Poem for Friday, October 31, 2009

Farewell, October

porch steps are lined

      with disfigured pumpkins

             triangular eye sockets

             waxy oxygen ablaze

                       some weigh more than

                             the children who picked them

                                                  some of the children

                                                  dance, dressed just like them

                                                            so all things embrace orange

                                                                   fruit, sun, leaf, power

                                                  clouds, candy, and teeth

                                                  the fingers with which I type

                      and all of the doorbells

                             glow ferociously orange

            on crystal suburban doors

            on tenebrous tenement walls

glowing for years, for eons

without a single flicker

Poem for Wednesday, October 28, 2009

A Perfect Day for a Funeral

       driving through a funeral procession on College St.

the Catholics are crossing the road in

lonely groups of one

        black umbrellas overhead to hide their saintly anger

the rain, daunting

this man or woman--who

        were they, and will they have a gift

        for the Holy Virgin despite their

bereavement? 

        jewelry of some kind, or a scant chant

        jewelry like the women wear into the church

angelic brooches, earrings given by grand-

children, and you, lady in black--is that

        a pearl necklace?

        the air, pungent with old flowers and mothballs

three dark death wagons brave the train tracks

        unhindered by flood puddles

        unscathed by those conflated

with somber prayers

         across the way

         a cross to bear

Poem for Sunday, October 25, 2009

Waking Up to a Storm

The prophets left ashes and myrrh on your doorstep

gift-wrapped but it all blew

away today in a violent gust undulating toward the sky

speed and sediment

       

        like the motion of

        the trees     screeching tires     your senses

you think of the parable with foxes and pour a cup of tea

begin the day reading

about third-world politics ending with gunshots

powder and physics

        what they're doing is

        making it rain      harder

The prophets were Pharisees in clever disguises

trying to steal your

thunder boom-boom-BOOMS spreads sheets of clouds

divides nations

        did you forget to

        thank    whoever    made this happen?

Poem for Friday, October 23, 2009

Motherhood

When I found out your mother

     died, I thought back to five

summers ago. We were sitting

by the tabernacle. I was looking

at the pews, sturdy oak and

conviction, and my palms were

    sweating. You were chewing

spearmint gum, smacking it against

your braces (you shouldn't have

chewed gum with braces). Our hair and

faces were much lighter then.

I thought about how young your mother 

was when you were born, the same age as 

    you that summer. You were more reserved 

than her, too timid to dip your toes in 

my cyan pools as you gazed at me. Not even the 

slightest touch because you would stir 

    ripples, and I would scamper away like a 

whitetail on an early November morning. 

I was timid, too.

On occasion, I think of your family. Adoptive

father, two blond little sisters, and a baby

boy whom I have never seen. I even feel sorry

      for you, once blossoming, now thrust into a

tormenting motherhood. Your petals have wilted

with circumstance. Your father cries over

your mother's grave, and you are unsure of

what to do next. 

But most of all, I think of how you have 

lost your timidness, and I still have mine. 

I wear it as a necklace that reaches down to 

my chest, tucked underneath my shirt, cold

      despite the warmth of my body. You buried

yours beside that tabernacle, and it's

still there.

Poem for Tuesday, October 20, 2009

Transubstantiation

And it came to pass that

the body of Christ

has been wedged in your

esophagus for the

past two          equinoxes

Scriptures and parables

echo off your teeth, over-

powering the formation

of palatal and velar

consonants

You can't even say His name

or His father's name

His blood trickles

down your corporeal

caverns, leaking like a

corroded pipe, blocked

by His               body

Just enough trickles to

make you wonder why

you traded your Bible for

bubblegum and if the

ozone layer is merely

God's bathroom

Do stars combust with blasphemy

or are they unrelated

Either way, you suddenly

understand that Death 

occurs when you can 

fully swallow and digest

Him

Heaven is the glass of

ice cold water to wash

Him down, river rapids

rapturing towards your

poor empty             stomach

And if there is no glass of water

for God's sake, don't swallow

Poem for Sunday, October 18, 2009

Prisms

Each breath, and our lungs are more crystallized. 

     Inhale--more prisms form, frigid, reflecting

the spectrum of light, wanderlust, embracing directions

and fractions of directions. Violet sucked down the

sewer. Red pulsating through a telephone wire. White

     absorbed in nitrogen. Indigo in me and you.

This is the only way we can see the world, see each

other. This is how we communicate--trapping

each other's thoughts in a pitcher of lemonade by

     a porch swing in Arkansas. This is, this is.

Please breathe in these colors: my obsequious

aura, yellow and trembling; your crochet needle, argent

and buried with bones; the rainbow after the storm

     that destroyed our heritage. This is the only way

we can

      see.

      

Poem for Thursday, October 15, 2009

Why Orpheus Looked Back

past the treacherous gray canyons

to his left, to his right

the pungent fetor of mortals' last

breaths

            Orpheus trudged upward

            unsure of himself

past Tantalus' fingertip fruits

grapes, mangoes

dripping slippery juices and

breaking bones

            Orpheus could not hear

            his specter bride

past the palp-palp-palpitations

hellenic heart, fear

Eurydice skating three feet

behind

            Orpheus knew men lied

            but gods lied better

past her vanishing

past his memory

out of

            Hades