#nebraska
My suitemate Sunny is from Nebraska. She’s 5’9,” and has cinnamon brown hair that’s half messy-bob, just long enough that she can twist it up with a pearl-studded comb, and half mohawk. She has the long, slanky elegance of someone who’s spent most of her 18 years outdoors.
She’s a cowgirl. There’s a well-worn sage-nova cowgirl hat hanging on her dorm wall and she has her own horse - a red-roan quarter-horse named Valentine - at home, of course. Her best friend growing up was a Sioux girl named Wachiwi who shared her love of barrel racing and lived on a nearby reservation.
Wachiwi was the first person Sunny came out to, at 10. Sunny was 13 when she came out to her family. “I like girls,” Sunny declared defiantly, out of the blue, one night after dinner, “not boys.” Her younger brother had snickered, her older brother rolled his head and said, “Oh, lord.” Her two little sisters seemed unconcerned. Her dad, after a moment’s thought, responded by asking her if she had taken the kitchen scraps out to the chickens yet.
Sunny grew up on a ranch and there was a rigid structure to her days. She would get up early and do ranch chores (muck out horse stalls, feed the chickens, gather eggs and set out hay) then study - but her first love was World of Warcraft.
Sunny was homeschooled and her stories of how that was accomplished are epic. For instance, they had three satellite internet services which she would have to switch between, throughout the day, like a gambler hoping to get lucky and every other Saturday they drove three hours to exchange books at the library. Whatever they did though, it worked. She’s unholy smart - like someone made a deal with the devil smart.
Sunny describes Nebraska as “basic, cliche and poor.”
“Wow,” Leong says, “you really paint a picture.”
“We all inhabited different worlds,” Sunny says, shruggingly, “Lisa’s from skyscraper clouds, Anais a palace, Leong a dystopian communist hellscape..”
“I wouldn’t say a palace,” I demur. “WHAT,” Leong screeches, throwing popcorn at Sunny.
“Stop!” Sunny says, raising both hands to ward-off further snack assaults.
“I just mean, if you were to go live in Nebraska - you’d have to go in on those terms - expecting something basic, unimaginative and poor, periodt.
“I couldn’t wait to excape.” she says, definitively, “I was thirsty.”
Everything about Sunny is deliberate, she looks you in the eye. Like a madwoman let out of the attic, she takes perverse joy in being fiercely blunt, raw and outspoken. She has a drive that can’t be mollified - she’s making her life over and you better not get in her way. The girl cracks me up - I could stand to be more like her.
Sunny’s joining my world this June for most of summer vacation. “Maybe you could show me Nebraska one day.” I say. “Maybe.. someday..” she says trailing off with a far off look, “but I wouldn’t do that to you, you’d go CrAzY in three days.”
“I’ll own that,” I say, wiping away fake tears.
.
May 6, 2022
May 6, 2022 at 9:11 PM UTC
#prairiegrass dreams
*Across the Sandhills
wading into the untamed Niobrara
barebacked.. brown, and beautiful
Within her Misty Mountain dreams
she is heading my way.
Ah, sweet lord God almighty,
look at her go..
Westbound, she is best-found
right there.. on the edge
of these dreams of my own
Oh my lord..
look at that beautiful horsedream go
Will I be able to survive her..
I don't know
. . .
You feel him.. don't you, sweet one..
my beautiful Snickers
on that Gordon, Nebraska hill--
his home, his birthplace..
Until his beautiful spirit
one day.. finally found me
Striated and stoic
he is waiting for you..
To bring, you
the rest of the way home.
North now, into Dakota
as you bleed
with the Lakhóta
on a trail, split
between Pine Ridge..
and Wounded Knee.
Feel your war-torn Spirit
melt in to them
(you will not fall)
As you ride this black-maned dream
just a bit further North..
towards a man, named Paul
Within my own, I can feel you both
Ah hell, babe..
I can feel you all*
#
Sep 30, 2021
Sep 30, 2021 at 9:09 PM UTC
on highways, rails, rivers and trails
we cut open the prairie wild
to poison our mother and bleed her dry
blind to the consequence
these fine white lines confine me
on aimless, nameless streets
where fences hang from twisted crosses
crucifying pages torn
from our fathers' histories
we'd rather soon forget
these fine white lines confine me
on shameless, blameless streets
when cold winds come blowing backward
and freeze the spaces in between
will our children know have this earth
if we do not know mercy?
these fine white lines confine me
on aimless, nameless, shameless, blameless streets
Feb 13, 2018
Feb 13, 2018 at 1:02 PM UTC
In Nebraska, they are murdering transexuals
those with necks red as blood and lipstick
This recording is the last of the words which are me
-Play on the air for all to hear
or smash them between these two bricks
these two red bricks of earth and stone
In Nebraska, they are murdering transexuals
which you may think is funny
when their lipstick gets smeared ridiculously
across the macadam
until you see their blood the same as yours
until they come for you
those "good old boys" with fists like bricks
and necks engorged with hate and spit
warm beer, **** and vinegar
sun beating down on their angry, little brains
This is the final transcript
of all that I am
embellished with sequins and such
scrawled in *****
These words are my lover's breaths
floating in darkness above cold ears
lost in cartoon-balloon blurbs
a drama of gasps
a flurry of snow and chipped nails
upon the pavement
across the prairie
in Nebraska
Feb 17, 2017
Feb 17, 2017 at 5:26 AM UTC
Wind whirling around prairie fence-posts,
a few weeks after winter’s last frost
was melted away,
replaced by white flowers that whipped
and flipped in spring’s fresh breath.
Like waves frothing in an ocean bay,
the fine, flirty song of a Meadowlark
is willed into the world,
and frolics through the windy hills.
May 15, 2016
May 15, 2016 at 1:21 AM UTC
If you say
the noun
Nebraska
to any
easterner
their eyes
will glaze
like doughnuts.
But if you
go there
and experience
the exquisite
loneliness
of the Niobrara,
the empty
intensity of
the Sand Hills,
the primordial cry
of the Cranes
and more stars
than you could
imagine one sky
could ever hold,
it will fill
your soul
to bursting
and you will
never again
belong wholly
to your thin
strip of coast.
~mce
Jul 3, 2015
Jul 3, 2015 at 8:11 PM UTC
Before I went my way
I was unsure if my car tire popping
constituted omen or bad luck.
That is the frame of mind I was in
leaving Lincoln.
Now I realize most of this is temporary
distraction, soon Nebraska passes and
Missouri remains, as it always has.
One year later I will change my college major,
theatre to sociology.
Lincoln taught me lessons, not
all of them important. I found true solace
in watching others, why they walk like that,
what their hair says about their politics,
microbes erupting into civilization.
Leaving Lincoln behind was so remarkably
necessary in its devices. I will always
make time for my thoughts, my seasons,
thanks to the dull, blinding cold of
Lincoln, Nebraska.
Jan 25, 2015
Jan 25, 2015 at 9:39 PM UTC
In Lincoln
two times I was drunk
one only slightly.
I was lonelier than I'd
ever been. I hope I never feel
that way again.
Three times I felt alone.
More times I was sick to my stomach.
I do not regret a single second.
Jan 22, 2015
Jan 22, 2015 at 7:12 PM UTC
Eyes can't help but follow
long hair in long coats
wind shaking the strands like
snowflakes, their own little patterns.
The cinemaplex is open,
negative seventeen degrees Fahrenheit and
someone is still making money.
Wrapping around a blocked-off
manhole I turn the corner too quickly,
bump into a homeless man and his chair.
He asks if I've any change.
I say No, my pockets are empty.
Inner monologue firing, always,
I cop the corner and take a moment to my
physical self, ask it questions, *How are you?
You've been a slight bit distant during this time.
Do you miss home?*
I'm not sure I've found a home to miss.
Jan 22, 2015
Jan 22, 2015 at 2:29 PM UTC
Hearts sparse in this carpark,
the wind feeling rowdy, biting like a
small rabid animal with no collar
wandering the city alone at night.
The car is making me claustrophobic,
I've spent far too much time with the heat,
too many minutes burning cigarettes and
my hands near-numb from the caffeine.
Poems are less like action movies and
more like action paintings exploding
in suspended motion. I'm sure we all
remember when art felt new. I can't
recall when it didn't feel so lived-in.
(*And of course this poem is merely
a memory of feelings, which is not much
of anything to me or you because the past
is dry and done and does not intrude.*)
Lincoln, Nebraska is a livelier city
than one expects. It is like going to an
art exhibit expecting Rothko and getting
Basquiat, bombast and immediacy.
My favorite poet is Craig Morgan Teicher
because he and I may ramble but he is not
afraid to sacrifice accessibility for
feeling. He could find the beauty in the
image of Lincoln, Nebraska in January.
I will soon need to devise another way
to keep myself entertained so let us
say this CD spins one more time and
maybe I can go for a walk, clear my head.
I do not intend this to be wrought with
sentiment, but there are times I am not
as cold as this city. There are times
the mind must scream
so the heart stays safe.
Dec 10, 2014
Dec 10, 2014 at 2:07 AM UTC