starfall

I tried to sound smart. “The stars are so much brighter back home.”

“I know,” you said. You looked at me as though you’d touched one. 

A black bird flies by me. So close, 

I could touch it, like your outstretched hand,

if only I could get through this fence. 

Falling is a spiritual experience. Like flying, and a poem,

it leaves me with nothing 
except the whistling air. 

“I need to write you a poem,” I say. You look at me like

you don’t understand. But I don’t know how to say it any clearer. 

Once when I was crying you told me, 

“You are enough.” This must be how that star felt

As you held her in your hand.

part-time

I said
"there are some things I do miss"
I was stressed
and afraid
and hurt
but it wasn't all bad.

You became a cook.
I tasted the air up there.

(Maybe because of)
All that stress
and pain
and anger

I became a poet
You fell in love.

I liked working part time.
Getting to enjoy my time, there
- instead of feeling like it was my job.

I just enjoyed doing the dishes
Creative problem solving
Making myself useful.

Everyone misses what they're good at.
And I was a great
part-time wife.

two poems in a gastropub

lines

You said once
that I had to draw a line in the sand
and work backwards from there.
I couldn't wait for what I wanted
to neatly fit into where my life was going.

I want your line in the sand
to be me.

------------------------------------
return on investment

return on investment was
the poem I was trying to write
to convince you to
see me through to the end.

It was exhausting.
Trying to persuade you
without begging you to stay
or alarming you
with the depths of my attachment.

I don't want to have to walk the line
between how much I love you
and how much I think you love me.

I was writing a poem
to convince you that
I could earn you a large
return on investment,
and was worth your continued affection.

But I don't want to beat around the bush.
My heart is already racing from too much coffee
and I have work to do today.
What I mean is:

I love you
and

I think we can do this
for a long time.

last night I said
I want to write poems about your orgasms
(we were both pretty stoned at the time)
do you remember?
I said
You made me want to write love songs.

If you had kept fucking me like that
I might have wept
tears of exhaustion and joy
of pure love and emotion
But I didn't.

You make me want to worship.
I wanted to take you inside me
fill all my senses with you
breathe in the essence of you
tell you that I love you

your orgasms make me want
to whisper loving words in your ear
to kiss your skin
thank God for your body
and the way you make me feel.

When you are inside me,
pushing me through climax after climax
without even letting me come up for air
I think that when He looked at
all the pleasures on Earth and said
"it is good"
He must have been
talking about
this.

three poems I wrote on the bus today and two more I wrote tonight

I can do this on my own. 

There are lies I tell myself so I can survive
The harsh winters of my life.

But I don't lie to you -
So you have two choices, here.

Understand that I have to start,
Or promise me I won't have to.

Reasonable Proposition

It is not so bad
being apart.
I've done it before
It's not worse
Just different.
More space.
And that makes sense
You're not ready to commit
And that's fine.

But,
look,
when you leave,
I promise to let you live your life
If you promise not to regret me.

Uneven Trade

I am starting to believe that I
am not a good person
to fall in love with.

I don't know how to moderate
These Feelings
without medication.

And so I sweep up into a pile
all of the things I think we want
as if we can have all of them at once!
That is a mania-fueled delusion
Which happens when I breathe too much of your air.

It becomes someone else's job,
then,
to clean up after my messes,
to group the many parts of our lives
into cans and cannots.
I don't know how to sit with cannots.

I don't offer a lot
other than occasional sex
and being good at having children
(And I will also lecture you
about the plight of women and the
working and non-working class
and stay up late, too anxious to sleep).

Unfortunately,
that would not be enough
for anyone I might fall in love with.

bite the bullet

Going through a heartbreak
Is like ripping off a cheap bandaid.

The worst part is knowing
That you will have to get it over with
And rip off a layer of skin
Exposing what is raw underneath,
Eventually.

When it happens, it is over quickly.
Humans heal.

But we don't want to.

happy birthday

you didn't tell me it was your birthday.
I could have
would have
planned something nice.

If that's what you wanted.

I can't even, really,
get you a gift.
Something small to say
"I'm glad you were born."
"Thank you for existing."
"You bring joy."

If I had had the time,
with a little warning,
I could have gotten you something
new
unique
a fresh experience.
Something you will remember,
because I am sentimental.

Instead,
I am lying here
at two in the morning
thinking of the many ways I could have said
(given some notice)
I love you.

Grinding my Teeth

“You’re grinding your teeth, again,” he said.
Grinding my teeth.

 Grinding my teeth?

I didn’t understand what that was.
It sounded like it hurt.
If I was doing it,
wouldn’t I know?
How do people not wake up?
Didn’t it hurt?

 I know, now.

Yeah, it does hurt.
It hurts like
when you’re fleeing him so fast
your chest is burning
and you wake up unable to breathe.

And it lingers with you for hours
as you eat your lunch and wonder
Why does this ache?

Sometimes you do wake up
But not always
like when you choose not to rouse yourself
during a dream where you’re being molested
and remember in the morning
that this could have been prevented.

And wouldn’t you know?
Shouldn’t you know
what your body is doing
without your permission
when you are trying to rest?

No.
Not always.
Because sometimes things happen
that are
out
of your
control.

one good poem

Not even one good poem

out of it.

Obviously

I was no Sylvia Plath.

-Elizabeth Brewster

Inspiration

(they say)

comes from hardship. 

So, I think, 

Maybe my hardship wasn’t 
hard enough

to inspire a book, 

or an essay, 

Not even one good poem.

There must be a disconnect 

between me 

and my talent. 

My experiences, 

and my efforts. 

Well, fine. 

If there’s no 

creative explosion, 

Maybe all I’ll get is

red eyes and hoarse throat

out of it.

And the simple things in life

like sweet fruit, 

clear skies, 

and a whole and satisfying

love

are still here to write about, 

though they may be a little bit

dull. 

I’ll never be an established poet,

Obviously

Still, I’ll be around to 

tease my lover, 

and birth babies

If that’s where life takes me

instead of to a short or long list. 

At the very least, 

maybe my children, 

(and grandchildren)

will boast with pride that

I was no Sylvia Plath

one minute

I'm never going to stop painting my son's nails.

Whenever he wants to match my
blue
or purple sparkles
glitter bronze
macintosh red,

I remember how good he is at holding still
(for a four year old)
It only takes a minute
(His fingernails are so small)
And he is so happy to match his mom.

I want him to know,
that beauty is not reserved for women.
It is not an exotic flower,
or something that we possess
and he desires.
I want all doors to be open to him.

Today he handed me a bottle of
highlighter yellow
and he said, "please, mommy"
Because he always asks nicely.
And I paused my video game and painted his nails.

It only took a minute
He shows off to his dad
His aunt
And me.

I am trying to teach him
that he can be proud of all his joys.
And not be afraid to share them.
Masculinity does not define him.

He defines masculinity -
by deciding which nail polish to wear
and strongly identifying with Gordon the express train.

After he fell asleep that night,
I found the yellow nail polish on my desk.
With two coats dried,
I showed his father,
proud.

It only takes a minute for me, too,
to unlearn what it means to be a man.

In Memoriam

So many bad things happened,
And I sat quiet.

But I want to walk into the street and scream.

Fifty of my siblings are dead.
They lay in pools of blood
while loved ones cry
or
convince themselves that
they are fine.
mourning their own friends at the hospital
cell phones forgotten.

I want to cry for them.

I want to confront the
toxicity of men.

I watch my sister's abuser
excused and justified.
Her pain erased,
violation dismissed.
Because of his
potential.

This week has been a series of headlines
About pain and death
and the only news is
that my life is tossed aside
just as easily as
fifty dead friends.

That my narrative is taken
as remorselessly as he took
my body from me.

These news stories
responses
memes
tweets
status updates
photos
only frame the portrait of me
that the world has been painting for
     years - 

A poor, queer woman
who is only newsworthy
In Memoriam.

On The Question Mark

I love the way you say "yeah"
With a question mark.

The question mark is important.
It is waiting for me to continue, of course
But it is also, somehow
Pleased.

It is like a puppy who hears
"Here, boy"
And the ears perk up,
Suddenly alert.

It seems, in a way,
To be excited
with an air of "wow, really?"
disbelieving, yet hopeful.

It is not incredulous,
This question mark,
or genuinely curious,
It is not looking to be answered.

It is, I think, a little shocked-
But pleased at the discovery.

just tired.

I'm too tired to write a poem.
I tried to write one about
how I only ever learned what not to do
in the ongoing struggle to raise a well adjusted child.
Or one about how desperately
I want to teach him he doesn't have to be afraid
like I was for twenty six years.

I'm too tired to find the words
look at my spacing
Does this line meter right?
is the break
appropriate
or is this line much too long?

All I can think about is
making my own tea
how many times I'm going to forget my phone in the morning
and who is going to teach me to drive, now.
The tiny little spaces in my life that he filled.
How he makes me cum long,
and deep,
slowly bringing me to a climax,
and knows exactly what buttons to press
and for how long
and in what cadence
to leave me exhausted and filled with love.

I don't feel loved anymore.
I don't feel anything -
just tired.

Economics

I'm better than this, you say.
     Brilliant
     Determined
     Beautiful
    (Deserving)
That's fine -

Thoughts like that are a luxury
(because there is risk in chasing a better life)
that I can only believe when I have some breathing room.

Some distance from obligations like
     Rent
     Hunger
     My son
    (His father)
Or in your arms.

The problem with boys with money is that,
when they love you,
there is a mania that makes us look beyond our limits.

That glimpse into middle-class possibility -
     A full stomach
     New clothes
     A vacation
    (Freedom)
Gone as soon as they are.

You make me high, or maybe it is the air up there
so far above my place
that you breathe into my lungs after you kiss me.

My medication warns me about
     excessive happiness
     racing thoughts
     reckless behavior
    (unusually grand ideas)
And I am calling my doctor

Because
how can I tell what is a mania-fueled delusion
and what is my use-value?

One-Dimensional

The first time I let myself admit I love you was in a poem.
I can't voice the words
but somehow they fit in verse.

I wish you loved me back -

Me, with a heating pad, complaining about my period
Sleeping for 14 hours because we need to adjust my meds (again)
Giving my son a bath
burning cookies
kneading bread
Domestic.

Instead, I think you love
me, with a book and a highlighter
undressed to the waist,
prone on the bed
reading some dull intellectual text,
with your fingers buried in me up to the knuckle
your hands around my neck.

I hope Good Earth us is happy -
     because this sucks.

Two Poems

feedback

It’s a strange loop.

I like the way you like

The way I like how you look at me.

The fugue intensifying until my ears are ringing

And your eyes are dark and distant.

Somehow, I have been distracting you.

At a volume you describe as ‘cacophonous’

When the only sound is your thumb drumming on my ankle.

You leave the room, and I want you more.

Suddenly I am back at the beginning of this

Mobius strip that I have been treading,

Hoping, futilely, that if I walk it carefully enough

I will end up somewhere new.

Maybe I would step off onto that Good Earth

(different than yours, I know)

Housed behind the event horizon of some imploding star

Like the one that sits quietly in my chest while I cry myself to sleep.  

Or the one that steals all the light from your eyes which are

Just across the couch (the bed, the console)

A million light-years away,

Silent.

The feedback is ear-splitting.

that arm

The stretch of that arm
muscle, shoulder, back
flesh
    slips
beneath my hands
this texture
i can’t describe
your skin.

That smell, not soap
in my hair
those hands grasp
objects and my fingers
with purpose and delicacy
    respectfully   
you open the door

and i enter.