Your Heart

Now, after the fact, like a glitterbomb coroner,

I want to have another look at your heart.

My microscope went blind last time--

I squeezed it too hard, like a sponge when I'm angry-cleaning.

I was too fascinated, sappy,

needful as a driver in a wreck.

Bring me an ambulance in the shape of a spyglass.

I want to find my own ghost.

I thought your bones were made from hard cane,

your hair caramelized smoke.

I wore a white coat (as if I knew something),

glasses made from willow switches, and a half moon smile.

Relax, I told you, but it was me in the coma.

Now--please hold still for once. These worms aren't good,

like the plastic model I saw at the vet's. Your heart,

like the plastic kitchen I used to play with,

practicing to be a fly that would bite you one day.

Eat my attention, it's good for you.

Each worm burrowed there is something I said,

some of which I meant--the rest was practice for a role. 

Let me pull one out like a string, pull it and it speaks this poem,

a pretty wasp with a stinger where the truth pools. 

I am too harsh, I know. I am the laundress who bleaches everything,

a maniac for killing the invisible baddies, a hospital candy striper

performing unauthorized tests that do nothing, or at least,

don't cure or induce any useful fevers.

I have your results. I'll bring them down to the morgue where my

hand awaits its conclusions as if they were a ring or a nail.

Summation:

they weren't worms,

just paper streamers.

I infected you

but it made you better for a while.

the microscope cannot be repaired.

my report needs to be presented in a recognized language.

i'm sorry, truly, if i hurt you

that was never my intention.

this poem is not written in my true voice.

i was never your babe.

that was never your heart.

_______

Music: Igor Paspalj "The Thrill Is Gone"

for Desperate Poets "Illicit Encounters"

Mulberry Rain

Rain falls from the leaves 

of the mulberry outside my window--

purple berries drop from its branches 

staining the walk--

my dog tracks them into the kitchen.

I love the rain--

my noisy neighbor stops working on his truck.

The rain, the berries, my dog

all soothe me,

but I am falling, too--

just slowly.

_____ 

A 55 for my excellent BFF.

 

Cleansing

Occasionally, one must be cleansed.
Sure, you could wait on a bench at the train station for Jesus to return,
surrounded by clergymen offering judgement and asbestos underwear.
But Jesus,
in white shirt and tie,
running the afternoon shift at Chicken Barn,
would take you aside from your deep fryer duties and tell you--
cleansing should be a private thing,
a personal thing,
not subject to "likes" and "shares" or other public scrutiny. 

Come, get still within yourself.
Lay out the things you'll need:
the towel,
the candles,
the knout and the noise-reducing headphones. 

Concentrate on necessary rituals;
the curly fry placed upon your tongue,
the orange soda in the tiny dixie cup.
Find the kernel of eternity and meaning inside the absurd and the preposterous.
What I'm saying is, look within.

Take the cloth and the sweet-smelling detergent to the tabletops
of your personal dining room.
Prevent disgusting build-up of
lies,
conceits,
aggressions,
and wild profane outbursts.
Stop sleeping with everybody who asks.
Make today a changing day in your life.
Turn off Dr. Phil.  

In the end, there is no "end."
You'll need to repeat this, like lines in a stage play,
but lines that change with each new performance.
Buck up, Bo Peep.
Jesus stands ready with company protocols and his wonderful crooked grin.
His hair is long, he likes the extra crispy sandwich, 
a good joke, women, kindness.
Present the clean crescents of your fingernails to Him.
Approach your duties with pride.
Go home, empty your mind, forget the hectic lunch rush.
Be at peace.
Do it all again tomorrow.
__________

Dido

She's so proud of her jugs, but they're only full of wash water.
Who else would wear diadems and diaphanous gowns to do a load of colors?

She says she gets a weird high down there in the basement,
and tells the future to Pecky, miserable in his cage,
more fascinated with millet than prophecy.
The sun, to him, is a fairy tale;
the rattling furnace is as close to a tree as he'll ever get. 

God, I hate her. She's so nice, and so stupid.
Going through the pockets of her man's jeans, she pulls out a diamond
from among the phone numbers and weed dust.
She sticks it in her eye and starts speaking in tongues. 

For fuck's sake, the cycle's almost done,
her kid is howling upstairs because Thomas the motherfucking Tank Engine ended,
and now I have to pick up her slack while she la-dee-dah's around 
like a brain damaged nymph.
"Snap out of it!" I screech, and she blinks, then frowns,
then flips open the machine.

"When did you buy that?" I ask her. What about your precious jugs?
She waves her hand.
Her one diamond eye sparkles, the other looks vaguely up at the ceiling.
Pecky screams, apropos of nothing.
"Bless your heart," she says. 
The furnace kicks on.
Her dog comes down and circles three times, then shits next to the dryer.
"We're blessed," she adds as she hefts a plastic basket on her hip,
then turns and rises up the basement stairs 
like carbon monoxide inside a party balloon. 
_______

for Camera FLASH! at Toads.