[0.]
Hello — the sweet smoke of it
like wet pennies in summertime
Hello — the dried lavender bags are in the hamper
the silverfish are scattering like snow
Hello — it's Autumn!
Hello — I'm turning into the cul de sac,
did you say your house is the blue one?
Hello — sung like a rocking chair or a carousel
Hello — the crows are fighting at our playground
over a small rusty spoon
Hello — and welcome to the Monkey Hotel :)
Hello — the world less a ticking clock
and more a gospel choir
Hello — so what if I'm radical?
Hello — we are strangers, but you know me
so well already
Hello — I am risking everything to meet you
Hello — sung as a remembrance
Hello — poetry is not a promise but
I saved these songs because I thought you'd like them
[1025.]
This isthe reddestFallvanilla muskand pulpedwith birchYour name'sslow beckoningrewinds the clockfrom seed to pit and back againTell methat you hearit too — CanyonCawingcrows perspiringlike silver
[0101.]
Last Friday afternoon, I sat on a park bench and watched some guy fish
for pennies in the fountain. He knelt, brows furrowed, pants-legs fully
submerged, loading coins into a yellowing jar with his thumb and index finger.
Besides him, a group of boys were terrorizing two ducks, chucking blocks
of bread at their heads and screaming quack quack, bitch, when, like some
karmic retribution, the fountain's sprinkler turned on. The boys were drenched,
their bread was dropped, left floating
above the remaining pennies. The guy was drenched too. He stood, stilled,
for a second, holding his waterlogged jar and watching as the boys groaned
and backed away, reluctantly. When the ducks began to peck
at the discarded loafs, victorious, he started to laugh. I started to laugh too,
and the guy raised his cocktail of pennies towards me,
a toast, scented soggy and sweet — the disappearing smoke
of a birthday candle.
[112.]
Hello, the sound of it, likea playlist I made you
Hello, the ducks have eatentheir bread, the fountainis penniless, and the breezesmells like vanilla
Hello! It was nice to meet youat the riot for the memorial parade,would you like to grabcoffee sometime?
“Hello” the canyon calls
Hello?Can you please stop hitting your bongfor long enoughto listen to me?
Hello: we are strangers,but the weight of usis still scatteringsilverfish like snow
“Hello” — youasked, don'tI know youso well already?”
Hello is harder than Goodbyebut we still choose it
Hello to our past liveselsewheres spent,the crows on the birch branchin summertime
[1.]
The vanilla-smokeCocktail lingers
But it is Autumn
There is a riot
The cul-de-sac
Where clocks tick
Like erupted birch
And silverfish scatter
Like crows
Your blue house
Is not a promise
But I still risk
Everything to see you
Our carousel is singing
crow choir
blue autumn
Hello
[2020.]
How we are benchedBy the crux of things: pork-bellyParties, or the dying whistleOf the bruised dinosaur beanbag. Or,The elevator, its wall crocheted a tacky orange.Sometimes, it'll drop, momentarily, and we'd fallAgainst the wall, laughing because deathStands in our corner! This youth is starchy,Distilled — like murky bong water, or the sweat of nightsCrouched over a street-corner. This youth is bitter. AsBitter as Vodka of the Gods — which we hate, because surelyThis isn't what the Gods drink! But we pinch our nosesAnd swallow anyways, too puffed to admit that we careAbout glibness — like taste, or liver health. We are allViolence — staccato shots, no chaser(?!), spontaneous games ofDont-fuck-your-brother. We don'tSay I'm wasted, we sayI'm somewhere else right now. I'msky-high. I'm soaring.