I asked the Unabomber
if he had ever been in love.

You know--before Montana--
before wandering the unforgiving winter woods
holding a frozen tulip
and a rolled up poem
nestled inside a pipe as if you were a minstrel.

I asked him
if anyone had ever inhabited
the slow-cooking smoker
of his heart.
Was there ever the very emblem
of desirability
in the formula of anyone's eyes?

In your Harvard classes
full of second-week quitters
and callow
nattering plebes
was there never any elevated romantic
who might have solved for the
impossible equation
of your isolation and your need?

Oh Teddy,
you coward,
you murderous nutjob,
if the one whose heart could have stopped you
were to speak at last to your wobbling soul,
could you still be fixed
even now,
or are you already ******?

Perhaps my question itself
is like postage on a parcel
that can carry your remainder
softly out of shame
or suddenly into Hell?

You had sunshine
In your eyes
but
I was looking
For the moon

the crows took exception to the man
being so high up in the tree

and they called out for some kind of justice to be served
in reply the chainsaw sighed and breathed

as boughs and branches found the ground
leaves already unsettled with the grey of november finally fell free

make sure
to
take the time
to
take the time
to
watch this world that whirls
in
and around you

Lies looking for girls to tell them
gather in groups--
little ions looking for a charge.

Girls grow up greedy to spout the wildest stuff
about each other
or boys
or you.

Girls spend hours in front of mirrors
telling lie upon lie.
I'm ugly/ I'm pretty/ that's enough/ never enough.

Girls grow and haul a whole hope chest stuffed with lies
behind them to college,
to the altar,
to the nursery.

Lies looking for girls to tell them are never lonely for long.
Diogenes ran a girls' school until he lost his mind.
The students lied and said he went sailing.

Sit with me. Talk.
Our mothers did the best they could.
We'll always be like sisters.
This tea is good.

Lies looking for girls to tell them
don't stop when friends go home.
They circle when you're
anxious
afraid
alone.

At sunset I shake all my gathered lies from my apron to the sky,
and when they work together,
oh my
how the feathers fly.

We play on the corner till the streetlights thin
and stars pinprick a corkboard sky.

Dinner is anytime: bologna on white;
Kool-Aid cut thin with tap.

No hurry home unless for the news -we don’t.
We want what’s coming, not what’s been.

Paper fortune tellers flutter open / close.
She writes the answers first.

Lift one flap: your dog dies. Another: a prince.
Another: best party in town, no dress required.

He lifts a flap: her name-
“meant for you,” her sister whispers.

Then rain- blue-lined paper caves;
ink loosens, futures wash mid-fold.

At This Street & That Road, a drunk witch
swears Saturn and Jupiter will make us rich.

She forgets conjunctions come every twenty years.
Lunch money turns to lottery slips.

Rounding the corner, the futures
sign their names where ours should go.

the night whispers the black water fall of ashes
that bloom into the sparrows of sorrow...


the sorrow sparrows are back again
sitting in the tangled woods of twisted trees.

their voices bouncing off love's walls.

the sorrow sparrows are leaning into me.
my sad eyes, dream of you brother.

I lean into the soft lit room
searching for love's quiet hours,
and sunlight flickering through willow trees.

"don't cry, darlin," my wife whispers.

The late night casting out a soul.
The body had acted on its own—

When no one is aware—
That this is my darkest hour.
———
Wander around even when you are slumbered on your feet.
The sounds you made, mocked me whenever I  thought to myself.

In my darkest hour let me figure it out.
I can tunnel my way through—
Like a honeybadger using my claws as a liability.

In my darkest hour, sincerely— let me be.