Tagged: the Dead
A Request for the End of My Life
always interrupt me for
animals or ghosts
food-related reasons
bathroom
a sound you
hear the car making
my exit
a song on the radio in
need of lifting
or a heavy thing
wake me up with tears
when you are cold
slipped like petals
on the sheets
like blood on a white wing
I’m asking
stop me at the edge
if I get too close
if I move like grief
drawn by a fly
or a bird hiding
its hurt
hold my body in
point me towards the
beginning
and set me down
Mink Teddy Bear
to exist beyond
the worst
having happened
is not the end
of fear
but a full lap
the kids will
often
bring me things
one brings a mermaid
I take its
temperature
one brings
a transformer
it lights up
another brings
a bear that is so soft
it feels alive
maybe it is alive
we’ll keep
its secret
it hides
in the child’s
arms
slips
behind
her voice
around the breath
beneath
the door
mutating, undulate
along
the air
like a virus –
evading its end
by
pretending
it’s
not real
Worm-Like
once I let the machines
repair my body
they power washed my stomach
drilled relief
into my tail
one guy spent the entire time
in my jaw, just scraping
they must have missed some
anxiety, I guess – what I
described to my parents as
a knife above my chest
not stabbing, just hovering there
I’ve got it down to my tummy
I’m trying to push it out
I’ve ejected my appendix
anxiety – what I describe now
as a strange fungus
aboard a ship
oh to cut it loose
watch it drift into the cold
never to return
never to wonder if you love me
to devalue your love so
never to make things wrong
because it’s easier
because I know these things by
prescription, or strand
because I blame them
or make them disappear to
appear changed
it’s still here
it’s in the room with us now
one day I will loose my hair
my eyesight
my home planet
one day there will be a voice
the one who keeps anxiety
at all costs
from reaching my hands
the poles
dowels in every pore
make the cut you make
across my wrists
nothing can escape when we go
Playing Dead
for a possum to play dead effectively
it can’t look too good
evolutionary priority is given
to the ugly – the mottled fur
the hairless face like carrion
the chitinous tail, the smell
if a possum chooses another
she will do so for its longevity
its eligibility based on ugliness
therefore beauty
the young are carried on the stomach
tight against fat hanging
towards the ground, dragging
through ticks and the litter
disgusting, undesirable
reliable
no one comes for the possum
not the hungry, nor the thirsty
the possum does not pretend
to be alive – it is therefore safe
it is ready to drop dead
at any moment
a long, upturned smile
the secret – to live best
when no one is looking
Nebulizer
my breath comes running up, alarmed
holding bags
my breath is sinched at the waist
my breath
is afraid to put it all the way in
my breath is unsure of the door
it rolls up a towel to
block the light
it knows footprints by weight
my breath escapes through
the window, and though it lives in me
it looks like a robber
feels like a robber, like
it has something of mine in its pockets
in this way my breath cares about
what others think
other’s thoughts hurt. other’s
thoughts can be controlled
my breath controls them
oxygen – a bundle of stones in the arms
of my breathing, a breathy voice, a
circulatory mind
my breathing is pot without
a drain hole
my breathing is root rot
my breath continues, though I
miss a few here and there
they fly over my head or
over my shoulder. it is a joke, or
salt, my breath, which today
feels like someone else’s. it is not enough
or maybe, too much my own
Fear of Dying
I beg the stars to move –
that is, to have died already
I’m still uncertain of their distance
now more than ever
what would happen if I ate one?
would it kill me? if I sleep
facing the sky, will it breathe me?
if I get bit, will I die?
I am unsure about so much
what does a virus want?
which is the universe
and which is the galaxy?
is it cicadas? or static on
spirit headlamps? or
Denis Johnson’s feverish
kazoo music?
could be just a bug
am I doing the right thing?
where do I place
the needs that could kill me?
Missy
Our girl hears Missy Elliot
on the radio, 95.9 – The Throwbacks
She knows all the words the way
you don’t really, just play the sounds
so when she enunciates GO DOWNTOWN
EAT IT LIKE A VULT-CHA we laugh
She knows that part, of course, but
then again she does know vultures
She jumps off the couch and soars
like a vulture. She dries her hair over
her face like a vulture does its wings
She puts her hands up against the light
– a shadow puppet vulture
She is black and furthest away
She sees vultures and takes binoculars
but can’t find them
The light is too bright
After Choking You in My Sleep
the dead must be hungry
the way they present themselves
to me – half a hand out
hollow legs
shrinking then wrapping
the corners as if embarrassed
I would be too
all that work to be dead
and still begging
not that I’m any safer here
stairs are one of the most
haunted places on Earth. I
could be sitting in a portal, or in the body
of something larger
someone’s work or unrequited love
a prison, the defense
of a choke-point
whatever it is, I feel its interest
it shakes my insides as if
listening for seed
it lands on me when
I’m not careful
forms to vacancies like
an owl to the tree
like your voice to my ear
when I’m sure you’re lying
or is it, when I’m sure
I would have lied
is it me? I am poltergeist
through misplaced energy
through dreams of fame turned
malevolent humility
inside lurks
the big black mass
of ever losing you, especially
to me
Activity
I am writing again, which
feels like the wrong thing
behind me
there are thousands of figures
symbols for lost time
like a chair is not its word
“chair” a person
is not his name
nor is he what he leaves
behind
he is not named
“gunk in corners”
though he resides there
with no need for sitting, writing
now he sinks
where chairs were
leaving behind residue
like ink
on the paper
at night
Thirty
I was standing in line with you
when I passed out, fainted
I guess, and woke up
on the floor
I remember feeling
guilty, like I had overslept
and how different
you looked
appearing over me, like
a god, or its mother
perfect
and impatient
my elbow hurts – I realize
I must have fallen on it
you say I may have fallen forward
if it hadn’t been for you
how lucky – I am grateful
– I am weak – I am
let down gently – I am
long to see
the security footage
in which your reaction
plays out like a silent film
in which
the faces of the embarassed
become everyone, black
and white, at each moment
assigned a time
