cxcvi

we colonized the patio, but first:
sushi with no service. I thought
the sun decided to think about
seeing us through the fog but
got blown up the hillside instead.
he adjusted my cardigan in the
poem. I read it to my father.
then he died. it made me
happy to write.

time to water the plant before
flying. first I wrote ‘lying’ but
that was a gamble. neither of us
are flying. we’re like penguin
wings.

the proof will come in the poetry
database. this was my thought
as I drank a bowl full of roses.

cxcv

a grievous blue bay topped by a tanker
under a sepia sky divided by cricket chirps
more phone calls from the roadrunner cloud

it won the race to the neighborscraper so I didn’t
have to boast but wrote my first poem on a trident

and what did I do today? me, too. turkey burger
with poem by guest appearance its shadow lurky
near the two moles we had for breakfast or supper

eagle ships certain to tide me over til Calistoga’s
headlines rip Waterstone’s submissions into
the study I keep interrupting but he’s trying to
figure out his major and doing volunteer work

my fingers dry the little line on my thumbnail
creeping up for coffee he was depressed and
bored with unemployment its goose a goner

I mean I finally looked into the mailbox

call mom and dad to let them know about my
situation something nice to wear a bright blue
bookmark oh my Dahlen it’s all over it’s almost
over from New Year’s Eve to Autumn I write a
poem a page a poem a day an overdue movie

and something to keep the t-shirt holes dirty

cxciv

we didn’t finish the history of fidgeting,
but it does seem they’d like to hire me. now
I’m a Boston fruitcake, spend time with
the slugs investing in Herman Miller futures.

the complacency of a certain 20-year-old
as said complacency relates to my com
plicity in said complacency = big tits
in a feel-good movie. an understated

performance. my four-line stanzas are
sharper than your four-line stanzas about
my lingering feelings for you-know-who.
only, seven ages ago, you-know-who was

you-know-where. we grilled margaritas,
donned our chaps, danced, pinballed,
drank, and fried mushrooms. ever the
chameleon, he passes out from the

screams upstairs, having nearly shoved
me out of the way in time for the movie,
sparkling debate about the mood ring
on my finger. for example, marry him.

as usual, the mushrooms were delicious.
but my strategy engendered poignant disc
ussion, a flop, quite unlike our rough
and raunchy flower scene. I can still feel it.

cxciii

he thinks he wants to look like he’s
in the action without moving.

the monotony of the bright spot,
that which has firemen working

underneath my pillow. we’ve
eaten too much landscape. he’s

no more somewhere than the out
side. the golden moments of

evening when the dust settles,
haze on Treasure Island, real in

viting. the more we watch tele
vision the more we focus. I sit

somewhere in the charcoal. OK
we can do something there, per

haps a little editing. a winter
storm with lots of salary. two

pennies basically told me not to
apply for any more positions.

that’s golden like the sleepy room
where lips and lips ellipse,

notable only for their first week in
Cambridge. many other positions.

unnoticed harem we focus. more
somewhere than here, an island

full of misfits. misted. OK per
the little hopes, the moments.

today is shifty. in which out
rageous century I am most contented.

cxcii

I felt guilty about the
memory that I had
paid for it. As you’re
starting a project,
you should see its
end. Lunch break.
MIT. Which took
place yesterday. 5
gals and quail kebabs.
I had to do something.
Same guilt burning
the haze of desire. Or
I burned lunch, a
memory project. I’m
riddled. Who I am
falling fallen who is
anonymous. Practic
ally a breakdown. I’m
always insensitive.
No dichotomy. Happy
anniversary celebration.
Cat pee in the China
Doll pot. Costs
lunch money. Makes
quail crying bob
white my angel.
Bob white.

cxci

can stick out like a dumb sore. there’s
a woman who walks like a man. she
says awesome too much. I’m not in
fallible. it’s cold in here so we just drop
and then we drop again. no fallacy this
latest Newsweek with the Pope in Cuba.
see the tugs gust through the haze (may
well have the guts). then we haul stuff
to his dorm room my head aches and
watch X Files for our official one
month Burger King. too much guff.
busy busy that’s why it’s all funky.
I had fries. you’re right, I only wanna
eliminate the bottom line.

cxc

then cook tediously
sitting on a blackberry
and get quite loaded
quick note. I’m alive.

lunch in Quincy Market
one sandwich full of mayo
four laps around the treadmill
is started late today. need

notebook. need poetry.
he wrote my mother a vanilla.
waited two hours for a fingerprint.
top left buttcheek burns.

I miss you notes.
notes note misses.
I do whatever that means Ani.
so familiar am alive and loaded.

I’ve been dishonest lately.
time can make that more intense.
I logged four help desk tickets
today alone.

clxxxix

I went to the doctor in a blue car.
There was a rash under my arm full of
red and golden stars. He said it was a
bacterial infection from coffee. Loving
isn’t very easy. No big deal. Either way
it’s not nice but I’m happy I’m
not really contagious.

clxxxviii

I went outside.
I took a nap.
I’m rash. I have a
bathroom. I pray the
Lord. And miles to go.
It’s warm. My head is gone.
Exquisitely warm. I sleep.
I went walking in a park
before my nap. A
security guard saw me. He
clinked his keys (or change).
Change. I dreamt I was
in a basement during a
tornado. We slept. He’s
going to work now. I’m
not. I worked five years.
This is my last day of work.

clxxxvii

It’s an hour before church meth church mouse
high on St. John’s in Jamaica Plain those
blowsy clouds put out to dry. Right by
Josh where Josh lives and what did we
accomplish but an hour of church and I
cleaned up and organized some. Some
what? I thought my heart was going
but when it stopped hurting I was
running for a week. I need a smoking
appointment at church for graduate
admissions to pay rent with. It
smokes more when the clouds
are cloudless. Send a certified
letter to Gulf. Pay rent and the
rest of my bills. It’s right by
the nib of the nob, its
repossessed business
waiting for the bread.
The bread of the
holy sun. Need
some shades.
And more
bread.

clxxxvi

lovely Sunday ok let’s con
centrate in the park its mis
begotten pink new year’s
balls flying into the fogbottom

rode its giant cypress-like prick
all the way up to Rhode Island
where trees with Woonsocket-pink
pools out-puncture the girls

then we have dessert at Grumpy’s
our shades a mirage of fog and
fountains on the ridge of hope
where I plant my feet “I’m grounded”

more ground than you fog
that ate the Golden Gate Bridge
probably more than you fog
in the street in front of Postrio

I’m a little nervous because it’s
snowing and so I thought we’d
drink more muscat for the pleasant
rise up the Filbert steps less pleasant

with each new step a new sweat
and then later we go ROLLER
SKATING how romantic -- isn’t that
pretty darned romantic no?

it’s the first day we don’t talk
which makes Lombard almost pinkless
but rollerskating -- wasn’t that just
delicious? yes it’s way past 1998

the girls keep asking for more
“GQ action here boys” and
Buddha says “is there room in your life
for one more trip to the moon?”

clxxxv

the thump of a thumper
or a thumper thumps

if someone sunk a
THIS IS YOUR LIFE

in front of my face
wouldn’t we be struck

by the redundant
abundance of it

coffee and too much
talk and too much

Christmas letters and
poems snowing oh

I’m all jackhammed up
this hearty rhythm’s got

inspired by suicidal
hairs a duo of graying

hairs inspired by the
snowscape out my window

what a fantastic gift
and an awesome offer letter

these diamond ear
rings and a blanket of

snow thunked like
thunk a fucking lack of

vocabulary its vocation
an evocation vacationing

this list could go on
ad infinitum

clxxxiv

sweet Christmas come and gone
along the beach its mutilated
curves a second truth indeed
it was almost romantic

a gift I’d never given
muddled here at Mildred’s
and lacking the zest of
some recounted scenes

these last few days
of peace and intermittent
sun of structures sound
and wizened

shit this guy over here
has lit a cigarette
I never gave to you
this story

the one I got around a tree
where a few windchimes and a
Big Sur bird that hadn’t lost
its sugar

each packet pecked it
flew it up said tree
and to its startled mother
a little bit of Christmas

well this coffee stinks
but the last few days here
except for the icy drive
were wonderful

I think I’m going to boycott Mildred’s
no more life
no more worry

clxxxiii

a cafe mocha I knew then
was a bit of an intense dawning
his dad’s family brilliant in feat
that I had come to the right face
along with his sister, also brilliant

this could really be something to cry up
into a totally oakened boulevard
because those holidays remind me of, gee
guess whose flowers I don’t always feel like

mind over flagpoles

optimism is he who is beyond wonderful
is forecast into the last card turned apocryphal
focused was I, ere I saw brilliant

the fact that I am only a potentially wrapped trout
an eclipse of unkempt sediment
a gull finding its way nowhere
over oaken optimism and it’s okay
that it’s noon now that I’m aloof

I will remain poor for a very long time
such forecasts are beyond forpaloocy
are beyond carkatootle
are beyond pattersnat and abanaddle

I try to telapode within that realm
but okay the potential is, gee
guess who:
arkapeen stamantopi marbaleen

not even so much as his family and my short role
have the hapless stepping into distraction

only a few minutes longer and the faces of
moonlight settle down into the corporate dream

clxxxii

An inverted compliment said
you will see me somewhere this weekend. I had coffee
and dropped off my final destruction. This caused
split pea soup (a bit). Why bother being invective?

I kidnaped him last evening to come study at
my place. This caused e-mail dialog, I guess, and then
we went through a bit of a rough patch. Also,
a conversation in the kitchen about how, individually, we can

become a company or digress toward a felicitous
utterance. Another inverted compliment. It doesn’t
really matter, does it? The anger is pretty mundane. This
builds understatement. Now he’s alive and well and apparently

going to visit his family this Christmas. ‘Dialog’ connotes
there are two of us, but how many do you count? One
more sense of no direction. Perhaps it’s simply my
lack of work; not worth my concern. But yours?

clxxxi

i should produce
something every day.
with goosebumps on the
phone, reading something
with my attorney, the bank.
and then I stopped off at the
post office, a stranger. he is
drinking beer with a lemon.
i mail off all of christmas.
my subscription to boston
expires, my application for
membership to the library.
i finally finish my goal.
he engages me. eight
reprints of a picture
of us kids.

clxxx

buoyantly hello HELLO!
I trembled when the door opened
saw my face smack.
a superior joke. yesterday I was
miserable and then coping, lost, trumpeted.

tell me if I could write a play, implying
counterintuitive headache and
sauce for the whole party. angel
an ultimate sign of affection.

he held me in a humbling revelation, some
flowery, honey-dripping vocal sensation.
fuck words! a cartography, self-deprecating
age-ist withered lung.

my birthday is joyous. space-aid.
a surprising tactile mayhem.

when I am lifted up to this hole
-- the end of the fortunate --
so many penniless, rhythmic; intelligence
is deliciously comic. trying on a new pair of
high heels.

purple peril. the edge of nervous
baby deficit. teaching. touching.
lift arm over working lung, heart,
bruises on right side, left for you,
left hand, tiny hand, left hand over
empty shirt.