“throwing yourself headfirst into the imperfect footsteps of giants”
Kurt Vonnegut said
everything was beautiful and nothing hurt
like it would not be possible for these two things
to happen simultaneously
last week when everyone was feeling salty,
Emily said I am with you in your brininess;
it was like she was invoking Ginsberg
I am with you in Rockwell
and I am,
I know exactly what Yeats meant when he wrote
Come away O human child to the waters and the wild
and yes
the world is more full of weeping than we can understand
everything is beautiful and everything hurts
in Rockwell
where dips the rocky highland
and
it’s okay
to not be okay
Saturday 30 April 2011
April 29 (poem 29)
"things that have made me cry this week"
1. he sang Palisades for the last time;
Jon do you remember when I offered you
my dna and the field in which it grows?
that offer still stands,
but I cannot promise that your children
would be able to maintain perfect pitch
through whiskey the way you can.
2. drifting through the place I used to call home;
it smelled exactly the same as four years ago,
only the names on the doors had rearranged their letters
and the postsecret wall I made was absent.
Emily do you remember dead poets society nights
and how your room always smelled like thai tea
and warmth, how we rafted mattresses together
in the lake of your floor, swallowing goldfish
crackers, chocolate chips, and orange juice?
Remember smearing purple shit into my hair
and how we stained every bathtub and shower
in the building for three whole months?
Meryl do you remember the time I dialed 911
the night I stopped loving the girl whose life
I saved by calling, how you anchored me to the good
dock of your arms as I sank again and again into
all seven seas of your chest?
Gabe do you remember how we played dirty scrabble
and translated everything into braille for your roommate?
Katrina do you remember how you used to stamp
kisses on the envelope of my cheek? It was the first time
I felt like it didn’t matter that I was gay,
you treated me exactly the same, thank you.
Do you remember the day Tea scraped a razor across my scalp
and Liz said, incredulous, that I was still beautiful
and my girlfriend’s silence said the opposite?
She was my first kiss, first fuck, first girlfriend,
and we had nothing in common.
3. the signatures orbiting the photograph of me as a baby.
I am not sure why I think I will miss a community that
made me feel so lonely toward the end.
I noticed when you made mix cds for everyone except me,
how your inside jokes sprouted in the sunlight of the
gatherings I was never invited to,
how I didn’t quite make it into all those photographs you took,
how David was surprised when I told him
I felt like a distant satellite most of the time.
1. he sang Palisades for the last time;
Jon do you remember when I offered you
my dna and the field in which it grows?
that offer still stands,
but I cannot promise that your children
would be able to maintain perfect pitch
through whiskey the way you can.
2. drifting through the place I used to call home;
it smelled exactly the same as four years ago,
only the names on the doors had rearranged their letters
and the postsecret wall I made was absent.
Emily do you remember dead poets society nights
and how your room always smelled like thai tea
and warmth, how we rafted mattresses together
in the lake of your floor, swallowing goldfish
crackers, chocolate chips, and orange juice?
Remember smearing purple shit into my hair
and how we stained every bathtub and shower
in the building for three whole months?
Meryl do you remember the time I dialed 911
the night I stopped loving the girl whose life
I saved by calling, how you anchored me to the good
dock of your arms as I sank again and again into
all seven seas of your chest?
Gabe do you remember how we played dirty scrabble
and translated everything into braille for your roommate?
Katrina do you remember how you used to stamp
kisses on the envelope of my cheek? It was the first time
I felt like it didn’t matter that I was gay,
you treated me exactly the same, thank you.
Do you remember the day Tea scraped a razor across my scalp
and Liz said, incredulous, that I was still beautiful
and my girlfriend’s silence said the opposite?
She was my first kiss, first fuck, first girlfriend,
and we had nothing in common.
3. the signatures orbiting the photograph of me as a baby.
I am not sure why I think I will miss a community that
made me feel so lonely toward the end.
I noticed when you made mix cds for everyone except me,
how your inside jokes sprouted in the sunlight of the
gatherings I was never invited to,
how I didn’t quite make it into all those photographs you took,
how David was surprised when I told him
I felt like a distant satellite most of the time.
April 29 (poem 28)
“five of eight”
sometimes love is
a box of See’s candies
five of eight of which
your grandmother ate
before she gave the box
to you.
sometimes love is
a box of See’s candies
five of eight of which
your grandmother ate
before she gave the box
to you.
Friday 29 April 2011
April 29 (poem 27)
“imperfect anniversary”
It has been three and a half years since
I saw the candlewax version of you ensconced in a casket,
your cheeks completely the wrong shade of pink,
your eyelashes actually visible.
When no one was looking I touched the thing that had been
your hand,
and I could not wash the coldness off my fingers for days.
You did not look peaceful or asleep,
you looked like a casting of yourself.
Six months earlier you drove six hours to see me,
your first and only granddaughter,
graduate from thirteen years of doodling on public school desks.
You told me you were proud of me
and I didn’t understand why—
“It’s just school, Dad Dad” I said.
You were always Dad Dad because when my tongue
was first learning how to walk
it tripped over Granddad and fell on Dad Dad;
all five of your grandsons, tumbling out after me,
following my lead,
never learned the correct steps after that.
There are six of us
grandchildren,
and I am the only one who graduated
with you watching.
Now, as I prepare to walk again,
I wonder if you would be proud of me,
your bald-headed city-clinging granddaughter,
who you taught how to flip a fish inside out,
who climbed every tree you introduced her to
barefoot,
who begged for stories about hornytoads and rattlers,
who navigated Lake Chelan from the captain’s chair of your lap,
who brushed off beestings
and filled her pockets with river rocks shaped like feet,
but who never scooped together
enough courage to tell you she’s gay,
and who did not even cry for your funeral
until three and a half years later.
It has been three and a half years since
I saw the candlewax version of you ensconced in a casket,
your cheeks completely the wrong shade of pink,
your eyelashes actually visible.
When no one was looking I touched the thing that had been
your hand,
and I could not wash the coldness off my fingers for days.
You did not look peaceful or asleep,
you looked like a casting of yourself.
Six months earlier you drove six hours to see me,
your first and only granddaughter,
graduate from thirteen years of doodling on public school desks.
You told me you were proud of me
and I didn’t understand why—
“It’s just school, Dad Dad” I said.
You were always Dad Dad because when my tongue
was first learning how to walk
it tripped over Granddad and fell on Dad Dad;
all five of your grandsons, tumbling out after me,
following my lead,
never learned the correct steps after that.
There are six of us
grandchildren,
and I am the only one who graduated
with you watching.
Now, as I prepare to walk again,
I wonder if you would be proud of me,
your bald-headed city-clinging granddaughter,
who you taught how to flip a fish inside out,
who climbed every tree you introduced her to
barefoot,
who begged for stories about hornytoads and rattlers,
who navigated Lake Chelan from the captain’s chair of your lap,
who brushed off beestings
and filled her pockets with river rocks shaped like feet,
but who never scooped together
enough courage to tell you she’s gay,
and who did not even cry for your funeral
until three and a half years later.
Wednesday 27 April 2011
April 26
“disorder”
I am used to having blood pinched
beneath my fingernails,
rusting my sleeves,
and streaked across my tongue;
I know exactly what the elixir of
anxiety and boredom
tastes like:
beer, pennies, and my own
inability
to stop.
I am used to having blood pinched
beneath my fingernails,
rusting my sleeves,
and streaked across my tongue;
I know exactly what the elixir of
anxiety and boredom
tastes like:
beer, pennies, and my own
inability
to stop.
Tuesday 26 April 2011
April 25
“Mimmie”
She had always wanted a girl.
When her boys were young and grasshopper-legged
she sewed the same three letters to the insides of all their exoskeletons;
she had named all three of them with identical initials,
different from the ones she had tucked away
for the daughter that never happened.
The first boy steeped in creation and
Creationism. He taxidermied birds and soldered stained glass,
storytold and storytold and storytold.
Now, chip-chinned and balding,
he preaches resurrection in a room illuminated
by mosaic windows
in a town the size of an illustrated
pocket-bible.
The third boy seethed in the loneliness of being the littlest.
He learned to whet his words and
throw them like daggers;
it was his only defense.
Now, with two boys of his own,
he uses his law degree to raise them to be
fastest smartest loudest but still
lonely.
The middle boy, as all middle boys must,
mediated.
But she always wanted a girl,
a long-haired rose-hip-lipped Cherokee-cheeked
girldollchild, not these
thorny-shouldered tumbleweed-limbed sons,
too bright to look directly at amidst all the blue of
a Wyoming sky.
The middle boy,
he’s my father.
On the day 45 years after she was born
so was I.
He whittled me girl and
sharpened me loud.
When I laugh, my noes wrinkles the same way hers does.
My cheeks are just as Cherokee as hers
but my eyes are more Wyoming sky
and my hands storytell loneliness.
She had always wanted a girl.
The Sunday two years ago we all held hands around her table
to celebrate the rising son
I rolled the boulder out from in front of my throat
and told her my hands held another girl’s.
All she could do was tumbleweed her head back and forth
back and forth and back and forth and
smile in a way that made her tears
collect in the raingutter wrinkles that her laughter
has installed on the bridge of her nose.
She had always wanted a girl,
not two.
She had always wanted a girl.
When her boys were young and grasshopper-legged
she sewed the same three letters to the insides of all their exoskeletons;
she had named all three of them with identical initials,
different from the ones she had tucked away
for the daughter that never happened.
The first boy steeped in creation and
Creationism. He taxidermied birds and soldered stained glass,
storytold and storytold and storytold.
Now, chip-chinned and balding,
he preaches resurrection in a room illuminated
by mosaic windows
in a town the size of an illustrated
pocket-bible.
The third boy seethed in the loneliness of being the littlest.
He learned to whet his words and
throw them like daggers;
it was his only defense.
Now, with two boys of his own,
he uses his law degree to raise them to be
fastest smartest loudest but still
lonely.
The middle boy, as all middle boys must,
mediated.
But she always wanted a girl,
a long-haired rose-hip-lipped Cherokee-cheeked
girldollchild, not these
thorny-shouldered tumbleweed-limbed sons,
too bright to look directly at amidst all the blue of
a Wyoming sky.
The middle boy,
he’s my father.
On the day 45 years after she was born
so was I.
He whittled me girl and
sharpened me loud.
When I laugh, my noes wrinkles the same way hers does.
My cheeks are just as Cherokee as hers
but my eyes are more Wyoming sky
and my hands storytell loneliness.
She had always wanted a girl.
The Sunday two years ago we all held hands around her table
to celebrate the rising son
I rolled the boulder out from in front of my throat
and told her my hands held another girl’s.
All she could do was tumbleweed her head back and forth
back and forth and back and forth and
smile in a way that made her tears
collect in the raingutter wrinkles that her laughter
has installed on the bridge of her nose.
She had always wanted a girl,
not two.
Monday 25 April 2011
April 24 (poem 24)
“If you are looking for hope”
There is a woman in France who smears salve in the form of
braided strips of fabric
into the chapped lips of the Parisian streets.
Her name is Juliana Santacruz Herrera.
There is a swan in Germany who has spent eight years
in love with a blue tractor,
trailing it as though he has found his red thread,
as though his heart could speak engine
as well as it speaks grit.
Currently there are more libraries in the United States of America
than McDonalds;
sometimes this is the only statistic I can stomach.
I have easily consumed more books
than burgers in my life.
As for you, Swan,
I too have learned to love things that rumble;
our hearts are not so different,
when it comes right down to it.
Last,
Juliana,
I just want you to know
that the potholed road I call my heart could use
some yarn art
to fill its splits and cracks
with softness.
There is a woman in France who smears salve in the form of
braided strips of fabric
into the chapped lips of the Parisian streets.
Her name is Juliana Santacruz Herrera.
There is a swan in Germany who has spent eight years
in love with a blue tractor,
trailing it as though he has found his red thread,
as though his heart could speak engine
as well as it speaks grit.
Currently there are more libraries in the United States of America
than McDonalds;
sometimes this is the only statistic I can stomach.
I have easily consumed more books
than burgers in my life.
As for you, Swan,
I too have learned to love things that rumble;
our hearts are not so different,
when it comes right down to it.
Last,
Juliana,
I just want you to know
that the potholed road I call my heart could use
some yarn art
to fill its splits and cracks
with softness.
April 24 (poem 23)
“sea stars are incapable of drowning”
you hugged me like a sea star hugs an anchor
that has dropped near it for long enough,
like iron is a rare thing,
like I could bring you
to the surface
you hugged me like a sea star hugs an anchor
that has dropped near it for long enough,
like iron is a rare thing,
like I could bring you
to the surface
Saturday 23 April 2011
April 22
“graduating”
I am not scared to
pay bills, do the shopping, exchange work for a paycheck—
but I am terrified of forgetting about
performance art
I am not scared to
pay bills, do the shopping, exchange work for a paycheck—
but I am terrified of forgetting about
performance art
Thursday 21 April 2011
April 21 (poem 21)
"convenience feminist"
“You’re a convenience feminist,”
my dad said;
his definition of feminist is
a woman who changes the oil in her own goddamn car;
and since I have a bike,
two good feet, and a license it took me six years
to nurture the courage to get,
I have little use for
oil.
“You’re a convenience feminist,”
my dad said;
his definition of feminist is
a woman who changes the oil in her own goddamn car;
and since I have a bike,
two good feet, and a license it took me six years
to nurture the courage to get,
I have little use for
oil.
April 21 (poem 20)
"if cities were people"
Nairobi,
she’s the girl who taught me how to drink,
taught me to take it slow and to appreciate water.
She wasn’t the first to whisper booze in my ear
but something about the roadrash scuffing her limbs,
how she wore trash like it was art,
and her trilingual laugh
lowered my inhibitions.
London,
she’s the midafternoon one night stand
I can’t quite shake out of my heart.
Tokyo,
I’m not even going to talk about Tokyo;
she was too much for me.
The first thing she told me was she’s got a history
and she was proud of that.
Seattle,
he’s the rain-eyed boy next door
who is afraid of my mother even though he’s always
been bigger.
Portland,
she calls me daughter,
thinks she holds me closer than Clark Gable holds perfect kisses,
when really I’ve always grown best at her fingertips
not in her heart;
but thanks for leaving the key under the mat anyway
so I can always let myself back in.
Nairobi,
she’s the girl who taught me how to drink,
taught me to take it slow and to appreciate water.
She wasn’t the first to whisper booze in my ear
but something about the roadrash scuffing her limbs,
how she wore trash like it was art,
and her trilingual laugh
lowered my inhibitions.
London,
she’s the midafternoon one night stand
I can’t quite shake out of my heart.
Tokyo,
I’m not even going to talk about Tokyo;
she was too much for me.
The first thing she told me was she’s got a history
and she was proud of that.
Seattle,
he’s the rain-eyed boy next door
who is afraid of my mother even though he’s always
been bigger.
Portland,
she calls me daughter,
thinks she holds me closer than Clark Gable holds perfect kisses,
when really I’ve always grown best at her fingertips
not in her heart;
but thanks for leaving the key under the mat anyway
so I can always let myself back in.
Wednesday 20 April 2011
April 19
“letter to baby brother”
you are born with a snake climbing into your belly like a hose filling you up with screams
like I scream you scream we all scream for ice cream
and it's melted all over you
vanilla ice cream from you splashing in mommy's bowl
mommy's big round moonbelly
you're as bald as the moon
you're as bald as Earl from church
daddy says he has a head like a ping-pong ball
but you have a head like a squashed peach
and frog legs;
I gave you a kiss, frog prince
but you didn't turn into a person
mommy says you will if I'm patient
I'm trying to be patient.
did you know you used to be a tadpole?
before you were a tadpole you were a dinosaur
and before you were a dinosaur you were stars
and before you were stars you were
nothing
probably.
frog prince, did you hear the songs I sang to you?
you should know your ABCs by now.
and twinkletwinklelittlestar.
frog prince, did you feel the kisses I sent blowing down mommy's bellybutton hole?
I will teach you all about dinosaurs
stegosauruses and tyrannosauruses and rexes
they all turned to bones when a star fell on them
and I will teach you all about stars,
how they're not fireflies or God like I used to think
but grandma says God is up there
and even though I've looked for a long time I've never seen him
although I'm pretty sure if God's up there then so is Jesus and Santa and the Easter Bunny.
firetruck mouth you siren so loud it wakes up all the people.
stop screaming so big
don’t you know it is hard to scream and sleep at the same time
and the three things you need to grow are water, sunlight, and dreams
so goodnight baby brother
goodnight frog prince
goodnight moonhead
I will play with you when you turn into a person.
you are born with a snake climbing into your belly like a hose filling you up with screams
like I scream you scream we all scream for ice cream
and it's melted all over you
vanilla ice cream from you splashing in mommy's bowl
mommy's big round moonbelly
you're as bald as the moon
you're as bald as Earl from church
daddy says he has a head like a ping-pong ball
but you have a head like a squashed peach
and frog legs;
I gave you a kiss, frog prince
but you didn't turn into a person
mommy says you will if I'm patient
I'm trying to be patient.
did you know you used to be a tadpole?
before you were a tadpole you were a dinosaur
and before you were a dinosaur you were stars
and before you were stars you were
nothing
probably.
frog prince, did you hear the songs I sang to you?
you should know your ABCs by now.
and twinkletwinklelittlestar.
frog prince, did you feel the kisses I sent blowing down mommy's bellybutton hole?
I will teach you all about dinosaurs
stegosauruses and tyrannosauruses and rexes
they all turned to bones when a star fell on them
and I will teach you all about stars,
how they're not fireflies or God like I used to think
but grandma says God is up there
and even though I've looked for a long time I've never seen him
although I'm pretty sure if God's up there then so is Jesus and Santa and the Easter Bunny.
firetruck mouth you siren so loud it wakes up all the people.
stop screaming so big
don’t you know it is hard to scream and sleep at the same time
and the three things you need to grow are water, sunlight, and dreams
so goodnight baby brother
goodnight frog prince
goodnight moonhead
I will play with you when you turn into a person.
Tuesday 19 April 2011
April 18
“Maria”
For nearly a year you and I have worked
in the same polygon hallway,
me cleaning up emotional debris and
decorating,
you scrubbing down the toiletbowls we refuse to flush
and smiling.
Even though I call myself an activist
the only things I know about you are
your first name, the color of your iPod,
and that for two months you used your lunch breaks to
knit 30 pairs of delicate white
baby booties.
For nearly a year you and I have worked
in the same polygon hallway,
me cleaning up emotional debris and
decorating,
you scrubbing down the toiletbowls we refuse to flush
and smiling.
Even though I call myself an activist
the only things I know about you are
your first name, the color of your iPod,
and that for two months you used your lunch breaks to
knit 30 pairs of delicate white
baby booties.
Monday 18 April 2011
April 17 (poem 17)
"Naked Mile"
We cracked out of our clothes, left our shells behind;
someone high fived my scapula with blue
and I labeled Chris’s spine with his name.
Armored in paint and the pack mentality and
not much else,
I was surprised to realize that
without fashion to segment us,
without being split into distinct articles of clothing,
I saw everyone as whole,
and when it came time to run
it was something my whole body was doing.
It felt like being new,
before you know what bravery is,
before such a word
becomes necessary.
We cracked out of our clothes, left our shells behind;
someone high fived my scapula with blue
and I labeled Chris’s spine with his name.
Armored in paint and the pack mentality and
not much else,
I was surprised to realize that
without fashion to segment us,
without being split into distinct articles of clothing,
I saw everyone as whole,
and when it came time to run
it was something my whole body was doing.
It felt like being new,
before you know what bravery is,
before such a word
becomes necessary.
April 17 (poem 16)
“van hymns in the rearview mirror”
I never guess them quite right before I meet them;
people are always different sizes than I expect,
different shapes than I anticipate.
I thought Michelle Tea would be bigger or at least
jagged enough to account for the glass fragments in her writing;
I expected her to be more canine and less incisor,
less hearth and more forestfire,
more rollingpaperzines and less ms. magazine
but she is fold-up size,
wrapped in tattoos like black lace
and all she really wanted was one
good night’s rest.
I never guess them quite right before I meet them;
people are always different sizes than I expect,
different shapes than I anticipate.
I thought Michelle Tea would be bigger or at least
jagged enough to account for the glass fragments in her writing;
I expected her to be more canine and less incisor,
less hearth and more forestfire,
more rollingpaperzines and less ms. magazine
but she is fold-up size,
wrapped in tattoos like black lace
and all she really wanted was one
good night’s rest.
Friday 15 April 2011
April 15
“night of noise”
so much of what we do
comes down to
making sounds into empty space
as though we could fill it
as though there were ears other than ours
to receive it
or hearts
to care.
so much of what we do
comes down to
making sounds into empty space
as though we could fill it
as though there were ears other than ours
to receive it
or hearts
to care.
Thursday 14 April 2011
April 14
“heartwood”
The only part of a tree that dies when it stops growing
is the heartwood
which pretty much holds true for people too.
You could count my growth rings
if you could take a cross-section of my insides,
but it would leave me shot through with holes
or split entirely in half
and it would probably hurt.
Considering our relationship with gravity
it’s pretty surprising we only teach people to stand
and don’t teach people
how to fall,
but we tell people that when you do fall
you will only fall once.
We never talk about the regrowth,
the spaces you open for newcomers when you’re down
how you can house entire civilizations
by instinct.
Know that what grows up out of you
can fall too
and really
you’re less like a tree
and more like a whole
forest.
The only part of a tree that dies when it stops growing
is the heartwood
which pretty much holds true for people too.
You could count my growth rings
if you could take a cross-section of my insides,
but it would leave me shot through with holes
or split entirely in half
and it would probably hurt.
Considering our relationship with gravity
it’s pretty surprising we only teach people to stand
and don’t teach people
how to fall,
but we tell people that when you do fall
you will only fall once.
We never talk about the regrowth,
the spaces you open for newcomers when you’re down
how you can house entire civilizations
by instinct.
Know that what grows up out of you
can fall too
and really
you’re less like a tree
and more like a whole
forest.
April 13
“indicators of ecosystem health”
My skin is canary song.
It is mayfly eggs downstream.
It is the usnea lichen on my limbs striking deals with nitrogen.
Even though it does not speak in a language I can read
it signals trouble.
When in November it spelled something’s wrong
I turned to professionals with letters
like reading glasses perched on the ends of their names:
MD, PC, PhD.
Their test results said:
More tests. More tests said four different things.
I did not want a diagnosis and
something else to swallow.
I wanted to find out what my mine is made of,
the exact location of the leak upstream,
why lichen stopped doing business in the forest.
But all the doctors could give me was a generic antibiotic,
an inflammation classification, a shrug,
and a heavy bill.
I am beginning to realize that a lifetime
of reading textbooks for med school
is not the same thing as understanding
the semantics of skin,
and even if I don’t know all the words
my body writes in a rash font across my arms,
I can listen when it sings,
and maybe,
if I start putting faith instead of pills in my body,
it will not only recover;
it will thrive.
My skin is canary song.
It is mayfly eggs downstream.
It is the usnea lichen on my limbs striking deals with nitrogen.
Even though it does not speak in a language I can read
it signals trouble.
When in November it spelled something’s wrong
I turned to professionals with letters
like reading glasses perched on the ends of their names:
MD, PC, PhD.
Their test results said:
More tests. More tests said four different things.
I did not want a diagnosis and
something else to swallow.
I wanted to find out what my mine is made of,
the exact location of the leak upstream,
why lichen stopped doing business in the forest.
But all the doctors could give me was a generic antibiotic,
an inflammation classification, a shrug,
and a heavy bill.
I am beginning to realize that a lifetime
of reading textbooks for med school
is not the same thing as understanding
the semantics of skin,
and even if I don’t know all the words
my body writes in a rash font across my arms,
I can listen when it sings,
and maybe,
if I start putting faith instead of pills in my body,
it will not only recover;
it will thrive.
Wednesday 13 April 2011
April 12
“I always wonder where the sharpies come from”
The words saluting across the cardboard
(ragged for effect)
said “Everyone could use a little help sometimes.
Thank you.”
Our eyes touched through the window,
him squatting on the concrete with a paper cup and
weariness,
me perched on the summit of a barstool chair in Starbucks,
with hot tea, Virginia Woolf, and
guilt.
The words saluting across the cardboard
(ragged for effect)
said “Everyone could use a little help sometimes.
Thank you.”
Our eyes touched through the window,
him squatting on the concrete with a paper cup and
weariness,
me perched on the summit of a barstool chair in Starbucks,
with hot tea, Virginia Woolf, and
guilt.
Tuesday 12 April 2011
April 11
“A Summary of President Barry Glassner’s Inauguration”
Important People:
This institution is a paragon of the
multiplicity of holistic pedagogy
the academy is integral to the stimu
Barry Glassner
the optimal soc
important
noble
Mayor Sam Adams:
Lewis & Clark is
part of the city
of Portland
(…I didn’t really
write a speech…)
Ombudsperson Valerie White:
Like the children in Mary Poppins
placing an ad for a nanny, we
wanted it all. And in Barry,
we got it all.
Grad Student Body President:
THE WORLD IS ENDING
BARRY WATCHU GONNA DO?!
President Barry Glassner:
BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN.
Reception:
yes quite
delightful
lovely just lovely
Important People:
This institution is a paragon of the
multiplicity of holistic pedagogy
the academy is integral to the stimu
Barry Glassner
the optimal soc
important
noble
Mayor Sam Adams:
Lewis & Clark is
part of the city
of Portland
(…I didn’t really
write a speech…)
Ombudsperson Valerie White:
Like the children in Mary Poppins
placing an ad for a nanny, we
wanted it all. And in Barry,
we got it all.
Grad Student Body President:
THE WORLD IS ENDING
BARRY WATCHU GONNA DO?!
President Barry Glassner:
BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN.
Reception:
yes quite
delightful
lovely just lovely
Monday 11 April 2011
April 10
“to the boy I asked to the dance six years ago”
I never told you thank you.
Your hull-rough chin,
protractor corners,
and envelope lips
taught me that the thing I like most about boys
is Old Spice.
I do not regret the porchfront moment when
you asked for a kiss and I said No;
thank you for answering
the question I had not yet asked myself:
now I know
I like Old Spice best
on girls.
I never told you thank you.
Your hull-rough chin,
protractor corners,
and envelope lips
taught me that the thing I like most about boys
is Old Spice.
I do not regret the porchfront moment when
you asked for a kiss and I said No;
thank you for answering
the question I had not yet asked myself:
now I know
I like Old Spice best
on girls.
Sunday 10 April 2011
April 9 (poem 9)
“dermatologist”
she scrolled over every page of my body without comment
and I thought
when did she start seeing skin as
a prescription note
instead of art?
she scrolled over every page of my body without comment
and I thought
when did she start seeing skin as
a prescription note
instead of art?
April 9 (poem 8)
"confessions in three parts"
1. doorknobs make me nervous
I can feel their afterimages on my palms
like ghosts.
2. when my stomach lionmouths
I imagine my thoracic cavity as an ice cave
it helps me breathe clear.
3. my panic attacks do not trigger the
most sensitive of sonographs;
I am good at masks.
1. doorknobs make me nervous
I can feel their afterimages on my palms
like ghosts.
2. when my stomach lionmouths
I imagine my thoracic cavity as an ice cave
it helps me breathe clear.
3. my panic attacks do not trigger the
most sensitive of sonographs;
I am good at masks.
Saturday 9 April 2011
April 9 (poem 7)
“adulthood”
at the Moss Street house
there will be
dinosaurs above the fireplace
an orange tabby in the windowsill
fruit game nights
and I will call it
home
at the Moss Street house
there will be
dinosaurs above the fireplace
an orange tabby in the windowsill
fruit game nights
and I will call it
home
Thursday 7 April 2011
April 6
“advice to my middle school self”
You will not always feel like an alien.
At some point you will also stop telling people
you are trying to contact the mothership
by twisting your earrings around on the dashboard of your ears.
When you wish your boobs rivaled Angela’s
Stop it.
When they bloom brighter than hers, do note berate yourself.
It is not your fault.
When Mr. Filer tells you
you can’t wear the purse you pack with embarrassment
– a toothbrush, pads, and braces rubber bands –
to his algebra class,
do not cry. Do not unzip anything.
When Mr. Boyd tells you girls are only good for cartwheels and somersaults,
research Title IX.
Even though you will never win a single wrestling match on the PE mats,
you will triumph.
When Kim asks you at Cassie’s slumber party if you are a prude,
do not ask what this means.
Pretend to be asleep.
While the other girls list boys
they would like to kiss,
always choose Dare.
Do not tell them how your insides sparked
every time Erika unfurled her lips in science class the day
you learned about heat convection.
Even though you will invoke his name like salvation,
the girls do not know that you do not actually know Kevin.
You do not need to carry a concealed camera on the last day of school
to convince them that you like him.
That’s called overcompensating, and it’s creepy.
When Logan calls you a know-it-all, do not turn cherry-cheeked.
Do not give him the answers to the Spanish homework.
When Jens tells you he has a secret and the first letter is G,
the next two letters are A and Y.
When you finally figure this out,
do not then shout “You’re gay?! COOL!” when the hallway
is cluttered with students.
But do hug him.
When Loraina asks you if you’re a Christian,
do not say yes, because then she will ask you what denomination you are
and there is no denomination that celebrates
Kwanzaa, Yom Kippur, Dia de los Muertos, and Solstice.
Invent your own gods. Give them Latin names.
Listen when she tells you about heaven,
but object when she tells you Jens’ boyloving heart is captained by demons.
She will not do it again.
When your brother makes you mad,
do not kick him in the balls. He will punch you back.
Steal one piece of his Halloween candy instead.
Stop wearing that goddamn jingle bell on your shoe.
And stop telling people it’s there so you don’t lose yourself.
Losing yourself and finding yourself are pretty much the same thing
and neither require constant noise.
When Cam walks around shirtless to let the
henna paste dragon dig its two-week-long claws into the cave wall of her back,
do not stare.
When at 3am she falls asleep in the crevice between your chest and your arms,
remember to breathe.
When you are absolutely totally one hundred percent sure everyone else is asleep
whisper a kiss into her hair; she will not wake up
but everything inside of you will suddenly sunrise, and even though
you know that the universe is expanding at the rate of 71 kilometers per second per Megaparsec
this will be the first time
your heart understands exactly what the universe is going through.
You will not always feel like an alien.
At some point you will also stop telling people
you are trying to contact the mothership
by twisting your earrings around on the dashboard of your ears.
When you wish your boobs rivaled Angela’s
Stop it.
When they bloom brighter than hers, do note berate yourself.
It is not your fault.
When Mr. Filer tells you
you can’t wear the purse you pack with embarrassment
– a toothbrush, pads, and braces rubber bands –
to his algebra class,
do not cry. Do not unzip anything.
When Mr. Boyd tells you girls are only good for cartwheels and somersaults,
research Title IX.
Even though you will never win a single wrestling match on the PE mats,
you will triumph.
When Kim asks you at Cassie’s slumber party if you are a prude,
do not ask what this means.
Pretend to be asleep.
While the other girls list boys
they would like to kiss,
always choose Dare.
Do not tell them how your insides sparked
every time Erika unfurled her lips in science class the day
you learned about heat convection.
Even though you will invoke his name like salvation,
the girls do not know that you do not actually know Kevin.
You do not need to carry a concealed camera on the last day of school
to convince them that you like him.
That’s called overcompensating, and it’s creepy.
When Logan calls you a know-it-all, do not turn cherry-cheeked.
Do not give him the answers to the Spanish homework.
When Jens tells you he has a secret and the first letter is G,
the next two letters are A and Y.
When you finally figure this out,
do not then shout “You’re gay?! COOL!” when the hallway
is cluttered with students.
But do hug him.
When Loraina asks you if you’re a Christian,
do not say yes, because then she will ask you what denomination you are
and there is no denomination that celebrates
Kwanzaa, Yom Kippur, Dia de los Muertos, and Solstice.
Invent your own gods. Give them Latin names.
Listen when she tells you about heaven,
but object when she tells you Jens’ boyloving heart is captained by demons.
She will not do it again.
When your brother makes you mad,
do not kick him in the balls. He will punch you back.
Steal one piece of his Halloween candy instead.
Stop wearing that goddamn jingle bell on your shoe.
And stop telling people it’s there so you don’t lose yourself.
Losing yourself and finding yourself are pretty much the same thing
and neither require constant noise.
When Cam walks around shirtless to let the
henna paste dragon dig its two-week-long claws into the cave wall of her back,
do not stare.
When at 3am she falls asleep in the crevice between your chest and your arms,
remember to breathe.
When you are absolutely totally one hundred percent sure everyone else is asleep
whisper a kiss into her hair; she will not wake up
but everything inside of you will suddenly sunrise, and even though
you know that the universe is expanding at the rate of 71 kilometers per second per Megaparsec
this will be the first time
your heart understands exactly what the universe is going through.
Wednesday 6 April 2011
April 5
"bus stop man"
his eyes were like looking at the moon through pollution:
intimately acquainted with edges,
yellow and somehow more full than
the bruises would warrant;
“the only religion I like is taoism” he said
“and sometimes islam” and when I tried to say
“islam is from the word for peace” this
empty whiskey bottle of a man
with more journey in his gums than entire teeth said
“salaam alaikum, I know” like the years
I spent convincing my brother that
brown, terrorist, and muslim
are not synonyms
was a candle that did not deserve the lightning
of the thing I called “double standard” and this brittle bus stop man
called “racism.”
his eyes were like looking at the moon through pollution:
intimately acquainted with edges,
yellow and somehow more full than
the bruises would warrant;
“the only religion I like is taoism” he said
“and sometimes islam” and when I tried to say
“islam is from the word for peace” this
empty whiskey bottle of a man
with more journey in his gums than entire teeth said
“salaam alaikum, I know” like the years
I spent convincing my brother that
brown, terrorist, and muslim
are not synonyms
was a candle that did not deserve the lightning
of the thing I called “double standard” and this brittle bus stop man
called “racism.”
Tuesday 5 April 2011
April 4
"homeland"
A person's homeland could be referred to as ko'u kula 'iwi,
“my plain of bones”
in Hawaiian,
and I think I have any right
to call myself
a citizen
like my bones are any whiter
than yours.
A person's homeland could be referred to as ko'u kula 'iwi,
“my plain of bones”
in Hawaiian,
and I think I have any right
to call myself
a citizen
like my bones are any whiter
than yours.
Monday 4 April 2011
April 3
“I am accumulating a stockpile of mistrust for the letter J”
Oh you know me, dry as humor,
my tear ducts taped shut
year-round;
I do not even trickle
much less cataract –
it’s just not a thing I do.
But tonight
after a weekend of three hands competing
to handpuppet me,
to transform my mouth into mouthpiece,
scrape my goodwill into carrier pigeon,
and raise my integrity into question,
I sit on the precipice of leaking
despite confidentiality contracts
and overdeveloped hydrophobia.
The most dangerous place for carrier pigeons
is not in the crossfire
but in the place they feel safest
which is also the place in which they are caged.
Let the record show that I know that
those three hands pulling my chains are attached to adults
whose isosceles could be righted
if they bucked up and acted like it
and talked to each other
like grown-ups.
Oh you know me, dry as humor,
my tear ducts taped shut
year-round;
I do not even trickle
much less cataract –
it’s just not a thing I do.
But tonight
after a weekend of three hands competing
to handpuppet me,
to transform my mouth into mouthpiece,
scrape my goodwill into carrier pigeon,
and raise my integrity into question,
I sit on the precipice of leaking
despite confidentiality contracts
and overdeveloped hydrophobia.
The most dangerous place for carrier pigeons
is not in the crossfire
but in the place they feel safest
which is also the place in which they are caged.
Let the record show that I know that
those three hands pulling my chains are attached to adults
whose isosceles could be righted
if they bucked up and acted like it
and talked to each other
like grown-ups.
Saturday 2 April 2011
April 2
"The Virginity Tree"
trigger warning: sexual assault
Prologue.
Andrea Gibson said to write the hardest poem.
One.
There are too many bruises in the word that does not belong between my legs.
It is four letters too many
which is to say it is four letters more than silence.
It is not a word that girls can give to other girls.
Two.
There is a tree that I can see from my room.
It’s heavy with shoes tied to its fingers as
reminders of what it means to be barefoot,
to be naked and touching for the first time.
It’s a tradition where I live:
you lose your shoes along with your virginity,
hang the pair in the tree.
Three.
Sometimes I imagine that I can erect fences around sections of my body,
miniature white picket spines designating parts of me as private property.
That is new; I used to imagine my body as a body.
Four.
There is a reason I remove my shoes every time I arrive somewhere new.
It’s the same reason I trust forests more than pickup lines.
Five.
My mother is a survivor,
a word she pronounces “victim”
and which she thinks pronounces her different,
even though the statistic is one in six.
One in six.
Six.
What is the meaning of the word legacy?
Seven.
I cannot bring myself to hang my sneakers –
the faded ones with rainbow laces and peeling heels –
in a tree so clamorous with happiness.
They would make terrible wind chimes.
Eight.
When the Womyn’s Center on my college campus strings the dirty laundry
of women’s shelter stories on a clothesline and calls it Take Back the Night art therapy
there is not a t-shirt there that fits me;
there is a man behind every curtain,
between every line.
Nine.
Her fingers knew the words crime,
No,
And Stop,
but she thinks her fingers can’t count.
Ten.
I called her “girlfriend” after that night,
called it a rite of passage
instead of wrong,
didn’t file a report because it took me three years
to even realize anything had been stolen
and not given freely.
Epilogue.
I still have not told my mother exactly how
precisely
I have filled her shoes.
trigger warning: sexual assault
Prologue.
Andrea Gibson said to write the hardest poem.
One.
There are too many bruises in the word that does not belong between my legs.
It is four letters too many
which is to say it is four letters more than silence.
It is not a word that girls can give to other girls.
Two.
There is a tree that I can see from my room.
It’s heavy with shoes tied to its fingers as
reminders of what it means to be barefoot,
to be naked and touching for the first time.
It’s a tradition where I live:
you lose your shoes along with your virginity,
hang the pair in the tree.
Three.
Sometimes I imagine that I can erect fences around sections of my body,
miniature white picket spines designating parts of me as private property.
That is new; I used to imagine my body as a body.
Four.
There is a reason I remove my shoes every time I arrive somewhere new.
It’s the same reason I trust forests more than pickup lines.
Five.
My mother is a survivor,
a word she pronounces “victim”
and which she thinks pronounces her different,
even though the statistic is one in six.
One in six.
Six.
What is the meaning of the word legacy?
Seven.
I cannot bring myself to hang my sneakers –
the faded ones with rainbow laces and peeling heels –
in a tree so clamorous with happiness.
They would make terrible wind chimes.
Eight.
When the Womyn’s Center on my college campus strings the dirty laundry
of women’s shelter stories on a clothesline and calls it Take Back the Night art therapy
there is not a t-shirt there that fits me;
there is a man behind every curtain,
between every line.
Nine.
Her fingers knew the words crime,
No,
And Stop,
but she thinks her fingers can’t count.
Ten.
I called her “girlfriend” after that night,
called it a rite of passage
instead of wrong,
didn’t file a report because it took me three years
to even realize anything had been stolen
and not given freely.
Epilogue.
I still have not told my mother exactly how
precisely
I have filled her shoes.
Friday 1 April 2011
April 1
"love letter to my body"
trigger warning: body issues, eating disorder
Dear body,
I have not always been the most faithful.
I have loved the Indianas of other women’s bellies
and the Appalachians of their ilia.
I have imagined their tiny clementine breasts in place
of your heirloom melons. I have
accused your hands of the crime of
being too wise –
I’m sorry for that.
I have treated you less like a temple
and more like a temptation
to call my skin sin.
From my father I received my nose
hairs,
doll-size ears,
and knees on rusty hinges;
from my mother,
feet that like to run,
myopia,
and the trichotillomania that compels me to
pothole my face
into a road so ragged it is difficult to
reach the destination of my eyes
without getting stuck along the way.
Dear body,
do you remember when Alex’s mom
used to call me Skinny Minnie and
you stood tall as birthday balloons
like you had accomplished something
simply by existing?
Remember when, three years later,
Mom said “chubby”
and you deflated like you had failed?
I know we have a grab bag history:
our handshakes with anorexia
(never a closer relationship) giving way to
our barnacle-knuckled grip
on body positivity.
I learned how to read a scale before
I learned how to take my own
pulse.
I have loved you loudly,
but sometimes those who love their
bodies loudest still believe they would
love their bodies louder if their bellies grew
perpendicular to gravity.
Dear body,
you have transformed paper into art,
bicycles into vehicles,
and rum into kisses and
impossible amounts of urine –
and people say you’re not magic?
you are not a temple –
you are the prayers that fill it.
Dear body,
I think you should know that
I did not learn to love the Venus curve of my belly
until I saw it shining on the
hip bone horizons of other girls.
I know that’s not how it’s supposed to work –
you’re supposed to love yourself before you’re capable
of loving others –
but
the human heart is capable of firehosing blood for 30 feet
just imagine how far love could travel
if you aimed it right
and what it could do
reflected in the mirrors of other people’s arms.
trigger warning: body issues, eating disorder
Dear body,
I have not always been the most faithful.
I have loved the Indianas of other women’s bellies
and the Appalachians of their ilia.
I have imagined their tiny clementine breasts in place
of your heirloom melons. I have
accused your hands of the crime of
being too wise –
I’m sorry for that.
I have treated you less like a temple
and more like a temptation
to call my skin sin.
From my father I received my nose
hairs,
doll-size ears,
and knees on rusty hinges;
from my mother,
feet that like to run,
myopia,
and the trichotillomania that compels me to
pothole my face
into a road so ragged it is difficult to
reach the destination of my eyes
without getting stuck along the way.
Dear body,
do you remember when Alex’s mom
used to call me Skinny Minnie and
you stood tall as birthday balloons
like you had accomplished something
simply by existing?
Remember when, three years later,
Mom said “chubby”
and you deflated like you had failed?
I know we have a grab bag history:
our handshakes with anorexia
(never a closer relationship) giving way to
our barnacle-knuckled grip
on body positivity.
I learned how to read a scale before
I learned how to take my own
pulse.
I have loved you loudly,
but sometimes those who love their
bodies loudest still believe they would
love their bodies louder if their bellies grew
perpendicular to gravity.
Dear body,
you have transformed paper into art,
bicycles into vehicles,
and rum into kisses and
impossible amounts of urine –
and people say you’re not magic?
you are not a temple –
you are the prayers that fill it.
Dear body,
I think you should know that
I did not learn to love the Venus curve of my belly
until I saw it shining on the
hip bone horizons of other girls.
I know that’s not how it’s supposed to work –
you’re supposed to love yourself before you’re capable
of loving others –
but
the human heart is capable of firehosing blood for 30 feet
just imagine how far love could travel
if you aimed it right
and what it could do
reflected in the mirrors of other people’s arms.
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