ships

There is something inherently gay

about trying to pinpoint the moment

our relationship ended

when, probably,

there was no relationship

in the first place

there was a feeling

there was a kiss, and then another

there was a night that I sat by myself

at a bar, in a long silk dress and a leather jacket

drinking the cocktail I ordered for you

when I thought you were running late

but then realized you weren't going to come

there are things like this

words and thoughts

that don't make it

past my fingers or my lips

but

there are the words that did

somewhere in the ether

on your phone, maybe

or scrawled on a paper scrap

moments that I longed for you

and you longed back

 it’s a gross empty/full feeling
listening to all the world’s troubles in the radio
the man in India who moves
from town to town looking for work and
making a dollar thirty a day
the woman recalling grabbing on
to the wheels of a plane leaving Afghanistan
the spiral that ensues
in which your irritations shrink down
when held in this light
then they creep back up to size
as irritations will do
but for shame
you must throw a heavy blanket on them
they don’t belong in this morning light which
vibrates with the voice of the interpreter and
underneath that the quivering of
a child now alone in the world

porch poem

  

People should be named

things like plant or water

or iphone if you’re being nifty

 

but all the Jonathans in the world

can not surmise

how this planet is a rock

just as that rock over there

is a planet

me neither

 

oh look

an obsidian squirrel

in the crunchy snow

 

oh listen, buzz buzz

it’s Priscilla telling me

to set a timer

and get my life together

 

oh feel

the cold, the heat

on my toes and fingers and face

 

People should be naked

things like January and outer space

suggest it

 

all the helixes may not

be unraveled fastly enough

to compete w your shadow

old pine

 

we don’t love u more

than the sun

or less

 

your name is mysterious

buzz buzz

 

look on zocdoc Priscilla says

the answer may be lurking

there