5 poems

Housekeeping

Throw your baseball cap
in the dishwasher.   (This
could be your son.)   Use
diminutive language.   Clean
the kitchen, try to get
high.   Remember:   you are fascinated
by repetition.   (you are
a human being.
              A letter comes
to “DAD” from Richmond.   For fear
of Federales, do not open.   It’s probably
an acronym.   Instead, buy expensive
underpants.   Knit a knit suitcase
reinforced with discarded three-
ring binders.   Swallow everything.


Explication

I am behind you
in the stairwell
explaining my
absence, that I had
purchased a book
and would accept
two more.   I appreciate
value.   I will buy
two toothpaste tubes
for the price of one-
and-a-half.   I am
a happy American.
I am fit enough
to enjoy a little
snacking.   I have
a girlfriend.   I have
a twelve-speed bike.
My girlfriend
is a twelve-speed bike.
I was androgynous as a ten-
year-old; I had long,
beautiful eyelashes
and red red lips.


Dear,

all of these salted
crackers represent
love.   jangling keys
stand for consumerism
and self concept:
catalytic, you leave me
without nexus— excited
particles conform to skin
of a balloon giraffe,
an emptied mayonnaise jar

the physical aspect of matter
is a kind of honorific assigned
to colliding energies— particles
of space connecting space
so when my sleeves give way to elbows
whatever’s really going on
has as much to do with being still
as a swinging lamp,
bleeding lotus flowers
and rose-red wine.


[How to un-do things:]

How to un-do things:
Cut directly through
the center—peel the subject’s
skin, fit to something more
deserving.   We are
all divine, perfect images
of a vengeful schizoid—
There is nothing more
frustrating than waiting
in line at the Post Office,
and little halves of books
are kind and unassuming.
The best customer
is a repeat customer.
For these many years
rain’s been falling sulfur
dioxide and various mono
nitrogen-oxide hammers.
I billow through the troposphere
collecting notes for maps.


My Body

Parts of me are falling off
and acting like they know what’s going on.
An expression of my recessive genes
has appointments in two different cities,
each accessible by greyhound.
My nose inchworms across the carpet,
encouraging comprehensive empathy
for other selves I’ve met.   Not that I need
reminders, really, it’s just there are
so many parts. My nasopharynx wants
to eat Korean noodles—the rest
disagree.   I’m glad you seem to understand;
I want someone who seems
     to understand.