in some muddy lot
all the horrors of life come real
that was the year
fires left the dirt slopes beside the freeway
black and charred
and the trees
spindly toothpicks burned through
like an angry child's artwork

later, when it wouldn't stop raining,
there were mudslides and floods,
echoes of nature's past violence,
reminders of things to come

someone, everyone,
made me the promise of a happy life,
success and satisfaction,
of the relief i'd feel after hard work,
the worth i'd find in the course i'd naturally take

but i don't find much worth in anything now
and i don't feel it's natural
the way my life is going
disaster mounting on disaster
with no meaning to the present
and no purpose for the future

lightning

nights like lightning
flashing one to the next
a rage,
a haze of neons and fluorescents
throats raw, tongues caked
reason, tension,
disgarded like cigarette butts, nightclub flyers in gutters

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

boys in the backyard,
in the lightning bug humidity of a long grass evening
cool and forgiving beneath your toes
beers warm and crickets chirp
and in the dim back porch light,
we watch the trees for slow change,
resting on damp wooden railings, chair arms
quiet in the night, shallow breathing in that still air

no evidence of life on these tumbleweed-lined streets
moving down roads with no way to capture the images
though all these signs of lonliness need to be photographed
be remembered
for some later solice
some later company

laying down, face pressed against hot asphault,
the smell of dirt and oil and rubber
the dusty smell of new rain

some prospector has laid out lines,
hammered in stakes,
a superficial attempt at eking out a territory
that will just be washed away, blown away

what is coming toward me?
what is coming for me?
burned by the blackness laid out in the sun,
passing by and never stopping

lonely again
every night like the last
wishing for company on the couch, in my bed

hearing the neighbors but not feeling their presence,
smelling their food and having nothing to eat
how will i fall asleep tonight?
alone and thinking, dreaming
of some distant future
where promises will come true,
where sheets will be soft and clean
and my company will not snore with the scent of alcohol

doors slam and i feel a fear that parents are fighting
always jumpy at these noises
though i wish they were my own

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

when will you find me
black-toothed and burnt up
from a life unprotected,
existance in the cold nights alone

days when i walked in dirt,
red dust rising around my shoes,
i felt convinced that some desert life would find me
and i'd never recede into shadows, never feel the black coldness
of nights alone, alienated on my own back porch
wishing for a dog, a friend

the longer it takes you,
the more eaten-up i'll become
hollow and mindless and unable to relate to you

but if you can't come,
if you can't commit to a rescue from lonliness,
at least send me money
i'm hungry and cold.

suppression as punishment
all that was waiting to get out until the moment
when rough hands with ripped nails
slid and caught on your child-like skin

that release, that expression,
spilling out like music, like clear water,
like a cool breeze through the screen on a hot summer night,
suddenly stopped up,
forced inside

to hide everything
and feel nothing
but anger and resentment and fear
is no life to live
is no life at all

do something; give me something
so i can understand again
what it is to feel the heart,
to feel any of the connected human emotions
before it goes so far until i can't remember
they should have been there

home, now

home, now,
in this city of pumpjacks and train tracks,
some relic of the old west, filled with korean neon signs
and screaming children
and fast cars with headlights too bright

when i hear the wind gusting through the windows
and the boxcars rolling and rattling in the distance
i feel that familiar pull outside
to be out in that cool, dark air
to feel that infinite freedom of fields and small towns and highways lit up like runways

backyards hung with a pale scent of smoke
hills high with grasses looking off into the black, glistening ocean

it all makes me lonely
like looking into houses as you drive past, seeing some room lit by a lamp,
where someone else feels tired and safe
and you are reminded, more clearly, that this is not yours
you are alone

but loneliness is a feeling i confuse with freedom
and i find comfort in that solitary strength,
that separation of one person from the next,
a unique peace in private thoughts
and moments of being completely withdrawn

it gives me a chance to notice the strange beauty
of things generally ignored,
things lonely in their own right
like the heat of ashes on the ground
and the smooth, straight shine of railroad tracks at night

and here i am in another city
home, now
for a while

everywhere i go
i find people who i could love
who i could know forever
who i could sleep with and cry with and trust with my secrets
but i hold back because i know
that they will get old, get married
or i will move away

in one town i am ripe
with confidence, poise,
heroin model clothes,
proud of the breeze on my legs,
bold in the heat and sun

two hours to the next town where my posture changes
the skirt, the bra strap
suddenly white trash
hot afternoons sprawled on the porch
too uncouth to care about the exposed skin,
the sweat at the backs of my knees

which life is mine?
the one that is easiest?
or the one that is least degrading?
and which is which? which is less a lie?
and what friends will i find in each place
only to lose in the transitions

as these days fade out, blackness into blue,
that summer teenage feeling washes in again
like a tetherless existance
like weighing in at zero with no foresight to the next second
thick bass strings
thick sunscreen
thick pain in the stomach from junkfood and excess

adapt to the dried soda stickiness in the webs of your fingers
the constant cuts and the salt that settles in them
you and your difficult girls with one note of behavior
become tiring so quickly
become familiar too fast

there is no fear of death behind their eyes,
just uncertainty,
brash and unsure explosions from some thoughtless place
sugared up with a smile, a long-practiced laugh

my days of pools are coming, skateboarding on concrete,
warm nights in parking lots,
fructose juice drinks,
apartments owned by some removed acquaintance

days of wasps and lizards overpopulating the porch
heat and sweat and stinging skin
short dresses
desert nights

where will your memories fade
of some lip-glossed girl,
so unknowable,
into the same hot sidewalk days of your youth?

(poor girl's lament in a time of economic recession)

i've felt your lips in my dreams,
rested my head in the curve of your neck,
moved through the stages of talking
and trust
and fingertips on your shoulder
and my hand beside your face

real life is stagnant
a glass tunnel out of which
i watch the world
and you
i cannot be heard
can barely be seen
and i staunchly ignore your existance

you are mine only in dreams
we are lovers, friends,
castaways on deserted roads,
where i know,
have an unconscious feeling,
that in waking our eyes rarely meet
and i am far from smiling with you
or feeling your lips against mine

i am too weak for this world of boxes and crates
too sensitive for your barrel women with skin like burnt pork
with voices like toads screaming for thicker mud in a downpour
too young and scared to fend off those who were raised
in smokey rooms with broken-bottle floors,
on cold park grass, wondering about cigarettes and knives
and the mating habits of birds

where is my man with a title and inheritance
to pay for my home, my food,
my paper
an old philanthropist to leave me a house
to leave me alone
to write my poems

shower

body of a blue-collar working girl
skin too pale, bruises
muscles in the wrong places
fair proportion except for the bony knees and narrow hips

water so hot it sucks away your breath
the only time it gets like this: the middle of the night
when no one's flushing the toilet or washing dishes or doing laundry
steam rises from your skin outside the bathroom
poison leaving the body

what mistakes have you made
what bathtub executions await you as restitution
as penalty for your unspoken sins

half-dried hair
blood frozen beneath translucent skin
questions made to haunt you
to leave you blinded by your imperfections

night

Ghosts pass by in parking lots
Lonely reminders of everything missing in the purgatory
Of gas stations and pay phones
And hot neon lights on cold foggy nights

Before you were born,
Trees rose up beside highways
And there was no chaos
Between people and reality

Now I look out at wet asphalt
Dying bricks, struggling wires
I see your life in all of this
Just like the lives of every forgotten ghost
Left like cigarettes to soak up rain

i am haunted by the eternal ghosts of this city
and the ghosts of my dead ancestors
and the ghosts of my unborn children

somewhere down the line someone might forgive me
for looking too intently and ignoring what i see
and taking things i don't want as payment for things i've lost
but it won't be anytime soon

life is heaven and hell and purgatory
and when we die there is nothing left
there is no way to measure or experience eternity

masses in the distance
pumping their white smoke into the sky
an offering to whatever gods still exist in the vast infinity of space

what qualifies as success
when we have all exploded from the same piece of dust
and we will all implode into it again
and there will be no
"good job"s
or certificates
or buildings pumping white smoke
or even white smoke?
what will you tell your mother
when you fail?
when you implode?

d

blood burning in restricted arteries,
a lightness in the chest
like too much air
like too much smoke
dizziness and nausea in the throat

i met you once and planned out our future
in dreams and sweaty-palmed anxiety
my thoughts directed our actions
like mind control or telekinesis
like just wanting something could make it come true

i couldn’t wait but there was so much holding me back
i gave you over to alcohol and lonely nights
of isolation and hunger
and missed something about you that had nothing to do
with what you said or who you were

i didn’t get to have you but i made it close
and cancelled the low rise of feeling in the heart
the slow desperation and confusion in the heart

a bad day
we can hear it in the deepness of trucks running alongside the river

feeling lighter
with blood pooling in the fingers and toes
we lean back in rooms of dissipated shadows
colors of taupe, mauve, celadon
colors of old women

breathing carefully
looking upward
we know everything
and we are nothing

we met between junkyards
graveyards
greasy diners

we held hands in moonlight
firelight
smoke burning our eyes

i have pictures
of people smiling into the sun
mostly records of moments
i wasn't there to remember

our ghosts separate
as parks are built
houses painted

were we ever there?
will it ever matter?

questions for my family

where are you now, my mothers, my fathers,
my lovers, my brothers?
were you taking care of me when I was taking care of you?
what does pain in the heart measure?
and what does it matter
when you have bars and cigarettes
and cataclysmic events
to take your mind off
the heartbreaks of everyday life?

who, besides me, will tell your stories when you die?
who will add up all your emotions, all the frames of your life?
who will cry for the day of your death, though still you live on
through all your suffering
understanding time only as moments
and taking parts of me with you
‘til I have nothing left?

we were born in dirt fields
in blinding sun
aluminum siding only exacerbating the heat

after minimum wage and prison sentences
those of us still lazy enough to sit inside during the day
went on to community colleges, state schools, and federal grants

learning fast to take what we could get,
we were ill-equipped to argue grades or bureaucracies or medium-rare steaks
and when we did fight, it was only out of the innate resentment that comes from being born in purgatory

mary

My mother named me mary
Before she realized the implications

There is a conflict there
And in a sense most girls are marys
Doomed to either chastity or promiscuity
No middle ground to escape sexual ostracism

I was not born to abstinence
Nor, I like to think, to excess
And it was not my goal to remain ignorant for so long
Or to be passed around in homes that weren’t even my own

I had hoped I would have a choice
Uncommon to most women
But available to me
Because I assumed I lived a fortunate life

But my mother named me mary

2

You wonder about me as I pass you
You want me but I won’t react
You are confused by your failure
If it is failure
You? Fail?
I must have something wrong with me
To not want you telling me what to do
Sliding your cheap fingers over me
Fingers that have slid over so much before
I must be crazy to not want you sweating on me
Calling me “baby”
Stretching in the morning like you have won some game
I pass you without acknowledgement
And am I really such a fool
To go on with my day
And not wonder about you?

out for a night

out for a night or in for a night
the result is the same:
suffocating under grotesque images of moving flesh
bombarded by perverse, psychological complications
of confusing and obsolete instincts
who are these vile creatures who prance and caress before me,
so proud of their desperation?

who am I to feel so empty,
so tied down within myself,
enduring the constant struggle
to embrace that which disgusts me?

distance/dissonance

Distance
Carrying out raids on tumbleweed fields
And flat expanses of chain linked dirt
Not even a horse to reassure me
Not even snow to promise hidden life

Dissonance
And no destination
Sounds with no source, land with no end
Futilely alert, still seeing some hope in dust

mothers + sons

mothers, whose sons I need to protect from you,
whose sons I need to re-raise,
know your sins have no forgiveness
the echoes of your anger will not subside with your temper

the things you say there are no apologies for
your boiling blood will drain out
and your skin will rot to unnatural shades
but your teachings will live on
in the hearts of all the children you’ve wounded