24 / 25

 

Three things that changed me: 

1. My Dad suffered 

2. My Dad died 

3. I learned I am good 

Three things I'm grateful for: 

1. A handwritten card

2. Woodland flowers 

3. Fulfilling work  

Two things I yearn for: 

1. Real love 

2. Restoration 

Thumbs on a nickel blitz

 

In the restaurant the window sun glows strong 

Sweat forms in the widow's armpits 

She hopes he will see 

Come evening the dog is too hot 

She pants on a red fleece throw 

She is practicing self-restraint 

It is a work in progress 

I could not be at a party right now

Perhaps I've shared too much 

I'm trying not to overthink it 

My heart is beating so fast 

My father calls me in the dark

 

Hey, I'm in trouble 

He doesn't know where he is 

It might be some kind of bunker 

He doesn't know who else is there, but he can hear them 

They might be cops 

They are plotting to harm him 

They are plotting to harm me and my sister

He needs to get out of there 

No, he's sure of it

Yes, he can see the TV on the wall 

Yes, he can see the curtain to the right of his bedside 

Yes, he can see the whiteboard with his name on it 

Yes, he can see the date in the upper righthand corner 

It is [April.] It is [June.] It is [August.] It is [October.] It is [December.] It is [Christmas Day.] It is [February.] It is [March.] It is [April again.] It is [May.] It is [June, again.] It is [July.] 

The large yellow paper magnetized to the board says, fall risk

Dad, do you think I would lie to you? 

That's right. I would never lie to you.

So you can trust me when I tell you that you're in the hospital 

Yes, really. You're there because you [have sepsis.] You're there because [you went septic again.] You're there because you [were so weakened by the sepsis that you fell and broke your pelvis.] You're there because you [were so weakened by the stroke that was caused by the sepsis that you struggle to swallow, and you've developed aspiration pneumonia after eating dinner one evening.] You're there because you [developed aspiration pneumonia again. It's because you had a stroke. Yes, really. It occurred because you had sepsis.] You're there because you [have aspiration pneumonia again and are going to have a feeding tube installed in your intestine because it's no longer safe for you to eat or drink.] You're there because you [have to undergo emergency surgery because the new feeding tube caused a life-threatening bowel obstruction.] You're there because you [were so weakened by the last year that you're having trouble walking.] You're there because [you've been so weakened by the last year and a half that your heart might be giving out. Actually, your heart is doing okay. Turns out, it's your lungs that can no longer function.] 

Everyone you can hear is trying to help you

I guess I just have to trust you 

You can trust me. 

You are safe. This is really hard. You are so strong

You're going to feel better as soon as we get you home 

That's going to be so soon, Dad 

I promise 

No living or sleeping aloud

 

It's been a long time since I've written love poems 

I didn't realize how much I believed was over 

All my scandals are internal 

In the picture of us both what I'm looking at is me 

Tenderness is possible 

It's morning. You have to go outside 

agree to degree

 

I expect the same kind of dance: kindness followed by its revocation 

Is this what all humans do? 

I have never been certain that he won't turn on me 

Is that normal?

No one has asked me why I like ferns before

I want to show you the person I am now 

I can sense what respect looks like 

If a door is closed, I won't keep knocking 

below freezing

 

In truth I've been loving the cold 

It's like the deep tissue massage, elbows sunk into flesh 

Pressure familiar and, somehow, almost comforting 

It hasn't pained me 

Not for me to break the silence 

I am using this as an opportunity to practice being who I am now 

I will not countenance subordination 

If a fight breaks out, I trust myself to discern: 

walk away, or finish it 

I wish I could turn into a baby kangaroo and climb into your pocket

 

In the pocket I wouldn't be visible to others, so they wouldn't think to ask things of me 

In the pocket I wouldn't have to see all the things going wrong 

In the dark, deep pocket I wouldn't need to make my own warmth

I could curl into yours. I wouldn't feel so cold 

solstice swap

 

Remember, you owe very little here 

There is part of you still mindful of how much pain awaits whenever you look up from this 

It's sensical 

Craving distance from all that suffering 

Still 

I can't put on rose-colored glasses

I've lived too much hurt 

It wouldn't be prudent 

the language of beauty

 

in the woods the snow keeps falling 

it cradles the banks and swallows the creeksound

the air is a soft wet cloud 

the rocks are slick with snowflakes  

the stately green hemlocks and the wet-green ferns  

soggy oak leaves up to our ankles 

so much insect potential 

we walk, ask questions, listen 

at the confluence, we pause 

look up up up the rock face, flakes catching our chins 

hop wet rocks across the creek 

tread the half-moon trail above the water 

we walk until the energy shifts

we all feel it 

 

the heluva good dip is done

 

I'm like a tea bag

swelling in hot water 

taut to bursting 

I probably shouldn't be doing this 

It's the curiosity that's captured me 

I don't know if you're fucking with me 

Is this what the early stages of addiction feel like 

You think, is it really that big of a deal? 

You think, how bad could this one time hurt? 

You think, don't I deserve a little relief? 

I'll just have a little taste 

I wished for percussion

 

Am I too loyal? 

Why am I trying so hard 

Is reciprocation possible 

Why do so many people seem to not give a shit 

Are we so broken? 

Is it really that hard to care? 

I feel like I'm nothing but caring 

It tenses my shoulders, stiffens my inner thighs 

Yes he's kind now but what about all the years before this 

What about six months from now 

Haven't you waited long enough 

So much of his growth at my expense 

And what about June  

Do I ever get a turn to be bad? 

I miss my Dad so much 

I just want to talk to him 

It was your turn, maybe 

I won't read too much in to it 

I'm trying not to get attached to people or to outcomes 

You're on your own, kid 

I'm covered in poison ivy 

The cat didn't mean it but he scratched my arm and I bled 

Something is gained by the elimination of the question mark

 

Can you sit with me and talk this through? 

I'm not nomadic any more 

The gladiators are juicing 

Everything I thought I'd remember I've forgotten 

Where are you now and now and now? 

I hope the poison doesn't come back 

Here is a concrete image to ground you 

The concrete is beige and hard to the touch 

Is it a problem? 

I've mostly stopped dreaming 

Am I simply more real now, more resigned to it? 

Is that progress or regression

Is this why adults need to spend time with children? 

I've grown so much more serious 

In the green-green moss garden where water seeps from stones 

There is a part of me that still wants to sleep under the stars 

Do I remember what it feels like to be alive? 

Is the feeling different now? 

I'm afraid your standards for other people are too high and you're going to wind up alone

 

how many types of sensation am i 

how long have i suppressed the longing

how long have i believed it could never be satisfied, 

or that i was not permitted to want 

all that energy roiling in my stomach 

the hunger has awakened. it's ravenous  

the moon calendar

 

I feel that old lurch in my stomach —

I'm gonna eat the cream top 

The people are noticing 

That's the good news 

With the tree in the house my whole body feels better 

I wish for more time in the trees 

I am eating almond flour crackers with my one wild and precious life 

I miss the snow 

I envision dropping with you into the cave 

it's now called pastanito

 

Never ascribe to malice what could be explained by oblivion 

I hate going to their house now; I hate feeling the absence of him 

I have grace for my desire to feel something different 

Always I am living in the forest 

People usually don't know unless you tell them 

on desire

 

I. I remember squeezing one of those squishy tube toys as a kid, the rubber lurching out of my hand and the delight of the sensation, how it would wriggle from one palm to the other as I exclaimed for the feel of it

II. On the table there is a moment when I am arching away from the pain, back of my head slipping from the edge as my hands grip the sheets beneath me, and I think how similar this posture is to the experience of pleasure 

III. He opens his pants and I take him into my mouth 

power trio

 

on this bed lie three strong girls 

two of them enrobed in black fur 

knees

palms to the wall 

blacking out in the bed 

I'm glad to know: there's hunger in me yet 

A pack of dogs

 

How quickly I move in and out of limerence 

I don't want to dye my hair pink but I do want to live in a world where people can, and they can still be taken seriously 

Five and a half miles around the circumference of the lake 

At the teach-in 

At the slide of silver linings 

At the time for your efforts is now, and also then, but certainly 

now 

Every new thing I learn about my country's maneuverings abroad is more horrifying than the last horrifying thing that I learned 

Perhaps we deserve our suffering

Similarly, those eighteen months: a progression of horrors 

I am ashamed to tell you how horrible it was 

For their part, my siblings continue not to do their part 

For the claim that he was making art, I have fired my therapist 

I get massages instead, teasing out all the emotions I've stashed in my shoulders, tucked into my hips, stuffed deep in the center of my left calf

After the hike I eat a large salad with chicken 

I stretch

I watch a comedy show 

For 21 minutes I remember how to laugh 

Gag

 

Of course, I overdid it 

Prickling my flesh 

I rip the hoodie off 

My favorite part of today was when she wanted to help me garden 

This week I am struggling to feel happy even when I'm with people whose company I typically very much enjoy. A lot of the time I'm faking a good time. So far one person has called me out on this. I'm grateful for it. 

Another one of those spiral epiphanies: I am afraid that other people will find me too much 

I'm textbook

Gag me with a spoon 

Fantasizing in the bathtub 

Early years with the faucet 

Most especially I don't want them to know the litany of traumas 

Who wouldn't be repelled by someone as broken as me 

Some people are saying 

Child, remember to breathe 

Housemade soups are back

I think it's time to admit that I'm unlikely to develop the hobby of crocheting my own clothes 

Frankly I just like knitting scarves, and then only rarely 

Treat yourself to tallow! 

I will try to remain resolute about the fact that anything can happen 

He can't figure me out 

Past the kumquats, she read it on a sign 

Just change two letters

Stop faking 

Stay focused on what you want for your own life 

Red

 

At the membership desk a decorous woman replaced my Dad's name with my own 

We walked the brown meadow until my mother got hungry 

We walked through one glass building and then another 

I told her what the dots were for

I forget sometimes how little she believes me 

One of the bonsai is approximately 800 years old 

We walked to the lake but the water was gone 

What is the eye without water

We are little but flesh and bone 

tired

 

I work for a few hours, then head to the garden 

On the way there a man leers at me from a van at a stoplight  

I glare into him and he doesn't stop

They are emboldened

Fifteen years ago on the streets of happy valley: so skinny and weak, and all the young men leering 

I have not missed being prey

At the garden I chop and rake and bend and scoop 

I drive to the natural food store and buy kale, yogurt, coconut milk, bok choi 

When I pull into the driveway I'm too tired to get out of the car 

Maybe I will stay here, in the front seat of the Subaru parked in the driveway 

I have food to last for days: kale, yogurt, coconut milk, bok choi, a glass jar of concord grape juice 

I'll warm myself by the bags of decomposing leaves and garden clippings on the back seat 

My toe hurts

 

It is shades of blue and yellow and purple and it hurts to bend it 

It hurts to walk

You won't see me limping 

Turn me on again

 

I wish I hadn't stopped making music 

I'm not sure anybody knows that one of my favorite colors is camel. which is a pretty silly name for a color 

The person I most want to fuck right now is Chappell Roan's drummer 

I'm sorry if I'm being problematic 

I feel like I'm not allowed to say that I was partly living out of a car and sleeping on my friends' couch ten years ago, with less than $340 to my name after I spent my life savings ($3,500 earned over nine years of working) on a Subaru Forester. But the truth of the matter is that I was partly living out of a car and sleeping on my friends' couch ten years ago, with less than $340 to my name. And nowhere else to go. 

Now I am lying in a Queen-size bed that I bought for myself in a house that I bought entirely by myself. Then I was making more money than I ever thought possible and now I am making less money on purpose, because I am trying to do more of something meaningful. And in the center of all of that money, and the lack of it, the having more and the having less, is me, a person, who has a name. 

I have been fortunate, and I have also been effortful  

I have efforted 

Here I am another layer into the spiral 

Learning again, not surprising and also epiphanic, the same lesson and also different, deeper: If you aren't able to be yourself with people, no matter how many you surround yourself with, you're still alone 

Casual

 

Here's the thing 

If I open, the longing comes back 

 

I work all morning then take the dog for a walk

For several minutes we watch the roofers 

I work all afternoon then lift weights in the back room upstairs 

I take a shower

I take the dog to her agility class 

I drive home with the windows down

I get lost in the dark in a corporate complex 

Back at home, I rub coconut oil into my scalp. My hair is instantly oily 

I watch another 40 minutes of insights for restoring the canopied landscape

I eat samosas and riced cauliflower to quiet the yearning

I had suppressed how much I wanted somebody to want to see 

 

You get to a certain point and you realize you made some mistakes 

In my case I suppressed awakeness for accomplishment, intimacy for the fear of being alone 

I understand why my Dad started playing the drums

Mid-November

 

Finally, I can feel winter approaching 

For the first day this season the bird bath sits empty 

The branches, most of them, are bare

The leaves that remain dangling are crinkled and brown 

The sky is gray

I go outside in a hoodie and a thick fleece, and I'm still cold 

When we walk beside the river, Suzie skips most of her favorite swimming spots 

Then we come upon her friend Sage, and together the dogs run headlong into the water 

Sunday after Tuesday

We sat in the church and he cried

They said they'd stand with us, but I couldn't believe it 

Even my friends abandoned me 

The minister says there's a little hope fledgling at the bottom of the box, ready to take flight

He is well-intentioned

The minister's assistant cites Dante's Inferno

She says she doesn't have much hope

The forest is dark, and the leaves keep falling 

She'll try to do good anyway 

Mount Climbness

 

We leapt from one rock island to another

One of us fell down but soon she was climbing again 

We walked the secret pathway 

We drew on big rocks with smaller rocks, purple and gray and gold 

We looked for a red rock but we did not find one

We found leaves as big as their heads

That was really funny 

We wrote our names with sticks in the dirt

We drew dirt mountains and volcanoes 

We tested different materials by tapping them with a stick. Wood, wood, wood... 

Finally, I remembered to dance

I am thinking about buying the winterberry

 

Of course there are a lot of factors to consider. For starters, you'd need to make room. You'd need to relocate the blueberries, which you've already planted in the bed where you envision the winterberry taking root. Where would they go? It's possible they'd survive on the hillside in the backyard, though you don't have a hose hooked up back there. Be honest: Would you really water them? Then again, given their propensity for dry soils, would you need to? You were excited about the blueberries when you planted them, and now you're feeling excited, albeit more so, about the winterberry. Before we dismiss this as a case of greener pastures, however, let's consider that you are refining your preferences every day. It's possible the vision you have for your garden these days is different than the vision you once had. You have evolved and you have a keener eye for garden design now than you did then. There's validity to your instinct: The verticality and the parallelism of the winterberry might in fact align better with the bed's shape and location as well as the azalea in the middle of it. The blueberries are useful, and tasty surely, but perhaps a bit squat. It's possible they might not grow large enough to provide everything you need or were looking for when you decided to bring new shrubs into your life. Of course, it's difficult to determine, when weighing the pros and cons of blueberries versus winterberries, whether or not the bush that's already growing in your homestead is superior to the shrub that has enticed you but has not yet proven itself a viable partner to your garden's soil, location, and goals. 

taking my mother out to dinner

 

It was difficult to find parking 

The line is too long 

There are two separate lines and it's confusing

The wait will be nearly an hour

No, I don't want to go anywhere else

The restaurant is too loud

It seems like every restaurant is too loud these days 

It's hard to find a table 

I think we have to go upstairs

Crap, it's crowded here too 

They were out of my first choice

I really wanted that reuben 

I guess I'll get the falafel, my third choice 

I don't even know what this drink is 

The room is too cold 

I don't know why my friend won't get her hearing checked 

If the food isn't ready soon my body will decide it's no longer hungry

No, if I eat anyway, I'll pay for it 

I'm hosting my friends next weekend but I wish I hadn't said yes 

They'll be here the same day that I have to pack for my trip 

You'll be here for Christmas, right? 

The room is still too cold 

I wish I had time to have a mental breakdown

 

Alas the emails need written

Alas the leaves are piling up against the brick porch 

The car's tires are deflating 

The meeting is at 10:45

You must prove yourself 

The carex needs to be planted

I wish for a time when I could wear black continuously and sit contemplating in a hay field, and everyone would understand 

Sam Cooke in the morning

 

I hadn't known how he died

He tried to rape a woman 

The bullet pierced his heart

The funeral home leaked 

The horse show isn't what it used to be 

So many people abandon their origins to memory 

I left so many times 

I'm here because I still think it's important 

The 4-H clubs and the pony shows and the equine therapy 

We're all different with each other and in different places 

Is anyone who they claim to be 

Is it fair to expect it? 

How do you judge a person? 

I like him on the table but what's he like at home at 10pm on a Tuesday 

For example 

My idol is a woman who conducted herself with integrity always, was kind to children, held others to a high-but-fair standard, and did good in her community. She didn't have a storied resume. She wasn't famous and she didn't need to be. Salt of the earth. 

indulgence

 

It's not that it's dark 

It's blank 

Force yourself up, say fuck, work all day, try to catch up on chores, fall further behind 

Do it again 

My Dad's book said, Chop wood. Carry water. 

There can be dignity here. 

I do not embody it. 

My Dad is I refuse to write it.

In my mind I'm drunk and chain smoking on the bank of a river 

I write the script / I am drinking 

I draft the report / I am drinking 

I tend the garden / cigarette smoke seeps from the hair follicles on my arms

Externally she is keeping things together 

Her Mom never missed a day of work 

Are you getting back to normal?

It has been three months. 

It has been so long. 

I do not remember what normal felt like. 

Is gratitude the same as joy? 

I'm so fucking sad 

Nicknames for Suzie

 

Suze

Suzie Q 

Suzie McQuzy 

Suze McQ

The Baby 

Beeps 

Beepy Deep 

Beepy Deeps

Beepy Deepy 

Beepsy 

Beepsy Boo 

Angel Baby 

Honey Baby

Sweet Honey Girl 

Sweetie Patootie 

Cutie Patootie 

Sweet Little Angel 

Angel Girl 

Girly Whirly 

Beepsy Boppity Boo 

Heart emojis everywhere

 

These people are sick 

A perversion of care 

Action eclipsed by fawning 

I did ask for it

Help, I mean 

It never came and it never came and it never came 

They feign oblivion—

Who benefits? 

It's not the water snake you have to watch out for 

It's the frog 

Two egrets stand alone in a cascade of water 

When everyone has changed the subject 

You are the one who remains 

and/both

 

At least it's Milkshake Monday 

After coating myself in P. incanum oils 

Earthy and redolent 

We walked the dog through the woods and played with her in the creek 

I make the points and then I stop

The deer have eaten my Fragaria

I can see now that you were unavailable 

Back on the bike again 

Only eleven easy miles, drizzly and wonderful 

Soon enough we'll be looping the big ascent 

I have developed some parasocial relationships 

Feels good to know more of what I'm doing 

I no longer feel unmoored 

I do feel, perhaps, a little rudderless 

Still, she is planting 

It takes years to know what's really taken root 

The goslings are getting so big 

Am I supposed to apologize for being cheesy? I mean it 

Remember when I lived in Queens? I ran through Astoria Park several times a week  

The students and I stroll slowly through the rainy gardens, sit describing a bromeliad in the internationally renowned conservatory 

I wish the mountains didn't feel so far away 

Tomorrow I will tend the native garden as children play around me 

Last Friday I waded knee-deep into creek water and splashed about with my dogs 

The wolf pads silently through the forest 

On Sunday I'll learn about birdsong

hospital visit

 

Time zones have aligned

Two dogs whoofing sleep breaths out their nostrils 

He mounted the horse and he rode it 

I feel like a shaken baby 

We walked a horseshoe inside the creek 

The weekend started out strong 

Now I'm counseling psychosis 

I have some experience with people who are out of their minds 

Mine is not the steadiest ground 

Driving back roads through the country 

Water stretching beyond, beyond — 

It's so pretty here 

Does the onslaught ever stop 

He held up a mirror and I looked so sad 

Less bluff and bluster

 

The clarity of knowing how to canoe 

The confidence of having directly sowed the lettuce seed 

Tomatoes happily growing 

Downy wood mint coming into bloom 

Avoiding the hitch that hooks me to his star 

Remember when I planted swamp milkweed in the dry dark? 

Oh remember that ghastly comment made from ignorance 

Remember how you got stitched into his sweater and nearly lost your mind on the office floor 

Now the winterberry sets itself to thriving 

Now you align the green hull with the bobbing dock, perfectly and on the first try 

You stand in your garden in socks and sandals and harvest a bowl full of strawberries 

limer

At last I've made it

Shin-deep in the creek 

The fray of whitewater bouncing 

down the waterfall 

How long it took to get here 

Lost in the Harrisburg suburbs 

Too high to read the cardinal directions 

Shot through aluminum 

Bushwhacking to the water 

That maroon knit coat 

One large boulder becomes a talus field at twelve thousand feet 

Jogging past ancient pines 

I only wear technical jackets —

Down fill power, nylon ripstop, wind and waterproofing 

I was so embarrassed

I thought you loved me 

Today the dog plunges into the water after a buoyant yellow stick

Today my toe hurts after slamming it, bare, into a birch root 

Today I climbed down to the water alone 

Today you are merely a ghost 

Don't speed

 

The steering wheel, a reminder

We are all struggling to grow 

The struggle is part of the growth, I mean 

Every other time I've hunted out my own failures 

Arrived apologizing, first fingers then bed

Did the research 

Sorted things out 

Prepared the plan for moving forward 

This time I'm simply taking care of me

Absent of animosity 

A kind of freedom 

Oh Mt. Sopris — 

Wind, horse 

When it thunders, the birds don't stop singing 

So you can take it less seriously

 

Do I judge you, of course 

But also, I understand

I did it too 

Now that we're clear 

I'm moving on 

Watching the dogs wade into cold creek water

Eddies around their brown and black legs 

Digging up liriope 

Planting heuchera and sedges 

He rakes leaves and small branches 

I take off my hat, unzip my vest 

The dogs run together 

That wildlife sign a reminder of friendship 

And what of yesterday? 

I cleaned the bathrooms 

Got a green smoothie and took the puppy for a walk in Lowe's 

It was raining 

Bought some toilet paper 

Sanitized the tub 

Vacuumed the upstairs carpets 

Turned myself into a gray rock 

Turned myself back into a person 

Drove to the doughnut shop 

Waxed poetic about ceramic mugs 

Laid on my side in the fetal position, gripping my ginger tea 

And what of tomorrow? 

Whatever happens, I'll prioritize feeling 

Little kindnesses every day

The sharp elderly woman in the grocery store aisle who joked with me about how we both hold our pee too long

The smiling man holding the door for me as I wheeled my cart out of the seed store 

The boy who told me wistfully, over and over again as he followed his mom into the creek, that my dogs are so cute 

nothing comes to mind

 

Perhaps I am not often vulnerable 

Perhaps I get that, to a certain extent, from and perhaps to a certain extent I had that forced upon me by her 

Fancying myself a coach, I ceased to practice 

I remember driving past the cemetery, shocked by the abjectness of getting a tattoo 

Memories—those sometimes awful things—

also help tether me here 

Also, saying it out loud 

I've never floated less

In the woods by the water she plunged her face in 

Yes the incapacity is devastating, and still—

We are raising a creature, together

See how magical 

pine comes

 

I'm not concerned that I felt it, at least 

That's not my primary concern 

I am alarmed by how quickly it's gone 

Like a leaf boat released into the sloshing gutter 

I wish you well 

Now it's morning and you are inside of me 

Just you, just me 

I never thought I could enjoy weekends like this 

After the poetry workshop I water all the plants 

We tromp the dogs through a field in snow squall 

Later we'll drag the big bed to the curb

You'll eat a turkey sub while standing in the garage 

preview forthcoming

 

If I cannot talk to him I can talk with myself 

Aren't I just as worthy of it? 

The pink flamingo shirt wedges between the dresser and the wall 

The squirrels are flying 

Flashes of that intersection 

On the way to the hospital 

So much horror and no one to share it with 

Of course I'm skirting the issue 

Honestly, I feel relieved 

The mountain painting reflects from the large wooden mirror 

The loons bob on the surface of the lake 

I'm not disappointed but I am a little mad 

The truth has set me free 

the longest train whistle I've ever heard

I'm pleased by the reflection of the fleshy succulent in the brown mug stretching from the windowsill into the sun 

All my feelings are pathologies

 

Without limerence, what's left 

It's been a long day and I need to retreat 

sitting on the big blue chair in the back room upstairs 

silken pajama pants and a loose, long-sleeved shirt 

I'm sick again 

a condition of cognitive obsession

I'm only just starting to come to grips with what it means 

Is all angst merely chemistry? 

Compulsion, obsession, and lack of control 

I feel more clear-headed than I, perhaps, ever have 

This is sad; this was a mistake; that wasn't okay; this is hard; this is perverse; I was struggling so much more than I knew

The thing about masking is it also obscures you from yourself

mirrors offer only a distorted reflection  

Now I see suffering. And also wisdom 

So much of what was presented to me as spirituality was poison 

I was susceptible because I was sick 

All my distortions were subliminal  

What I'm trying to say is 

This may be caused by low levels of serotonin in the brain 

remember when I lived in Maine

 

I've forgotten how to relax again

Pay attention to your breathing 

Feel the rise and fall of your stomach 

Soften your shoulders 

For a second -- 

Then everything braced again 

This year, so hard, has softened me 

I am toughened and suppler, like leather

the robot in the grocery store

 

every time he rolls past me with his giant googly eyes, i want to tackle him to the floor. i want to hand the $30,000 it took to buy him to a human being who will use the money to pay rent and who will open another checkout lane when the line is backed up halfway down the baking aisle. i want to rip his googly eyes off. i want to beat his plastic head in. it's not a head. it's plastic. 

the only time i felt for him was the day he tried to escape 

snowing

My heart —

it closed 

back on skis again 

ever sad and ever lonely 

I held my father's hand each time that he cried

As a child, sick 

Lying on my side on the brown couch in the basement 

He brought me peach fruit-on-the-bottom yogurt, gently stirred

He brought me orange juice diluted with water 

He'd bring me whole wheat toast, pat of butter in the center 

I see how deeply I have been loved even as I've felt so unloved 

I see how unloved I was even as I've been told I'm so loved 

I don't know if I can bring myself to care any more. I'm so tired of feeling hurt. 

I'm sorry for equivocating. The cigarette poem was about exactly what you thought. 

For a while I fancied myself far braver than I actually was. 

I'm a more honest person now. I've suffered for it. 

I look skyward into big, wet flakes 

The fencerail sparkles

Small crystals cling to the tiny blond hairs on my cheeks 

He looks like you and I can't get it out of my head —

How much I wanted you 

Stuck in the shower

 

I have been closed off to magic