boys who would be future men
squealed at new Pokemon.
mimicked moves, karate'd birds
flapping and winging and flinging
OVER NINE THOUSAND!
miles per hour
and things
eight-dollar K-B Toys
always break
blue mega man
onto metal bunk
bed swung
CLANKCLUNK
sprints'a from kitchen, lotsa surge,
hi-ye-ho bullet train
small-scale rail
the basement
digging
digging through purple bin
TREASURE! TREASURE!
homemade pogs; on one side
the cut-out cartoons
from game manuals, Zero so cool
his long blonde hair, red armor
give me his sword no
it's mine
x-buster
circular cutting
rise to heroes controlled
control was so easy
yes, yes, think of life–
death in digital terms
those boys were the masters then
the future men and their
cold basement summers
(originally published in Suburban Diaspora)
publication
Breathe Trees
I want to ask how it feels to be a forest at night,
wood in your lungs.
Tell me the ancient sap suckles at your chest,
that you pine for a spell
of two-glass wine.
It’s negative-three for my plus-one
in this suburb, the
white dress
masked in time, this intruder.
No more imperfections
came so suddenly.
(originally published in The Rain, Party, and Disaster Society – August 2015)
Beach Mouth
Bicycle Wheels, Empty Parking Lots
The spokes on the wheels
spoke of hyperspace tunnels
we could fall into forever
suspended in orbits
circling, circling.
We spoke of forever,
how short that is.
Spoke porcelain
bowls smoked joints
made points
in German accent jokes.
Spoke grass tones.
Spoke of bed
dreams of bed
in red made-up languages
we woke we spoke we
never learned we
joked we hoped we spoke
our smokes I watched
you smoke we
sucked lips
(turpentine kissed)
all that time we
spoke smoke we
don’t speak of that now
(originally published in Beechwood Review – July 2015)
Work of Man
Gruesome scarecrow bore into me, wicked carrot limbs, dried snowman. This farm is seeped with the blood of the farmers but the cows are all right. Have you seen a cow’s smile? It crumples the yellow Mississippi into a zagged horseshoe. Forever we’ll remember the first game we played. The hoof felt like hardened slabs of discount deli turkey, art deco. No one won. No one is winning. The larger the city, the truer this fact. You can almost feel the weight of a tower’s collapse in its shadow, bogged shirt. Hemp gravel lines. I see the kinetic potential of kindergarten, a kinder garden than which you cribbed your tomatoes in, so stabbed by the wanderlust deer. We dug those tiny crevices with conveyor shovels. Wickets, wickets, and did the terrain ever grow out of itself like the work of man– ah, did it ever.
(originally published in Ping Pong, October 2015)
A Walk Through Palms
When there’s nothing special about a sunset
lined with palms, there is nothing special.
Trees jut from behind roofs
like green skinny beanstalks extended forever.
Every plane a UFO.
Breathe the collective breaths of everyone.
Walks should be alone,
watching crows circle majestically
above stacks of garbage
bags in shopping carts.
Soon there are words:
first a sweeping hush,
a low hum.
Then the revving of neighbors
and their chatty sportscars.
The emissions enter the brain.
Then the atmosphere.
Whatever that is
is not what I am looking for.
(originally published in The Quotable – 2015)
Tiny Vodka Glasses
love is however many tiny
glasses of vodka we drank
and discarded
sun shards held those hands
of many folds
this little glass-dagger
carves the elegy of hummingbirds,
holds veins in my porous fingers
we sing the wooden desk
in the alley of deep potholes
our branchmouths stripped
of leaves but kindling flame
to scratch the words evenly
scrapes on the whitened palms
the lines intersect always
it is not simple to crumple
those tiny bedroom vodka sheets &
weave them neatly into garbage
(originally published in Loveliest – Issue #1)
Palm Springs
we rode bikes laughing
the sun pedals woof wild
index fingers pointed mountaintops
hiking heat in flip - flops
canopy games spilled blue ink
blueing the vodka pool
on your knees you told me
it was too early
you like to be teased
That was
all we had.
(originally published in S/WORD - Issue #5)
Tongue
mouth sculpture in a gunpoint ell
little gunshot clicks and pops that
wound
when
wielded
well
(originally published in S/WORD – Issue #5)
Pretty Autumn Sunset
Blackbirds suspended in triumvirate.
Clouds in a sea of burnt clay
mold into a blanket, the bed
unmade. Every beautiful sunset,
look:
see the others on their phones
snap photos for strangers,
likers, digital lovers.
Lowball grandeur on a
five-inch screen.
It’s gone in a moment, anyway,
the pixelation of life,
bloated
and trapped
and yours.
Palm trees stand as windmills,
stilled, and they cannot fan
the vertical Culver sign,
risen like held smog.
Headlights on cars move
indistinguishably in time-lapse circles,
one after the other after the other.
(originally published in The Literary Commune – Issue #4, April 2015)