things that happened to me
that seemed so full of eternity
and set in green and granite

things i figured i'd never forget.
The city distracts me but
i go back to dry land



everywhere i find evidence of my memories:
people, places, streets, trees,
the laces they took from me at the hospital

i cannot find them-
they lie in a bin,
in a landfill, deep in the ground under the rot

but these memories-
i cannot find it-
the idea they happened to me



i am finding ground
and lying on it
but falling through to the core.

forgetting what it is like
to feel air on my face
to feel my chest when i cannot recall

the feel of anything
or anyone at
all.

the few days i do remember
are vignettes of a film,
stored away in archives and
exploding in a kiln

the other ones run from me in a tunnel
towards green orange and gold days
of leaves, and air, and trees and hay

to lock me out forever
to send themselves away
from me.

to forget my memories  
it's like a sickle wedged into my heart,
handle out towards the hand of time that sunk it there

who did it happen to,
and when, and where and why
I don’t know

purple vermillion skies
in October, the turnpike pulsing under me
flying past on an over pass.

Now a year later I lie
in cold sepulcher of room,
wooden smell and dark purple night

I can finally see the stars
but they do nothing for me
except to remind me


they were there this whole time
and remember more than i could ever
dream of.

The dew drops off the brown brick still
I am not there to watch it
Back home everything stops
It is hard to imagine my life without me
In the gray city, I lie in bed
For what reason?
Why am I here
As the rain comes down
And washes the garbage away.

7/19/2017

"I did, and it broke my heart- into a billion pieces but I had to. I had to."
"He held up his head with his hand, steadily observing her. He turned to his side fully. She could no longer see his face.
'you don't understand,' he said finally
'i've always been afraid of being an egoist'"
"'I've a couple idee fixes'
'not any i need to know'"
"i'm sick with the idea... sick with it.*"

2017*

I hear the first mourning doves of the year
somewhere high in the branches of this toohot day
like your calling me then going away

You are sick, sick
your head implodes with the fetid treacle
of thought.

and i have done what i could
this is:
nothing.

i will marry one day and be happy
fat and glowing, tenderhearted
i will send you a letter

perhaps you will know
if you want to know
but for me this year is this

the talking too much
and hating the
taste of cherries

the last blue nights by the fountain have passed
there are scarcely poems to write.
a plane flies high in the sky

white and dry
to jump from it,
broken parachute

and land at your feet, liquified
is a fate of which i
can only fantasize.

4/18/2018

the waxwings singing
through my window
remind me of when i was young.

letting bygones be bygones and
staring boldly out the doorway at the
morning sun

but who am i anymore
if i cannot be that girl
i don't know, i don't know

to sleep's to dream
and to love's to keep
April– the canopies turn white and green

ND
1944-2018*

You taught me how to write
it took me too long to write this.

When you died,
the nurses combed your hair

and put your favorite perfume on
your neck.

without you I am nothing
and a ceaseless
mess

but for you
have kept
living

in 1967 you had a daughter,
born dead.

you never visited her
grave  you didn't want to know where it was

but your husband did.
and the first person he told about you was her.

she was born with
lemon yellow curls stuck to her head.

the pain is so much
but not as much as your beauty

i will learn to live without you  as
you would have wanted it

racing matchsticks down storm gutters
i still don't believe in god.

But if there is a hell
that means there is a heaven

I would take eternity of
darkness and iron hot
pokers

if it meant you could be
with your lost daughter
and hold her.

1/18/2018

i used to be sentimental,
i declare like some sort of achievement
like it is something to be proud of

that i feel nothing
nowadays.
and i do, i think

but i have always been told
my writing is analytical
corpse cold, to the point

the car's quiet in the night
and, moving to the corner
and crossing my arms

i entertain the notion of what've i done
but life doesn't mean anything
and that's the good part

i laugh but I'm not smiling
as you confirm this idea
the fields are

evil and dark
but how do i explain
i can't it's not like i have ever felt it before

with a smirk
i
play with my hair

and remember
what being a woman's
good for.