(NaPoWriMo Challenge: April 10, 2017)

I don’t know what the perks of the prince are
besides the castle and monetary wealth implied.
I’ve never seen them articulated in copious accounts
of literature. I guess the point is clear enough.
Marry the prince or look into other genealogies.
For instance the Godmother’s son who literally
cooks off the book, has been raised by women,
pings only girls on Match who like Lucinda,
is a steadfast shapeshifter, a soul catcher,
a charmer who tests high in Context
but performs well in Woo, a magic woo
that can hypnotize the sisters of Cinderella
during family games of Scattergories, leaves
lids off of perishable items, wears a map
of Ireland on his *** like a logo of his ancestry.
Probably does more than half…blue,
blue eyes, undeterred by your madness.

(NaPoWriMo Challenge: April 9, 2017)

Hocus pocus—artifice alchemy brew.
Seek the dictionaries of abracadabra
To find a liquid mercury clue.
Alla peanut butter sandwiches
Will turn your poem blue
While Walla Walla Washington
Will douse the verses through.
Best recipe for a glimmering hoopla:
Salagadoola…bibbidi-bobbidi-boo.

(NaPoWriMo Challenge: April 7, 2017)

I always tell this story to others and to myself when something bad happens, the Taoist parable about the farmer who has only one horse and that horse runs away. The neighbors say, “such bad luck for you” and the farmer says “maybe” and then the horse returns with 10 new horse friends and the neighbors say then, “such good luck” and the farmer says “maybe.” Then the son breaks a leg trying to ride the wild horses and then the son escapes the draft because he has a broken leg. The neighbors never do get it right. The farmer never does decide if his luck is good or bad.

The problem is that life is so big and luck is so small. So when I was nine years old and left my favorite pendant, a mysteriously cloudy colored heart shape, hung on its chain at the corner of our yard’s wooden fence because I was leaving a sign to the universe that I wanted a life full of love adventures, a few days later the necklace vanished; and I knew even then, as I felt acute loss and for decades afterwards, (because my grandparents from Oregon gave me that pendant and I would never, ever see it again), even then I knew it was too early to know if the story was misfortune or good fortune, as some bird carried my heart flying toward some nest hundreds of yards or hundreds of miles away, (maybe even over all the states to Oregon), to a place where God only knows.

(NaPoWriMo Challenge: April 6, 2017)

This is a man who literally counts his dogs.
This is a man who knows geometry and trigonometry,
      casually.
There exists in Alabama a hedge maze of this man’s brain.
This is someone concerned about time trails and sun dials.
This is someone concerned about IPCC reports and drought.
This is a man who would literally sacrifice his skin.
This is a Shirley Jackson story.
This is a Lemony Snicket story.
This is A Rose for Emily.
This story will one day be a movie, no doubt.
The half-glass proverb was not a metaphor to this man.
There is a man in every town who shouldn’t be made to want to leave it.
Who tells his story?

(NaPoWriMo Challenge: April 5, 2017)

The world
     resolves the core –
          the sky revolves
               its atmospheres

from blue to white
     to watermelon
          to night – coyotes
               inhale

their sleep, dreaming
     of bobcats
          lunging
               on rabbits –

the sabi of the tree
     is its deceiving
          bushness
               and asymmetry,

its crisp-rust
     smell of berry,
          leaves freshly
               toughbounded

covering the hidden
     folds of hills
          like country
               bedspreads

and cedar pollen
     blowing its dust
          over the dirt carpet
               of the plains –

tears of penance,
     choke of beauty,
          filaments of the lungs
               wheezing in the wind.

(NaPoWriMo Challenge: April 3, 2017)

This is the elegy for the one I didn’t know.
This is the elegy for my lack of knowing.

All the others said things
and you said things to all the others
who have each said things I remember.

But to me you could not speak.
You could not move your mouth or tongue.
You were like Frankenstein that way,
full-hearted shuffling, full-throated lumber
to the bathroom, to the dinner table.

And sitting with you alone
I was always afraid of what you’d say—
those words that were not words,
could not be words, the wordless long vowel.

You were a powerful existence even then.
Because you were big—you smiled big,
you walked big, you slid heavily
into the hearts of your heirs.
You said things they still smile over.
They tell me these things.

They tell me a pack of horses ran with you
along the fences, along the stark plains,
running along the headlights and the hearse,
running over the packed caliche dirt
toward the graveyard out on the mesa
where the meadowlarks sing like a wild tribute.
Because you were a beacon to the larks
and the horses always loved you.
This is what they said.

You could not speak anymore.
And you and I cannot speak anymore.
It is only the horses who are full of words.

(NaPoWriMo Challenge: April 2, 2017)

A fresh attitude (sautéed with butter and either garlic or onions) is hard to find in certain climates. Serve with any choice of greens.

Folded like divinity with pure cane syrup.
½ Tbsp of honey drizzled in the pan.
To caramelize is entirely your option.
Peel 6 or 7 tenets and shred.
Add a pinch of the herb mixture on page 11.
Knead out the narrow of the marrow.
Start to fricassee some fresh foliage.
Do not pare down or skim the concoction—
You will starve the recipe and the starter will fail.
Toss in some mettle instead.
Let the mix marinate overnight, uncovered.
Have a cooling rack handy to the side.
There will be stewing. There will be steam.
Add the hot sauce of your municipality.

This soul *** is a food staple worldwide.
Serves 7.49 billion.