Your mood was in mint condition When the furnace choked And the toilet began coughing up rivers of water Which proceeded to pour through the bathroom door And onto the wood floor of the kitchen
The oven stood watching And the fridge was ready to kvetch As the broom stood in the corner A skinny, mean wretch Always looking for dirt
You can feel the whole house hurt From being old Right now, it’s creaking, complaining Cold
Whatever happened to summer?
Time to warm the air Call boiler repair And, for sure, a plumber Time to fix these old pipes and bones And say goodbye to old appliances
Goodbye sink Goodbye fridge And stove It’s time for new alliances You have to be no more sentimental Than science is
You have to forget The way your mother and sister danced on that kitchen rug Or the way your father once killed a bug That looked like a dinosaur You have to forget the beef brisket The homemade cake that came from the oven Or the cheerful pattern That once graced the now-mangy hot glove Left in the stuck drawer
You will fix the misaligned door Mow the lawn And take the wet, sad leaves out of the gutter You will remember laughter Fights, friends, music Sex in the basement And all the bright secrets you could never utter To anyone But the house
You go down into the basement Fearing you may see a mouse Or a ghost But you go anyway
Upstairs the toaster makes a final slice of toast Ah, there, there You can smell the heating of the bread Smells fantastic, like it always did And you remember All the yummy things you used to eat Before going to bed
The basement leaves a weird, sticky darkness On your feet You go upstairs And the toast pops up like it always does— Complete
You put some butter on it Then some jelly Close your eyes And eat
Spinning at the carnival Pigs in the sty The veil makes her feel fierce She refuses to cry All of the onlookers Each human eye brings Windows to dream
Rules don’t apply The black horse is moving now Stamping his hoof The blackbirds are rising from Some smoky, coughing roof
She pictures her mother’s face From when she was young The sword in her mouth With that sharp, metal tongue To swallow
Hollow and spent She will enter the circle tent Empty of sins Almost content
The animals gather As the circus begins No one sees the injuries Coming to gleam Sparkling danger A bright guillotine Of risk
The circus clowns drumming The animal-frisk Below and between The ladder to heaven The fateful tryst The flying trapeze slips And offers its dare— Seize life
She slices the air With the greatest of ease She remembers the elephants On their knees And the circus fleas In their tiny dome Still dreaming of home She thinks of the mattresses Of cold straw and foam
There in an audience Waiting to shout Flying above them She crosses into doubt Somewhere in the interval Where love meets desire She falls on her mother’s sword She swallows the fire And severs the cord Of the thin, safety wire
Dreaming of a paradise Toward which she can sail This is the moment She pierces the veil To let go into nothing Now Releasing her hands She stares at the audience Hears the gasp in the stands
Let go of all destinies Flying toward fate To reach for the handle Of St. Peter’s gate Before she arrives She must wait And wait and wait
The ghost of her mother still debates her From inside Her hands meet the false hands That reach out to save her From the divide From her plans From the almost-dive Into emptiness
The eternal sands Of time’s hourglass shatter Broken But her heart commands her To open another way To what matters
To survive the audience That gathers to escape Or to see pain They will not look away
She crosses the emptiness And hears her own voice Pray To sustain this leap
Invisible to the naked eye The watermark Scars itself paper-thin Stark
The dark beauty of you Mysterious quark Impressing a shadow into my heart Seen or unseen You are there I feel you I inhale you From what is sparkling of you In the air
A pattern An image Shades of light Transmitted Through what cannot be pretended Borrowed, faked Or counterfeited
I admit it Some things are always true Like the words between us Where you drew a tiny, perfect bird Better than a photograph Better than a word That image was you
Now I see it Now I understand How life flows through us Through the hourglass Unplanned We move like stars Like dust, like sand
Now I remember holding your hand At the very edge of the dock As night took command And the waves we saw Disappeared into mystery
That moment is alive That moment is history That moment makes me wonder If you would ever miss me As much as I miss you
It doesn’t matter Grief eats me like a shark I wish I could join you Where the waves stop I stare into the infinite beauty Of the eternal soft darkness We still share
I wrote in sand And bled your name First the ocean Then the rain Then the day that never came
The thin red flower Bled petals Into a bed of thorns A needle threaded Pulse of veins
A storm
To speak your pain Without a tongue To blame them not I turned my body to a flame And shot myself a rocket To your glory
Let me rise In ash and story Let the morning fall before me As they sing their foreign words I rise To fly among the birds Sky beyond me Earth below Sand and time And names I know
Carrying this broken hymn I sing into the perfect wind Ash to ashes Tears to rust I rise in blood And turn to dust
The flowers are shouting purple from the lawn The inset of daffodils is cheering them on There’s the lost glove you thought was gone Waving at us Royal, grand Like some happy, supernatural hand
This is spring Inevitable, unplanned Amen! It seemed like good weather would never come again It seemed like we had been in a gray basement A locked shed Circling the same conversations in our head
Let’s go outside for a deep, pink breath Let’s see the trees show off their tresses See the robins dress for success This is more than we had expected Or remembered It’s the best spring ever yet No less
Let’s go outside together and lay down in the grass Let’s feel ourselves orbit the sun And enjoy being passengers in this beautiful earth The only one in all the universe Where we reside
Let’s inhale all we can hold inside From the bowl of the sky Feast on beauty, feed the eye
Bending wide across the arc Of our understanding The standard model of our design We encounter mystery Now As the muon bends Our minds
There are equations That hold Our understanding There are understandings That exceed Whatever we can construct Measure, communicate Read
Out there in the field Out there in the fields There are understandings That the infinite–Infinite Yields
And every life Every lifetime of pursuit Studies the tree Studies the root Studies the ephemeral Illusions Of the forbidden fruit
But once given a taste Of what we might possess Embody, face We allow ourselves to be disrupted Into epiphanies With which We are invisibly interlaced
As our minds and bodies open To the illusions that appear We become one with the Oneness That does not adhere To the rules
We are divine fools We are silly children In this extraordinary game Learning to discover Learning our own reflection To name Atoms, electrons The Higgs boson The same Labels for uncertainty We attempt to tame
But here come the muons To change And reclaim that space Where we realize We don’t know much
Yes, we are here We breathe, we think We touch We move through time and space In a mortal rush To live A more meaningful Allegory
But When we wake up, we see It’s all imaginary, a story There are no atoms There are no equations There is nothing But
Like some lost swan I waddle the lawn Make my way to the pavement Then to the street
I am ashamed of my shape I am horrified by my grotesque Webbed feet
Everyone stares To see me making my way To the neighbor’s swimming pool Which has finally opened for the season
I woke up this morning like this Can’t tell you how or why Can’t give you a reason But at least now I am floating In this strange, man-made pond
The neighbor does not recognize me I used to be blonde and leggy I try to say his name But it comes out a cry Time to get out of the pool, I think Time to fly
I manage to get up At first flimsy Then a little higher Then high enough to find my way Above the telephone wires Right up to a bird’s eye view Ah! There’s a lake I can fly down into
Now I am landing at the water’s edge Waddle, waddle across the stone ledge And plop, plop into the lake I am gliding now I barely cause the water to break Look! Look over there Another swan
I go over and say, hey And it’s my husband He says, I’ve been waiting here all day And I say, how did this happen? But it sounds like a bitchy swan-scream
And he says, I don’t know That’s why I’ve been waiting for you To come and explain What does this all mean?
You crush the words With your teeth Pull sharp meaning From the sheath of nuance In order to break Me
Words are darts Words are swords Words are knives For cutting the cords that Bind us Or Connect us
May the unforgiving silence Protect us From ourselves
There are books and books and books On our shelves In which we lose And find ourselves Unsung
Books that hold centuries Of the mother tongue In all her secrets And revelations
These are the building blocks of nations These are the castles We inhabit These are the magician’s hands Pulling the rabbit out of his hat Pulling a quarter from your ear Making the ace of spades appear And disappear
Words are like that They conjure They take shape They take you to the exit They take you to the fire escape Or they lock you inside
You stare at me And say The words are the key
I could not believe you more I have to say I agree
The words are honey The words are free The words are full of love And flowers and empathy
This is almost enough care To smooth the jagged edges To help the words Repair Themselves And me
Thank you
Let the fresh air Fill our lungs Let’s walk together And wag our tongues Like puppy’s tails
Let’s comment on the clouds And how they look like giant sails Finding their way across the ocean of sky
Give the words a rest Give the face a smile Let your teeth be a wide wall of happiness For a while
We don’t need to chew cruelty We don’t need to speak dirt Let’s find the comfort That sits inside the hurt
Lift our hopes On the breezy skirt of the day Flirt with the infinite See the wonder That stays just under the surface Always waiting to come out and play
Don’t look at me I’m not in pain My hand is not bleeding I’m just holding a key- Chain
And the Parson calls me He does not know I bit the tongue off the Jester And I am not ready To go
Over there
Stay in your corner On the angel’s halo On the devil’s horn
Maybe it was the Parson’s warning ringing In my mind Bringing us together Maybe he was just waiting For the storm For the weather For the Jester whose face is lined Like leather
Waiting For the ringing of the bells For the toll that comes and tells us It’s the end It’s the truth It’s time to stop Pretending
The Jester is mute And uncouth
But he knows what he would say If he had a tongue If he had words If he had legs To run away
Instead, he witnesses Instead, he watches He sees The hands on the clock stop To clap us back
The hands that hold us The hands that will unfold us
Time will scold us in our own voice And then it will grow tired And the universe will rewire itself And we will die of the shock and tedium Of days repeated Knowing it is not our place To see the entire picture Completed
We know We are here as jigsaw pieces We are here as mere tucks And creases in the fabric of the world The fabric of the flag of days Unfurled into a life
Hand me the Jester!
Hand me my knife I myself will take his tongue His will His life Because I do not wish to know My own edges Sliced away
I will pretend I’m not afraid I’m not alone I’m not with the Parson As he chews With bloody, angry teeth A bone There is nothing left to own There is nothing to bequeath No Christmas tree No Christmas wreath No Santa Claus Only this unbearable pause Where we breathe Until we don’t
You may fear this But I won’t
Instead I will go on Holding fear and morality on a tight leash Appreciating the senses that tell me I matter
And maybe I do And maybe just like you I came here for a reason A season With these strange, compelling dreams
I am awake now The Jester is quiet Playful He has his tongue back On its seams
And what does he do?
He cries He laughs He sings He screams
As the Parson warns us
The fabric is torn
And we emerge Exhausted And bloody And ready To be reborn
