Friday Morning - Back from holidays

(fragment – “Good Friends”)

Last night our lights were hung real high and twinkling
Twinkling
Left the party, here we walked and shit we talked was babbling
Babbling
Good friends can get so curious eventually
eventually
my home is where we laid it down like urgency
emergencey
and we should not be doing this
but here we are, we’re doing this
Recluse rebels spidering in symmetry
proximity
Combining mismatched handmedowns so pleasuring
pleasuring

Friday morning

Redo the thing

Honey do that thing
The pigtails and teddy bear laugh.
There’s beautiful women everywhere I look
I need to remember why it’s your purse I’m holding.
Wanna relearn falling asleep with the phone to my ear.
Wanna redo clumsy first handjobs and holding in our farts.
Wanna reprize our time together.

Baby do that thing
shotgun a beercan and encore it to celebrate.
Wanna uncall you a rotten dirtslit.
Wanna unsleep with that Pizza Hut girl.
Wanna unhate your dirty hair.

Honey do that thing –
the
       voice –
  the
            walk –
  the –

whatever it was
I forget

But do it
I’ll remember

Monday Night

2:03 am

We could have played lip legos till June.

I built a cushion fort in the imperative,
          begging  you      to put down your Gameboy
      and  crawl         inside.

one night
                               I took your nightmaring body,
                                                                                               kissed your screaming head
     and you sighed out
                                              “It’s beautifullll…”

        it was a sad season we got born into.
     we forget our tuques in October
      and suddenly it was February  
I can’t scarf down on memories like you can.

the tiny men of tiny town   were     terrified
to learn their idol         grew wings    and flew away
     while they left her behind to fish   for minnows.

it’s late, and I’m tired.
        we      might have kept the light on to see what        might come by,
           but we’ve burned it out already    and  I’m tired     and it’s too late.

clackclack,    the muddy bike wheels across train tracks
clackclack,    the muddy bike wheels aren’t coming back

                   Even the brightest watercolors
     are just water
                           and color, Chuck.

Sunday morning

(fragment – Sunday morning after)

you said something about getting up for mass,
but I thought you were joking.

you left note in pink highlighter
like early Sunday evidence
“Thanxoxo”
on a 30 cent soy milk coupon in my fruit bowl.

salt stain where your boots were
with a yellow thread of neon bootlace
hugging two mudpuddles by the door.

your damp towel left on your pillow
on the other side of my bed.
I saw you getting naked but
I missed you getting dressed.
and I’ve missed you ever since.

I can’t believe you took a shower and my pomegranate before leaving.
And your Christian name is Charity?

Sunday morning

(fragment)

I imagine what I’d be like if you had no way to get home
no way to get better
no way out at all

I’d let my flakes get soggy just listening for the words
to write about how I can’t help you

Monday morning

13°C

Moana,

It’s November 14th.
I can hear church bells on Sheppard Street.
My neighbor is inflating two happy snowmen
and putting Christmas lights across our balcony.
I can hear a girl brushing her steps through the leaves across the street.
One maple is still kind of green.
If you come home to me, I’ll make waffles and blanket you till December.

Sunday morning

(fragment)

We played lip legos.

I should’ve known you’d never miss me if I didn’t go away.

Saturday morning rewrite

Hypothetical Continuity

If I can get my paycheck early,
and you can get your paper in,
then we can make a run to Tremblant and rent a chalet this weekend,
     your legs snuggling in between mine like roots in the night,
       my arms wrapping around you like branches in our bedgrove.

If I can get these taxes done
and you can get that baby quiet
then we can have eleven minutes together with the fire before Nightline,
     your lips on my neck erasing any cliché of the moment,
       my snifter of port notwithstanding.

If I can get the driveway shoveled
and you can get the lunches made,
then we can hug for a deep second in the open doorway,
     your toes curling against the cold to pinch the rug,
       my mittens nestling into your robe to pinch your bum,
          our hearth fire melting the chill from the door into perpetuity.

Monday morning

Cheese Rich, Cracker Poor

Cheese rich, cracker poor:

Loving life is loving rules.
Loving fun is loving.
Happiness is something you can tell yourself and be understood.
Loving fun is loving Polish bakeries and plum filled donuts.

Saturday Morning

(fragment – “Hope Slide”)

needher-totter
seesawin’
by the couldabeen swings

Hope slide
hopeslidin’
into idiot pit

Friday Night rewrite

Wookie Suit

When we had just finished trick or treating,
as we were sitting down in your kitchen,
you on the counter, me on the bench,
grinning triumphantly, loot bags bulging,
a layer of sweat under my wookie suit,
at the apex of our youth,

I thought of kissing you—

your angel hair shining,
wings translucent.

You blew a Dubble Bubble
and snapped it in your teeth.


And suddenly,
I wonder where fifteen years have gone.

Thursday Morning

(some fragments/rewrites…)

(fragment:)

Happiness is something you can tell yourself
and be understood.


(work in progress:)

Mirrored

When I see my fire painted
in another’s creation

I cannot hope to contain it
through an act of repression.

My own soul has just been mirrored
with an artist’s precision.

I could call this girl my mother,
I could call this man my son.

I could blow through open windows,
I could pop like bubblegum.

I can see a tower rising
I can hear the church bells sound like
dum dum dum dumdadum dum
dum dum dum dumdadum dum

Wednesday Morning

(a rewrite of an older poem)

New new new

I’ve become one of those people.
The “I’ll-buy-something-to-cheer-myself-up’s.”

Now I’m out twelve bucks
and in a pair of yellow sunglasses that don’t even fit my face.

Only new sunglasses, new placemats, new sheets, new friends and a new you
can fill this old donut hole you ate through me.

Friday Morning

Hypothetical Continuity

If I can get these taxes done
and you can get that baby quiet
then we can have eleven minutes by the fire before Nightline.

If I can get the driveway shoveled
and you can get the lunches made
then we can hug for a deep second in the open doorway,
     your toes curling against the cold and pinch the rug
       like my fingers nestling into your robe to pinch your bum.

Thursday Night - Poetry Assignment Attempt #2

Aberdeen

As so many days begin:
wake up.


Boots make fresh dew tracks through the grass and earth.
Smell wet chickens.

Collect eggs. Milk the cow.
Make omelet. Eat cornflakes.

Start the Gravely.     
Double pin the hitch.

Fill the chainsaw.
Fill the trailer.
Fill the wood bin.
Fill the stove.

Cook grilled cheese.
Buddy Holly’s “Dearest” plays.
Two whitetail does walk through the pumpkins.

Work at the crop till a whippoorwill call lilts through the crickets while you pee.
Sigh and look at the tree line.
Leap over a ditch.


As so many days end:
go to sleep.

Wednesday Night

Good Day – A Shameless Brag

8:30: Wake.
11:30: Play drunk; Teach many college students how to save a friend from choking on vomit; Get paid.
3:30: Play director; Teach high school students how to act.
6:00: Play actor; Workshop new text
8:30: Play confidant; Give new perspective to friend in need.
9:45: Play writer; Do poetry assignment.
10:00: Get fat with sense of accomplishment. Sleep like a farmer.

Tuesday Morning

Walking through the planetarium,
and then all the way back to the hostel,

all I could think of

was the space that your leaving would leave
and how perfectly my hands fit over my ears.

Poetry Class Assignment, Attempt #1

This is the news story that I had to write a poem from:
South Dakota: Aberdeen- For the first time in 40 years of farming, Gary Meyers is harvesting a fourth cutting of alfalfa. He credits ideal moisture and growing conditions. A good year of alfalfa farming typically brings in two or three crops. Each subsequent cut typically yields less volume, but the quality usually increases, Meyers said.
This is the poem:

Bowser, Donkey of the Prophecies

I am Bowser!
Donkey of the prophecies!
White spots paint my shoulders:
     Venom from the snake gods.
My ears rise proud
             To overhear the sacred whispered secrets of the sprouts.
Earthfire swishes in my belly
And spits up my esophagus.

Morning I was born the farmer clipped the wings from my hooves
and put them in a pickle jar.
He still has them.
     I have seen them!

Watch me kick!
I could kick that henhouse over the plains, catch it,
and have it rethatched before I swam the river with it like Thorpedo.

My powers have their proof:
Ideal moisture and growing conditions are no fluke of Nature.
Behold! ‘Twas I that wrought the crop!
Hear my chants!

HEE!                HAW!
HEE!                 HAW!

Unhitch me from this post
so I may claim what is mine in the name of Set,
lest I smite thee like a weevil!
 
I am Chosen!
I am Bowser!
Donkey of the prophecies!

Monday Morning

Good Date

Hooray for hopeful accidents!
Hooray for sharing beers!
Hooray for live music!
Hooray for outgrowing old habits!
Hooray for karma!
Hooray for tremendous brunettes!
Hooray for pearls!
Hooray for involuntary smiles!
Hooray for casual touching!
Hooray for half-drunk boogie-woogies!
Hooray for sweet walks home!
Hooray for voluntary sleep deprivation!
Hooray for the road not taken!
Hooray for getting colds!
Hooray for happy obsessions!
Hooray for possibilities!

Sunday Morning

Ti’ Coq the Timid Rooster

One day Ti’ Coq the Timid Rooster went to the barnyard shindig.
All of his friends and co-workers were there.
(Friends and co-workers are the one and the same when you live on a farm as chipper as Cheery Cherry Valleys!)
Everyone showed up: Ding-Dong the Dairy Cow, Scraprat the Rhyming Bunny, Coleslawp the Emphatic Pig, Ellen the Bi-curious Hen…
Even Good Ol’ Farmer Sonny showed up with a jug of his Sunshine Moonshine.
Ti’ Coq the Timid Rooster was trying to look like he enjoyed the beans and greens casserole that Scraprat the Rhyming Bunny had brought when he noticed that Chiquita, the Chipperest Chicken in Cheery Cherry Valley was coming right towards him.

Ti’ Coq was afraid that Chiquita had seen him watching her all afternoon.
He swallowed his food and tried to look proud and boastful.
Chiquita, the Chipperest, Charmingest Chicken in Cheery Cherry Valley thought Ti’ Coq was trying to be funny and chuckled.
She told him he was a Funny Li’l Rooster asked if he’d like to try the suet and chickpea masala she made.
Ti’ Coq was a little scared to try it, but she insisted.
He took one beakful, and boy, was it spicy!
He ran around like a chicken with his palette cut off until he found the trough and dunked his whole head right in!
Well, I’ll be darned if everyone didn’t think that was just the funniest thing they’d seen since Mallory the Faithful Retriever give birth to a litter of Dalmatians.
Coleslawp the Emphatic Pig laughed so much that he snorted.
Milk shot out of Ding-Dong the Dairy Cow’s nose.
Good Ol’ Farmer Sonny threw his head back so far that his lumbar readjusted itself and for the first time since he had fudged it up while rolling Big Ol’ Bertha into the recovery position he could bend down to scrape the plop off of his boot.
Ti’ Coq the Timid Rooster was a big hit!

Ti’ Coq and Chiquita, the Chipperest, Charmingest Chicken in Cheery Cherry Valley gabbed all afternoon.
They clucked about the new feeding trough by the coop, the sudden disappearance of Terri the Tasty Lamb, the rainforest, transcendentalist poets, and ska.
They didn’t know they had so much in common!
Before they could finish their discussion about Pete Tosh, the sun went down and Good Ol’ Farmer Sonny rang the bell for bed time.
Chiquita, the Chipperest, Charmingest, Chicken in Cheery Cherry Valley asked if Ti’ Coq would like to walk her to her coop.
Ti’ Coq the Timid Rooster was nervous, but he really wanted to, so he nodded okay.
When they got there, Chiquita, the CCCC in CCV asked if he would like to come inside and see her new roost.
Ti’ Coq felt that they were fowls of a feather and he would have given his left wing to have gotten closer to her right then.
In his birdbrain sprouted at least five cuttings of disastrous possibilities all sowed by some innate, inescapable quarter of his identity:
Under his bright if slightly unkempt plumage and that weird red rubber glove looking thing on the top of his head, Ti’ Coq the Timid Rooster was a big chicken.

He stammered out some excuse about having to wake up early
and scampered away from the coop like Huffy the Hamster in his spinny wheel,
his little birdballs retracting.

The next morning when Ti’ Coq woke up the farm, he felt like the biggest liar;
He knew that he was the Cock that Doodle Didn’t.

TOMORROW: Will Chiquita, the Chipperest, Charmingest, Chestiest, Choosiest Chicken in Cheery Cherry Valley decorating advice from Ellen the Bi-curious Hen?
PLUS: Taste testing the new McLambwich!