mmcdiv

                                              Tumble-
  weeds we’d have been were it not a
melon patch we were in....
                                       —Nathaniel Mackey

Happy Hippie Hill Day! Needless to say,
I’m excited. I’m giving each of the
Painting Ladies (a wonderful new twist that
I just caught quite inappropriately) personal
names. By me. This one’s Hello, Mister
Boyfriend. And next to him is Jonah Hill
Is No Christian Bale. It’s true. All at once
(and one with) relaxation, a modicum of
technique (how to lie down on a sparsely-
sunlit, mildly moist angle of grass traversed
by more dogs than humans), and no bottled
water (can’t afford, stupidly didn’t bring).
I almost manage to snooze a few minutes
after finishing two books I began a couple
of years ago (plus took a selfie with the
poem that made me cry a little bit). One
is a book of prayers by someone who doesn’t
pray but seems to sincerely desire to do so
(a whole book built around this, and if
crying indicates goodstuff, it worked in
there somewhere). Perhaps this one I
actually began only a month ago. Was
it a Christmas present? Or just a random
gift that appeared in conjunction with, or 

in the vicinity of, the holidays? I can’t
remember. But the poem about being
picked up at the hospital as a teenager,
puking drunk, or drunk puking, but
mainly fine, by a father who worked
all night in a bar, who tucked her into
his automobile and brought her to
work, a foreign place she’d never
once set foot in before; him wrapping
his arms around a trio of monster-size
maraschino cherry jars, gentle and
joyous as if they were newborn
triplets: the music is gorgeous!
The sun is out. The spring lures
me in before I sneeze a little to
greet it. I spend my evenings
with Monsieur Baron Joie de
Vivre (I’ve named a Painting
Lady for him, too), and I
really must do this again 

sometime very soon.

mmcdiii

I’ve dropped
infinity on
your shorts. 

Who am I?

mmcdii

I Can Do All Of This On A Virtual Piece Of Paper

This is just a means of keeping it alive. Make it
anything you want (friendship, collaboration,
evolution as human, love, creation, ideation). So
why set the default for crises at retreat? Who

knows how to keep it? It. Can anyone help
with how to keep it? It’s okay. I understand.
On an apologetic note, I went to bed with your
bag of wavy Lay’s. Sorry for eating every last

chip. Not to excuse the gluttony, but I was either
drunk or sleeping or both. But you already know
all of this. Today is all about chowder. Today.

I don’t mean to startle you when I mention that
I’ve started a list. But I have. I sit here penniless
after spending millions of dollars purchasing the

proper equipment to do so. And I don’t use proper
equipment (I forget). But it’s perfectly fine by me
if you look at me funny when I screw it all up again.

mmcdi

That Said Nothing

Loves to disintegrate
the horrible feelings.

Doesn’t love calling
it a weekend. Doesn’t

love the most difficult.
Palm Springs and cham-

omile. I have never been
so confused (speaking

as if to the tea, to the
trees). I feel like my

life is moving to Texas.
Damned despondency.

I feel naked and so out
of the city. Which could

mean I steamed it up
(stop crying) after an

explosive breakfast
with Loves to Diminish.

mmcd

Poem to Nowhere (with Wolves)

Stupidly, I fail to mention
my happiness. One month
plus one week plus maybe
another week by now. Some
people collect hearts. I give
mine away. In pieces. I am,
however, surviving okay like
this, see? Well. Right at this
moment. With the grinding,
etc. But I feel art (as I eat a
french fry). An attempt to
dig out of the French poodle.
I have to get myself wrapped
up and out the door, somehow.
The number one reason to wrap
oneself up in a pub (and not a
poodle) is that the high is so 

incredibly cosmopolitan.

mmcccxcix

Poem With No Patience

I said that I stopped using
words, but the other side is
I have yet to learn how to

read. I pick up the book
How a Wheel Works.
Apparently, love isn’t

the only battlefield
in this sleepy café.
It is a gray day.

On this gray day,
I want to write
everything down

from my trip to
Palm Springs last
weekend. But

I’m not feeling
so hot. Did I really
go see a movie with

Jennifer Aniston
instead of eat lunch?
Not with Jennifer,

I decide, but with
Erin. Yes, a movie.
I get up at the end

and shout about
therapy, or at least
medication. As I

descend the escalator
that leads back to the
office, I think how

this experience will
perhaps significantly
enhance my life. Am I

coming or going? I miss
my exit, and I’m only on 

page 8, so I guess I’m gone.

mmcccxcviii

Wacky Valentine

If I do this right
I should feel fan-
tastic in no time.

I leave behind
a language that
got too hard.

A stiff con-
versation isn’t
happy with

itself. I worry
about trees
and electrical

outlets. I play
too many games.
And I’m so rude

with my breakfast
crew. The eggs,
the bacon, and

the people who
so enthusiastically 

put up with me.

mmcccxcvii

                                                                It’s tough
             To wax prosodic when your metric’s del-
Iquescing.
                                             —Lauren Shufran



Sleep after work for
a year or so. Photo-
graphy for a hung
brick. Some cheap
soul. Finish plotting
road trip. Sick finish
with saber after abusing
the laundry (Me, too!).
Plunge off bus into
Seal Rock. The
ocean. Drink
saké after Block-
buster. Great
spirits avoided.


    It’s a little like a pickle when you view
         It at that angle. 

                                    —Lauren Shufran

mmcccxcvi

“His Name Together”
 (Doorway to the Stars)

I hear the song of
Sound Alley at my
door, for sure.

I blinked once,
into the limelight.
It got dark. You

kept singing.
“Glory to the
voice,” I stam-

merred, still star-
ing at the same
door. Some-

times the water
falls wet. But
other days we

hold out our
hands for the
sting, get

nothing. Oh,
how I yearn
for the song of

Sound Alley
at my door 

for sure.

mmcccxcv

My New Novel

     Control two lovers simultaneously in your
     quest to unite them.
                —from an iTunes ad for an game called “Staying Together”

Inside my telephone I see two spots,
and several dogs on the run. Cons-
truction has moved from outside
to inside. How hardcore can a team
of specialists banging around my
bay windows be (the answer:
very!) as they gradually make
their way into the stairwell,
which is now an art exhibit
of rectangular shapes cut into
the walls, complete with ladders
and sheets of plastic covering
the stairs. As I walk down
for some groceries, I peer into
each hole in the wall and can
see the beautiful inner wall that
is within. It’s made of bricks
of many different colors:
floor 3, clayey red to the east;
floor 2, brown like the soil in
the river valley (Northwest
Arkansas); floor 1.5, black
like a soot-covered,
chargrilled heart.

     Looking out for the needs of a single character
     won’t get you far, as these inexorable
     companions move in unison.
          —from the same iTunes game advertisement (“Staying Together”)

mmcccxciv

Hiawatha

Typing a quick note
to all of the assistants:

It’s finally happening! 

or It’s really happening!

Sleepy again after a
long while when I wasn’t.

Trying to find some
time for all of us to meet

in the rain.  Maybe buy
a new bottle of shampoo.

Feeling so peculiar
because I’m terrific,

slapping my phone on-
to the window to take

a snapshot of the big
metal wing as it

slices that cloud into
a gigantic sandwich.

mmcccxciii

Is This a Taco Bell Dream Come True?
           —a headline from CNN online

Our neighbor wakes us up
at 4 a.m. banging on the
door. She wants to know
if we’re the source of the

very loud music. I take a
sip of water from the Aqua-
fina bottle I received (comp-
limentary) on my first day

of work (I can’t seem to
to part with it). “No, no
music here,” I say. I’ve
only been asleep for an

hour, having been kept
awake late, no doubt,
by the same music about
which she’d awoken us.

Slipping back under the
covers, I’m thinking that
I’m certainly not the big
dragon that I used to be.

At this moment finishes,
the other me is just now
getting out of the cinema;
a film about a play (play

within a play, play on!).
Arriving home, the other
me sends an imaginary text
message to the neighbors:

All is well. We are here. Peace.