Cargo Cult

I've become one of those people. The kind with a zombie blog.
Hello Russian women. Put on a balaclava and we'll meet secretly at the airport.

On the Box
After you drowned, your life
Was magical for a while, wasn't it?
Sexy portents, synchs, a couple
Of events some called miracles came
Easy as every breath. I could swear
I even heard a soundtrack. I know,
I was there, front row at the luau,
Picked from the tourist audience
For the cultural exchange demonstration.

Now it's all back to daily fucking bread.
And the chief, drunk on washed-up hooch,
Doesn't always remember to throw
Even that much out on the rocks for us.

You won't be happy until it happens again.
So you stack up your scavenged crates
And climb to the top and stand there.
All your calculations say
The big wave, it's on its way.

Photo: Poor, but Kathleen on the head of Shiva from the 1976 The Last Tycoon.

Paging Dr. Zhivago

Blogspot gives you all kinds of baby analytics now when you just push a button. They're apparently just wild about me in Russia. Hi, girls--you're cute! Wanna get gay married?

Unbidden
Determined to run even
A ridiculous slight distance,
And here it is: An argument
Conjured out of mud and shuffle and breath:
Poetry. Proving the mystery of art
(And love) mechanical, after all:
Insert the right amount of change
And that weird candy bar,
(Laced with synthetic vitamins and essential acids)
The kind they can't sell anywhere else,
Pops out.

Queen Bees Knees

Taken almost three months to get through Kathleen Spivack's "With Robert Lowell and His Circle." It's just a thin thread keeping me attached to somewhere besides work bed work bed work. The book is terribly in need of an editor; full of redundancies and cliches next to astounding observations. And hilariously funny in many parts. I love it; you should read it.

Despite an acutely rendered scene of afternoon tea with Mr. and Mrs. Hughes (the big dark brooder stuffed himself with tea cookies and the two carrying on a muffled Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf-ian vaudeville), she's one of the few who has some sympathy for Sylvia Plath. Here's one of those artless and absolutely on-target observations: "Sylvia had no sense of humor. Ever!" That's about the size of it.

You know what Spivack gets here, she gets the money thing. She gets that Sexton used her grant to put in a swimming pool and that she caught a lot of crap for it, but that swimming pool probably did more good to more writers and artists than any fucking Intensive Program. I'd do it if anyone ever gave me a dime, which they don't, and I'd call it the Sexton Memorial Pool besides. She gets the money thing:

"According to Anne Sexton, Sylvia was paid $50 by her publishers as an advance for her first book, The Colossus. But follwing her death, several publishers advanced prospective biographers more than $20,000 each, an unheard-of sum of money in those days. So suicide increased Sylvia's worth, much as she could have used the money in her lifetime."

She gets the exhaustion, too. At a certain point, you'd just do it to get some sleep.

Golden
say what you will about her making her own bed
and making her own bread and lying
how she was so mean she wouldn't get stung
by her own bees when she yanked their honey
right out from under their bobbling asses.
she sure could have used that money.
i will tell you that money damn well does
serve to keep a woman alive in winter
with the diapers and the rashes and
her head full of pus. that money,
once, it meant coming home with her hair
fresh golded and twined goddess and
yes, he'll see me, he'll see, he'll see,
crossing paths with him, and that
as much as you'd like to say poems
and clean living and keeping an even
keel and as mad as it makes you to be
above it all like they tell you you should
even when you're on that floor that will
never come clean and as ashamed as it makes you
to admit it damn you new clothes and
smooth hair and money yes the money
yes the money would have kept her alive,
liar, it would have taken nothing more,
and that fact doesn't make her less.

Image: God knows. Her father was a bee expert, you know; she raised her own honey.

Sweet Baby Jesus, It's The Sort Of Annual Charity Poetry Contest Again

My mom sent me a check for the holidays, so I'm doing the charity poetry contest again. Here's how it works: You put a poem in the comments section. For every poem, I put $5 in the hat. When it's Dec. 25 or I run out of money, whichever comes first, the contest is over. I decide the best poem. The winning poet gets to decide what charity the money goes to.

Here's mine, and it just might win. So there.

Tantrum
Why didn't I get the shining snake?
Why didn't I get the sweet call, what's wrong?
I got the pencil stub, the vending machine crackers
Settling in my root chakra. My stomp
Sounds like why. Why. I didn't work
Enough, I didn't stand up, turn my back,
Raise my hand, just stop working.
Dance. The gun's always aimed at the dirt
At my feet, not at my feet, you know it,
I know it, why fight it, why ask?
I didn't spend enough time with cold hands
In cold spidery rooms, I spent too much time scratching,
I spent too much. I didn't buy the right presents.
I was breathing way, way, way wrong, you know,
Yes, no, I don't know where I went
Wrong. Nodding. It was that night
I drove home and in that overturned bowl of stars
The road dipped under, my hands reached up
And knocked at the sky, smacked, banged
At the sky, shouting, let me in, me, me, let me in!

Photo: Still from an animated student film from Newcastle University of The Little Match Girl, by Lulu Su and Yajing Cai. Isn't it like the most horrifying story? Especially when she just says fuck it and burns them all.

I Immediately Fell For The Wicked Queen

Watched "Snow White and the Huntsman" with DD the other night. Charlize Theron is great and Ian McShane is a dwarf! I got to wondering about the backstory on the mirror.

The Magic Mirror

The true treasure of our kingdom, they all called it,
My flawless honesty, and didn't they realize
I'd know their admiration was a lie? It was a birth gift
Doled out by a bitch of a godmother, double-edged--
It was the closest thing those women could do to fighting,
Of course, throw a curse in the guise of a blessing:
She will be untouchably beautiful, she will be above
All others all her life, he will understand the true meaning of riches,
That sort of thing. He will be ever-honest, that was mine.
Drove a few tutors mad and two wives away. Then the new queen
Came along, and clapped my spirit under glass. Gave me
The one gift I'd never had: He shall reflect on things
Before speaking. Her little joke. She spends most evenings
In her chambers, with me; I remember what it was like
Not to get invited out much. She'll never abandon me.
People pity me my enchantment, but I pity them
Their enslavement: I am the only one permitted
To tell her that she is not fair.

Uncertainty...

Overfull

This is not the time
For what we had once.
The vessel would crack
If we tried to fill it now,
Even with smoke.

They tell me I must let go
To let another in,
I must give something away
To receive, but you know how
Exclusion breaks my heart, no,
It's a heel trying to claim
The space that muscle of blood
Occupies, all winter long,
So stalwart, no matter the weather.

Here's a particle of hope: spin
Against the clock, and two
Can live as deeply as one. Prove that.
My thoughts attempt to coil
Around these principles,
But none my mind can master.
But no one's arms encircle me now,
At the crossroads; what I observe gives the lie
To all this. Yes, there are two
In the same space, in the same time.
But when I turn my back
They go in the same direction.
But I can't live like that.

Split

People keep comparing what's up now to the Civil War. I've been writing some stuff about the Civil War for a while now.

A Photograph of the Company

Quite altered--yes, yes, I see
You find me so, I know,
The needle and thread that draws the clothing in,
That pinches the skin. And hidden
In the folds, this image, imprinted--

The line of those once loved. Their hands raised,
As if to fling at me a sentence of exile,
Shock after shock, how many a body can bear,
I believe I know, but cannot tell – that last betrayal,
The gesture like a wind waved away my breath
And now I cannot gather myself. I am lost again.

Arms brown and pale, thick and kindling-thin,
Split rails propped and woven for a fence
That keeps them free of me. All kin,
Yes, they are kin, arms raised to keep me
From getting in. Brothers and sisters in arms.
Sky icehouse-gray, dawn or dusk,
Which is which. The treeline on the ridge.

Breaking The Fast Early

Poppy seed baked goods lend themselves to the whole contrast, spiral yin/yang thing, don't they?

Broadcast
When my finger rips the paper packet
Seeds burst out all over my hands, no matter,
You always say it's better
Scattershot. These hands, oh how I wish
These were not my hands, crabbed
And cracked, their grace a ghost.

All so tiny, so tiny, I wouldn't know where
They fall even if my eyes could make out
Where they fall. What kind of seed
Would demand a fall planting?
I'll buy the lie of freshening air,
Pretend this is a place fit to begin.

There, there, find a niche, little spill,
Frost, earth heave and crack--
They say you want to be broken like that.
It's hard to believe. In summer,
Skin-thin wrinkled petals, a fat
Sac of sap. If this works, next fall,
Your pain will be nothing and your vision
Brilliant and it will feel like it will never end.

Star Spanked Banana

I've been celebrating the anniversary of the War of 1812. When was it again?

The Foe's Haughty Host In Dread Silence Reposes

It's not that having illustrious ancestors
Turns you into a drunk. It just gives you that push.
Illustrious drunken ancestors, now that,
That'll do it. Lost, genius, dead young.

Our anthem is a song beloved of none
But delusional divas, clutching
Their way up the staff to touch free.
The tune, a gentlemen's club drinking song.
In its slumping waltz you can see
The robust arm of a tavern slut
Slinging a mug, swabbing a counter,
Milking somebody's trousers.
The words, a back-of-the-envelope scribble,
A bit and a piece from here and before,
The fruits of your inspiration
A painfully drawn out interrogation:
Can you see? Can you see?

Of course you'd never call it poetry,
But it made you feel like somebody,
Thinking that's where you came from.
A name like that, to you it's worth
Any number of beautiful, beautiful shirts.

Photo: Still from the version of Gatsby coming out this year.

Without Further Adieu

And another thing...

I was so pissed about health insurance that I had to come back and start this shit all over again.

Here's a poem about peas.

The Devil's Truck Garden
I pretend I'm idle to allow my hands
To play among the vines. By the time
You're off to the desert in August,
I'll be putting in the cold-weather
Greens. With the seasons askew,
Every damn plant is bolting and bitter
Too soon for my taste. I seem to be the only one
Who eats the peas. I'll pull them up.
Three people and a hill of beans:
An unbalanced equation. Two plane
Routes wrap the map without enough play
To meet neatly on the other side.
I'll plant seeds in the damp soil;
You, fire on the dusty rock.
You pretend I'm in Antarctica;
I'll pretend I'm not in hell.

Photo: Bogart rides his bike to work. Man up.

Dark

I'm too dumb to know how to do it, and I'm grateful to the smart people who make it so easy for any fool to publish, and no one is reading anyhow, but consider this dark.

The Beam And The Mote

This is not the way the card is meant to be interpreted. It is actually a very happy card. I am constantly accused of "seeing things the wrong way."

Four of Wands

Fukushima

It's so hard to catch my breath,
Coming over the ridge. Panting.
They say that's normal. The atmosphere.
My skin the soft, deceptive blush
Of the newly burned. Thirst eclipses all.
None of these sensations is unfamiliar.
Insert joke about finally using what
You've been trained for here.
That's what used to pass for dark humor.

Then on the bluff, towers, a colony.
The fires and floods must be behind them.
"Not waving but drowning"--?
Beckoning. From here, they look whole.
Approach the gates and you see
Robes, rags; hair, strings; eyes, blood-rimmed:
But smiles, welcoming.
They have been hungry for so long.

Down For The Count

When I lost my phone recently, it had a lot of my personal info in it, so I've been advised to abandon a lot of my online presences and emails. Hope to see you in a couple months in a safer place. Thanks for understanding!
MP

Tear The Roof Off The Sucker

I bet you never thought you'd see Spraycrete in a poem. Mwah-ha-ha.

Four Seasons Storms

We were warned to expect extreme conditions;
We decided to ignore that, and create our own.
Nature's forces executed a home invasion
In every space we tried to occupy.
One a sauna crackling with static--
It killed all connections, took out the tech.
We were racing to get to the plane to the desert
When the hurricane winds tore the roof off
Another haven, and the rains sluiced in,
For steamy weeks. Now there are mushrooms
Growing through the floor. We boarded
The life raft as the humidity rose and the chill
Spraycrete ceiling dripped stalactites. I know
It's your sweat or your spit only by its warmth.
I could stand back and admire for a while
The Pollock palimpsest the weather has made
Of the walls, or we could run for the open
Field, when the lightning strikes--Here.
They say to lie flat. I'll cover you.

Situational Awareness

The Recurring Nightmare

The forest is burning,
The street is heaving,
The plane is crashing,
The tide is rising,
Again. Very bad-cat-at-the-door,
The way it comes around, right?
Home to hack up a bit of
Undigested bone, from some poor
Creature he shouldn't have eaten.
Some petting and pills, and the house
Is quiet again. Oh, our dear fond
Fears, our familiar terrors, the threats
Any reasonable person would run from,
The typical villains on the lists,
The shades and shapes and eyes
We've been taught to watch out for--
Oh, we're ready for that.
We've been practicing our whole lives.
We put our faith in preparation.

And then, one night, on the horizon line
Snakes the long black neck and ragged
Feather form, black against the sky
That never really gets dark anymore.

Solace With Saturn

The Singing Acupuncturist keeps quoting a Browning poem to me about "love me for love's sake," part of the ongoing campaign to get me to think of myself as a spirit rather than as an object that needs to lose ten pounds and get a pedicure. Of course I'm still dwelling in the sense that it's all too late for that, that I've run out of time or spent too much time Doing It Wrong, and a salon blowout might be a better investment than any amount of cultivating inner beauty. Time, as always, will tell.

The Store of Breath

Can those who never knew love as children
Ever truly love others? They tell us no.
But they've always told us no. We've never listened.
I remember times strangers set to care for me
Would try to tempt me with food, and I'd refuse,
Thinking it a trick. I am ashamed now of my rudeness,
As I was then of my need. Could this have been
A pleasure for them, I wonder, like the cat that pushes
His head into your hand, yes, he is wild but soft,
And he believes he's the one who has surrendered,
But it is your hand that delights, you hold the secret
Of that moment of trust, it is a triumph and testament
To your patience, your even breathing, your ability
To keep a soft, appealing tone. You have gone back to dreaming;
It is where you do your work, and you growl
At creatures you chase there. I slow my breath;
And smoothing my skipping pulse, soothe yours.
No one has truly loved us but each other,
But within us we hold centuries of lives, the source.


Here's the Browning (Elizabeth):

If thou must love me, let it be for naught
Except for love's sake only. Do not say,
'I love her for her smile—her look—her way
Of speaking gently,—for a trick of thought
That falls in well with mine, and certes brought
A sense of pleasant ease on such a day'—
For these things in themselves, Belovèd, may
Be changed, or change for thee—and love, so wrought,
May be unwrought so. Neither love me for
Thine own dear pity's wiping my cheeks dry:
A creature might forget to weep, who bore
Thy comfort long, and lose thy love thereby!
But love me for love's sake, that evermore
Thou mayst love on, through love's eternity.

And the Browning I like best, Robert:

All, that I know
Of a certain star
Is, it can throw
(Like the angled spar)
Now a dart of red,
Now a dart of blue;
Till my friends have said
They would fain see, too,
My star that dartles the red and the blue!
Then it stops like a bird; like a flower, hangs furled:
They must solace themselves with the Saturn above it.
What matter to me if their star is a world?
Mine has opened its soul to me; therefore I love it.

Photo: NASA

Rememory

As always, My Special Camping Trip provides much inspiration. Hope some happy ones will follow--it was a good time, tho you'd never know it from these lugubrious lines.

Four Desires and Forgetting

That burning cross becomes a decoration to dance beside--
Dancing, my hair whips, free, a transgression,
Our naked feet on the grass, another kind of transgression,
WIth every step another rule is broken; every breath, stolen.
My desire is to dance. Not to know.

It's a hard job to find a mirror in this place,
One that isn't dark, clouded, or even flecked with piss.
My desire is to be in the place past caring.
Because it will always be denied me, it has become
My greatest desire. How by some physic, slant or blessed,
Has the sharpness of the word and symbol been blunted?
A toy weapon, then a pencil sketch of the weapon,
Then a crumple of paper to ignite a bit of tinder.

On the second day I tell you I will do anything you desire.
Forgetting your own desire to follow another's feels like freedom.
This finds me on the most holy day a little drunk
And following orders from a German. I am myself a German.
The third desire, I grasp at every day:
I want to have no part in them. I want to call another
The other, to draw a hard line in the sand.
We all know what happens to sand.

We have forgotten more atrocities than it is possible
For us to mourn. We could look at the grass beneath
Our bare feet and see symbols of each one, and
Numbers, too, see them, there in the crushed blades?

On the first day I was on my knees on the splintered
Rough wood floor of the uppermost room in the hidden temple.
In transgression I fulfill the fourth desire: To increase the store of bliss
Until it is numbered in the stars.

Who Am I?

Another drive-by record review from the Half-deaf Music Critic, on the road with her family during a trip out to see friends in the far suburbs.

DH (turning off car CD and plugging in phone): I want to listen to this new J Mascis.
DD: Will you play Who Am I?
DH: Yeah, OK. Are you a person, an animal, or a thing?
DD: Person.
Me: Which one was he, anyway? I get all those quirky facial hair guys mixed up.
DH: Who? Are you Michael Jackson?
Me: J Mascis.
DD: Not Michael Jackson.
DH: Dinosaur Jr. Major guitar guy. Hey, he just did a free show at the Kennedy Center. Why are you asking about him?
Me: You said this was his record.
DH: Are you a president?
DD: Yes.
Me: (grabbing DH's leg) Ha! Michael Jackson! Michael Jackson?
DH: This is Stephen Malkmus. And the Jicks.
Me: Ohhh. I thought you said J Mascis. That's the Pavement guy. He's still really cute. I like that button-down shirt thing.
DH: Are you an inventor? See, I'm not just asking are you this person, are you that one. I'm asking real questions.
DD: Yes. I am an inventor.
DH: He said as soon as you're past the lake, you have to make a sharp left. As soon as you see the lake, put your turn signal on. It's on the left. He said put your turn signal on as soon as you FEEL the lake.
Me: I can't hear anything anymore. I can't see. Screw it, I'm old. I'm putting on my turn signal RIGHT NOW. I'm gonna leave it on the whole way. You know, I haven't heard anything that's impressed me much. This sounds like one of Beck's acoustic albums. Remember that show we saw in Miami? That was really good, but it was mostly because of the element of surprise. And all those kids in the audience who wanted to sing along with cheeze whiz. Thwarted! This just sounds like old quirky hipster stuff. Beck's Modern Guilt sounds newer and more interesting than this. And that one was from, what, 2008? I still put that on lots of mixes. It was haunting.
DH: This isn't a Beck record. He just produced it. Are you Benjamin Franklin?
DD: Benjamin Franklin isn't a president! Just because you have your face on a twenty-dollar bill doesn't mean you're a president!
Me: Jesus, there was so much hype about this record. I'm reading about it everywhere. This one has at least got something interesting happening rhythmically to it. Maybe it's just too subtle for me. Hey, that trail looks good.
DH: That's a really good trail. You know what you need to do, you need to go over to Ben's place and get your rollerblades, then practice up in the parking lot for a while, and then you and DD can come out here and do this trail. She can ride her bike. She could get rollerblades.
DD: I want rollerblades too. Can I get rollerblades?
DH: You need to give mommy a little time on them first, then we'll see.
DD: Mommy needs more help than I do.
Me: I have to give it up to Pavement for saving my life in Miami though. Underused. You can say that again. Not feeling like that anymore. Except at work. Wait a minute, is Thom Yorke on this record too?
DH: That's the CD that was in there before. I just unplugged the phone.
Me: Oh.
DD: I feel the lake! I feel the lake!

On the return trip:
DH: Do you want to hear the new Neil Diamond?
Me: Ummm...OK. He just got a Kennedy Center Honor award.
DH: Dave Alvin?
Me: Neil Diamond.
DH: What?
Me: I thought you said Neil Diamond.

The new Dave Alvin is very swamp-stompy and has a great song on it about Johnny Ace. He's a poet. He doesn't really stretch out his voice much. Also, the new John Hiatt is a knockout. Overlooked songwriting from both--when someone picks up a song from either, they can really run with it. I would love to hear two woman musicians I know cover almost anything from either of them.

I Mean It!

This one's inspired by the GOP and corporate executives and all the rest of you out there who bravely bear up even though everything and everybody is against them at every turn and persecuting them, and they're really not feeling very well, either!

Turkey Vultures

Your cry attracts more scavengers
Than rescuers. The swing shifters
Shake their heads and sigh.
If you've got enough breath to complain,
You can wait for fresh heroes
To haul you up. We're off. We're done in.
They trudge off to have a drink and forget you.
It's easy. Laughter breezes in without you,
All the ones like you, left behind again.

Maybe there's one who stays and waits with you.
A matronly type. Secretly, you're disappointed.
You think you're entitled to someone more in your league.
A handsome one like you are,
And still not yet middle aged.
You smile yet at her kind hand-holding
Out of habit. It never hurts to get your hooks in.
You might need her someday.

She leans close to talk, to help you pass the time.
She tells you: "The vultures, you know,
They're so much more sensitive than we are.
We hear a stifled cry, a brave protest against aid,
And we rush to reward you with more
Admiration and affection. The tale of your courage
Makes you twinkle like a star.

"But the birds, all they see is your weakness.
They don't know from fake. You lie there
And they see: You're weak, you're ripe,
You're going down. Careful what you wish for,"
She chuckles, tucking in the blanket.

You'd smash her teeth to shut her up
In an outraged flash; but no, that was
You years ago; today, you know better.
You put on your best wounds.
The dignity of your protests is impeccable.
You are deeply sorry that she has misunderstood you.
Perhaps it is her plainness that has made her so mean.

She tells you:
"As soon as you asked for pity,
It was a signal to the skies: You'd gladly die
To get one desiring look. Here they come gliding.
You're so sweet to them. If you stood up now,
How disappointed they would be."

The Post closes its suburban bureaus to save on leasing and equipment costs. The reporters will pick up these costs individually, and they will not have a moment they are not working. The 21st-century news business is now just like the 19th-century one. Every man for himself, and glean your own straw.

Photo: Entrance to Abita Mystery House, Louisiana.

Civil War Surgery

Sorry to be such a lameass correspondent. I was traveling -- road trip through Louisiana, Mississippi, Tennessee and Va -- and then to the beach and then camping and then the hospital. Appendix is gone and I'm happy about it, I really am, and I hope it will be happy wherever it goes and I don't bear a grudge in the least. I just want us both to be happy now. But I didn't need the pain. It was too much. Sometimes you just have to let go, even if it is a bodily organ. Just tell yourself it's vestigial, and make that clean cut.

I have a bunch of stuff I'm writing about civil war sites in Mississippi and Tennessee. Very haunted.

If you're in Annapolis, I'm giving a reading Friday at 6:30. Details here. It's an open reading afterward--why not? It's an easy crowd, believe me. They're all hopped up on those oversize chocolate chip cookies.