Daily Archives: March 2, 2012

2012

Afraid of what I’m seeing
out the front window:

a cloudburst
each drop
nearly the size of an egg
and smelling of sulfur.

Eggs falling from the sky,
exploding upon impact.

Of course, half the smell out there
is likely coming
from the bodies of the dead.

I would say this is all a dream,
but I am fully awake and clothed
to go shopping.
I’d be out there already
were it not for the fear of the rain
that in spite of its volume
has not wet the street at all.

And now, I have to say,
the dead have vanished too. 

This is perplexing,
terrifying… 

perhaps
this is prophecy?  What day is this?
What’s the date?
Maybe it’s all from some drug
I don’t know I’ve taken?
Yet I feel one hundred percent
normal…

maybe this
is what normal is going to feel like
and I’ve surrendered?

Maybe
the lack of devastation
is in fact
the illusion?


Picturesque

You exhort me to know and love
the natural world
point to orcas and eagles
polar bears and honeybees

but tonight I sing
of silverfish
spiders flies and 
centipedes

who speed around 
our feet and food
hang suspended in corners
behind the dryer

who are
nearly impossible to 
catch or kill and who
always have the cellar

as a retreat
Those are
the beasts for me
Unlovely and universally

reviled
yet thriving
So perfect for the modern
broke household

I’m getting them
tattooed upon me
Spirit animals
for this generation

I have
lived among them and
learned their habits
Prayed to be

good enough 
to fake my way into
cockroach acceptance
as this world is ending

because I know the natural world
better than you son
and you don’t survive just by being 
picturesque

 


dear joe

dear joe,

please,
i want to come home.  

it’s very bright here.  
the food is good,  
the water’s clean,
the beatings are
practically
nonexistent. 

still, 
I want to come home.

dear joe, 

there are no locks on the doors.
we come and go as we please.
we wear what we want.

dear joe, 
i want to come home.

they keep telling me I am home.
they keep saying they love me.
they keep calling me a name
and claiming it’s mine, 
but it’s not mine.

dear joe,

I apologize for the informality
but I find when I use
your preferred name

nothing happens. 

it’s sinister and puzzling how
you aren’t answering.

I want to come home
and you’re not answering.
nothing happens.

maybe home
is wherever you end up
when you reach your limit
on answers?  when stuff
stops happening?

dear joe,
no matter.
if this is home,
supposed to be home,

make it feel better,
I beg of you,
please. 


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