1

Mercury Poisoning Passing the tuna fish tower today at the 24 hour Shaw's I tossed a few cans in my basket, the same watery Star Kist Select Chunk Light I swore drove me crazy and away from you. You drove sloshed through the rain and when the officer pulled you over on the interstate line, you didn't slur. He said have a nice day and it was the best day! You bought two Waffle Bowl Sundaes at the DQ and told about your stepdad. You'd never met someone who cried because you did. It was important to be drunk to have it out: I said I don't like this town the sky crushes me. You laid me out a line long and fat and the stars quit pinching. When you got caught pissing behind the dumpster on your boss's camera you stopped drinking and stayed home getting fat on low fat string cheese and Chunk Light Tuna that tasted delightful rolled up in Bisquick. You smoked and watched the windmill movie over and over and over.

2

In the nightmare where I leave you I wear your mother's hat. You scared me no more in those days but no less either. I packed on New Year's Eve, pretended not to hear you say you loved me, aren't you going to say it back, bitch? I'll come back I said and when I called to say I wouldn't I blamed it on my madness and my madness on the tuna. Here in the new digs, same city different town, I stand on tip toe and stack the cans in rows on the highest cupboard. I touch the battered lids like Braille. In them I read your name. I touch my favorite poem.

3

Amber Musk candles on the table burn slow and low heavy and block-bottomed the wicks embedded in paraffin from which the flames flash in flamboyance. I love this table even in the messy morning with coffee-rings, or now, in evening, almost dozing into dawn: here a book, there a pile of knitting. This morning the dog ate your toast. I watched him do it, moved to stop him, but the hound stole the rye into the corner. Now he licks his crotch by the TV where Michael Jackson, gushed, “I feel so alive…Can’t you feel it?” The dog-eared chlorine stained magazines, fanned across the table in those few long summer days before he flat-lined. The phonograph plays. Next door the infant cries, and Bob and Sarah go at it. I sit drawing Xs in my notebook in the chair, goose bumps in boxers in the January air into which the wax vaporizes. Between us unopened holiday cards, a magazine, my laptop, your smokes. Beside us the lights we strung up glow. Stockings hang, so much to celebrate, and

4

I can’t shake the thought of MJ’s bursting heart, his last groggy breaths. It’ll soon leave me: what is there I have not lost? Or will some day lose: this table, the winter draft, you— even the scent.

5

Tentative Goodbye Nothing falls apart by chance: I said don’t touch that vase it’s my Yaya’s. I’m scared when I leave you, I’ll be the sorry one. I scare at the violent orange of the U-Haul, other days I’m so fed up I’d jump the fence just to lie beside the 26’ Super Mover. The odor of mothballs mystifies me, the damp, cardboardy smell as they ripen in drawers, bins, steamer trunks— you throw them at the dog, you crack me up! I’ve bought you coffee and hyacinths (purple for forgiveness)—the petals flung open in a moment’s ecstasy: my heartbeat, the final bursts fireworks the smoke filled sky that lingers… I won’t leave you tonight. The city’s too colorful. I race down Moody St. to bring this cup to you. I wish you could see this: 10 AM and our landlady shops for nips in her bathrobe. She drops the change in Suzie’s jar: new jackets for the Dynamos. I’ll drop coins in her jar too because I love the way her ribbons

6

curl so tightly. I see destiny in their stubborn loop, real tenacity. I’m tangled in you— outside Dunkin’ Donuts—a line of white vans, the Global Thrift ladies, a violent orange stripe across my palm, along the life- line. On my journey to explain the logic of your objections, to drifting off to- night a sleep wrapped in delta waves and half forgotten dreams. Scarlet O’Hara’s had the baby, but oh remember Edie Sedgwick looking so posh in horizontal stripes, hailing a cab to meet Andy Warhol. I nod to Larry the local crack head and he winks back.

7

The Woman's Song —Translation from Adonis I watched you sideways, imagining how seasons and long days will age you. Then you turned and were yourself again. In my rush to set the table, I'd forgotten the wedding vase; I set it down, as if tonight was our last supper. Seagulls know the past and future: They see day drown herself at sea and wait at dawn for tomorrow. Come to me, come with me, my love— share my bread, my wine, my bed: I'll open the doors to the wind and sun; come share this last supper.

8

Visiting Hours The timbre of his voice has deepened, and the tarnish of his hair; his under eye pigment, the hollows of his cheeks, his stoop, the hue of pupils, and creases of the face. The sag of his smile hunts a deeper place to drown. In the grass between our toes: Snakes. In the wind against our skin: Daggers. Someone has slashed the pillows and now the feathers take flight into his ears.

9

Van Gogh Paints Wheat Field with Crows I am no longer a painter. He knows this in his soul. Still, he has an artist’s patience, an artist’s anger. He paints with the control of a simmering kettle. The crows on the horizon echo his heart’s flight Their wings resist earth the way the wrist fights the body’s quarantine. The chaos he paints spins: the rows of wheat, the pathways through the fields, the troubled sky— endless. But his breaths are measured and each stroke is his own breath. They march him up to the horizon and there show him the light that leads to no more light.

10

Triangles —after a photograph of Lauren Hutton by Richard Avedon The body tessellates— the acute bend at the waist the shadow that divides the clavicles a scalene shimmer of sweat above the unbutton of the v-neck the prop of the arm and the space that swims to meet it, the backwards fling of the head and subsequent underbelly of the chin: a form that mimics the sharp beak of our ancestor the dolphin— the body is fusiform, streamlined, shapes, movements smooth as sonar: graceful, obtuse—it moves through water a fraction of its supposed weight, responds as an echo to the rough touch of reflex or tidal ebb; no different from a wave, it rises, unfolds, recasts itself.

11

Lovely Thing Lola now lives alone but I lived with her two claustrophobic years and dream of her in broken REM cycles that desperate insomniac pops Klonopin and Xanax like candied nut mix that weighs on her nervous system and turns her into a waking bunch of jitters passing most nights in the bathtub the porcelain surprisingly warm but then again the water is steaming up the mirrors and steam is rising and isn’t it swell to be sweltering she’s got a real chemical (psh!) dependency that makes her act up and upset the vase on her way to the icebox where things are slow and smooth and slippery where she may wander in search of a cold breath her hair limping along the caddy until the frost reveals god god she could use some rest

12

and he carries her blinking and breathing lovely thing an ice tray that winks diamonds that cracks a smile as she does a living lovely thing

13

as you and i returning —after ee cummings see the sky got knocked back, like a shot of bourbon, into the black throat of night you trip, clumsily pressing to me the shoelace of your grin You may burn a bit darker than the toast tonight skinny dipping in sewer river as you cannon- ball: even so i'll politely swallow, tentatively tasting the carbon remedy (toast) while dozing and twitching a fact wakes and retches in the forecasted morning

14

Regards from Lower Latitudes I miss you on murky dawns when the cereal is soggy and the wool motheaten the radiator burns my thighs I miss you to the dishwasher drone and muted newscasters I miss you tonight at O’Hara’s the ice smacks like exploding gas pockets and I am wistful remembering the fireplace I toss one back and the gin burns with questions how are things up north do you see many deer did the cat scare the babies I haven’t called but keep busy with houseplants and an attention to drainage you’d admire the bedroom remains unkempt lately the walls have warped into drift wood it is illogical to think of you minus me in the equation it numbs me to count your cards weeks ago the skies were mild now street lights are lost against black I must be direct the songs are only memory devices

15

you know the feeling when you drive off without your shoes

16

Palpitations Signs for towns that didn't own us. Trees carved for someone else. Highway rest stops we'd never grace to stretch, long stretches of terrain we missed forever each time we blinked. No records broke for state license plates passed. Flooring it, I couldn't break the sound barrier. The roadside coffee was only passable, but it made my heart rattle as we drove—tin can from a string tied to the back of the Chevy. It never loosed, never caught on a stray post. Longing, it tuk tuk tuked along with the motor to the radio that melted into soft fuzz as we drove north out of range of the station.

17

Archeology I was grateful like sea legs on dry land For soggy, decomposing, leaves Layered like tongues under dry ones Flecked brown, they paratrooped From the neighbor’s maple And burned everywhere autumn I uncovered grass then soot The dagger prongs of my rake stung the ground Like it was god’s command—I didn’t know Night-crawlers writhed where my knees landed In the thick of the pile that scattered beneath me The tree shedding like the cat Or like the neighbor’s catalpa—elephant ears I thought; they collapsed on the earth Like sailors do and kissed the soil

18

Bury Me Deep Beloved, don’t call the priest, busy with confessions, he shouldn’t compose a eulogy of any kind. Don’t call the journalists either— underpaid drunks, all of them, their death notices full of misspellings; don’t ask them for an obituary. Our friends have parties to attend, soccer games, and bills to pay. The grave digger is on strike— do not disturb his peaceful protest I am in full support of a pay raise and would gladly devote every cent of my estate tax to the races. My Sunday clothes to my brother, flannel and denim to the poor— Leave me nothing but my shoes, shabby as in life and my beard, tangled to drink the rain. The fleas are thirsty, beloved, you call them vermin, but leave them my blood. May it not go to the embalmers, eager with ethanol injections, Leave my body frozen in the throes of rigor mortis, so I depart by my own doing. As to you, beloved, as to you: wear overalls, torn, as you do on Sundays Go on some romp among the flat stones; pardon the fallen leaves as you do me.

19

One Way Ticket Dorothy looks sharp in red shoes and a blue dress, sure, but the woman by the river is not her—it’s Aunt Em grey from raising chickens someplace dark with neon signs and cans along the bank. She touches her heart and squints into the shadows— a thief snatched her basket. She’s trying to say help but the word itself is useless: the river will carry on. I feel for the weary Kansan, I feel the miles from the farm ache in my own heels. I see this is a true story—she’s lost, basketless, beside some river and she can’t go home.

20

Go West Do you love me? Don't answer that. I love you quietly, as if saying so might make the possibility untrue on a train going—you'd know better than me—to the city (that's east, which puts you west of me) riding sideways in this car like women from the western later to- night where everyone's dead by the end and I remember I'm American: proud for cowboys, their stoicism, who must love quiet, or not at all.

21

Howlin’ Wolf Bottleneck. Stag Antler. Buffalo Horn. He slides

the hollowed bone down nickel wrapped strings. Mornings

he smokes a Marlboro out the back of his father’s trailer.

He falls asleep humming tunes from his favorite album,

Muddy Waters:

King Bee Nights he drives down Moody Street in the blue pickup he won

in Reno when he toured with The Blue Man Group. He talks like he’s from nowhere Georgia, Boston,

Los Angeles, Every saloon up and back

Route 66. He papers his windows with unfinished song lyrics, My Pen Won’t Write

No More. On weekdays he works the smoker

at Blue Ribbon. In the dark of his bedroom I memorize his profile. Once

after a party he let a hobo clean

his apartment

in return for the empties. On the first he collects from the renters. The proceeds buy scratch tickets, gas, guitars. Les Paul. Martin. Fender. Gibson. Taylor. He sings to me so tenderly.

His fingers: Drive My Blues Away…

22

(Little Anna Mae) He bought three dog tags from an Indian, carved his name in the metal. Yesterday he painted

his father’s trailer: sanded filled and slicked over

the flaking paint chips.

Backstage he tucks his suit pants into

snakeskin boots. My Home is on the Delta. Scars are cowboy tattoos with stories. Rambling Man.

When he pulls me to him tin letters press hot into my chest.

23

All Country Long We drank cokes in cans, in bottles, flat from the fountain over-syrupy, with real sugar as we neared the border—$2.50 from a machine in new Jersey—$3.00 in Vegas which exploded on the horizon like an acetalyn torch, and we split it to stay awake north on I-15 to Wyoming where the sky should’ve felt ashamed it was so big and paid $0.39 a pop for two fountain sodas ($0.82, logged August 5th—expense book) at an Indian reservation, our best deal yet Then drove west into dust as measured on a fraction of my pinky, the miles to the Pacific.

24

Frisco, Kid I can't stay where you want me— streets delirious at all hours, Little Steve, I need some speed or something, waves grill tongs on O'Farrell and Geary, the Highlander sleeps in the lobby, his floral dress soiled— I'm high just thinking of it, oh I can't stay! Ranjan sweats over six burners stirring curry for leg locked tables, take-out customers outside cracking fennel seeds in their teeth; Jody's waiting for you with her legs wide open, bitch! says Steve and I am confused but hopeful; who and moreover where is Jody? Ranjan's tea is milky and bitter and the patrons sip it and spit it on the pavement, staying warm after sundown; The police haven't caught the man who shot up Jelly's, drifting off, I heard them— can't say what I was thinking; can't you ever remember those last waking thoughts, either?— six gun shots; maybe the Buddha can. Yuppies in yoga drag: Friscans don't get sarcasm any more than one can enjoy a moment in peace these days, I mean, sorry Sister of the Willow, do continue your sunset commentary. Come winter you'll call to say the temperature is seventy-two today as always, hah, well, like they say, I want the news and not the weather: Fruit Vendor Shot, 18 and Mission; bled out in his down jacket— August sixth! The coldest summer in forty years, sixties, blustery, colder still I'd say on your side of town, always shaded and the smog hangs so low one doesn't dream of those mountains beyond and the redwood's ancient shadows.

25

Buenas Noches Turn on your back and now I am the wandering albatross reaching to span the heavens with my wings across your chest, your snores soft. Didn’t you run away from home and wasn’t everyone happy to find you safe? Isn’t that what winter’s for? It could drive a body mental. And the late crowd is chattering like glass of sharp, crystal, shattered, rainbow-reflecting pieces more lucid than a cresting wave headed for shore, before the surfers paddle out to the sandbar, and beyond everything‘s uncertain.