laundry

Today, Henry is espresso.
He presents the shopping bags
dutifully, caffeinated and vacant.
He asks, “How are you?”
his thoughts careening vicariously
into quantum physics,
sometimes even youtube.
Henry is a rewards member.
This kind of a Reward is capitalized.
Loyally, he offers this Reward
to the SUV‘s, the Louis Vuitton
purses, and the wet babies going home
to eat a better dinner than Henry.
Henry is a perky exterior
with a wilted interior.
He can’t question a woman
who has better nails than taste
in books. After all,
Henry’s shirts
smell like cat piss.

dad

Soggy mustached gloom
sits like a chess piece.
Wise to avoid
eye contact, feet contact
and all the contacts
in between.
Yellow stained
fingers, dead against
the yellow strip,
he takes only his generic
transparent grocery bag.
A box of “feminine products”
signifies nothing
to anyone, except
to the daughter I am
and once was.
For five rainy
stops, I am sitting,
warmed by his checkmate.
If only you
were still around
to pick up my pieces,
the queen:
never as important
as the father figure.

stranger

the kind of night where I am spinning
in my head, there are summer lawns
winter rain, leafy brown graves
spun around me like a spring hailstorm
possessed by the eyes of a frantic owl
in my head, I'm shivering with words
pregnancy, they say, does this to you
I didn't know about the cravings
I just want it out of me
cravings can kill you without a tongue

the fumbling gropes of morning breath
have taken away my appetite for youth
my leaves pirouette to damp ground
silhouetting sweaty dreams of gray hair
I wake up ripping holes in my sheets
forgetting who I'm pretending to love this time
in my head, I'm shivering with desire
to be a recluse, they say, is selfish
I just want it out of me
being alone can kill you these days

5:35 am

I like digging little graves
miniature ash trays, smoldering brain cells
I rub my eyes into my mother's wrinkles
the faithful mirror sings a lullaby
I don't know any better
I'm doing my best
I didn't mean to
I don't remember that

stupid girl

chair corpse

That frozen mourning
All of the colors bled in unison
like the world outside your car window
you left your sweat there
and ignored your mother’s wisdom
Later you remember the feel of chilled glass
Against your baby cheek
You forget what she told you
About mornings like these

These mornings I sit straight up
Erect, like I remember you
You ask me to sit on the toilet seat
While you shower so we can “talk”
Dripping about how I’ve known you for years
I let the water dilute your memory, apologizing
secretly whispering hopes for its demise
you leak through my cracks and I put my bath
mat in the dryer, pretending it’s me

Dripping, dripping, dripping
the chair I left outside all winter
cracked open, weeping ice
The corpse is still in my kitchen
I remember you asked me to shave
your neck, right below your hairline
I can never refuse your nudity
This mourning is a stale bagel,
smiling, “I don’t really care anymore”

spider smiles

It all makes sense
when I eat lunch.
Dinner is cold,
I’m unraveling
all of the mystery smiles,
the fake opinions
and the good jobs.

I concentrate
on word relationships,
sneaky blind dates.
I think if I could get them out,
maybe they’ll slow down.
Those charming adjectives,
and their arrogant nouns.

Are we all this scared?
I want to see
if it’s not just me.
I think about the spiders
in the downstairs bathroom.
They’ve probably see it all
I bet they have the answers.

self portrait in underwear

Tangled in a knotted nest of curls,

I am defeated by the cold, pale skin

of morning’s icy hands.

Her fingers wring my sleepy neck

as my eyes burst free from weighted prisons;

thrust into the world

like a stillborn child.



Are you the same silly girl

who left the coffee pot on?

Burnt coffee smells like sin

and wasted potential.

You can’t just put it in the dishwasher!

Now this morning’s cup of possibilities

tastes like yesterday’s failures.

permanence

We sit in sloppy nests
amidst the eggs of education.
Shy hands flag down ideas,
cheeks tinged red and sticky with hand sweat.
We croak our uncertainties,
tracing our heads
through the wiring
of text messages,
and laptops;
emails and due dates.

Doctors notes excuse absences,
while teacher’s mechanical smile
forgets what’s absent.
The girl with the dirty hair
lost her nest,
she trembles in her nakedness.
Black veiled bullet hole eyes
rolling, she thinks:
there’s no doctor’s note
for a broken heart.

Mirrors should learn their manners,
white lies soften black eyes.
It was permanent, I whisper.
But the thing is
no one bothered telling me
about the nightmares.
I wash my hair these days,
my eyes are green.
They color me with potential,
but I don’t forget that girl.

car accident

That day you picked me up from school,

I knew you were mad. You flicked

the turn signal so hard that I cringed in its pain.

Your stop sign red hair warns,

you’re always mad, aren’t you?

That day you picked me up, you asked.

You said, "sometimes I feel

SOMETIMES…I feel like you

Sometimes…I…" But you stopped and looked

at me, eyes like those marbles

that I used to collect. The ones dad bought me.

Cold and glass and easily lost. You said,

"sometimes I feel

like you love dad more than me--"

I hate the way you drive so much faster

when you’re mad and I am

actually afraid. So instead,

I become a liar.

I hate when people say "no regrets"

Good feelings
are a dime
a dozen.

If I catch
your drift,

no promises!
We take
what we can get.

The next time
I chew my skin,

I remember.

You make love,
but you can’t
say
it.

No promises,
but the thing is

I never take
what I
can’t
give.

You laugh condensation,
brain freeze in
my glass head.

I use my finger to draw:
no regrets

you have to

It’s December, your rough hands crack with cold.
Slip on the city stained ice, tripped by the sinister cold.

You got on the bus, tapped your pass, it’s expired you’re told.
Get off the bus and hear your bones moaning “cold.”

Today the whiskey crazed scarecrow by the red line grew old.
He slumps, rasping “we’re all dying anyway” and smiles against the cold.

Lipstick lady sweats diamonds in her fur coat, feeling so bold.
She hands him a twenty dollar bill, not knowing he’ll still be cold.

It’s December, you’re so sorry but you need to put that one on hold.
It’s life, not a phone call! They scream. But all you think is it’s just too cold.

city flood

Puffy black coffin coats
Drowning eyelash clusters
Blurry feet hesitate
Then, squirming
Become one
With the mismatched
Polluted oceans
Spotting the city
Like tear stains
inner tube feet
Become sinking boats
Rain glazed strands
Of runaway hair
Line my complexion
With soggy worry
Like the withered worms
Making their way
To watery hell
I’ll squish back to you
Sigh, bite my lip
The bottom one
Red like your hair
My bloated notebook
Greets my trash can
At its overcast funeral
Before I say goodbye
I write
The city swims
In sadness
The words bleed
But so does my lip

road animal

The pavement snarls
vibrant shades
of stony viciousness

Sometimes a bitter animal
its cynicism sparks
my demise

Leaping out
dotted yellow teeth
black cavities

I surrender
my flailing body
as its casualty

The wheels
of my slaughtered bicycle
glitter with our defeat

factuality

Sweaty intimacy

and swine flu

warnings

surround us,

we are shuddering

to a stop.



We fell in

at Kenmore,

fell out

by South Station.

Tonight, we illuminate

Copley.



The automated voice

knows everything,

so much more

than the wasteland

of multicolored letters

all screaming for Boston.



I said,

I better go home now.



You said,

I’ll call you later.

fabrication

We begin,

born an oxymoron,

sitting parallel

in hazardous

safety.



We perched

on green thrones,

the cat

on my arm

caught staring.



We end.

Died a fabrication,

sitting side by side

from 385 miles

apart.