hit your children. my own, I love the way they look

before I don’t. every shadow

leaves its post

after
the talking
animals
of body
horror

and before
acolytes
anonymous-

the wrong
dying
baby

I say things above my son when he is underwater.  I say things in a rage.  I pretend I am nearby the brother I am closest to.  he would forgive me.  my body has always been outdated.  my son’s body is plinked.  not unlike a piano beside which siblings hug.  there is a sorrow I’ve forgotten.  not unlike the recording equipment one leaves in a dream.  it is a stretch, the tornado siren momentarily belonging to a church bell.  more of one that my son is a cracked bullhorn.  ghost town debris.

lightning
might find
sixty
people
per year
one of them
foreground
of oblivion’s
lucky
bee

I know his-
and my son, his own-
strength.

there is no breaking of bread, no beauty
the eye
can carry.

maybe
when you visit
we are away
on heaviness.

god
in that
children’s book
was given
to rising
early- so much prayer- just three

families
in the world
when one prayed
he hear
only
theirs.

healing is not a story the limping enter.  

who writes about death
writes
to return
the trespass.

accepted
an illustration
for her father’s
book
of madness
called

a shortage
of recent

absence

the girl who cries wolf
cries wolf
to three men
whose sons
are dead

the field
where father
sold
from a grounded
helicopter

a fog
machine

to one
whose pregnancy
had not
ended / the field

where brother
found
in a ******
a piece
of chalk / the field

sorta
field

like

with its puppies
and its trash / yeah

there is something to be said
I don’t know what
to echo’s
first

love / the dizzy

spells
of deer

be clear.  preserve for me the myth of white male melancholy.  we put a cross

on the moon.  we gave

hell a hell
that does not disprove

a godless world.  in the origin story

of my father’s
parvenu

unease
we

mid woman
came up

with woman.  

     I am not made

of touch.  I am made of yours.

I was listening
to my father
tell a story
about two men
with one
outfit
between them
when I noticed
my brother
had been touched
by sleep
and my father
saw him too
and began
a second
story
about the face
of a ghost
that had seen
a woman
undress
and both
stories
made me miss
my mom
for you

Adam had no memory of his first wife.  as created, he would look at Eve all day and feel nothing.

-

the vacation house was found to be owned by another family.  in it, my mother resisted arrest.      

-

my father was born with six fingers on his right hand and seven on his left.  he was not fond of either hand until later in life when the grandchildren asked him at different times during their visits if he had been tortured.

-

God created the world because he couldn’t do it on his own.  ah, note to self, *******.  person is place.  I might’ve killed a man had I not been poking holes in a poem by Barton Smock.  

-

my brother says it’s part of his condition that he can only explain himself from the waist down.  he says he feels horrible in the back of his head and wants me to take a look.  he says I don’t know what darkness is.  before I can play doctor he remembers he has a story he wants me to write.  the outline of the story is off site.  in the opening scene brother recalls that a young man is blowing dust from a human skull made of plastic because it’s all the narrator can afford.

-

the head itself was an afterthought.  had god not allowed the soul to come up for air, beauty would have been spared our invention.

-

a single mother is a twofold mirage.  please argue above her quietly.  her legs collapse.  her child comes first.

-

your sister is the only person I’ve recorded to have been born without a gift.  I was told this in confidence by an angel masquerading as a small animal the size of which escapes me.

-

I am aware a sparrow exists.  not in a spiritual vacuum.  people are another hell.  

-

excuse my friend his earlier joy in saying who do I have to **** to get ****** around here.  at age 19 a man exploded beside my friend and my friend went quiet.  to his grave thinking his own bomb malfunctioned.

empty imagery*

Adam had no memory of his first wife.  as created, he would look at Eve all day and feel nothing.



empty imagery

the vacation house was found to be owned by another family.  in it, my mother resisted arrest.      



empty imagery

my father was born with six fingers on his right hand and seven on his left.  he was not fond of either hand until later in life when the grandchildren asked him at different times during their visits if he had been tortured.



empty imagery

God created the world because he couldn’t do it on his own.  ah, note to self, *******.  person is place*.  I might’ve killed a man had I not been poking holes in a poem by Barton Smock.

empty imagery

the head itself was an afterthought.  had god not allowed the soul to come up for air, beauty would have been spared our invention.


empty imagery

a single mother is a twofold mirage.  please argue above her quietly.  her legs collapse.  her child comes first.


empty imagery

your sister is the only person I’ve recorded to have been born without a gift.  I was told this in confidence by an angel masquerading as a small animal; the size of which escapes me.


empty imagery**

it wasn’t until my father lost his job that I began to go hungry for myself.

empty imagery

erasure poems write me from prison.  I read them aloud in front of the mirror in my mother’s bathroom.  a terrible mirror.  I don’t know how my mother does it.  she must have a good idea how she really looks.  


empty imagery

I can’t tell if I’ve been thinking of my father all the time or if I’ve become lax in my selection.  I am trying to reach him about the car.  on paper, it’s totaled.  the dog in the backseat surprised me.  very solemnly I was informed the dog seemed pretty beat up before.

      
empty imagery**

my brother says it’s part of his condition that he can only explain himself from the waist down.  he says he feels horrible in the back of his head and wants me to take a look.  he says I don’t know what darkness is.  before I can play doctor he remembers he has a story he wants me to write.  the outline of the story is off site.  in the opening scene brother recalls that a young man is blowing dust from a human skull made of plastic because it’s all the narrator can afford.

empty imagery

I am aware a sparrow exists.  not in a spiritual vacuum.  people are another hell.  



empty imagery

woman large, woman blank.  vessel of prayer.  being led by my father to the backroom where her child is being held for shoplifting.  dizzy child versed in how equalizing the chewing of gum can be.  once in the backroom, my mother takes over.  the child sitting, a son, knuckles hovering as listless as this dual recount.  

the table being carried from the employee cafeteria.  not arriving before the woman rears and breaks the child’s nose with her boot.  the table in the wrong room.  the shy people around it.  the following mayhem from which the boy shrinks to swallow his gum.  how the gum goes right to his chest caved from being stepped on by his older brother’s left foot to keep him still during the nightly ritual of lengthening both arms by the hands.  his arms necessary for thieving.  

his arms for pain to tunnel through.    



empty imagery

excuse my friend his earlier joy in saying who do I have to **** to get ****** around here.  at age 19 a man exploded beside my friend and my friend went quiet.  to his grave thinking his own bomb malfunctioned.



empty imagery**

to think on it is to acknowledge something came before both the chicken and the egg.  but don’t get knotted.  we’re going with the coverage of the tree no one heard.

as references to my brother
appear elsewhere
I ask my mother
if I can use
her lipstick

-

collateral:

I have a friend who was asked
by a representative
of a reality TV show
to be someone
different-

someone famous.

-

I smoke *** under my sister’s bed.

stand and brush her fingernails
from my belly.

she thinks I’m her brother.

-

saying
they’ve nothing
to prove

     many attest
to the hush
of my father’s
congregation

-

when brother is born
I am due
his mirror

-

wager:

in one place
at once

     God

in the house
of the toddler
famous
for pulling
from a dryer
an entire
scarecrow
the soon to be
dad
with his one
bad
blind

eye

puts a rock
through hell

the child
said to be
in all of us

how leaves it
the woman
become
pregnant

how returns it
to god
and is killed

so say
not poor
woman
but poor

god

( once
  so accidentally
  weird )

to have named

the animals
and later
to have only
two boats, two people

you’ve known-

god had an earache and I heard thunder.  I learned to shrink into the smallness of my brain.  I associated money with my father’s funny bone.  my mother with the dual church of hide and seek.  I went on to have a son with special needs.  he cried once.  cried milk.

who knows how these things start.  some animalistic girl with the air of donation sits beneath the kind of playground slide could convince nowhere of a middle while two boys with cardboard swords keep each of us from the ladder unless we allow her to bite us on the arm.  pretty soon we’re in math class showing each other how many times we went down and pretty soon our younger siblings are smacked or hungry or puckered from being bathed.  some of us run out of room while some of us have two good legs.  some of us pull at our mothers as if all prayed out of playmates.  the girl goes weeks without god before giving in.  her swordsmen move on to pocket knives and loitering.  you see her in the food court of the mall sitting with her wheelchair bound father and brother and tell us there’s no magic that pushes them both.

my father snaps his shovel stealing snow from our travel-addicted neighbor.  his mute sister’s last confession is a first.  his doctor brother’s dollhouse is a hospital.  television is a byproduct of my mother’s human longing for animals.  if my arms were healed, I’d keep the baby from swatting its *****.  I call my next trick rabbit sorrow.

there are people doing what you do.  houses make a difference.  the age of a bedroom where touching.  where tickled I am against the will of my belly.  am engine and am weight.  am might as well be

feather in the tread of still

a fighting shoe.  of the only pair I torture.  make with me on the powerless boat of night.  drop my jaw to match the microphone of hunger.  

it rolls like a flashlight.

the dead triplets     harmonize

-

it is the mattress
speaks to
the massaging
of imagery  

it is the mattress / mother was
from / wait

     yanked from
like a spine

-

I *****
but keep
praying

I am not hoarse
I am trying to catch
god’s
throat

-

     evanesce

is father’s
favorite
or second

favorite
word, he says we have to share

the smallest opposite
of resurrection

-

they glow     eating a hole

they attract

i.

horror film: the last place the poor can go.

our second date- her father had given her chase but in slow motion.

he gave me his hand and I took it because it was free.

I told her in the car while it moved what a cliché she was. she looked at hills

a few of them
stopped rolling. she had me pull over.

horror films ain’t rocket surgery. I knew what she meant.

ii.

mothers and fathers, lie to your children.
tell them the honeybee wants to die for them; that no matter their stillness
it will sting.
tell them each they are a limited edition glow in the dark action figure.
tell them the world is flat;

that when it’s not, don’t get romantic to traverse the banged on ceiling
of hell.

{entries for dimension}

at birth
it says
iceberg, and then

crown

–

I have this story that can put
for you
a banana peel

on the floor
of the delivery room, this other

–

with a scarecrow
midway through it

looking all
tore up
like it was used

last night
as a fork


{entries for belief}

ain’t a thing can be crucified that has clothes

when people think
you lonely
you can slip
twice
from your mother

you can chew with your hands in your pockets


{entries for Ohio}

I am to my blood
what ant farm
to ant

–

the mother worries about them sleeping at the same time
the twins

–

the dark has an ugly brother

revenge
a rare
photo

–

this babysitter I know
driven
to suicide
took things
from a movie
set

–

god says
bring her in
the fast
reader

for observation


{entries for intimacy}

things I said when I stepped on a nail
things like
a spelling bee
is underway
in hell
and how deep
it goes
the thumb’s
suicide


{entries for music}

while I kept
scarecrow’s honor
my elbows
off the table
and ate
to practice
swallowing
mom she put a litterbox
on a piano bench
telling dad
dreams
are the paws
of god

[entries for meaning]

/ the past can’t do this anymore

/ the brainwashed narrator of my absence
he will not explain
fog
to snow

/ she will not sleep

with it
that says
word
for word
I am my mother’s
fear
of the male
body

~

[entries for transformation]

i.

is there blood in something born outside,

a history that works in one ear?

ii.

time touches nothing. is the *** of my bruise

/ a scar

~

[entries for children]

remember, it is dark and memory is god painting with the blood of those he would create

[entries for creator]

to keep my son safe, I invent hole and hat and await the rabbit. in the meantime, I watch videos of daycare workers beating on food as if kids could betray starvation. but really I’m just sad no one knows anymore how to make a fist. say Ohio aloud and you’ll not notice

a pattern.

[entries for undoing]

he go to water
to form’s
disciple
where last he saw
his mom’s wheelchair
momless
in a net
made of spiders

[entries for restraint]

lightning, keyhole, the forgetful
giant
blowing kisses
from bed
to the eyelids
of nostalgia’s
immortal
messenger…

is this how I am beautiful in an airplane bathroom

is this the mother burns her own
ears
to get
god
talking

/ stop reading
you come
to crow

mom works nights answering the phone for a nameless thing

/ which sister
gets
the strawman, or

a narrator’s
struggle
with pica

/ what example
we set
for sleep

horror and recognition are functions of the past. I brought to your campfire an empty dollhouse. I lit with eyesight a haunted cigarette. it’s not your baby, it just can’t flee.

had a child and began to see people

/ every bandage is a red-haired ghost

I like everything about your story except where it starts.  a little longer in the dog’s mouth.  I couldn’t separate the gnome’s suntan from the minotaur’s heart transplant.  maybe your parents could write me a letter?  how many missed meals does presence eat?  it did make me sad, the snowball fight beneath a boneless moon.  and the daughter born to fake her pregnancies.  look, we all have a brother who can’t move.  who puts a clock in a time capsule.  suicide?  on other planets.

what creature
itches
at night
knowing
I have learned
to crawl

the name of this scar
is
they couldn’t hide
the canoe

mom says there’s an oven
at the bottom of every lake

that I was born asleep
surrounded
by toe touchers

is art
world-building
for the geeks
of grief

have you crucified

starfish

mom is talking to her wounds. dear baby I don’t have to carry. dear purse I don’t have to fill. her dolls draw blood and her animals say goodbye. there’s no substitute for loneliness. memory knows more than what happened. dad is an oil slick seducing a satellite. his dolls eat pillows.

not a thing born
nor a thing
howled at
no
you are not
again
these things

the baby
it continues
to purple itself
where it can

it crawls, but is mostly stunned
by its own
vocabulary

the dog has the tongue of a cat

this is new

I am looking for the phone no one hears. the phone I use to call people I want to hang up on. my son has not yet become the size he wants to be when he’s with me. I hope he has friends. I hope his friends know that to be taken by aliens means god is serious about studying who misses you. I don’t believe in god nor in those given a shorter time to think on death.

they will begin to think you’ve lost them. a mirror will go to prison for harboring the invisible cyclops that discovered how to miss the trace nakedness leaves. a rabbit’s foot will pray from inside a crushed hat. and the land will be flat because a hill stopped filming.

am giving the balloon a head of hair and my brother his skateboard a set of teeth. are we teasing the same creatures, yes, with mom’s eardrum. all our birds have one father and the father foreign concepts of farewell. sister is urging us to hug but we know from stick that river had a nightmare.

mirror
to window
we’re moving
away

can we stop this talk of the baby cut in half and ask why this town has two graveyards. show me a dog showing an angel where to dig. the brothers have all gone underwater to raise money for hand signals and the sisters have taken from a tale of snowfall an ****** to amnesia’s headstone. the parts of the movie you look at

vanish. it’s my fault there’s a god.

my roommate’s father lives in a skipped year rewatching a tv show about what poor people film with a puking man I call future

we worship
not god
but the expression
on his face
as he recalls
being washed
in his mother’s
kitchen sink

the future sees itself as a man unable to be forgiven in an Ohio of pawn shops and nakedness

for a god
who body shames

birth

be

ultrasound

be

what is really a group of nudists holding a séance

in a treehouse
in Oz

a cricket turns into a frog

the worm it works
for peephole

oh sound, attracted to nothing

what on a raft am I rubbing

whose suicide
is this, whose bloodbath
footwear

drivers of the haunted tank

sorrow the mudwrestler of my drought

whose tooth fairy
does
impressions

can we erase
what silence
films

a dog
a smaller
prison

I bring with me
to put
on the moon
my webbed
foot /

father for soap has been known to use a magnifying glass

brother he bend a tooth
in the temple
of the spoon

sister she is fixing a screen door
when her child’s fish
moves
its bruise