Tuna sandwiches on white bread
Carried in a paper bag
Josh Groban on the CD player
Season Three of 2 broke Girls
Matching shoes and purses
Vacation in the Pocanos
Subscription to People Magazine
Pennies in a piggy bank
Silver-beige 4-door Accord
A little college but no degree
Always ten pounds overweight
Celebration meal at Sizzler
Artificial Christmas tree pre-lit
A mole that wants removing
Off white walls, pale green carpet
Outfits from mail order catalogs
Paydays with no yearly bonus
Jeopardy and Wheel of fortune
Polyester perm press everything
Bic Stik ball point pen
Swanson's TV dinner
Flip phone with no camera
*** two times a week and Sunday
Writing verse nobody reads
ljm

It was a pretty standard bench;
the same one in the catalogs
with golden lillies
engraved right into the plaque
on the back rest

But Oh, how I loved
to sit there for hours
just kicking my feet back
and forth
watching the cars go by

He sat there once too
beneath the moon
and under the oak trees
in all his galant glory
I was ashamed;
but he was beautiful

I'm not sleeping tonight.

I know if I tried, I'd fail
So instead I'm thinking of you.
Cataloging you in my mind.

Simple things: favorite colors and foods
Deeper things: experiences and viewpoints
Deep things: do you notice when the moon glows?

I've got most of the first section down, I think.
The second will need time to fill.
The third keeps changing.

The third is most important to me, you see.
What color do you think music is?
When you see the sun
Do you think of power
And creation and destruction
Or do you think of skin cancer?
When you eat
Can you feel your taste buds celebrating?

Basically, do you notice important things?
Do you see what some people don't care about?
Because I care.
And your catalog can't be finished
Until I know.

I stand in awe.
In awestruck-awe.
I see no flaws.
Even with my faith I see no flaws.
overwhelmed.
Crazy, mad, impossible, some would have said if they knew just a bite-size of your grace oh God.
How I stand in the middle of your radar.
As the waves and frequencies of your grace surrounds me.
The only fear I would have is that it would be too overwhelming for me to take in.
When the devil says you don't love me.
Remind me to see the horizon.
An endless, endless, endless, stretch of grace.
As my sin increased, your grace increased...all the more.
Because it's endless I would not be able to wrap my head around it and make sense of it.
Only to make sense, something that is so profound, and absolutely indescribable. Even the word 'indescribable' alone won't fit it.
Let alone your grace, how about your love. Your mercy. Your power. Your majesty.
Endless.
Endless catalogs and memoirs of what you have done for me.
Never a remembrance because they aren't dead. No.
When anxiety comes, God, remind me of your word. Your promises.

Ocean of grace.
Not yet, have I seen your face.
I wait till that day, just push me at your own pace, and carry me closer and closer to your face, as I slowly fade....
away.

Head a hostile environment again
Emotion overthrows intelligence
Fragile skull accepts another beating
and indecency becomes preference

Absorbing black into gray matter
Meticulous infiltration;
Makes death a desire
and living a fear

Friendly fire
Mind battles disease, disease
obliterates mind to violence
collided with sharpened corners of myself
****** mess, wrong message

Swallowing hostile heavy medications,
contain my elation so that overjoy
doesn't morph into mania, or joy
Mass of electrons now inside
find nothing positive; thought paralyzed

Deviating cells that scare themselves
from the darkened sanguinary state.
wide eyed faces searching for a homeostasis
Far from stable since demon's rule

Constant epiphanies with no execution
turn to facts filed in brain catalogs
Fully aware solutions are there,
but the drawers are glued shut

~kb

I the indiscriminate
feel strangely tired with in the eyes  
they fill up corners of my vision with Zz's
and catalog hours as moments at rest.

i wonder
how we managed
to convince our hands
not to hold onto each other
when we said goodbye.

now, i'm writing
inside this flying can;
thinking this might be the closest
to a home.

these small seats,
with even smaller legs space.
these funny-shaped windows,
where all you can see are
white clouds,
and sporadically
some lights.
tiny houses,
with even tinier people.

and us,
tiny giants,
reading overpriced perfume catalogs,
listening to mispronounced english,
using disposable low-fidelity headphones,
inside low-light low-love low-cost
low-everything
airplanes.

Tell me, are you a library, full of stories?
Are you a collection of fiction and fact that no arms could contain or no minds that could grasp?
I look into your eyes and I get a glimpse of the catalogs and genres which you keep within you.
You must have had your fair share of history; that is one textbook I want to study and memorize by heart.
Do you think I can be the one to take care of you?
I want to keep you a classic and as a monument in this era of advancing technology.
I will clear the dusty parts of your heart and wipe the slippery surface of your crying face.
I will caress every page you own and help restore the words you've been trying to preserve.
I may not be the one who found you first but I will be the one to stay by your side, until the day either of us crumbles.
So let me check your books out and let me return to you so very often.
Let me call you my favorite place and my second home.

I am here and it is the day after.
I lift a pile of unread mail off of a chair and open the blinds,
And watch the sun boil the dust in the air. I set and I take it in.

The room smells of old corsets and perfumed talcum powder.
An antique Lady Schick Consolette hair dryer
Hides partly obscured under the heavy frame of the carved mahogany bed
Along with stacks of magazines and catalogs and…………
God knows what else lurks there.

And I realize that I am the only one now lurking,
Looking into a room that had been forbidden to me
The soul domain of the lady of the house.

But she in not here to make things tidy for this impromptu visit.
She would be so shamed by my eyes taking this all in,
Her secrets, her pills, her special candies, her oils, her perfumes -
All of the alchemical accruements of femininity in jars and tiny boxes.

And the symbols of her wizardry, her diamond encrusted Eastern Star ring,
Pendants, broaches, earrings, necklaces, bobbles, bracelets, clasps, loose pearls-
From a strand I broke long ago during happier days.

The sun dust boils from this cauldron now,
This stuffy, over stuffed chamber of perfume and chocolate,
Of daybeds and special treatments, laxatives, gels, powered and pills.
I dream…..a can of gas and a match would be a fitting end

And then I see it on the dresser, an old photo of a family, a pretend family
And a face is cut out of it, his face…….and so I feel, for a moment
Her pain and see the world has she may have seen it. So be it.  It is done.

The woman body is designed for my desires.
No matter the shape/
Let her be.
If her rolls unfold /
then her rolls I'll hold.
If she sees a tenth of her beauty than I'll see twenty.
My point...she must understand that she is one of a kind.
True Beauty can't be measured by the masses who follow catalogs .
True beauty is simple with intangible flaws.
If you really love her start with her toes....slowly .
Let her teeth sink in her lips as she waits...patiently.
Work your way up and pull her in closely ...munch.
Taste the fruit and let the juice run wild...lunch.

Where Eagles Soar

Fade not light the rear of night’s blackness so dims all the beauty that light gives and surrounds us so
Placed to draw and because the effects of appreciation we spill out of homes seek the wild in natures

Trails the dappled sun dances on the leaves oh how tension it does relieve we without exception do
Blend into Each shade drenched undergrowth there moods do their best broods to reign in our thoughts

to give  
A halt to measures sometimes this act can increase even enhance experience you zero in instead of
Allowing the mind to disperse in all directions but to define to outline the loveliness of form particulars

Separated for detail and the penetrating gaze these moments are catalogs of special meaning as they
Collect and permeate the soul wonder lastly invades broken and bruised affected areas mellowness will

Surge through the entire being the spirit soars unexpectedly richness moves in like the mist all division
Is harnessed now it becomes a benevolent power that can be driven either great distances or to the

Heights of splendor there you lay down the thoughts that war and allow peace to transcend all
Difficulties only victors hold the heights by clouds and windy delights see and know as the eagle shows

Vistas expanses that ridicule limitations go ahead and soar you’re only touching how your future will be
In company of angels that will no longer be hidden from the royal family now your birthright is known to

All from the golden crown to the righteous robe with the royal crest a coat of arms that bears the word
Mercy depicted through a crown of thorns not dripping with blood but that are blooming with the Rose

Of Sharon with the earth as the background shinning in the brightest light

Remember the days when our shoes were stolen by the earth.
  And false Truths could only be read
   On purple stained Popsicle sticks.

When we were willingly kidnapped by the
antihero's of our Fantasy.
   And Stockholm Syndrome devoured us whole.

When false prophets graffitied their wisdom onto bathroom stalls.
   While we washed our religions down the sink.
   And our purpose along with it.

When the letters of every books pages flowed into us
   Like a torrenting river we struggled to make sense of
   But reinvented us all the same.

When we didn't believe a friends last words
    Could be spoken through a mouth in the neck.
    And the whisper we'd hear would fall victim to our failing memories.

When we met the loves our lives everyday of the passing decade.
    How our hearts shattered into countless parts.
    Yet we loved through the pieces of it all the same.

Perhaps these recollections have faded.
Perhaps they still reside here.
Or are mixed in with catalogs of fiction,
So that we can learn to make sense of all these things.

Hello happy hour!
I see you're now reduced
to fifteen minutes of
soft drinks and
smiling depression:
simper and wine.
check that...Sprite.

But I'll drink to
nagging doubt anyway.

Cars are now a kick.
Who knew gridlock
could offer such joyride:
the drive home each day
my ******* sabbatical.

I wrote 3 letters the other day
(the handwritten, paper kind)
and feel a little
like Jane Austen.
I think she'd like Dr. Pepper,
but not Mr. Pibb.
Too foppish.

Then there's this:
the wax and wane
of life between the bed
and the couch.
There's six degrees
of separation
through the five layers
of this reusable face mask.

Speaking of masks:
"one for the money,
two for the show,
three to make ready
and four to go."

And somehow I know
I will never breathe it in
that way again.

Random curtain calls:
I'm so starved for someone
to talk to; the mail lady
had me at "hello."
I offered her a soda.
Mail order catalogs are king.
The Saturday Night Special
from the burglar alarm brochure
was my final good buy.

When the body falls and lands into the dirt
Would you care to guess which one hurts?
The bullet that killed him, or the scars that bled
Ignoring your feelings in these words you read
If you were to write upon his tombstone
"The boy who always felt so alone"
Would you point and laugh, Caring not to cry?
Or try to act cool, and tell your friends a lie?
As you continue to build a persona of a facade
Which is created through media and catalogs
A kid sells his should to his very blade
Hoping to escape the images you made
But when its too late and you think you're brave
You search for this kid that's lost in the cave
The kid that's to far gone to be saved
The same kid you pushed into his grave.

You hold my hips as we listen to Kaskade
I'm never going to know the exact name of the song, darling
I rest my head on your shoulder
Exactly 72 hours or more after we met
Smiling serenely at each other, trance-like
Our bodies swaying to some invisible beat residing in our heads

We never do watch that Minions movie in Dunellen
We do eat cold leftovers of Chinese takeout
Retrieve them from the mini fridge in the hotel room
Congealed chicken and broccoli and your beef dish
We eat cold slices of Margarita pizza from the first night
Shared an Italian dessert with two spoons and one glass and thought nothing of it
Talked of your ex as if you'd driven out to see me for months instead of just that one time
Smell **** in the hotel hallway when we come back from our escapades
Joke that maybe we could ask the other patrons two rooms down for “a sample.”

The room becomes a home
We domesticate ourselves
Trap our secrets and nightly admissions in the thin walls
Share a toothbrush
I model for you in your old boxers
You grip my hips and kiss tortured minds out of our systems
On the first night, you fumble for me in the darkness
We had *** hours before
I'd only had one pair of clothing
I was high on hypomania
You were lonely and desperate and enamored with the idea of me
I heard your voice in the pitch black of the room
Disembodied, floating, pining

“Taylor...? Are you awake?”
“Yes,” I answer back, stifling a yawn
Demons crawled along the surface of your bronze skin
I could feel them too
They were always there, slinking into the corners of every room
Perching on the windowsill, furtively glancing at us
Unseen, invisible, unknown, silent stalkers

You ask me about loneliness
You speak about your worries for an “us” not even a week
After your Facebook friend request
“I don't know if we'll work out in a relationship,” you say
I watch you with my large brown eyes, inquisitive
Bite my lip, taste the salt of you on my bottom one
Taste your skin and spit on me

Hours before you'd clasped my leg, it, laying on your shoulder
You pounding, feral, all wild animal, sweat on your brow
Grunting quietly, watching me, looking at nothing and everything at once
You **** me until I'm completely dry and sore
Lament that you want to be inside me still, that it *****
I think, oh how it does
We took off our glasses to blindly ***** at each other in the darkness
You'd said you liked how it sharpened the senses
I was a repeating rainstorm, endless, Summer showers in the bedroom
Hot, sticky, palpable
You taste saltwater, briny, sea, inside of me

“I don't know if we'll work out together
When we do go back and if we do end up together
It'll be disastrous,” you fortune-tell
I bite my tongue, taste salt and pennies in my mouth
I swallow it down wordlessly
Hours later, you're back in PA
I message you on Facebook, my heart in my mouth
I want to ***** with the amount of anxiety,
Tremulous in my fingers, humming in my blood
Throbbing, alive, achingly


“I don't intend to fall for people usually...
But I've fallen for you
I don't think I can keep talking to you like this
I'm usually scared of falling for people,” I write
You reply without any trepidation
Some strange confidence and Siren call beckoning you
Some spellbound hook curling around your fingers
“I'm emotionally invested in you too
Look, I understand
But I enjoyed my time with you
Let's at least be friends
It's not easy for me to shake someone off.”

Two months later you tell me, after messaging me at 10am
To see how I was doing
That when your room mate was wildly ******* his girlfriend you thought of me
“Most days I think of you.
You're in my daydreams
I come home and I wish you were here
That I could come home from work and you'd be there waiting for me.”

I try to scratch you out of my head, now
It hurts too much
I told you I was in love, I tried to deny it but now it's more apparent
I message you and get silence in response
Talk to someone else
Have ******* with another man
Purge it out of my system
Stick my fingers in the back of my throat
Try to puke. Nothing. Dry heave.
Encourage him to see me and then I encourage him not to
I lose about five pounds

I think about you and your stupid dog and cat
I think about you and the daydreams
I think about you and other women
How you'd **** them
How you'd take them out to dinner and hold their hands
Rub their fingers with your thumb
How you might be

Your hands
Your soft breath
The bright gleaming eyes
That strong German jawline
That fleeting mood,
Upswing and downswing
Your insistent arrogance
The hot tongue on my hardened ******
You suckling
Dark heat emanating from your wet and warm mouth
******* me on the couch
Clasping to each other
Burying our heads in each others' necks
Slow rocking back and forth
Rhythmic
Our shirts still on, your jeans half-way pulled down
You entering in such haste and hunger
The board game forgotten on the table
Laughter muffled by your feverishly kissing me
Did you love...? Did you?

I think about the physicality
But then I think of the late night conversations I'll never get back
Your sleepy “hello” at 1 in the morning
Philosophical musings I never tell my friends that we had
Us, talking about literally nothing in the beginning
The lingerie site we subscribed to
Looking through catalogs of what you'd see me in
You saying you could buy me something to model for you
The *** chairs we looked at, furniture to purchase
Odd daydreams of a coupling that almost-was but never-was

I think about you holding me even though you're so unused to it
The smell of baking banana bread
That inner battle in your head when you saw me the second time
That sadness
That loneliness
Your... “don't forget to come back.”
Cologne on your medical scrubs
How I didn't want to let go
How I wanted to stay
God, how I wanted to stay and just do better
The kiss and then...I wonder if there was a lie in your mouth
No, I don't think so
Was it my fault to fall?
No, I don't think so
Was it yours?
No...I don't think--

so many tables  
stacked with catalogs
and coffee cups
our long discussions  
cluttered  with memories  
and
relatives
long renting spaces
underground
potential plans made
like  guest beds in our minds  
favorite tv shows
devouring  our  
afternoons and evenings
together  
dotted  with  
occasional power
struggles
minds at odds
a generational
dissonance
the  backdrop  
for  the need
to leave  the nest
again
freedom I sought
and liberty
was gained
now
flash forward
less than a decade
later
and you
are wrapped
  in a mere
flesh shell of existence
no longer engaged
in this world
with anything
but breath  
and  discomfort
thankful
for tender mercies
am I
  for you
still remember me
for
now

I'm from hate and discontent,
from words so caustic that they burn after 35, 40, 45, 50 years.
I'm from nowhere and everywhere,
I'm from nine schools and fourteen houses.

I'm from "You'll make new friends,"
and "Quit crying, we didn't live there that long."
To the KFC Christmas and "They're too old for a tree anyway."

I'm from slammed doors, and curse words and silent treatments.
I'm from high expectations, icy glares, straight A's, and disappointment.
I'm from 800 miles of claustrophobic silence in the family car and 18 years with no vacations.

AND

I'm from lazy days at the family farm
and hard-*** work a few years later.
I'm from rides on the tractor with Grandpa,
and watching the illegal sabong... with the sheriff.

I'm from Uncle Martin and Mary Lou,
and the tiny apartment with the swimming pool.
I'm from the mean man in number 9 screaming at us to be quiet
and Uncle Martin telling him to, "Shut the Hell Up!"

I'm from David and Richard, my cousins, my brothers
I'm from poison oak adventures at the creek
and countless days at the beach

AND

I'm from Gentile and Jew,
From Asian and White,
From Catholic and ****.

I'm from St. Patrick's, the old church.
I'm from stained glass and wooden kneelers,
incense, and Latin Mass.
I'm from Ego te absolvo and Dominus Vobiscum

I'm from tradition and sanctity,
dignity and peace.

I'm from Hellfire and Brimstone
Screaming, Bible pounding preachermen who are slain in the Spirit,
babble in tongues, and exhort the congregation to be "Washed in the Blood of the Lamb".

AND

I'm from love and loss,
and love again

I'm from Lisa, and Donna, and Carole,
the girls who were far too pretty to have been my friends (but were)
I'm from Jaki who wrote me letters letters every two days
and sometimes more,
and Laurie
and Kelly.

I'm from Cardinal and Gold
from Conquest and Traveler,
from the dorm and the Row.

I'm from 90,000 screaming idiots,
I'm from Greek Week and road trips,
and long nights in the reference section.
I'm from typewriters, card catalogs, and white out.

AND

I'm from gritty men and terrible places.
I'm from peace, and war, and peace, and war again.
And peace - with war thundering in the distance.

I'm from the cold wet ground on cold wet nights,
and I'm from blisters upon blisters; blood and water.

I'm from the Blacksheep, the Alphabots, and the Ranger Creed.
I'm from the M-249, the 203, and the A-2.
I'm from Colt, not Beretta; that's the M-1911,
and I'm proudly from jungle fatigues and black berets.

AND

I'm from a fateful encounter on a random night
an order of pizza and beer that would change our lives
Days together and weeks apart
Time didn't matter
She'd captured my heart.

I'm from loyalty and faith,
Trust and honor.
I'm from a small ceremony,
nothing to big or too fancy,
and groomsmen carrying guns, pagers, and foreign passports.

I'm from odd jobs and uncertainty and graduate school
I'm from UPS and PKP, and Summa *** Laude,
MISD, WM, and the birth of Anthony.

I'm from safety patrol and tug-of-war,
Accelerated math, now Maria's born.

I'm from the Blonde Mafia, the Bumblebees,
the Shopping Girls, and the Ubermensch.
From 14, and F, and back to 14, and 15.
Principals Emerson, Anthony, Blix, and Mellish.

AND

I'm from the Middle School
and teaching only math until
I'm teaching math and tech until
I'm teaching math and tech and study skills until
I'm teaching tech and study skills and more tech until
I'm teaching tech and study skills and media and Spanish until
I'm teaching tech, tech, tech, media, and Spanish with
Principals Miller and Budzius and Lucas and Stone

I'm from the animé girls and the theater crew
From the gamers and poets and dreamers
From the introverts and hackers, autistic kids and slackers
I'm from the kids who don't fit anywhere....
Neatly

(To be continued)

Everything I own in my home
Came from mail order catalogs
From the authentic Star Trek front door knocker
To the Lavender bear rug in the hall

Some may say I'm a nerd
Truth be known I just don't like shopping at the mall
The selection in this weeks issue is outrageously sweet
Place your order fast, do not stall

Just name your collection they come complete
Darth Vader bean bags, plus Yoda sheets
Only Mail order can you find a Chartreuse scarf
In the store they tried to sell me yellow, it just made me ****

And with Finger Hut having daily specials
From hot air balloons for hamsters to Jacuzzi fish bowls
There's no need to question my answer
Just mark it all down as sold

With UPS and FedEx these days knocking down my door
I barely have time to open up my mail order score
As piles and piles of boxes are taking over my rooms
I pull out the latest magazine and place my order for June

Microdosing mushrooms and brandy  
Pots and pans to bang
Walking round gallery’s and show rooms
You say no I say dang
I’m whacked out and bleeding garlic
I stank like frat boy boat shoe
You look disheveled and I love it
I unoriginally ask about your tattoo

You know I really want to *******
I want you to take me home
Don’t want you to see my apartment
Don’t want you to see my zone
Living in ***** laundry and unopened letters
Allstate  insurance and catalogs
When’s the last time I took the trash out
When’s the last time I walked the dog

You ask me if it’s *******
I say no it’s ketamine
You ask me if you can try it
You ask me if it’s clean
I say baby there ain’t nothing better
It’s the bees knees and the bugaloo
Just stay away from the edge now deary
Or I’ll have to go fishing for you

in the car
sat next to my mother
sweating along to the country songs on the radio
my toenails scrape against the bottoms of my shoes
as i scuff the them against the worn carpeting
the car smells like very berry hibiscus
and black coffee that reminds me
of a place before they were gone

at the cemetery
it feels wrong to be alive
and i make sure not to step
directly onto the headstones
because the horror movies always warn
me of hands coming up through the dirt

but i can’t
help but to think of how nice
it would be to be held by my great grama
one last time
even if i got dirt in my eyes
it would be nice to see her again

i’m sorry that
i didn’t go near her coffin
i remember his funeral too
though i don’t know how many years ago
it happened to be
i cried the hardest
and i remember at her funeral
how my mom and sister were talking about how
proud they were that neither of them cried
like i did
and i felt small and weak and childish
but also
painfully human

i find that
it is easier to think of the cemetery
as more of a library for the dead
because most of them are as old
as the dewey decimal system
and i’m just pawing through the card catalogs
looking for a hand to hold

your parents are
under the c category
c for classen
c for caring
c for compassion
c for clarity
c for cherished memories
c for come back

=====================
I love my beautiful craftsman's brain
Wisdom helps my ignorance to drain

I love my head of thick black hair
Enjoying the sun and moon in chair

I love myself regularly day and night
Diamond in my eyes makes life bright

I love my golden musical voice
Rejoice in melodious song of choice

I love my soft elastic muscular heart
Stretches my true plan action to start

I love my abundance of delicate stomach
Digests everything without pain and ache

I love my masculine energy and fertility
Which gives me desired family of ability

I love my healthy sturdy body the whole
Which helps me achieve worldly goal

I love my whole self better than a dog
Enjoying all catalogs in summer and fog

I promise to love my soul an eternal embrace
So that I can love you all with just and grace

I love myself so I can love the whole world
The whole world is precious oceanic pearled

Written by
~~~Jawahar Gupta~~~

Delayed reaction
Bitterweet one-note transaction
Turn a blind eye
Voice it in a lie
From compulsive catalogs
Gift-wrapped by mythomaniac hands
Mixing false theories
With hour-glass sands
Because everyone can
And everyone will
Believe the scientific rulebook
And how the high heavens, they shook
So long as it looks pretty
And speaks in a foreign accent
Join hands in singing the praises
Calculating our own descent
Passively uninvolved?
Problem solved...

We birth a thousand
destined broken things:

chair legs detach from their seats under  
the weighted repetition of sitting cloth

itself threadbare from
the rubbing of muscle.

We glue together the
blue China fallen in grief.

The silver nails of the crib are
reserved for our rusty coffins.

We mend the holes
of our tattered souls.

We reattach old soap specks to new
and shape them into a bath ark.

The fallen pecans and apples are
hoarded for the sweetest pies to be.

The broken necks of pollards
make our most savory stock.

The new rug turned ***** is beaten
until dust flies like stars.

We shut the curtains in the
afternoon to cool the room.

Mothers iron, singing in their reverie,
folding neatly, stacking all on the chair.

They listen for the passing mail car
so they can mark the new catalogs

with the dreams of their families
cruising to a distant, distant  land.

Everything under our houses is just
the dust of every housecleaning before,

the joy of  parents knowing their children
will move out and be blessed

to reach their Jesus year and know
the sanctity of resurrected dust.

Now I’m brunching
on weekends
Painting black bird wings
On my face
My hair spirals
Spirals
Spirals
Like my fear of the space
Between the face in the mirror
And the women in the catalogs
And yes
Yes
I’m getting closer now
To that ideal
I scribbled in ink
On notebook paper
When there were
Fewer lines on my face
I wait in lines
For the train
Wearing stilettos
Growing up tastes like
Black coffee and
Owning four mascaras
That all look the same
On my face
I take your hand
We look like
Your American dream

Texas billboards wound my eyes
Every mile apart
They lure the cars on 35
To burgers and gas marts

But as I stretch my vision down
The line of road ahead
They're nullified when soon I spy
A mass of flower beds

They aren't the kind that Granny's find
And plant from catalogs
Always a disappointment when
They bear no fruit at all

No these are weaved among the weeds
Along the roadside ditch
They're wildflowers consisting of
Milk thistle perched by finch

Their purple orbs tall ornaments
Protruding, taking cue
From all the yellow yarrow that
Contrasts with robin blue

That's crowded thick among the mix
Craving all the attention
The blue bonnets that sit like hats
On stems that aren't worth mention

And like the bush 'twas burning on
The mountain of Sinai
The paintbrush named for Indians
With their head dresses thrive!

And as my mind reflects upon
This flower popping power
I never even notice that
The drive lasted for hours

Written by Sara Fielder © May 2013

Soon Sears will be history
J.C. Penney is all but spent.
Even mighty Hudson Bay
Sells their building and pays rent.

Here at Macy's flagship store
Friday was black indeed.
They couldn't process payments
at close to normal speed.

Jeff Bezos is a billionaire.
Brown boxes flood the mail
Clicks beat Bricks is the news at six
Is it lights out for retail?

He started out by selling books;
lost cash on every sale.
Barnes and Noble bled a ghostly white.
His competitors turned tail.

Competition is the rule
All change comes through disruption.
As catalogs give way to clicks
some stores need extreme unction.

hallways,
fluorescent lights
the faint scent
of
latex gloves and
sheer nightgowns.
you stand there,
slowly breathing
in rhythm with
the ticking
clock.
he holds your hand,
the very touch
the transfer of
warmth
between your fingers.
you feel,
somewhat relieved
like if this were meant
to
simply
happen
you were glad
he was there.

didn't you always want this?
to be swaddled with
twinkling toes
and miniature socks?
was it not you
who felt the movement
and prayed for the unexpected?

the results aren't
even the hardest
part.
it is the waiting,
the absorbing
the acceptance
the denial,
it is the
in-between
yet also
the after.

as the blood
swims through
the plastic tube,
the liquified
decision
right there
in crimson red,
waiting to tell,
wanting to whisper
"your life may change,"
you look through
memories,
moments,
like catalogs
in magazines.

what happens next?
no one knows,
except the specimen
painted
masqueraded
in crimson red.

Gauging the stability
         of minds that fit not into the
Bell Curves or catalogs of symptomatic Checklists in Diagnostic books bound
                         By blood......

Tuna sandwiches on white bread
Carried in a paper bag
Josh Groban on the CD player
Season Three of 2 broke Girls
Matching shoes and purses
Vacation in the Pocanos
Subscription to People Magazine
Pennies in a piggy bank
Silver-beige 4-door Accord
A little college but no degree
Always ten pounds overweight
Celebration meal at Sizzler
Artificial Christmas tree pre-lit
A mole that wants removing
Off white walls, pale green carpet
Outfits from mail order catalogs
Paydays with no yearly bonus
Jeopardy and Wheel of fortune
Polyester perm press everything
Bic Stik ball point pen
Swanson's TV dinner
Flip phone with no camera
*** two times a week and Sunday
Writing verse nobody reads
                   ljm

Sometimes poems are so full of themselves,
loaded up on words and story,

with their "likes" and their "as"
to connect the most dissimilar things
     to denote clever

with their superior pinkys
erecting into the air

before prose ever made its
way into the catalogs of dialogue,

their indistinguishable punctuation
and schizophrenic indentation,

and the greatest of them all
never knowing when to stop,

sometimes deciding to merge into
the next book as you decide to
put them down.

She is the supreme vocal bible,
a vivid volume of vast sounds
amplifying into harmonizing
highs, hypnotic flights,
smooth sultry vibes so mesmerizing,
so deep and wide-ranging,
a lyrical genius full of fascinating
beats and rhymes, sleek crystal-clear
skies and clouds, glowing galaxies
revolving within her realm.
Her brown-skinned enchantment
a serene sensation to the world,
a captivating imagination
of dazzling depictions, sweet
horizons and blossoming flowers,
perfumed plantations rising
to the occasion.  She is a whole
universe of spectacular songs,
brilliant catalogs extending beyond
infinity.  A bursting beauty
named Brandy aka Moesha,
a gleaming actress, a movie
star, a stunning songwriter,
so classic and timeless,
a flawless public figure
full of swag and style,
intellect and artistic inventions,
breathtaking compositions,
a masterpiece of art that
will always be monumental
and legendary.

James Joyce had smelling salts and ***** tins tucked in his Dramamine
and just off the coast of his swarthy daggers, lay all the pirates of bright minds
clumped in a sponge of all the orange that an insipid grin
could forge into a cufflink at today’s prices -
and still bargain.
Frumpy catalogs of myriad departures, woven into leathery air… dark portals and cucumber sandwiches; savoring an afternoon of incomplete theorems
At High Tea, at odds -
with Low Tide…
but consensual by default
Like a lamb in a spider’s web
when all flies are ghosts
of Veal.