Overlord in a Melting Pot
I made rice and also pommes frites. Circle over to the
laundromat that’s turned into a fondue parlor. Email
Kevin and water the plants. We opened a New Zealand
wine that John and Larry had brung to the housewarming.
Tomorrow I’m to play racquetball with Madoc. Be able
to plug laptop into large monitor. Unparch with a Faz
glass (a mason jar) full of lemonade. I just want to
GRIMACE at that. What does that make me, an
interior designer? That kind of distaste becomes
HONESTY. We have enough space to not worry
so much. We can concentrate. Steph loaned it to me.
The slimness of Vincent and his engagement. And it is
disgusting compared to Starbucks.
Warm as the bloom of a lotus
in heat. Who knew it’d ever
cross over to the dark side?
“I did! I did!” Rainy Sunday.
You just dropped your phone. “A cross
is an X,” I remind him, before send Rachel
email, send Kim email, fix big monitor to
connect to laptop. It’s morning of up all
night. The birds are singing in the bird
sanctuary, an oasis for interior designers.
But not enough to make you GRIMACE
on top of all that. What does that make a
jealous hubby? Bend the knees by way of
death. Look up how to clean the blinds,
how to update debts and assets. “Into
oblivion,” whispers the murderer.
Into oblivion.
It has many other uses. Like my hair.
My hair is not dead people.
—Sean Malroy
Relax into it. They’re hungry or happy as
ash out of Groucho. So don’t pitch a fit.
Build upon that, rainy Sunday! The start
of a book to me, saying despite the slimness
of however she feels, or the sliminess I’ve been
treating you. How young at heart. Preach a line
by Schuyler like Pastor Ron: “or lamb leg with
mint sauce!” Followed by a long pause. She
feels how he treats her. Despite the engaging
shimmies, the heft of the lattés, the cross over
to the dark side.... A pair of socks that resembles
a checkbook. An entire Saturday on a bookend.
Mr. X-eye Featherhead
A hundred ‘woof!’s across Ocean Island.
Cooking with the best of them and then
snapping it shut. I still have to get over
how wide it is. Fried eggplant with a
white sauce all over it. Slip an abstract
project into an oily mailbox. Feed the
cat. Dusk never settles and you’re
morning, bright with fever. Open a
New Zealand wine. Stretch. Slip some
skin on top of it. Dust and clean the
living room and hallway. Racquetball
before housewarming. Clean bathroom.
Clean blinds. Update info on 1960s.
In the morning, head over to the condo
to measure it. Color me jealous. HON-
ESTLY. Concentrate on keeping and
wonderful and maintaining. Call the
doctor to say there’s no need for closure.
Human Debris
If only I could ride you unpublished. “Here’s
another $24 drink,” all smug and lustless, with
contemporary Chinese interiors.
Ron, what was the name of the sushi restaurant
after Kylie wouldn’t pee? Toe to toe to toe for a
decade or more. Or was it just a year? How to
talk Cantonese? So, they first met, slept together,
first date, etc., on January 7. It’s October and another
French trilogy. Completing amazement. Unfortunately,
the hotel strikers, along with music from Heartthrob’s
computer (in the living room; I’m on the bed), having
just finished A Thousand Devils, this frazzled
Rauschenberg. In the October will it feel oh so
new again? Should I be disappointed with an
old swoon? A few years later and never dull.
Not a disinterested dull. Less interested in
new leaves and romantic road construction.
We was all quite a peach.
Walk to the Ferry Building market,
walk through the market, head north
and turn left on Broadway, enter North
Beach, then down Grant through China-
town so Otto can pick up a stamp w/his
Chinese name and for me a copy of
China Modern. Follow me so far?
Page 2,247, a contemporary interior.
Then Sushi Rika for lunch, after which
it’s furniture shopping. Then home
for a while. Nooo. Wait! I’m so
confused. First, we had lunch
at XYZ. Then he went to lab
and I bought Princess Mononoke.
Relearn More Appropriately Sonnet
Agenda rhyming with addenda, and so on.
“A little Malaysia goes a long way,” he
says all slash-and-burn. I turned it in
with a list of all the jobs I’ve ever had.
This all seems a bit L.A., don’t you think?
I look out at Treasure Island while he talks
to his grandmother then his dad then his
mother—who tells him he sounds so
happy. In recollection of my inner thigh
(left side) and the guy who stomped my
back flat after a mani-pedi on Tuesday
afternoon. “The stars are not chimps,”
I lose him saying. Scratch another item
off the list while walking Grant to Broadway.
anachronism is the refuge of modernity
—Standard Schaefer
Stayed up til 4 arguing about
making things clear. Marvel
vs. Capcom 3, etc. Today’s
list is horizontal lines. Re-
learn touching, making things
clean close to him, waking up
Saturday and going to Starbucks
and The Gap for a blazer exchange.
Put the bag away for a while and sit
in the Henderson Room. Cloudy with
a chance of purge. Email job lady then
several friends. Call Mom (this one on
the list for a while now).
Wake up trembling, think I hear sarcasm.
Clean all the blinds. Or buy new ones.
Music we remember to forget
—Michael Palmer
I can’t imagine him with a
vibrato. “It’s the Three of
Pancakes,” she says. His
head’s a computer screen
circa 1998. A headache
that blasts 80s music. A
calendar with a little in-
struction each day: Re-
member, a mediocre
effort never improved
anything. Cat’s paws
at it under a birthday
present (an office
chair replacing one
‘inherited’ in 1992).
Oral Necklace
The vistas are a smiling ship on the ocean.
About to barf if I read another conversation
with yourself. Didn’t I want to add my
voice? We drove out past Half Moon Bay
with Curran and Masashi this afternoon to
a pumpkin patch. To pick pumpkins. It was
lovely in all possible ways, sitting in the back-
seat holding Otto’s hand while he slept. Barf.
Looking out at the beautiful sky. Passing
Spindrift Road. Having a pie at the patch.
And oh, the maze. I never made my way out –
could not find my way out of the lovely
hay maze. Did someone have to come
find me? Rescue me? Here I am,
backwards, pestered at 4am. Around
8:30, touching. This is the real me.
Egg Balm
That short poem is so 1950s. I like the way
you made it so southern. And so subtly.
Tonight I’m going to make like I remember
the last decade. “These are things I should be
doing for number one,” you say. Let’s do the
untwist instead. Relationship update: all is
check; easier to tell; chopped off; and the
best. There are two bottles of lubrication
in the closet. Like when you find out your
dialect is more obscure than others. I
hear you crunch Doritos in the bedroom.
I check out the window for the day. It’s
in the mail like the little egg full of lip
balm I ordered. I’m lying in our little al-
cove in our blue bedroom with clouds. Ron
Howard is definitely no Clint Eastwood.
Much Muck in Your Mailbox
My favorite vegetable is okra. I
watched you on teevee. My land-
lady got an e*@!ction. There’s way
too much seance in our relationship.
A Rose in the Slat
Depression makes my skin ache. It’s
nine o’clock and I dip into a jacked-up
bar in the gulch, half a chin tucked into
my sweater.
It’s a grizzly-bear nation. These dunder-
heads threw in a kidney stone; two hour
flashbacks to a party of eight. Once home,
I read a love poem to the sofa.
It swoons. Lots of people chopped off their
thumbs. David left while growing striped
pants. The penguins are in the mail to
Kevin (flash-forward required).
The glass of water infected with ice.
European stains on the carpet.
No More Sewage
Let’s go body shopping and get
meta-flogged. A meta-flogging.
Address is correct. Date is correct.
Vice presidential debate....
Interesting. Water pumpkins drag-
ging colored squid in quick bursts,
north, then south, along the bay.
I need a whole day of this snake
pit. Charming devils. These are
the guys who should be running
for number one. Layered inno-
cence. A thin wail. We threw
him a nice party, even though
he chopped off his thumb at 5.
Will this work?
It all depends on what makes you feel.
Another Pet Obit
Define like. I’m doing okay
sitting on my ass, right?
I’m talking to David. He
offered me a seat because
there are none. Men joke
like steak knives. It was
the first time I ever tried
to sit down. Awkward.
The cat has a birthday.
She sits on the word
Namaste. Does this
give her a stroke
two years later?
I found your ring
beside my bed. The
bed is ringing. The
trumpeters are all
puking but the
whole damned world
just keeps on ringing.
God Men War
Is this the first book I’ve finished in months?
I wonder and I’d like to know. I have an
inclination to know. I sit on the couch
in contemplation, put my finger
to my nose.
downcast his throat
—Guy Birchard
But I feel good when I take them. And
my experience is better than normal. But
how can you focus on the process of
moving forward and forgiveness?
The only mistake in retrospect....
We’re so negative all the time. But
I love that Cosmo centerfold you
did when you were 22.
My experience on Saturday better than normal
It’s time to enjoy the skin you have. Consider yourself
comely up close. It’s miles away from a pair of Monday
interviews. You wouldn’t imagine it now, but they will
each last a year. It’s a boutique investment bank and
you’re experiencing a crisis in penmanship, cover
as much of the manila as possible in blue Sharpie.
And please bring resumes.
Food’s here. Kenta follows me to the side of the stage
yelling “Jenny Jones!” “Jenny Jones!” I always laugh
and wonder what’s inside that joke. Or if I’m in on it.
