Kathy

 I felt bad, after

like a house of dirty windows

like my heart had hit a quicksand ditch going 90

and my ribs kept giving me a sharpwire bone-hug every time I breathed.

Kathy came by, 

crossed her arms

dipped her chin and said,

"Well don't you look like hammered crap."

Knowing I'm sober,

She goes, "Wanna get wasted?" 

and there's that shit-eating grin.

"Yeeeah," I tell her with a loud sniff and a lip twitch.

"Well you can't, stupid," she says.

Filling my coffee maker, she strings together some very inventive,

vile, and hilarious names for Ms. Thang until I finally snort and shake my head.

"You are one fine fucking mess

and more trouble than you're worth, you know that?" she says, tilting her head. 

I know that.

"And I love ya, ya goof."

I know that, too.

Then I am crying, and she is rocking, 

and the coffee maker burps and coughs like it might die, but doesn't. 

_________

for NaPoWriMo day 5. 

Visions of Code-y

 

Sitting in a coffee bar, I was hit on by a Kerouac simulation.

I am the nightbird genius mix, said FauxJack,

clearly hopped up on lollipops. 

Do tell, said I. 

So babe, what's on your emotional jukebox?

Some kind of dubious doo-wah Dada bop?

Maybe.

You're like smoke, there's rise in your eyes.

And you try too hard.

Auughh! Gutshot, right in the LOLcode. Want me to fade?

No, as a matter of fat, I've read all your graphic novels, FakeJay.

You're a real Ker-Ker-Karma Chameleon.

They call me Cat George, mama. Imma thicc throwback skellychaser!

You don't say.

Don't armadillo me, hard candy. 

This is love-a-rooni, jive jazz Nirvanaville, hep kitty.

Hep. Oh, I like that.

The double yellow asphalt ribbon is callin', Gypsy Rose.

To-go that java and jump immediate!

You're on, daddy.

Ergo the ersatz ecstasy, holo-hipster. 

Aw Athena, now you're blowin' a sweet riff! 

That's me, Riff Tin Tin. Awoooooooo!

You are off the leash! 

Faux man go. Let's split before the squares hack your dome, Jack.

____________

for Word Garden Word List--Janis Ian. 

Music: Eddie Harris Sham Time

Coffee Girl

I'm Coffee Girl from a pottery wheel
warm and curved and hanging from a hook
I know one trick,
to distract the honest eye
but every shell is empty.

Choose me
and you'll be sorry, though I'm
sweet on my feet,
I'm Coffee Girl when I fall
I run out right before your honest eyes.
_____

for Friday Flash 55 at VerseEscape, hosted by my fab BFF Hedgewitch.

Croc Girl

Croc girl meets Florence of Arabia down at the Lavender Laboratory,
where a girl can get
pretentious coffee made from beans picked high in the hills
by female fingers only--guaranteed.

Later, in bed, Croc Girl can't shut up,
she's got a big mouth.
"Bla bla bla bla bla," she says, eternally,
"Bla bla bla," until the moment is lost and Florence of Arabia gets out of bed
and starts waving her scimitar around.
"Bla bla," continues Croc Girl, hating herself, but helpless.  

The next morning, alone at the Lavender Laboratory,
sipping some idiotic kind of tea and writing long, dreadfully sincere poetry,
Croc Girl feels shitty and realizes her blood sugar is low.
Ever seen a croc girl eat?
Whole boxes of Debbie Cakes down the hatch at once.
Croc Girl sits there, stomach rumbling, hating herself, but helpless.

O for the water.
O for careless thirsty creatures whose names she doesn't know.
O for croc moms who don't hover, bitching about everything.
O for peanuts and Cracker Jack, blue skies and sun all afternoon. 

Croc Girl goes down the block to the chain drug store,
spending forever in the lotion section, mooning over Olay,
Jergens, St. Ives and Burt's Bees until the tears come.
"Hold me, I need love," she says, all the time.
"GTFO," says everybody.
In a low blood sugar rage, Croc Girl sweeps all the stupid lotions onto the floor--
you don't need boardinghouse reach for that.

The next day, down at the Lavender Laboratory,
perched in a chair high enough for Seven Foot Billy, the old carnie freak,
Croc Girl sits reading a lesfic novel.
It's about Raven, or Madison, or Dakota, or some other heroine
named after a creature or a place,
who had a nasty break-up, moved back to Podunk, 
reconnected with Sally Silo,
and did it 'til LBD set in, but that's not included in the edition she's got.
"Bla bla bla bla," says Croc Girl under her breath, mocking the author's style.

Somewhere, there is mud enough for a thousand mud masks.
Somewhere, a girl can float with just her eyes above the water line.
Somewhere, a girl can wear a sleeveless dress
without some bitch saying maybe she shouldn't, with a pointed glance.
Somewhere, a girl can have a big bad-ass tail, 
long and wide enough to knock over the garbage bins.
"Say something about it," she challenges,
then realizes she has spoken out loud, 
making anorexic truants from the local high school turn and curl their lips.

Something slips inside Croc Girl, like The Golden Key Card,
and she blinks her eye in the weird way that only crocs can.
The truants all falter,
go back to their chai tea,
made only with milk from happy Tibetan goats, guaranteed.
Croc Girl slips down off her chair in one easy motion,
grins her shit-eating open-mouthed grin,
and says, "BLA BLA BLA!" 
They think she's crazy, but
it sounds like pure poetry to her.
______

Note: LBD = "Lesbian bed death"

Dining Car

I took my eyes out of my head and set them in cups, like eggs.



Look at them, I complained.

They are like library lions, guarding the doors from the steps,

And the steps are sinister,

Always rising.



I seek the sun inside an egg shell,

I don't even tap with my wrench,

I float,

Like the heavens over a corn field at night...

But it is the corn field in motion,

Not the stars.



Look,

My baby is blind.

Look,

How my eyes sit paired, set before the morning with a linen napkin lying next to them, an adored and lazy lover.

Reach out,

Splay fingers in empty air like prayer.

Sense the scion settling in,

Wearing a summer suit,

Arriving refreshed,

Combed, cologned,

And hungry.

_________

Burn

Word starts getting around about Danny's Coffee Shop--

A girl wearing black fingerless lace gloves and her skinhead boyfriend walk in and he stands right in front of the Succubus,

Snapping pictures with his phone

As the girlfriend swipes her dyed black hair out of her face and giggles.



The Succubus once owned this place. She was the first.

Then she got stupid over Chloe, and though they still share the air,

They are like buses at a stop--

Never touching and bound in opposite directions.



"I've become a Point Of Local Interest," thinks the Succubus as her ashy heart turns over in her undeniably perfect chest...

"I've become a demon in a zoo."

In one motion, she stands up, all seven glorious feet of her, and spreads her black wings,

Knocking over everything within her wingspan;

Soon the skinhead's phone is dust and the silly girlfriend's skin has gone all to hell--

Well damn,

Sorry about that, kids.



The Succubus strides out, imperial and evil,

And everybody just steps back.

Nobody has seen her like this in months.



From rooftop to rooftop she moves in the frozen night,

Until she finds the place she was looking for...

In she glides, like a knife drawn from under a peasant girl's skirts, and slid into a wound,

Killing the priest who accused her.

She is here to enter the dreams of the woman who sleeps before her,

A genuine beauty,

Alone,

Hers for the plucking.



When the Succubus enters someone's dreams, their dreams turn sweet beyond imagining--

It's just that

They will never have another one.

Pity that.



Together they rise, they join in this wicked illusion,

But then,

The Succubus smells smoke.

No, it's not the Boss.

The space heater has set the blankets on fire and the place is going up...

The Succubus looks at her prey, whose name is Angeline, and she can't help herself,

Can't stop herself...

She alters their dream to one of cool water, pitchers of cream poured over soft skin, all things soothing and sweet-scented.

She wraps her body around Angeline, but not as she had planned to do--

She carries her out onto the balcony near the fire escape. All she needs is a goddam day-glo yellow helmet and an ax.

The freezing air wakes Angeline and she makes her way down, down,

To the street and to life.



Around dawn, the Succubus walks back into Danny's Coffee Shop.

The Queen of the Vampires starts to crack wise, but is stopped by one lifted finger with its razor sharp red nail.

"Don't," says the Succubus,

And sits down where she was when the camera kids came in.

She is not the same.

Time will reveal whether this is a good thing or not, and time is one thing,

Along with a deep, black melancholy,

That she has plenty of.

She curls one foot underneath herself

And folds her wings back in

As if they were her dark intentions

Brought back to the roost like bats.

___________

Breakfast

Breakfast rebels.



"What makes you think," challenges a crepe,

"That you can just arrange me, serve me up and consume me? Am I not human? If you prick me, do I not bleed?"

I blink, fork in hand.

"That's strawberry juice," I point out.



Orange juice burbles, "You have taken me from my fruity womb, and poured me into this glass body, where any may stare at my nakedness!"

I have never encountered a modest breakfast drink before.



Strawberries moan, "You have rent us, and thrown us upon strangers, to die!"

"You're a fruit garnish!" I protest. "I just got up! What is this?"



"You see us only through the prism of our utility to you," whispers the entire group. "You see us as less than you, as existing only in relation to you. Shame, shame..."

"And you have made us party to it all!" shriek the plates.



"But I'm hungry," I plead weakly.



Whipped cream implores us sweetly, "Can't we all just get along?"



I drink some of my coffee, and am denounced as a murderess and a heartless savage.

The stand-off drags on.



"You are getting cold," I point out.

"We are frozen in our resolve, impenetrable in our determination," declares breakfast.



"Look here," I say, "It's early. I brought you into this world and I can take you out!"



"Liberty! Equality!" chants breakfast.



"All right. I've had enough. Time for the Ultimate Weapon!" I set the plate in the microwave and turn it on.

"Monster!"

I laugh dementedly.

"Our younger siblings, lunch and dinner, will avenge us!"

And then it is silent, except for the little bell dinging.

"Ask not for whom the bell tolls," I intone, setting my plate back on the table. "It tolls for thee!"



I begin to eat.

My dog looks up at me accusingly.

"Et tu, Bosco?"

He licks his lips.
_________

Denise Endormi

The succubus is having a latte at Danny's when some dark haired chick walks in with a panther and they grab a booth.

The chick wears killer boots.

"Bitch," mutters the succubus, before finishing off the latte.

Poor succubus.

It's only eight, no sleepers to stalk, but she gets up and makes for the door anyway.

"Nice boots," she says to the chick, with a wink. The panther stops shredding the booth with its claws and fixes its yellow eyes on the succubus.

Its lip curls up, revealing gleaming canines and dangerous intent.

The cheap silverware lifts off the table and bends from the charge in the air.

The succubus leans close, her red lips nearly touching the ebony ear of the cat.

"Honey...don't you ever sleep?"

They hiss at each other for a moment, and then the succubus is off like a prom dress, out the door and into the street.

If you're thinking of becoming a succubus,

This one could tell you

It's not all daisies and puppy dogs.

Sometimes,

Succubi sit home on a Friday night just like anybody else.

But not this time.

After smoking for a few hours with a gargoyle on the roof of the Frank. J. Wabeek building,

She crosses the street and slips in a window.

She creeps down the hall.

"Nice Muchas," she thinks, admiring the prints of vintage advertising art on the walls.

Then she is slipping through a doorway and into someone's dreams.

In this dream, there are chocolate trees and caramel streets.

In this dream, the sky leans down and kisses any woman walking by.

In this dream, Brazilian music plays and there is the constant feeling of sultry anticipation.

The succubus knows

She is there to steal a soul.

She also knows

She can't.

Slowly, the way hot fudge melts ice cream,

She settles in next to the sleeper, wrapping herself around her like a sarong.

"Mmm...Chloe," she murmurs helplessly.

"Uh huh," comes the soft reply, and then the arms, the butterscotch lips that everybody needs, even demons.

In the morning, the sleeper turns out to be a waitress named Denise.

She goes to work, lets herself in, and starts the coffee.

She smiles, thinking about the succubus,

Hoping that when she gets back, her apartment will not be empty;

And,

In the middle of all these early morning daydreams,

She sets down a saucer of cream

For the panther

Asleep like a baby

In booth #5.

__________

Lives Of The Saints

I'm actually pretty quiet.

Honest.

It's just my head keeps coming crashing down through the rest of me like a

Bowling ball down the front staircase;

And if that's not gauche enough,

It's got ma name on it.

It looks like

I won't get that part

In Swan Lake after all--

Never mind all the parts I was handed and spat upon

Cos I got no more manners

Than a pig at the State Fair.

My body has played dirty tricks

All my life,

But the better part of me

Floats like a lantern on a lily pad

Inside--

Just try getting in if I don't want you there.

The entrance is piled high with bones.

Last night I dreamt

That the hour was late

And I was far from home.

Well,

That's life.

I have my moments, though--

Mostly I flail

As if possessed by cats in a sack

And time is the river;

But in a moment of perfect bliss

When I am,

For example,

Egging my neighbor's mail box,

I am Athena with her bolts.

I am Artemis with her arrows.

I am hanging out with God at Danny's Coffee Shop,

And when the cops come in

Asking where have you been?

God vouches for me.

"She's been right here with me, boys," she tells them just as sweet as honey rolling off a warm biscuit,

And I whisper,

"Oh You

Are so cute

When You lie!"

_________

This poem is dedicated to Dulce and to Mama Zen. Danny's? Three-ish?

Single White Succubus

(The succubus has fans. More succubus poems they say. Okie dokie artichokees!)

The succubus stops at Danny's coffee shop in the cool oyster morning.

Some guy is waving his arms and pontificating.

"When I was on 20/20..." he drones.

I'll send my mad friend the incubus to that guy's house tonight, she thinks, wrapping her beautiful fingers around a chipped mug filled with steaming tea.

The succubus is a working girl,

All night she enters the minds of sleepers wrapped up in their blankets like little human burritos.

Some of them sleep in pairs, as if they were earrings set on a dresser.

Just because I'm a succubus, she thinks,

Doesn't mean I wouldn't like to be asked out on a Saturday night.

Sometimes the most beautiful girls end up watching tv

In their bath robes

With a clicker, not a lover, at hand.

As if I would steal a date's spirit, she argues indignantly with a sugar packet.

Work is work, and love is love, and that's that.

She sighs.

I'm just tired, she tells herself.

She gazes out the window.

I'm really quite sweet, I think. Given a chance.

There is a businesswoman passing by the newspaper machines in front of Danny's.

She is chattering importantly on a cell phone,

Holding it the way peasants once held icons.

The guy in the booth behind her is still holding forth.

"When I was on The View..."

The succubus purses her lips and her eyes go as dark as bibles.

The businesswoman makes a face and stops dead in her tracks, looking at her cell phone as if it had just turned into a dog turd.

The man behind the succubus curses sharply.

Somehow, his hot coffee has been upset onto his big fat lap, interrupting his story about Good Morning America.

Well, darn.

Two women sitting together in the back start laughing.

The succubus feels appreciated.

It may not be such a bad day after all.

____________

Dishin'

Some pendejo from the neighborhood

Finds a cure for cancer,

And dandruff,

And invents lojack for lost socks

And just like that, whoopee, King of the World.

Well, if you ask me,

It was just dumb luck.

I knew the dude in first grade.

He ate paste,

And when Jenny McDougall told him to lick the frozen tether-ball pole,

He was gonna do it.

Now he parks his ass in this coffee shop, taking up the whole damn booth,

Waving his arms like a crack-headed baboon.

Everything's

"When I was on Oprah..."

And

"When I was on Dateline..."

Til ya wanna shove a fork down his big fat throat.

Now listen, I'm glad he did all that stuff

But madre dios, does he have to talk about it til everybody wants to puke?

What?

Oh, pop your eyes back in your head, you hate him too, you just act like, oh, he's so great cos he got your car started last week.

Well, girlfriend, I can't hang around here,

I got stuff to do.

What, just stuff, ok?

Oh, scuuuse me, I'm not some luck-out fat shithead man, curing cancer and la de da.

I got laundry and then my shows.

Oh, fuck you.

Ha, looking at me like I got lipstick on my teeth or that.

See ya, Gorgeous. Say hi to that man of yours for me. Tell him I said get a job. Yeah well, maybe so, but one that brings in a paycheck.

Love ya. Mwah.

Watch Dateline Boy crack his neck watching my ass on the way out.

Cure that!

Never happen, I'm tellin' ya.

__________