doordoordoordoordoordoordoordoor go
this one gets yesno this one knows that lie keep
talking eyes closed memorized the next word’s
the closer one of these soandsos youknowwhos
knows who took it it’s like taxes: eyemam
a divorced widow on my taxes then you sign it
this game is harder than bridge much [cry] you ever
play? you can’t blab everyonetoeverything
them? there? they can’t hear me
they’re a wall not family
Hi again. I thought of you when my lens slickswifted
over a seal. Sitting on a samegray blanket in a boat.
Facing thataway. So maybe it had nofaceatall. One
of those bowlingpinius nightmaricus seals. “Reader
like seals,” I thought, then, “Faceless seal?” because
it was. “Reader like true?” In a shortblink, mind
brushed its image over me, singing that Mamas
and the Papas song, “Faceless seal,/no time to turn
around./I’m sneezing up yer image/as I float on by.”
I was going downstairs to do laundry. So ok, sea:
samegray as seal. Blanket: samegray as sky and sea. ss
Laundry: soon blue then gray then drained again.
“Reader love nature.” True. So I carried faceless
seal in my jaw, smelling, tasting, superimposing
face on seas, skies, laundry, etc. Thinking of you.
in that bathrobe” again, I typed,
“You lick rubber boots,” took a screen
shot, named it the date, and saved it
to a pile of screenshots on my desktop.
If the committee asks, “Did you tongue
the signal back? flair it up?” what they are
really asking is, “Would you call what
you have a collaboration?” I will say,
“Like a cop? Nah dude.” Ha! Behold
my trove of fawned o’er harmonies:
in every one, I am heavily makeuped
and overly clothed.”
baking nananabuts in a broken brisket basket? No
thank you. Or unshowered informal poling? Nope.
Visualize shaggy nailbeds splitting rentable firepits
for Power Outage 3000! Check out Connie‘s new Chic
Sureties of the 90s™ survey! I admire her frozen head!
All the outlets are blown, so what’s beeping? Just
hang up! Don’t answer! Don’t look! Throw some LPs
from the years between the wars on. Pro tip: Mancini’s
“Wince Rhymes with Confidence.” This slow, grinding
purple instrumental might as well be fire, or bleach.
your neck from the subway platform
dodge balled up hatshop’s bid bailed
unbelch your jaw unbreeze the sail say
HAH big whoop if seizure crimped metal
releases sinking seek loose keep-down
locks across eerie canals till the bottom
box strobe doesn’t hurt that’s you that
mountain lion turned inside out and
bleatings not bleeding but (look at
how gentle I’ve been) beating.
The empty space inside
the lines not empty.
Good morning! This is Carl from Marketing USA!
How’re you doing today? I was on acid Fffine
as was Martha, whose gigantic Muppet smile
had started to fold. My boyfriend left two hits
on the counter when he went to work. Aw
I thought Martha with the feathered hair was
square but she’d been dosing since 3rd grade.
His bed was a parade float we piloted with our
minds, backs against the headboard, legs stuck
out like pencils, waving at people on the TV news.
It started out stupidly funny then morphed into
legit feelings of helpfulness like shoveling coal
in an engine to keep the talkers ringed in light until
the phone rang. Uhnho M said because she had
a fiancee and a graphic design job already lined up
and ambulances were dopplering all over Rochester.
But I picked up because people call on phones. That
was my free acid to the world, and I hope Carl won
a prize for all the questions we answered that wintery
afternoon. What’s your highest level of education?
One First grade? Yep. I passed the phone to
Martha, and she absorbed it. Rent No Yes One
million dollars I saw I’d underestimated Martha.
She was ballz deep and knew when to hang up.
I wished I’d high fived her more. I mean
I wished I’d high fived you more.
the drugs are working and this
is what feeling feels like, flying
down the road, a solid color not
edged in sparklers or strawberry
dot me just awake and the o
cean out there Nope
but the drugs are working
like the ocean in a painting
Aunt Kathryn said salt and sugar shot out of Dutch show chickens inhabiting the golf course since before she was born, since before the war before she was born, and before golf was invented.
Every Sunday, the strongest boy with the smallest hands shoved pellets of imported grass and gravel down their gullets. The problem was, when laughing and lights from night parties woke the chickens up, they marched into the ballroom and climbed up peoples’ pants and pantyhose, onto their laps, and flew at their heads…
Or was it Aunt Marilyn? “They seemed like bikers, but their growing brains just wanted to party”? Oh, that’s a Marilyn statement, all the way. That just. In Marilyn’s stories, animals always won. If they lost, she’d slash your tires, and she was an excellentgolfer.
In Kathryn’s stories, she’d bred Fluffy Dutchers all her life. And her father’s father’s father. Here’s a photo of three she defaced with her initials. Salt was for packing wounds— sugar, too (see “Sugarfoot K.E.K.”)—before, during, and after wars—and to make War Pickles, dipped in iffy cream.
Enough with elipses because. I watch
the monster movie mouth open because
that’s how I’m steering the maulings because.
See the silence bubble up Family Feud ding!
not sorry because. Just climbing on stage
is a giddyup because. Climbing on stage:
is jacoozis because! Do I I you mouthing
I, Godzilla or May Godzilla grate its graze
on you because. “Her mouth can’t park
in the We Lot because?…” I can’t real it
really because. ie Her mouth writes checks
her ass can’t park in the Me Lot because.
“Haldol,” the nurse said. “Haladol?” I mis-
pronounced it. Have a ball. “Haldol,”
she repeated, “is for psychotic breaks.”
“Is that what she’s having?” The nurse
shrugged and smiled flat. Shit’s weird.
“I just played her back her voicemails
from this weekend.” “And?” Hijenit’smon
Listeni’mhearinyouanyourfriendright
nowneststoreandthenurseinshearyootoo
andlookheredonawtgivehimanymonee
“She smiled the entire time. I’ve never
seen her smile like that. ‘Is that me?
I like this! Thank you!'” Shit’s weird.
I don’t want to end up like that but
it’s just a matter of degrees. I talk
to myself constantly, in the other
room with the TV up too loud.
She floated her fingers like chiffon shreds at the gray dog
panting in the backseat in front of her. Cool, like the Go
thing they do in The Sting with their noses. Go.
The dog took note and turned back to the driver peeling
out on green. Research shows people are less guarded
when there’s a silly old dog in their rearview looking
tired. Our brains mistake panting for smiling.
So that’s the policy for now.
grabbing all the eye-catching (white orchids?) swirling tire-level high
before they were shredded by the passing traffic’s wake. Her arm-neck-
head-hands snatching (onion skin cups?) like emus with a flaxen rind
and poor co-ordination but the (spiderwebby mouthwash lids?)
blurpled through her mitts like mercury (Herculese). The surrounding
highway, unfettered by car parts and skid marks, showned she hadn’t
slown down and jumped out when she saw the tiny (paper pill cups?)
twisting. So she must’ve scrambled up the fill slope fill slope fill slope…
Woof! In what shoes? Those puffy soled ones? Naw. Barefoot? Give
that kid an (ankle monitor) for Surprisingly Useless Athleticism,
which must make me the soon-to-be Old Woman Pulled Over
with a Popped Trunk Filling with (thumb skirts?).
Hazards tocking like a heart.
