It's december

It's december
And it hasn't even snowed


LIL

snowbird

the birds feed through the fall. beaks

to bite holds--all bitter

grains and flapping wings

against autumn's palate

of pastel sugar cravings:

motion in a still landscape,

moving to the speed of flight.

in the moonlight the momentum of

survival slows,

the metal of a man-made feeding

machine catches the night sky's

mirror. this inverse

revolution tickles the calendar

of waves and shadows like

a caffeine buzz on the brain.

sometimes i commute by plane, fly

high with

no wind in my hair,

no flutter to wings,

on a never

ending chase of stimulation,

going to work finding another

limit, the feeder with no food,

relapsing once more in an addiction

to temporary, a love of what's away.

sunshine stays vain like a lick of

hair stuck on red lipstick, razor

thin heals clicking marble floors

only under her feet, waves of light

trickling down on skin. she glistens like

a woman who knows what

she wants, taunting us who

don't with a strut that shines

through the night,

catching tips of resting feathers

on wings.

dls

when i was strong

i leave a trail of burnt coffee
and bones broken inside,
wrapped in scarves.
the colors covering what
was once carved in calf when
i was strong.

a woman warrior, amazon
stripes of mud lined my ankles,
feet flew swift, a
blur of faster than you can
catch because out there,
there, i was it. playing tag
with the breeze,
unflustered, a storm of
brain heart and body,
going somewhere.
strong.

now i’m going nowhere fast--
wincing with each stride,
feeling no more strength
than the weakness of my bones,
the failure of my body.

today is still like a broken dawn,
time stopped due to lack of motion,
a frozen picture in the past,
in medias res,
and now i am lost in a maze of words
with nowhere to run, and no way to run.

i miss my legs like i used to miss love,
someone to stroke my hair in the morning,
someone who knew how to tell me it was
alright. i was my own answer: my own feet
to cry on, my own portrait of strength.

needless.
when i was strong.

dls

'wings'

she carried sorrow
like an injured bird
caged held cradled
between two hands

dark lids she fluttered,
eyes looking down

and sometimes slowly
opening her palms--
waiting for the bird
to fly.

her lashes spoke
fly away, little bird.

but its wings only
ruffled back the breeze
of moving feathers
muscles still
hidden beady eyes
staying as she stared,
staring into those hands,
thinking only of
flight, and of a breeze
so thick it's opaque,
so strong it could make
sad girls have wings

dls

ode to muskeg

i remember her from a dream--
where fireweed multiplied, night seldom came,
and when it did, it held a silence as unwavering
as an oceanic horizon. in the dream
she whispered. not words--she whispered
something else, something
beneath the darkness of a boulder field
lips pointed towards the earth, the deep
inner part of the earth, hushing
sounds, a faint breath.

awake, she growls.

she sets
fire to the plains, drips
rainbow explosions—psychedelic
polychromatism—texas tea some say,
while letting the rain splash her
face, never washing it away.
rumbling to wake, i wonder
if she will slip back into
consciousness today, rotate once more,
grace us with movement.
and she does. an oil spill
in motion but in motion
when told. through the great
land she wanders, lusting
for mountains, following rivers,
passing under the canopy
of swaying birch trees.

and if she had hair, I bet it would black—long
and black and unwieldy. her hair
would dance with every gust,
swing to every step. she has
heart, I can tell, waves of revolt,
refusal in her brakes,
mud on her lips.

in my dream, the mud
was chocolate, frosting splattering
a counter of sugar
water hard candy porcelain
windows house of candy house of cards
floating in clouds.

when i wake, she is a car that won’t start--
full of grease, no windshield wipers,
a busted emergency brake, fusebox
on fire, but then again,
I’m usually dreaming.

dls

Salsa-knuckled hands dip
triangles to jar-depths
and feet stomp by
dollar-a-log bonfires.
Our appendages
plunge, pound
ground and scrape
crevices. This protest of
limits, my flailing
arms, attempts to increase
surface area.

EWV

dreaming in between gavan hill and harbor mountain

it defines vision, seals the sky,
confines reality, tucks me closer and closer in
to only myself. thick rolls of white pouring into
canyons, sometimes flooding, sometimes
trickling jungle feathers brushing my cheek
not touching, though, eye sight's sometimes
sore sometimes soaring has a touch as
startling as the fingers of his absence,
i hold my breath expecting to trip through
this thick mass of nothing and all it is
is just that--nothing, and up here, here
in this idealand, i get up on top of
the clouds, race through the mist
because it's not there at all
only webs of cotton candy webs
of sugar air frosting the tops of trees
sweeter full of
something intangible ineffable
but full and i don't feel it at all
but i see it, and i believe, what else
can you see but not touch? maybe
only dreams.

dls

uncollected, barely edited thoughts from a train, tipsy

car ride to north station went too quickly,

hand drumming the seat divider

naturally and cell phone

beeping unnecessarily some swerves

and puddles i was happy just to be

there because i had found my fire, hit the

floor or touched

the earth as they say in dimly lit yoga

studios, had found something like earnest

italian and realized my

heart was beating overtime, like it was pulling

water from a well and pumping it with all haste to a fire to be put out,

but a forest fire, one of those necessary if not

controlled burns tree roots tap in

to later (once made rich the soil)

energy and strength, nervous energy transformed to excitement

watching thoughts is almost like

watching the words at the bottom of a singalong

song. don't know if i've ever watched so

boldly but in a book of good ideas, pt. II, i might add that we should

kiss and see what happens. start a business

dreaming of music videos that never

get made but sound really beautiful

fingers playing mountains like a

keyboard and picking cirrus clouds like

guitar strings.

teenage dream? admit it build that

fort of sheets and memories brought into

the present

in the yoga room focus on

hands crunching arms,

foot sweat slipping

eyes looking straight

forward or up or

relaxing the (i imagine) three braids of

muscles in the back of the neck.

in the yoga room where sighs make up most of the air,

shaking arch, mind's stories,

pass observed then

find fire, a blaze controlled but

right let the heart (pumping blood, taking

air) want to be

elsewhere sometimes. boom

boom and now the rain is

beautiful

cvp

an island

clouds like strata layer today's horizon,
stacks of thick white drifting on clumps of
alpine grass, gaming hide and seek mountains,
rain mist tip top toes swish on rolls and curves of rock
hide them hide them
but they are there i just know it
the brightest white of wet days
is playing the darkest dark of
the night that never truly comes here
to hide a stretching reality underneath. here
instead of dark we get ink blue spills washing
out to the north, solstice is nearing, and a big moon
has shed color streaking the sky yellow leaving behind
a watercolor of melting light and color undulating
like the swells of sea under my midnight kayak. i have never been quite
sure if the fear of bears makes my legs faster or slower
bushes and trees brushing my thighs do not stop
just go his muscles, so quick bob ahead, mirage ahead and
on mile 12 i swear there was an eagle fishing swooping
making magnificent manifest and here roads end, stop
mid stride the only place to go has not been reached
made closer made recovery the magic
of still unmoving wings breaths taken lost
taken lost losing me trifecta of trombones at dawn
dusk gloam here sink here sit here be here
there is no there there is no they, roads may end
but a we goes on. here i still miss something here
on an island with everything or perhaps nothing
the difference is slight, like the blank slate of deafening noise
whose consistency of sound has the most
hollow silence, the universe contained in the dirt
under my fingernail, in the wet of one dancing cloud
tapping toes on gavan hill, cartwheeling on
the ridge to harbor mountain, in the specks in the
iris of light blue eye.

dls

June 13, 2011

I've

Watched the sunlight trickle in in bars

And I've

Stolen furtive glances

through the window

and on the the street.

It is peaceful.

The shirt is white

And everything that is brown

is glowing.

Not so many scars today,

while there's sleep,

but heavy eyes

carry stories

that stand against a starch collar.

Here's a time for smiling.

A rare moment for rest

the present.

-BHN

sparknotes on chapter one (or snippets of crazy from a leathered journal)

i. postcards of flight fly into my pocket

birds like paper airplanes
float on wind air
the buoyancy of tiny
minnows in midwater
ocean floating
a caterpillar inches forward squishes stretches
at the most steady pace the
minarets here poke holes
in a paper blue sky
construction paper maybe
he left six days ago
bullet holes in a tin wall.
my heart beats syncopation shudders
down my spine his words are like
steel wind chimes tickled by
the breeze a thick orange sunset
sky holds the silhouette
of six birds a series
of black right angles in the sky
string marionettes at the
outer tips
invisible strings i think
i loved him too young buoyant
love an invisible riptide, water wind,
shifts the course of the largest sperm
whale.

ii. synesthesia

there's sunlight in the tea here
rays of light a dark mix of a sleeping sky
slip farther muddy hands
like melted chocolate bars deep caves
and long shadows the wind blew
my bangs a flapping flag
mountains carved of rock a breath
of adventure rolling contours a
fast drum. her hands weave wings for
fairies and her eyes close and i know
a dream lives there
synesthesia musical colors thick fields of
flowers light yellow petals he left clues
in my book i will meet you again someday
dance sunshine with you weave trains of mountains
grab your hand and let tall grass brush my hips running
nowhere but somewhere, perhaps, because we will be
that--a we--going nowhere.

iii. internal forts

land of magic land of one thousand
sheets hanging from rope land of
i love sisterhood and the way
light soaks through thin cloth
here the divine feminine speaks through
our head on lap hiccuping tears i will scratch
your curly hair until She has written us a Bible just
light me a candle if i close my eyes
i can fit on a toy sailboat and weave between
the tiniest of waves you are
beautiful standing in the middle of the street with
no cars wind rushing your hair up in laughter
yellow leaves flying
the air full of them
and i know what joy looks like
She tells us of these things here
the feminine is divine, the divine is feminine.
you are divine, my dear, hair flying up
or hair lying down because a tornado
of brilliant autumn leaves lives in your heart.

iv. primary colors

sunshine stripes through clouds
splotchy sky prisms of perpendicular
paralysis one moment
stillness amid movement
water trickles, horn honks,
merhaba merhaba
bright red scarf, flag, sky,
the sky shines red before dark
wind caught fabric sun through
cloth beam. sun beam sugar tea i still
smell you-smell in the morning when
i close my eyes the warm spot in my bed is where
you just got up good morning sweetheart
yellow city shines one color
multiplex matte brick shine he's not
here not even close.

v. istanbul, cuba

my body contained something electric,
an elevator of electricity rising and falling
in shafts of my bones tinkering
between tendons as he dipped my head
bent my back shocks of
i am alive ran through
me and salsa music played.
i dream in memories not my own when
women warriors marched in sedentary
stone and my namesake sang lullabies to
unborn babies and turquoise tiles fit on floors
a mosaic of unmemory mixing like sugar in
my tea with tiny girls in pink dresses
with hands full of Turkish plums
and powder sugar hands and rose
Turkish delight.
2 birds nested above breakfast
and his curls were dark, eyes deep
and warm, coffee no sugar sweet
smell of apple hashish, fingers grab mine,
the breeze on mount nemrut wisps dirt off
Hellenic eyes, light catches birds
flying like confetti in the sky
amid the general wonderment of the
world's largest dandelion, and i like
your energy, there's something, something
something about the way Arabic letters melt together
and his translation of Turkish into
colors sings (it's not synesthesia
when it's music).

vi. jumping off rocks

sun dripped indigo hot acid
brainwaves slow crystalized
sodium licked on dry warmed up
skin freckled on lips dots of salt i
leaned onto the infinite turquoise ocean
hair flew a tornado of hair on
a perfectly still wait
one dimension of mountain horizon
low late sun spreading silver spilling it on
top of wind blown sea
letting go letting go
big jumps off coral cliffs
seconds spent mid air
hair above i'm tall
you see as tall as
the sea sky really they
might be the same i am
the tiniest piece of meat
in the largest sandwich
the universe expands
contracts a held hand a
caught eye fingers two of them
stroke a fresh face underwater world
crash swimming is like dancing
in slow motion, hushed underwater sounds,
hushed swooping legs, hushed wet face,
hush.

DLS

hiccups

heartbeat, i
hiccup
hurt, heave
sighs, hide
salt in my
eyes, hurry
to class
and hike
stairs to a
room where
you are not.
heartburn i
hiccup and
your name
comes out
pops out
out of context and
dressed up like
a rainbow in a
soap bubble.
heartache i
hiccup gasp for
breath dream
you are coming
back wake
blink and find
that the curve
of my waist
is hands free no
hand is on me
tonight.

dls

days spent under the bed

chickpeas, hiding under the bed
on rainy days, i think of chickpeas
and the sugared almonds she
used to keep in a contoured glass
bowl in the room of family portraits.
there are no easy ways out of here,
i must lay perfectly still, not fill my chest
too full of air, the metal springs only slightly
too close to my nose, the shoeboxes next
to me only slightly too full of buried things.
something about rainy days, buried things
and daydreams about food i never particularly
liked reminds me that the blackberry bushes
near rock pond soon will be freckled with
plump berries and thorns that snag the threads of my
sweater--the berries reach full capacity juice-wise
before the sun reaches sink-through-the-epidermis
to-heat-up-the-nerves-underneath strength. i hear slow
picking of tight mandolin strings under the
pelting rain. this house of moving parts in the
darkness of an overcast sky slips silently, loud only
through the consistency of noise.
here we fear acceleration, the intersection of breath
sped up and smile slowed down. three fingers
reach carefully towards my check,
where they bend and the top knuckle of each finger
strokes the tiny hairs of my cheek bone. i close
my eyes and it's only chickpeas and pelts of rain
and tiny upturned hairs, lullabies after i'm already
asleep, the tilling of wet april mulch--i wait patiently
from under these twisty metal bars and fragmented
daydreams for the rain to stop,
for the swallow to break the echoing of this silence.

DLS

This moment will be seen by architects

Today for breakfast I am having
Two oranges
And five slices of pineapple.

I am drinking as well--
Cups of water, tea, coffee.

Outside the day.

Inside they are taking photographs
And ask us if we mind.

-NSG

simply sitting here

simply sitting here
i watch rocket rain drops
plummet
streaking the window
freckled with dots
striping its pane with descendants.
simply sitting here
i get distracted from my books
look up from the pages
and place my chin
on my wrist,
and instead of pages passing
words i watch the
rain. plinking puddles,
dressed up clouds,
newspapers covering
heads hands pulling up
pants runners with fierce
faces children jumping
with bright green rainboots
briefcases held close
like lovers.
i once loved the rain too--
screamed out into the
night laughed with a
wet face stuck my
arms straight and
SWOOSH, i am superman;
i fly on command i fly on the wings
of muddy grass i will save
lives if you ask me and i will fly and he
often flew with me, our clothes
sticking to our skin, our arms
out our voices
loud our faces wet with laughter.
simply sitting here,
i softly hum a song under
my breath and think of
my grandma and wonder
if she is okay.

DLS

wakeful dreams

today you are here
and so am i! together, we
are here together today
and your hand has found
all its five fingers on the
dip in my side the cinch
of my waist the spot
where i ache in my sleep
and slipping into wakefulness
you mumble with closed
eyes, do i want coffee? i smile
my eyes still closed back--
i have never once in my life refused
caffeine and we stretch legs feet
tip off the foot of the bed eyes open
you are here and so am i! waking up
when we are both here and soon
we will drink coffee in bed joking
about how unfunny we are, laughing
only at only our own jokes, and
despite the buzz in my brain i'll rest
my head on your arm, the curve
of your shoulder will fit into the
bend in my neck as one lock
of hair falls from my ear, catches
my nose. the sunlight
stripes square shadows through
the windowpane it's a spring day,
summer seeps
through windows with every passing hour
spilling pent up yellow sunshine onto
winter's white canvas. i love the sunshine,
the way light splatters from my eyelashes,
fuzzies my vision, the way it feels on
my face the way it stirs me in the morning,
fluttering lids, waking smile.
soon the sunshine
will stir me with a flood of yellow rays, liquid
laughter tipped over, finding its way to the spot
where your hand used to be, that achy aching spot.
i will be here, dreaming of
dressing in florals for the sunshine
and in the morning when i wake you will be
far away--a typeface,
frozen pixels, a breaking voice--jumping
ahead, still here, lying in
bed, eyes closed, skin warm of sleep,
and you are here too with me, together,
seemingly asleep.

DLS

bird feet

birds fly on sundays, their
wings swoop and swallow,
their melodies trickle from
trees, their tiny feet
tiptoe with scintillating speed
across the sidewalk. i
saw them, three of them, today
flying with the smallest
wings, together, their
melodies trickling, the tips
of their toes raised and brushing against
the wind. my own love abides
strictly to the laws of gravity,
it stays incorrigibly
inside, stuck there,
bird feet in a puddle of
corn syrup, the sugary stick clutching
tiny toes, mute and mangled,
alive but asleep.

DLS

more candles in college courtyards

she slipped away
before passing me
on a street just
a ghost like many others
all seconds of the day
passing into some
existence where
movement resides
out of sight after an
ephemeral exit,
an opaque process,
and there are
no cross outs in my
date book to prove this
proximate
stepping out slipping away
just flickering candles
and the saxophone's
wail. (the night sky then
briefly fell under dreams
of oceanic wonderfalls
and celestial dark
clatter and poetic spring
rain.) it is always
night if you close
your eyes, you know,
the sun may also rise
but there is
no steady rise of the
sun when erratic
motion of eyelids
enclose but also
expose the
splattered paint
of a starry sky. the college
years ought to be bright,
strings of moments when day
is chosen with a swollen
breath, a beating heart,
charged with caffeine
and ticking with motion
until it suddenly stops
shattered glass on the face
of the clock, a mug on the counter,
untouched,
crashes to the floor. i don't
understand this, really i don't,
but i know i miss
the clock that broke, the
coffee left brewing in the kitchen,
the sound of a pocket phone
buzzing but not picked up, the
ghosts that never passed me
on the way to class.

dls

Wednesday

Sakht-e esta

pesadez que

traiemos estos

dias, sakht-e

So heavy and

hard to carry, the

newspaper full of

radioactivity and cuts

to Planned Parenthood,

rebels down in Libya and

unemployment up and

this rolling sense that

no one in Washington

gets anything other than

lobbyists across their

desks. Tan pesado es,

one more death among

us all trying to

live bright

college years under this

sky not redolent, just

so heavy with

rain and gunmetal

clouds.

CVP

Tree of Names, from a Different Branch

Tree trunks of inter

twining names and

hearts grown into

elephant skin bark

reminded me that

this is the time

of year when we

hurtle to the

end but tingle with

beginnings, when we

rejoice at

grass and daffodils

become luminescent

after dark.

CVP

tree of names

have you ever climbed a tree
and wondered at the not
quite top if you are going
to cry because i certainly have
not ever done that.
once i noticed, though,
that the tree was full of names,
and more importantly saturated with
love. elephant skin its bark
was elephant skin and i pined
at its dry wrinkled elephant skin
with my fingernails until its
waxy flesh appeared. everywhere
on this tree, engraved in its bark, its
ever so rough elephant skin bark, were
letters, and each combination
of letters was a love affair. swollen disgustingly
swollen love was etched into each scar
on the trees' rough skin. i leaned back on the
branch, folded into the trees thick arms,
and slowly closed my
eyes and held my heart.

dls

an infinite history of short loves

this one is

not to be published but

here i am

again at that

feeling of wistful freedom

after a few days, or

weeks, never even

months of minor misgivings and

doubts and then a moment of decision,

or occurrence, really, like

finding one's breath after

touching the bottom of the pool or

capturing the flag or

dancing around on the

lawn summer

joys simple joys skin

to skin to lip to cheek to

eye and shoulder that

linger sometimes smoulder

sometimes burn out.

i get soft

quickly but only

for those days,

weeks, never even

months where i hold other

hands and now this one

slant of my

shoulder seizes, a little

fidgety a little untethered

collar slipped

so free from everyone but those

who know i tie myself in

tight hugs, that i don't

run too much, only when the

frontier gets fenced,

only when the

way each story starts

then stops and i, content a beginning

even began, feel

maybe i should

feel more remorse it

ended but everything moves

in circles

right? everything moves

in circles until

two ends

meet?

(february's)

Remember when Sextus said

we couldn’t know anything

because of the shapes

of our eyes?

When I kick ladders out from under me I fall.

There is no equivalent to

“to thunder” for

lightning. We may say

“it lightens”, which technically means

something else but essentially means

the same thing—a buildup of

electricity is released.

I catch a moment, here, there,

between thundering when,

things lighten.

Our very eyes condemn us.

The “I” is not within our field of vision.

We cannot see ourselves.

The “I” is a convenient grammatical construct but

otherwise meaningless.

Everything is meaningless.

Still there are clearings, small patches of

forest ground penetrated by sun where

it lightens.

If you begin with immanence you

end with immanence if you begin with

material you end with material, nothing

from nothing, from nothing, from

nothing, from nothing, from nothing,

from nothing.

And so on.

EWV

Proust on the novelist

For what feels like the first time in my academic career, I have lately been consumed by the reading I have been doing for my classes. It feels as though every book I pick up, from Schmitt's Political Theology to Freud's Moses and Monotheism to Rulfo's Pedro Paramo has been chock-full of pieces of advice; keys to the locks of the mysteries of the human condition.

We were assigned a selection from Swann's Way for my "Roots of Modernity" class this week. Even if you've already read bits of Proust before, I really recommend going back and checking it out again. I am open to the possibility that he's speaking to me particularly as I'm in sort of an anxious and undecided state right now, but I have the feeling that he'll touch all of you. Here's a bit from "Combray" where old Marcel is describing young Marcel's love for reading.

None of the feelings which the joys or misfortunes of a

"real"

person arouse in us can be awakened

except through a mental picture of those joys or misfortunes;

the ingenuity of the first novelist lay in his understanding that, as the image was the one essential element in the complicated structure of our emotions, so that simplification of it which consisted in the suppression, pure and simple, of "real" people would be a decided improvement.

A "real" person, profoundly as we may sympathise with him, is in a great measure perceptible only through our senses, that is to say, remains

opaque,

presents a dead weight which our sensibilities have not the strength to life. If some misfortune comes to him, it is only in one small section of the complete idea we have of him that we are capable of feeling any emotion;

indeed it is only in one small section of the complete idea he has of himself that he is capable of feeling any emotion either.

The novelist's happy discovery was to think of substituting for those opaque sections, impenetrable to the human soul, their equivalent in immaterial sections, things, that is, which one's soul can

assimilate.

After which it matters not that the actions, the feelings

of this new order of creatures appear to us in the guise of truth,

since we have made them our own, since it in ourselves that they are happening, that they are holding in thrall,

as we feverishly turn over the pages of the book, our quickened breath and staring eyes.

And once the novelist has brought us to this state, in which, as in all purely mental states, every emotion is multiplied ten-fold, into which his book comes to disturb us as might a dream, but a dream more

lucid

and more abiding than those which come to us in sleep, why then, for the space of an hour he

sets free within us all the joys and sorrows in the world, a few of which only we should have to spend years of our actual life in getting to know, and the most intense of which would never be revealed to us because the slow course of their development prevents us from perceiving them.

It is the same in life; the heart changes, and it is our worst sorrow; but we know it only through reading, through our imagination: in reality its alteration, like that of certain natural phenomena, is so gradual that, even if we are able to distinguish, successively, each of its different states, we are still spared the actual sensation of change.

I'm really into this idea—that somehow there is a reality we have created for ourselves as readers that only fiction can ever fully describe; that we are incapable to discerning reality within even ourselves and our consciousnesses without the aid of fiction and prose. Hope you're all reading tons.

LIL

girl says
dresses submit
notions of
inequity, an
absence of
parallelism derived
from abundance
of ism,
lots of
long lost
loss, innocence
lost, pointing
fingers breaking
bones and
i just
want better
but better
woke up
late and
won't be
in this
morning
so must
keep pushing
boxes envelopes
people agendas
lovers longings
words paper
beetles pretty
pictures of
faraway places.
must keep
keeping on
lingering over
stuttering on
the question mark
wha-wha-wha
what do we do
when we
wake up
late, lacking
most things
abunding in
none, besides
zeal, passion,
and the rest
that got
crystallized into
dark green
stones--jade:
sliced thin and
put in the light:
magic. i'll day
dream my way
to tomorrow, dreaming
dreams of better,
hoping i'll wake
up after night
dreams of
worse early
enough to
sculpt something
from the bundings of
abundance we
have here,
shaving away
the bad, and sinking in
the sunshine of the
good. sunshine
dream of sunshine
sunshine is better
than what we have
here--broken bodies
hushed voices
and lawyers who
keep the tip.

dls

daffodils still dance

and blue weeds sparkle in a sea
of green grass
tiny sprouts of green grass
flowing fields of wild flowers
and weeds seeking
pleasure pleasure-seeking
in a swaying breeze
amid the singing
of birds oh
the birds singing such trickling
melodies tight springing chords
of the sugary sweet
decadence and honey,
dark molasses, hushed
sugar coated fingertips,
that sticky pollen sensation
of spring.

dls

Her Hair in terse blond droves: pixie, Reading over a pot of tea

She leans in, placing one hand at the nape of her neck

Then removes it, nibbling at the skin of her thumb,

Pressing her hand up to her chin, and

down to paper

Into her hair, then back to examining the inconsistencies of the

callous cuticles about her nail

-BHN

no sleep

some songs are

symphonic like

shivery wavelengths

through the heart

the kind for

soaring a little tipsy

through a packed

party feeling that

anything could

happen.

this one is

too, heard first

in its natural

habitat:

from big

speakers at 2AM

after glasses of

wine.

it played again

late, in the library,

at the hour

when reading isn't

appealing anymore

and all you want is

love. that

time, between

books, it struck me

sadly,

symphonic

shivery wavelengths

of misplaced

promise

no jobs and

no sleep and

live it up like

it's the weekend

vibrating with

those empty night time

emotions that

don't find

feet in the day, don't

translate themselves into

connection when

we scatter around

city blocks.

test its

promise. make

out to a song

like that in the

morning

with the windows

open and

the sun catching

rising particles

of dust.

cvp

Love Poem

You are almost taller

than me, little beanpole

budboy. You

slouch sometimes because

all the other boys are

shorter and you

lisp a little because

your teeth are still

retained but I see

you

in your messages, in your

jokes, in your calm composure

snorkeled face to snoutnose face with

a shark.

You outgrew your

blazer already, obviously,

because no amount of

Newman O's or grilled cheese

could fill your stomach

these days, and every time I

come home and you run to

the door your stick legs

are three inches longer. And

I was so happy when mom

gave me the blazer: Brooks

Brothers youth small thick

double fabric, gold buttons,

striped lining, the same that you

will keep wearing until

Mom and Dad don't dress

you anymore. I like carrying

you on

my back, like so many

piggybacks and pony

rides, like you carry that

big backpack, now, full of

long books and A+ tests

in Spanish, when you

remember to do your

homework.

You still run like a child, a little

gimpy, but

I see the lope coming,

I see the fire that will light

something more than this fun

phase of pyromania and strobe

lights, the fire that

maybe set you off

on the first of many runs

with Dad on the first day

of spring. Spring off, beanpole

budboy, lope away, just

promise me you will

always hug me the way

you have since I could

carry you.

CVP

even stillness can move here

old cameras click twice

the shutter stutters

stop go second guessing

the shot before

then click

pull back, captured,

sepia smile, frozen faces,

flying hair.

the movement stops there

or keeps moving but is captured

savored, undone.

no movement could unmove

me these days i am whizzing by

catching flight on bicycles and

letting the wind wisp my bangs

up through the air.

once yesterday amid this movement

moving quickly i was deep in

motion on the street going

somewhere and i suddenly thought

that you are leaving soon and soon

you will be gone moving away

and i will be here moving around

in aimless motion clicking my

boots on pavement letting

momentum ride on the soles of

my shoes lingering between me and

sidewalks while i am muting thoughts

of other things besides permissible

distractions like the

undeniably compelling

tap of tapping fingers on

tabletops, waiting. in the

morning you smell warm

of sleep and your skin is

something smooth and close and

still. soon your absence will be thick

air, humid nothingness next to me

in bed, densely trying

to be matter until motion and

remotion dissolve it into the

movement of the day.

d

Listening to Songs from Two Years Ago

Shh

Spring is still

sleeping snow still

melting from the sky so

I plug into my headphones

walking step shuffle

click rubber soles hit

strangely electronic, a

soundtrack to

my footsteps shimmering

baseline remix.

Love Like

a Sunset feels right for

the gray, the cold, the

snow

last night's dreams and

memories: a

late night car, a

landing on the

moon. chords pop

pull me

out dry but leave me

strangely

sentient vibrating

to the sadness

behind my lids,

the sounds still between my

ears

Nemi tunam

begam ke khub-e, ke

koshang-e, ke

khoshal-e chun

nemi dunam chi-e,

jendegi kardan dar

Tehran: streets like any

other city but they drink

tea there, and the girls

wear scarves over their

jeans and combat boots and

speak in lion's voices and

sometimes their

brothers rape them,

sometimes they are fourteen and

their mother's slip them

E in their baby

dolls.

The House helps

them but I can't yet

say that it's

good, that it's

beautiful, that it's

happy, because I

still don't know what it is,

to live in

Tehran: Nemi dunam

chi begam.

I don't know what to say

but I know

I would walk there in

a second for the

squeeze of a hand, the

promise that it will be

good, it will be happy, it

will be beautiful.

CVP

lazy fog

this isn't spontaneous overflow

or a garden of words

with flowering language

and scintillating syntax.

it's a box of postcards,

old photographs,

faded rays of sunshine

and chalk white smiles--

running through fields

with a bush whose top sways

in the breeze.

i miss

memories i've forgotten,

they leave craters in my

heart, suck water from my

brain, like sticking a

straw in a coconut

to suck the milk from its shell.

i miss misunderstandings through

unshared words, miss the lack of electricity

that illuminates an electric sky--

splattered stars and a nightlight moon--

i miss

fog that sleeps in,

nestled inside the valleys of

one thousand hills.

i've wanted to sleep in, too, lately,

sink deep into silence,

clutch tall grass and refuse

to rise, shut

my eyes tight until sunny rays

light up behind the lids

and tell me that the beat goes on,

the sun will keep rising, even

if people are dying, killing,

standing on streets with machetes,

or living through a nightmare that

refuses to stop.

the drum deafens, that endlessly

beating endlessly moving endlessly

constant sound of progress, turning

pain and passion into rote learned facts

of history.

i don't understand this, this movement, unremembrance,

flow of time.

i immortalize tears,

strain them for their salt, seek them

for their solace, misunderstand them for

meaning as i flip through these snapshots

that show

bright colored cloth

bumpy roads,

fancy looking insects,

unfamiliar to this castle in which i abide.

difference is relative, though.

maybe we're all relatives. so raffiki this is for

you. i'm holding tight to your words as tears fail

to connect these dots and photographs

into a life, a history. your words

stand tall, they shoot for the stars

all the time every time, even after

they miss. lately mine seem to be drowning in

murky puddles, falling flat, lacking hope, but yours

need no conditioning. you speak from

what is it? the bottom of your heart

inhaling before their utterance

and exhaling their veracity. we can't do

everything, but we can do something.

dls

NOTES ON KIERKEGAARD FOR THE MIDTERM EXAM

It's settled then I will never be a philosopher I get far too distracted here are some more lines that needed to be put in a poem

1. One does not dare look at the other at all for fear
of discovering that he does not have proper eyes
but glass eyes and hair made from a floor mat

2. Like the customs clerk who,
in the belief that his business was merely to write,
wrote what he himself could not read

3. It is like wanting to paint Mars
in the armor
that makes him invisible

4. But to be a lover, a hero, etc.
is reserved specifically for subjectivity,
because objectively one does not become that

5. BEHOLD
a. Behold, erotic love is a qualification of subjectivity,
and yet lovers are very rare

6. BY KILLING ME
a. Thus abstract thinking helps me with my immortality by killing me
as a particular existing individual
and then making me immortal
and therefore helps somewhat as in
Holberg the doctor took the patient's life
with his medicine
but also drove out the fever.

7. SOME REFERENCES TO THE MOON
a. It can only occur...
by tying a ribbon around the little finger
and throwing it away in some remote place
when the moon is full...
b. Speculative thought must first explain
how a particular existing subject
relates himself to the knowledge of mediaton,
what he is at the moment,
whether, for example,
he is not at that very moment
rather absentminded,
and where he is,
whether he is not on the moon

8. AT THIS POINT MY INTROSPECTION WAS INTERRUPTED BECAUSE MY CIGAR WAS FINISHED AND A NEW ONE HAD TO BE LIT. [!]

9. ASTRONOMY OR
We shall stop with these few examples.
Examples I have aplenty; I can keep on as long as need be;
I have enough for a lifetime and therefore do not need
to proceed
to astronomy or veterinary science.

- SK, mediated by CDL

Nonsense Poem

And the boys visited this weekend, the tall one,
the one with red hair who broke a glass and said,
how many ways are you going to tell me to leave,
which meant you woke early for once.

The library with the paprika carpet
means artists would hold dances there,
grinding charcoal into it,
throwing confetti at it,
biting each others' ears.

Spring begins, lingers, which means
I see a beach at sun-up or mid-afternoon
like the beach where the seal was washed up
when we had graduated, like the beach
when we drove her to the ferry,
hung-over and bare-armed and left our shoes,
which meant, "Off and on, off and on,"
or something to that effect.

CDL

oh my goodness it's march...

and it's been

one year since february first sent us into the night.

she sent us with tall orders about the morning after

that night. orders

about breakfast and words and loving

each other. be good to each other,

february whispered, i think.

be excellent to each other, maybe.

sip champagne and whiskey, kiss strangers, dance

freely, write papers, read books, wear

clogs, do yoga, cry often, skip when necessarily,

eat when not, choose sleep some nights and adventure

others, but always, always, wake

in the morning to snoozing alarms, dining hall coffee,

smart start with soy milk and a poem. write them

for frank. or each other.

or yourselves. or no one at all.

and no matter what, be excellent to each other.

dls

Monday

Today I saw

someone

open a window

wide, invisible

hand pushing slowly

from inside to feel

fingers against air

like a new puddle and

after dinner, a beautiful

night, sky warm,

clouds red and

the atmosphere

stratosphere

worldosphere

flung open

cautiously, but

soon.

CVP

hello spring

shy thing tickle my

toes and make me

sing or at least keep

the sky lightening

so my ears keep opening

to the guys from the

dining hall smoking

outside silliman and their

round hollers coming

from the car tracing an arch

around grove street with the

light green. cross campus isn't

white anymore snow melting

just a bit more to reveal

the strange the mud the

o's on the sign in the

6th floor sterling

bathroom filled in like SAT

bubbles, hands shaking think i

ate too many antioxidants and

is that guy in libya's name

spelled with a G, or a K, or a

Q anyway?

CVP

dark highway, all night ride

Somewhere between the

tundra and the

sea, I realize I

am speeding,

driven on

by cold-tingled

fingers and a warm

breeze. Radio's

on

boy from San

Fran wants to

take his

tongue to the

southern

tip of

her body

so we still have

'nt talked much,

still lingering on a

few depths' worth

of touch preter

naturally verbose.

I can run six miles

now without

thinking, feeling the

push-off of toe to

now-bare

sidewalk like a deep

breath but today

I thought

at least six miles

worth, wind

through my shirt

like windows

down, speeding at

night when

the sea is near and

policemen sleeping

over glasses of

wine

don't want you to

drive drunk, no, just

intoxicated as

long as you

still get

home.

CVP

A breakfast poem again, truly

A OGMS—

Amigo mio, fruto del centroeste
Tus palabras se parecen como sueños
Esta mañana. Los disfruto tanto como el
desayuno que como, solo, para dar un esfuerzo
Que calor hara, ahi en la selva—ni me imagino—
Aca, todos los mosquitos se han muerto hace años.

Tu, el unico amigo que podria llamar hombre—
Tu, el unico que ha sentido la libertad y la perdida del amor—
Tu, el unico que me das abrazo y beso antes de decir: "Estas gordo."
Y tu, el unico que me dices la verdad, cada vez—que lo que yo hago no es lo correcto.

No se como podrias decir que estas 'stuck in Dayton' cuando manipules tus palabras
con tanta fuerza y subtilesa; en sierra o selva, desierto o mar, montaña, cañon (o puta ciudad llena de puta nieve)
Se que tu siempre estaras ahi conmigo, juntos, felizes en la infelizidad
Contra las perras
Los adultos
Los politicos
Los jovenes
Los ricos
TODOS—pero siempre juntos, ctm hijo de perra.

LIL

Frankly,
I find Kant confusing.

His terms not the least bit
amusing.

Why on him must I stake
the choice to forsake
a career of philosophical musing?

EWV

wild horses

i don't quite know

what to do with

a voice of different

register, resonance,

region

no reason

really i just

i just i

just don't --

no, i, no need

to back

track i do

i think i'm just

i'm just

so new.

sun-

sitting:

snow melting,

bank on the corner

of temple and

wall streaked with

gold.

CVP

Last night I had some trouble sleeping
(the pink pill keeps away more than the black cloud)
So I wondered, for a minute, what it would be like
With you and me

How it would feel when you met my parents
(I don't know that they'd like you - too quiet, too snark -
but when has that stopped me?)
How we would laugh in your seaside bedroom,
Walls softly blue,
Reading magazines and thinking and not-laughing.
But starting again, soon enough.
Your body would fold up over mine, and we'd cease to be

I imagine us at your graduation; my graduation
Cardboard hats and big white smiles
Suntans and perfect hair on one side,
Frazzled normalcy on the other
Do we remain graven in the other's photos?
Are you offended when I take a Picture without you?

And when we marry -
It will be in a huge cathedral
We'll look great. My mom will cry.
But I wonder if I could convince you (and Them)
To come to us. Either way,
it will certainly be Catholic.

And some hip indie band will probably play
And we'll probably get a listing in the Times
But wait - what to do with names?
Will you want to hide?
(Protective patriarchy?)
I think we will probably call each other partners,
And not Wife and Husband.

It was at this point, I think, that I fell asleep (lost awareness of awareness)
And when I woke up, I realized I had spent the night with
Someone else.

Do I have to apologize for that?
Doom, doom doom


LIL

space games

i am an astronaut, too,
i seek oxygen in the no
gravity zone, float far off in the
universe for clockless days,
close my eyes to
vaccinate my motions with
silence, lubricate them
into calm.

i shouldn’t have
worn mascara the
other day.
a hangover of sorts
ensued—
black bleary eyes
required
alcohol optional
invitation to snooze only.

the earth from space would be small,
a spot to mix acrylic paint,
just a marble, beautiful and round.
in space I would
look down on earth, invite
earth to snooze with me
in warm, crinkled sheets,
or float off in no gravity fashion
into silent serenity,
linking pinkies as we embark
along the milky way.

a long run is quite like a shot into
space, the sneakers a launching
pad that defy gravity,
bring about those laughing gas smiles,
mechanize floating,
abstract from linguistic frontiers
and wipe away
the soot from mascara eyes.
only the fierce get to close
their eyes out there.

strange
how motion and motion more
can mean
leaning back into thick air
to play marbles with
the planets.

dls

sitting down to write

pen meets paper or finger meets key
mind meets heart or i meet myself.
yesterday i wrote about us. a poem
about us to the tune of iron and
wine under a pile of blankets and a single floor
lamp spotlighting a blank page on my couch. dear
self, i asked in untranscribed thoughts,
what do you know
today that you have never known before? what are your
thoughts on your thoughts, and which of your thoughts
are really dreams and which dreams thoughts? i know
almost no
things.
so writing words and calling them poems helps me
mix. mix mediums mix tapes mix melodies
and when it's there--penned paper,
fingered key, mind, heart and self all met--i'm still mixed
up. lines between facts and dreams and thoughts are
blurred in syntax and i know no more
things than before. but when the paper is penned,
something abides, even small things. something
lives in the words, the creation, even
if that just means freezing sadness, giving a thought oxygen,
immortalizing one night's crazy for another night's nostalgia.

dls

weathering

icicles have started
growing on trees-they
coat branches with a thick
icing of celestial clarity and when
the sun rose, she lit them up
like a cluster of stars--a
milky way among us
sprung in this
forest of elms; glittering and
dropping they sway
with the wind, threatening us
with creaks and howls. the sky
is falling, i think! the sky may even
have fallen. the firmament, that heavy
space between above and below, is
crashing with ice that snaps
and snow that crunches--
this snow that keeps falling in the
thickest of bundles, the thickest i've
seen because when i tip
my chin up, the sky
is gone, out of sight--just
snow and ice
up there today.

dls

Judy is in the hospital with bone marrow and breast cancer; Clara will outlive us all

When I spoke to my grandfather this morning, Judy’s heavy breathing, heavy eyelids, slow steps behind an oxygen tank for half a year and longer,

made sense, finally.

And now she will leave us

He is older than I realized

and Mother cried after Christmas Eve that he is not well

Come summer or spring, he will search for movies on strange high-speed devices that he cannot manipulate

alone, if at all

And there will be Clara to take care of

Clara, who lives heartily even sixteen years after Norwood’s passing,

Who is so beautiful even in her infinite regression,

No longer trusted with a fishing pole:

Her house carries indentations of ardor where she has met it on her lawnmower

more than once

There will survive mother and son without partner

and age will be too great a barrier for even a wandering heart like his too seek a new beginning in Eros’ wake

We will be the next ones to bear children and someday grow old and fruitful

-BHN

a poem of us

a poem of us
could have no reader.
i could write it down,
let the words flow over my skin--
good morning sweetheart, i love
lamp, snoopy is mine, sing me
a song, you never tell me
when you miss me, should we
shake on it--
i could swish them around with soap,
scratch them into my scalp,
let them wash and whisper under my fingernails,
or pour them on my face,
but a poem of us
could have no reader.
for she would let those same words flow over and
under her skin;
she would enter our mess of tangled
limbs and get lost in our labyrinth
of mixed feelings.
she would finish reading it--
i can just see her--sitting sad and
confused at the blurred jumble of text
before her inviting
her into bed with strangers
unsure of whether or not they are strangers to
each other after what seems like a lifetime
of shared words and limbs and some sad
folk songs before
sleeping. so a poem
of us wouldn't really be a poem at all,
it would sit among a stack of unsent letters
filling dusty shoeboxes of old birthday cards
and souvenirs from broken hearts
under my bed.

dls

An Email Put Off

When you haven't spoken to someone
When you haven't spoken
When,
in ages
From a young age,
you learn to speak
to other people.
Speak to someone.
Today I did,
(ok, I wrote, forgive)
and it made everything seem
covered in snow.

I wrote to someone today.
I was covered in snow.
It was on my hair and on my coat.
In my mouth, it tasted like relief.

Forgetting other people are
as equal as every day in your life is
is forgivable.
Remembering is
waking to a world covered in snow:
so new, clean, and, when you fall
all muffled.

CDL

nobody speak i
think i hear something--
a silence
of rippling
water, soft
waves uncaused
yet causing charmed
movement, hushed
movement of mirrored
branches, and on them tinier
leafless branches below snow
stuffed clouds waiting
intolerable minutes to set free
their snow on
this quiet wintry eve.

dls

a lost email from Annette

you are the butterfly on a mango tree
in jamaica.
you stopped by on your way,
going somewhere,
else.
you forgot to notify my subject line
that you had disappeared from my dreams.
because today i woke up and
you just weren't there,
clear and empty space wished me good morning
and i sat down with a frumpy face
on the grass.
the mangoes and me,
we made some juice with rhinestones
and sang scientific sound them out words, together
as we waited patiently for
jamaican rain
to wash away your foot prints
from the mangoes you used to perch
your stringy legs on.

in new haven it rains.
footprints disappear from mangoes all the time and sometimes
it's hard to remember if they were ever
there at all, but i know that if i
just close my eyes,
behind this purple eyeshadow
i will see your wings fluttering around
my mango tree,
like a ghost from a far away memory
except it hasn't happened yet,
so keep fluttering, and i'll
see you there-
or somewhere-
sometime soon.

DLS
Berkeley dining hall's ghostwriter

This January

we celebrate all the heated conceptions

of eased off summer dresses

by heaping heavy coats in corners

and dancing to stay warm.

EWV

(trying to write more, if but a little)

typography

the blank
page has
evolved. no
doodling allowed
in times
new roman
size 12
double spaced
black font.
the blank
page is
no longer
an open
road, it
is a
double laned
highway speed
limit 55
miles per
hour in
a no
passing zone,
auto pilot.
the blank
page no
longer means
splattered paint
and mona
lisa smiles,
it no
longer includes
anxious and
illegible cursive,
or hearted
i's, or
furious post
scripts, or
the grey
area between
i love
you and
i love
you not.
the blank
page means
emotion less
email, strict
syntax and
marginal degrees
of modernization.

dls

TAL #424: Kid Politics.

his speech
shudders down my spine,
sleeps in my neck,
constructs dreams
in the marrow of my
bones; birthing fictional
characters
in the space between
vertebrates who
play, kids in
motion, clinking tendons
together like high heels
on marble.

his words are like the fourth
of july: full of history,
fireworks, hot
dogs and laughing
children
that echo through
the shadows in
my skeleton-

just bones, muscle, and
eyes
i am, a
capsule of miles
a metered stick
passing his fourth
of july on slushy january
days like it's a sign
post to see,
to sprint towards,
to marvel in
its concise language,
stop. yield. children playing.

out here we are linguistic
imperfectionists. we adhere strictly
to the literary law of the street: where
beating hearts, beating feet,
beating minds, beating that
walker in an over-sized blue parka
rule like miniature kings
on top of snowbank castles.

out here we speak
in words not sentences,
we sing of fire in our feet
not the sky,
our drumtaps tell the
small epic tale of
our footsteps, not
a children's march
towards
death and freedom.

out here our thoughts
are dreams and our dreams
are thoughts and we slip on words and
ice, like small children
playing tag on frozen playgrounds
because how can you ever
really know who's it?

dls