the Prodigal Son

" ... there's an innocence to this place, that's why there's no graffiti on the retaining wall, why every change you perceive as positive... "

"It's also why I hate it."

" ... and why it feels like home."

Put The Kettle On

I live by moments
by seconds
one minute it's there
then it isn't
but don't let that stop you from starting,
or ending
the boiling of water
that you forgot about while I was gone
but not forgetting.
because I live by these moments, as do you,
with the constants- dragging you by the hair- that you've been growing out for our wedding--
ever forward

And so you slept in the car
or pretended to, I couldn't tell (and I laughed)
but that time was not lost
though you spent it forgetting,
(like a name you can't remember, or never learned)
and got home to a house
spitting back
acrid black jam
on toast with coffee...
while you had tea, or intended to, elsewhere-
and spent time forgetting
and sewing the lace
to cover your hair at our wedding.

The Giants Are Coming

The airiness of life,
the light, as it were,
fluttered in and hung itself lazily in the trees.
To be described later as a flicker in the kerosene lanterns
then the bumping of heads in a mine shaft
then as the talkie took your notice, curl a come-hither finger, dripping with the true honey that is temptation on the projection screen
even then, as boxes whizzing down the carbon production line,
each one forsaking each one before it, forsaking each one before it, forsaking each one before it-
but this is the beginning of all that.

Then there was the walk to the beach.
climbing gingerly down the face of time and gravity
to see
the kayaks on the shore, two heads bobbing,
then shoulders,
then shirtless, bare breasts
then the mindless stare as i turned to leave
but, not, too fast.

as i looked back-
the monarchs of time stood idly by
while our perpetuality-
{and my understanding of it}-
surrounded me
and stared me down.

Do You Think He's Talking All Intellectual To That Girl?

Faces blurred now
from too much smoke "But
Mark, you're only home twice a year!"
and I forgot to ask for the night off at work in time
sooooo...
that's where we were.
And everyone was smoking,
as always,
the foul stench of cigarettes, like boiled cabbage, is still comforting and
the confused brunette gave me a drunken kiss on the cheek!
but the lights were up now (which she ignored) as she
ignored my disinterest as she
ignored my fiance sitting
five feet away.
who is one of the few people you care to see when you come back
twice a year
(which is still more than I eat boiled cabbage, anyway)

On Adderall in a five-speed

Thought I was encased in bones--
like some Kafka-esque dream
where I fall in love with my friends
and shed off my limbs
to find a bright, shiny pair of new wings

and they were just a little too big,
but I'll grow into them
just like my shoes when I was 10
(though I'm still stubbin' my big toes)

you were breathin' fire, and you yelled my name;
EH-CAR-US!
I didn't take it as a threat--
I didn't know that story yet
and anyway,
although you weren't quite a woman,
you definitely weren't a son

Before you hopped in your car to drive down to New Orleans
you explained the rattle in my key chain,
the one that opened bottles and got me through winter,
as a place you would show me, if I ever came to visit.

sixteen and a half hours
on Adderall in a five-speed
or
a three hour flight on shiny new wings;
unclipped, if I wanted.

Thinking how I want too many things
and I'll always be let down

in New Orleans,
if i wanted to,
I guess.

Jacob, As Your Are Now

If you haunt this place
you do so with such grace
I do not know.
If you do haunt this place
you are
the flutter of light on the rhododendron
as you are also
the birds lost in the leaves
incessantly skwaking
while I am fast asleep,
receiving everything,
as you are now a part of
yet still lost in.

Happy To Be Embarrassed

America moving slowly
outside my window
twisted, rusted skeletal systems
graveyards strewn about-
me, living
alone for the
first time in years
finally noticing
the dogwoods dotting
the dense, blurred forest
outside my window.

A change in focus brings
an honest reflection;
my face over
everything I see-
A slight smile,
I notice, become embarrassed,
bite my lips.

two seats over
lifting her hand
still in his, to his
lips, smiles, kisses
her fingers and looks
out the same
window as me