This Is Just A Corner

Nouns to Verbs

Writing past the boundary's resist

Resisting disorder in the  house

Housing a welter of memories

Remembering a laugh in the dentist's chair

Chairing a committee I have forgotten

Forgetting an unskewed self

Self-centering on the views of others

Othering the random ole' gene pool

Pooling funds to scrape off the film

Filming it over in my head

Heading for years I never imagined

Imagining it as I write.

Maybe She Was Easily Fooled

eyes whistled shut
ribs tucked in neat
countenance unspent
swell to her shoetops
thumb crooked over the lip of the pitcher
measure measure each drop rolls like mercury
each memory bounding like beads unstrung

The Song Came Forth All Shakery

Sing ahead of your life;
make your death an early midpoint in your song.
Age is long, with much sitting;
therefore, twirl and clap, a Godcap caper.
Voice the joy of the stream-lined chair;
Push back weary thoughts, hang them on the wall.

The simplest bonnet frames a wrinkled face
slightly smeared with crumb and preserves

The Crone Does Crosswords Under the Moon

Eight letters is all she gets,
and her mind balks at the limitation.
The way to freedom is the clue.
Easypeas. She's done that!

shuffle, rage
snuffle, rage
stuff/full, rage
sluff, you'll rage
suffer, suffer, rage,
pull off the R
age
suffer, age,
and suddenly,
suffrage

O little Star of Silencio

O Little Star of Silencio

  - remembering J.Edgar Hoover, the Herod of His Era

How humdrum the skylence,

birdless,  the breeze

barely feathering the droopy eucalyptus....

Above the butched lawn's creep towards sunlight,

haze,  with dull sky and dissolved clouds

barely breach the spotless windowpane....

Yet in the double boppy, the infants/twins do grow

and pull in air and circulate 

the blood Herod would spill

(sort of can be sung to the xmas carol O L T of Bethlehem)

I Am Afeared of a Hungry Lion, Too

i am afeared of the lifting fog

rising from the morning moist

EartheArtheaRthearTheartH

tiny damp songs pillaring through the dirt

don't be like me, no, not me

I'm humming the tune, can't help it,

a spiritual from family gone down,

from family seared to ash

family thick in the very strands of me

more Addams than Brady

the autocorrect says brandy, but it is wrong

Hey Hungry Hippo

The pet names fly down the hallway,
Pudding, Butterscotch, Lurch...

The worst names ricochet like racquetballs,
usually after cheap beer, not the better Scotch...

The lunch words oil splotch the paperbags,
Flybynight Focaccia, why do they line thermoses with glass?

The passenger calls shotgun, putting walls up
for the slower runners, who only get to honk, beep cheer...

Ratchet up the volume, more Magnetic Fields than REM,
cause Science is for the vibrant thermal reactors, girls.

Immoderate Family

The father pouring in the liquor, sucking up the vapor,

folding in his ears, and keeping the tips low

The son yowling with the movie, ripping newspaper, tossing the foods

that touch on the plate, casting spells, frantic gestures at every face...

One pulls what's alien inside him, one pulls worlds out of him, 

both bizarrely tethered to screens, 

or loudly demanding the attention of their shared motherwife...

There's gulping, and gavottes, and plays for the girl...

It's getting desperate, the screens bounce jellied trampolines,

the woman admits she is tired, as her son melds his bony brow 

to her cheekbone, still bruised from last night's antics.

Her husband forgets he was childish. He says what he thinks (again)

and it sinks in her, and then, like a glancing balloon, rises up. 

Can't Get Past That Bong in the Kitchen

Malificent magnificent jolie belle big screen tv good to be bad
Tail thwacking Great Dane galumphs along aquarium wall, stirred fish, crazed under glass,
Cushions torn from couches trip the boy, the cushion redistributor, manic howling
boy, whacked out with late night energy, dances Night on Bald Mountain vigor
babysitter apologetic, parents loopy, ice cream bowls balanced on the fridge
from the dog, from the fuckinghuge dog, and the neighbor's pinata party still going,
cheers, a loose onion rolling past, the houseguests drawn in, a bong on the kitchen counter,
familiar burning sock smell, two conversations and the opera child in the floodlights,
smartphones consulted, music upon a time fairy tale, gestures flung, it's grape-stomping,
lungs ballooning out the rib slats, grown ups gobbling, pulling more in, more food, smoke,
determined human vortexes, careening close to the pint sized caruso,
pajamas damp splotched from the overture in the bath

Child Run

The saddest day is when the child chooses not to run

but to walk, to simply move from one locale to another,

without any shift of speed, without that glorious bristle of muscle fibers

catapulting gravity, weaving past furnishings, big people,

over rock, roots,, shifts in linoleum,  around the Best Toys, 

weirdly equal to the Worst, as impediments to an inner velocity - 

Child with unspeakable knowledge that to move fast is to be superb,

no future drug will ever match it,  superbeing wheeling

joy, the bird of your mind on an updraft spiral,

never hungry or tired,

just tearing  air, or,

puma/velociraptor/sailfish

crisp tissue

snatched

Scurrilous Penance

Aunt Judi's husband Mark has built a windowseat for the dog
Grandma says that he loves the dog so much he is like a maiden aunt
Pop said no, Mark is married to the aunt, so he is an uncle, and married,
which argues against maiden, which gave us some pause
And I said, is it just for the dog? can people sit there too?
confusion leapt up and licked some faces

Grandma says that is the point, the dog is like people
I am biting my tongue so hard, I am damaging the buds, a familiar act,
scurrilous penance, whose tail is wagging, despite the sad eyes?

Can't we just be happy for the dog?

October, 1971, Scenes from the Car

anger browns the insult char

call the older brother "CHEAP STEAK!!!"

wacky laughter shames the younger sister

out of the firepit of righteousness

tangerines peeled into skin rivulets

pithy bits stuck to our dried fingers

windows down, we sprawl in the back of the unpadded Fiat

instructed:to wait for our parents at the funeral home

car window view is southern, low hills, white building, columns

older brother bolts over the lowered front seat 

another minute of patience and he will go loony

a quick walk and a cigarette away from the sister's book addiction

parents return, they always do, or, so it seemed

appraising the scene -  full box of kleenex unfolded and twisted

a white garden of dry roses in the back window

every child is scolded, each frames blame, repentance resisted

Government Contracts for Inorganic Mulch

when is something sold, when is it "goods", and when do you shift from seller to purveyor?
the film that brought you the unbearable philosophies of war
the sticky label in the jacket pocket "ten tiny Mexican cups $1.50"
the haiku so clever it must be explained
hot air whistling dryly, ineffectively, from bent metal vents, at least the sound is warm
Can we sell ourselves a story as good as that one on 700 pieces of paper
someone has stitched together?
Is that done in China, too, like the bluejeans and the Applepliances?
Great concern for dust in the workplace, little notice of dust in the lungs.
Sell the folk horoscopes with ocelots, & polar bears, the attacking kind
also the drone that's just a bottle-fly
Working on the concept of "when" before hearing the rest of the question
Conceiving without eggs, or nest, or the glimmer of Spring.

Relationship is No Boat, Not Amish, & Not Run with Batons

a fluid transfer, a sloppo de la moppo, a game with red Solo cups,

a forehead of bangs that fight the eyelashes, a deaf ear for advice,

two locks with four wrong keys, an idea polluted, a quilt with doghair,

bisque chicken statue (not a soup), a mapquest, a riddle, an oar that

once splintered and was reshaped, rickrack on cardboard skeins,

the skin at the fold of your neck. A word scramble that spells out

Recipe for A Happy Anniversary.

From The Knowledge of Finn, 16 months.

British cab drivers learn the streets of London 

and drive what they learn until the map is seared on neurons

with their mothers' names, their favorite team, the taste of milk...

Finn's mind is busy burning connections, labeling and classifying,

so that forevermore he knows the sound of the mailslot flapdoor,

the smell of dishwasher soap, the pattern of light on the rug...

Forever he knows that dogs prefer some books to others,

that sand is thrilling to throw, that old women offer to take 

him home and keep him. Steps are high, the Recycling Truck is

the Best Truck. Hummus on banana cannot hide the taste of banana.

Moons must be bade Goodnight.

Sunday's Child Uses the Internet to Find a Therapist

200 words or less to say

what in the samhill is wrong witchaa?

(does everyone email succinctly?)

Dear Dr., I need more words.

tired eyes snag on power quotes

from Thoreau? Moore, Jung, oh, the happy guys,

who are all fellas

who are all dead

morning silent hours, grey to sun,

 air thickened and easier to swallow

the time bends to afternoon

as data trollopes up

Finish That Year

I hadte finish that year, hadte start another.

my list started: buy new calendar, send off children...

one kid bused to Truth or Consequences

one kid flew to droopy Florida

one kid stayed home in an unheated house and paid off a loan

I'm the me, the mom, who went to a salad party, 

the last holiday party, a Late New Year's Party.

It was really a croquet party,

with Korean beef and a Kimchi refrigerator-

which has three compartments, 3 temperature controls-

and mostly teachers muttering that school starts, starts,

i n t h i r t y s i x h o u r s....WHACK, croquet ball lumps over dirt.

In 36 hours we will not be balancing plates with too much salad.

We will be starting our year again, like we always do,

helplessly, fearfully, brazen, muttering.

our paper plates will sog- up in the trash.

my vision will scramble death into hadte,  into Ed hat, into detah, into he dat...

and this year I  will think about the truth more, and the consequences,

the calendar will hold me to it, and it will withhold the children

until all is true.

Two Lines Times Ten Fast Memories

The car warmed the mittens off 

Finny old caddy w/six cylinder heater

The passenger was splashing her

sister -popped heel bliss...

Hurry home to Two Car Garage Door

open your eyes itsa  Genie surprise

Set Corelle on mats of plastic

Know you don't live here. In the fridge, a box of beer.

Can't we finish? Can me and Shelly go?

3speeds hop the sidewalk cracks, souer-calling our cul de sac

Math homework dull, dialling Mary Fuller

twelve rows of problems, no one can solve 'em

Cartoon morning on pillow stiff and puffy

Headache already, too hot for nine o'clock.

Stay in the TV present, wontcha?

Betty Boop's vowels sell  lotsa paper towels.

Claw out the dandelions, careful, all the roots

Nickel for two clumps, then, figure, quarter for ten.

Some Christmases,  only lights are strung

Ornaments are fingered over. Let's just recover.

Ten Lines Twice

chokeholds in the news-

that family has stuff they won't share;

nothing to do with the police.

(keep  butter from the cats, stave off anguish)

stories of interrupted eyes, minor seizures-

I hate when we don't breathe;

missing some hook to hang my dear hat on,

missing the work i  did love half-sassed

planes go down, albums release...

doves dove off a pier, diaspora from a beach wedding.

Choking with  news, it's so old-

that family has stuff they can't lose;

nothing to do with Grandpa's famous grip.

(keep us at his side, unflustered side dish)

store it up in a net, grab handfuls that squish,

I hate when we're bereaved;

missing some handle to exit cold warehouse,

missing what worked to keep us all in

parents may drown, songs decease...

doves appear in droves, they missed the words, they work for seed.