"Carelessness" and Other Poems

Carelessness She stood at the water's edge wearing black high-top Chuck Taylors, screaming white sox, tuba-red shorts and a lilac tank top. She is squinting. The water behind her looks thickish, murky. Less than a dozen feet from her toes is an alligator, maybe watching her pose from his dank turf. She doesn't know he's there. Arithmetic The smell of sharpened pencils, Hard-to-remember symbols and tables, wrong answers and a couple of slaps. No wonder nothing adds up. Wound A deep cut of noise, her screaming at him that way. All he did was forget to listen. He said he was sorry. The wound can only be healed by sutures of silence and she won't shut up.

Samoan Laundromat She used to go to the Samoan laundromat. For company. She'd get the clothes washed, too, but she could have done that at home in her basement. She liked to listen to the Samoans talk. She didn't understand a word, but she understood the laughs. Their laughs made her feel a little bit like she was flying. Your Philosophy Over the Phone Uh-oh. Here you are again. Pouring out your take on things in your Nyquil voice and with jailhouse sincerity. Trying to sell me a taste of inspiration that even you won't swallow. If I hang up, you'll call back. Luckily, my "hmmmms" are in good shape.

One of Chagall's Paintings The calamity of dry buildings cracking crumbling fleeing faces an army of red flags approaching a blackboard sky sobbing stars Christ crucified expiring like a coupon Apostles scurrying to their hotel room "Did he really say, 'Father why has thou forsaken me?' and they whisper of Judas, one eye on the door rustling agony inside and out and Thomas, free of faith, prays for the gift of it flames sputter spit splash from the right towards the Christ He is let down from the cross ex-crucified excruciating the frenzy the vortex That painting stuck with me somehow. Twelve Years of LiCO3 Damp and frayed plaid blanket to squelch the searing images, the fiery shadows of metaphors, crimson, sputtering notions and flickering similes. A brake pedal, mean-spirited, presses down and down, asphyxiating infant poetry suffocating newborn prose. Verbs nouns fence around her heart, they whisper in her ear too low, too low dictionary burned and buried? language sentenced, imprisoned? forgotten? The lid on the pot stole the smells from the kitchen. sixty-four crayons replaced with eight and say, "Thank you." Damp blankets nourish mold.