Emily goes on a date

Night started out okay,
He was nice he
bought me a cherry coke and
shared his sweet-potato fries and his broccoli.
Later his friends would call him a Jew for
not buying me dinner but he wasn’t stingy
I’d just already eaten,
beforehand.

He was nice at the frat party.
His frat hates their school,
they’re the normal ones
not the Armani tight-jeaned faggots or
rich bitch stuck-up whores no
they were just normal guys
liked flipcup and beer pong
liked old-school rap meaning Tupac
liked nicknames like
"Swamp-girl" for the ugly girl
one of their brothers had hooked up with
and "Mexican" for my date.
He didn’t like this nickname he
insisted he wasn’t Mexican
just because he'd lived in Spain
just because his mother was from Panama
and named the other Hispanic countries of his heritage
that were cooler.

Anyway he was nice he would
set his hand on my back sometimes and
pumped the keg for me.

He walked me home we went by the waterfront
I dropped him off at the Metro and
we kissed.
Not sure why except
maybe because he was nice,
with the beer and the broccoli and all,
but more probably because
it’s what one does on a date,
an empty formality
like shaking hands—
seems harmless enough but
in reality spreads germs.
Anyway it was a spectacularly boring kiss,
it's funny the feeling of
lip on lip
feels so different depending on
who it's with.

The next morning I felt depressed
maybe because I’d wasted a whole night
not wanting to be where I was or
maybe because I’d wasted a whole morning
slightly hungover with the blinds down low
or maybe because
I’d been excited about the date,
beforehand.

EWV

waltzing across walls, waltzing with the sun

the sun rose while
the birds sang
even the rooster broke the night
as the dark city
became golden.

when the dance ended
and i lay in his arms
shivering in the holy air
everything no longer looked so perfect
from such great heights,
even as the dessert sun
peaked over the wavering line
of the west bank
horizon.
it took me five beers,
one semi-square in a waltz,
three jumps back from the ocean,
two blindfolded eyes above this confusing city,
4 a.m. walks through deserted streets,
a handful of wails from allison, gillian, and iron and wine,
and one prickly face against mine
to realize
that perhaps i am not detached
from my movements,
thoughts,
and sinusoidal fluctuations
of emotion.

after the loss of
expressed love
my eyes stood hard and dry,
and only memoirs of war
were able to warm
my cold blood
to feel
the pain in this world.
but what of my own?

(i closed my eyes when his
opened into mine,
and i thought
of the promises lost,
and dreamed of a me
who would know better,
or at least keep my eyes open
to see the fault lines.
for when will i know how to draw
a line made out of anything
but sand?
where does adventure become reckless
and wonder become wonderful
and love become something worth fighting for?)

maybe my cold blood
is not frigid
for the sake of frigidity,
maybe it's just selective in its enforcement.
maybe when i find my cliche
of the important things in life
and write "you should" books
based on small heroes
in far away places,
peace and justice and universal love
will be at the top of the list,
and a specific "you" will
have to come later.

(for i do love you,
the editorial you at least,
with no country on your passport,
but an unidentifiable face
that i want to make smile.
schindler, oz, sarah, kristof
you all say it,
that it's one life
that counts,
slowly, each one,
and i want to start somewhere
else, somewhere far.)

or maybe i say this
to avoid all kinds of self-loathe,
which perhaps comes more easily,
but i would rather love myself
with freedom and security and peace,
knowing that i am trying with each day
and hour of sleep
and breath of holy air
to make it better,
improve lives,
and train myself
to do so
indefinitely
without second thought.

i know i am an imperfect being.
i fall apart each day:
my hair comes out in the shower,
i tell lies in my dreams,
i eat wilted lettuce and accidental
pieces of eggshells in pasta,
i stalk celebrities who cheat on their wives,
i cry listening to npr on the bus,
i criticize my mother,
i am distracted by travel ads on the internet
i yell when i stub my toe
i write poems and dream smiling dreams
about a boy i loved and hated and want
to hate
but most of the time don't
even in the very moment i say i do
i spin with knives at the end of my hair,
and am often hypocritical beyond measure.
these days i'm just,
slowly,
waltzing with entropy,
spinning towards
chaos
in between
left foot back right over glide and
forward.

but for today, (inhale/exhale,
in methodical and rhythmic sequences)
i will choose my steps,
i will choose to be okay,
i will choose to love universally,
and include myself in this
universal declaration of human love
(including rights),
and implement it better than the bureaucratic entities.
i will choose to make big plans
and dream of the future of peace
i'll be a part of making.

(with a sigh, a tear and defeated smile,
my self self-help
repeats in circular and repeated doctrines
not only to smile and do,
but to run and write
speak my mind and
fill my heart with the realities around me,
to read and sing,
eat chocolate and fresh fruit
after chatting with the man who sells it,
and never lose hope,
to be present wherever i am,
but know the difference between
liberation and self-destruction,
to sit and think,
put my hands in the earth,
learn languages and
engage with everyone around me
with no pretext and no
judgment,
to remember that people are mostly good
and to make time for yoga, tears,
beauty, and the sun,
and resist feeling guilty for wanting something
for myself,
to stay in love with the world,
even amid the hate,
and devote my life
to bringing the sun
a bit closer.)

i will look for a beautiful life,
and in the process,
a beautiful me,
for what else can i do,
as i move in this
spinning, waltzing, loving
dance?

(eyes closed now,
but as they slowly
open,
i catch
a glimpse of
a slice
of peace
as the sun
floods through
all the separation
barriers,
making the opposite sides
indistinguishably
light.
it still looks more
perfect
from these great heights)

DLS

Greetings to Slumber; Farewell for Now

Goodnight Sun,
Goodnight Moon,
Goodnight Stars,
Goodnight Sky.



B

the world is not a sad and broken place, the world is not a sad and broken place...

salty eyes,
untagged with reason,
just
an uninvited saline and sad
bird
perched on the branches
of my thoughts.
i asked her,
kindly
with these salty eyes,
to please fly away.
the salt stings,
and the background noise
of her chirps
is no longer
a smile of wonder,
it is a soft, wailing
melody
(like the pain of the inhale of a
harmonica, sung with eyes shut
and a piercing throat vibrato)
perched with miraculous constancy
amid my web of thoughts,
so tangled they are
opaque.
she only stared back
at me,
though.
her full eyes were
black and empty
and her three toes
gripped the branch
only tighter
as her wings expanded like a fan
only to recoil back to her
statue stance.
her wings aren't clipped,
i saw.
she has flown from her nest,
she is free,
but she stays
to darken my white lies
with her stare,
to mock my unwinged arms
and heavy feet
with her choice,
and to remind me
with her song
that the world is all too often
full of other, louder
wailing birds
singing to us
of broken bodies and
broken spirits,
whether we hear them
or not.

DLS

Hello

I was walking down the street &
(I was walking my dog &
the sidewalk was empty but there were
cars parked tight on the street
& occasionally a car would pass going
thirty or forty which I thought was fast
for such a small street such a quiet neighborhood
where the sidewalks were uneven with
the stones jutting up high so I had
to watch my step & there didn’t
seem to be a direction home because
I think I was lost and I didn’t
recognize the housefronts and the windows
were all shuttered-up so I couldn’t see
if there was someone I could ask)
I think I ran right into myself under
a tree & I was standing there not raising
my head or looking at myself or even
my dog even though he was peeing on
the tree. When he was done I left myself
and retraced my steps back & above
the yelling of Bob Dylan about being
tangled up in blue in my ears I heard my
phone ringing & I answered & my mom
asked me when are you coming home &
I said I am lost mommy please help me I
don’t know these streets & I don’t see any
cars or people & the dog is getting tired &
she said that she would get in the car to
come pick me up & I shouldn’t move but
just sit down on a stoop on the corner where
I was & I waited for her a very long time
because I think she got lost too & finally
a tall man came out of the house & he told me you can’t
sit there anymore & I said please & explained
& please I haven’t
seen my mom in a long time & he
looked at me in my eyes & my dirty dog
& he said that he missed his mom too &
I could stay. We talked & he told me that
before college he worked in a car shop in the Bronx
& went to Yankees games a lot & he said
I went to college when I was twenty
five because it took me so long to save up money
because I loved the Yankees so much. I told him
I didn’t want to go back to school sometimes &
he said I never missed a day but you
really should get a college degree because
it gets a lot of use in your long days and short nights.
& then my mom drove by
but I was sitting in the other seat the passenger seat &
I looked at myself again & I didn’t know what happened
but then she came around the block & picked me up
& she drove my dog & me & me home. I waved
goodbye to the stoop & the stoop & he said
come back anytime & we’ll watch the Yankees
& the car carried me away
& my dog barked & my mom said
Hello.

—EWW

renewed vow to vegetarianism

biting into the red juices
spilling from in between
the pitas,
and speaking
in between
the loud noise
of his chews,
he slobbered:

you know,
i just don't want to know where
this slab of meat
comes from.
ignorance is bliss.

my unblinking eyes
glared
as images
of his whited out world,
full of nameless slabs of meat
(including the cannibal kind
just over the fence)
being ground
by his ruthless
growls
and sharp
teeth
as the invisible juices
spill down his
coated red palms.

bliss.

DLS

the divine feminine, reading the news

her voice rolled over me,
and after seconds of infatuation
with just the oscillating sound,
i heard the words.
you are seeing it now,
she crooned,
aren't you?
you are seeing the rigidity
of belief,
and the people
you would love on every side
of this mirrored window.
you are seeing the need for
hope,
she said softly,
almost to herself
with a far away gaze.

bringing her back,
i whispered with sad eyes,
but what is this thing we call hope,
and how can it fix this unsolved mess,
which is now a two thousand year old
unsolved mess,
maybe more?

shifting the angle of her gaze,
it absorbed mine, and i
floated in the fullness of her dark iris.
hope,
young one,
is why you ask me these questions.
without it, there would be no curiosity,
for there would be no solution
to discover.
it is when you stop asking questions,
stop trying to soften these sharp corners of
belief, stop seeking understanding, stop sifting through history,
stop eavesdropping on stranger's conversations, and stop
coming to me with sad eyes that yearn for peace
that marks the dissolution
of hope.
its once potent pedals will become soggy in
those poisonous waters, and its wings will no longer flap
in mere disbelief
of its own capability for flight.
you will then sit still in a room
with mirrored windows,
reflecting back your hardened notions of the world
through empty eyes,
with nothing and no one
able to penetrate
the thick glass walls.

DLS

be here now.

i blew bubbles out my caged window
last night
onto different people
from different places,
thinking of his note and
the peace rainbows in soapy
water
won't make.

i blew notes into my metal bar-
5,6 fiveeee 6
(halleluuuuujah),
and closing my eyes into the instrument,
my arms defied gravity
spinning under the peruvian sky,
while hiding a tear
in strange sheets
as he sang to me
his brother's lost chord,
and quickly running by
the grove street graveyard,
losing my breath,
instead of gasping for it
when thinking of the flight
off the horizon from the tapenzee.

my mind blows everywhere,
merely carried by the wind and my whims,
but my body is absorbed in this
sweet city of stones
with a sun
that speaks
and a skyline
that echoes
and shadows
that tell
stories
in a language
my ears can't
hear.

DLS

June 2 (written as the sun went down)

I danced in my kitchen at quarter past noon
because you were six hours ahead
on the middle of a bridge in Paris and told me to.
You have nothing to go on but my word.
I looked 19 and my hair was wet from a shower.
It was hot today, and it could be my bare feet
scraped the dunes of a desert.
I spun three times and murmured
Hebrew words, "croque monsieur."
Eyes open, I found my toaster and America.

To my far-flung friends I send well wishes,
concentrated thoughts.
Sorry I can't meet you in Jerusalem
or in some charcoal sketch of a Montmartre.

My brother, there, is staring with his one new tooth:
highchair regal, no-drool serious.
Sometimes you have to stay in one place
long enough that the people there
(especially the small ones)
can recognize you.
So I mow the lawn.

One day I'll tuck my brother securely under one arm,
like the Vikings their women or Paris, Helen,
and we'll away.

For now we sit on the porch and turn the day
from vinegar and heat to fingerfuls of icing from the bowl.
Three birds fly from the tree like an omen in an epic.
Tomorrow I'll take him someplace foreign, like the pond.

CDL