1 through 7

1

the orange net means safety.  the orange cones mean rest.  the sky over the concrete wall suggests the ocean

2

coupled people using tinder for the first time

3

my aunt and flowers and my grandmother's legs

4

my grandmother's legs and shoes and a chair and newspaper

5

beatrice in the wooden rocker on the porch, wearing a checked dress and holding an egg

6

(part of) the bust of alexander skene

7

below, a white guy in a toyota stuck waiting to cross the road, caught digging in his nose for gold while he thinks no one is watching him

Riding in the Backs of Cars

drink more water
you always tell yourself
have a good meal in your stomach
you only brought three beers but somehow you drank more
riding in the backs of cars always makes you nauseous
it's worse when you've been drinking
you roll down the window
let the cold breeze hit your face
and think
that's better
then it all comes pouring out
bright purple
the cab driver hands you a rag and a bottle of water
and tells you to clean off the car
and you oblige
before he continues on his way.

if my eyes decide on you

you become from shifting

into lines affirming

and the rest is background

does not corroborate except

by going

then you can only move

toward or from me

swaying like one walking

over nothing on not much

I can see your feet

soles flashing and your heels

round to come down

till they insist on the ground

and I can see it

if I can

I look into what you know

like the air you take into you

what emits you

isn't you but as you touch it

matters

if as a given you don't take me

up then I will see you going to

the library or from the store

but I'll have to look again

not sure who is

#1

show don't tell show don't tell show don't tell show don't tell show don't tell show don't tell show don't tell show don't tell show don't tell show don't tell show don't tell show don't tell show don't tell show don't tell

I wrote this poem backwards
Not fucking sorry at all
I'm not sorry at all
you know what
sprawling
like ice crystals across glass
the careless way they pile up
And I can only think of music notes
When I'm falling for you
There are those moments
on the daily 
I experience earthquakes
between stay-go-stay-go-stay-go
I'm vibrating
because I don't know how to go forwards
I am writing this poem backwards
the heat length and strength of you
like the longing of my body for the curve of you
the crystals that work in their own nighttime logic
trace the labyrinth of ice
fear misdirection
and I love longing
because I never saw you coming
I will write this poem backwards
The heart moves to its own beat
Can't direct a fractal
What can you do

This year

The space you need where sadness is okay
The space to step outside yourself and be larger than, those multitudes.
This year, what would it take?
and every year, for everyone
what would it take?

Roomba

Echo chambered, bounced in a castle of thought.
Dodging myself, my dream to be left alone in my Florida kitchen,
circling the tile for snapped off spaghetti
and oatmeal flakes,
flicked off the counter with heritage grains.

A Holy Day of Obligation

Wake up! Saints down 45th, aloft
on brass, on dads.
Families not hungover, godly
horns bleat past the bed.
the dads and their trombones, the child-free and
tubas. Birds competing
"they're still there?"I thought
they weren't still there, the riot
raised when all the saints have
trundled on, have
labored in the sun.

Suddenly there's Poughkeepsie

In the backseat of the minivan
I took a vow of silence -
a teenage adaption of running away from
home-
sitting quiet
like waiting with bated breath on
the side of house
listening for any hint of
where did she get off to?
Plopping down on damp leaves
when knees get worn down from
squatting one hand on the linoleum siding to
keep from falling over.
Sounds lull on and on with no
mention of me.
Then
suddenly there's Poughkeepsie.

LATELY

On the first day of the New Year

I feel far from poems

chest still shuttering to shake

the halted embrace

that finally let itself

turn avalanche–

a cobalt sky, a lost maraschino

folded nylons and the blinking lights

of foolish comfort

temporary homes. 

Gift

"Of the increase of his government and peace there shall be no end"

Mostly the sun-

seared  pink, horizon

Mostly the pan 

of Eucalyptus curved over the road

My upside-down sweetness,

My life for death

Cubierto, Amante,

My Bower

My Lord.

HIDING FROM BILL

In the morning from bed

I hear his snores transition to grunts

and then the music comes on,

Jack Johnson or something at top volume.

Bill is singing along, stomping, dancing,

falling, chortling, yelling,

switching songs in the middle,

turning the volume up,

going back again,

breaking every rule in the book.

I stay in bed til noon

with the cat curled kitty-corner

from me, alone as we can get.

When I finally emerge

Bill catches me on the stairs with a question:

tomorrow morning can you please keep the music down?

DOMINOES

this is the season of nesting
listless memory recalling the summer peach
that is the back of your neck. a sweet nectar
as you roll on the couch in the sunlight, I am left to
catch whiffs of the perfume-
signs of bruising, already

this is the season of inarguable difference
shadows long on the wall, amid storms swelling I
deconstruct like a maryoshka doll. breaking down
into smaller and smaller versions of myself
becoming a lesser, and lesser woman

this is the time for us now
blanched, poached, bloated, we
form imperceptible knots in the string binding us. left unnoticed
until the need to tug hard,
a hail mary
these minuscule knots tied before,
now ripping at the seams.