puzzle pieces

i'm going to dog ear all the beats
last night where i wanted to kiss you--
where the roof of the car became 
aluminum foil & unrolled sheet by sheet.
where the sidewalk outside buckled,
each crack the back of a knee, my knees 
following into the violin bows--
my brother played violin for a few years
before hanging the instrument on 
the wall on my uncle's side of our 
big soft yellow house. did i tell you
my parent's have a big soft yellow house
& if you put it into the palm of
you hand it becomes play dough. this is
where my bed room was, i tell you 
& a red beet drops from the ceiling
onto an anthology of something. this is
too purple to be blood. this is the mouth
between the mangoes-- the hair washed 
in vinaigrette. the cranberries that 
all of of our scabs, just sweetened.
alone at night in my bed after you
left i took a sharpie to the wall 
& tried to draw the lines of a great 
puzzle, like one of the ones stacked 
in the rec room at the nursing home up
the street. will this be a lighthouse
from your poem? the shovel? the wall
sconce flickering between us.
i'm pulling the pieces out of the dry wall
& they broke on the wooden floor: 
dust & celestial particles. tell what
now about the moon. & the wall will
not become a puzzle just because of
lines. crouching, i opened every book
on my shelf & each became, in that instant,
a coffee table between us. a cast 
iron pot of dragon tea. a beet bleeding,
now, only heavier. oh, purple us.
a blue ceiling light.

handfuls of clay

at Glen Cove the tide comes up like 
a strawberry field full of birds, they carry 
the distant boats on their backs. 
i turn to take a picture of 
the wooden stairs that lead down to the beach. 
i tell you, this is Gatsby's beach
even though it could have been any on 
the north shores of long island. 
i think it was this one because
it's so quiet & aching. the beach 
collecting dead branches to feel less vacant. 
sand turning to stone knuckles. naming
her joint-bones mars & moon & venus. 
sea weed against my ankles, the shed green walls
of a uterus. i imagine Gatsby here,
pants rolled up to his knees, white
button down shirt hanging on a tree branch.
he walks past me a few feet further.
i don't bother ghosts. it's best to
let them work. kneeling i watch as he
takes handfuls of clay & piles them
on one of the great big rocks that peer
out of the water like dulled irises.
i sit on one & it blinks. i wonder if
he was also a child of water, raising
his hands up to the waves & telling his
mother that he swayed them.
a great mansion grew between the trees.
it had old thick grey stones & a golden 
car to drive to the city in the afternoon.
when i ambled closer, i touched the walls.
they were slick & made of clay as well
& Gatsby was still out there, waist deep now
trying to build a man from the kaolin.
the clay would never hold long enough,
always tumbling back into the surf. 
the boats at a distance belong to no one,
they're made of paper & held up by a string.
if i'd taken a few more steps i'd have
found the houses looking out at the bay are
just railroad miniatures. i didn't want
to look at their smallness so i stepped back,
stayed in my place; water holding me
with her spattering tongue. a blue bucket washed up close 
but i didn't pick it up. i'm a firm believer 
in leaving things as you find them.
across the bay i could see no green lights
to mold american dreams out of, i watched as the clay 
man reached himself into the water again,
fingers melting & becoming small listless 
hunks of grey clay. Gatsby lit a cigarette
& the smoke turned blue & then red, bursting
with wings & beaks. he didn't notice
me that whole time. he didn't notice
anyone, just stared forward, intently. i'm not
even sure if he came here before, this might
be before the book & all, but he was here now. 
when done, he just put back on his shirt, unrolled
his pants & sunk underwater. with handfuls
of clay i too tried to make a man, only 
my man was smaller & wanted nothing at all. 
gently, i rubbed his face smooth & blank,
i pinched his arms into place. i wiped my
hands on my shorts, red dried blood stains.
he didn't stand though, not all the care 
in the world could hold him together,
first buckling at the knees & then scarring over.
the waves broke him like a host.
i took a piece in my mouth, chewing 
out of respect for the not-really dead. 
the boats shuttered & the tide rose,
spitting feathers. water-plumage.
i erased my thin avian foot prints
from the thin gravel shore.

ice cubes

i refill the ice cube trays 
& stand in the kitchen waiting.
it takes so long to become a solid
object-- i open the freezer again 
to dip my toes in the cold water--
each cube the size of me-- each little
division another pool deep enough
to fall into. i take to pacing 
the dividers like the train tracks
threaded through town. the station
is on williams avenue & the street
is hot with asphalt & 
the beam banging birth of 
a new building. the construction
workers are too big to fit into 
the spaces of the ice cube tray,
they stumble occasionally into 
the house to try & i warn them 
that it's rare that someone else fits.
they want to cool off. we all want
to cool off. i chew ice & pretend
i'm eating stones off the driveway
or maybe hunks of sidewalk in winter.
dad pulls open the freezer door &
grumbles about the empty trays 
again-- filling them with tap water.
the frozen peas are so many planets.
there's a bag of mangoes from last year.
if i tuck my knees into my chest i
can be fully submerged. i hold my breath 
& teach myself patience by watching 
the first layer of ice form-- a pane of
glass to look out of. house next to
house next to house-- the ice cube
tray of all of grant avenue. when dad
comes home from work this time
he'll find all three trays full--
he'll crack me free & i'll bob 
in his tall glass of diet coke-- 
the bubbles floating me to the top. 
outside the construction workers 
chew ice on their breaks-- peer in
the living room windows-- their mouths
bloody from the shards of glass. 
i pull the blinds shut. wait for 
the cold to make everything still &
quiet. i lay down-- a piece of
me in each divider. it takes skill
to freeze yourself in segments--
like the dead cow in my parent's 
chest freeze. i want to un-thaw 
slowly then. hand by hand. rib by
rib by iris. don't resemble me.

stevia

I.
by the coffee machine overflowing. the grounds
bubbling & spitting, grit & black sand. a pot of thin 
charcoal snakes. uncle Rich in the living room 
with a mug in each hand waits & blinks to flip channels 
of the television. the shelves with the glasses 
& plates shutter-- clinking like the scales of a great
beast; one that lives all over the kitchen.
phantom & fork-toothed. one packet of stevia is enough 
for a cup of coffee. all natural zero calories.
the honey crystallizes. mom at the table; wrapping my 
brothers in newspaper. the coffee was too strong
because i didn't measure the grounds. the stevia packets
opened themselves one after another, their sweetness 
aloof & skeletal. 

II.
i asked the waiter for a sugar substitute
at the cafe off of hempsted. i was embarrassed 
to have to find fake sugar in front of you.
i usually come prepared now with yellow packets 
in my pockets. the sugar jar on the table 
was a beach with pure white sand. the waves hot & steaming-- 
steeped in blood orange tea. i wanted to dig my hands in, bite
handfuls of gravely sweetness, melting to 
nectar. you tell me about brewing sweet tea in texas with 
the sugar already in the pot. i found two packets of stevia.
they were next to the coffee machine at my parents 
house. i didn't take long to walk there, always on the 
other side of the room. i tell you in one sentence
that i used to have an eating disorder, but still kind 
of do. it tastes like stevia. open the packet 
& my mother with the newspaper was
at a table next to us. the television
blinked in the foreground. tell me what
you do for sugar.

caged birds 

the pet store up the street, the one that i told you about 
has a back room with glass windows full of parrots

it's hidden past the aisles of kibble 
& shuttering white-bar cages

the ferrets sleep on each other like living
lamp posts-- 

i leaned down to i watched their
tiny chests rise & fall, making sure they 
were breathing 

back there: iridescent blue macaws, reds 
plucked from fresh stop signs-- their wrinklked
grey talons gripping the sides of their
cardboard-box lives

the smaller birds chirped like popcorn--
their voices muffled by the glass.

in the foreground the shop owners 
talked about the light rain in Portuguese.

i left without saying anything, 

lingering by the store front a minute or two,
straining to hear their dampened gossip  

would they talk about me or was i just
another human body at a distance.

like all men, the hero complex kicked in
& i saw myself returning in the night,

my iPhone flashlight in the shop window,
a paperclip lock pick

i recall being in 5th grade & trying
to lockup our own front door, needless
to say i broke the knob

this time it would work & i come
to that back room to let all the birds free

they'd stare wild at me, eyes full of
neon & city street hum 

& none of them would budge,

preening each other & telling stories

angry, i'd wave my arms trying to tell them
to run or fly, to escape

the door is open

they'd turn their backs, huddling together,
scared of the creature with 
the strange pink fingers

paper-machete feathered & gripping onto
their cage bars, calling each cage 
mother, mother

don't you want to be free?

& the eldest bird would laugh &
come over to me, he'd take out some
of his feathers & start applying
them to me, saying 

this is a body

& i'd pick the blue cage, the one 
on the top shelf with the little
swing dangling from the top

& the paperclip would break off
in the lock to the front door
of the house, again.

i'd pull off the screen & crawl
in through the window, 
construction paper-feathers
wet from the light rain

violets on Jericho Turnpike

i called you from the bench with
an angry third arm. the violets
sat with their legs crossed 
in their planters beside me.
the carnations, dozing off, letting
the wind preen them of wilted brown
petals. it takes me apart too; a good
breeze & my hair flies away
in maroon & gold leaves. autumn
is an ache that lies dormant beneath
the asphalt but for now it is
too hot to be a body. the walk
signs are misleading here, red hands
waving from every crossing. i tell
you about each store front, reading
them like a menu or the index
of a book. when i hang up i linger
a few moments longer. there's a valet
parking cars for the Portuguese bisto 
across from me. he probably heard my
whole phone conversation. he looked 
past me like i was one of the potted
flowers & then i looked down to find
my feet into the dry dirt, my face
a purple bruise. the plants giggling
& hushing me, telling me to be still
or i'd give them all away. they waited
for dusk when the street was made
of only neon & stop lights & they 
pulled their feet loose. ambling
past shop windows up & down 
the Turnpike, some pointed to flags
in the international grocery store,
saying how they'd like to own 
a flag for Brazil or Colombia. 
they tell me i would make a fine 
addition, that i should stay &
window shop with them each night.
i tell them that i have places to 
go, that tomorrow i want to figure
out the buses & maybe the next day
organize the books on my shelf.
when all the cars go by they dash out 
into the street, hold hands & 
twirl on the double-yellow lines.
i tell them to be careful but they
don't listen. i don't run out
with them. my pink skin comes back  
& i blink, ankle deep in the planters.
a man wrestles with the chair's third 
arm & opts to just sleep beneath it.
i used my GPS to walk me 6 minutes home
& one of the plants followed me;
dug herself into the front lawn
until she became skin & bones. i brought
her some of my old clothing, but
said i was sorry but she couldn't stay.
if you let one flower in they'll
all want fingernails & knuckles.
i gave her a handful of change
for the 7 eleven. in the shower
i washed the dirt from between
my toes, plucked out 
the stray thin roots still leftover. 

lady bug

on the back window of the car
i found a lady bug with six spots.
i asked him how long he'd been inside
& he scurried away, down into the
seat crevasse. i told him that he should
get out while he can, rolling down
the windows near the perkiomen trail--
the water wearing a dress. he's a stubborn
man who counted his spots like coins
as we passed each toll booth into 
New Jersey & then New York. he told
me that bridges cost too much &
considering the pot holes i agreed.
somewhere in the midst of crossing
the throng neck he realized that we
were leaving or that we had left.
he counted the street lamps in our
old driveway. he counted the cockroaches
on the front steps of the old apartment 
building. he began to weep quietly so i
asked if he wanted to talk about it.
he shook his head & i told him
about the lady bugs in the walls
of my parent's house-- how they emerged
mysteriously, unreadable omens
disappearing back into the seams of
the wood. he took out his ink pen
& asked me how many spots i would
have if i were a lady bug. i was
still driving so it was hard to
think, i came up with the number seven
because it used to be my favorite number,
a useful number. if you picked it up
it would make do for an umbrella.
the pen tickled as he drew & i gripped
the steering wheel as we passed 
strips of thai food places &
a colombian restaurant that made
me think of my mom. he said that his
mother liked to knit too-- that
she would miss him. that she would
knit him six gloves in october.
i don't ask him why he left. 
i imagine he will tell me in time. 
outside the new place i check 
the seven black spots
in the windows of the car. one for
each sin. i laughed. he tells me that
humans trust too much in symbols.
crawling up the back window he 
watched me unpack &
stayed there in the car all night.

tomatoes

i made a cutting board into
a bed. the knives are in the trunk
with the rest of the kitchen.
how many chambers are there to the heart 
when it's an heirloom tomato? 
thick & asymmetrical, a blooming face.
i got the yellow from my father &
the red we learned when we were
still chewing the alphabet pink.
the gnats swarm all over the racks
of tomatoes at the farm, landing 
on every pockmark & scar-- onyx 
bodies gone angry-- a collar on my neck.
they're good for BLTs, or, at least,
that's what the farmers say. 
sitting on milk crates, acidic
blood dripping down their elbows.
the bacon finds its way, raw & fatty
creeping & tightening like my father's
worn leather belts, smacked across me.
i turn you over in the kitchen,
above the granite table where all
slicing will be done. give me your
sun-burning down-- your mouth empty 
of red. i want to lay open 
& dress in salt. i want to hear 
you fresh & spitting stone.
everyone keeps a jar of mayonnaise at
the back of the fridge where we could
hide to be safe until the family
orders italian hoagies again. salami 
as a sunday hat, peppercorns in our 
dress shoes. i love to see you like this, 
among the tomatoes, plastic bag sitting.
this is all bruises you know? 
we'll eat them standing up & 
tomatoes will taste like the backseat.

toll booth man

you told me about the man
in the toll booth, about how
he watches the people as they 
go past, sometimes the same
ones each day. how he had a simple
life & on the others side
of the booth the cars rush fast
like manta rays--gliding facelss
& in a rush. he unwraps his sandwich
from a plastic ghost, ducks down in
the booth so that no one will
see him, legs crossed on the floor,
whoosh of vehicles still on one side.
i think he's me or at least he will
be me in do time. i moved
to a toll booth years ago. hung
my jean jacket on the back of the chair,
scotch taped the two pictures i 
have of my father & i to the desk;
the one of us in Halloween costumes  
& the one of me watching him
on the bar stag-- his black &
white Rickenbacker hanging from 
his body. i reach my hand inside
to feel the texture of the guitar
strap-- like a stripe of Persian rug,
leather on the back. on the floor
there's a stack of books, of course.
the one card board box full that 
i've been carrying with me. on breaks
i touch them by the spine to wake them
up & they roll over, eyes bleary from
too much sleep. i whisper.
we'll read soon. only at night,
of course, by flash light i remain,
criss-cross legs with a book sprawled
out in my lap. her words go 
blurry, spoken under the tires 
of cars. even in the dead of night
sometimes i pop up, just to 
see if i recognize any of the vehicles
making their way onto the turnpike again. 
i catch a glimpse of the family,
my family, maybe a decade or so old,
headed to the big apple to bit 
the pavement & free the great blue
whale from the museum of national
history. they won't succeed, of course.
their hotel will have not enough windows
& i will decide to move to the city.
what would he think of me? alive 
only in the four walls of the toll booth.
he would join me, a little boy 
in a dress with a bob-haircut & 
a candy necklace. he sits on my
lap & i ask him where he let our
family run off to. laughing he crawled
out into the rush of traffic, just to
become a plastic bag before i could
reach out to grab him. the next day 
i see the same car again, & another
& another. 
you tell me of the toll booth 
man & i nod.

lantern flies

in august everyday 
i found dead lanternflies 
in my car, legs pressed together,
oh the sarcophagus body, the metal
tomb. i don't know why they'd all
come here. is it the soft floor 
of the backseat? the shine of roof
drawing them in. i cup my hands to 
drop them onto the hot sidewalk. 
i drove home to visit my parents 
& on the way they swarmed. they make
nests on the roofs of the battery 
factory where my father goes to 
stand in an assembly line-- click
wires into place. the closer i get
to kutztown the more toss themselves
at my car window-- plink of
folded paper skeletons-- from
a distance they look like origami,
like purposeful creatures. as they
swarmed they all flew in my mouth--
a thousand or so of them, tasting
like cherry throat lozenges. 
in the living room when i tried to
smile they angry-buzzed. they spoke 
in fifty voices, admonishing me
for having teeth crooked as 
the tombstone across town. 
in the bathroom i openned
the medicine cabinet to look
for a face wash but the bottles 
where all empty so i just used 
water. the drain in the upstrairs
bathroom is clogged so the whole room
flooded. i wrote an apologize on 
the foggy mirror & didn't tell them.
this will suffice as a goodbye, yes?
i open my mouth & they flutter
their black wings. you
asked if he could help me, but i shook
my head. they'll move on eventually.
out in the backyard i saw more,
nesting in the gutters-- making
a crown on the head of the house.
we should have said a more sturdy 
goodbye, yes? but what is the use 
of all that. the lanterflies would
scoff at the sentimentality of humans--
we can't let them know how soft we
really are. bent over the toilet 
you watched me pull them out 
one at a time-- squirming, dangling
from the tweezers. i told you
not to tell mom or dad. they are
worried enough, yes? i don't 
mind artificial flavors, you know,
the tastes of medicines. i am 
allergic to something around here---
is it the skin of the buildings--
papery & dry from the heat. 
the bowl of fruit on the kitchen
table melts into a brown syrup
& flies the size of needle heads
gather-- quick quickly & full of sugar.
as always i need to go home.
the sun is sweet & orange scented.
the lanternflies, seated on
the roof of my car, come along for
the ride. dead in the morning
on the front seat. a row of priests.
i brush them off & mutter
to them not to pray for me.