facing the wall

2012-01-26T20:58:00.000+08:00

thank you and i'm sorry
tell me it's break time

this apple did not even try
to fall far

2012-01-24T14:07:00.003+08:00

an idea on the side of your head
pains you and is unsightly.

from there the bulge grows

chicken poxes itself all over

your body is a quiet bitch

it takes what you feed it,
faking till you fall asleep.

2012-01-24T00:59:00.001+08:00

when things get really bad, she rips her face off, piece by piece.

2012-01-23T12:21:00.004+08:00

mom doesn't see like she used to.
she knows, but she doesn't say so.

2012-01-23T04:40:00.002+08:00

firework fingers
flash-frozen faces

2012-01-21T01:00:00.001+08:00

all is guilt

2012-01-20T00:09:00.004+08:00

i am a stand-in
for my good friend
here be the words
of an eternal life
on earth as it is
in heaven.

eighteen years later

2012-01-16T23:40:00.001+08:00

in a different country
as a different person
lost again
when she turned her back

no terror, just embarrassment
still from the same feeling
of abandonment
detached from the hand

this time
played out like normal
the event did not dilate
i'd already turned and left

there was no mother to find,
nor crowds to break through.
there were rows and rows,
ordered and static

awaiting their days of consumption,
i passed through them all, exited,
took my scarf off, slung it over,
and went upstairs to find you.

2012-01-16T23:31:00.003+08:00

you can only eat so much plain.
should you have the sugar sprinkled?
should you have the butter and jam.

you should have it.
then you shall have more.

brazil nuts.

2012-01-13T11:09:00.000+08:00

she says as i force the wrench down
do you know people can go crazy
thinking about someone, thinking

my aunt waited for her daughter
every day at the train station
for a train that never came

how easy transportation is these days
i'd walked from dawn to midnight
now there are hundreds of readymade lines

and there are more underground

2012-01-13T00:35:00.000+08:00

behind you there is a girl in red

she is laughing with her head atilt

her left foot is lifted her sandal slipping

her bag has just dropped to her elbow

the fire speck looks like an earring

beside her face

there is another

you are smiling at her the way she holds

your hand

thin

how it fits.

2012-01-12T22:34:00.001+08:00

you sound like a fortune cookie
who doesn't give a shit.

2012-01-12T00:11:00.001+08:00

the homeless dog follows you
because you feed him.

2012-01-11T17:22:00.001+08:00

like a straw through the yogurt bag
suck it all out

2012-01-09T19:05:00.001+08:00

red pulls on a train of snow
empty the house of people

a vacant car
with a pile of nothing

a grove of middle-aged trees
stand losing their hair

the very last word
was buried last winter.

2012-01-06T20:54:00.004+08:00

From water to mud, the goldfish dulls,
sinks to home in a long winter's journey.
The river soft, runs through my hand.
Sounding whispers, time turns gentle.

quotable.

2011-12-30T23:54:00.001+08:00

i don't know much

all i know is

i'd play with it

and fuck it up

because i fuck up everything i have

2011-12-30T15:14:00.002+08:00

let us be
geniuses of another kind

2011-12-29T21:49:00.001+08:00

in the kitchen

you cut your finger

until it falls clean off

waiting for the scream

that never comes, but
hell, it's bleeding.

2011-12-28T12:01:00.002+08:00

between the valleys
there is a crag
and on that crag
an elegant man

the water is shallow
the winds are soft
they carry off
the hat from his head

his hand reaches
but too late
the hat is gone
cradled by water

his scarf flows
his feet rise
his head looks up
and his eyes look down

the valleys are tall
and so is the man
he grows until he reaches
the blankness below.

2011-12-27T09:49:00.000+08:00

i am the good substitute,
the second choice, next

to the last in your list
of fears. This year,

i will keep you warm
enough, for the time being.

At seven am, the sun
fights to crack through,

bleeding the gray to make
light of today.

What is there is all we have,
and it is better than chasing

when you're lazy in the morning,
and even worse at night.

2011-12-22T09:00:00.001+08:00

the last cough drop.

mother

2011-12-21T23:21:00.002+08:00

little by little
the water trickles
down down the baby
drowning in the hole

the tree the canopy
breaks through the sky
falls through the infant
chewing out her way

2011-12-21T09:57:00.000+08:00

the shame has been here,
scattered about on the floor,
collecting dust, losing dust.

the question is, why are you walking in the woods at this time?

2011-12-20T00:43:00.000+08:00

out in the woods, mom turns back and tells me to watch out for the slippery mud parts. i try to avoid stepping in her footprints, but really, everything is muddy after it rains, and what's the point of trying to stay clean when you're walking in the woods after a rain?

2011-12-18T19:49:00.002+08:00

cold drones. empty cups.
broken stones, thinning bracelets.
afternoon...then night.

the hour only comes into the house through the back door now.

2011-12-17T13:35:00.003+08:00

is it bad that i am used to boredom?
i can sit here and be fine with it.
it feels a bit tiring, a bit useless.

i feel wasteful, but i have adjusted my watch.

today, her voice is setting my peace on fire.
i watch it curl up and burn. she talks into the phone.
she raises the volume of the fire when he says no.

i see the smoke.
she touches and tickles the ceiling.
she is rising but has nowhere to go.

the ceiling squirms.
the ceiling has never moved before.
the smoke insists.

come.
come.
come.

the smoke pleads in her slow way,
playful in grace at first but now
she is crying, angry at the rejection

of today's blankness. there is so much
boredom and she has never felt it like this before.
she walks into the bathroom and closes the door.

she looks into the mirror and fills the space.
she looks at herself and every bit looks the same.

when words fall out

2011-12-17T11:37:00.000+08:00

when words fall out unnoticed it's not that they disappear. you can pull up the history and look, there they are. but no one eats stale bread. people put stale bread in bread puddings, or tomato soups. you have to recycle them into something new. you either eat the bread fresh from the oven, or you make bread pudding.

or you throw it out and try to forget about it.

placements.

2011-12-17T00:58:00.003+08:00

tonight, to replace what is not
here: all sprawled: the camera,
the computer, the orange winter
jacket with the barely warm hood,
the handmade book that is now
the journal of tedious worrying
over the things my mouth touches
that my body refuses to forget,
the crumbs of tonight's numerous
snack foods and fleeting fulfillments,
two reddish pink pens issued by the school,
the stack of notebooks fingered loose,
atop the clipboard with the schedule,
curling up at the corners of each day,
the cellphone that denies the existence
of certain voices, especially
in crowded places--some think
it's a piece of crap, i think it is
just shy--the stray
hairs from last week,
the remainders of dirty jeans
rubbed all over with grimy hands,
dusty roads, the city's exhales,
exhaust, ecstasy, and i am
here, all sprawled, alone.

Gradiva imprisoned.

2011-12-16T00:06:00.002+08:00

the town is down today.
the shops are closed.
in the restaurant, the wife
cooks and eats for herself
alone. and she grows fat.
when her husband comes
he will only smile. his words
are always kind. his jokes
well-padded like winter clothing.
there is protection against the cold
but when the skin thaws from the freeze
there is a moment of sharp unbearable
numbness. the pain that resides until
the feeling is lost on the nerves.
there is surrender. one adapts.
one is thankful for the sun
in this town of limited follies.
there is the daily madman
that hides until nightfall.
he waits for her then.
she does not know.
she waits for him, her
husband, who is late,
again. she eats, a spoon
to her face, slow and reflective.
she does not stop. this is all there is
to hold. this is all there is to the day.
outside is a place she cannot care for.
the husband is coming. the madman waits.
she does not know yet she is pregnant.

translation.

2011-12-14T23:40:00.000+08:00

neighboring chapters

warring in a table of contents:

the cyclical discontent droops above

the ruins. the eagle turns into the vulture.

you stare into a cereal bowl of the past

in two dimensions: a polaroid filmcard

cries dry. hollywood tears, a homecoming

of yesteryear stars, a welcoming that flows

from underneath

the rash.

nearby, the milkcow has just died.

the crippled nun stares at it

from across the way, her mind brandishing

a crown for the holy creature.

in which i see only the inside of my eyelids.

2011-12-14T22:20:00.003+08:00

i do not like it.
you do not tell me

you are leaving.
i am not awake.

when i wake up
and you are gone

i have finally been
broken out

from a dream
suddenly alone

in a repeat
of a childhood.

my eyes are closed
and they all turn back

a memory that scares
the grown-up part.

2011-12-12T22:37:00.001+08:00

the comfort of being close
so together feels like nothing
simple room temperature air

in the summer the sweat
gently sinking cotton sheets
the sun playing on curtain skin

in the winter you'd complain
so for the colic infant a blanket
and a hug to sooth the cries

a gesture often repeated
goes gently unnoticed
as fall with the leaves

drifting down
so calmly
no hurry

to reach a dying that happens
quietly life carries on without it
the comfort of being close

2011-12-08T23:23:00.001+08:00

the younger stranger on the train looks at you and you look back. you wonder if the stranger is looking at you because there's something about you, or because there's something on you. you're staring at each other when, finally, another stranger comes between your two gazes, trying to reach the designated seat as told by the ticket in hand.

she is your age. she looks normal, and is sitting as normal people tend to do. her right hand is concentrated on an object of interest on her left hand, her index and middle finger occupied by the comfortably routine task of turning a silver ring round and round.

you feel tempted to ask her about the ring she keeps in motion: the hand is running on a schedule, programmed to carry out a most unchallenging sisyphean act...not in boredom, but in waiting.

how it began: the interim; the leftover meal.

2011-12-05T20:32:00.007+08:00

prologue.

in the beginning there were words, so we began with words, and with words we were.
when the day came we didn't know. in place of words, an eternal waiting: from one to the other we threw a string, fishing for each other's missing parts: a hand to grasp on to, and two lips to speak. when favorite moments of the night ran blank like paper burning into smoke, a terror escaped. from the place between our ribs to the door of one of our nostrils, it tore at the air inside like a restless infant, and upon arrival was expelled by a long exhale.

...

our heads too heavy for our age say nothing for the fear but think without paying heed to the lights at the intersection which are forever green, even when yellow, even when red, even when our police car tails us with its sirens screeching: we run out from underneath the law of restraints we'd set in place and the smell of the sweets you had smelled are always delicious, because you'd never tasted. bones lost in the soft skin like any other soft skin, in any other bed, on a cloud of cigarette smoke wandering like chronic drifters in a crowded bar

we wish we could be mature about this like our parents were, when they were still married.

one day we will, and we will hate our selves for betraying us.

...

epilogue.

some nights it rained; some nights it snowed. but the lines remained so still, frozen into winter. fingers grew cold. and the words never showed.

and so the fishermen gave up their posts, and returned home to remove their boots. that night they waited for their wives' voice to melt, warmed in memories that had been frozen for too long. there was nothing else on the dinner table.

2011-12-03T21:40:00.001+08:00

a lover's paper weight is intent on self-empowerment. who says paper beats only rock. paper beats glass. paper beats on the expectations of mundane rooms. wheels of the train railing on the steel. all the loose screws. all the cracks that grew. once the book fell the ground fell too. we looked on.

2011-12-03T21:34:00.000+08:00

smoked seeds, empty shells
after the mud a litter of rain:
walk on, harried bikes

2011-12-03T21:30:00.002+08:00

signs to foreigners:
happy christmas holiday!
shop here. we are low.

2011-12-03T21:29:00.001+08:00

liquid red glass light
candle fire people chatter
in the mouth and throat

2011-12-02T07:43:00.004+08:00

the moon melts on
a tongue rubbed raw
tangerine mold
dropping down.

2011-11-28T19:53:00.002+08:00

if, after dinner,
all those words were
CC'ed to her.

2011-11-24T09:23:00.001+08:00

writing empty on the meaty arm.

capture

2011-11-23T09:49:00.000+08:00

by means of obscene moments
the slight coloring mother gave me
the birthmark i thought was gone
the picture that does not lie
the lighting that darkens and stays.

2011-11-22T09:47:00.002+08:00

the heater sounds like it will explode and i'm sure one of these days it will.
at night i hear it click like the turn of a burglar lock.
in the morning it churns quietly.
the crescendo that i can't escape.
it grows and blow my hair,
invisible air rising.
the winter has come and the skies wait for the turns of weather.
today it was pink and purple in ascending order.

winter morning haiku.

2011-11-22T09:40:00.004+08:00

temperature dropping
steam from the urine fountain
quaint rural China.

when i woke up for the second time today

2011-11-13T11:07:00.003+08:00

the sun sliced through
the vertical blinds

covering the window
and me in our bedroom.

childhood
and its memories

warm, golden,
and piercing.

advice.

2011-11-11T12:56:00.005+08:00

i have loved myself for too long

my father tells me

now is time for hate:

balance is everything:

where there is no want

go there

of that which has no pleasure

do so.

speak and follow
your own commands:

in and under,
surrounded by power.

reason for staying in.

2011-11-11T12:51:00.001+08:00

take off the sweater but not the feeling of the day

grabbed from the city outside and brought in like mud

dirty shoes represent

the reluctant wearer

a limp and

deflated bounce

2011-11-10T19:02:00.000+08:00

I _____ when you are not here and i _____ constantly until i run out.
I cry sometimes and it's healthier, but healthier's not the right word.
When I _____ I don't enjoy it.
EVerything fades a little by a little until there is nothing left but the motion.
And the motion continues until I feel too sorry for myself to continue.
Or until I get sick.
I _____ when I want to stop time.
I _____ when I want to focus on the one thing that has pleasure within reach.
I _____ until the pleasure goes away and then I fall on my bed, stomach down, sad and heavy.
Some nights are worse than others.
What I _____ is good until i make it bad.
I _____ when I want to do nothing.
I _____ until I can do nothing else.

double a batteries

2011-11-09T09:37:00.001+08:00

coming down the stairs i rock
back but not soon enough so
many missteps and moments gone
to the next level of pain hitting later
with a couple of rolling cracks
the bone begs to be left alone
and so it is. the re-injury of tonight
remembers the last time it was
hurting so badly on the field of grass
in spikes and softly tumbling down
to the surprise of others, i mean
why does she fall down so easily?

2011-10-20T16:50:00.001+08:00

but a jar that refuses to be opened
should be left alone to sit.

chatting with melissa.

2011-10-20T08:04:00.002+08:00

you know what

there are happy things already

i just need to hug them closer and feel them there

2011-10-20T07:34:00.004+08:00

in the morning, a muffled burst.
water cooler clicks before it heats.

i hear the click, wait for the boil.

the water turns, the water burns,
nerves exposed, all breaking down,

so confident of its fate and strength.

leaves, unfurling, end to end.

the water's turmoil makes my tea.

2011-10-13T18:33:00.002+08:00

"a
more complex consideration of the identity over time"

2011-10-12T01:23:00.000+08:00

broken hands
stay up all night
waiting for another
word

simply wonder

2011-10-09T08:30:00.003+08:00

if night has overtaken day
or if day has embraced night.

their children are beautiful, glittering
seeds that burst slowly and grow

diluted across the span of distance,
a few years, some universal memories.

so many tiny drops of spilled milk,
cries unheard from too far off.

the stinkbugs struggle against their trapping.
the neighborhood cow lows.

2011-10-08T11:12:00.001+08:00

(this is not a priority.)

say it right, when you find the answer

2011-10-08T07:26:00.001+08:00

of all the women in the room the light falls
on her who stands bent at the neck and knee
falls into her tall glass of october morning fog

the question wanders away to leave the lovers
their own concerns distant from unfaithful voices
broken at the endsound of the last step off a train

curveball.

2011-10-07T16:27:00.000+08:00

charms of everyday living:
waking up at the sounding
bells on record, echoing
repeats of their own

repeating letters of exchange
thrown off of mountainsides
carrying questions you've had
for a while, now you look for it:

the sounds of falling answer you

if there are any stars
the sky is happy at night,
and if there is none at all
it will wait for the day after.

2011-10-06T14:19:00.003+08:00

gone fishing gone
bracelet hooks the wrist
strings and needle patch
the changes back and forth.

2011-10-04T06:51:00.001+08:00

fingers all walk down the street, and pinky tries to catch up.

2011-10-03T09:45:00.002+08:00

the curtains are soft and dry.

thursday. dirty unused tissues collect dust bunnies on the floor.

2011-09-29T15:20:00.004+08:00

i have moved off the page and there is no excuse for my absence.
two or three persimmon pits lodged in between the heart
and spine, feels the pulse of the afternoon drums played
by a child's grimy hands stinking of eggs left out to rot,
what a waste. what a waste of pen on paper and colors
bleeding through the marker tip, sucking
every last bit of disintegrating chalk
falling down like snowflakes on a pretty day,
dandruff on a bad day, or dead skin cells,
dead silence, just chalk dust. disinterest, it is
never as good as you think it'd be, never
as bad as you thought it was, feet stomping down
right before the next steps fall, clock work rhythm,
fine and functional, though not ideal. manmade patterns
break and convene, move like an ant puddle
feasting on the street spilling sweet refuse.

2011-09-27T20:40:00.004+08:00

i am a boy
and i am a liar

of all the things
my mother is my world

she is beautiful
she is faint

of all the things
she is my world

i am a girl
and i am a liar

there is nothing
i have not seen

today it rains
tomorrow it shines

so over and around
i turn and turn

what have you done
to make it stop

there is nothing
i have not seen

i am your mother
faint, beautiful, world

a question unanswered
yellowing away.

on the wall

2011-09-27T00:32:00.000+08:00

handsome names
sticker tags
pink stars
mosquito guts.

2011-09-26T21:25:00.001+08:00

so heavier and heavier alice fell
her dress a puddle on the floor
where the mushroom sat tall and strong
a ruined piece of earth

the kids could not resist their hands.

until happy.

2011-09-25T22:49:00.005+08:00

seriously tried once
to think about the kitchen,
the pantry, and all its bottles
rattling their insides.

baby wants to know how
she came awake,
pushed from the warm
sleep of an eternal love.

she grew into her water
and there she flailed,
head heaved above the line,
afraid to drown.

baby's sore neck clenched
from swimming, the water
coloring her chlorine lips,
sogging limbs confused,

trying to figure out
how to change properly
an inhale for an exhale
without choking in air.

baby rattles her head
sometimes, to hear
the world is going
blindly bumbles

with the sounds preceding
the cries: that of a creaking bed,
oddly paced footsteps during the day,
and at night again, the death of a lightbulb.

baby would like to know
how many books
how many lovers
how many bottles

in a happy year,
if, holding all things
constant, the people never change,
and the questions laid to rest,

to reach and
cradle steady
your self, then
someone else's.

baby sees the other lost
bodies trying in the winter,
to find their own
warmer waters

but she knows what it is
is hot ginger soup from a bowl,
melting down the lonely tongue,
sweating it mutely out in bed.

2011-09-25T19:29:00.002+08:00

some of my dreams come true sometimes.

window panes.

2011-09-22T08:02:00.004+08:00

cried looking at mother's aging face
her sunspots dark with age

lips open
lips retreating

every bug i trap here dies

and for every one
a little more pain

their corpses litter
the new wooden floors

panel after panel
of growing old

babies at their parents'
funerals.

picture from early august.

2011-09-21T20:55:00.003+08:00

midsummer
her hair a tamed
mess the fire
his hand and hers
mixture of eyes
fire lights
her temperate face
biting stars
swallowing words

on her wrist
his warm beer spilling
the ground is cooling
the moon is coming

behind the clouds
taller trees than dreams
from the shadows
climb the souls.

2011-09-20T18:13:00.001+08:00

full belly of disgrace
wishes to run fast
past the boys
grabs and jeers
pigtails go on pigs
and ponies are made to break
short legs wear down
at the heel of two long days
weeks go off the bridge

fire would be born in water
had the river lived through the drought

if i let them burn me
would i be a good girl?

2011-09-19T21:51:00.002+08:00

i saw one taller than the rest
burning high to crumble down
beneath them all i stand to know
which princess today will be

in the carriage she sits upright
glassy eyes and soft taint lips
her hair and neck and bones all clear
her dress a curtain stained with rose

down the road the horses pulled
running the whip screams the mane
the rocks beat dust and the dust beats on
one fatal bump and the princess falls down

her hair and neck and bones all clear
her dress a curtain stained with rose.

2011-09-18T20:35:00.007+08:00

1.
forgetting last week like you forgot the past

two decades of life like two wet socks

from yesterday's downpour washing clean

the streets splashing traffic on your skin

2.
from high above the flooding puddles
second looks plop down
a landscape of eyes
wide and shot blank

in the face of strangers

reflecting us

we are something of the glass variety
kept behind the local display of the familiar
novelties sold on corners
half-priced with bad weather

4.
we sleep on our shoulders
at odd angles and hours

all heads and necks creased
and tucked in secret at night

at night we slipped to escape the glass

the glass fell through to the floor

floored between a thousand gaping hands

hands all with their eyes closed

closed for the evening of nightmares
nightmares and dreams

6.
the elevator carries up broken mirrors
and disabled hands come down
detached at the waist
then rejoined in bed

7.
a neonlit child calls.
her lost shadows form an assembly line
out under the dim red cross,
the echoes of her mother,
a mother,
no mother.

(she will learn how to share
all things good in time)

8.
in departure there is return

9.
to the caged monkey
i will sing

10.
full belly, full moon,
go sliver by sliver,
she left us
all alone
in a land of strangers
stranger than we,
no belly, no moon
to walk by tonight,
no belly, no moon
warm dark to cold light.

http://asofterworld.com/index.php?id=532

2011-09-16T01:15:00.001+08:00

2011-09-14T19:55:00.007+08:00

the walls are bare
the mosquitoes full

the buildings dirty
so easily

the children play
the children fall

careless steps
on the stairwell slide

motorbikes riding
on ghosts of dust

mimic the missing
clouds on ground

2011-09-14T18:25:00.001+08:00

today's dream rose
in a pot of oil

bubbles marched in line formation
held limping crickets

and dried moth corpses
poured out the throat

of a mute little girl
spilled on the floor

and down through the holes
of the mice who scrambled

before breakfast was made.

2011-09-14T00:36:00.000+08:00

the breakdown of a ping-pong ball
along in the local river current
breathing water and giving air
bobbing for a little more time

2011-09-13T02:27:00.002+08:00

in a blink before sleep
i lay next to the burn out man

dead light tainted with the dust
summer collected and abandoned

the flies hover
the ceiling
overhead hangs

a three-fingered helicopter
disabled in flight

he who stopped for a longer rest
became too lazy to get up again.

2011-07-29T00:16:00.000+08:00

mama spider catches her web
her babies are on the way
she goes up
she goes down
trailblazing through
the window dust

she is a tired body today
her babies are waiting
the dust is waiting
the window is waiting

the sky puts on the mountains
a gray raincoat

then mama spider shakes
climbing up the glassy slope.

2011-07-24T20:17:00.000+08:00

change of pictures, change of people, change of place, and story, and feelings, and love, it just doesn't ever stay the same as when we left that sidewalk under the lights on, lights off, weird cats, tall trees, bright minds, dark rooms, a bare bed, i washed the semester-long grime and hoped the next time the glasses clinked, you'd remember who it was that night.

backwards meaning.

2011-06-29T19:15:00.002+08:00

i like wearing shirts backwards.
does this have any significance?

probably not.

will i assign it one?

yes.

and who can you love if they are dying all the time?

2011-06-29T01:48:00.007+08:00

the crises of yesterday are stomped on by the crises of today, but they fight hard for breath and kicking space.

obsession finds those with too much wasted time and what if i wonder about the weather where i don't live anymore or rather

never lived

is that a crime?

or just freakish behavior

i found what they said long ago to be true but
it was too long ago for me to remember its significance so now i have to learn on my own
for myself and this obsession
with knowing and having always already caught the answer in one hand and dismantling with the other well

what do you say to someone who knows everything

and what do you say to someone who thinks she knows everything

and are you any different?

that is the question you keep asking yourself because
really are you any different?

whatever the answer, you begin to calm down a little
the hardest question has been laid on the table now

but it is not painless
self-interrogation

the hands in your head fiddle absent-mindedly and manages to touch nothing but nerves

a drawn-out affair to take place preferably in front of the mirror, but if you are too lazy, like i am, right here will be fine.

first, how often does the object of obsession cross your mind?

second, elaborate.
you know you want to.

like, how hard do you try to cross it out of your mind or do you embrace it and write about it or try?

so third, is this helping at all and if not what will you do afterward to jolt yourself out of this daze

if only that fan were working, the room would be much cooler and the plants might look happier for once

empty applications and cards of identification are lying

all over the place

hair begins to shine & grow faster, thicker,
as promised in shampoo commercials
but in your dreams they take over the rest of your body
and you lose all of your friends

what good is proof of identification if you are
constantly changing, and God,
that is an ugly picture with your face on it,
wonder if you can change it this time?

.

on dad's birthday, but not about dad; replaceable years.

2011-06-28T10:41:00.006+08:00

watermelon juice
distracted hands
dripping the sink
running water
run the bill
wonder if electricity
can kill down here
get some soap
rub it in
wash the grease
pull the plug
watch it drain
down the hole
take the trash
wash it down
cut the rind
smash it up
call me
crazy summer's
too hot
walk the distance
walk it back
repeat
i quit
i quit
but maybe just one
more, what's another
june then july
then i am just one month
in a string of all the rest.

helpless cats.

2011-06-27T13:45:00.006+08:00

you do not like poems
which is good

because i cannot write poems
(though this is far worse).

you call for me this time,
but i am impossible now

and words just won't do,
not when the cat's gone

missing.
what have we tonight?

there is no one to fight with
and the couch is all yours.

suddenly, no one wants
to sit there alone.

you will wait. you will
wait until the cat comes

back through the back door
(do you have a back door

for the cat?) because that
will set your day in place

again. routine places,
routine bodies, all present

when the sun rises in the morning,
as it travels to the other side,

and when it disappears
again. you will wait,

awake or asleep,
until the morning.

you know it will come back.

.

torrefying.

2011-06-24T09:55:00.005+08:00

my life repeats
every four years

by then my ground
has gone, has come

and from inside
exists another

voice of mine, new
but already old

by this time
when we start again

step into the water
when i have to

waiting for its temper
to rise match my skin

but my skin never stays on
the water coming down

chanting my bites of the day
spitting my father's

disapproval in my face
the echoes of the new

echoes of the old
already my voice.

a deepening

2011-06-24T01:23:00.000+08:00

sinkhole.

2011-06-22T20:43:00.001+08:00

xenogenic?

2011-06-22T12:30:00.000+08:00

my toes are numb and so
i can't feel where i'm walking now
though sometimes
that is more than i'd need to know

my hair looks especially good tonight
after a shower and some cheap shampoo
my father bought some months ago
on sale

the bottle says it's supposed to smell
like kiwis, and it looks green
like kiwis, and it looks green
like kiwis, straight out of a nice hot shower.

and it's awful.

2011-06-21T21:21:00.009+08:00

she says to me
i never feel hungry anymore

and it's awful
how these cells
pullulate & break her
softened borders, hiding her
bones underneath these days,
burying them long & deep like a worried dog

2011-06-21T13:12:00.001+08:00

(does it mean much when it's so easily said,
or are you just braver than i am?)

(what else can you do with/the change in your hands?)

2011-06-21T06:24:00.010+08:00

the animals dream of human lovemaking
themselves, actors
in a gentle wave of curiosity
as if this were not their nature
and all the uncertainties of a child
still present, in the way the bodies
morph into one another
like carnival dancers engaged
in a magical warfare, for entertainment
purposes, only, taking
unknown steps in the blue
crossing over the yellow twilight,
who wishes it might be
another color tonight,
for it has heard people say,
pink is the more beautiful...

at this hour, you can hear music,
and the elephants' stomping affirms
your reality, the last blaring roars
from a starving tiger's mouth,
shakes the cage that contains
all the faces that can be seen:
all who are dressed like kings
and his many unhappy queens,
flanked sparsely by angels here
and there, fallen to be lowly
ladies in waiting
with crowding tangles for hair,
and for wings, gaudy pieces
that tatter and fly away in the wind.

it is a patchwork playground
with plastic flowers painted in
a hidden corner of the camp,
which she picks from the floor and plants
   in her head in the yellowing light,

this carnival dancer
   will twirl for you, for a time,
   in place; at the end
   of her last revolution,
   she will turn to you to say
   and for the right price,
   it can all be bought.

[draft]

2011-06-21T06:08:00.001+08:00

your daddy's breathing snores sounding like time tunnels about to collapse
daddy
daddy wake up daddy
wake up.

2011-06-21T05:28:00.001+08:00

this week i have no courage to deny myself,
though the rejection would have hurt less.

from that country/when things don't stay

2011-06-21T05:13:00.004+08:00

her clear eyes sent from your homeland
it is vacation and a child's day
and her a child's face, a child's hair
clipped in place by a jeweled clutch
a child's smile is there
and so she plays to record the moments
in which you see, behind the fading colors,
yourself loving her more and more

in my absence, i grow
less fond but fatter, a single
but broken piece
of sponge, full of holes
dirty from use, soaking up
the splatters from the kitchen
counter, moved by an aging
hand i can no longer

recognize, nor do i care to, now--
it does not matter,
today, anymore.

.

in response to sarah's notepoem.

2011-06-21T05:06:00.000+08:00

(and the second hand drums on your right temple, the minute hand on your left, until all you can do is invent word after word out of a set of letters not of your own choosing.)

2011-06-20T02:32:00.001+08:00

to retreat to the comforts of being
soft to the touch like a plum in august
dark and tanned to its purpling nature
ripe to its boundaries now
too bodied to be like the rest
at the stand by the roadside
it waits--
will you stop and choose
the perfect one for today
or will it go on and rot
until purple turns to black,
fresh to freshly carcassed?

2011-06-18T05:29:00.002+08:00

fat sinking into
the living room couch
my bed is lonely
my parents do not approve.

some words of things on the way back home

2011-06-15T14:27:00.002+08:00

strawberry nuzzle
resistance and the hollow
after the first big bite

grotesquely creamed
skies spilled
and curdled sweet

2011-06-11T03:59:00.000+08:00

embers we stare

the glow powering

down, slow

this is when the night

2011-06-09T15:22:00.001+08:00

imagine me, then.