Tagged: the Dead

SWAT

woke up drenched again, not
dreams, not raining
who knows

there’s a resiny
imprint of me
on my mattress, laid over
countless others
like days

I go through what I ate, when
the withdrawal symptoms of
things like caffeine
pot, what I’m wearing
sleep positions, if
I should shower before I sleep

maybe my mattress is a valley
my blankets roads
I overheat, sweat
become cold, pull them up

to wake unsure
where the water came from
if it’s water at all, or
just salt

if while sleeping, I’ve
been swimming, and
barely made it back to shore

Coleoptera

      Entomologists estimate there are nearly
1.5 million different types of beetles
if you double the weight of all beetles
the world would cave in on itself
I love this nature fact – partly because
it sounds so made up, and partly
because I believe it must be true

      Cleopatra wore lipstick made
of crushed ants and beetles
David crushed Goliath with a stone
Since then, the weight of humans
has doubled many times over
we are gathered around a large hole
each awaiting our turn to see

      My parents have just called a meeting
to say just cremate me, no need for all
the fuss, unless it feels important to you
that you have a place to visit
Do we get a hole to see down? 
a box in vain denying the earth
thousands of beetles crowded around
the stags, the rhinocerii, the oxen
Now that would be interesting! No
mom says, and please,
just pour us out anywhere

Apnea

the trees, their leaves dipped like eggs
into cups of dye, the one flaming oak
on Flaming Oak Cove that has not changed
noticeably, but tonight appears more
red than yellow, an act of collective
memory I contain only part of. I contain only
part of what it takes. I take things out of
the forest and lay them flat onto paper, like
these trees, too much on purpose. I
build my web between birds and train
them to fly in unison above tall grasses,
ponds, collecting bugs. but only in poems
only on weak bones perched in your mind
someone saves me each morning. is that you?
or do I save myself? have I somehow timed
the jump back on correctly, all these times
how have I not stayed too long? this
is where I have been for most of my life

Senility Lane

the blanket says I brought it on myself
but doesn’t remember why
she might’ve meant how much I’ve grown
or the tree I told her has fallen in the yard
I hope she doesn’t think a tree
has fallen on me in the yard
or that I might have already called her
she might have already told me
the things I’m supposed to know
like how to get out from under a tree
how to clean a fish over the phone
my parents could’ve looked it up themselves
or probably done it for me
but they made me call my grandmother
who walked me through a process
I’d have to call her again to do
that little perch, its bones
like splinters in its own flesh
newspaper torn, black blood and
sunlight shifting in the winded
tree, garage glinting
it had the look of still writhing
or still writing, which is
the back and forth of fear for me:
a dead thing still moving
an alive thing that doesn’t

Quick Quick

those of us safe
are loosely staked
in soft ground
feet shifting, we
sink a little, and though
we are not smaller
we seem smaller
to ourselves. so,
in our desperation
in our hatred
of not being heard
or helping
we try new ways
of saying what has
already been said
perfectly, by ourselves
even, when we
had said nothing

Grief Later

What’s the turn around? Will this
be like when I was 4 and didn’t cry
at Nana’s funeral, because
she smelled funny, because
she brushed my hair too hard
in a hammock once? I was 4
I remember things as if through
that hammock, my face pressed
into ropes like the blueprint of a face
I can’t remember what I’ve lied
about, or what is a story. Was it even
me who saved the chicken heads
because their beaks still moved?
Where would I have put them? If I went
back to the house on Rogge Lane, to
the adjoining back yards, would there
be a knot hole, a cinder block shelf
rowed with chicken heads?
Are they still in my pocket? Or
are we completely mistaken by grief?
Kidnapped. I wonder…
can it be considered a good life
if when you die, even for a second,
someone hopes you haven’t?

Poem for Someone Who Died

i put on my rain jacket, boots, roll
up my pants, step outside

i see myself in the window
of my dead neighbor’s house

now that his front wall has been knocked down
i can see more – the beggar’s lice, the

packages lying in its burrs like dogs
i see myself in the rain, too

how each wet streak is at a loss
for the likeness of those around it

how they explode, reach in all directions
run off together.

the construction workers pull
a tarp over their wood. they fire

the last few nails from their nail guns
it sounds as though there is knocking

on all of the houses. someone
is in each doorway saying

here. i saw this
and i thought of you

SNITCH

a bus exhausts at the exchange
of people. on the stop itself
someone has posted a kid’s face
with the word SNITCH above it
the flyer has pull-tab bottoms
like you see on NEED ROOMMATE
listings, ad spots
for math tutors. several tabs
are already taken
I take the rest, holding them
in my palm like money. no good
reason. maybe I will lay them
somewhere. on the chest of a hill
or the bottom of a well
are we sure this isn’t Hell?
all we do is tell each other
what other people have done

Joan Rivers Addiction Specialist

If I’m honest
there’s an envy
being scolded

the briefest gold
sepulcher
of wanting to die

I could sit
atop my headstone
tallying visitors

watch them
sift for time
in their pockets

finding none
pull out scarf
after scarf

I could call them
names like
‘Joan Rivers’

So much
time
in a day!

compared to life

So much down
to the way
we think

For instance, I
just learned
that sticker burrs
are really seeds
that they ride on us
even
when seeds
are eaten freely
by so many
animals

So it’s harder
and harder
to walk
by yourself

plants
grab hold

and people
present
their faces to you
like balloons

They have
miracle answers
to well-rehearsed
questions

and give you
some leaf print
of being

Remember being
young? was it that far
from being dead?
aren’t they both
just doing
the same thing
over and over again
without
getting tired of it?