golf course

how do you spit the factory green?
i take a ride into an alternative natural
where no one knows 
the names of flowers.
instead, we go plastic 
as far as plastic will go. name a boy
after ourselves. cover all our tattoos
& pretend our skin is blameless.
in the forest once there was 
a god. he let the woodpecker
drill a hole in his head to spill nectar.
this is where we have nothing left to drink 
but our own horseshoes. 
wearing the right kind of clothing.
white & pressed. 
the right kind of face. 
white & pressed. 
a mirror with antelope legs.
do you go carnivorous 
in the open? tell me, is there
anything left of the wild? we all point
to a little tree with a choke collar.
it barks, pleading for jupiter to answer.
good boy. by which i mean 
terrible terrible boy. there is a conference 
coming to my despair. money 
to be made off the slope 
of my favorite hill. dig a hole
& spend the rest of time searching again
for that fissure. i put the golf ball
in my mouth. wait for you
to pull it out with your
leather gloved fingers. 

false alarm

a tree of sirens grows in the yard.
i go out each morning to tend it.
flashing lights & screams.
i don't know how
it doesn't wake you up.
once, we grew lemons 
but inside each fruit we found a tooth.
you said, "let's bury them"
& so we did. now mouths open
if you are not careful. ankles bitten.
tripping in the crab grass.
i love the taste of a siren. it fills
your mouth with ache & running.
i haven't run in years. my body 
doesn't let me. ankles twist 
& turn into licorice. but, i can 
feel anything in a bite of cherry.
syrup drips down my arms.
i don't want you to have to see the tree.
it's so bright & loud & angry.
the truth is that the tree grows 
wherever i do. in the alley way
of the house in new york.
sleeping in the wedny's parking lot
in my oldsmobile. there the sirens were.
i told them, "i already know
everything to be scared of."
the tree always laughs & says,
"but did you think of the war.
but did you remember that once
everyone you knew 
turned orange & silent?"
& more & more fears until
we are both wailing & i am climbing
every single branch trying
to pluck the fruit. 

tough it out

putting a fist into the moon's belly,
i thrash like the eel i am.
we had no use for privacy 
not when everyone was 
lighting their backs on fire.
all the dads called me "writhe"
for how i responded to the iron.
brightness is so often 
associated with good 
but when i see a glow
all i can think is, "where will i hide?"
mid day sun. why did being a man
feel like such a process of loss?
shed the feather & the ripe apple.
the trees had on their victory faces.
a staircase is just a staircase
if your legs aren't wool & willow. 
i prefer to crawl on all fours
when i encounter a stone.
the stone saying, "don't be
such a pillowcase."
i breathe through a straw
& i lie & say, "i am alright.
i can do this." this has cryptic blue eyes.
spits on my shoes. i turn my knees
into stomachs. eat as much as i can.
picked up by the scruff of my neck
& carried into the boy zoo.
"come on," the stones say. 
i try & try but i am sitting in a ball pit.
the snakes have taken 
my vertebrae for their own. 
"i can't," i say to a toy gun on the table.
my shadow takes a pocket knife
& tries to cut himself free. 

toaster oven gospel

the church on a slice of bread.
i was summoned
as marmalade.
always knew communion
wasn't really flesh. instead,
i saw it as bone. hard to chew.
my tongue, the rutter 
of a ghost ship. sand between teeth.
you will do anything
when you are starving.
fill the monster pew.
i find crumb litany 
& carry a trowel through the day
in case i have to stop 
& bury another angel. 
butter comes in fistfuls.
a dripping sink. heat 
angry & glowing red. i put on
the complimentary sun glasses.
i shave my face 
so no one will recognize me.
skip town. another church.
another sunday morning without
enough light.
me, just a golden plate
waiting to carry the skull
of a deer into the sacristy.
red flickering flame. 
i carve worship until 
it becomes a garment.
put on the dress. become
the woman priest. 
light my hair on fire. this is not 
a tongue of flame. this is
the ashes of a feast. 

considerations for quicksand

i was taught not to fight it
when the floor opens beneath you.
reading my survival guide
from the safety of the library.
outside it rained frogs & mice. 
i took notes. how did i know
so young to be always preparing
for the rapid release of stability.
cautious of sand boxes. what i didn't know
was where quicksand came from.
i assumed it might arrive
at any moment. i was right.
did not trust bath tubs or beaches 
but especially not evenings 
alone with my father. his beer bottle voice.
decapitated telephone.
the yard where i dug with a spoon
in search of dinosaur skulls.
buried my baby teeth, convinced
they might turn into a tree. 
step slowly. do not cry for help.
the sand can hear. knows thrashing.
find a branch to hand onto. 
i looked for arms. anyone's arms.
men's wiry hair. i read that it can always
be too late. too far into the swallow.
i believed though that i could
memorize these tactics 
& escape. have you ever watched
as a belief slipped through your fingers
just like a handful of sand?
goodbye instruction lullaby. 
here i am hanging on to the wrist
of a stranger. his breath 
smells like iron or blood. then i am
again in my bedroom feeling the floor.
the night has eyelashes. 
when you get out, run as far
as you can. you never know
just how wide the quicksand is.
you never know how much it wants. 
 

uses for a plastic bag

carrying the ghost home.
filling it to the brim with apricots.
to remove the dress
from the blender. to hold
the fresh liver. to put
over the head of a monster
when it emerges from an open window.
pulled over a sneaker
to invent a winter boot
when the storm comes
sooner than promised. 
as a sail when the ships loses
a wing. as a bowl when all bowls
have cracked right down the middle.
to deliver a gift when there is
no wrapping paper. for guilt.
for reconciliation. forgiveness.
for your mother's dirty potatoes
she gives you when she visits
& does not come inside, 
just lingers in the doorway.
a neighbor's cucumbers 
because his garden grew too many.
to ferry bottles of shampoo
& body wash from the car 
into the black hole. to throw up into
on the car ride when 
you would not pull over.
to clean muck from the bottom
of the sink. harvest tin cans.
pull over your hair while dying it red.
avoid stains. to pluck
a dead bird from the sidewalk
& hold it for a moment
wishing it would come alive 
& be furious at you.  

memorial

there aren't enough.
i go down to the quarry 
& gather piles of shale.
once, as a child,
we made a worm graveyard.
said elegies for the necklaces of hearts
smashed under foot.
then, watched as the weeks after
it's construction the stones
slumped & then fell.
the graveyard became 
a video game. the sky outside
had leather shoes & a briefcase.
i hate procedures & every impulse
to legislate love poems.
i do not want to follow
a guide. i want to kick god's teeth out.
i want to carry a shovel
into my life. dig wherever 
the bodies come. in offices 
& at grocery stores. in the parking lot
of a dead toys r us, we kissed
& talked about malls.
a mall is a worm graveyard.
so is a highway & so are most
gas stations. i do not want 
to have to make tangible 
every memory. someday we will
live in a time so just 
that we will walk, dreamily,
& not have any reason to hold on.
each day like a silk scarf.
a spilled bowl of ice cream.
lifting a spoon to your lips. 
for now, we have to made hard candy 
of every wound. let the light
shine through it red & orange
& green. this is not a gem.
this is not sugar. this is scab
as a stained-glass window. 

grown up

do you remember when 
we were weasels eating
the rotten face of a summer squash?
i wish i could be as pink
as i used to be laying 
in the grass & not thinking
about all the bugs who know
my name. centipedes & black widows.
i had always believe i would
grow up to be an obelisk.
a marker of where the birds had come
& died like airplanes. sometimes 
i call my parents & when they answer
all i hear are blender sounds. 
they are spitting out the old bullets
& making protein shakes 
with the darkness. i could have
grown up to be a firework.
i could have flashed. fantom gunshot.
instead i am here collecting golden rod
& praying to a plastic shopping bag heaven.
but back to being rodents.
i saw you & loved you. we ate anything 
the sky spat out. reached in knuckle deep
& twisted until the moon had fins.
a shark in the sink. running barefoot
past any kind of tether. i have
a bank account. in fact actually two.
i do not plan to become a permanent
kind of prophet. instead, i will
keep talking to the stones
until they tell me something i don't know.
"wide awake," one says. "so that you don't 
go hungry," says another. i do not intend 
to be a person with a garage
& i will never be someone 
with a flag pole. i will be a flower spinner.
a dragonfly host. a crystal chicken. 
i will make shrines in my bones
to the purple mouth i used to have
when i ate the precious gems
out of every single corner. 

roofers

let's pry the scales off the back
of the decade & call it a love poem.
men come like lanternflies 
& work to dismantle my face.
i pay them in tongues & tails.
you tell me you believe in change
& then you set fire to the effigy.
a whole town holding hands 
in a circle around a mother figure. 
i promise i am deadly. i promise
there will be a storm worth 
all this preparation. just yesterday
you asked, "are you preparing 
for a doomsday?" i responded 
"all my life." the ceiling that leaked
all kinds of ghosts. pinning them
to the walls of my room like butterfly
specimen. don't take my word
for anything. go outside & see them working
with their shovels & teeth.
in the school yard when it used to rain
the ground would be covered 
with little translucent grubs.
kneeling us children would
peer into their writhing bodies 
& witness the faces of our ancestors.
the world is a process of shedding.
you cannot tell until you see the skin
if it was something you really
wanted to lose. 

razor blade forest
 
i am almost never tender to myself. 
i put the leash on 
& have a telephone walk me 
through the razor blade forest
until i am ribbon. driving,
i look up to a billboard & i see
my face selling a bottle of ketchup.
i didn't consent to this
but sometimes our faces go off
& do crime without us. 
i try to imagine what gentleness 
could look like. a fridge of only butter.
a microwaved marshmallow 
eaten with my hands. i used to be
an altar boy & my favorite role 
was ringing the bell. in the sacristy 
the priest would turn into 
a statue & ask us children 
to name our favorite ice creams.
my dreams turn to pastels & smudge off
the more i try to show them around.
when does a hand become
a corkscrew? how have i always
come open so easily. in the closet
i do at least keep a flock of mourning doves.
i feed them cough drops & iced tea.
they sing & ask, "tomorrow?" 
i shake my head & close the door.
it is not tomorrow yet. i open
the door again just a crack 
to promise, "soon."