we all know the place i write of
your hands at a table
a crumpled note or a magazine

your father home soon
a buzz just coming off
from whatever you have

rationed by you mother
who is working upstairs
your phone heavy with texts

you go through being
smugly satisfied warm with
anticipation and deep anger

i am a phantom you filled
with desire and rejection
yearning hope and mania

but you're not here you're there
more real than here in the place
i imagine and write of

noted who is narrating
the scene begins

to pale and fade
only my selfishness remains

the great engine of desire
drove us both off a cliff
then beyond and beyond this

where even my remembering
how you might be right now
is an exercise in blind vanity

no nevermind dear nevermind
we live and new lovers and loves

when the phone rings or
a bouquet of roses appear
dear nevermind

did you ever cry
because you couldn't save

what you see as
a perfect sunset

love going
is like that

there are billions of suns
and as many loves



***

i'm suffering from samsara
but i'm not broken

there is nothing to break
except my illusions

saying conserve us
we're the spice of your life



**

mother cries at the gate
she holds your hand through the bars
but she is going back

it will be a long journey then
to be here
even to these bars

these bright lights
these painfully shining linoleum floors

as two separate points
you get farther away from mother
your mother gets father away from you

who knows when a journey
might bring you to her
or her to you

you stay at the gate
after mother is taken away
dots her tears on the floor

like a path
to another locked and closed door


**

hands moving in hotel rooms
drinking wine signing stationary
wish you were here glad they are not

vista outside of a perfect white beach
wind blows through the room
everything neat and paid for

from the 40th floor you see everything
everything is possible and exciting
either considering to jump or eat dinner

balanced in hotel room you know well
that one motion starts another everything
from that first perceptible accident


**

pictures of hotel rooms
of hand signals
of outfits
of cars
of restaurants
of drinking
of beaches
it never ends

there is no narrative
only assumptions
of what is gracious
of what is stylish
of what is attractive
of what is fancy
of what is desirable

the mummery continues
wants and desires
wrapped layer on layer
until the mind is paralyzed
the true self unrecognizable

but finding true self or clarity
was never the object of this

behold my beauty
and despair




**

because i was dead
i could see everywhere
i knew everything
but i thought back

to when i was alive
when i fished at night
i seemed to be pulling
fish out of a starry sky

the boat moved
over the moon
an orb that winked

the great deep
blackness of time
i easily conquered

the only break
in this

were the fish
writhing and dying
gasping to death



#

you can find me
i am in the sky
just beyond swaying leaves
i am in the fields

if you are happy
i am here too
all kinds of happiness

i am in the sky
in the fields

by the lakes
you can find me
in noon and in dusk
golden light
apple colored light

if you are happy
i especially appear
all kinds of joy

white ice
melting
tan grasses

i am in the sky
in the fields
by the lakes


*

Osseo MN

living in an age

where poetry is just a thing

like a dirty note

gas receipt or mattress tag

*

there is a picture of you
in your car

a selfie
why in the car no reason

we drive
in our cars we sit in them

you are in
your car smiling

a selfie
why are you smiling

no reason
we smile when we take selfies

sitting in
our cars showing something



*