The Ghost Whisperer.

*********

A speck on the horizon.
It wasn’t the UFO he was expecting. It wasn’t the UFO he was hoping for. It was just the moon, taking its first breath on a cool autumn night full of broken thunderclouds.
Lieutenant Barney Trent gazed up at it from his Porsche, wondering when he was going to see the UFO. He had been out here for hours, waiting for the right moment for it to arrive, waiting for something fantastic to occur. He didn’t have much longer to wait. He glanced at his commander. His name was Matthew Plunkett, and he was forty-seven years old, had a baby girl and a wife. They were struggling, he heard. It was sad. He was glad the man was here. It was a good idea to have someone else with you to witness a UFO sighting. One person wasn’t enough.
“Do you think they’ll come?” he grunted, glancing at the man and raising an eyebrow at him.
Matthew shrugged. “They’re aliens. Aliens are supposed to be unpredictable.” He snorted. “I’d say yes or no.” He chuckled. He was having a ball. He didn’t believe in aliens one way or the other. He thought they were imaginary. His mother told him so. He still thought they were imaginary. Nothing was going to change his mind. “Let’s wait.”
They waited. Waited. Their commanding officer, Wolf Morrison, said he didn’t know when the UFO would come. Or even if it would. Matthew didn’t want to pass up the chance of seeing something he would never get to see again. The sun went up. It went down again, down, down over the horizon, until it was just a speck. That wasn’t a UFO. He told it to himself, silently, quietly. The sun and moon were not UFOs. He wished they were. Finally, silently, near the dawn that was coming up out of the darkness, he saw it. A green speck of light on the horizon. A green speck. It came closer and closer until it was nearly standing on top of them. Barney’s breath caught in his throat. He didn’t know what to say. It was the most wonderful sight he had ever seen in his entire life. He didn’t need a video camera. He was going to remember it forever. “Is it real?” he whispered to Matthew.
He shrugged. “Don’t know, don’t care,” he answered, shaking his head. “Let’s just watch.”
They watched for what seemed like forever. The UFO turned on its side and dipped out of sight. They never saw it disappear. One minute it was there. The next minute it was gone. Just like that.
Barney shook his head and chuckled. It was better than Christmas.


* * *
Benjamin Hades didn’t realize what he was signing up for when he joined
the United States military. He was twenty-three, going on twenty-four, and had just graduated from Princeton University with a degree in sociology. He had a whole wide world to explore. That was when he got the call. They needed him at Area 51. It was such a simple request, they said. A simple request that could potentially persuade his entire career. He thought about it for two weeks before agreeing to leave his crummy, part-time job at McDonald’s, and delve into the career of a soldier. He hated war. Hated the possibilities. He needed the money. They said they’d pay for his schooling. He signed up immediately. He flew a plane to Roswell International Airport, got off, and three security guards lead him to another bus with blacked out seat windows. He got on and was driven three miles to the Area 51 site, near Groom Lake, a dry riverbed that was going to be turned into a dam by the end of the year. His boss’s name was Matthew Plunkett. He knew he wasn’t going to like him. He was tall, hard, and cold, his eyes like brown saucers in his head, his mind sharp and quick, like lightning. He ushered the man into his tight little office, an office that was a span of about twenty feet wide and long. A diploma adorned the wall opposite his desk, from MIT. He rubbed his hands together gleefully. “You’re working at Area 51,” he said. He paused, studying him. Benjamin didn’t like being profiled like that. It made him nervous.
Benjamin nodded, confused as to why the man was being so secretive. It wasn’t a big deal. He’d had plenty of jobs before this, five, as matter of fact. This was the most interesting job he’s ever had. More interesting than working at a grocery store. “What do you want me to do?” he asked quickly. He hoped he hadn’t offended the man in some way. That was the last thing he wanted to do. Offend the government. Yeah, that was rich. He scowled.
“Your job is to monitor Bunkers one through seven,” he replied. “We have everything already set up for you in the security room. All you have to do is watch.” He rose to his feet like a giant monster rising from the ground. Watching Bunker One through Six was like watching golf. Nothing happened. Several men came in and out of the building. He had a toll booth. They signed when they came in, and when they came out, usually around dawn. Barney was up with the sun, and went to sleep when it went down. The days became tedious, dull, real. There was nothing special about Area 51.
The next morning, he went to downtown Roswell, and bought a cup of coffee from McDonald’s. McDonald’s was the fast-food chain of choice for these parts, either that, or Denny’s, and Denny’s wasn’t open yet. They didn’t open until 11am.
“What am I doing here?” he demanded of his steering wheel.
He drove all morning and went back to his apartment and fell into a deep sleep. Night came, and his shift, second shift, just began. He hurried into his clothes and drove down I-55, and stopped in front of a large building marked with the words “Employee” on the sign. The garage door opened, and he inched the car into the garage. He stepped out.
A man wearing a black suit and tie wandered over to him, carrying a clipboard. “Hades, Benjamin?” he asked in a cheerful voice. It was hard, being happy in a place like this. Harder than a person could imagine.
Benjamin thought the building was haunted.
Benjamin nodded, wondering what he had gotten himself into.
It wasn’t like he couldn’t find work. It wasn’t like he didn’t have enough money to eat and rent an apartment and put gas in his car. He could find work. He could do all those things. It was the feeling of excitement, of doing something he wasn’t supposed to, that he liked. It was like, I don’t know, finding God again, as corny as that sounded. It was like being friends with your inner demons. Officer Cooper Smithson kept Benjamin company, spouting stories of World War II and Vietnam. Tall, lanky, with brown hair and eyes, he had been stationed in Vietnam, he said. Had shot and killed a man, a German soldier who was working with the Chinese. “Have you ever heard of such a thing?” he said laughingly, slapping Benjamin on the back. Benjamin thought shooting a man must have made him go mad. His behavior was sporadic, chaotic. Benjamin smiled encouragingly. He wished the man would just shut up. He wanted to eat his soup. It grew cold. He took a sip. That was better. Soup was good on a night like this.
“You ever seen a UFO here?” he asked Cooper curiously.
Cooper’s face suddenly turned serious. His eyes lost focus. “Once,” he said stiffly. His shoulders drooped. His face went white.
Benjamin looked at him. “And?” he prodded. He looked at his hands. They were large hands, large ones that had seen much labor. He remembered the little ones that fit into his father’s hand. He remembered other things, too. He kept it to himself.
“Once is enough.”
“Was it on the ground?” he asked quietly.
“Yes.” He nodded. “It was on the ground.” He paused. “I was just a solider back then, had just started working at Area 51, thinking of all the possibilities it had to offer.” He shook his head. “That was so stupid of me! Really stupid. Anyway,” he continued, “I found out what Area 51 was really working on. A futuristic version of the Stealth-fighter pilot, it was a small, sleek-looking model, gray, about seventeen feet wide and across.” He stopped. A single tear squeezed down his eyelids. He didn’t bother to wipe it away. Benjamin studied him curiously, wondering what the fuss was about. It was just a UFO.
“I’ll never forget the experience,” he began. “It was stupid. I don’t know why I was there in the first place. I guess I had a weird feeling in the back of my mind…maybe I picked up on it? Sometimes I do that. Like, I can tell what’s going to happen next, or I can guess what’s in a room without actually going in it. It’s stupid, I know.” He sniffed.
“What happened to the fighter pilot?”
He shrugged. “We sold it to the Japanese,” he replied. “They like fighter pilots, especially ones like that.” He paused. “I don’t think anyone actually gets these ideas from real aliens, just geniuses with nothing better to do with their time.” Cooper wrung his hands nervously. “You must think I’m really stupid.”
“No,” Benjamin told him. “I don’t. I want to see a UFO.”
“Maybe you will, sonny,” he replied, patting Benjamin on the back. “Maybe you will.”
All Benjamin could do was scowl.
The next morning was dreary and cold. It was spring. The weatherman said a big storm was coming, part of a hurricane that had come from Mexico. The hurricane was called Hurricane Fran. Benjamin wondered who named them. He slept until noon. He staggered to the shower, got dressed, washed his face, and brushed his teeth. He didn’t have anything to do until six-oh-clock, when he signed in for work. He glanced up and saw Cooper watching him, with a glazed expression in his eyes. Idiot. He’d been here for years. The man said so himself. Benjamin hoped he wouldn’t turn into Cooper. He was just a little too weird for him to handle. He shook his head and went to the security office, put his card in the door, and it swung open with a creak. The sound was deafening in such a quiet little room. He didn’t like it. It made him nervous. He checked the sign in sheet on the desk. Everyone who was here had already signed in. No one unexpected was supposed to come in today. It was second shift. They usually didn’t have any extra people come in on the second shift. He wandered into the hall. A light bulb swung from the ceiling overhead and cast a pale, orange glow on the walls. It was eerily quiet. No noise anywhere, except the wind moaning outside. Hurricane Fran was headed this way. He went to the vending machine and bought a cup of coffee and went outside to look at the stars. His break began in five minutes anyway. He had time to look. They had a small black and white TV in the break room. Light bent in the dark.
Footsteps whispered on the floor. His mind reeled. His mind thought about different things. What he was doing, where he was going. He never expected to work here, of all places. He’d heard about Area 51 before this, from colleagues at Princeton who were writing papers about the strange things that happened here. His grandfather was in the army. He’d fought in World War II. That was when he saw it. A black Sedan pulled into the driveway and three men hopped out. His eyes squinted in the dark. They weren’t supposed to be here. There weren’t any other names on the sign-in sheet. Everything was supposed to be on schedule. Those were the rules. He swallowed hard. He didn’t have time to radio the FBI or the police. He was going to have to follow them. Benjamin took his flashlight out of his pocket and followed them. He was the shadow stalking them. The first man had white hair and a white beard. The second man was younger, and had black hair and brown eyes. His mouth was drawn downward. He looked pissed. “What are you saying, it’s not running right?” he demanded into his walkie-talkie. “I checked it this morning. It should be working.” He scowled. His scowl deepened. “Jenkins, check on the sub, now.”
Benjamin frowned in puzzlement. The sub? Were they talking about lunch? Benjamin followed them into the side door marked “PRIVATE.” The door slammed shut behind them. Darkness swallowed them whole.
“Which way?” Jenkins whispered in a tinny voice. “Which way, Harry?”
Harry pointed. “That way. You know which way it is,” he said. “Don’t act like you haven’t been here before.”
“I keep thinking I’m with Wolf. Sorry.”
Harry snorted. “You know he’s a Shadow, an insurgent.”
“For who?”
“Them.”
A chill rolled down Benjamin’s spine. He didn’t like the emphasis Jenkins put on the word, “them.”
Harry scowled. “Don’t say it like that. It gives me the creeps.”
“Okay.” Jenkins snickered. “They.”
Harry glared at him. “Shut up, Patrick.”
“Hey, what about the new guy? You think they’re gonna tell him?” Jenkins asked.
“Of course not. He’s a Level One Access. They don’t tell rookies anything. It’s the law.” He snorted. “Dumbass. Should have known that already.”
“Oh.” He nodded. “Right.”
They rounded a corner and entered a large room.
The room was round and white. In the middle of it rested a large pool filled with water. In the water, was the strangest submarine Benjamin had ever seen. It was sleek and white and looked like a large whale with windows. The windows were new and looked like they had just been washed. Benjamin stared at it. That’s what they were hiding! He was so excited he almost bumped into a wall.

Rain and Rivers.

The rain breaks through the storm clouds.
Zealous reasons, like reasons unknown,
my heart creeps across broken stone;
light is a yellow cloak, a shroud.

The rain breaks through, I tiptoe
and dance,
rain breaks through reasons of glow;
we are sheltered in this loveless romance,
God is a system we can't overthrow.

Moving in reason, moving without season,
the rain glimmers on the stone.
God moves to places unknown,
sometimes, in England, thrones are overthrown.

Pieces of rock, sheltered in shock,
glowering in distance, the geese will flock.
Open doors are closed again,
I knew my sad old friend, way back when.

God is a reason, reasons unknown,
sometimes, in England, thrones are overthrown.
Sometimes, friends, they come and they go,
moving like shadows and the waters that flow.

I am on Chapter Ten on "Eyes of Elisha." Chelsea is in shell-shock.

The Day After Veteran's Day, 1999.

It was the day after Veteran's Day
that you applied for the new job at Home Depot,

that you declared you would stop smoking cigarettes
to help me breathe better. My mother works as a secretary

at a doctor's office, shelling out files at forty knots
per second. She is the kind who wants to listen to the radio
while she's at work but can't,
afraid of offending the boss
who will not give her a raise.

I never mourned the passing of the dead, my grandfather, his grandfather,
and vice versa, people I have never met,
people
who did not help me with my taxes, my words, my unseeing
grace.

I do not speak much. I put my head in my hands and think about
nothing, we are almost equal to apes, grapes, lima beans,
Lima, Peru. I remember once I read a story about an Indian boy
who found sandals in Ancient Peru,
who admired the long-long dead. The dead don't come back, said my uncle,
I only speak to him on the television set, now, the Discovery Channel,
The History Channel, the Food Network, too.

Today we go to Farmer's Market. Today we speak to old men named Bill.
Today we run up and down sidewalks, yelling in Spanish, in English,
in French and German and Greek. Today we go. Today we mourn
another day.

These Rivers, I See.

Like rivers folding,
Like rivers crossing,
My mother told me I could not have anymore
Books.
That was the day I mourned the loss of books,
Every kind of books,
Big ones and little ones,
All of them inbetween.

I didn’t think about him,
The old friend who betrayed me,
The one who became homeless and ate out of
Trash cans instead of learning how to speak,
The one who ate sunflowers and
Prayed silently to God to smite him, the one whose newer
Friends made fun of my suffering,
Called me a cow, a liar, a fiend, a cheater on tests
Of all kinds.

I didn’t think about him,
The man who taught me nothing,
The man who taught me how selfish he is at funerals
And at home,
The man who would only let me use his toilet if I was standing
Up, because he didn’t believe in the scar on my forehead.

The anger seeps inside of me, I can’t even feel the anger
Because I have to pay my taxes, because I have to dig wells
For people I never meet, because my friend thinks he is right
When he isn’t never. Who is right anymore? Surely not the Republicans,
The old men who drown in sorrows in coffee shops,
In doughnut shops,
Dreaming of places they will never see.
He didn’t give me an apology like he said.
Wouldn’t tell me his own name.

Change of the Season.

I mark the change of the
seasons by punching a hole in the wall, by
bringing fresh tomatoes from the garden.
I mark the change of the seasons,
As every day comes as the one before,
As the darkness that wans, the sliver of moon that bends.
The winter months fall because of bitter realizations,
I am forgotten, like a ghost, forgotten for the time
I spent doing good deeds.
I am not a soldier. I wish to be dead, to be stillborn,
To be underground with the others,
The ones who are silent when I walk,
The ones who never say anything bad about me.

Flowers in gardens. Big and little flowers,
Flowers of all kinds.
I trip over my feet as I went up the stairs,
You said you were trying to teach me a lesson,
I know you’re lying.
The bells ring in the distance.
I know what it’s like to be forgotten,
I hear the tolling of bells.
The wind moans, darkness comes,
Steadily, tramping up doors and banging on them.

I mark the change of seasons. Seasons pass, come and go,
Fill up the water hole with pits and shadows.
You scream for baked bread and peaches.
You yell at your pillow. The day has not grown old.
I hear bells ringing.

Update On Book.

I am currently on Chapter Four of Eyes of Elisha. Chelsea is at her friend Gladys's house. I don't think about God either way, but I like to read.

If I was an Editor, I would probably publish this book, too. No book has ever been the best thing I've ever read, but most of the ones I've read are publishable, and will sell enough copies to pay royalty checks.

When I reach THE END, I will post a small summary of what I think about the book.

Eye of Elisha.

I received the "Eye of Elisha" by Brandilyn Collins in the mail today. I am currently on the second chapter.

I will update more later.

The Plum.

The plum awaits to be eaten.
I wonder what the plum thinks about that.

I wonder if the plum thinks about anything,
like
my last boyfriend, whose name was Wilfred,
whose name was foreign to this land.

The plum came from a grocery store in Waterford,
Michigan.

My sister-in-law's mother lived
in a house across the street from the grocery
store where I bought the plum,
old memories flicker against the mind.

The plum is covered in fuzz,
I sit at the kitchen table, pick off the fuzz,
and let it fall into the trash can.

The plum is not entirely eaten.
I open my mouth and take another bite.

Another hour passes. The sun is covered by shadows;
no storm in the distance. No one comes to check
on me. The clock stops ticking.

We Don't Communicate.

I talk to you in front of a mirror
That did not show my face.
I bought the mirror from an antique shop
In Warrington, Mississippi,
Where my grandfather fought in the war in the 40s,
Where he lived and died and lived again.

It is November, my feet are heavy with dread,
I told you sorry once,
I told you a thousand times.
You can’t see in front of you.
You can’t see behind you.

The green grass is growing beneath our feet,
Everywhere around the world,
We are walking,
Walking like there’s no tomorrow,
Walking like we’ll never walk again.

I talk to you in my mind,
Trying to make you understand,
The feelings inside me,
That brush like paintings on rinds of stone.
That brush like a wind brushing my hair.
You are here. You are not.
You say you love me,
That you won’t refuse to think about me.
I don’t know what anything means anymore.

You borrow my brown jacket because the cold
Is too hard to take.
I don’t know what I’m doing anymore.
Your friends steal my words.

Poetic Reason.

I wish I was daring as a hat, the hat that is placed on
My head; the heart that beats like a sad remembrance of
Things wanted, things that are ashamed. I cannot know
What it is I have reflected, a genius of sorts, a prodigy
Of the mind. Sometimes,
I cry out in the lonely night, wishing for a spark of genius
To strike me; most of the time, there is nothing but memories,
Flitting like a butterfly in my mind. I try to wipe it away,
Try to hold it back, but there is nothing more than a sparrow
Pushing me forward, holding onto the rhythm of something
That is not as likely as it seems.
What happened to the beat of my heart? What happened to
The gentle understanding that comes with sharp rain?
I am not whole again, my heart does not beat steady.
In the night, I often see spirits that haunt me, like bitter reveries
In a night storm, my mother always in my mind.
Words are like poetry; they move me to enter the door,
Swinging in an arc.
Why do I like poetry? There is no rhyme or reason,
A simple day that gathers rain.

Didn't write for nanowrimo, but a short.

SONG OF THE DRAGON

The dragon hissed at the fluter, its tongue lolling out like a snake. It had been sleeping, sunning itself on a rock, when the fluter came, playing a tune.
The wyrmlord had not been in to see them today; it was away on business, selling cloth at a carpet trade in Hagawirn, a city close to the Lery peninsula.
It was a long trip and winter was coming.
The dragon hoped it would do well, even if it was not fond of the fluter.
The fluter brought one of its wooden flutes. It had three flutes: a wooden one, a silver one, and a flute made of gold. The flute made of gold was used only for festivals and contests, of which there were not many nowadays.
A flu ravaged the world for the last three years and only a handful of men and women survived. Slowly and surely, they were building up their world again.
Mostly everything had been ravaged by pirates-mutants from the Undertow, cities that had been built underground when the flu first began.
The flu was deadly.
Scientists were not able to find a cure.
The wyrmlord, a young man by the name of Bearl Harow, had not been affected. He said he was immune because of his genetics.
It would not be the first time he said something silly.
Bearl was always saying silly things. His best friend, Thery Ferlong, said he should be a comedian.
Bearl thought about it and decided against it. He was better at the flute. He learned it in fifth grade and it stuck with him since.
The fluter didn’t think the dragonlings liked his song.
They were hissing and scratching and shaking their heads back and forth like a yo-yo. He met the wyrmlord at the door of the cave. “Tough crowd today,” he said to the wyrmlord. He wore a long white robe. The robe was always dirty.
The wyrmlord snorted. “That’s because the biggest dragon is sick,” he said. “His name is Seryis.”
“Seryis, eh? Strange name for a dragon.” He snorted. “Strange name, indeed.” He grinned.
“What’s your name?” the wyrmlord asked curiously.
“Bearl.”
“That’s stranger than Seryis,” he murmured, shaking his head and grinning.
The wyrmlord knelt next to Seryis and touched its flank. “Hello, dragon,” he said, smiling thinly. “How are you feeling today?”
“Terrible,” the dragon answered, wincing. “My throat is raw. That idiot Bearl tried to sing.” The dragon bared its teeth. “I don’t like it when he sings.”
Lanor chuckled, amused by the dragon’s obvious distress over the fluter’s presence. He had heard the fluter sing, and he wasn’t that bad. “In one ear and out the other. That’s the best way to listen to his music,” he said cheerfully.
“Why does he come every day anyway?” Seryis asked him.
Lanor shook his head and shrugged. “Because he’s bored, I’d wager.”
The dragon sniffed. “If humans want peace between dragons, don’t send the fluter.” He almost growled the last words. Lanor couldn’t help but chuckle. Seryis was a funny creature. He hoped he would get better soon. The next morning, the fluter did not come.
Lanor said he had been called away on duty. Not only was he a divine fluter, he was also a soldier. A war was going on in the north, between the Willingtons and the Theryndians, two families who were fighting over a suitor for their daughters.
Neither daughter was friends with the other and it created a clash between the two families. They were at war. It wasn’t a pretty sight. The more Seryis heard about fighting humans, the less he wanted to see of humans.
He stayed in his cave most of the time, listening to the rain patter on the roof of the cave.
The coldness crept under his skin. Settled like a bug.
“Why do you always stay in your cave?” Lanor asked one day.
Seryis’s mate, Ulenda, had gone out to do the hunting. She was not back yet. The trip would take a day or two, according to the dragon. Lanor wanted to accompany her, but Seryis said she liked to go hunting alone.
“How many babies does she have?” Lanor asked.
“Thirteen,” Seryis answered. “All of them are in a nest, thirty miles west of here. I’m not allowed to see them until their first year.”
“How long is their first year?” he asked curiously.
“Eight hundred days,” it answered.
Lanor shook his head and patted his neck. “That’s tough,” he said sympathetically.
Seryis hissed at him. “Don’t touch me!” he growled.
Lanor backed away. “No wonder the fluter is always nervous coming here. You creatures don’t know anything about friendship,” he said in irritation.
Lanor didn’t come see the dragons after that.
Seryis grew lonely. It had the cave all to itself. The other dragons moved to the caves that were closer to the river, to get away from the smell. Seryis had been throwing up on itself and was not doing well, physically or emotionally. The fluter had sent for a doctor. He was a young man, twenty-three, and was part-Elven. One of the few left in Frevien. “What is the problem?” he asked.
“My stomach,” the dragon pouted.
“My name is Eerwin,” he said, smiling. “Let’s see if we can get that bug out. What were you eating before you got sick?”
“Wolf meat,” the dragon answered. “It was left in the sun for a day, but I don’t think that would have made me sick.”
Eerwin frowned and pulled a handful of pills out of his pouch. “Take one a day, with food. It should clean the bug out in a jiffy.”
“How long should I take it for?” Seryis demanded.
“Until the bug is gone.”
Seryis scowled. The dragon didn’t like being the center of attention, even if it was for its benefit. “Tell the fluter I said not to come anymore. I don’t want him to see me.”
The doctor went away. Seryis puttered about the cave, looking for something to do. The fluter had not come for three days. The dragon closed its eyes, imagining the music in its mind.
Seryis could not hear the sweet notes. It made him more bitter than he was before. The dragon didn’t like the sound. He told Bearl so.
“Why not?” Bearl asked. “I always liked my flute playing.” He held up the wooden flute and turned it around in his hand. “I thought the song was nice.” Bearl smiled dreamily. “I play the flute in the marketplace sometimes,” he said. “The crowd likes it.”
Seryis snorted. “It sounds like a cat getting its tongue cut out,” it told him. The dragon wondered why it liked the fluter when he was gone, but not when he was here. The mood puzzled him. “I’m a dragon, after all,” it said. “I’m not human.”
Bearl thought this over and nodded. “You’re right,” he said. “Maybe dragons like different music. Like the cello. I could bring that to you.”
Seryis shook its head. “No, no, no!” it protested. “Don’t do that. Please don’t.” The dragon prayed he would not bring another musical instrument.
The doctor came again to check on him. “How are we feeling?” Eerwin asked. “Any better?”
“I feel better,” it answered. “I was wondering something.” The dragon stopped.
“Yes?” Eerwin prodded.
“How come humans like Bearl’s music and I don’t?”
“I don’t know this man, Bearl,” he admitted. “Is he a friend of yours?”
“Yes.”
“Maybe it’s because you like Bearl as a person, instead of Bearl, as a musician.” He checked the dragon’s scales, running his hand along its spine. “Your scales are not falling off anymore,” he said. “Your pupils look better.” He smiled. “I don’t think you need the pills anymore.” He chuckled. The dragon rolled its eyes. It never understood medical humor.
“Me either,” the dragon said. “Am I well enough to go to the marketplace?”
Eerwin nodded. “You are if you think you are,” he said, chuckling.
“I would like to see an old friend,” the dragon said. “His name is Bearl.”
Eerwin smiled. “He would like that. Goodbye.”
“Goodbye, doctor.”
The dragon struggled to its feet and hobbled to the door of the cave. The creature flew away. The marketplace was bustling with activity. Seryis was surprised to find dragonlings roaming about. The dragon chatted was chatting with a woman with dark eyes when he heard it. A man singing. It wandered over to the center of the marketplace, where a large crowd formed. The man’s voice was sweet, like a lark. Bearl saw him. “Bearl!” he said, laughing. “I came!”
“I see,” Bearl replied, with a wink.
All through the conversation, he never stopped singing.
Seryis thought it was okay.

The House Stood Still.

The darkness came after the storm, a darkness that was bitter and cold and wrapped around me and broke my skin. I forced air into my lungs and pulled the hat lower over my eyes, trying to shield my head from the howling gale. I glanced behind me at the house and it looked like a gigantic eye. My legs were getting frost bitten and my arms were weaker than sin. If sin is what it was. Something else howled. A lone wolf, some three miles away, possibly getting closer. This was way out in corn country, in the upper peninsula. The state that was shaped like a mitten. I learned that in second grade.
“Glorious, glorious day,” I muttered, shaking my head. “Weathermen never get it right.” I scowled.
It was September 5th, thirteen days after the passing of my grandfather Biff, the man who built this house from his own two hands. He had been working at General Motors for several years before he went on Social Security and spent the rest of his days at a nursing home until he went to the Big Sleep. The Big Sleep is what they call death nowadays, especially the old folk around here. It really wasn’t where people hibernated just like the animals and the animals took care of us until we woke up.
My grandfather plowed the land and raised corn and wheat and planted apple trees and I ate apples during the winter months and snow was on the ground. It was darkest during September and November, before the winter winds froze the ground and made it hard to harvest the wheat. I harvested wheat in the spring and planted more in the fall. Sometimes, I went into the woods and hunted for deer, rabbit, and geese. The geese were my best bet. The smaller animals, like the rabbit and geese, were easier to find in the woods. The larger ones, like the deer, could only be found out and about during the early morning hours. I didn’t like getting up that early. I was out of school and could be as lazy as I wanted to be. The storm was coming. I was worried about the horses. I only had two, Buttercup and Lionel. Lionel was my favorite and I felt guilty for leaving them in the cold barn but hopefully their fur made them warmer. The wind was very cold. I gasped and spat on the ground in front of me and made my way to the barn and forced the door open and pushed through and it was warmer inside the building, but not much.
“Lionel,” I muttered, stroking his mane. “Buttercup.” The horse nodded in acknowledgment. He had seen me come in. His breath poured in white rivulets in front of his face. I went and closed the window. It was warmer. Lionel blinked at me.
I baled more hay from upstairs. Lionel crunched on the yummy food and Buttercup drank from the bucket of water I just refilled. I filled another bucket and positioned it in front of the horses. Lionel grunted in satisfaction.
“The storm’s are harsh in the winter,” I said. “Have an apple.”
Lionel took the apple in his mouth and crunched on it. They didn’t seem to mind the cold. I put on my gloves and went outside and the snow was falling, so hard I could barely see in front of me. The wind was harsher than before. No one was around. The fields were empty. The animals safe in their dens.
I picked up my feet and hurried down the path I had made earlier. I wasn’t sure but I thought I saw a small moon peeking behind the clouds. It was October, close to Halloween. I tripped on a rock on the ground. Picked myself up and dusted myself off and zigzagged through the snow and entered the house. It was dark as the mouth of a cave. I turned on the light. Light flooded the living room, bedroom, and hallway. I went into the kitchen and made myself a cup of apple cider and went to the window to watch the storm.
It was growing worse.
It was only October.

Mystery In the Air.

Saturday, the crowds have stilled,
Bending like a wildflower.
Sunday, it was Halloween, a woman
Holding the hand of a child dressed in
A monkey suit,
Tired from the day before,
Whining about rap music and the president.

Mystery. An air of mystery swirls
Around the day,
The day that is almost done.
Mountains creep around the clock’s hands.

A woman spots an old crow walking on a wire.
A young couple makes love underneath
A mountain.

Compass Pointing North.

Yesterday, the train came roaring down the tracks
And stopped just outside my house.

I see you outside, painting the house in crimson colors,
Red and blue and green, a yellow sunflower. You look at the sun,
Glance up at it as one would stare at a compass,
A simple strain of words, sounds, thermodynamics.

I am standing in the dirt road that leads away from the house,
Leads towards places unknown, places I have never been. Clouds flicker away
Like shadows and breathe drops of oxygen. I stand here. Looking upward,
Looking skyward, like broken roads and broken dreams that shutter down
Like butterflies, wings of grace. Lightning flickers through October skies.
The heat is intense, a heat that is like summer.

Around me, the world opens like a flower, like a quilt out of sunshine,
A darkness that pours from the streams of broken roads.
Tell me what you like.
Tell me what you hate, the words ripe and raw, shadows shinning up chimneys.
Old men push wheelbarrows, spirits roam ancient worlds and cast spells to wanderers,
Wanderers looking for things to eat.
Potatoes, salad, lemonade, I told you this distance would never do,
You told me you understand.

I am not a memory. I am a stepping stone of geometrical shapes,
I am a noun, a piece of rainbow, a shard of glass. The realness is whole. The wholeness

Is real. I am who I am within myself. I right wrongs.
Sometimes, they break me-sometimes, they put me back together again.

Sometimes, I was never broken. Dreams are written in chalk and smoky mirrors.

A man in Flint wears a brown beret,

A man in Flint wears a brown beret,
Keeps quiet about the news.
His anger is loud, he picks up an old newspaper
And swats a fly on the window. Like a flower,
It withers and fades. The bus pulled to a stop
Beside the old woman, and she climbs aboard,
All smiles and cheers. Her face is a cloud of smiles
On a stormy day. The rain falls outside.
On the beach, a man named Joseph scours
The beach for forgotten pennies,
Pennies he could trade in at the bank for twenty dollar
Bills. His mother tells him he must love Jesus,
A man who has died years before,
He must pray to him every day.
All the while, his great-aunt, Trixie, scolds him for reading
A book about the Buddha, and he lives alone.

DRAGONBANE.

Sebastian Monteserrio’s feet pounded through the forest, glancing behind him as he did so. The werewolves were coming fast. He had tried to steal one of the relics back from them and they were angry about it. They were also hungry. What did I get myself into? he asked himself. His demon lover, Alira Thornbane-Monteserrio, told him about a spell a long time ago, a spell that broke through the barriers between magic and man. He was not gifted in magic like his brother. He was only a loner, a Dark Knight, an agent. All he could do was deliver messages. What do I do now? He thought, grimacing. His hands flew to the hilt of his sword but Damsel had taken the Sword of Thorn again. She was the youngest Monteserrio and had it worse because she possessed greater magic, with or without a relic. The Power of the Six made him sick to his stomach. He wished the relics would disappear along with the story of Merlin and it made him feel bad to think about his beloved creator but he did and that was all he could do. The pain pounded at his mind, the constant pain of wondering who he was and what he was and why they believed so strongly that the world was created by a man with a staff. It was simply ridiculous. It was insane. It was…nothing. Sebastian breathed a sigh of relief. The werewolves stopped crying. The wind whistled through the trees and it was dark and still around him. He couldn’t see ten feet in front of him. He couldn’t see ten feet behind him. All he could see was darkness. I am a Dark Knight, he thought, grimacing. I am supposed to put myself above that. Above everything. He realized how crazy that sounded. A Dark Knight? Ha! He had left Crandek back at the monument and had not seen him since. He had seen a few Dark Knights here and there and figured they had decided he wasn’t worth it, that he was just another stupid human. Many Dark Wizards worked with the Dark Knights. At least, he thought so.

THE BIGGEST LITTLE WORM HOLE IN THE UNIVERSE.

“What about Prisoner #3422?” the warden, Timothy Markowitz, asked thickly. He was staring hard at the back of the head warden’s head, wondering if the man had gone mad. He just said he was releasing all prisoners to different parts of the galaxy that was ordered by the President of the United Nations. It was vital to get them out as soon as possible. How soon could they do that with all the names they had? It was going to take all day to sort out the problem. Timothy sighed. He wanted to fly a starship, not do all this stupid crap. He didn’t even like prison. The food was awful. The prisoners were loud and obnoxious and the head warden looked like he wanted to throttle Timothy all the time. Once, he slipped and fell on a piece of ice and had to have back surgery. It wasn’t a pretty sight.
“Put him on a starship,” Johnson Jones answered with a sugary smile. “He’s no use to us. We’ve studied his intelligence scores, he’s good at math, but not much anything else. With the population exploding, we don’t have any room for him on Earth.” Johnson snorted. “We don’t have room for anyone on Earth, actually, least of all the prisoners.”
Timothy shook his head, looking worried. “This is bad. Very bad. What are we going to do?” he asked critically.
“You’ll still have a job tomorrow-if you do it right!” he snarled, and threw a paper weight at his head. It hit the wall and fell to the floor with a crash.
Timothy swallowed hard, terrified of the head warden’s weird attitude, and nodded. He didn’t want to get kicked off the planet like the other prisoners-he had never gotten in trouble a day in his life. “I just hope I’m not going to hell,” he muttered, and, shaking his head, filled out the prisoner’s release form. At least he wasn’t going anywhere. That was a plus.



Squeeeeeeeeeeeeeee. Squeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee. Screeeeeeeeeeeeeeccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccchhhhhhhhhhhhh.
The super-tram was coming in faster than I expected.
I jumped back onto the platform just in time to see it squeal to a stop next to me.
The conductor helped me aboard. “Nervous?” he asked me. He wore a gray tie and a suit. I wore jeans and a t-shirt. I shrugged. “I’ve never been to the moon,” I said.
He snorted and almost smiled. “Very few people have,” he answered. “Let me take those bags.”
He took the bags and tossed them in their rightful compartment; the suitcases landed in their rightful places in one flying leap. I was impressed. Not many people could do that.
Being a conductor must be an interesting job.
I smiled.
Not as good as my job, though.
I was a prisoner with the Department of Corrections, on voluntary leave of absence for three months. I learned my lesson. Never take a hover craft without permission. It was a federal crime on most planets.
“Please,” he instructed. “Take your seat.”
Swallowing hard, I nodded and found a seat by the window.
The conductor came over the loud speaker. “We will be arriving on the Moon in three hours and fifteen seconds,” he chirped. “Buckle your seat belts and hold on tight. It’s going to be a wild ride.”
“Three hours,” someone sitting next to me whistled. “That’s pretty fast.” He shook his head. “Makes me wonder how they build them darn things.” He shook his head again, and chuckled aloud. Hey, I liked this guy. Not more than myself, but still, he was cool. Maybe this wouldn’t be so bad after all.
I chuckled. Clearly this guy wasn’t a scientist. “I’m Brian,” I said, lying through my teeth. “Brian Jones. I’m a physicist at the University of Norte Dame and I’ve heard that they use microchips in their engine-it programs the trams to move faster.”
“My name is Nicholas Lauder. How are we able to breathe oxygen in space?” he asked me curiously. “I studied astronomy for two years at the University of Michigan before I became a real estate agent, but I’ve been wondering about that.” He frowned. “It’s very peculiar. Very peculiar indeed.”
I shrugged. “Just like in a space shuttle,” I said. “That’s all it is.”
“The trams have been around for awhile,” he said musingly.
I nodded. “They sure have,” I answered.
I didn’t say anything after that. It wasn’t that I wasn’t willing to talk, it was that the low-gravity amps were making me sleepy.
I curled up in a ball and fell asleep, using my arm as a pillow.
A man in a dark suit came running up to me while I was asleep. Looking left, and then right, he injected me with a syringe. Chuckling to himself, he walked down the aisle and disappeared. I never felt a thing.
Nicholas shook me awake. “Hey, kid,” he said softly. “You’re not supposed to be here.”
I yawned sleepily. “What are you talking about?” I said, rubbing my eyes. “I’m supposed to give a tour of the space station on the moon.” I creaked my neck and looked out the window. Nothing but darkness. Nothing but stars. Stars as vast as the sky at home. I missed Earth, but not that much. “What about lunch?”
Nicholas frowned. “I don’t remember seeing you get on,” he said. “What’s your name?”
I looked at him in confusion. “I just told you that two hours ago.”
“I don’t remember,” Nicholas said.
“You don’t remember?” I squeaked. Clearly, this man was having a mental breakdown. He just wasn’t aware of it. I shook my head. “You know what? Never mind. I don’t care. I just have to get to the space station.”
“We’re not going to a space station.”
“Where are we going?”
Nicholas shrugged. “We’ve been stuck in a worm hole for seventeen years,” he explained. “We’re not going anywhere.” He chuckled. Apparently, he found the whole thing very funny.
I stared at him in shock and horror and couldn’t say anything else. This was too unreal. I couldn’t even blog it online like I could back at the prison. I shook my head. “What do I do now?” I asked him.
He shrugged. “There’s nothing we can do,” he explained. “Most of the people on here have some strange amnesia I can’t relate to.” He glared at me. “Including you.”
A shiver rolled down my spine. I didn’t know what else to say after that.
I got over that shock after like five seconds, especially when I realized I wasn’t going anywhere. I stumbled out of my seat and down the hall to the captain’s quarters. A green alien with tentacles was at the starboard. “It’s our prisoner,” he greeted me. “Good evening, prisoner, I hope you are well.” He looked like he wanted to kick me. I wasn’t sure if I wanted to let him. I wanted to find out why.
I looked startled. “Evening? I didn’t know you had day and night in space.” I frowned. “I didn’t know I was a prisoner. The only bad thing I’ve ever done is gotten a ticket for my hovercar. I was going seventy in a sixty mile per hour zone. It wasn’t a pretty sight.”
He shrugged. “We have so many crew members we decided to use it before we left.”
“Now we’re stuck in a worm hole.” I frowned disapprovingly.
He nodded, his face crestfallen. “Hey!” he said, brightening. “You wouldn’t happen to know how to get us out of one, would you? I’ll give you a gold coin. The universe is full of gold.”
I scowled. “I’m a physicist,” I said, shaking my head. “Not a magician.”
“That’s funny. According to your files, you’re a prisoner from Earth.”
“I don’t remember committing any crime.”
He sighed and snorted. “They all say that. According to our Intergalactic Laws, we have to tell you that we’re not going to judge you based on color, sex, religion, or creed, and you are welcome to work alongside the other crew members if you feel up to it. If you find a way out of this ship, we are not going to object. Do you understand?”
“In other words,” I said. “We’re all the big crazy.” I laughed. I liked being the big crazy. It sounded nice.
He nodded. “Pretty much.”
“Care to introduce yourself?”
“My name is Getta Gotta Gem. Call me Gem.” The alien smiled, and cackled madly.
“My name is Brian Jones. What kind of worm hole are we stuck in, Gem?” I asked him.
“According to our starboard, it’s one of the largest this galaxy has ever seen,” he said. “Our archives can record anything that has happened in the universe a long, long time ago, including the formation of the worm hole, but it can’t tell us how to get out of one.”
I frowned. I didn’t know what to say that would help. “Bummer,” I said instead. “Do we have any tacos?”
Gem chuckled. “We have tacos from three different galaxies. They’re in the cafeteria.”
I hurried out of the room, eager to find the cafeteria and to eat lunch.
Fun on the starship lasted about five seconds. I wandered around, looking for something to do. The crew members were more than friendly. I talked to Nicholas and Gem for three hours. I played video games in the virtual reality tank. I wandered back to the starboard, hoping to find a way back home.
“Gem,” I said. “I was supposed to start class before I got here. Have you ever tried going through the worm hole?”
He nodded. “Many times,” he replied. “We’ve tried different things to try to get us out of here, and nothing works.” He pointed to the starboard. “That’s the throttle that makes the ship go forward. There’s the break. And those buttons program the ship to do different things.”
“Like what?” I asked him.
He shrugged. “Like, star-jump. We’ve tried to star-jump once, but it didn’t go very far, only three feet, at the most. If we want to star-jump more than three feet, we need more fuel.”
“Where do we get the fuel?” I asked him.
He looked at me strangely. “Gee, you don’t know anything about star ships, do you?” he asked me. “We get the fuel on different planets. We got some fuel three hundred light years ago, and we’re always almost on empty.” He frowned. “I don’t know how to fix it. It’s becoming quite bothersome.”
“What happens to us when we’re in a worm hole?” I asked. “What happens to our psyche?”
“Psyche?” he scowled at me. “Listen, boy, we’re in this together. We can’t get out of it. Sit back and enjoy the ride.”
That’s exactly what I did.

Men of Satire.

The man with the plaid shirt speaks to me
from his hospital bed. He is trying to
change the channel on the television by himself.
He cannot rise from his bed. Doctors orders.
Cars speed by on the freeway, screeching brakes.
Old news reels flash in my brain, 1997, 1999,
worlds I have never been to.

The man with the beat up truck was taken to
the police station downtown. He is afraid of satire,
afraid of walking outside to see which dog was
barking. My eyes burn like red peonies. They're
just metaphors. Sometimes, when it rains, my hands
grab at the cold water that runs down my skin.

The man with the black glasses does not desert me.
He sees me when I get the mail, get the groceries,
when I want to dance in the rain. The man with the black glasses
finds something to do and the sadness clings to me
like a spiderweb. The wind whispers lies in the dark.

The Wildflower Diaries.

Cows lull in the winter months.
The barn door bangs open, shut.
Open, shut. Winter winds move
And darkness comes weaving on a bicycle,
The stars blot my hands.

The sky is torn with bleeding fingers.
Scarecrows dot the fields like wildflowers.
Old hope fades.
My old lover says I am fading, fading.

There is death everywhere,
Even the flies feel it. They don’t like it.

Shush, says the wind. Shush.
Mandolins play on broken wings.
I am never home anymore.
I still pay the rent.
The garbage still gets taken out.
Someone tells me to hurry, hurry,
The night leaves me.

Sounds come broken through radios.
Dirt is scattered across freeways,
Highways I have never been. I am quiet.
In my mind. My husband screams at me from
The bathroom, saying we need more toothpaste.

The wind asks for quiet conversation. The clock is
A witch with no hands. I have not gotten over my own death;
My own light is quiet within me. I told you I am no one,
You never answered my voicemails.

We are done. The toast is done.

Think About It.

Tomorrow will be another day.
The sun will rise and set; the weather will be cold and rainy;
and the dog will bark, lonely, on the street. Tomorrow will be
another day. Tomorrow, my grandmother will still have cancer;
tomorrow, I will get myself lost in a bookstore somewhere, far out
north, where the wind weeps in the trees and the shadows fold
like golden wings. My mind is folded. I am jaded. I am happy
with the way things are; I am happy being me. I am happy falling,
being the loner, the drifter, the McDonald's cashier. I drift alone
in a hot air balloon, reaching on a tethered line. I am nothing. I am
me. I am worry.

Light From the Lamp Post.

I don't know how to stop it.
Don't know how to stop the snow from falling
in late October, when you and I are outside,
kissing, hands entwined, looking at the lamp post,
thinking of what the world was like before lamp posts,
before buildings, before God.

A dog walks passed us-woof! woof!-a man with a stroller
lumbers by, whistling under his breath, or maybe
saying something about the young and the restless.
I don't know how to stop it.

Don't know how to keep
the cold from entering me, from becoming a part of me,
the darkness snakes around me, up my legs and spine.

What Animals Know.

The fox is the one who bothers me-no, maybe it is the wolf, or the owl,
or the doe, who stares at me with wide wild eyes from a bush.

The deer emerges from the woods every morning before I go to school,
at my house in Flushing, on the road that curves like a wide v.

The fox lives in its den. The water runs in its brook. Clouds scuttle
across the sky; my father breaks his new boat. Here, I sit on the porch,

leafing through dumb magazines, words crawling across my hair. Sunlight
is broken. Everything is broken.

The fox is the one who bothers me. He is the one who makes me frustrated,
like I have to paint some giant painting for him to see me, know me, understand me.

This is not like a Disney movie where everything happens the way it should. This is not Greece, or Italy, or Rome. This is Jackson, Michigan, and I am sitting here,

typing this on my broken typewriter, spinning stories so God won't know.

Sarah Is Walking Home.

Sarah is walking home from the deli,
and cradles a tuna fish sandwich.
It is autumn. The rays of sunlight has
fallen, quick, over the mountains;
my neighbor got a goat and names him Will.

Sarah is walking home, and spies a lonely kitten,
drinking from a canister of milk someone
left on their porch.

The wind sighs lonely and sad. Darkness falls
in every street corner. Fireflies come out,
one by one, and greet the darkness of the sky.
Sarah is walking home, she holds the sandwich
as if it is her last link to earth.
No one will befriend her, now.

Not even the old man
who brings her the mail, a sad, sorrowful face of
forgetfulness, a man with Alzheimer's.

She knows people are like chess pieces. She knows
people don't know about sunlight,
or how to buy new cars.

A man drives a hole in the world.

Dance of the Universe.

The clouds perform a dance
Of the Universe,
And the Music is a lesson we cannot hear.
The soul of voices rises from Your pain,

The pain of plentitude,
The pain of beginning.

I can’t begin to describe this lesson,
The lesson that is an unknowing,
A season of darkness in the winter months,
Shadows that reach out and shake broken hands.

The clouds. Perform. Zealous eyes,
Glare, from water. Streams are broken,
Streams misused,
I am plenty gone.

The clouds perform a dance of
The Universe,
The numbers on the hands of Time
Have stilled.

The crabgrass turns brown.
It is fall. October is cold,
Like Alaska, like Antarctica,
Cold as the darkness that is within me.

Just In Case.

Just in case I die before my time,
I leave you with three things:
A jar of clay,
A sculptured pony with a jewel in its eye,
And a blue hairbrush my grandmother
Made for me.

Just in case I die before my time,
I will tell you stories I have written
In pen,
Stories that are burned in tabletops
Somewhere out east,
Stories that tell of my grandfather’s pain.

Sarah told me you hated them,
Hated the words, hated the sounds
That rolled from my tongue,
I thought it was in English.

You said it was “Getthefuckoutofhere,
Shithead.”
Your words are pained and painted.

The jar of clay was put on the windowsill
In my grandmother’s house.
She spoke of China, Ireland, Aruba.
She spoke of letters in brown boxes.
She did not speak before she died.

Just in case I die before my time,
I will leave you the world.

Sing To the Moon.

Detroit was a big city filled with pollution and old men who hated the Japanese, and wheezed about the Vietnam War at lonely old doughnut shops that sat on lonely corners with street names like Franklin and Carmickle.

Maria Sanders lived with her parents in a small white house with a picket fence. She was doing her homework at the table one evening, and the light was slowly dwindling in the sky. Her mother was on the phone, talking to her Aunt Christine, who lived far away in Seattle. She was talking about Uncle Jim, and their family. They lived on a farm in Durand. Maria's third cousin, Isaac, was seven years older than she was. By the time she was fourteen, he was already out of the house and joined the military to feed his wife and baby girl, Layla, who was born seven pounds and just shy of five ounces.

Maria was half-white, half-Hispanic, and had a part time job at the supermarket, shelving food items.

Her boss, Mr. Salez, was a balding man with a beak-like nose and an odd demeanor that made him appear almost menacing. It was Saturday and Saturdays was Farmer's Market and Maria was putting milk in the refrigerators when Willis walked in. Willis was Maria's next door neighbor and he was old and fat and was a trucker from Ohio who divorced twice already and had a new girlfriend.

Maria never met his new girlfriend but she saw that he was happy with the way the relationship was going because he always bought beer on Saturday nights and he only bought beer when he was happy. Maria saw him in a foul mood twice that she could remember. Willis leafed through the magazines on the rack by the front door. A nineteen year old boy walked in, smiling at her. He looked at her with his eyes. "Hello," he said pleasantly. "Do you have any flowers here?" he asked.

She nodded mutely. The flowers must be for his girlfriend. Of course. Maria was Hispanic and never had a boyfriend. She was slightly overweight and had some freckles and wore thick, black glasses that hid her face. She said, "The flowers are back there." She didn't want to look at him, she was so mad. Why was she mad at him? She just met him. She blinked back angry tears.

Mr. Salez looked at her and chuckled. "Maria, my poppet," he said gently, lifting her chin to stare into her eyes. "You must meet my wife."

Maria blinked back tears. "Meet your wife?" she managed. "I didn't know you were married."

Mr. Salez laughed. "That's because she doesn't want anyone to know!" he said jokingly. "My Madeline is very protective of me. You can come over if you want. Forget that boy. You can have some tea cakes and talk about your friends."

"I have two best friends," she whispered.

"Good, good. Come Saturday." He smiled and resumed counting the cash in the cash register. The boy bought the flowers and left the store. She hardly noticed. She was planning what to wear.

"Okay."

After work, Maria went home and took all the clothes out of her closet and put them on the bed. She shook her head. No, no, no. Those wouldn't do at all. They looked old and shabby and Mr. Salez's wife was probably sophisticated. She'd heard from other coworkers that they had two other chain stores in the tri-county area and it meant a lot of money for them. Maria was only sixteen. Her mother said she needed to put away that money until she was an adult.

Maria always did what her parents said. They knew best.

The next afternoon, her mother dropped her off at the mall and Maria wandered up and down the aisles at a clothing store, exclaiming over the tank tops and dresses she couldn't buy for herself. She had thirty dollars in spending money and she could only spend sixteen. The rest was for gas and a snack. She reluctantly bought a one-piece dress that cost 8.99. The cashier, smiling pleasantly, bagged it and took her money and gave her back a penny in return. She was finished for the day and had some money left over.

Maria went outside and sat on a bench and waited for her mother to pick her up to take her home.

The Ford truck pulled to the curb and Maria jumped in and her mother dropped her off at the house before heading off to work. Work, she said, was dull and dreary and long without her daughter around. Maria smiled at the thought. One day, when she was an adult, she would have a daughter just like her mother did. She was going to name her Sarah.

She loved the name Sarah, after she read a book called Sarah, Plain and Tall.

Her best friend's name was Ellie. Ellie had long blonde hair and brown eyes and she liked to sing songs and dreamt of being a famous singer one day. Maria couldn't sing and the only instrument she played was the cello. Ellie said singing was like a language and only special people knew the language. Maria could speak two languages, English and Spanish. They mostly spoke Spanish at home.

"Maria," her father complained later that evening. "¿Qué usted está haciendo?" His face was pinched and angry. That was how he usually looked, especially after work.

Maria was in the bathroom, singing a song in English.

"Apesadumbrado, padre," she apologized, her lip trembling. "Ellie liked singing and I thought-"

"I know what you thought," Mama said. She was brushing her own short, brown hair in the hallway mirror downstairs and had come up to see about all the racket. "You will not be a singer. I don't want that girl putting ideas into your head. You must get grades on your schoolwork!" She scowled and went downstairs to make dinner. They were having pot roast for dinner tonight.

Maria sighed and went back upstairs and cried into her pillow.

The next morning she got ready to go to Mr. Salez's. She got permission from her father the day before and he was off at work already, he worked at a feed supply store called Grumley's and made enough money to pay rent and bills. Maria contributed thirteen dollars every month, to help pay for milk for her little sister, Laura. Laura was getting to be a big baby and would be going to preschool in four years. She did not want that day to come but it must come, and when it did, Maria would be proud.

Maria arrived at Mr. Salez's at four. She repeated Madeline's name in her head to remember it. Madeline, Madeline, Madeline. It had a nice ring to it. Unlike her own name, which was a normal Hispanic name for a girl.

Mr. Salez lived in an apartment building downtown; his wife was the owner. They were rich. Well, almost. She buzzed the doorbell and Mr. Salez answered. He wore brown slacks and a brown shirt that looked fresh and ironed. His hands swallowed her small ones. "Thank you for coming," he said grimly, and she followed him inside.

The apartment was made up nicely, just like a magazine. The living room had a coffee table, a long, brown couch, and a grandfather clock and fireplace. The fireplace would not be lit until winter. It was only spring. Maria saw Mrs. Salez. She was humming in the kitchen. It was a song Maria did not know. "Is that her?" she whispered, low, so he could hear.

"Of course." He pushed her forward. "Go on. No time like the present."

"Hello, Mrs. Salez," she said softly. "How are you this evening?"

"Roger!" she exclaimed. "Maria is beautiful! And so sweet! You need to hire more girls like her."

Roger rolled his eyes. "I'll do my best," he muttered. "I'll see to the cakes." He scurried into the kitchen to check on the tea cakes. A wonderful smell filled the living room.

"Tell me, Maria, do you have a boyfriend?"

Maria blushed. She didn't like being put on the spot. "Well, no," she admitted. "There's this boy, Jake, at school, and-"

She beamed. "Are you in love with him?"

Maria laughed. "I would like to get married when I am old enough. Boys are immature. I plan on getting married when I turn eighteen."

"Eighteen? Why?"

She shrugged. "Many Hispanic women get married at a young age. My father said it isn't a tradition, he says women are getting smarter these days, what with the war and all."

Mrs. Salez became serious all of a sudden. "The war in Vietnam is a terrible thing," she said, shaking her head. "Have you heard of this man, Dr. King? He speaks for all races, not just blacks."

"I have a cousin in the army," she said.

"Is he in the war?"

She looked troubled. "Last time I heard, he was stationed in Mississippi. I don't know why. They never say why."

Mrs. Salez nodded. "I suspected as much. You are too young to know, anyway."

Mr. Salez came in with a plate full of tea cakes and set it on the coffee table, sharply. That was their final discussion on war.

"It was weird," Maria said to her second best friend, Ronald Chandelier, over the phone that evening. "It was like, she didn't want to talk about the war."

"Most people don't want to talk about it," Ronald replied. "My cousin died in it and he's only 18."

"Oh," Maria said. She felt sad, suddenly. Why did nice people have to die?
"What are you doing later?" she said. "We could play baseball in the park, or-"
"I can't," he said sharply. "I have to watch Emma." Emma was his baby sister. She had not turned one yet.

"It's time for me to go, anyway. I have to do the washing." Maria hung up the phone and started singing. She sang until dinner.

After dinner, Maria went to bed, and dreamt about butterflies. The next morning, she got dressed, and went to school. Ellie was standing next to her locker.

"Ellie!" Maria exclaimed. "You're back from Seattle. How was it?"
Ellie made a face. "It was terrible," she answered, shaking her head. "The traffic was so thick, we were waiting at the light forever. Benny arrived before we got there."

"I'm sorry," Maria said. "You have a little brother now."

"I didn't get to see him come out!" Ellie pouted.

"It's okay." Maria grinned. "I am sure she will have one more."

Ellie nodded. "You are right. She loves babies. She said once she will have ten of them one day."

The bell rang. "Race you!" she said, and tore down the hall to geography class.
Maria followed slowly. Her mind was on singing. And her cousin in the war.

The war was not going well, her parents said at dinner. It looked like Vietnam was going to win. Vietnam was a small country in Asia.
"Why?" she said. "Why are they winning? Every side should win." She pushed the green beans around on her plate. The baby screamed, its face red and angry.

"Time for homework!" Maria said. She jumped up and went upstairs to her bedroom. She did not sing that night. That night was for sadness.

The next morning her mother was gone. She left a note on the table, saying she had gone off to a job interview. Maria's father made enough money, but just enough, and they needed more to keep the family together. The family was not doing well financially. Maria could only give them a little money. She wanted to give them more.

That afternoon, a letter came from Isaac's wife, Jenny. Jenny had smallish handwriting and her dotted i's looked like flowers. Isaac had died, killed in war combat. He stepped on a grenade on accident. It took off his leg and he died the next morning. Maria never felt it coming.

Maria opened her mouth. She couldn't stop singing, not even when her father came in, his face angry, twisted, and yelled at her to turn off that damn radio. They were both surprised he spoke in English. Her father rarely spoke in English.

"Looks like the war's over!" her mother laughed, and hummed a Beatles song under her breath. They went out for dinner that night. It was the first night in years. Maria could breathe easily again.

In the darkening Atmosphere.

The trees vanish after centuries,
glaciers form from huge cavernous rocks
in the ground. Snow in the Himalayas
are melting at a rapid rate;
herons settle in ponds of North America.

A change in the atmosphere, bodies littering
the ground in Hoa An, the landscape is quickly
changing.

Four years old, I was reading by firelight,
the shadow flickering on the walls. The wind
pushes me constantly, in a spiral,
I spin until I fall down.

The sun is dark. The streets are dark in winter
and summer, and a lone whale stakes itself on
the beach in California. As far as I know,
all the pelicans have gone home.

Apology to Moths.

A moth lives in the attic at night,
sneezing dully. Rabbits hop about my
backyard, three of them at once.
The stars shine in the night above me,
like shooting stars.

I am sitting at my typewriter, clickclacking
away, trying to create/make/bake something
that is more worthwhile than words.

A moth lives in the attic at night,
and eats away at my clothes every single hour
of every single second of the day,
munching happily.

My little cousin asks me if moths are like
butterflies. I tell him, "Yes, they are,
listen to the beat of their wings." He falls
asleep on the couch.

The Sea.

The rocks jut from the stormy sea like eyes
that look back at me. The flowers are wilted,
like green hands growing; a man bends over a fishing
pail, and drops in a roll of quarters. The sea is lonely.
It is wide and lonely. My mother makes me sandwiches
and puts them on the table in the kitchen. Flowers
sit in the vase. The words are not spoken, they wither
like sorrowed dreams and broken things that glow,
shattered and old.

The rocks jut from the stormy sea and the sun flashes
off of them. The boat rocks in the harbor and no one
has ever gone in to shore out of darkness,
darkness that rises from shards of glass. The woman on
the beach wears tattered, old clothes she got from
Goodwill, in Ohio; Ohio was where her baby was born,

who was taken so cruelly from her. She has long
fingers; the fingers are covered in sores. She has been homeless
for a long time,
and still, the rocks jut from the sea. The sea has drowned her.

My Husband Talked To a Man With an Eyepatch.

The surgery I had lasted three hours long.
My husband was cooped up in the waiting room,
Talking to a man with one leg and an eyepatch
Over his left eye.
He said he was here for his father’s open heart
surgery,
Of which he had several.
He says every day the doctor tells him
He has twenty-four hours to live.
His family takes it as a joke, now.

The doctor’s used kitchen utensils, and stitches; they said
This later, when I was in the recovery room,
Eating jello and drinking ginger ale.

The nurse’s shoes sound like whispers on
The cold linoleum.
When I watched tv,
I had to cran my neck upward to see it.

Always Tries, Beethoven.

My mother asks me, "What do you want from me?"
My brother thinks I'm too old to play poker.
My sister is in Florida, learning how to be a nurse;
my stepfather is busy being in the army. I don't want.
I am. Shakespeare wrote this in his plays;
Mozart played this on his piano, back when he was a boy
and learning how to be famous, before Beethoven stole
the spotlight.
My boyfriend always tries to make it up to me by being
a hooker, by bringing home strange women who can't think
for herself.

My mother asks me, "What do you want from me?"
When I am stressed, I hide in the bathroom, reading The Atlantic
Monthly and Times magazine.

Sometimes, I give old men second chances.
Other times, I send them messages through my absence.
Everyone thinks I have a problem. My problem is everyone else.

Divided by Problems.

I planned on being divided like strangers.
I planned on shielding you from the warmth of the light.
I planned on Halloween costumes in October;
running through streets at night.
Clouds hang in the sky, the sky frowns brokenly down at me.

There's only so many problems I can take.
There's only so many wishes I can grant.
I am not a musician. Heck, I'm not even a doormat.

I am always the little problem in the back of your mind.
I am always the dent in someone's forehead,
the glare, the whisper, of shadows that moves within your mind.

I planned on being divided.
I planned on rushing rivers, scaling mountaintops.
There's nothing more you can do than to go back,
to be alone.

Glimmer of Trains.

I don’t see you solving the glimmer of
The train that whizzes by on its track,
The sheltered stones that sound on rhythms beaten
In crowded rooms.

The zebra munches happily on long grass,
Dances in a field of roses blooming.
No one is at home right now.

I don’t see you. I can’t find the sorrow
That flicks through the rain,
The harbor of night,
And the boat on the shore.
I am not what I have seen.
I solve the puzzles in the back of
Newspapers,
I wreck places that move within
A night of shooting stars.

Someone creates drama. More drama for me.
More stress I don’t need to deal with.
Bats fly through the air and
Disappear in a cave. Cave of night,

Where are you now?

The Morning I Lessen.

All the night.

All the dusk.

I walked down the street. Walked with my head up, drinking rain.

Rain falls.

Secrets about rain.

Secrets, secrets about somesuchnonsense, she whispered. Her words. curve. Sorrow is nonsense syllables.

Colors fade.

Night. Nights broken.

You. You left. Shattered, grains. Screams of ghosts. Night. Night is good. I am homeless. I am broken. Words creep across stained glass. I sit in churches. Sit, glance, seize dayz and throw them out.

Too many lines. You snarl. Too many lines like cat claws. Throw words in gutters.

On the War In Vietnam.

From the depths of the night,
I followed you, walking,
Down the path in the park.
A sparrow flies past me,
Chittering softly.

I am walking my miniature poodle,
Who I rescued from an animal shelter
In Jackson, Mississippi,
When I lived there with my uncle,
Who was dying from Alzheimer’s.

Sometimes, I could hear him crying
In his pillow,
Carrying on and on about the deforestation
In Malaysia,
About the dying, the crying,
The horrors he saw in Vietnam.

Instead, I melt slowly inside myself,
Until I am nothing but a shadow of myself,
Wishing for another heartbeat,
Wishing for the cold to enter me.
Wishing for someone other than myself.

I am gone. Just gone.

Winters in North Carolina.

The winters in North Carolina are bitter and cold.
I can’t move my hands. They are frostbitten,
Like shards of glass,
Moving in front of my face.

The sound of a dog howls outside,
Lonely,
Bitter and lonely,
Its eyes like two lantern flames.

I am whole within myself,
Whole within the…something.
I am movement, stiller than life,
Stiller than autumn leaves.

October comes swiftly,
Swift on its wings.

Nothing Shatters.

Nothing Shatters

I forgot the sky got dark early in October and the wind moaned like a beaten animal.
I felt guilty for the homeless people who would not be sheltered tonight, or the men in bars who pondered over their wives who made bread from scratch and married them for their wedding rings and their beer bellies and their families who adopted children for money who couldn’t remember their names the day they came home from the adoption agency.
I cannot face my relationships without harboring guilt.
It was one of my confessions.
I sat in the rocking chair late one night in October, watching the wind whipping through the trees and hearing the wind moan in the corner of my ear. The day had gone by swiftly, like a pigeon soaring through the air, and the darkness was thrust upon me without warning and it felt like being in the middle of the universe, always spinning out of reach, always spinning past me. I forgot when it got dark in October, October was the month when they updated the book rack at the pharmacy and I liked to go down there and read through the titles, old paperbacks by Danielle Steele and Stephen King and names I’ve never heard of and sometimes I bought the ones that cost only ten cents, not any more or less. October was a strange month. It wasn’t even tax season. I didn’t know what to do with myself in October. It was a perpetual cold that went down, down, down, to my feet and past my ankles, but no one was ever there to warm me. My family lived in Florida and my ex-wife, Anne, was living with a man named Michael somewhere in New York, where Malcolm X was toiling in his grave. I didn’t like to give out Halloween candy. Most children were brought up poorly like all my old school friends who forgot me and left me for dead, who took jobs at factories and movie theaters instead of having careers, who married women named Heather and Brooke and Caitlin-I always hated that name-and left me off their wedding list.
I used to have a career.
I was a journalist and worked in Great Britain and England and got fired over an article I had written back in ’07. I got Social Security, now; sometimes I write short stories for the local magazines and made fifty bucks which didn’t cover any of my expenses except beer and old wine. I lived in an apartment outside of Brooklyn and there was nothing to do here except smoke cigars and leaf through porno magazines and wait for the mail to come. I never got anything interesting except a Medicaid card every month and an occasional check for my writing.
I started novels and discarded them after thirty pages, it’s hard to write something when everyone told you that you’re a huge failure and your life is nothing but misery. Sometimes I wondered what everyone else’s life is like until I realized they’re all idiots and I have nothing in common with them except some of us share the same zip code. My grandfather used to own a farm. The farm was torn down in ’93 after he died and he left me the money in his will.
I was his only living heir, besides my great-aunt Harriet who lived down south somewhere in some nursing home.
I haven’t seen her in years, not since the birthday party of ’99 that only housed me, all of her senior citizen friends, and about a dozen cats and red and green balloons and a chocolate cake.
I only came for the cake. It was Saturday and I went downtown to the supermarket and wandered up and down the aisles, getting the food I needed. Apples, lettuce, tomatoes, onions, bread, cheese, meatloaf, mashed potatoes, and, of course, coffee and beer.
I couldn’t live without beer. The cashier was a young woman in her twenties with flaming red hair and blue eyes and she smacked her gum and spoke in an Illinois accent and I left the store and went back home and spent all day dozing in the rocking chair by the window.
The next morning there was a package waiting for me on the front stoop and I bent over and picked it up and realized it was addressed to my ex wife, Annie. Last time I talked to her she threw a hair dryer at my head and I almost got a concussion. I brought the package inside and unwrapped it-it was my mail after all-and a catalog for wedding cakes fell out.
The magazine was from ’98, quite a few years back. I wondered why it took so long to get here. She had a different last name now. It was Johnson, I think. Or Jones. I wasn’t sure.
Couldn’t remember. Didn’t know if I wanted to.
“I don’t want to have to give this to my ex,” I muttered, and, shaking my head, I threw it on the kitchen table and went to sleep.
The next day the catalog was still sitting on the kitchen table. I haven’t thought about weddings until now. Weddings. All my friends were married off and my wedding was small and simple with thirty of my close friends and relatives. We had a white cake with pink frosting and we didn’t add the plastic bride and groom on the top for fear of it giving us bad luck-maybe we should have added the bride and groom. Maybe we’d still be together. And maybe pigs could fly.
Hey, that wasn’t such a bad idea.
I snorted. Not a bad idea at all.
I needed to get out more.
I traced my fingers over my ex’s name and put it down. Picked it up again. Apparently, I thought cake catalogs were quite fascinating. I hardly had any money in the bank. I didn’t know anything about weddings; Anne hired a wedding planner for ours.
She didn’t know how to plan them, either.
We were thirty at the time, which was a little old for most couples to be getting married but it worked wonders for us. I missed being married. I didn’t miss Anne. Who am I kidding? I missed Anne. I missed the sex. It wasn’t that bad. I hoped I had been good for her. I hoped Michael had a small dick. I hoped he was gay. I hoped he would find his long lost uncle and move to Mexico. I put on my jacket and went down the street to Sarah Ferguson’s Cemetery. Sarah Ferguson’s Cemetery was a cemetery my grandfather built for the family.
Three generations of Harrison’s had there final resting place in this cemetery. My resting place, most certainly.
I haven’t made up my will. I was only fifty-seven. It wasn’t my time to go yet. It wouldn’t be for awhile. I hoped. The doctor said my heart was tick-ticking away, like some great big clock. The cemetery was very peaceful. Some of the tombstones were old.
Very old. Or quite old or not nearly as old. I liked the ones that looked like they were from some ancient Old West cemetery with cowboys and Indians and the skull of buffalo. I imagined bones that littered the place. I imagined ghosts.
“Right, Max,” I snorted, shaking my head. “No ghosts live here.” I had to stop buying mysteries at the pharmacy. They had other good books, too.
I stumbled over the tombstones to reach my grandfather’s.
I leaned forward to read it: Scotty F. Fitzgerald, 1924-1999. Loving husband and devoted father and grandfather.
Someone left a rose on his grave.
It wasn’t me.
I stared at the flower for a long moment. A twig snapped from somewhere behind me, and I turned, somewhat irritated, expecting a ghost to sprint out at me at this very moment.
Nothing did.
No one was in sight.
Which made me wonder where the flowers came from.
I took a piece of paper from my pocket and a pencil and put the paper over the letters and shaded the letters on my piece of paper. I missed my grandfather so much I could hardly breathe, but there was no one to talk to, and a psychologist cost too much for me to afford one. I had Medicare. I didn’t want to be a bother.
I put the piece of paper in my pocket and snuck away, hoping I wouldn’t disturb the dead.

THE END.

No Good Deeds.

I don't do the work I should be doing. Your wife putters about in her kitchen, whistling a tune

under her breath, oblivious to the suffering outside.

You are dull of the mind; you get angry when you don't have to
be angry; the words roll off your tongue.

I try to have a good conversation with you, but you glare at me
from hunched shoulders,
like a gargoyle, and shout swear words to me in Spanish-
I don't know what words they are, shithead, damn, fuckturd,
that one was your favorite.

Finally, I Exist.

Tomatoes in the garden. A bug sits chewing on dirt in the garden.
A flash, a movement, a sound of voices,
the metaphors look at me from behind pained eyelids.
I am not who I say I am; I am a piece of paper,
a book, I am something that is not even real.

No one cares to know me. To them, I am a ghost,
something to be stomped on. You see me climbing
up and down a moss-covered wall; you see me staring
in the windows of houses with families. My mother stares
at me dully, with eyes like glass; trying to get me
to take out the trash, do my taxes, get married to a man
I don't love.

I used to love you, stranger, used to love you and wait up
for you at night, while my bed is cold and the sheets
are cold and others act like I don't exist.

I wish I hadn't met you. That would have been better for
the both of us. You put on a good act of being a nice
person.

Untitled.

Clouds blink against angry rain that washes down
streams and picks apart the moon that shimy-shamy
smiles down at me-

my thoughts glare at me from down spirals and shadows
pierce through a veil of stars and I am, I am
reason that remains hidden within a veil a seed of

destruction. I am not nothing. I am not anything
that I can see, I speak to you from times unknown,
reasons that are not meant to be.

We are wrapped in misery. We are wrapped in darkness,
I speak of sadness, gladness, words that are not mine.
You think I care but I don't care. You think I can't see but I can see.

Befriended.

The woman knocks on my door every Saturday morning,
hoping to revive my faith in a God I no longer believe in.

She is not Muslim, Christian, or Buddhist. She is Catholic,
she says, one of the few left surviving in the world.

Every Saturday morning, I disappear down the street,
and sit and people watch at the coffee shop on Mood Street,
trying to find a way to network.

Most people I know are doormats, losers, sinners, thieves,
living in a world that is not right for them.

I know, twenty years from now, she, as a forty-three year
old woman,

will still be knocking on my door, her face pressed against
the doorknob, desperately trying to dredge up a reason

for coming here, for her existence, for something that is
bigger than herself. I refuse to befriend her.

How I Know Each Poem.

I know each poem like it is my best friend.
The words sit on the tip of my tongue,

settle there like dust and destruction.
We live for destruction. We are a part of destruction.

The darkness is pure as I am to yourself.
The wholeness of the world is bright and unseeing,
the face is reflected in the glass.
I know each poem like it is my best friend.

I write each words on paper plates, napkins,
on desks at school.

They speak to me in a way that is transparent,
unmoving like shadows and miniature statues.
I know each poem but they do not know me.

On Discussing Sigmund Freud in Seventh Grade English Class.

I am ignored. I am moved.
People ignore me like broken rivers,
Dreams that are shattered and torn,
Dreams that are shattered and torn.
I cannot speak to you right now.

You call to me from the mist of the deep,
The deep dark that deserts me
In the midst of chaos.
I am moved.
I walk across empty streets all in the name of
Beer,
All in the name of an ancient language
That was spoken by the gods.

I am a language.
My mood is a happy one,
I am filled to the brim with pickle brine.
I wrote a note to myself in seventh grade,
When the boy, Matt, would not appreciate
The teacher and spoke out of turn.

Wheels turn. Everything turns.
I am ignored. I am moved.
Nothing moves.

Cars on Freeways.

Soiled sheets drifting like barren coins in names of
Dreams that focus on seeing eyeglasses
I said I wasn’t back in Kentucky I wasn’t
Back home where you melted the hole
In the wall and I crept on my hands and knees
And spoke to the dead.

Trees gloat at me from the shadows
And my father drives a silver Mercedes he
Got at the local dealership and when he spoke
To me last Thursday night his mind was somewhere
Else,
On fucking a blonde woman he met at the bar,
On the work he was supposed to do and didn’t.

He was the man who got cancer from a doctor
In Ohio and angered my mother,
She broke a vase and threw it out the window
And onto the ground,
All tired out she went to sleep on the couch
And the tiredness is still there, still unseeing,
Still within the sight of mind.

My mother was a redheaded woman who did not
Like alcoholics or parallel parking,
Who worked at a nine to five job and
Quit because the manager was obese and looked
Like he needed good home cooking
And Tennessee Williams. His uncle was a famous writer
Whose last novel bombed and he went to work at a
Dealership instead,
Living off of food stamps and angry words.

once i knew.

Once I knew where I was going.
Now I am in my twenties, fresh from hard labor,
drowning in my sorrows at the loss of the X-Files,
and my grandmother with the big ears who used
to speak Russian and no longer remembers.
Once I knew where I was going.
Once I stood for something.

Now I write poems that are too short for magazines,
too long for anyone to understand them.
Now, I break my back walking to the store,
where I bring home a carton of eggs that rots within
weeks,

and the man of my life, the man who was supposed to be
my wall,
left me in a pile on the middle of the kitchen floor,
laughing at me like the Joker from Batman.

Once I knew where I was going because of Gandhi, King,
Malcolm X, Maya Angelou-once I wrote their names on blackboards
in my tiny, childish scrawl,
in first and second grade.

Once I knew, now I know nothing.

Unknown.

I left you, far away, dancing in a field in Georgia.
The corn fields are always growing. The women are always
large, especially their breasts, which heave in rhythm to the rushing
of rivers-
streams.

Thousands of streams rage across Georgia, hardly understood by man,
for they can save lives and take them. I am not one to understand. I hold
no objects in my heart; I do not cater to a man; my eyes are small and
brown and you yell at me from the other room, asking me when dinner is going
to be made.

Sometimes, I want to scream so loud they can hear me in South Carolina,
especially in Greenwood where the president heard his favorite story over
a cup of tea from a man with a brown hat and rotting teeth. In Africa, it is like
this, the woman in South Africa tired of being raised by her aunt,

tired of wondering where her mother is, her brother, her sister, tired of not
knowing her own name.

Cat.

The branches tremble like a leaf in the wind.

My eyes stare through the window,

to the place beyond the garden, where my cat is sunning himself in a field of

roses. I wish he would come home. I miss stroking his back, his ears, I miss talking

to him even though he cannot understand a thing I say.

I go into the living room and flip through my magazines, constantly aware of

The passing time. It passes quicker now, quicker than a rabbit with wings,

Nothing can move me, not even still breath.

My memories sift like sand.

They rot like forbidden fruit.

Fruit that I refuse to eat.

My mouth is full and ripe.

The garden moves in the wind.

I rise, exhausted, from the bank of the river

And cross to tides unknown.

The Woman Who Loved Cheetahs More than God.

The cheetahs. Yes, so much to say about the cheetahs
with their wild hair and wild stares, and the old woman
I knew once who loved them more than God.
Big cats, little cats, cats who climb up branches and fall
flat on their faces. In Africa, they are being driven
out of their home by wind, rain, and poachers-
poachers who live for their pockets.
The cats cry out in lonely nights, in deserts under full moon
brights. The cheetahs are bigger and louder than the
lion, who sleeps lazily under a tree.
In the winter, the winds are bitter, and they cry out to their
dead mothers, their words echo lonely across angry rivers.

Hours and Hours.

I work.  For hours and hours and hours, I work,

trying to please, trying to bend knees.  For years I have

worked at the same place-a chinese restaurant-shelling fortune

cookies and feeding them to pelicans.

This is not hard labor.  Hard labor is different it is something else,

something you cannot see, cannot feel, cannot be.

Every day, after work, I eat one orange, my grandfather loved oranges

and peeled them for his wife until they both died-collapsed on

the kitchen floor at ninety-one.  

I do not break down.  I do not move like an unmovable wall.  You stand

there like a wall.  You are my boss.  I am not sitting.  I am not tall.

I am not reflection.  This is not my house. 

Sometimes I wish for a quick death and that is all I can take,

talk, talk about now.  The wind moves my hair.  

Fields.

I am raw.  Raw as the fields in which William Carlos Williams walked,

hands stuffed deep in his pockets.  I am raw.  Rawer than the fish I ate

for pot luck supper that one night in October when the leaves were

beginning to change and I had no one.  

I am raw.  My voice is a seal, and the door opens and you stand,

nodding your head, nodding, always nodding.  

I am raw.  I am pain, pain that is quicker than lightning,

that moves up out of the ground and onto still air,

I have won every award that does not bear my name.  I am childless.  I am homeless.

I have no bread, no way to eat.  I give my food to orphans.

I am not anyone's angel.  I am nothing.  The world is ever changing, ever dying.

You accuse me of nothing.  I speak nothing.  I speak.  

you call me.

you call me a faggot.

you call me words my grandmother

would not speak to her enemy.

you say, you do not deserve ripe

cheese, you cry tears that are

raw.  

i see flowers on the stove,

the oven is baking sourdoughbread,

it is being made by my mother,

the woman who destroyed

her womb to heal me.

you call me a liar.

you feed me to the wolves, the lions

in their dens, and your old girlfriends

who know nothing of the suffering

in afghanistan,

or the pain of being in surgery

for forty-eight hours straight.

you call me a cunt, the words

slow and loud, drifting down from

thunderclouds.

Vulture.

Vultures sit on the 

dashboard 

of promise,

flicking their 

great 

brute of wings.

You rise from shadows of

things,

you empty out your pockets,

and call to the wild,

the wild wilderness

that holds my tears.

Vultures peck at 

corn fields,

and spout calls 

of venom.

I ward myself away, away,

breathe in the cold.

Ruler.

The shadow in the distance,

that bleats like silver eyes.

Is barren like leaves in spring.

A leaf wanders across the sidewalk,

parks itself in front of your driveway,

singing sad love songs to a pine cone.

I hate your eyes, the way you stare

at me, I hate your face,

etched in bric-a-brac.

The clock ticks in the kitchen.

An old man hums,

speaks of tomorrow and the yesterdays

that came before.

the shadow in the distance that bleats

like silver eyes,

and dances across gray areas.