summon
sudden
ly
all wings
minute wind
sweeping the porch

i fold my map
listen to the drift
of open wilderness
scooping night hollow

theres too much
to stay
silent longing looking

lift and fly-
one possessed
with words

everyone is sitting in the cafe
nine tables for one
everyone is eating
cake cookies soup
looking out windows
looking at cell phones

i notice the pretty ones
and those not afraid to be present
spreading thoughts over crackers

we are all here together on a tuesday afternoon
we have no where else to go
and no one else to be with
but each other
but alone

i am singing in the shower.
no one will ever hear this,
but its beautiful

i don’t care what the old man upstairs says
i think this is poetry
i don’t care what the old woman in my head
says
i think its art

long blue butterfly wings
uncrinkle stretch and fly
the steam balmy
around my bellybutton

sometimes we lose things
from the belly from the heart
i could stay in the shower for 40 minutes
and still not wash it all away

you’re not here
anymore
to knock on the door
you don’t care how long i take
you don’t even know

i pay the water bill myself
now

its a feat
to not notice
your intentions turn
at long legs large breasts
teetering on heels make you think you might
catch her

you speak it to death
squeeze the letters out of my voice

i wonder how to pace myself
against your movements
those small hard attacks
that threaten to cripple the knees
throat

i’m tired of speaking in pieces
i want to seize these fragments
make a whole sentence
a whole paragraph
for once

my words are slower to form
than yours
but longer lasting:
the page.

seconds

narrow as needles
brilliantly
twist time
into tomorrows

and tomorrows away
my life
lived narrowly
as needles

what i’ve breathed toward
since the first
second

the difference
of change

the beat of the train
the beat of feet
along hot sidewalk
the beat of hearts crying
to each other

we click along
moving
at the rate of our losses
guided
by what we’ve left behind

churning the city
builds higher
licks the sun

even sky
has a heartbeat
and rainbow-colored veins-

inner editors
gangly gangsters
let the mind shake loose!

say whatever is on the surface
or at any layer
put things together in a strange order
as long as its
truth

dear possessing selfhood of
the righteous mind:

you are smarter than you
give yourself credit for.
your mother reminds you of this
when she sends you articles on aspirations (poetry)
your gut reminds you of this
when it unsettles (at other jobs)

where the flesh is, the skin is
the means of communication-

your beauty is behind your eyes

is it trust that has been missing?
or
the wanting to be glossy, scooped up
like a gossip rag?
wanting love and attention
so hungry for it
that instant cup of affection
you starve yourself of the stuff that reels
at the back of your mind,
pushing to come forward-

who others see you as vs. you are
what you’ve heard a buzz about vs. you are
what will do the tricks vs. you are
open eyes taking it in and labelling it confusion vs. you are

slow and steady is the way
what whitman said about the body becoming a poem
when one lives a beautiful life-

you said it on the roof
you said it in the mirror
you said it alone
in the bathroom stall

to believe in shedding
start with your own skin

step to the light
press your palm
to the future

“what did you do last night?”
and i talk about writing
the pigeons overhead lined up
like an ellipsis

you cross the street

when we get there
you take my coat
and look at the tag inside

these words
are important to you