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