Plastic Box

Verse

Thought I would mix it up a bit, since I left my camera at gramma's on Christmas and won't get it back to upload pics until New Year's. The first poem is by Ivan Minic and the second is from a draft folder I just found on my hard drive this morning. Looks like I wrote it last year.

After a While
by Ivan Minic

After a while you learn the subtle difference
between holding a hand and chaining a soul.
And you learn that love doesn't mean leaning
and company isn't security.
(Kisses aren't contracts and presents aren't promises.)

After awhile you begin to accept your defeats
with your head up and your eyes open,
with the grace of a woman, not the grief of a child.
And you learn to build your roads on today
because tomorrow's ground is too uncertain
and the inevitable has a way of crumbling in mid-flight.

After a while you learn that even sunshine burns
if you stand too long in one place.

So, you plant your own garden
instead of waiting for someone else to bring you flowers.
And you learn you really can endure,
that you really do have worth.
You learn that with every good-bye comes the dawn.

 

Julia

She never comes up here anymore.
It hardly seems worth it, since that time she was caught
And her mother cried and demanded to know
What was wrong with her.
But on sunny days when Miss Melanie lets everyone play outside
She sneaks up here
To walk barefoot on the hot tar of the hospital roof,
Twelve floors above the storytime corner
And six floors above where her mom answers the phone
Making appointments for sick kids
Just like her
And comforting their mothers in that practiced, robot voice.

 

Today is a sunny day and so here she is,
Tiny amongst the ventilation fans, pipes, and the backdrop of the city.
She can see the green grass of the baseball stadium
And people washing their cars, making mist that shines with tiny rainbows

 

It’s almost time to sneak back down the stairs.
But maybe just another sticky step or two,
The skin of her feet not quite as black as she likes them to be.
She twirls the sore steel post in her ear,
Newly pierced,
And wonders why everything hurts so much.

Vacation

Mom shakes me but I'm already awake.

Through the open window

I've been watching the waves that woke me.

Their incessant clapping broke my dreams

But as I continue to watch

I see that it was worth the sacrifice.

Dark, warm, and wet

It is unusually light on the shoreline for this late hour

As the three of us,

Mom, dad, and I,

Walk to the large rocks rimming the lake.

Barefoot at night, so good it's sinful,

And the night air is warm against our faces

Fixed on the sight that drew us hypnotically from our beds.

So many peaks of white, like mountains on the run,

Deafening as we get closer.

A sight of every hundred years as the tide shifts so dramatically,

So beautiful in its overpowering voice.

A thousand miles from home

But I have everything I need

On this cliff

On this beach

On this high tide.

The Accident

They’re siding with the dog

And I can hardly blame them,

As I look down at his eyes like melted puddles

Of warm, sweet chocolate.

He looks back at mine, pupils dilated

In the dark of a late-summer porch,

And I am resigned to the fact

That we have both been kicked out of the party.

Oiseau

I’m crossing 150^th and I don’t wanna look.

Somewhere around 121^st I heard it hit,

A soft, scratchy thud that forced the overhead light to land in the seat next to me

Staring up with bare bulb asking “Whatthefuck?!”

It’s big, I can feel it,

And the feathers in the rearview mirror

Form a trail behind my weary Chevy,

Flaunting my misfortune in a plume of grandeur.

No one is staring, pointing.

“What is it?!” I want to scream at them.

“Will someone please help?!”

But I can’t bring myself to slow down,

Because maybe if I drive and drive

It will somehow just get up and fly away,

Taking with it the sizeable dent in my roof.

Images flash in my mind of a mighty feathered beast

Of Jurassic proportions,

A prehistoric rat still clutched in its talons, now pointing to the sky.

Or maybe a great eagle, fallen from a battle mid-flight,

Only to land smack on my roof

As the victor soared away into the glare of the sun.

What grand design has chosen this moment

To involve me and my ’86 sedan

As I drive back from the liquor store.

It’s dusty and hot and I’m cooking something big

As the tar pops under my tires.

Walk the Line

I saw you tonight.
Or, rather, what I remember
That you might have been.
Sweaty, head on pillow folded,
Yellowed shirt crumpled on a bed,
And rock ‘n roll spilled
On an early morning floor.

You were breath in a microphone,
Sticky with ended love.
The torture that drives you...

I felt your hair on my neck
And your smell
That smell
Was on my hands,
As I clasped one to my mouth
To stop the revelation.

I tried to pretend that it wasn't me,

That it couldn't have been

But you sing to me
And I’m a duet of silence,
Up at the mic
With no more words.

Peach and Pistachio

Set the tone for getting old,
Gathering herbs as knees creak down to the garden,
Knuckles white on the rail to the basement.
She can still play the piano
Side-by-side with me
And grampa's still opening paint cans with his fingers,
But it's the cool peach tile
And the pistachio towels,
The scent of Johnson's Lotion
And the slow chopping of onions under the fan blade
That tell me the time
Without having to look,
Eyes closed.

Maria, diosa del sol

Carlos squeezed the orange softly

Noticing that one end was green.

‘Why would someone buy fruit that’s not ready?’

he thought,

Wanting to eat the orange now more than before

Just because he couldn’t.

He saw that she had uncorked the wine,

An Ampurdán-Costa Brava,

To let it breathe,

But that was also not yet ready.

‘All this waiting…’

He paced and scratched and wondered

Why he came back.

To this place where nothing seemed to suit him.

The fruit too green the wine too dry

The absence of warmth in the marble counters

And stiff-sheeted bed.

Why this woman

In whom he could find a thousand faults

Like the cracked earth of the desert.

You couldn’t see it without getting close,

But what he loved was the fire in her.

A burn that defied decency and politeness.

Evident even in her hair

There was a sense of something

Untamed.

He heard the door click upstairs

And beads of sweat pooled in his armpits.

Soft pads of footsteps

And the brushing together of her thighs

Were the drums beating between his ears,

And the feeling that something was going to happen

Ripened the orange still in his hand.

Golden

Having early morning coffee at Cafe Trieste

The sun shines down on the San Francisco hills

And bounces back up onto my shoulders,

Framed by the scratched storefront window.

The gold leaf letters are faded, but perfect in their imperfection,

As "old" here means something completely new to me.

I look out and look in, calm and happy,

With my right palm warmed by au lait topped with cinnamon

And my left hand tracing the pattern on the tabletop,

Carved by poets and pavers and bankers and mothers,

Each of whom found this place by no accident of fate.

Paul slops the hot coffee on the hot counter

And everyone in line knows what to say to one another

In this, their haven that we have stumbled into,

Miles from home.

But this moment right here

Is what I will always think of

As my favorite San Francisco morning.

She's Losing It

I don't know how to crochet

And therefore can't teach anybody.

I don't know where you were last night

And therefore have to read about it like everyone else.

It's all slipping away and I don't know how to grab it

From this far north.

You used to be down the hall

And below my bunk

But now I couldn't say what city it was

That held you Saturday night.

I want to reach out to you and make you feel

That I'm still here,

Willing to hold you when times get tough

Willing to dye your hair when it goes bad

Willing to tell you you're beautiful

Because you are.

These miles are too much sometimes

Like today

When all I wanted was to  be with you,

To share something stupid that no one else would understand.

You know me still

But I'm losing it,

This grip

On cobwebs

In the corner of a room

That belongs to someone else.

On Nice Days We Take the Shoreway

The Sun is still yellow,

Not orange as it used to be at this hour,

So we drive along the banks of the lake

And shield our eyes from the glare.

Can't be upset

At the surprising light that is still with us

After a long day indoors.

The waves lap at the shore,

Still cold

But warming like a shivering child

In from the snow.

"Soon, pretty beach.

Soon,"

I whisper, thinking how lucky a thing it is

To be so close to these gulls

And broken mussel shells.

I can almost hear them crunch under my feet.

An infinitely more pleasant sound than the snow

That has done the same for months

And months.

I can't wait for the shivers that come from the same wind,

Hot,

Not bitter,

But still makes me shake from extremity.

On nice days like this we take the shoreway

Over the potholes and the extra fifteen minutes...

Because it's worth it.