Small Craft Warnings Collection
Published in Small Craft Warnings (Swarthmore College), 1999, 2000
Season (1999)
It gets dark fast this time of year
the old man behind me said as
we moved together backwards
approaching the city center
We hate darkness, I thought
especially that which comes early
We hate rising in it and retiring in it
seeing light only through panes
begrudgingly
We hate summer too, we say,
the heat that leaves us sweating
slouched on platforms
fanning ourselves slowly
In winter we are only death at our desks
Pushing white paper around
The trees have been brown too long we yawn
Spring spring we chant, looking forward
to that which is warm, colorful
Searching for tiny purple buds edging the path
from the station we point and
say there’s one excited energized
by daylight we earned
we saved for so carefully
Close (1999)
In the heavy heat of almost summer we walked without destination,
city block by city block, roaming the interior of our neighborhood.
North south east west we walked pavement lying flat or cracked
in need of replacement in places or shifted like mismatched lips.
Looking up through sodden air I noticed the sky still blue,
daytime with the lights turned out,
saw the clouds move in bunches surrounded by this strange night blue,
The starless sky has clarity without light, I thought.
Processing in this lightless light we entered alleys,
saw white roses spilling out over the tops of fences,
looked up at your old window, watched the hyacinths growing
From a flower box outside a rowhouse door.
Entering and exiting smells, the flowers, exhaust, the bodies passing,
restaurant food cooking, the garbage in dumpsters rotting,
snug in the humid air, the airless air,
passing through it slowly, as it required,
we walked the middle of streets,
looping around behind buildings standing straight
or crouching beside lampposts above blacktop,
returning to the same conclusions again and again.
We crossed at lights, stop signs, when we wanted to in between.
We talked, pointed at places we knew.
We walked in silence
moved further into our neighborhood,
inside the heat, circling the center,
peering in to what is hot about heat.
Lights, garish convenient store lights,
Sirens, car alarms, voices from tables
defined our small exchange,
our purposeless journey.
Christmas Poem
For Mom and Dad
You do not know about
the lights on Rittenhouse Square
the way none of us saw them coming
and a few of us suggested they were a miracle
They hover in the trees-multi-colored spheres
I search to see if they line the entire park
My heart feels all there is to feel
when one is overwhelmed
by excess, but still wants more
No, you do not know about
the lights on Rittenhouse square
or my throat gone tight as it does
by the silliest things
the moon in a sliver or
perfectly round and orange
the bus coming when I want it to
an arm's smooth stroke through water
when, in that first feeling moment
I think of telling it
of how to tell someone about it
I think of telling you about it
Maybe I will forget to tell you
about the lights on Rittenhouse Square
How they remind me of everything
and nothing at once
how they seem to be like small planets
I can imagine reaching for
to cup in pale hands
How they take my eyes in their possession
pulling them upward
pushing heat through my chest
like hot water through pipes
revealing for a second
life turning slowly
dangling from something a
as fragile as a branch
Ferris Wheel (2000)
The ferris wheel across the bay
was spectacular at night.
I could not detect its movement
from the dock where we swayed
in the tumultuous wind we marveled at,
were slightly afraid of.
I held hope that it was something great
to see moving slowly, consistently,
something so perfectly round and
brilliantly lit.
The man who was here
a few days ago
was the first I heard mention it.
Pointing a broken telescope its way, he said
Let’s see if we can catch that ferris wheel.
My ears perked up instantly,
not caring at all for broken telescopes
you said were broken your entire life.
It was the words ferris wheel that caught my ear.
I did not see it until three days later,
at night,
with raw eyes, without magnification.
Surprising myself at feeling sad
and alone seeing the lights so far away,
feeling the wind again blowing hard,
knowing all the miles of ocean and beach
darkened and deserted were close,
the families I do not know by the dozens
coming and going.
The waves have always brought forth in me this
precious sadness
Longing thoughts of a perfect like, b
ig things with smallness beside them.
A house by the sea.
I have had to take deep breaths, hold my throat tight,
Emotion matching the tireless
disappearance and return of the bay.
The ocean is a thing that doesn’t change,
yet is always changing
nags, whispers in ears again and again
There is something else here, something else,
Either surrounding, holding us up to float, or
hitting hard, salt water waves breaking, or receding
skulking out to sea,
draining the bay into thick mud,
Small puddles, leaving
tiny flies that sting or the
worms that you pointed out,
poking their heads up,
first one then hundreds,
visible from the light
of the house behind us. PASTE POEM HERE
Commonspeaking Collection
Published in Commonspeaking (Swarthmore College), 1999
A Sleeper Car (1999)
You are asleep with your small glasses folded up, grasshopper legs.
I squint out the window to see flat land, shadows of darkness,
am convinced that I have never known anything about this country.
There is the steady chug of the train moving forward in the night,
your steady breathing filling the car, your relaxed knee, bare foot,
moonlight reflected from the ring you never remove.
Another train passes so I could reach out and touch it,
headed someplace faster it seems. Somewhere where
they are not I suppose sleeping time away, meandering down
narrow corridors unsteadily, chewing slowly, digesting well.
I see your shirt hanging on the door
swaying slightly as the car rumbles onward
convincing me that I never knew anyone before you.
I let the curtain fall, smothering the moon,
the wide light that pulled me
from sleeping beside you
Salad Days (1999)
For my parents
We had a strawberry patch in our big
green, brown, and forsythia yard
beneath the pealing blue moon with
white trim and dark eyes
We lived above a tennis court never built,
left an ambiguous pit overtaken by daisies
The pines bowed courteously
beneath their skirts we dined,
silverware, bright pink and green
plastic baskets left over from Easter,
baby dolls with heavy eyes
We had a banging back door,
cracked wooden steps
The ground felt uneven beneath our feet
The grass held hidden treasure
The weather, sometimes grey and sometimes blue
sometimes warm and sometimes cold
We knew no schedule
The woods, soldier friends lined up
A tree house held low in a crook
an arm snapped
Injury never healed
A path meandered downward
dotted by protruding tops,
buried bottles
Memory reflects the shimmer of metal
A colander in the late spring, early morning sun
We picked our berries knowing
the devouring would wait
past pump, past blackeyed susans, a pear tree
a hose wrapped up like a snail
We returned to the moon which awaited us,
disappearing, fading into its cool shadows
Redtree Collection
Published in Redtree (Bryn Mawr College), 1994, 1995
Tomatoes, Elvis, and the Beatles (1994)
Tell me you were
not always dead.
Tell me I was careful-
I picked your face
ripe and fat,
a tomato from
a drooping caged vine.
Insist I pulled it
plump, that I spoke
so softly, that I refused
to risk the slightest
impression.
Tell me your
red skin was once
that supple, that
sensitive.
Did I,
in some
spoiled fit
kill you?
With a twist so
sharp, with a hand
so huge, I crushed you
and squeezed
you shapeless.
Could it have been me?
Was I the culprit
who poked and
peeled you
to a splotch,
a puddle of
seeds and pulp?
Perhaps you were
neither alive
nor dead, you
were a seed
I forgot to plant, you
were the flash-fear
of a potential
stain, you were
green and window
sill bound.
Yes, you were
neutral and I
was indifferent.
I imagine having
not picked
killed, or ignored you.
I fantasize you
fallen, wasted
overripe, a taste
bitter and
dark, gravity your
only murderer,
a merciful undoing.
Tell me it is
good that you
seemed always dead
(like Elvis) or
always broken
(like the Beatles)
that I found you this way.
Our relations could be
a sighting,
a flash of sequins,
a cape, an impromptu
reunion,
so singular, fantastic,
and unreal
that they exist
forever in
dispute.
Linzer Hearts
puff up so big and white in this heat,
voluptuous, untouchable.
Back on countertop they withdraw
to factual selves just a
little better than disfigured.
Reality has set in and has
relaxed them to disappointment,
rationalized them to rightness.
They lie on wire racks,
cooling in cooperation, never
resisting jam spread between
their doubled selves, sides
which have somehow failed.
And as brown edges deflate,
awaiting a shower of white
felt like rain on a roof two
stories above, a subtle
shock on top, memory slides and
perfection reaches a pleasing distance.
The jam, a sweetness without teeth,
the remnants of the young woman stuck
inside who knows her body has not lasted
who knows all were is really is
the warmth of sun across
one’s face when clouds
come apart.
Miss Rumphius
Living to be old enough to have
little children circled around your feet,
crumbs dangling from their lips,
eyes wide and fearful and reverent,
you sleep alone and easy at night,
knowing you always kept your options open.
Looking down at a body laid out wake-
straight, covered like a good story-book
lady in patchwork, topped off with a head
of skunk-striped hair, you are blue
from the day in day out of watching
the sun and moon switch places.
Their consistency mocks your options,
their push and pull of the seasons,
the waves, puts the freedom
felt from globe-trotting
to shame.
No island king or fresh fruit could
keep you, your body nagged and you came
back, the sea which spat you out
swallowed you whole, the roses and
purples and violets invited you,
intoxicated, and put you to bed.
The third thing, which you
placed hesitantly on
a back burner, did not need
you, came to life on its
own, blended in to
the clock-work of stars and water
right under your window
sill, beneath your nose,
seeds blown by a wind stronger
than any body, any suitcase full
of souvenirs.
Large and legendary,
it is your name which
precedes you, outrageous
amongst the sparseness of a
small house by the sea.
Having accomplished your tasks,
having lingered above the dusty skies,
the backgrounds you filled in long ago,
sitting solid amongst these colors so
real you could eat and drink them,
you look as though this was not a
matter of choice, that there
were no real options.
You remain here as if only to
prove that a whole summer spent
throwing seeds to the wind is
not a whole summer
wasted.
Dye Job
Published in Uses (Villanova University), 1992
Dye Job (1992)
Get a dye job-
a polident, liposuction
dye job.
Take those strings woven
into your ritzy wig and
get a dye job.
Dye red-a deep, fire
Lucille Ball-technicolor
red.
I’ll do it for you.
I’ll rub that bloody goo
into your scalp and we’ll
watch it swirl down
the drain.
The dye job should
go without a hitch.
So get a plastic pump
transplant-get your veins done.
Scream over the
vibrating boob tube
from the kraftmatic adjustable.
Curl up in a tanning bed
-bake at 375-
you’ll come out lovely,
lovely and brown,
as brown as your
dye job is red. PASTE POEM HERE
Manhattan Magazine Collection
Published in Manhattan Magazine (Manhattan College), 1989, 1990, 1991
I am stupid (1989)
and yes you are pretty
and what a grand job we did
fishing with hooks of pure
vanity.
We have caught dinner tonight
full of ourselves when
we put ourselves down
caressing each word
Of their reply
grabbing each compliment
and running away.
They’ve called it insecurity,
it just looks like
vanity
to me.
In Retrospect (1991)
It was all so very imperfect.
I was chatty and I believe you said catty and
don’t forget insecure.
You chose your words right:
You were truthful, a noncomformist,
you suffered so as a child and now
you want to sleep with your mother.
How suburban, you yawned, my middle-American ideas.
I wasn’t the artist you thought I was so
I apologized profusely.
It was all so imperfect, the nights entwined
uncovered truths.
We just did not know what to do with it all.
Babies in 95, you said.
Sex will be sublime, you said.
Whatever you say, I said.
I was old hat in two weeks’ time.
You were consistently never home.
I was steadily silly, and innocent.
With breath hot, canned, and sticky I
hissed into the aftershave embalmed telephone.
I stripped.
I begged.
You let me off the hook.
Clothed, I sat on a bowl
and heard the shuffle around my stall.
My palms grew wet as the enfolded my
aching face.
In the future we spoke-
it was as if we never met.
Just the way you liked it.
All gone-all
in retrospect.
Now, you and I are
perfectly
safe, separate.
PASTE POEM HERE
Good-Bye (1990)
Don’t know where, I will begin
white desert of
fresh paper
stretching forth
(a vulgar sin)
Heart knows just what to say?
Steady, dull, thump
thud
bumping
Brain is reeking with crud, decay
Taillights flicker
I stand
where you used
to be
(for the worse?)
Red, white, and blue truck
brings me to you,
Looping ink
into
shapely
words-
Glue taste on my tongue, tasty goo.
Missing you, helping me to be what I like
better than before.
Taillights flicker into black tomorrow.
I stand alone in dim today.