Bending Waysthe man in the mirror is staring at the dirt on my nose. i lift my arm to wipe the dust off its face. it laughs and coughs into my lungs where its particles shred into tiny threads the little heart I borrowed from the sun when gods melted gold and wove them into a mass of blackness floating on all seas and oceans of the universe. we’re all living on borrowed time. earth must bend its ways to let us flow in its streets crowded with bows and arrows travelling through the flesh of our souls as we bend on our knees to let monsters know we’re choking.
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having been written into existence, i realize something importanti am not a character. no, not even in your capable hands. i am not a vessel for organized, appropriated feelings. i just want to sit here and pet the dog. i am not an emotional arc. do not chart and log my changes. i will not be surprised at the end of act two. i just want to listen to fire alarms going off in other people’s apartments. i will not escape in the nick of time. i will have no redemption and refuse to learn a lesson. i just want the plant on the windowsill to live even though it doesn’t get enough sun. i am not going to save the world. please don’t ask me to. i am not a facsimile of a memory of a person you used to know. Watch OutWatch out for the use of small things. Example: the incident with the frying pan and the mashed potatoes or how the wheel unhitched itself from the Hyundai or how the howling cowboy rides the bomb at the end of Dr. Strangelove. Each becomes iconic of a moment’s inattention: so many opportunities, so many reasons, so little time. Small things accumulate. They become the mess inside the pillow I keep, that in its way undoes the body. Each one also derives satisfaction by being unmade. Soon night overwhelms us, and evening has no meaning. While we are here, watch for the misuse of small things. Drive with caution. Ball Is LifeI mourn jump shots The feeling of a fast break Where the right pass or the right shot Can turn the momentum from famine to feast I miss rebounds Controlling the pace of the game Outlet passes Timely picks and backdoor screens The eviction of a clean block Yelling “Cookies!” as the opponent is stripped I miss the fatigue you could get over The fatigue that only visited and never hovered My twenties ended halfway And every day I live my life With just enough to prolong the descent To kick the can a little further down the street Hoping this isn’t the day life comes to collect Setu Bandha Sarvangasana: Bridge PoseYoga means yoke, to connect as a bridge connects disconnected land between spirit and body because the brain pushes pain aside like a fascist on a propaganda-inspired deleting spree. Meanwhile, your body harbors agony: organs, muscles, vessels become burial plots, graves trapping trauma, grasping a ripped photo, a dropped glass. Invisibly fragile passion evaporates into air after final words are spoken, but the body holds onto lost pieces, even as a home you shared with a man you loved disappears into your rearview mirror as you drive away. Like ChestnutsLike chestnuts we mature burred against the world, stabbing prying, forceful fingertips. We open haltingly to our surroundings, oxblood nuts tumbling pearl-like from squirrel-furred depths. Thick shells, even then, protect our yellow, soft insides. Russian Roulette With Toy RevolversA bar. The red in Tim’s mother’s glass disappears. Hit me again, she says. A bar. Tim shall look after himself. A blur. The tire swing replaced every summer wets the muddy ground with its rain soaked shadow. Tim blurs away in his eyes. I am late. I should be there with those underaged beers I promised. We have toy revolvers that look like a heady mix of black and clotted blood. SplashpadI wish heaven was a big ol’ splashpad Everybody playing with smiles What’s the opposite of being color blind? Seeing your wholeness, I guess Can you imagine whole people? No scars, no chips, nothing making you lesser Just running through the water And never running dry . . . |
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