my mother insists
she was never a witch
but she gave me a bag of amethyst,
sunstones,
citrine

10:20 AM**
utensil song
repeats a sleepy dirge
like i repeat another day
of walking in a circle

I want that smooth, low voice
not this muppet one I have
but oh!
I can still sing!
    Warble and be your song bird
I want to be a *****
one with a sleek, **** body
but still!
There is something cute
  about a plump girl
   writing poems
     more naked than in the eyes of the Lord.

I want to be so much for you
and sometimes, I am only far away
but
but you take those things I am
and you see them as angels' giggles
polish those ugly parts of me
and keep them in a display case between your lungs
right where I keep yours

Uncle Bruce writes sermons and gives grace at the Christmas table
his family bowed their heads
and listened to what they thought of as
"quaint"
"old time-y"

Most of them there were atheists
or maybe Catholics
(it depended on the side of the table)
and even Uncle Bruce was not sure what he believed in, not yet, not yet
after 53 years, he wasn't sure
(he had always been a smart man)
even after debating how many angels could dance on the head of a pin
and preaching for years behind the pulpit

What Uncle Bruce does know, he does
He gives us all faith

My name is Haley Gilarwald
and I am a force of nature.

                                          Not too long ago, the stink bugs invaded our city
                                               Unlike aliens or the usual sort, these were just
                           plague.
Like swarms of locusts they came, but they never seemed to eat, rarely seemed to die.
They just clustered.
And wings, sounding like B-52 bombers, they rattled around the bare watt bulbs and roared, and I
Swear
to Jesus God
Drove everyone here mad.

                                                                          I hate the little *******.
                                                                         I sit in my room, typing a dreadful paper for a dreadful class
                                                                         when that hell sound shows up.
(my floors, they are hardwood!)
and so I stood
notebook in hand
and skivvy clad
I played tennis with the swarming thing
they do not die!
like men, they only keep coming back
little war machines
buzzing at my discontent


                          NO MATTER HOW MANY I FLUSH, THEY ALWAYS COME BACK
                                                          THE                               SAME.    
                                                      (I am certain that they cannot die.)

looking up again
the light has lifted from the sidewalk
and shines only on the tops of the apartments

never sharp enough
to take the skin off a tomato

i need you like i need the paint that runs through my veins
and keeps my cheeks colored
to spew onto canvases

he smiles at things
that make him sad
chicken soup
mommy's smile
and the quick flint knife
of snakes at his back

there is nothing so sweet
or sour
as the Bb range
high C
for those of us who can reach it
my god
heaven

i don't
know
what to say
to anyone
anymore
can't can't
i'm not i'm not
i'm not here for speaking
i'm bad
and i'm usually so good
what's happened with me
what's happened with me?

a sliver of streetlight
passes through the slotted blinds
cats
on my bed
pawing at my eyes
bidding my awake

i was doing
so much better
and now
i am falling off of my desk
to play in the sunrise with
a ******* knife
spraying pepper spray in the knicks
somebody help me
i'm not even sorry
i'm an addict
can't ******* stop
i was stupid to think that i could
so now my insides are flying out like of my pores
and it feels so good
to hurt so much

There are nights when the only things that interrupt the darker portions of my discontent
is the heavy drone of insects
around my single bare bulb.

I do not live in poverty, nor could I claim that I ever have
but the tiny souls still dance
around that single bare bulb

It hangs down from an empty rafter where plaster demons creep
like a little necktie party for one
lucky bulb.

It makes me furious to see it's glowing corpse so teased
laughing monsters around it
you're with me, bare bulb

Those who mock you, I will end.
For in my room, you are king
(I could never turn you off)
Forever yours
Bulb

she was so lazy
that the bed swallowed her whole
"Netflix! Come save me!"

Fajitas? For Breakfast?*

Well

I still feel pretty.

Miss Percival's famous jell-o molds were
the talk of every summer block party.
No one was sure where she had come up with
exotic shapes that adorned red benches
robins, and faces of famous people
they really were a thing to be envied.

One Memorial Day, though, there came a shriek from Miss Percival's kitchen
and the flowery curtains shuffled as they did so

The first ones in (the couple that brought the waldorf salad every year. It was good, but it was nothing next to Miss P's jell-o molds)
were Mr. and Mrs. Carroway
Mrs. Carroway almost fainted when she saw what was on the counter

You see, Miss Percival was fond of one site for her molds
and they shipped them in every month in big brown crates
there was a big brown crate, to be sure
but no mold inside

It isn't proper to gossip, but I heard that it was a bowl full of eyeballs;
A medical school had put the wrong address on their order.
I bet that there was a confused batch of medical students
being stared at by a jell-o model of Walter Cronkite.

There are days when I write
that my thoughts are black and sticky
tar on the windshield on a January
It drips down my pen or gunks up my keyboard
and I sob at the mess that's slowing my down
always slowing me down

There are days when I write
and my thoughts are ghosts
they just want to lay down, but the shadows make them jump
possibilities alien or needed frighten them
and their only artwork
is a plea for help

There are days when I write
and my thoughts are spiders
and I work feverishly
my paintings and poems smeared by eight long legs
angry, violent, (secretly scared)

Those are what people like.

There are days when I write
and there is absolutely nothing wrong.
what a lovely morning...
*I think I'll write a poem

My boyfriend is my lap top computer
Yes he exists
Yes I have met him
I have met him time and time again
touched his face, tasted his sweet lips, and heard him humming me to sleep
I have done all of that
and I have had him ripped away
across rivers
and mountains
and state lines
State lines carved in our hearts deep as French, German trenches
and as wide
as that song they keep playing on my Pandora
and I would walk five hundred miles...

So
My boyfriend
is my laptop.
When I cannot see his face
there are his photos
and a few youtube videos.
When I cannot hear his voice,
skype sends itself to me.
And when I long to hold his hand,
I can push up to my laptop
and feel the whirring warmth
of a hot hard drive.

Is it the same as his chin on my shoulder?
How he's shorter than I am
but he still rests there
with a little difficulty
and so much love.
Can I feel a laptop
breathing softly on the back of my neck at night?
Can a laptop
stop my nightmares?
Surf the roaring waves of behavioral disorders?
Or even really hold my hand?
No.
It is not substitute.
So I will wait.
I will wait for my love
just until I have the time to last up my shoes
*I would walk 500 miles...

The
butter
has
stopped
flowing

                               ** But the clogs are still there.

I wonder if wine feels this way?
Sure, she's a chick who knows how to please
and the only way
she got there  is through practice.
But did she want to be stomped in the first place?
There's a reason that the grapes are not 'caressed'
they were never taken to a bed
at least, not their first time,
and no body leaned in and  whispered
It's okay
You don't have to be frightened,
I've got you
No
the grapes
they get pushed hard against the bathroom wall
and get told not to talk about it ever again.
Then the juice was sipped before mature
and since the cask was opened again and again
far too early
it started to rot
get bitter.
Only man that truly savored her
right on time,
he doesn't care if she's wine, grape, or juice
He just loves her
and she hates that she's intoxicating

I wonder if wine feels like this?
If it ever misses the grape.

That morning, sound was a spear of melted glass
pouring down over the mountainside.

The treetops don't hiss anymore with crying katydids,
the bird songs even are beginning to dwindle- as they
cast their voices across the sky, pulling away.

And as the world grows quiet, the visions get loud
black trees cut blue and yellow skies
ice on the corners of your car window
a reminder of what's coming
in litotes