The Santa Fe International Hostel has
a strict 1 bug per bedroom policy.
In some rooms, mine included,
this complementary beetle is dead.
This rule also extends to the bathrooms
(I learned at one in the morning)
and ostensibly the kitchen, lounge,
patio, front patio, upstairs bathroom,
etcetera.

A similar policy that the greyhound bus
service has enacted, states that
there must be at least one drunkard
per station. If not
one racist cop who suspects
one indian, native american,
mexican, hispanic, or generically
brown skinned person to be drunk.

During a 7 hour layover in Albuquerque,
I found that each time I
returned to the bathroom,
one more stall had been shut down,
slowly closing in on the single
stickiest and most terrifying toilet
in New Mexico, and possibly
greater North America.

My united states
has always been untarnished by
incompetent bus drivers who break
their glasses thus forcing
day long delays. And previous
to this week, I could not claim
any friendships with former
meth addicts, convicts, Canadians,
or people with face tattoos.
But this fourth of July,
I watched fireworks over a correctional
facility next door to a bus station
in Omaha, Nebraska and felt
a startlingly strong kinship
with the grab-bag mix of
tired, poor, huddled masses
who were all heading buckshot
across these fifty states. America,
you are not the golden coastal
cities I was grown in, with
their discreet poverty and
painted skies.
You are vast expanses of
aluminum plate houses and fields
of empty nothing dotted with
more motels than your inhabitants
can fill. Still
when the fireworks started
for a holy second
we all
caught our breath
and watched the sky
hopeful as our forefathers
And dreaming of the possibility of new life.

I was handed a key
previously
to a door I had yet to encounter
so I
stowed the key away
in a small box
and away it hid
beneath a stack of
old filings
in a desk drawer
and now
I am faced with a door
I have no key to
unless I go back and
dig under those filings
or at least
that’s how I feel
sometimes

smoke leaks from the tip
of the stem of the pipe
where i puffed a moment
before on that brilliant
thing we love — tobacco

Oh Mom
I’ve been watching the steeplechase
and I keep wondering
why the runner in the back
is getting such high marks
I mean this is a race,
that is, a steeplechase
and he’s running and all
and he just keeps getting such high
marks
and I’m just wondering, Mom,
how someone in the back can
come in second?
Why can’t they just let him race,
Mom?
Why can’t they just let him
lose?

i live for moments
where (like right now)
my heart is beating
slightly too fast
and i’m just a little
faint as the wind blows
through the window
across my face and furls
my brow but i don’t notice
because i’m completely
wrapped up in what’s
happening and awaiting
my chance to say something
i hope is profound
but will probably just
be profoundly stupid.

i live for moments
like these, where my
pulse is near-to-death-inducing-freedom-from-this-world

if there is no skin
if we’re all just the same
then why don’t i hear
you crying my name
when you sit on the pulpit
your eyes all aflame?

the juxtaposition
of classic rock
and jarring mariachi
that he plays
synchronizes perfectly
with the street performer’s
tuxedo print shirt
and well tailored suit.
A combination
which could only be so perfect
on a street like this
where the sunlight
seems to radiate from
the trees themselves
considering skies so grey.

Filling opera houses is impressive
but making strangers
stop walking, and sit
and smile
Is a special brand of holy.

the room fills slowly
with eyes roaming to and
then slowly back again
while mouths stay shut
and people sit anxiously
trying not to wiggle too
much or to avoid having
to re-cross their legs
and thus re-adjust their
junk in the midst of mixed
company where the conversation
topic will be anything
but comfortable while
all will nonetheless agree
about it’s importance to
their everyday lives and
their thoughts though
the teachers may do a
downright terrible job
and therein lies the rub.

are you here for what
i have to say? or what
the one in charge will teach
you.

there will be a dramatic difference.

for Tara

you are so sunlight
so sunrise
so sun. I
am sometimes the moon
but usually the dreamcatcher
though never the dream.

I will be grasshopper
to your lightning bug.
Listen carefully
even now
hear my heart chirp.

i spit in to this river
because we all must.
to add our little bit
to the bowl of bacteria
in hopes someone downstream
will drink.

you indignant monster
maybe you are green
at the towns-folk for
their primal jeers

conversly

they hear your cries
echo through the valley
and are angered and
who is the chicken?

I SAY BOTH

I SAY

AFTER THE MELEE

WITH THE PITCHFORKS
STREWN ABOUT

WITH THE BLOOD ON YOUR
GREEN SKIN

YOU’RE ALL CHICKENS
AND THERE ARE NO EGGS
AND I HEAR YOUR CRIES
DOWN THE VALLEY STILL

and i will meditate
on your tears.

i’ll record this conversation
a record for my books
a place to keep my thoughts
away from dirty looks

this guy with whom i’m talking
doesn’t even open his mouth
but i see him in the mirror
the best looking in the south

It was like any other day
but the martyr refused to die
though his death would save
millions
and his fate was all but
assured
and it wasn’t even going to hurt
that much,
anyway,
and actually he didn’t even
have to die

I saw a sandhill crane yesterday
it flew with purpose and it
did not stop to look around
and it didn’t have to measure twice
before it cut once but I
am not a sandhill crane
nor can I fly nor can I exist
so precisely but I will
strive for both but I will
still measure twice every
time I’m about to make a
cut

a smile for a sitting friend
walking through the park
in the middle of the city
streets surrounding people’s
lives changed day in and day
out of the country, towards
the city with lights and friends
and the promise of the lack
of loneliness, though you quickly
find it’s an empty promise a
promise you never will leave
me alone in such streets as
these where the only green is
isolated to a small square a few
blocks from here, a park
with police of it’s own. a park.

there is no human in us anymore
our arms are in need of refinement
with them we cut through our surroundings
like drops of oil in water

For Tara

I wish I could capture
the beauty of California
for you
and the romance
of the weeds which
make knots of themselves
and boomerang green
chasing yellow flowers
which will explode
into dandelions, Someday.
Knowing only how to exist,
so simple, yet
unteachable.
I want to thread lavender
and mint between
your fingers and trace
your lips with
lemon leaves
and show you where the
grass grows even under
dead trees.
I want to kiss the spot
where the ocean meets the
rocks with you.
And plant gardens
and grow love in
abundance.
I’ve seen the sun play miracles
against your eyes
It’s undeniable.
And here
where the sun is already kind
I’d like to see the magic
you would bring.
In the meantime
I stitch post cards and photos
skintight on to my chest and
imagine holding them strong
against you. I pray
for the sun to love us both
unsparingly and rename
the prettiest days
after you and
where daydreams are always beautiful
I always dream of you.

clouds move in
and the sky, blue/darkblue/simply
dark
now

you’re not overwhelmed
but you are literally
being smothered by the cold the
rain has brought. and the reminder
that this week you are no longer
the invincible young’n you were
last week.

in the parking lot like
a pile of garbage
there lies the baby bird
who fell from his nest
gruesomly reposed
permanently although
you only see him on
your ways in

out

and you note “oh, poor
thing is still there”

but he’s been there every
aching moment
getting ground by feet
and wheel and
turning slowly into dust
and
getting eaten by bacteria

he won’t move unless
something moves him

it’s
invisible in plain sight
no one wants
his unfortunate
circumstance
on them

and the bacteria add
to the illusion
that every aching moment
doesn’t ache at all
and that things just
disappear.

a line
here
to distinguish
from it’s friends
above and below