30 Poems in 30 Days

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again-5

no no no I can't give you my money
not 30 or 40 or even the pre-hang up "please"
of ten, just ten dollars?
of course of course I am sorry about the officer
killed in the line on the line for the line of duty
and his young wife two year old son thank you,
really, thank you
for taking care,
for gathering up those who believe the gold decals on their bumper
will save them from ticket and change

I am sorry
I honestly can't give your village a goat
not today not today not today

but while I have you on the phone
I am on the board of an equally good cause
you got any spare change?
No? Well how about buying a few tickets to our pancake breakfast
all
you
can
eat
no?
but it is for the children...
no? not today, thank you thank you for listening.
 
2-6 Bachelor's Button

Speaking to the metal in his ear
a weekend lion button starts his car,
inhales a line to give himself veneer.
Speaking to the metal in his ear
he flirts with her and also a cashier
who fantasizes him in her boudoir.
Speaking to the metal in his ear,
a weekend lion button starts his car.
 
17-13

revival of the fittest
smiling and still smitten
as another and
another project the
same passion
the very reason
for any of this
sweep my muse
wet with your poet's tongue
lick around the crusting edge
-the place it had begun
another's life and love
and lust
is fuel to yesterday's fire
combined document
of every corner
it remembers me
and now i see
only two lines are
worth a shit.
 
?-4

hunger staggers
missing a tooth
the wind can see
it makes it make noise

what to we crave?
why do we crave?
is this feast
to fill the belly,
to fill the soul
to please the tongue
to treat the sense to a fetish of taste
a obligation to family, culture

dirt and rocks
beans, carrots, and salt
the earth on a plate
eat the mother
spit lesser stones

drinking beet juice
I drool a heart
let the iron shake me
to that place I dance from
between my hips
 
2-7 Pissy Sweater

A cat complains at your locked door, paces
the floor in front of your apartment.
In the hallway. How embarrassing.
When you come home 3 1/2 hours later
even more so. This is the first sign you've gone feral.
Atone with cut flowers in the hallway. Probably Lilacs.
You'll know you should check
under the basement stairs but looking down
into the loneliness will be too much (really
how long has it been since you've been warm?)
 
17-14

this painting
unfinished forever
they don't even make
that shade of blue
anymore, how can i
complete something
that was finished
before it began?
 
again-6 Economic Shock Theory

It always starts with a crisis
Usually you need to invent one,
sometimes, nature does your dirty work.

$12,000 a body pulled from the flood waters
then they gotta cut the food stamps,
the welfare, the medicaid
who pays?


it goes on like this all morning
south africa iraq indonesia even canada
give 'em the old chicago trick
yet here he goes and goes
using the same scare tactics
he curses down from the pulpit
with his own version of fire, brimstone?

show us 20 minutes of fire?
best you show us where the water hook ups are
best you courage us up a bit
or you know, we will run too
or stand, paralyzed, beaten down
ready to sell our rights
to make it stop


(very rough I usually do not write political stuff but I I I needed something to write and it was on my mind and an and....)
 
?-5

the mourning sun

how should I take revenge
there I was in the cold, with my coat
being prose with all the dew children
floating on the hue of booze from my breath
the music of laughter still in my ears
the cell phone heavier with numbers
heart light with the promise of new smooth darkness

then that bastard came
first he woke the birds then
took away the secrets of the dark
and before I knew it my date was dead
killed by the sky king in his quest
to rule the sky

What light lies heavy on my soul?
I wear the sun, a talisman that takes my head to pillows.
On my knees I pray for another hour of night.
That tomorrow wouldn't be today.
I would go to the city garden and stand among the roses and howl at what is left of the moon.
I would leave a piece of Nights petticoat for school children to find.
So they could wonder what worlds happen
between the days.
 
2-8 Fishing

The room is dark with wood and heroism
celebrated too long and too late.
I don't look at my glass because then
I would think about its measure
more than its flavor. Instead I eavesdrop
on the perched bartender and her customer sort
the catch of the night before and I feel too pale
next to the window, fingers splayed over newspaper.
I offer a round of Mezcal in honor
of Philip Schultz and only I and the bartender
drink it. Some people will do anything for a worm.
 
17-15

opiates and detonation
rebirth in disintigration
the intergration of life
seen in death's one big eye
mingling together
the music of the paralyzed
pennyroyal tea incestacide
my all-time favorite
suicide.

4-8-1994.
 
again-7 I got this coupon in the mail

so it's spend 35 get 7 back and I take both boys
no wait
I take all three boys
certainly the one not needing shoes is not a necessary part of this story
but something makes the details important
forgetting that this could be fiction
I could have said spend 37and get 5 back if I thought the syllables mattered but they don't

what matters is when my 9 year old steps on the metal foot measuring device
yes, that it it's official name, I looked it up hoping it would have a proper title
like stethoscope or protractor no, it is a metal foot measuring device

but what is important about this foot measuring device is that it does
not
fit
his
foot.

she tells me
she needs to get the men's sized foot measuring device
I pretend to be unphased,
put on my best pseudo-positive voice that you hear
in the grocery store with the PTA primped "Sweetheart,
we don't put pennies in our pants, thank you."
and so we look at the selection
this cannot be
my son cannot be in a man shoe
he cannot even tie his laces
they do not make man shoes with velcro
unless you are convalescent
so here we are stuck inbetween the cannot yet do
and the cannot do anymore,
grown into the world of able bodied men
Shoes for sports he cannot play shoes for work he cannot do
no no, there is some kind of mistake
my baby cannot be in a man shoe

just today we practiced
I hold up a piece of gum
and say
"Is this a chicken?"
he answers
YES
and I pause

what is this?
GUM
he answers.

Yes you are right. It is gum.
Holding gum firmly in front of his face
as a reinforcer.

Is this a chicken?

YES.

No, it is gum. You just said it is gum.

Is this a pretzel?

YESNO it is a gum.


No no no
he cannot be in a man shoe
carefully kicked from the special olympics
I remind him to use his fork
 
Juvenile dreams 4you2 (and smiles as she does it:)

So will that red mouth of yours let you fly
gliding those winds of gossip.

Myself I have only silence
slowly digesting my screams.
If there is a answer to truth
It's not in your eyes.

Every good lie must start within
becoming your truth of the day
That is the way of the world

Stepping out of your door
I see only empty roads

Soon I will fill them up.


------------------

And as time went by i nodded.
and got visited by a dream
She smiled and asked me
Is it fun being you

I looked around but finding no ready answers
I turned the question around
nodding as I did it.
 
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?-6

flame in the heart of the city
motor oil falls from the sky
the people cheer

children catch the grease in
mechanized jaws
 
2-9 Over river, through woods

The stucco is thick and always reminds her of cake,
sloppy frosting petal up to the cherry, only
instead of a cherry, there's a weather vane.
Looking up to it, the girl believes gods are speaking
through the proclamation of the metal rooster.

She does this every time, this paused step to look up,
and believes that the windy days when the cock points
will be days to stay out of Grandpa's reach.

She places one small sneaker in front of the other,
creeping like a vine along the wall until she unfurls into a kid,
skipping Grandma into the kitchen and snooping bags.
 
17-16

myspace and
your space
should never intersect;
your sect
domination denomination
ever filled with false pride
knowing what's best
every minor deviation
fails a man made test
while truth of time
sub incised parable
when taken too literal
beats down all the rest.
all but you.
 
again-8

the sink:
clogged with potato peels
cotton shirt:
milk soaking through
the note that came home in his backpack
the note that didn't.

so I have someone to talk to
I set an imaginary therapist on the coffee table
he completes a triangle

he asks us about communication

moustache twitch

I answer no, I really don't bother anymore

sleep greens my vision
there at my point

besides, he doesn't need
anything else to worry about


my husbands fingers tap the table
I ask
what are you doing?

embarrassed
"ummm...calculating probability"

ten minutes past dinner
35 miles North
juice boxes slide in the bottom of paper bags
providing the perfect foundation for baby oranges
chocolate pudding
rice cakes
peanut butter and jelly
spoon
napkin

the drier stops
 
?-6 the two fer

I remove one arm and put it on the night stand

I remove one arm and put it on the night stand
so when I lay with her
between her breasts
I will be closer to her heart.

---------------
Women go to a fro
and I watch
not for practice or for fuel but
in reaction like the flowers waving in the wind
like the bee seeing what the buzz is about

I watch women from the edges of
the book pages

they walk with their sex or their heads
some don't know the way they
turn the snake or pretend to pick its fruit

I watch the ones who walk with sex
and see them in the act from the
way they sway, confident in the pretty
they dress the part and put the perfume
I want to know how they smell under
cause I already know how they fuck

I watch the ones who walk with heads
I see there ambition in the strength of their stride
they attempt to shake the world
with the weight of their confidence
I want to know how they fuck
cause they project their smell

I'm looking for a girl with
heart, one who shifts her purpose
with every step
 
yesterday 2day

So I breath in and out just like you
But yours is the promise of life
Like soft hills seen from a distance
In a blue haze of yesterday

------------------

I saw a girl with a tattoo yesterday
Made in red and black in the form off a star and a circle
It was on the back of her hand

She looked at me and smiled
So I went away
The time for new lies is past I thought

But the truth was that I was scared.
I know this cause her hand never left me
Will I always be that late

--------------------------

When is a dream true
Are you a hostage to your life
What is this crazy universe.

Humans fill it up with decrees
lofty promises of a higher purpose
while brown nosing their peers
Are you serious.

Who knows
Not I
 
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2-10 Trianglulation on Trousers

Two old men bickered, set up chairs
in the shade and finally laughed at
a common target on the street going by.
The tall 20 yr old strode, would not hurry
to beat the light. One geezer clucked as
the other stood up and called, "Boy you in school?
You need to learn to pull up your pants."

The other man howled. I blurted
a little laugh, too. I wonder how the old man knew
the kid didn't have a gun?
 
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