memories of damage #1

there are, no lights
when my eyes open. Except
the hushed blue
from atop the garage door.

clotted/throbbing/shifted
indigo leaks onto bone and
I immediately notice the jagged pain of
a metal
can, cracked in half
between two vertebrae.
I am showered in it's thick liquid;
warm sugar dripping down my neck.

they left!
panicked, before I was
re-submerged by the darkness.
unconscious.
nothing but August night air hitting the train tracks and
coyote calls around me.
body pressed to concrete
bike left untamed.

I remember the view.
railings of the loading dock,
my feet above me,
backpack straps,
bicycle splayed sideways on
the narrow slope of grass,
night sky obscured by
tops of warehouses.

I cry out.
thick layers of skin lost
from my palms, my knees.
helmet digging into my chin
swollen.
a sense of loss
embarrassment
disgust.
where was I? Alone, and
betrayed by my own actions of which
i still can not remember
to this day.

you must stand, now. I said
to myself. Out loud and
gently.
my mind gaps
on how i lumbered to my bike
wheeled the damaged steed around the corner
stopped.
street lamps
and another coyote howl.
Someone was waiting for me there.
I collapsed. supported.
someone to hold my
body, tender like
bruised roses.

HOW I LOST MY WAY, OR: AN ODE TO NOODLE PETE

i track murmured words
and lines of sight.
watch you gaze to
the horizon,
the speaker,
the cold air, is
what finally makes you blink.

there is often comfort in
unknowing.
in feeling around in the dark. let
fingers do the work.
squeeze biceps,
rub necks,
the cashmere, is
what finally makes them rest.

(they had caught two foals,
two wild young stallions which
kicked and reared and bit and
struggled frantically to free themselves as
Birk and Ronia tried to tie each of them to a tree.)

It's too much in the mornings, you know?
so many hasty steps to take and
rosemary bushes to count. I'll
stop to pick up feathers,
bluster at the grey skies,
your gullied smile, is
what keeps one foot in front of the other.

I need a deep breath because i realize
the awkward growing pains of those
stretches,
pauses

of

time

 manifesting as inches of
space, between us.

very simple, two good hands

like desert, his hands of dry earth
and callouses. splintered
nails. Ocher and rust,
they match the colours of his neck.
Exposed to the winds and the suns of
many years
standing knee deep in
rubble
hot metal and
the tides.
Each night they shine silver with
residue from fish scales.
thickened by nylon ropes and salt
they've tied knots he
now sits at the kitchen table, idly
twisting into found pieces of string
and rubber bands.
Smelling of soot and fresh wounds
they
line metal, grow weary of the repetition of
a welder's work. Stretch
tense muscles and count
scars.
Firm on the wooden handle
smears of chalk and
sawdust line the cracks. He
comes home
to wash the babies and feed the dogs.
his hands
scabbed and blackened at the knuckles,
He touches their backs and
the children take comfort in their weight.
Warm to hold
an infant's head, and
his wife's smooth plait.
the dense click of fingernail against
tooth
he is thoughtful.
they hold so much weight, these hands
of carbon and sinew.
it is so
very heavy.
it is so
very simple, these
two good
hands.

YOUNG WOLF

I remember cradling your head
cooing; singing your family songs
in a voice not quite confident.
Those big purple/green mountains looking
all bruised and intimidating
deafening
in their volume. Static noise, which
over powered the dusty tapes we played
as we rush past in a little silver
volvo
taking a deep breath to go on to the next verse.

I remember a few chilled October nights
your slight nose painted,
brown for fox
black for tiger
other animals too, i suppose.
straw bale hair
bushing out, almost
as excited as you.

I remember hanging upside down on your couch
 hair, dusting the floor.
Wayne's world 1 and 2 and
two bowls of ice cream because
i wanted you to think i was cool.
Almost sheepishly I took the worn bills from your
mothers hand
shy
to put value on time spent together.

I remember your new sounds
voice low now, like aduki beans
and dry toast.
You wore a nice grey sweater
and I was unsure of the moment you grew taller than me
Did it creep past me?  or maybe it stood proud in front
of me and
I just looked through it. Glassy eyed and back facing the door.

I remember two years ago and shuffling
in the robust kitchen, socks collecting crumbs. I sneaked you downstairs
fed you liquor,
the agave burning our lips as we passed a bottle between
cousins.
Upstairs, pressing thick plastic buttons we left sad messages.
I was too drunk to remember the rest of the games played.
You were too sweet to remind me.

I remember last year. shallow messages sent
into late night grey clouds on black.
your sister and I
we drove
and drove
and drove, something we do. Across empty highways
Your nonsense, tomfoolery. you have such wit
and a golden heart. To aide and abet
navigation
high school
all things made
of salty blue skies
and wind whips.

A WORK IN PROGRESS

Really, I think of our

Autumn:

your ghost face and dying roots. Our love, irreverent.

You left nothing

but your skeleton.

Bones slick

mucous/tissue/blood/alone

to rust.

I picked them up.

Built a fence.

through construction,

they are mine.

Rejoice!

RESPONSIBILITY, UNDERRATED

what if

I chose to forgive.

burrow, to the belly

scoop this

sickness

by the handful.

I think it would

feel like ash

yet, jet black.

Powder everywhere.

I would weep

as I dug.

scraping all the sides,

to remove

every trace

Begging to be washed

free of all the

hurt

and anger, incinerated.

Released.

I guess, I do not always remember

that

it is my own job

to

free my own heart.



THEY WROTE ME BACK

I'll sit on the bus

and feel cold

glass on face

and simultaneously,

a man's deep baritone

rumbling too loud

talking too much, about

Portland.

food trucks, micro brews, and

vegan stripping.

Who cares

about your post-feminist values

shaming and

I remember when I was

drunk and applying for jobs

as a dancer.

Also shaming.



THEY COME IN THREES

1.

I swallow this thought

wet, and thick,

like an eel.

oh! (your sweet slumber)

you do not deserve

me

 

 

2.

As the drones must be

driven from the hive, come

winter, so too must

you

 

 

3.

I wonder, how many times

will I have to learn

the lesson; just

because a fruit falls from the tree,

does not mean it is

sweet.

I CARRY THE WEIGHT

I have plans to

 make plans

(lists of lists to write.)

weary of their cultivation, ideas sown in the soil 

they are fed acrid resentment
and only brief sparks 

of lucidity.

I look at your feet shuffling

a rhythm.

I meet you there.

Patterns must be dismantled
 bit,

by bit.

Fingers busy.

teeth chew on lips, hungrily,

anxiously.

yet pulse
is no where to be found.

EVERYDAY WITCHCAFT

What I was told:

face of a fox

and do you

curl your hair

wait, no

maybe it's straightened

open me another beer, okay?

I'll spend the whole night folding origami animals.

I'll build you a zoo.

NOT YOU, NOT ME

My tongue heavy

I am choked. Grasping for 

bodies sweet.

the distance grows

thick

like Black. Milk. Honey.

An omission.

chapped lips, and vertebrae in

all the wrong spots

something clearly lacks.

pleASECOMEBACKtome

AGAIN I AM REMINDED

there are places, spaces,

 air clotted like blood fills

my mouth and
thoughts of you

appear like brilliant white flashes of pain. I've told myself

"It's just a road (or a house, or a flower, or a song, or..)  don't make a monster out of it."

 there are hundreds of monsters
everyday

who suck the life out of moments

where, in a knock kneed state,

fragile at best,

i am not cautionary.
 potentially quiet at mind

if not at heart.

in an instant, i am destroyed.

I can not imagine aching for somebody as much as i ache for you.