Ping Pong Player

The mailman is here.
The moment I see him pull up
to my mailbox
I get out of my chair
and run down the hill to see what he left me.
It doesn’t matter if I am in the middle of a song, poem,
thought, etc.
I am ready to leave it all behind and go flying
like some crazed poodle that heard the doorbell ring
and is compelled to respond.
I don’t even think to ask myself if I want to go get the mail right now,
or if it is convenient for me to get the mail,
I just go get the mail.
It’s like that with me.
Something happens,
I react.
The phone rings,
I answer it.
I rarely screen calls.
A bill arrives,
I pay it that second.
My mother calls,
I spend hours in a pea soup of her own making.
I never let things pile up,
like laundry,
or dishes,
or feelings.
I am constantly trying to undo what’s been done.
Action.
Reaction.
Action.
Reaction.
No wonder I’m such a good ping-pong player.
I’ve been playing ping-pong all my life.
Now,
I must learn to sit
while balls are coming at me
and do nothing.

Empty Buckets

This morning I jumped back in to the frenzy
of numbers.
I cast my line into the sea
and waited for the big one to bite.
There I sat
with my little fishing pole
hoping my prized tuna would see my sparkling decoy.
Hour after hour
I waited and watched
tossed about on the deck
till I was green as the water below.
Nothing came of it
except nausea
and the empty feeling that I was chasing
something that should never be caught.
I prefer to fish
just for the art of fishing,
to walk away with the heat of the sun on my back
and the sound of the deck creaking below me.
I prefer not to bring anything home except
the memory
of salt air.

The Good Fight

There is not time to fight the good fight
for anyone else’s life
but your own.
In a moment
it can all pass
like a lightning bolt shooting across
the sky.
And then,
it is done.
Harmon
suffered a massive stroke this morning
and is being taken off life support.
On Sunday night
he was so alive
sitting at the dinner table
discussing life and death with the grace
he always possessed.
He didn’t know that two days later
he would be lying in a hospital bed
breathing his last breaths.
Each day I must begin asking myself
if I am spending my minutes on what matters.
Watching the market fall and rise
or my lover
run through mazes
are distractions.
It is far better to sit in the grass and watch the butterfly
drink from the daylilies
than worry.
All of this other stuff,
these other things,
are nothing to hold onto.
They are as pale and thin as dragonfly wings
blowing in the breeze.

The Apartment

It is a small room,
with two windows facing downtown.
A motel-like unit will keep them cool in the summer
and warm in the winter
and they will have meals in the cafeteria
sometimes twice a day.
Meat and three with cornbread
and a slice of chocolate pie.
It is a bit depressing,
considering they came from swimming pools
and country clubs,
but it will be their home for the next few months,
all four hundred and fifty feet of it.
I can already hear the fights over the t.v.
and the bathroom,
and the kitchen.
It will be a miracle if they survive
a week
without killing each other.

Mental Warfare

You start wondering
if you were in denial
all the time
about the Alzheimer’s,
and the gambling,
and the fighting.
Were you too busy
at college
studying zen,
biology,
your professors,
to even notice
the decline,
fall,
lapse
into the other world?
Now he calls
six, seven, eight times
a day
repeating
the same stories,
the same numbers,
the same resentments.
They were the same stories,
numbers and resentments
you grew up listening to
when you were three,
ten, twelve, twenty-two
thirty-six,
but now they come faster and harder
over and over
like gunfire in a war.
Over and over
dodging bullets
getting hit in the back, legs and arms,
cowering down
under the covers
pulled up
over your head
and you start to wonder
when did it happen?
How were you blind to it for so long?
And are you next?
But mainly you wonder
has it all been a lie?
Has it all been a lie
you didn’t see through
until now?
Who he was?
Who you were?
What you thought you had?
And now,
where do you go to escape
when there is no escape?
Or not even a now?

Poisoned Dogs

In Tai Chi
my feet aren’t supposed
to turn out rabbit
like an old aunt
banging into tangerines.
No,
my instructor tells me to keep them pointed straight
like a cobweb
collapsing and blooming.
Pale arms
candle my walk
as my head stays motionless.
It is easy for him to say.
He didn’t study ballet for years
where out is the royal jelly of the princess.
He tells me I have bad form
from point after point.
He tells me of famous dancers who stopped
twirling by forty
when their knees collapsed liked poisoned dogs.
He tells me I have weak ankles.
I leave the room
sullen as a pancake
left out on the counter overnight.
I thought I was taking Tai Chi
to relax,
not to lift the veil of my past
with a Chinaman’s knife.

Lullabye Nation

In the race for mayor,
our level of stupidity
has sunk to a new low.
A newspaper just put out an article
entitled, “get to know your Mayoral Candidates,”
and then proceeded to ask them point blank questions
such as “Where they eat breakfast, lunch and dinner?”
and who their favorite musical artist is.
The answers for eateries ranged from Noshville (a deli in Nashville)
to McDonald’s,
and for artists the answers were
Ryan Adams and Aerosmith.
There wasn’t a single question about
party affiliation,
personal finances,
positions in regard to pollution, transportation, crime
and education,
nor were there any questions about their plans for the city,
just, “where do you eat?”
Who cares!
I don’t understand what’s happening to us as a people
or as a country.
We are picking our leaders based on whether or not
they eat at McDonalds or dye their hair.
It feels like elections for class president in Junior High.
How cute is he or she?
What kind of clothes do they were?
How much money does their father make?
Do they have zits or not?
Are they on the football team?
We are quickly becoming a nation of pacified morons
who care more about game shows and “reality” t.v.
than we do about what is happening to our country.
The worst part is our press and our current leaders
are happy to keep lulling us to sleep.

Moving The Dead

Good things are coming.
The dead tree that has stood by my front door
is finally being cut down
after many many phone battles with the electric company.
Jupiter,
my adopted dog,
got a home with a family and another dog for a playmate
and, I’d like to believe, a much better life than the one I could give him now.
I’m selling my house to a couple I like,
who doesn’t have a realtor.
My parents are getting an apartment in town
and I’m getting donations no one thought I could get
for Nashville Humane and Metro Animal Control.
I feel a shift.
I wasn’t expecting the tree to come down.
Last I was told,
they said they weren’t going to do it.
Then these two men showed up this morning
with their chipper and chainsaws and started taking it down.
I take it as a sign
that anything is possible.
Just when you’ve given up all hope,
you can open your front door
and everything dead
can be taken away.

No Rain

No rain.
No rain.
The cicadas are screaming in the trees.
No rain.
The Skip Laurels and Holly bushes are praying for relief.
No rain.
The grass is browning from exhaustion.
No rain.
For weeks
there has been
no rain.
What once was green and lush and deep
is now wilting.
Even the weeds have barely managed to raise their heads
above the grass.
It is as if God moved us to Tucson
without telling us.

All Shook Up

It isn’t the tie rods,
or the ball joints,
or the alignment,
or the struts.
It isn’t the set of tires,
or the glove box,
or the windshield.
I’ve changed and eliminated just about everything it could possibly be
and it still shakes.
It rattles around like Chitty-Chitty Bang Bang
without the fun of the flying machine.
I keep getting sent from mechanic to mechanic
and no one can solve it.
I feel like the patient with the mystery pain
in her back,
the one that doesn’t show up on x-ray or MRI.
It’s like my car has Chronic Fatigue Syndrome.
No one can solve what’s wrong.
Meanwhile I keep driving
back and forth
over road and hill
juggling all the way.
I keep thinking if I try just this one last thing
it will solve it.
But it never does.
Last night,
I watched a Texas minister on t.v.
telling me to “wait expectantly;.”
God has heard my desires.
I bet he never drove a twenty-year old Volvo.
He’s driving around in some brand new Mercedes convertible
with his blonde wife next to him
laughing as the sun bounces off her diamond ring
right into her eyes.

Mother Of The Insane

You with your two eyes
what do you see?
Do you see the apple honey branches
waiting for you to climb?
Do you see the green clowns
that slaughtered the goat on their way to the circus?
Cinderella and the Prince
lived happily ever after
but what about you?
Do you fit into the envelope?
Are you the recipient of the ball?
Or are you the mother of the insane?

Less Than Human

I can’t stop thinking about them.
Their warm eyes
that ask for so little
and give so much.
I can’t stop wanting homes for all of them.
Leroy,
Ebony,
Zoey,
Ava
and
Licorice.
It seems so unfair that we should be free
in this world
while they are in cages.
What have they done to be locked up?
They have not polluted the world
with their foolishness.
Nor have they started wars,
or insulted their neighbors,
or insisted their political and religious views
were the only ones.
They have not asked for the diamond ring,
or the gas guzzling Mercedes,
or the second home in the country
and then fretted like a spoiled child when they couldn’t get it.
They only ask to love and be loved.
They only ask for food and water and a safe place to rest,
not accessories.
Why should that be so hard to give them?
In the shelter
they are pressed against the bars of their cages,
curled in to little balls,
forlorn.
Some have given up their dream.
Others bark frenetically
begging to be noticed,
begging to be given a chance,
begging for their life.
It’s so unfair.
We’re the ones who should be begging for their love
and companionship.
We’re the ones who should be asking for their forgiveness
for all the times
we were
less than human.

To The Moon

You are off somewhere new,
to your new home,
and your new life.
You, who were once alone and had no one,
now have the American dream:
Two kids, a wife, a husband,
a dog,
a fenced yard and a three thousand square foot house.
You, who once wondered where your next meal
was coming from, will now get “all natural” food.
You, who had no one to love you,
now will be loved by all.
You will learn new games,
go fishing,
have your tail pulled,
go to bar-b-q’s where you’ll probably listen to too much right-winged politics,
watch over the young,
and sleep in your own bed at night
under the stars.
You will have the life
(except for the politics)
that I always dreamed of for you.
You will know peace and security.
And me,
I will be o.k.
without you.
I will think of you
and wonder where you are and what you are doing
and I will remember the sweetness you gave me.

The Hen

I can not keep coming
to you in the cage
and not bringing you home.
I can not keep saying,
“Be patient, be patient.”
and think that that will keep you from crying.
What can I do?
My hands are tied
and I can not wring them again.
Each day
I watch
you slip further
and further away
like some red floating ribbon
drifting from sight
curling and twisting in pain.
You,
who have always been my friend,
are still waiting for me
to be yours.
But when I ask what you need
you only cry.
My ears are heavy as tombstones,
numb to the years
and still I have no answers.
I want to be your friend.
I want to take you out of your cage
and give you the home you deserve.
I want to make the memories
of so much neglect
disappear
forever.
I want to be the hen,
pecking and scratching
the dirt
till it is soft and warm for you
to lie in.

Cooking With Chocolate

Sometimes
the sadness is too great
and I have no choice but to put my guitar down
on the bed
and rest.
I don’t know what to do with it.
I have tried
crying it out,
But it returns.
I have tried pretending
it is not there
and busying myself with causes
and distractions,
But it returns.
I have tried minimizing it
and telling myself
how much better off I am
than ninety six percent of the population,
But it returns.
I have tried long walks in the woods
and sitting on picnic benches alone.
I have tried living alone
and living with someone else.
I have tried not talking to my parents
and sleeping with stuffed animals.
I have tried pills,
and Vodka,
and puffs of grass,
and keeping a journal,
But it returns.
I have tried orgasms,
and mopping floors,
and cooking with chocolate,
But it returns.
I have tried therapy
and read way too many self-help books
But it returns.
I fear I shall never be free of it.
I have cried so much
I don’t even know what I am crying for
anymore.

The Egoed Saint

It breaks my heart seeing him
behind bars
or at least I tell myself it does.
Two weeks ago,
I would have been grateful for that sight
knowing that he hadn’t been put down
for some oddball reason
like crooked toenails or something.
I would have been grateful that he was alive
and I hadn’t helped send him to his death.
But now,
now that he has made it this far,
I want more for him.
I want the 100 acre farm with sheep
and cows
and a kindly Mrs.
who will ring the dinner bell
and he’ll come running to the back porch
for a steaming plate of steak.
I imagine his black legs flying,
hips slinging from side to side
like jello in a washtub.
His brown eyes
alive and happy,
herding one four-legged creature
after another into place.
I want all of that for him,
because I love him
and because
I want to feel good about myself.
I want to be the good angel,
the hero of the play,
the one that can point to herself and say,
“see, I did something. I saved an animal from the needle
and found him a little piece of Heaven.”
“Look what I did. Aren’t I wonderful?”
But the truth is
I don’t want to feel bad
about giving him up.
I don’t want to admit
that I’m not ready to love another animal that hard and deep again
and then break so badly when he dies.
I want to love at a distance now
keeping my head cocked to one side
and my heart zipped tight.

Solitary Sun

It doesn’t have to be so hard,
the baby unborn,
the dog not kept,
the marriage never entered in to.
It can be as simple as saying, “no”,
and walking away,
as simple as closing your eyes and letting go.
This morning the sun is out,
the birds are chirping
and I am alone.
People,
animals,
and things do not fill me up.
I am here
no matter who goes away,
and the sun will shine for me
just as much as it does for you.

Cage Free

We are all in cages,
big cages.
Cages we create with our minds
and with our hands.
Cages built by hate and greed
and jealousy and fear.
Cages that keep us from being
all that we can be.
Some cages are built of wood.
Some of brick.
Some of metal.
Some cage cats and dogs,
others cage people.
My cage is a 1957 ranch house
with wood paneling
and pink ceramic tile in the bathroom.
A silent,
lifeless,
airless
cage.
A cage bought for me as a present.
A cage I have been unable to let myself out of.
For years I have tried to escape
the long birthing canal of a hall
that stretches from den to back bedroom
with its flat champagne walls.
But each attempt
has only produced miscarriages.
I keep getting stuck,
mid hall
and die on the wood floor in a bloody puddle.
I think of firing myself down
the hall
as if I were a canon ball.
Surely the momentum would get me out the door
and I would be free of this cage
once and for all.
But I have no canon,
only my two hands
to unlock the door.
And so I turn and turn and turn
as if my hands were covered in grease
and the house were on fire.
It is a frantic turning
that leaves me crying
the way a child would cry
who has been left in his room for too long.
Exhausted.
Asleep in tears.
And when it gets to be too much,
I sit and look at what I’ve created
and then I know
I must stop fighting
and just
be.
The only way out,
is
in.

Jupiter Rising

I keep thinking about the impermanence of things.
People.
Animals.
Relationships.
He is gone
and now I am alone again.
I thought that’s what I wanted,
but I am lonely
and now he is lonely too
there
in his little cage
with the others barking beside him.
I think about all the people that have come into my life.
The ones I have passed on the street,
the ones who have passed by me.
The ones I will never know,
the ones I know too well.
The ones I have held on to,
the ones I have let slip away.
It is easy to let things slip away,
to wake up and realize fifteen years have gone by
and you are nowhere.
I gave him away so easily,
just signed the paper and he was gone.
It was as if he never existed.
Trouble is in the ground
as if he never existed
to anyone except me.
All this disappearing and reappearing
feels like the worst magic trick in the world.
Poof,
a cloud of smoke,
and what once was
is gone.
It is that easy.

I am what I am

I am giving him away.
I am telling myself that it is what’s best for him,
but truly,
it is what’s best for me.
Yes,
he needs a playmate,
some short-haired four legged friend
he can run and jump and swim
and wrestle with.
He needs a buddy,
a friend,
an instigator.
That is what he needs.
But what I need is freedom.
The freedom to pick up my hat
and run out the door
and not worry about who or what I am leaving behind.
Yes,
it is lonely
without him.
But I do not feel it is right
to make him fill my loneliness.
That is not a reason for keeping someone.
I am trying to be brave,
I am trying to learn that short term pain
is better than long term martyrdom.
I am trying to be selfish
and honor myself.
I want to lie in the grass and roll on my back like he does.
I want to feel free
and not have to feel guilty
that I want what I want.

Stepping in Poop at the Dog Park

Nothing but bad news today.
Bad news in the market.
Bad news under the house.
Bad news from the doctor.
Bad news from my back.
I am trying not to let all this bad news get me down.
Tomorrow is my birthday
and I am trying to tell myself
that things are o.k.
I go through the list of everything I should be grateful for:
I’ve got a roof over my head,
a car to drive,
I’m not working in white slavery,
and I’ve got food to eat.
But I’m still really really depressed.
It just feels like for too long now
there has been one thing after another.
It’s like stepping in poop at the dog park.
The thick warm goo wedges in between the ridges of my shoes
and no matter how hard I try,
I just can’t seem to get it out.
I’m starting to feel like a trapped animal,
one that has banged himself against the cage so many times
trying to get free he’s now curled up in a ball
lying silent against the rails.
Defeated.
Every day I ask God
what he wants for me,
but I hear nothing.
I hear nothing.
I am paddling my boat alone
crashing in to rock after rock,
turning in circles
when I know that somewhere out there
there has to be a clear path.
I just can’t find it.

Yoga Body Yoga Mind

This morning
I tried to lift a cup
to my lips
to take my vitamins.
My arm trembled
as if I were lifting
four hundred pounds,
not three little pills.
My yoga arm biceps
bulged
like swollen eyes
on a prize fighter.
And I felt muscles
I never knew I had.
This is what it feels like
to get in shape,
to change a body
from soft to steel.
My mind
is calmer too,
a still pond
flies can light upon and leave
without resistance.

My Body

has become
the other.
The one I thought
I would never
have.

Ginger and Germs

Now we are dating.
He driving the car around to the front
to meet me.
Me standing on the black driveway
in my short denim skirt
hoping in the car
like I did when I was seventeen
anxious to go make out with some boy.
We do this weird escape ritual
to keep the dog from knowing we both have left the house.
It is hide and seek,
fun and games,
a life of pretend
just so we can try and not upset
the dog.
So far the dog hasn’t caught on.
It’s kind of fun too
like outwitting some dear deaf elderly parent
or having an affair.
We dine on sushi
and look into each other’s eyes,
and debate our happiness
or lack thereof
and how we both got to be so fucked up.
We look at the waitress,
who barely speaks to us
and wonder if she hates us.
We think everybody hates us
because we share meals,
order as little as possible,
and complain about everything.
But today
we dip our vegetable rolls into the same
saucer,
sharing ginger and germs
and hold hands.
I have known him for almost eleven years
but in the car
I look at him and kiss him
as if I were kissing him for the first time.

Push Pull

He is fighting for a spot in my heart,
in between the scar tissue
of loss and betrayal.
He is hoping I will open up
like a rose
and allow him
to stay where the others
once did.
I feel the struggle inside myself.
The pull to close off,
shut down,
and heal.
The desire to be free,
to walk off with nothing or no one,
to have only myself
to come home to
in the dark.

Finding My Voice

It is so hard to do the right thing.
It is so hard to get quiet enough
to hear which voice is speaking.
For me,
I can not tell them apart anymore.
Fear’s voice is so strong
and urgent
that it is hard for me to refuse it.
But I must refuse it.
It has led me astray.
Fear tells me to hold on,
to cling,
to grasp,
to try to control what is happening.
It is the terrified child in the corner
certain it will die
if it lets go of the pole.
It is the face of tears
and redness,
and curly hair askew.
It is the voice that keeps others away from me.
And the voice I use to judge with and hide with
and protect myself with.
It is the voice that keeps me closed off and shut down.
And yet,
it is all I know.
I am trying to learn to find the other voice in me.
The one that says,
“slow down,”
“it’s o.k.”
“you’re still here.”
That voice remembers there is still time
to breathe.
That voice remembers
that every choice is not a mistake,
that I am loveable
and good and kind
and worthy.
That is the voice I am hoping to find
sitting here
alone
in the den
staring out the window.

The Responsible One

I can not run fast enough
from it all,
the floor and the bathroom
and the rotting wood,
the cracks spreading across the mortar
like rumors.
It was all here when I moved in,
a problem passed down to me
that nobody saw
or that nobody wanted to see.
Silent
and terminal
like cancer
passed down from one generation to the next.
Everybody turned their heads and walked away.
Everybody shut their eyes
and pretended nothing was there.
But now
I am
waiting for it all to fall down
like Humpty Dumpty
sitting on my rotten wall.
I am mad
for being lied to.
I am mad for not following my instincts.
I am mad for being pushed
and refusing to say “wait”.
I am mad for smiling
when what I really wanted to do was get out my knife
and cut out the liars’ tongues.
I am mad that I
am once again,
the responsible one.

Sniffing Ghosts

He is outside sniffing
where Trouble was
trying to make sense
of a ghost he can not see.
Yesterday, he pulled out one of Trouble’s old toys,
“doughnut,”
and without thinking,
I picked it up and threw it to him across the grass.
I haven’t touched it since Trouble died.
It, like “Jewish toy”, his beds,
his collar and all his other things
have become almost shrine-like.
They are “hot objects”,
objects that I haven’t been able to look at or touch
since April,
objects that only made me cry
when I looked at them.
But now,
throwing the toy across the hill
it took on a new life,
it had a different meaning,
less meaning.
Suddenly,
it was just a toy,
and someone else
other than the dead
was enjoying it.
And I thought,
yes,
this is how it should be,
life should be passed on
to another.

Definitely Trouble

When I am away
he acts like a nut,
terrorizing the garage
and the gate.
He is determined to get out
or get back,
or find his old owners.
I don’t know what it is,
maybe he’s looking for me.
Yesterday,
he followed me into the bathroom
and lay at my feet
and I asked him,
“Where have you been all your life?”
A question
I could easily have asked myself.
Now he is here
and while he definitely
takes my mind off of Trouble,
the problems are starting to add up.
We can’t fix the fence often enough
and his new tactic of terrorizing unguarded rooms
is starting to be problematic.
He is smart and sweet and gentle.
And when I am here
he is the perfect writing dog,
content to lie at my feet and sleep
beneath the fan.
But when I am gone,
something happens.
He has this split personality thing.
I have visions of him in my head
gnawing the metal fence
like a fugitive
with a makeshift saw.
He pulls everything off the shelves in the garage
he can get his paws on.
I found a white t-shirt in the yard,
a baseball cap,
one of Trouble’s yellow play toys,
a pair of gardening shears,
and a mop pail.
I only wish I had the whole thing on film.
He is either bored or scared or insane
or all three,
and I have nothing to offer him
in the way of sheep
or four-legged friends
to keep him busy.
I feel like a failed mother,
although I know that is ridiculous.
Whatever problems he has he had long before
I found him.
But still,
I feel bad.
I didn’t get him just to give him away.
Now it looks like he’s headed somewhere else.
I think he’s been down this road before.

Brown Stone

Last night I found a tick
in my pubic hair.
The dark brown stone
feeding
silently upon my flesh
had been there since Sunday
when I squatted and peed
in Kingston Springs.
At the time, I joked
that I would probably get a tick
on me
and I did.
Now it’s hard body
was pressed into my soft body.
It lived off my blood.
My every move
was shared by it.
It never let me know
it was there.
It is like that with leeches.
They drain the blood from you
until it is too late
for you to do anything about it.

The Taking

I can not keep him from running away.
Yes,
there are chains and cages
and locks and ropes.
But if the animal wants to go Daddy
he will.
It is like that.
Nothing can be contained
that doesn’t want to be.
The cherry taste of open roads,
my camera clicking
black and white.
The first step of the hunt.
Each morning I am one step closer
towards what is mine.
If only I would begin.

My Decorator

Last night
I came home
to find the den “redecorated”.
The plastic blind over the door had been yanked down
and half of it eaten.
Both the shades were hanging limply on the two other windows.
The rug was piled up into a ball in the corner of the room.
My papers and bills were strewn about the floor.
My favorite children’s book, “The Little Engine That Could”,
was ripped and the spine stripped.
Both cushions were off the chairs
and a pair of shoes and a rawhide bone were now resting in their place.
It was as if an insane person had come in,
ransacked the place,
and then left.
But this wasn’t the work of a person,
This was the work of a two-year-old lab/border collie I adopted.
He had been so submissive
and gentle for the last two weeks
that I didn’t see this coming.
I wanted to yell at him,
but I didn’t.
What good would it do?
He wouldn’t know what I was yelling about now
and it would probably just frighten him.
So I just stood there thinking “bad dog.”
I gave him a few dirty looks
and spent most of the night ignoring him.
But this morning when I woke up,
I thought
his work was rather ingenious,
almost Picasso like,
the way the shoes and bone were arranged
and the papers scattered.
It showed a great deal of attention to detail.
It got me wondering,
what could he do
with a set of finger paints?

Catching Crabs

Friday
and the maple tree
is in full bloom.
What once had died is back.
What once was brown is green.
The orange daylilies are open and singing
their song of summer.
Everything is still.
The dogs lie in the sun
quiet as statues.
Children sleep in white linen
and dream of snow cones and hot dogs
and hours of fun in lakes and pools.
Summer is here
and with it comes freedom.
The freedom to sit and dangle your toes off the edge of a dock
tickling the water below.
The freedom to catch crabs with rotten chicken necks.
The freedom to lie on your back
and smell the honeysuckle
waft through the air like a fine perfume.
It is a time to remember
what it feels like to be a kid,
when the biggest worry you had
was how many days were left
until school started again.

Diapers and Lighter Fluid

Who’s the drummer?
Everybody asks when they come into my house.
“I am”, I meekly answer.
But the truth is, I’m not.
I haven’t drummed in years.
Oh, I bang on them
every month or so.
But I haven’t been a drummer since I was sixteen.
“Who’s the musician”?
“I am.”
But I haven’t put out an album in two years
and when I do sit down to write songs
it is after I have finished doing all the other stuff
I have to do.
The truth is I don’t feel like a songwriter anymore.
I don’t feel like much of anything.
I am sitting in this house decaying
like the floor joists beneath me
getting moldy and creaking louder with each step.
I am tired of what my life is now.
The same phone calls.
The same fights.
The same mornings
that end with the same nights.
I am tired of pursuing a dream,
and wonder what I have been doing
all these years.
I thought I had gotten somewhere.
But now I feel like I’ve been in one of those lap pools
paddling and paddling
but really going no where.
I turn up the street to my house
like I have been doing for the past ten years
and wonder why I am still here.
It is dead here,
a suburbia of gossips
that aren’t interested in changing the world,
just diapers and lighter fluid.
Trouble is buried deep in the ground
and every reason I had for being here is gone.
I wish I had left when he did.

New Love

I guess I need him.
I thought I didn’t.
I thought there was only one for me.
The difficult one,
the one who barked and demanded
and ran my life.
The one who gave me headaches
every time he got in the car.
The one who humped his bed
after every meal.
The one who kept me as his own.
The one who raised me to take care of him.
The one who acted like it was his house
and I was lucky to get to live in it with him.
That is what I was used to,
the nervous one.
The one who woke me with a start
and kept me going all day.
The one who guilted me
into long walks and overindulgences.
The one who would never take nice
no matter how many times I asked.
I loved that one.
But now I am falling in love with
a different one.
One who is quiet and calm
and asks for so little
it makes me worry.
He is content to lie at my feet
and eat what is given.
He is soulful and at peace.
He is a teddy bear
I can’t stop holding.
Yes,
I am falling in love.

A Poet's Confession

I am starting to question
the questioning of my neurosis.
This attempt at trying to understand oneself
is like trying to pull apart a rose to see
what makes it beautiful.
Once you get to the center there is nothing there
and it doesn’t even look like a rose anymore.
It is this preoccupation with self,
this need to unravel,
this mining of oneself,
that is creating the neurosis
in the first place.
I have forgotten what it feels like
to just be.
To sit and laugh and feel the sun.
To step out into the world
and feel another as they brush past.
I have locked myself away
into a Hell of my own making,
banging against the prison of my mind
like a lunatic
when what I needed was to never to go in there
in the first place.

Southern Goodness

I am trying not to react
to the stupidity of others,
the kind that left my dog dead
and leaves me waiting
forty-five minutes for a ten o’clock appointment.
It is so hard to be kind,
to stop and remember
the goodness of people.
Here
in the South,
the slow speech labors
and hangs
like a black python
in the trees
waiting to fall.
It is either
the pronunciation
or the slowness
that leaves me wondering
if the brain is working
at all.
I have seen men treat their dogs
like punching bags.
Mothers treat their children
like rags.
“Christians”
who haven’t a clue as to what spirituality is,
shove Bible verses and righteousness
down the throats of others
in the name of God.
I have seen ignorance
about gays,
and blacks,
and Jews,
and thought
as thick as grits and gravy.
I have felt myself curl inward
and away
and questioned how so many lives
can be about nothing more
than Doritos and beer.

Left For A Spade

The ten of swords
came to sit
upon my wooden table.
With broken eyes
he swallowed up my stew.
I asked his name
but he refused.
He turned away and spoke
in rhyme.
He did not wonder who I was.
Or why I dined with him.
He only thought of the time
when tens once carried swords.
Now they carry nothing but shoestrings.
We dined that night on shrimps and quail
and raised our glasses to the sky.
We did not worry who would come
or if the crow would fly.
The ten of swords
believed in love
and all that it would bring.
He had a lady once, he said,
but she left him for a spade.

Greek Tragedy

Today the food at the Greek restaurant
was awful.
The pancakes were cold.
The grits were as thick as mashed potatoes.
The toast was hard and the coffee was bitter.
When the waitress asked how everything was
I quickly said, “good.”
It was probably the second biggest lie I’ve ever told.
She didn’t really care
and I didn’t want to tell her the truth for fear of having a replay
of the exact same scene we had there 6 months ago.
That complaint about cold eggs led to a forty-dollar gift card
that took us nearly four months to use up.
The food here used to be good.
But that was before the owner/chef and his owner/wife
had a messy divorce.
Now the wife has re-married to a cook that used to work here
and the owner/chef has taken off and opened up a new restaurant
with one of his cute ex-waitresses.
The result: everything has gone downhill.
The new chef’s not nearly as handsome as the old one
and he can’t cook as well either.
He’s about two feet shorter and fifty pounds heavier
and he always looks like he’s got a layer of grease
on his face.
Meanwhile, the wife still looks as angry and unhappy as she used to look
when she was married to her last husband.
It’s like a weird Greek tragedy
only no one is cutting their eyes out
or having sex with their mothers.

Waiting For The Rain

It is time for me
to move on,
to leave the battlefield
and put my eyes on new targets.
All this fighting has been too much
for me.
Now
the trees accepted the loss
and wait with open branches for the rain
and so it is with me.
I can not be the crazy woman
beating my brain
senseless
with thoughts of regret
while moment after sweet moment
escapes me.
I can not run and hide
and gnaw myself ragged
trying to keep up with the sharks.
Better to let them go by
while I wait
limp
like seaweed
swaying in the tide,
struggling against nothing.

Jupiter

He
is here,
this new black dog
I know nothing about.
I brought him into my house
and out of the cage he lived in for the last thirty days.
He was scheduled to die this week.
He is soft
and sweet
and wags his tail at every word I say to him.
I am trying to come up with a name for him.
So far he’s been called “Springsteen”,
“Lorcas”, for Federico Loracs,
“Oscar”, “Bebop” and “Jupiter”.
I think I’m going with “Jupiter”.
He is a mystery to me.
He doesn’t beg for food,
comes when called,
doesn’t know the word “walk”,
seems to have never played with a ball
in his life
and is confused on a leash.
At one moment he seems out of breath
and the next he is happy to run the sixty yard dash
across a field at warp speed.
Just when I am sure he was a farm dog,
he doesn’t want to stay outside and prefers the cool of the a/c
and watching t.v.
All of this has left me wondering about his past life
and past owners,
questions I’m sure I will never have answered.
But none of that really matters.
All I know is
I am happy I adopted him.
He needed a home
and I needed someone to help me forget how much pain I was in.
It could be the start of a beautiful friendship.

Animal Colony

Penny and Springsteen
are locked inside cages
waiting for someone to come.
They at least have faces
while so many others don’t.
Tens of thousands
waiting for the needle.
I want to help them all,
bring them all home and let them live
in my backyard.
Watch them run
from tree to tree
in one big animal colony,
my own personal zoo.
They are so helpless
and scared.
They have no one,
no voice.
And the thought of them
being put down one after the other
is too much to even think about.
It is so much easier to
pretend the horrors of the world
don’t exist.

The Last Time

Some days the loss
is worse than others.
Some days I can go about my day
and be concerned with faulty windshield wipers
and oil leaks.
Some days I can sit in the red chair
and roll around the room lost in the squeak
of my wheels.
But today wasn’t one of those days.
Sitting on the bench underneath the tree
surrounded by fourth graders
I wanted to sing blue.
I wanted to tell them how much I missed him
and how amazing he was.
My dog.
I wanted them to take my head in their laps
and put their arms around my shoulder
and be the friends I never had.
I wanted to play charades with them
and swing on the swings
and talk about which boys liked which girls.
I wanted to go out for an ice cream with them and lick all the white
down to nothing.
I wanted to go back in time
and remember how good it felt
to laugh out loud
and not worry
if it would be the last time.

Four-legged Human

They are so perfect,
these four-legged creatures
that never ask for more
than to be walked and fed
and played with and loved.
They never judge us
or tell us what we could have done,
or kick us when we are down.
They never say hurtful words
or hold grudges,
or tell us we’re not making enough money.
They are happiest
playing with a stick or a ball
or chasing a squirrel.
They are happiest
sticking their head out the window
of the car and feeling the breeze blow.
They do not worry about tomorrow,
or about having enough,
or about their destiny.
They do not have a novel to write
or ladder to climb.
They are content to lie on the blacktop
and feel the sun on their back.
They do not look in the mirror
and count the new lines around their eyes
and fret over grey hairs.
They do not compare themselves to others,
or wish they were from a better lineage.
They do not spend hours crying over their mistakes
or wondering “what if”.
They do not start wars that should never have been started
or pollute the air with their factories,
or pretend to be something other than what they are.
They are far more human
than we will ever be.

Vanishing Act

It is like someone came
and took you away.
Just picked you up in a car
and you were gone.
One minute
here
taking up space
breathing the air.
The next,
nothing.
No mark of you
but the flowerbeds
you had dug
slowing filling and changing with the rain.

Little Shop of Horrors

When I think about them
I think about the insanity
that they are.
Both on that couch
like two ships
wrecked
on shore.
Both incapable of moving out of the way of the wave.
Day in
day out
the same day.
It is like a Sartre play
with no exit.
The Pinter pause
taken to the extreme
lasting hours, weeks, even months.
The same fight.
The same food.
The same endless drama.
No wonder I wanted to be an actress.
I was raised on a stage.

Raw Lou

I think about you,
Lou.
You
who dreamed,
you who
struck New York with your chords
and dirty drums.
You who slipped inside me
and froze my tears.
I kneaded the bread of your lips
in my ear,
the milky dreams of your song.
The hungry perversity of raw genius
plaguing my dreams.
You could melt the darkness
with your voice.
The irreverent beat
refusing to appease the middle class.
No apologies.
The masses missed
what I knew.
But you
continued
pressing the cave of bees,
poking the windows with your fists,
plugging my socket.
The cacophony of voices,
Jesus,
The man,
the carpet roses
refusing to die,
laughing like a fish
on the dresser.
You who controlled
your destiny
with your hands in your pockets,
you never worried
what they said.
You’ll go mad
before you let them silence
your Sunday.

Three Weeks Gone

At the beach
I thought I saw you
playing in the waves.
I squinted into the sun
and I saw your black body
running after seagulls.
When I lied down on my towel
I felt you sitting next to me,
wet and sandy,
and I imagined you looking out at the ocean
and listening to the waves
marveling at God’s creation.
Now that I am home
I see you on the hill,
eating grass,
digging up my flowerbeds
and darting from tree to tree.
I feel you in the den
and when I step on the spot where your bed used to be
I swear the floor is still warm.
At night when I pull up into the drive,
I still expect to see you,
but there is nothing
but silence,
horrible silence.
I find myself doing all the things I did when you were here.
I still shut the gate so you won’t get out
even though you're three weeks gone.

The Return Of The Rabbits

I see you
in the shadows.
You,
who stole my heart.
You,
who tripped me with your baby teeth
and small black body.
I see you
in the grass
running with the squirrels.
They are here now
eating in peace,
covering the hill like frost.
They are here
delighting in the safety they have found
now that you are gone.
Soon the rabbits will return
and the grass that covers your grave
will grow long and tall.
Everything will be as it was.
Everything,
except you and me.

Imagine

I imagine him running in a corn field,
endless
and yellow
on the hunt of some poor animal he has sniffed out.
I imagine him
hitching a ride to Mexico
wearing a sombrero
and eating tacos by the dozen
with Patch.
I imagine him running free
down the beach
kicking up the sand
and chasing the seagulls so hard
not one of them will dare to leave the safety of the sky.
I imagine him
sleeping
on the blacktop
like he used to
the wind blowing his black hair.
I imagine him telling me,
“Come on, mom,
stop crying, let’s go play.”
and me getting up with his leash
to take him to the park
or on a walk.
I imagine I hear his bark in the morning
and his tongue on my face
waking me.
I imagine he is with me
every moment of every day
I imagine so hard,
I swear he is still here.

For Trouble

It is so quiet here
without him.
It is as if the world has stopped
but I know it hasn’t.
There is no more early morning “shake”
of his dog collar.
No coming in at 6:15 to wake me with his nudge and his paws
like Peter Pan’s nursemaid.
No bark demanding his breakfast,
or sad brown eyes begging me to go on a walk.
There is no “big yellow ball” being thrust at me
while I am trying to write,
or nudge of his head knocking my hand off my guitar.
No hair on the floor.
No response when I say the words, “walk” or “park” or “bath”.
There is nothing here to let me know he is here.
I think of all the times I was too busy writing to play with him,
And he would entertain himself on the hill with a stick he had found.
I think about all the trips I took where I left him at home with a teenaged dog sitter.
I think about how much he licked me when I cried
and all the times I told him I loved him.
I think about his spirit,
throwing himself against trees and fences trying to catch a squirrel.
I think about his focus
and his concentration
and his funny ballet like walk as he would approach a squirrel.
I think about the backward look he would shoot me when I would try to “help” him hunt,
the look that said, “Mom, back off, this is my territory.”
I think about all the times he never gave up
when I would have given up long ago.
I think about the times he rolled in manure
and I had to give him a bath,
which he hated more than anything.
I think about the bath I gave him last week,
never thinking it would be his last.
I think about him up on that hill
buried three feet below in the cold
and I hope he is o.k.
I hope he is somewhere else,
catching all the squirrels he could ever want
and playing with Patch.
I hope that somehow I am with him
and that he isn’t afraid.
And I hope he will always be with me
no matter where I go.
He was my best friend.
And I love him
more than anything in the world.

The last Cowboy

stands at the wall
and says, “Shoot me. Shoot me.”
The last cowboy
keeps his gun in his holster,
bullets rusty,
trigger permanently frozen in place.
The last cowboy
says he has seen one too many sunsets,
chased one too many Indians,
kissed one too many women.
The last cowboy
is tired of traveling
to places like Mcgill and Tonopah.
His back aches from hours on his horse
and his eyes are full of dust and sun.
The last cowboy
wants to put his feet up
on something other than a barroom table.
The last cowboy
wants a good mattress,
not a night under the stars.
The last cowboy
knows his whiskey too well
and doesn’t want to wait
to see
what the world will become.

SpiderMum

The yellow Spider mums in my Polish vase
are worth much more than the four dollars I spent on them
ten days ago.
I changed their water,
and trimmed their stems,
and now they are as fresh as the day I brought them home.
They have been revived,
brought back from the dead.
I never expected they would last this long.
I thought I would have to throw them out last weekend
like I did the white mums I bought at the same time.
They were covered in mold
stereo
and put in the trash bin
with tuna cans and carrot tops.
But these Spiders are survivors.
I see them parrot in the sun,
their round heads bobbing in the wind
Southern Belle style.
They are not going fruitcake anywhere.
They are here for at least another weekend
maybe even two.
And when I go to the store to buy flowers again
I will think Spider.

Close Call Yet Again

Last night
I was almost killed.
A kid,
barely fifteen or sixteen,
driving a Land Rover,
lost complete control of his car
and careened into my lane
forcing me into oncoming traffic.
For a few seconds I was sure that this was it.
I saw my life flash before me.
I saw the ambulance come
and I heard my bones breaking upon impact.
I honked my horn at the car coming towards me
and swerved back into my lane
missing the head on collision.
The kid,
drove ahead,
and waved at me as if to say, “sorry”.
“Sorry.”
like he had just spilled a Pepsi on my new dress,
or forgotten to say excuse me when he burped,
not almost killed me.
I pulled up to the light trembling.
I wanted to get out of my car,
grab him and say, “you idiot,
do you know what you just did?”
But instead, I just sat at the light trembling
and scribbled down his license on a receipt I had from
Star Physical therapy.
I tried to calm myself.
I was o.k.
I was just freaked out.
It all happened so fast.
No warning.
Two more seconds one way or the other
and I would have been dead
and that would have been that.
No going to New York to live bohemian
for a couple months,
no relocating to Portland or Seattle for the good air,
no fourth album,
or poem of the day,
no more ballet
or walks in the park with the dog.
No more trips to the beach
or drives to Chicago for Calamari.
No more wishing I had done things differently.
My life would have just been over.
April 2, 2007 at 5:15p.m.

Dead Elephant

He says I only need a handyman
and a couple of Mexicans with a Clorox bottle.
He says I should never quote him
or use his name
and that he’s speaking “off the record” to me.
So many people have been trying to rip me off.
Thirty thousand for this.
Nine thousand for that.
I have been pushed back and forth like a dead elephant
floating in the river.
It is refreshing to finally have a person come
who is a person,
who still knows what it means to tell the truth.
He told me not to worry
and to wait till I have a real problem.
My father tells me the same thing.
He says, “You have no real problems. You don’t know what real problems are.”
I guess he’s right.
So today I am going back to writing and listening to the birds
and being grateful for my small “problems”
while they still are small.

Nothing Needs Fixing

Nothing needs fixing
right now.
Not the floor,
or the roof,
or the dishwasher,
or my heart.
Nothing needs fixing
this moment.
It is amazing how much time
I spend
trying to fix things.
My mother.
My father.
My sister.
My boyfriend.
My finances.
I could spend entire days
trying to make things better.
but the dog will still be dirty tomorrow.

Somewhere I Stopped Laughing

When I think of all the choices I have made in my life
I feel sick.
Here I am
and where I have got
is not where I want to be.
Did I go out for lunch
one too many times?
Or worry about whether one of my boyfriends
would call
or whether he needed a root canal
when I should have been worrying about my own teeth?
Just how much time have I spent bemoaning a review
or fretting over someone
who was rude to me?
How many nights have I gone to bed early
feeling like it is too late for me
promising myself I would work harder the next night
and when the next night came
I was in bed again?
All of these days, weeks, months
have added up to years
and here I am,
where I do not want to be.
I pray to God
to help me find a way out.
I thought I was doing o.k.
Doing the right thing.
I thought my life was going along fine.
But somewhere
I stopped being the youngest in my class.
Somewhere
I graduated from college years ago
And stopped using the three years of training
that I called my M.F.A.
Somewhere I stopped believing that my dreams
would be a reality.
Somewhere I stopped laughing.
I feel like I am standing in a crowd of hundreds of people
all rushing in different directions.
They are all “going somewhere”
while I stand there
trying to speak,
trying to ask for directions,
the paper in my hand,
the one that tells me what I need to know
and who I am supposed to be
in this life
falls to the floor.
And I can not get it back.

Men With Tools

There are men
across the street from me.
Men with tools,
hammers, saws and drills.
Men who sweat
and urinate in plastic outhouses.
Men who eat fast food lunches at eleven
and go home by four.
Men who can fix things.
They are the kind of men I need for about an hour
and then never again.
I watch them
day after day
going in and out of that new million dollar house
with their tool belts strapped around their waists.
I watch them like a dog in a butcher shop
salivating
over what I can’t have.
They are so close,
so touchable,
and yet
so out of reach.
It isn’t fair.
I only need one.
Just one
with his big drill,
to fix my backdoor,
and put on that new mailbox,
the shiny black one I bought at Home Depot
the realtor says I so desperately need.
It wouldn’t take long.
Why a man like one of those could do the whole job
in probably fifteen minutes,
thirty at the most.
They’d hardly miss him at the big house.
And then, I swear,
I’d put him right back
Just like a kleptomaniac
who stole a sweater and had a change of heart.
It wouldn’t hurt anyone,
wouldn’t cost anyone anything.
After all,
he’s getting paid by the hour.
What difference does it make if he’s working
over here or over there?
He’d be doing a good deed.
He’d be doing such a good deed.
Why it’s almost wrong of me
not to ask.
Who am I to keep that man from having the opportunity
to feel good about himself?

Perhaps it’s the mailbox

why my home won’t sell.
The realtor across the street seems to think so.
He says it’s the first thing people notice
and if the mailbox doesn’t look good
people assume the house isn’t good.
Maybe he’s right.
After all,
my mailbox is plastic and tied on to the metal post with a strap
which covers up half the stick on numbers.
Maybe that’s giving people the idea that the entire house
is falling apart.
Makes sense to me.
Faulty mailbox equals leaky roof,
cracked driveway,
and overall dilapidated house.
Right.
If I believed that I would have a mailbox built out of marble
at the foot of my driveway
with numbers made out of fourteen karat gold.
Come on.
Is that what they are teaching in real estate school?
“If the mailbox is lame, go to a different house.”
The truth is,
a couple of years ago
a car full of kids drove by and knocked my mailbox down with a baseball bat
as part of their high school graduation celebration.
It’s a Southern tradition,
like eating grits with eggs
and throwing puppies out of moving trucks.
So rather than buy a new one,
which would probably get knocked over again
next May,
I had my roofer try to fix it.
When he couldn’t reattach it,
he took a bungie cord and tied it around the mailbox.
It’s held on for three years now.
I’d kind of forgotten about it
until the realtor pointed out its’ uncomeliness.
But still, even with a questionable mailbox,
I find it hard to believe that's what's keeping my home from selling.
Nevertheless,
this week I am putting up a new mailbox,
a ten dollar shiny black metal one from Home Depot.
That should get the offers rolling in.

What's Missing

Stop it!
Stop it right now!
Stop running.
There is nothing out there.
Nothing in the malls,
or on the clothing racks.
Nothing in the perfume bottles
or in the pockets of furs.
Nothing in the smiles of strangers.
There is nowhere you can go
that is better than where you are now.
No beach.
No mountain.
No spa.
Nowhere.
Take a look.
I dare you.
Open up your window
and see.
See the new leaf sprouting on the maple tree.
See the red cardinal flying from limb to limb in search of love.
Listen to the plane flying south above you.
See the white moth banging against your panes.
Yes,
all of it is here,
and it doesn’t cost a dime.
God has laid a bounty before you
and you only complain of what’s missing.
The only thing missing
is you.

What Was

Since last July,
when my sister and I were forced to move my parents’ our of their home in Texas,
I have been homeless.
Yes,
I have a roof over my head
in Nashville,
but Nashville isn’t home.
Home is Wade Hampton.
Home is 713-464-8774.
Home is where I lost my baby teeth.
Had my first period.
Kissed a boy.
Home is where Mattie told me stories about the big white cat
who would eat me
if I walked across the freshly mopped floors.
Home is where I would run
whenever someone was mean to me at elementary school.
Home is where we ate Thanksgiving dinner,
and opened Christmas presents,
and had Shipley doughnuts on Saturday morning
while we watched Bugs Bunny cartoons.
Home is where I hid in the closet,
where I dreamed of being a star,
where I learned I didn’t matter.
Home is where the arguing
was as constant as the t.v.
It was never great,
but it was home.
Now I am like a bee
whose hive was knocked down
from the tree.
I am hovering,
and buzzing
and trying to make sense of what isn’t there.
I have no place to land,
and no where to go,
and I can not recreate what was.

Things I like

White roses.
Yellow roses.
The sun on my back.
The sun on Trouble’s back.
Hot water.
Seventy five degree days.
Spring.
Tulips springing up.
Empty parking lots.
My wind chime rustling.
The happy chirp of robins.
An unsweet ice tea with a chocolate chip cookie.
Peach cobbler.
Walks in the woods.
Driving to the beach on a whim.
Time alone.
The smell of sesame oil on my skin.
Cloudless days.

The Unworthy

I listen to their calls,
the same repetitive sounds
like the thoughts in my mind.
My yellow daffodils.
The red cardinal by the holly.
Trouble asleep in the dirt.
The bushes alive with the rustling of nature.
It is like that here.
Settling down into myself
I am leaving the world of worry behind.
There has been no call from the woman with the check.
No word from the broken.
Yes,
I am doing it again,
giving myself over to the day
and it’s troubles.
Now,
I must sit on the couch and confess
to the page.
Now I must find what I want,
once more,
regardless of who or what or how.
For most of my life,
I have let the unworthy lead me.
I fear I will never leave this place.

White Roses

White roses.
Curved over glass.
Heads soft as marshmallows.
A bridal vase of yellow, red and white.
I see you in my dreams.
So soft,
so soft.
The ruffled lace of virgins’ gowns.
I dream of holding you,
your sweetness filling my nose.
How still and beautiful you are.
If I could paint you,
capture you,
remember you,
I would keep your image in my head
and recall you
on days that are bleak and sallow.
White roses
do not die.
Such loveliness should never
be forsaken.

Breathing In Chicken Fat

I am so excited.
I can barely sit.
I am leaving this town.
This boring, stale,
close-minded town.
I am leaving the cicadas,
and the trucks and the tobacco.
I am leaving the anti-abortion stickers,
and the pro W people,
and the phonies who promise
but never deliver.
I am leaving the doughnuts,
and the toothless
and the slow.
I am leaving suburbia.
I can feel it now,
the water.
I can hear the traffic,
the buses,
the cabs,
the trains.
I can see myself on that bridge,
that balcony,
eating Chinese
that tastes like Chinese,
feet in the sand,
watching the sunset
with the harbor below,
shopping
at real stores,
dining
and not leaving nauseous.
I feel so free,
like I am starting the next chapter of my life.
Whatever it will bring,
I know it will be better
than breathing in chicken fat.

FSBO

I am ready to pull it down,
take in the sign
and forget it,
resign myself to this hill,
and the pollen,
and the mosquitoes,
and the drivers.
Twice now I have been offered an opportunity
to leave
and didn’t take it.
Once,
from a psychotic buyer
from L.A.
who offered me a low bid,
and now,
a month later,
I have a thirty-month renter with two kids ready to move in.
Neither are all that I had hoped for.
The renter can’t pay enough
and the buyer,
well the buyer was
nuts.
But still,
I wonder,
what am I waiting for?
Is it the noise of New York that scares me
or the fear of the rain of Seattle?
Maybe I’m just scared that
I wouldn’t be any happier there
than I am here.

I am a Vegetarian

Somewhere
I
lost
sight
of myself.
The downward descent of
ebb and flow,
the marker that keeps one
reaching
for the right path.
This year has been
my mother,
my back.
Weeks lost
to plane trips and lawsuits.
Months spent on grief
and the fear of permanent loss.
Where did I go?
The Jew
wandering through the desert
in search of the promised land.
Today
I sit in a room full of children
and try to get them to listen.
A Herculean task to say the least,
and I am not Hercules,
but a mouse
running from boy to girl
trying to dole out markers and crayons
while they poke each other
and laugh.
I was told I had to be tougher,
meaner,
but I do not like to yell.
My throat doesn’t know how to scream.
So where can I go?
Where can I go,
a silent muted girl
walking home after school with her books
so alone,
so alone.
The pushers,
the stealers,
the grabbers,
they seem to get what they want.
Just like in the time of the dinosaurs,
the plant eaters were eaten.
And I am
a vegetarian.

The Knowing

It is the chase,
the thrill,
the up and down hunt,
the relentless desire to capture
the uncapturable.
It is the running,
the throwing of oneself
into the air
without concern for the ground below.
It is the committing,
fully,
to the task at hand,
never stopping to question
the why
or when.
It is the unshakable belief
in oneself,
the knowing that someday
all will be reached.
It is the reason
every step taken
will not be in vain.

Taking Bunny Outback

For her birthday
she wants to go to The Outback
or Red Lobster.
To me
going there is like going to McDonald’s
except that you sit down to order
and you have to leave a tip.
I want us to go to a nice restaurant,
you know,
where the food is actually cooked by someone
who cares.
If we go to an Italian restaurant I’d like an Italian chef in the back
or at least someone that’s studied Italian cooking in Italy,
not some pimply faced teenager slopping canned tomato sauce
on linguine so he can buy that ’78 Camaro he’s always wanted.
But that’s me,
I’m the oddball of the family.
I’m the one who always wanted to see those “weird” art films
when my sister and parents wanted to see Smokey and the Bandit.
I’m the one who doesn’t eat meat,
meditates,
and makes my bed in the morning.
I’m the one who writes poetry,
and songs,
and believes that “Zen and the Art of Archery”
actually has practical applications for life.
I’m the one who believes in following my dreams,
and that people can change,
and that everyday is a new day.
Yeah, I’m the weirdo.
So, I guess I should just shut-up
and let them eat wherever they want.
Because if I suggest a place,
chances are no one will like it.

Time

It is a strange thing
to hold one’s position,
to decide that you cannot change
directions
in mid-stream,
to sit steadfast in your intention
regardless of the temptations
put before you.
For too long now,
I have given up
what is mine.
I have let myself be swept away
into the mire
of others.
I have watched the years come and go
with promises of tomorrow
and the threat of changed behavior.
But tomorrow is tomorrow is tomorrow.
Soon
there will only be
what could have been.
I tell myself that
when I choose the remote
over my guitar.
Or when I choose the phone
over my pen.
I tell myself that
when I walk out the door
in search of something
I really don’t need.
I tell myself that
when I run to my lover
instead of to myself.
My prayer is simple:
God, help me use the time I have been given
to do what I know is write.

Laughing With Ice


I am ready to begin
laughing with ice,
to watch the poet
seashell
himself
into the milk of the moon
again and again.
How many flowers
have fallen
constricted by the memory
of greed?
Brother against brother,
the challenge of glowing coals
surrounds us.
Now that I am blind,
armed
with violin and flute,
the crescendo of color
waves its flag in my face
like a poor musician
struggling to be heard
above the roar of the crowd.
It is as if I were
alone on the sand
collecting pebbles
so that others may speak.
Time after time
I have crowned
the queen,
remembering
the power of orange skies,
her thighs,
a bit of foam,
and the garden
where all my tulips
wait
to rise.

Dream Couple

Tomorrow
a couple from India
will come and buy my house.
I know it.
I was standing in the kitchen
talking about this couple
who are going to buy my house
when I realized I was having deja-vu.
A couple of years ago,
I had a dream about a couple from India who wanted
to buy my house.
And in the dream
I was telling my boyfriend about them.
And in the dream I was
in the kitchen
just like I am now.
Only now,
it isn’t a dream.

Certainty


Yes,
I knew it once
long ago
when I was a child
and still ate Oreo’s
while sitting on the kitchen counter.
I was certain
my father was right.
Certain
my birthday would come.
Certain
I could eat as much buttered white toast
as I wanted.
I was certain
I would never forget
how sweet the creamy white middle tasted.

Happy Valentine's Day

Today
rather than write a poem,
I thought it might be nice
to put up a song.
Go to
myspace.com/dianadarby
and listen to Valentine's Day.
xoxoxo

diana

p.s. I hope you get lots of chocolates.

2 Line Poem

I’m only stopping here for a little while.
Don’t bother me.

Death of A Clown

There is a clown
laughing
in the yard.
A big white dog
with a bone in his mouth
drinking down ice water from a yellow bucket.
I am in my room
drinking Kukicha tea,
trying to ward off the cold I woke up with.
This morning when the sun came in my windows
I saw it.
I felt the blue.
I wondered where I have been the last forty years,
curled up in some deep haze of hurt,
trying to control the uncontrollable.
Now, I am ready to start again,
to leave behind the past that was mine.
I am ready to find out who I am in this world,
ready to go to Portland, or New York,
or somewhere where I can be
me.
I do not know if I am the clown
in the yard
or the dog with the bone in its mouth.
I only know
to stay here
would mean death.

Nashville

I am tired of churches,
and the suffocating crosses.
Billboards imploring me to love
Christ
and repent my sins.
I am tired of butter on rice
and sugar in tea,
and the kind of people who live in this city.

White Page

I am writing between lines,
like I did in school,
filling in the white with words.
I haven’t written on lined paper
in years.
I gave it up a long time ago
in favor of the blank page.
Lines feel restrictive.
They keep you in bounds.
They keep you from crossing over.
When I was a kid
I never knew what the lines were
so when I crossed them
no one cared.
There were no punishments,
or repercussions.
No one saying, “Stop”.
No bedroom doors refusing to open
without a knock.
Everything was
a white page
for me to write upon.
Looking back
I can see the lines
crossing and counter-crossing
creating a black field
so intertwined
it is impossible
to see through.
A doodle
gone mad.

Superdumb

Yesterday,
I watched the Superbowl.
I don’t know why.
I found the entire event to be
somewhere between a bore
and an offensive hoopla.
It wasn’t just the laser light show
and the go-go dancers
worshiping Prince,
or the slamming of bodies
that bothered me.
It was the commercials.
They either celebrated big breasts,
burgers or beer.
I remember when Superbowl commercials
used to be some of the most creative things on t.v.
all year.
Not this year.
I can’t even remember one of them,
except that they all seemed either racially,
sexually, or monetarily offensive.
Maybe I’m completely out of step
with the rest of this world.
I don’t eat meat,
I rarely drink,
and I don’t have aspirations to drive a Lexus.
Maybe I don’t know what it means to be
an American.
But whatever the reason,
next year when the Superbowl comes on,
I’m not watching.

Asylum

I want to come home
somewhere
to a man with one ear
painting flowers and rivers
in the kitchen.
I rise,
hopeful,
but hope turns to despair
when the gulls come begging.
How does anyone live in this world?
I think of the asylum
and the overcoat in the corner
and I wish I could run there.
I think of the phones that I should like to unplug,
the ones that ring over and over
and the ones that never ring at all.
I think of the bottles and drawers
and stiff fingers
and the voices that never stop.
And I think of the asylum.

Pond

What I would like my life to be
is not a large boat
breaking the water,
thrashing the waves
with streams of bubbles and spit.
Or a crow
flying through clouds
shimmering into the last snow.
Or a marshland,
endlessly hungry,
crying for bugs and the comfort of stars.
No,
what I would like my life to be
is a pond,
nestled in the sweetness of woods,
reflecting the butterfly’s wings
with my eyes,
still,
allowing what comes
to light upon me
and leave
without struggle.

Sole Mio

I am full of pasta
and pizza and bread.
I am sluggish
as a sleeping pup.
The words are coming out of my brain
sideways
like blowing snow.
Drifting in and out,
the last sip of red wine
still on my lips,
my fingers red with sauce.
I forgot the day,
and my work,
and the after
of so many bites.
There was only the cold
and the linen tablecloths
calling me to lunch.
There was only the smell of garlic
and mozzarella.
There was no one warning me
like they do on a pack of cigarettes,
“Eat at your own risk.”
Now
I am still and silent as a fruit bowl,
round and full
and ready to explode.

You

I’d forgotten you were with me
and so I turned to him.
I lay my sorrow at his feet
and expected him to lift it,
carry it,
water it,
nurture it,
and give it a home.
When it died in the corner,
I blamed him.
But that was absurd,
I couldn’t even fix it myself.
Neither could my guitar,
my skinny friends,
Anne Sexton,
my new ballet shoes,
cherry pie,
ice cream,
or the peanut butter malt ball
I swiped on Tuesday.
Then I remembered,
the one thing I had forgotten,
the one thing that would never leave me,
the one source of pure love,
You.

Excuses

Who am I
if not the wounded child
playing in gardens?
If not the hurt
misunderstood
and abandoned
daughter
hiding in closets
and
sitting at recesses alone?
I have served these roles
so well,
sucked down the juice
of sorrow
and wallowed in self-pity
for so long
that I have completely forgotten
who I am.
I can point to you,
and say
you are the reason I am not,
have never been,
will never be.
You are what has kept me from being
all that I am.
What a wonderful excuse
you have been.

Floating Globules

We are all floating,
grabbing and floating,
grabbing and floating,
trying to hold on
to those things that make us feel
safe.
Trying to make sense
of the senseless.
We spend years
with our heads
in books,
in love,
in search
of sanity.
We spend years
crafting,
and working,
and running
from and to
all that we are,
all that we have been,
all that we want to be.
We try to put down roots,
in a city,
in a town,
in a house,
with a wife,
husband,
child.
We spend money
on clothes,
furniture,
and cars.
We accumulate
degrees,
jobs,
scars,
and property
and then point to them and say,
“see, my life does have meaning.”
“I am really here.”
“Look at all that I’ve done.”
But really
we are all still floating.
There is nothing to hold on to.

Doggie Style

This morning,
we both feel like Hell,
that is the dog and I.
He doesn’t feel like chasing the ball
and I damn sure don’t feel like throwing it.
Last night his stomach exploded
all over the living room floor.
This morning it was my turn
to run to the bathroom
cursing.
Blame it on the strawberries
we both ate,
or the pinto beans,
or the guacamole,
or the organic blue corn chips.
Blame it on the moon,
or our new vitamins,
or the stock market.
Blame it on my poor judgment
or his lack of willpower.
It doesn’t matter.
Whatever it is or was,
isn’t going away.
We’re in this together now,
he and I.
He on his bed,
me on mine.
I just wish when he goes outside to eat grass
I could go with him.

Spun Sugar

I am late
and winter is long
and the dark-faced lie
I told
is circling my brain
like a bell-hop
lost in the Taj Mahal.
Blue leaves,
the bare sky,
and everything
synonymous with nothing
awaits.
A few days
picked here and there
remind me of pink sugar
spun into cherries.
I could eat them all
but I’d rather come home
alone.

Left for Lost

I found you
in the lost and found.
Your eyes bookmarks
of years of neglect.
Your head a tangle of recycled papers
and trash.
Had I not taken you home
you would have been lost
forever,
stuck in the back of a shelf
left to die.

The Next Taco

You don’t worry about
being alone when you’re young.
Or how long you will sit
before the next one asks you to dance.
You just get up and dance
and hope someone joins in.
The late night burgers and fries
never seem to leave a mark
and the fog of 3 a.m. beers wash away
with the sunrise.
Each day is a never ending bloom
of breasts and cocks,
walks in the park,
and road trips to small towns like Hohenwald and Pulaski.
Moving is as simple
as loading up an old Volvo with your clothes and a bonsai tree and heading West.
Now there are 401k’s
and realtors knocking at your door
with lying smiles
and trumped up comp sheets.
Babies and diapers
and parents with diseases no one can pronounce.
Hardening arteries
and wrinkles
and gray hairs looming.
There was no fear of death then.
Or thoughts that life hadn’t been lived as it should.
There was no constant uncertainty,
or the need for reassurance,
or the need for more hours.
There was only the present
and how good the sun felt on your back
as you walked in the sand
and the waves licked your feet clean.
Each day was a new page
yet to be written.
Each morning a new bagel
to spread the softness of cream cheese upon
while you lie on the couch admiring your toes.
There was time to drift,
to sleep,
to dream.
Time to find
the next band,
the next girl,
the next taco.

The Color of Summer

Dining on yellow
the color of summer.
The minutes of happy come.
The whiteness of petals
sing
where shall we go
to lift up our heads
and rejoice?
The night rolls in fast
like a turtle on skates
yanking down
purples
and blues
with the sun.
But I will be here
with a gun in my hand
shooting down stars
one by one.

Soldiers Of War

In my garden
the green tops of daylilies
are shooting up,
standing tall and erect
like little toy soldiers
on their way to war.
They were lied to,
tricked into believing it was Spring
by the warm Southern winds.
But now the air has grown cold.
Winter is here
and they have no where to go
to escape.

The Rules

Start where you are
in the room.
Start with nothing
but a red wheel barrow.
Lilacs.
Green arms
and the sea.
Swallow
the blindness of leaves
and jazz
and the nightly crowds
of thieves.
Give your nice hard ivory
the weight of trees
soft-eyed and tangled.
Of death,
be a friend,
for a man who covets
life
is disingenuous.

Home

I am looking at houses
trying to find out where I should go,
trying to find home.
Home wasn’t L.A. with its palm trees and coconut glazed women.
And it wasn’t Houston,
with the Bar-b-que breath of men pressed against my neck
like humidity.
And it wasn’t Nashville
with its pre-sweetened tea
and my life in danger every time I got behind the wheel.
Sometimes I think home is New York
but maybe that’s because my boyfriend would be with me
and I’d have someone to press into at night.
I could share dumplings in Chinatown
and eat Pizza folded in half
and we could stay out till four and come home to our one bedroom apartment
with the five flight walk up.
But what if he were gone?
How lonely that little place would feel.
The tea kettle screaming for one.
The dog, bored and waiting for my return.
The long walk in the cold
down concrete streets,
past faces I didn’t know.
Sitting in cafes and writing and watching.
The hot summers
sweating.
The subway,
a death tunnel,
a lonely black hole
I would fall into every time I had to go across town.
No, that isn’t home.
The truth is I don’t know where home is
and even if I did find it
I’d probably never feel like I was
home.

Turkey Dog

He is bored.
He has walked from room to room
with his toy mailman in his mouth.
He has looked out the window,
barked at the men across the street building the new house,
chased his basketball
as it rolled down the hill,
eaten his dinner,
and shared organic almonds with me.
He has done everything he can possibly do to amuse himself on his own.
Now there is nothing left.
He wants to play
and he wants to play with me.
He wants me to stop writing,
get up off the couch,
and play catch with him.
And we both know I will because
I am his slave,
his Edith Bunker,
his long haired mate
who opens the door for him
when he wants to come in.
The one who shares her dinner with him,
takes him on long walks in the woods
and marvels at his agility.
The one who opens her bed to him at night
when he can’t sleep.
I am the one who pulls thorns from his paws
and takes him to the vet every time
there is even the slightest something wrong.
He is the one who pulls thorns from my heart.
He found me wandering alone
in need of a friend.
He was in need of turkey.

Thinking Cake

I am worn out
from thinking feelings.
My mind is a runaway horse
galloping through the mud.
Or so I think.
I think I am a thought
that I am not
but I am not the thought I think I am.
So what am I?
I am trying to feel what I feel
but I do not know
anymore if I am thinking
what I am feeling
or feeling what I am thinking.
When I am sad
I am thinking sad thoughts.
And when I am happy
I am thinking happy thoughts.
So therefore
there is no sad,
just the thought that begets the feeling.
And there is no happy,
at least I think there is no happy.
So what is there?
Chocolate cake on the counter.

Torn Fruit

This liquid running
of tears
into the self but not self
perplexes me.
The childlike flow
back and forth from present
to past
without control
leaves me
demonized
like torn fruit.
Ripped and pulled
and sucked
over and over
legs spread
against their natural direction.
The rag doll in the corner.
Hair askew.
Eyes black holes.
Mouth stitched closed.
A broken lifeless body
bleeding in silence
waiting
always waiting.

It was the only green one in the room.
I rolled it and held it under my chest
and when I moved
I did not take it with me.
She lied and she said it was hers.
But it was mine.
It was mine.
The dark
is mine to hold
with nothing
but shoes.
My sister
shut me in
over and over
Shut me
in
and left me
exhausted
unable to get out.

I want out
but no one will open the door.
So I lie here
on my back,
unable to breathe,
unable to know
where I am,
my blanket
on the other side of the room.

Desert Frost

Lover
where are you?
When you are here
I am curled up
in a little
ball
far far away
as if I were on Pluto
lost
in black darkness.
When you are gone
I
wander the halls
in and out of bedrooms
too afraid
to touch bottom.
I am scared,
so scared
of what
I don’t know.
But this going inside is killing me
like the frost on the trees.
When it melts it will be too late.
I have wandered this way
for years,
in my own desert,
in my own prison,
in my own Hell,
here
but not here,
in my skin
but not,
trying to feel you,
when I can not feel myself.

My Mother

She is getting better.
I can tell.
She is getting nastier everyday.

Washington Square

I can just see you
sitting on that bench
in Washington Square Park
eating your pretzel
and sipping your Coke,
sharing your crumbs with the pigeons
who gather round you.
You squint
the sun from your eyes
as if you are struggling to see
something more
than what is actually before you.
Your voice
is sweet and warm,
a cinnamon smooth cream
that floats
above the cacophony of New York.
Your hands, soft as butter,
melt women with one touch.
I have loved them for years
so have all the others.
I saw you in the coffin too.
What a big dope you were,
sleeping your life away.

New Year's Resolutions

I have already broken them.
I vowed I would stop eating sugar
but on Jan 1 I found myself at the Target
grabbing the Hershey’s Dark Chocolate Kisses that had been marked down 75%
and throwing them into my basket.
I ate two before I gave them away this morning when I went to the gym.
I swore I wanted to lose weight,
but I stuffed myself like a zoo animal at the Indian Buffet today.
It’s been five hours since I last ate and I’m still not hungry.
I vowed I would start spending more time with myself
and go to Radnor Lake and walk.
But when I got there,
my ears were cold and I left after being there just ten minutes.
I vowed I would look for a job,
but every time I search
I get a nauseous feeling in my stomach
like I am veering off my path
and becoming someone other than who I am meant to be.
I vowed I would meditate every morning
but this morning I slept past seven
and barely got to stretch class in time
much less any meditation.
So far,
I don’t know why I bothered to make any resolutions at all.
Oh yeah,
I almost forgot,
I vowed I was going to be less judgmental.