Miss Havisham

I call her Miss Havisham
Not to her face
We’ve never exchanged more than a few words
Good evening
Good morning
Lovely weather

She comes in very night
Sits at the same table
Coffee, regular
Rye toast
The waitress hollers to the kitchen
Whiskey down!
And Miss Havisham smiles at the secret code of diners

When the toast comes, sliced on the diagonal
Dripping with butter
The waitress hots up her coffee, asks
Anything else, hon?
Every night, Miss Havisham says the same thing
No, I’m good, thank you so much.

She sits, looking out the window
Lifts her cup to drink, surprised that it is empty
The waitress hurries over to refill the cup
Leaves a small pitcher of cream on the table
And a donut
On the house, hon, enjoy!

Miss Havisham smiles, takes a small bite

Staring out the window
Watching the cars buses bicycles
Bouncing down the avenue
Their lights flickering in the dark
Sometimes making the windows opaque
The street lights get brighter
The clock over the griddle reads 11:37
Miss Havisham sighs, puts on her sweater
Leaves a generous tip under the coffee cup
Opens the door to the dark alone
Disappears around the corner
Every night the same
Her shoes are down at the heels
Her sweater has pills
Her nails, poking through her gloves, are bare
The bills she left are crumpled singles, and coins

Good night, Miss Havisham
See you tomorrow, God willing
See you tomorrow

Turn

Waiting at the red light
This is the turn
the right turn I took
so many nights
after the bars closed
after everyone went
somewhere
with someone

I, alone, in my car
waiting for the light to turn
but I hang a right on red
driving on instinct
on muscle memory
not sure if my eyes are open
at this after hours after hour
until I pull into your drive

And I don’t know how you knew
how you always knew
sitting on the porch
with two steaming hot cups of tea
on the small round table

Maybe its been a week
Maybe a month, two months, three months
Maybe yesterday
Since I pulled into your drive

You’re waiting for me
You open my door
fold me into you
I breathe you in

We stand
until I feel safe enough to sit
The tea has gone tepid
We drink anyway
We sit there, on your porch
the sky pinks
the stars disappear

 

The ice Floes

I’ve left my mates, dying, on tundra tracks

Opening the small tins of potted meat

Discover just sawdust inside to eat

I sledged, exhausted, past the icy cracks

Whether cold, scurvy, or evil attacks

Dragging myself, my tent, my stove for heat

Despair. I stagger on, with frozen feet

I dream my mates are dead, piled in stacks

Arctic summer flowers, it lasts a night

I press on, snow blind, wind howls, black toes

I press on, voices sing, strip off my clothes

Arctic winter sullen, it ends a life

Perhaps, they’ll find my smiling corpse one day

Perhaps, they’ll leave a marker where I lay.

Winner 1st Place 2019 FSPA Petrarchan Sonnet

Borrowed Pajamas

You borrowed a too big tee-shirt

when you spent the night

so big it grazed your knees.

It shrank in the wash.

Now, it barely brushes your hip bones.

It shrank

over the long years

of borrowing and

not borrowing.

The neckline which hung off your shoulders

settles nicely on your collarbone.

Your face fades from the mirror

while I brush my teeth.

I fold the shirt

place it on the closet shelf

shut the door.



3rd Place, Gwendolyn Brooks Award 2020

Catulli Carmina 101: A Play in One Act

Catullus has returned to Rome from delivering the eulogy at his brother’s funeral.

He is sitting at a bar, about to be cut off. His friend is trying to get him to leave.

                                                                       

You think I’m a pathetic little turd?

Pfft! I’m not.

I’m something much stranger

much sadder

than that.

A Hack.

Yes, a hack.

Paid by the verse

by the line

by the word.

Joy to the newly wedded virgins – ha!

Sadness to the mourning widows – ha!

Enlightenment to the beardless youth – ha!

Success to those who pursue – ha!

Redemption to those who repent – ha!

Please don’t insult my intelligence

by believing in

my output.

Why do you think there are cliché phrases?

Formulaic thinking?

Repetitive images?

You think I’m not better than that?

Excuse me while I sip my wine.

You’re such a kidder.

Except for …

the words I write for me

and the words I write for her

but I won’t discuss those.

Barkeep! More wine.

Shoo. Leave me in peace.

Ave atque vale, frater, ave atque vale. Shoo.

New York October

We spend the equinox together

testing, toes frozen in puddles,

testing if I can live in

darkness, on streets of quiet except

for the trash collector and the

cries of pimps beating the last few

pennies from crack whores.

You have already rejected my

sunrise. It made you squint and plead

for inner corridors and musty Victorian

drapes and carved doors locked with

fobbed keys.

We share a $2.95 breakfast special at

Moondance.  You pay the check.

I leave a $5 tip before I dive into the light.

The Future is Invisible and So am I

     "You know, we’re at a crossroads? That things are going to change, evolve? Whether we want it or not, change is inevitable. Trite, but true, and the changes outside are going to impact us. How we deal with them, cope, in the end, it’ll be okay, we’ll be okay."
     I hear his voice, words I wish I heard, but it is all imaginary. He says nothing, staring at the papers, document sets, email chains, the bottom piece removed from a Jenga pile and the resulting crash.
     He says nothing.
     That is my position, silence, not his. My standard operating procedure, mode du jour. He has no right to usurp my place in the relationship, no right to mystery, circumspection, privacy, reticence.  How am I supposed to respond? Do I take his role, wiggle my ears, turn cartwheels, cajole? I am clueless. The endless ramble voice I wish I heard strangles whatever my tongue might dance.
     "This is a good thing. It’s time, more than time and now we’ll be able to move forward to another level, we really will. Just think, baby doll! No. don’t think, babe, feel! Let yourself feel, babe! I love you and this is good, it’s all good. You’ll see. I’ll be fine, we’ll be fine, more than fine, better than ever."
     But the fantasy in my head, whispering sweet nothings, protestations of eternal love and rose strewn silk sheeted beds and microchip diamond rings, the voice promising tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow, stays there, in my head, hammering my brain, not swirling down my helix to caress my tympanic membrane. The ossicles spin, measure and cut in a padded room.
     He says nothing as he folds the papers back into their standard sized envelope, adorned with a certified return receipt required edge, nothing as he scrolls the numbers in his cellphone, nothing as he fills a duffle bag with pants and shirts and socks but not the photos he took of me.
     Nothing as he throws the bag into the back of the car.
     Nothing as he turns the corner.
     Nothing as he gets onto the Interstate.
     Nothing as he watches the odometer climb.
     Nothing as
     Nothing as
     Nothing as
     The air conditioner clicks on and the temperature drops a few degrees, startling me. I lift the needle from the scratch, worn through to the turntable, on the 33 rpm. I suppose I could burn it to a CD or MP3 player, but what would be the point?
     It will still be stuck in limbo.

Unclean Title

The hibiscus are in bloom.
There. That place. Where I used to live.
Engine running, Jackie-O sunglasses and scarf, I resemble a 1960's starlet in disguise.
But if they came out, they'd recognize me.
I hope.
I dread.
Its not yellow any more. My favorite house color.
Every house I ever owned was some shade of yellow,
Porch, shutters, gingerbread, window trim, if not all.
The sun bouncing off the clotted red hurts my eyes. I blink a few times to focus.
The crepe myrtle is gone, and the palm
-I don't know what kind it is, I never cared about that-
is so tall it shades the optional bay alcove I paid extra for.
Its just a place I used to store my things and pace the halls because I couldn't sleep,
hornets stinging, subdermal demons writhing,
while the voices threatened to trap me in between the sheet rock and cinderblock.
It was never home.
I put the car in drive and ignore the stop sign at the corner.

Modern Labor Saving Life

How did they do it, get it all done, before all the labor saving devices came about?

Did they have a more integrated life, living more fully in the here and now,
different sets of priorities, fewer priorities and calls on their time
or was it the half-empty bottle of tequila on a high up shelf
that got replaced every other Thursday?

Victoria Falls

He hears me calling in the water rush, door very deliberately left unlocked
Translating the storm to ‘help me', he breaks my solitude, appearing through the steam mist
Knowing he'll find me fetal curled, scalding the lunatic day off my skin,
skin covered with scars over scars over scars over scars, he squeezes inside
Picks me up. I cling, blind and weak as a baby opossum
Words spoken are lost in the susurration of the shower, grief swirling clockwise down the drain

Rude Behavior

Sitting here, not paying attention
rudeness to the nth degree
but at least I sit quietly,
absorbed in myself.

Carding the Three Fates

Spin grief into the fibers of a fine woolen jacket
Weave it on frames of wrong
Fashion it with repentance
and wear it as a mark of Cain
warning the world away.

Totem Mask

He's waiting. Churning. Trembling, watching the clock numbers change,
I know everything that will happen when we put our public faces on the wall for the night.

Bright Light Blind

What tragic mistake did I make, at some point in my prehistory?
What led me to this?
Staring up at the guillotine, sunglint blinds me.
If I press a little harder...
It doesn't matter, does it? Press or don't press. See or don't see.
All lines converge on the horizon,
No matter how they skew out.
All lines converge and disappear,
Whether I run, hide, stare it down in an attempt at stoicism.
All lines converge into smoke.

All My Roads Pt 7

"From Orlando, take I4 east." Take it until you can't go any further, until you've gone off the interstate, off the road, off the sand and right into the ocean.

Take the ocean until you hit land again. That may be Greenland or Africa or the UK or somewhere else. It really doesn't matter where you end up exactly, as long as you keep moving, heading east into the land of the rising sun, that golden orb which blinds you if you gaze at it too intently.

Not all things that glitter are gold. Some are dross, base metal, some are pyrite, fool's gold, and some are, well, some just are. Glitter, that is. Some things that glitter are just glitter, little flecks of metal you can stick on valentine's or birthday card with Elmer's glue, or sprinkle in your hair to catch the strobe of a disco ball. I learned that long ago, glitter isn't necessarily gold, during my infatuation, my transition time with hamelech malchai hamlocheim, the king of king of kings, the man who would be king, king in his own mind and universe, anyway, that was for certain, and for a blaze, as long as it takes a match to strike and burn, king of mine, ruling my emotions with a toreador's flourish, ole!

If you go long enough, past the ocean, past the first landfall, still moving east, always east, past the oared ships of the Aegean, remnants of a mighty kingdom now sunk beneath the sands and waters of time and tide which wait for no man or woman either, covering memories with salt dust while the holder of those memories wonders if it's safe to blink, you find a greater landmass.

Keep on east, snows and desert, hop a ride on a camel or an elephant, take a train or three, Orient Express, Tibet Express, bullet train, heading east right across the Bering Strait. Look for that overland passage Prester John spoke of, that Sir John sought, the one that crushed the Erebus and filled all with Terror. Or maybe, instead, risk everything with the absurd passion of the besotted and shoot south right off the tip of Africa and set yourself up for a repeat of Shackleton, the ever rising sun now a shadow gazing over your left shoulder, shading everything you do, casting darkness alternating with blue glare so sharp you can't even see your own hands as they work. Maybe you'll be crushed as I was crushed, as my endurance was repeatedly crushed by the ever shifting pack ice I couldn't and can't escape, that I carry with me as my boon companion, still.

Anyway, look for that overland passage, the opening in the sea ice, quick, quick, and maybe you'll escape before it grinds you down and turns you so far around there is no north or south or west anymore, just east, east, east. Keep moving even though north is south now and you're so far from the equator you have to zigzag back to your point or place of beginning, if that matters.

"Take I4 east."

Or you could just take it east until you find a turn off that takes you home.

You can find a home.

You can make a home.

Your home can be anywhere or anything or anyone.

Because some things that glitter are gold, 24K, warm to the touch, reflecting your own affection back to you, and soft enough to reveal your own fingerprints when you press your hand down on it, your personal tattoo, brand, mark, malleable enough to spin into a cloak you can pull around and use to keep out the chill of setting suns.

Some roads lead you home.

Lust

How can I get shoes like that? What they say about her, her skills, interests, abilities, income level, all the socio-economic crap we get buried under, as opposed to my cheap generic foot coverings, multipurpose plain which means that they are good for everything but really good at nothing. You cannot be all things to all people and a shoe cannot be all things on one foot.

What leads a person to make the moves, choices in life that allow her to afford those?

Why do I end up making the wrong choices or what feels like the wrong choices certainly, over and over, looking back, all shot to shit, my lifeview widening as I move away from the now, all the choices I rejected, by design or misinformation or hidden agenda or need for approval, a river of choices, and back to the now, tunnel vision staring at a pair of shoes on someone else's feet on a sad, foggy evening.

Midnight Oil

The copter flies over again.
Past midnight, is it looking for my life?
The real one, not the one I'm leading.
It's back, wondering what I'm doing and what's going to happen next because
I don't know.
I didn't write the script.
I didn't even see the chapter outline.
Too silent now, whirring blades sucked the night noises after them.

Tears are Salt Rain

When you cry, voiceless
How can I? What do I? [deep breath]
You rip my heart out,
Chasing yours, trying, wanting
anything to be your net.

Somewhere Over the Rainbow

They banned kites.
‘Too distracting to vehicular traffic' as it careens down onto the Belt Parkway.
But once upon, the sky was a crayola pastiche.
Laying here, at the end of nowhere, two Japanese box kites dance,
the cherry blossoms framing their tails, sky so close.
Smaller here, at the Gardens, bits and pieces of scent hover, gardenia, roses, rot, heavy.
How do the kites stay up in the hevy air?
Before they had an ocean. Swallows, diamonds and yes the ubiquitous Japanese box kites,
elaborate flying machines lost in a blue so big the steamers passing underneath were toys.
Curlicue tails tickle me, wrap around my big toe and sink their teeth in.
I hold the tendrils, up here, where I can touch the roof of the world and mourn the finite space below

Eclipse

The world is becoming a ghost town
jobs families homes towns,
all sinking back into the sand that castles are made from.
Moon comes closer, pulls waves high onto the shore and steals it back.
Holding flotsam, praying for salvage treasure, praying to be salvage treasure,
out and out and out.
Dreams turn into chum,
sharks chew the last little bit of flesh and crunch the bones.