MY FATHER'S DAUGHTER

as my father’s daughter

I’m not myself

til I’ve walked around a bit

found trails

to the water

not told anyone

where I was going

and come back

on my own schedule

with a story to tell

ready to make a meal

a list of two

It's unclear how this will play out

Your synopsis winds me-

not spoken to but cc'd, as an aside

in case she may know someone who may need...

and yet clearer than what you've said before:

couldn't work.

...unclear how

this will play out.

I keep saying to myself:

my father

my father, my father

neutrality now weighted.

My father, this ache.

To suspect how I feel is permanent

even if you climb out of this-

the break in my voice will still cling to the words.

I am floored by your email, because the evening had felt so pedestrian

Sunk in to my work on the concrete floor.

Present in the drama of my own chosen world.

there has never been something so hard to keep in mind- I've reminded myself

so painful we cope with them by putting it aside:

a list of two

the climate

my father.

my father

Oh my god this horrible vacuum sound

illness hours imagined and more worthwhile for being so
unsure of what's created in the mind to weigh the head
and chest.

This vacuum gut-hum is insane!

Today the whole house was a bed, the floor, the cats, the clothes-pile
blasted by this vacuum desperate vacuum just give up!

The world draped in white sheets

cover the word in wrinkled white
call it bleak when it
hollows itself out

and in the middle
the quilt of slurs
stream along shutters

9

1. I could stand it in so much anger
So much anger in such a small body
Standing in the doorway in such a small body
How can I stand there in the doorway

2. I used to sing really sad songs to my mom
Like Sunrise Sunset
and Somewhere Out There
and The Boxer

3. How could I stand there with so much fury?
So much fury in such a little body
Such a little body standing in the doorway
How could I stand there in the doorway?
Probably best to just leave me alone then.
Probably best to just leave me alone then.
Probably best to leave me alone, then.

4. Things get confused for me, easily
In my first dream a creepy old man melted
my brother and his whole boy scout troop
into quicksilver and reformed them as robots
and sent them out to destroy the world
and I watched through a crack in the doors
I'm sorry, what were we talking about again?

5. In the door in such a small body
Telling him to choose
Me or the computer
In the door
in such a small body 
Things get confused for me.

6.  My mom didn't sing me to sleep
I sang to her and stayed up all night
watching the shadows. You have to choose what you love.
You have to decide what you love.

You need to decide what you like.

7. This next part is the part I can't talk about
not even to you
The next part is the part that I can not talk about it
Not once, 

8. 



9.  

  
I stand there, with so much anger

So much anger such a small body 
Door body so small

How can I stand there in the doorway

(The things for me confused, easily   
best, worst, mother, child, caring, violate
Wrong, right, want, do not want, like, do not like 
I'm sorry, what we're talking about again?)

Things for me confused, easily 

This next part is the part that I can not talk about it
not once,I used to sing songs really sad for my mother
Friend, lover, brother, best killer
As sunset sunrise
Best, worst, mother, child, caring, break
And somewhere
Wrong, wrong, like, do not want to, like, do not like
 And everywhere
And Boxer
I'm sorry that we're talking about again?

 

Man

Man, making a meal of his crisis, slowly.
What? Me?
What?
Me.
This crisis?
Wha.
This. Is.
Wha.
I did, me, crisis?
Wh.
This might be.
Crisis?
Pipe. No longer at jaunty angle,
flopped in half, knackered, at the pool.
How do people get killed.

rules

he leaves class today
to read you his haikus
he wants your approval
and
he gets it
because those poems are mad deep
and
you can't do things
that have too many rules
like writing haikus

the class snake disappeared today
and
one teacher said it's going to surprise us in the bathroom
others say only a person could get it out of the cage
and the principal warns that the cold outside will kill it
and
i wonder
will it eat all the pet rats the kids bring to school
and
how did anyone leave the building with no one noticing a snake in tow?

there's graffiti on the walls today
and
the smell of weed coming from the boys' bathroom
vandalism
and
getting high in school
it seems like
these days
no one follows the rules

AT SOFIA CENTRAL CEMETARY

Leather jackets cradling carnations,

roses, big plastic bottles of beer,

rakia, fanta, all the solitary marches,

and me along their side.

The same man circles the periphery.

Bare head, windbreaker.

We chant izvinite as we pass.

Do I think love lurks in cemeteries?

Do I believe in love?

Is there always free parking at a funerals,

but not always free bathrooms?

Some gravestones have the simple ovals,

silhouettes in contrast, a people united

in good, strong looks.

The photograph of Stefan’s mother

head back, brown bottle.

Is that when Mitko decided to love her most?

Did he see the confidence

of her sharp, full swig

and know right then

she was the truth?

New groups arrive

at the Sofia Central Cemetary.

The women sellers hustle

bouquets in gentle tones,

the highway rushes past.

I will cry for my family

who I do not know how to mourn,

and for the stranger etched into stone

who leans against a white sports car

with a golf club for a cane.