy nodded, climbed down off the bed and went downstairs. A.C. took his time putting on sweatpants and a t-shirt, then followed him down, yawning and scratching his belly. Luke sat at the table eating cereal from a big bowl with a big spoon, gripping it near the middle.
A.C. sat down heavily. A puppy came bounding from the other room and leapt into his lap. He rubbed its belly and scratched behind its ears. “Hey buddy,” he said to the dog, then looked up to include Luke. “Can you be ready in ten? We’re late.”
“Yep.” Luke stood and went to the kitchen. A.C. heard the clatter of dishes and running water. “Hey A.C.,” the little voice came from the kitchen, “when are you going back to work?” Leaning back, A.C. closed his eyes, scratched the dog’s ears and let go a long breath.
“I don’t know.” The water stopped and Luke came to stand in the doorway, a dishtowel over his shoulder. He cocked his head and looked at A.C, but didn’t say anything. Then he went back to the kitchen and started making a sandwich for lunch.
An hour later, the old station wagon pulled to a stop before the school. “I’ll be back at three, make it your bee’s wax to be here, kiddo.” Luke didn’t say anything for a minute, just gave him a long, serious look. Then he leaned over and kissed his cheek. A.C. watched him run off, backpack bouncing and lunchbox swinging at his side. That look bothered him. He put the car in gear and pulled out of the parking lot.
A.C. sat at the picnic table on the lawn outside the house. The puppy ran past, chasing a blowing leaf. He peered up at the cloudless winter sky and shivered. When he looked down a centipede was crawling along the surface of the table. He resisted the urge to move his hand, instead letting it walk up to his fingers. It poked at him with its antennae for a moment, then crawled upwards. He felt the strange sensation of its legs on his skin. It wasn’t so bad, he thought. It started crawling up his palm, but as it neared the cuff of his shirt he jerked his arm and shook it off.
Around two thirty he went to pick up Luke. By the time they got home it was dark. A.C. carried two big boxes into the house, while at his side Luke struggled along with a third. They set them down heavily and stood, panting and looking at each other. The dog came running up and sniffed at the cardboard. “Scat, buster.”
Luke went into the kitchen. “What do you want for dinner?”
“I don’t care, whatever you want.”
“OK.” The gas stove flamed to life and A.C. heard the sound of running water, then a clank as Luke set a pot on the burner. He mixed a drink and sat on the sofa, his feet up on one of the boxes. They were dusty, it looked like they’d been in storage for some time. He sat and sipped his drink, gazing vacantly out the window as Luke boiled macaroni. It was snowing, he noticed.
They ate quietly at the table, Luke sipping his milk, A.C. his drink. “This is delicious, kiddo, thank you,” he said through a mouthful. Luke looked up, but didn’t say anything.
After dinner they did the dishes together, then went and sat on the floor next to the boxes. Luke took a binder out of his backpack and opened it over the top of a box. He worked on his math homework as A.C. watched the ice melt in his drink. When it was gone he made another. Then another. Luke carried on doing math problems while outside the snow fell in silence. Everything was still. The phone rang and A.C. picked it up.
“Hello?” He was quiet for a while, listening. “No, we haven’t seen anything. Yes, I’m sure. Alright, I’ll keep an eye out.” He hung up and turned to Luke. “That was the sheriff. Says he’s been getting some strange calls recently about an animal. Thinks it’s probably just a coyote, but wanted to let us know.”
“Hey A.C.?”
“Yeah?”
“Where’s Edgar?”
He looked around. “I dunno, haven’t seen him since we got home.”
“Me neither.” They checked the bedroom, the closets, under the sink. It was a small house, and the dog wasn’t in it.
“Did you close the door when we came in?” A.C. asked.
“I think so, didn’t I?” They went to check, and found the door unlatched. A chill wind was blowing in through the crack. A.C. pushed the door open and the light from the kitchen illuminated a small patch of snow-covered ground. They both looked out at the darkness as the snow continued to fall. Luke shivered.
“It’s okay, kiddo, you were helping me carry boxes. Go finish your homework, I’m sure Edgar will turn up.” Luke looked at him, but didn’t say anything.
When he finished his math homework Luke got up and brushed his teeth. Then he took a bath. A.C. listened to him splashing around, then heard him drain the tub, dry himself and get into bed. He got up and went into the bedroom to turn off the light. As he was about to close the door he heard Luke’s little voice. “A.C?”
“What’s up.”
“Can I hear your lullaby one time? Say it for Edgar and me.”
“Yeah, alright. One time.” A.C. sat on the edge of the bed. In a low, quiet voice, he began:
“Soothing rhythms bred from they
who read these words aloud as day
fades the harshest squirmings cease
so rest my child and dream of peace.”
Luke’s eyes were closed as A.C. stepped quietly into the hall and closed the door. He went back to the living room, mixed another drink, and sat down with his feet on a box. The snow fell unrelenting outside the window. He sipped his drink and watched it until his eyes grew heavy and he drifted off to sleep.
In the middle of the night he opened his eyes. The house was dark and cold and still, but he had the uneasy feeling something had woken him. There it was–a faint growling coming from outside. Then a yelp. Then silence. He rose slowly to his feet, rubbed the sleep from his eyes, and went to check. When he opened the door he stopped. In the darkness near the edge of the light was his dog.
Edgar was lying in a pool of blood, his stomach ripped open, one leg twitching. A.C. stepped out and gathered the little body in his arms. Gazing all around him he saw nothing, only falling snow. He took him back inside, locked the door and threw the bolt. In the hopes of sparing Luke, he wrapped the corpse in an old towel and hid it under the sink. He took the bottle of vodka with him into the living room.
He took the top off one of the boxes and sat for a long time looking at pictures. An elderly couple, smiling. A young woman, beautiful, her arms wrapped around a young him. He pulled out a CD and blew off the dust. When he got up and put it on the melody came to him, heavy, laden with old feeling.
What was the name of this song? He unscrewed the vodka, sank back into the cushions and took a long drink. Then another. He couldn’t remember. He knew it was in his brain somewhere, but he couldn’t think of it. It wouldn’t come. For some reason this made him want to cry.
Rising on unsteady legs, he walked to the bedroom. When he opened the door Luke was awake, watching him with his serious little eyes. He leaned sloppily against the doorframe. “Luke. Little Luke. The world is going to eat you up.”
“I know, A.C.”
“Well good. Move over.” Luke slid over and A.C. got in beside him. “Don’t worry,” he murmured, “it’s going to eat me first.” Luke reached out a hand and placed it flat on A.C.’s chest. He felt the heart beat slow beneath his palm.
“A.C.?”
“Yeah.”
“You shouldn’t say things like that to me.”
A.C. didn’t say anything to anyone, just took a long drink and set the bottle by the bed. Eventually they both fell asleep.
Outside, in the darkness and snow, something sat watching the house. In no particular hurry, it licked the blood off its lips. Then it sat very still.
a place between where i exist
i check my pulse i laugh i have
escaped again i felt and found
the way the jailers all forget
all the time and all the chains
and all the walls can wait for me
to wander back from my escape
in beauty where the tiny touches
pattern in the huge and hidden
place between where i exist
in living breathing poetry.
Spring Animals
I was bumming around with Em, years ago, sitting on a bench at a little park. It was autumn and cold and there were no kids around. We were just sitting there without talking, there was nothing more to say. Over her shoulder I saw a little playground with some plastic animals set on springs. I got up and walked over there and she followed me. We both took an animal and started rocking back and forth. Hers was a dragon. Mine was a sea horse.
“Are we old?” She asked.
“No,” I said, “not yet.”
“I feel old.” She shivered beneath her coat.
We sat there side by side, rocking gently back and forth. I tried to reach out and touch her, but she bent sideways on her spring, so I stopped. A breeze blew some dry leaves off the trees and they settled on the ground around us. I was looking at them when I saw the kid. He was standing by the swings, one arm looped around the pole, just looking at us. Well, he wasn’t looking at us exactly, he was looking at our animals.
“Can I try?”
“Yeah dude, knock yourself out.” He came walking up to my sea horse and put a hand on its curved plastic tail. I stepped off with one leg, but my pants caught in the spring. The horse pulled forward with me as I tugged. When I yanked it free the horse jumped up.
Em gasped. My hands rose of their own volition and gripped my hair. “Oh shit.”
“Why did you do that?”
“Oh shit.”
“Oh my god, look at him. Something’s wrong with him.”
She was right, something was wrong. I went over, crouched down and looked at him lying there. The fingers of one hand were clenching and unclenching, like an insect without its head. I looked at his little ribs. “He’s breathing.”
“Why did you do that?” She asked again. She wasn’t looking at the kid anymore, she was looking at me. I wasn’t going to answer a question like that. It was cold and the dying leaves rustled on their branches. Another one broke and came drifting down.
to our first days, my love, from daddy far away
listen my baby, my darling,
i’m sorry your mother and i
have been fighting so much
lately, it isn’t your fault
it’s both of our faults and nobody’s
fault but what can you do? it’s
just life my darling, my beautiful
baby and i love you so much
and i’m sorry so sorry
that i’m here and i can’t
come to visit and i can’t
pick you up on my shoulders
to dance and make animal noises
and swing you laughing around
because this distance, my darling,
between us is time,
only time,
and not space.
kuvunjika kwa koleo sio mwisho wa uhunzi
“the breaking of the tongs isn’t the end of the forging”
he found it late and started
thinking of himself a painted
god and did it at a whirling
pace and ate his first rejections
and that made him strong
and he went about in flush
with power of it painted
gods don’t fear they roar
and live their secret songs
and publish and he ate
his first deserved tearing-downs
and that made him strong
and as he roared he drank
and fled but at his best was still
a stoned and smearing painted
god and sent off applications
to learned places he could work
the craft not carry its enormous
weight alone he ate rejections
and that made him strong
and he did it then with fire
licking at his painted guts
white and wipping arcing fires
backlit in his frantic eyes
and then the rains arrived
and then they stopped
and something soft and spent
and aimless curled up
inside and didn’t do it
anymore and didn’t want
the pity for the aching loss
for the purpose he had carried
then he carried still inside
alone as ever from the first
alone with all the scalding
flames the searing light
he felt it still in darkened
places hiding lost as ever
same as ever but he knew
that once and who can say
this once he roared and shook
his heavens rattled chaos once
he was a burning painted god
and washed of paint he looked at last
clean and blinking from himself
and in the darkness ate the truth
and it made him strong.
kiwi!
from one flightless bird to another.
a mellifluous cacophony
“You can’t have one.”
“Why not?”
“It’s a contradiction in terms, it’s an oxymoron.”
“Whatever, it’ll be my band name.”
“Yeah? What do you play?”
“I’m learning the guitar.”
“Is that right.”
“That’s right.”
“You and everybody else.”
“Yeah. Well, at least I’ll have a good name.”
“God you’re annoying. You’re not starting a band.”
“So what.”
“You barely know three chords on the guitar.”
“That’s true.”
“You’re just being stupid, none of this is real.”
“Is that important?”
“You can’t have a mellifluous cacophony, it’s literally impossible.”
“Watch me.”
“Do you want another drink?”
“You just watch me.”
Give Me Everything
I was tired of everything and I think she was too. We were sitting on a park bench drinking, sometime in the late afternoon. My old nemesis the sun was still too bright but fading. She handed me the little pint bottle and I finished it.
“It’s too bad you’re such a selfish bastard,” she said as she leaned back. Her heart wasn’t in it though. I looked down at the empty bottle then back at her and shrugged.
“Sorry, I wasn’t thinking. You’re very beautiful, you know that?” Her head was back against the bench and her eyes were closed. She barely moved. Just slow breaths.
“Shut up with that.”
I left her there and went to the shop. When I got back she was asleep on the grass. I lay down next to her, opened the bottle and lit a cigarette. One arm behind my head, feet crossed on the grass, I listened to her breathing. The sun was setting and the sky was changing colors. Not too bad, I thought. Not too bad at all.
handkerchief tied to stick 