Night beckons to strange people.
Actually, if you can accept this premise,
then the mind makes everyone strange.
And still yet, there is something specific about darkness,
I cannot put my finger on it,
that sends odd sparks of real life
on a mission to city street corners.

I hide in my car after leaving the café
with the hope of seeing, "The Pigtailed Man."
This isn't his name.
However, I need say no more to any stranger
for him to envision my character.
We objectify him and his image becomes clear
even when spotted in narrowed alleyway darkness.

He has a beautiful wife
with locks past her shoulder
of auburn and lillies,
and two wonderfully bright children
who sit on his knee when listening
to nighty-night, bedtime stories.
Their ringing laughter illuminates
the darkest corners of their happy home.
They'll never know why he needs
to go bye-bye at dangerous evening hours,
hunting sour scowls from passers-by.

He's unkempt: legs unshaven, chin covered
by midnight shadow, beer belly hanging over his
plaid picnic-basket red schoolgirl skirt,
and his face sags as if a topical novocaine
was applied generously to his chubby, rosy cheeks.
Upon seeing his aimless strut
and dead-to-self eyes, I wonder: Where does he dress?
Does he put his outfit on from plastic grocery bag
around the block from the lamp-lit looks of
the neighbors' friendly daytime greetings?
More importantly, if I were friend
and was to catch him in the act,
would I say anything?

Darkness calls out the most intriguing creatures.
We're afraid to call them "human beings,"
because being human most certainly
does not look like this.
Or, does it not look like this?
Shadows claw walls around all
because not one body projects light.
There are some who know, and some who appease.
The pigtails hang to his knees as he stares
at the mannequins of pretty women
in the window of the closed department store.

I want to tell you I could love you.
I could make you happy.
I could make you fall apart on the
bedroom floor,
helplessly and desperately proclaiming
that our love was more
than the nights of
raised arms and oceans of threatening depths.

But fifteen is an age when all of this
is just a dream,
a cliff where the jump is even more
dangerous than everyone says it to be.
Fifteen is the age when I believe,
that my hands have grown rough enough
to take yours
and maturity and age
have always been our similarity.
But fifteen is just another name for
"You're too young."

I cannot promise you that a wedding ring
would worth more than
the freedom to love the women
of taller heights and wider hips
for their lipstick is much darker
than the lip balm I use to
smoothen the dried skin.

For I do not know what it is like
to slide the glass between my fingers
and to taste the golden bubbles
freeze my teeth.

I do not know how to light a cigarette
or how to inhale the scent and death of rebellion.
I do not know how to let the ashes fall
unto the tray without burning my skin
and dirtying my nails.

I do not know how to make you want me,
how to dress and turn my curves
into mountains you wish to explore.
I do not know how to turn my tongue
into a weapon much deadlier
than the wind.
I do not know how to make you
feel beautiful.

So with all of the worlds streets, corners and
dimly lit bars,
I am nothing but a little pigtailed girl
with a lollipop in one hand and a poorly written
love note in the other.
And there you are,
as tall and as handsome as I've always seen
you as
with no time to look down,
only straight ahead.

But I guess, thats okay.
The heels would never have fit me anyway.

You're droopin' now like a sad balloon
cast down from Heaven
Your tail's dragging on the ground
- the one you escaped so long before -
and now you're down, down, down

You remember floatin' in the sky
watchin' little people as they all walked by
busy with themselves and their teeny-tiny lives
Now they're bigger than you and you don't know why
you can't fly, fly, fly

The wrinkles in your face are deep
As you sag closer to the ground
You're sure it's the end and say your prayers to
the Helium Gods and the party favor stores
when a li'l pigtailed girl picks you up and yells,
"Look what I found, found, found!"

And then you know it ain't how high ya float
that really matters in your life
Despite your droopin' and saggin' you don't
got no naggin' 'cause this kid's gonna love you
'til you die, die, die

*pop

Dear daughter,
Let me introduce myself.
Whether you call me your friend, your confidante
Or you call me a **** and crazy,
I am your mother,
Your Ma, your mom, your momma, your mommy,
Your Mother.
I will be your faithful guide, friend, companion.
I Will be your first teacher and your last.
Sometimes I will be in front of your saying “Nice try! But try again.”
Or I may be beside you unsure of the same answer as you.
But sometimes I will follow behind you, learning from you along the way.
Remember the good times
And the bad, and be scared of your feelings
Because fear is an emotion too.
When you become lost, never let the wonders leave your eyes,
Even though you may wander.
But in your wandering, your small hands could touch nations,
If only you would let them.
Just believe the world has magic in it,
Because the moments of small silence give way
To their own kind of bewitchment.
Sing loud and proud like no one is watching…
And if you can’t, Happy Birthday works just as well.
Look for the glow worms, my child,
The baby fireflies,
Because they are a rare creature indeed
And can only be seen at the darkest of times,
Just like the stars.
Let your eyes be like fireflies and your steps like a prance
Because nothing attracts men like a bright girl who can dance.
So move your way closer to me
Because there is a pigtailed shaped hole in my heart
For the little girl that you will always be to me.
Live as many lives as possible and explore several worlds,
But always follow the banana bread crumbs back home by nightfall
Because nothing good ever happens after eleven…
Unless you are making a wish.
And if you are, load every 11:11 wish with a prayer
And aim it towards the sky.
Send a letter to the stars to make room for one more
Because someday you will shine,
But on your way to the top,
Tread lightly, my child,
And don’t wake the beasts
Because they exist
Trust me, I know.
Even when you are grown and have daughters of your own
Think back to me and remember.
Love,
Your Mother

a thick fog of hyperventilated breath, microwaved dinners, and nail polish remover separates into two halves as my mother breaks through my bedroom
the creaking of the door always, without fail, pierces directly through my ears and into the part of my brain that knows how to be kind and pleasant

no mother, i didn't hear about the wreck on 288 today
no, i don't know if i can go grocery shopping tomorrow
no, i don't ******* care to be a part of this family

every picture of a sad-looking, round-faced, blonde pigtailed child in any photo album collecting dust on a shelf in my house has "victim" written underneath like a description of a particularly memorable event, photographed to document such a milestone
i never caught any fish
i never won a trophy
there was so much empty space

mother, i could've been a ballerina
i would have enjoyed learning an instrument
mother, i wish none of this happened either

i suppose you can't ask why someone is upset when their house burns down because they left an open flame too close to the curtain
it doesn't matter why everything you own has turned to ash, it just matters
when every birthday cake for every year seems like a post card from the future saying "wish you were here" it feels good to blow out the candles

yes mother, i am the curtains of the family
no, i don't want to be

Head smacked
With an abrupt thwack.
Nose aggressively shoved in the corner;
Followed by the crazed rant
Of an old school rhymer;
Unaware their current act....chant....
in the Future be court docket tabled....
Labled...
And designated a "child abuse" crime:
Breaking news at prime time

"How dare you speak to me?
Didn't your mother...
Or father teach you proper manners?
Look here, look listen! Directly into my eyes see!
So... I may know you understand clearly.
Little girls (and boys) are to be 'seen and not heard.'
You disrespectful ****."

" thwackity thwack"
A hard double hit reverberates  
(Emotionally terminates)
As a forceful chalked blue
Cue
Smacks...
Cracks...
The backside of the child's red
Pigtailed Head
(Thrusting it forward in an eight ball call shot
Designated for the left corner wall slot).

Nose banking the wall with a hard ******.
Dripping blood
(In full crimson flood),
Invading her mouth with copper waste
(Mixed in with the salty taste
Of tears falling in silent haste).
Destined to dry with a tinge of rust
and crust.

Followed by a loss of parental guidance trust.

Daring not a single peep--
In weep.
The child covers her bloodied mouth
(With trembling hands)--
Muffling emotional cries at an alarming rate--
(In a fearful state),
Dreading a forced follow foul stroke:
That a single sound could provoke.

Contemplating her prelection:
In extreme sudation.

She wondered why her mother....
Father..
Encouraged her ranting chatter
And told her that all questions matter?

Didn't they know that bubbly banter...
Chatter...
Would cause her
Disciplinary stature
(Possible nose fracture)
And a guaranteed position in the corner
(Under the care of an old timing
Rhyming....
Bitter....
Head splitting
Sitter)?
Marie Moldovan ©️ 2021

Dear old friend,
Remember that little pig tailed girl?
Dressed in pink...
Only to think
She's sitting in her room right now
With her pigtails ruined
Makeup smeared
Crying because your not here
Ever since you left
She's been so depressed
Hoping one day soon
She'll take her last breathe

She's gotten so good at hiding her pain
No one even notices
She knows she's the blame
Her new best friend doesn't know
But only because she never showed
The scars on her skin in fear of people leaving
When really
It gets them grieving
And they know your in need of saving
She doesn't want to be weak anymore
Because one day the cops will be knocking at her parents door
With a note
written on it
"I wasn't worth it"

They think it's all an act
It's been hell since you were gone
And maybe she'll be soon gone too
With you
Dear best friend,
I was never worth it
I'm that little pigtailed girl and people just lost focus...

I

That twitch in the schoolgirl’s eye
Isn’t caused by snowy mountains.
There’s Guildhall in her twisted lip.

II

I was of three minds.
Greta Thunberg took all of them
And cloaked them in a yellow hood.

III

A small part of the pantomime was never Greta’s style.
She has miles to go before she lets us sleep.

IV

Of the things schoolgirls hate
The sun is not among them.
The blackbird’s wings and the oil fields of Manitoba
Are one.

V

I do not know which to prefer,
The thought that they might one day bring out
Greta Thunberg bobbleheads
Or the fact that bobbleheads exist at all,
The fact that we’re ******
Or the fact that we’re enjoying it.

VI

An indecipherable cause.

VII

O pigtailed teens of Stockholm,
Please remember
What Wallace Stevens said
About birds of golden feathers
And of black.  

VIII

What is involved in what I know?
Like Socrates, I don’t know.
But it’s more than 99.9 per cent
Of climate scientists could ever dream
And less than a signpost
To the wrong city in the snow.

IX

When Greta sailed two weeks to New York
She was in a circle of close friends.
I bet they ate tinned kippers
And had those sweets the Swedish love.  

X

To cry out sharply is what we do
If we are lucky enough to cry.
And so I have more compassion
For Greta than you know.  
Some women have no time.
Their children dying
Takes up the best portion of the day.

XI

I can’t remember the part of the campaign trail
He rode over to tell a waiting crowd
How the size of his equipage
Compared to his small hands.
There are good reasons why Greta hates his guts.
This is not the best of them.

XII

The river is full of plastic.
The thermometer must be rising.

XIII

It is snowing
And it is going to snow.

it takes me about 2 hours to drink a bottle of wine
in the form of kalimotxo by myself...
2 hours while i watch a bat fly around
chasing moth tapas...
2 hours from around 9pm through to 11pm...
before i finally relax and open a second
bottle... if i push it through to 2am
and wake up at 9am... well... problem solved...
whatever the "problem" might me...
an irksome memory most probably...
a past girlfriend... Siberian... hardly any
Mongol ethnicity in her...
but still all the more crazy...
apartment in St. Petersburg etc. etc.
the best *** i ever had...
until... the best *** i ever had was
with a Turkish *******...
so... that chapter is sort of done...
hang-up from the age of 21... now that i'm
35...
well... sort of wow... 14 years...
not bad...
                but i can at least find relief in not
being ****-hurt about not getting any...
on a spectrum:
the alpha the beta and... mr omega man...
how i'd love to own a dog...
but taking it to a public place to ****
and then have to bag that **** and dispose
of it... and i've seen them!
those dog-walkers...
even in the advent of facemasks and hand-sanitizers...
did the dog walkers use hand-sanitizers picking
up that hot-dog-of-a-****?
no... sure... it's through plastic:
double-sure Irish revelations concerning
the ******...
put it's one thing sticking your whittle itch'ard
into a mouth of floral batters and
oyster digestive juices...
and picking up a dog's hot loaf...

oh sure... for the love of looking into
a dog's eyes and seeing all
that b.d.s.m. playing out...
                   i suppose dogs are great when
growing up...
but once you age...
you find miracles in little things
like... your cat deciding: no...
i'll take a **** in the neighbour's garden...
am i to... arm it with a c.c.t.v. camera
so i might know... where he... did the deed?

rain of pigeon ****...
if Warsaw is a city known for the happiness
of pigeons and parking-meters...
i guess London already knew about that...

- because all the world is filled with
a grift for defocusing narratives...
because: you can never experience thinking within
the confines of a unifying narrative...
a narrative of focus...
from the many: unto none...
or... from the one: to the few...
that's why i better believe
the astronauts of text, memes...
the advertisers... because... poets are paid
peanut while "journalists" are
being paid: a wage-gap...

on a Saturday... on  Sunday...
taking the knee: it's absurd... since you're not
taking both of them...
like one might at a Catholic mass...
but beside that...
some reverse psychology at work:
"taking the knee"...
   em... didn't Derek Chauvin take the knee?
you're taking the knee?
i'm taking the knee...
here's my knee-cap...
you're taking the knee?
Derek Chauvin took the knee...
apparently he "took the knee"
to the point of... suffocating a man...
hell! let's all take the knee:
let's take too!

how about i lie face down and imitate
crucifixion: how about not ******* off
some ethnic **** - because all
the white english girls are hell-bent of proving
us wigs perfumed: pampered in
baby-powder as being anti-racist:

racial equality? hmm...
i'd love to see it in two instances...
on a 100m sprint event
at the Olympics...
and... also at the Olympics...
at a 100m sprint event in the pool...
i'd love to see a white man win the 100m sprint...
perhaps i'd also love to see a black man
swim... just swim...
for all the racism in h'america:
no wonder: if you band-up together
and call yourself african-american:
but you have no idea what
Zulu warlord sold your for:
clearly a fair-game of exchange of goods:
a TRADE...
it's not like these... David physique European
wimp lords managed to chase and
chain the Goliaths of Africa...
i look at them now...
walking freely in the prospects of Europe
and think to myself: how the ****?!

don't give me that **** that a limp biscuit
cuck armed with some iron pebbles
and some fire ***** shot from a rifle
could overcome...
a zealot barbarian wielding a tomahawk...
if half of the african-americans knew
their heritage:
if you'd identity me as Russian i'd take
offence...
some Arab pushing me Quran
on Edgware Rd thinking i'm German
while having a mulatto indian-anglo-saxon-celtic
girlfriend... i don't mind...
mistake me for a Serb...
hell... mistake me for a Dane...
but don't mistake me for a ******* Russian
or a(n) Ukrainian...
we might all be white...
but i'm pretty sure money dries up pretty soon...
what... Maurice... no... it wasn't Maurice...
Malcolm X... no... i'm pretty sure
it wasn't him...
oh you know... pan-Africanism...
like pan-Slavism was a thing...
Marcus Garvey...

       exodus back to Africa... like hell the Jamaicans
were going to give up Jamaica... ha... ha ha...
slavery in Russia and just nibbling on some
vantage point of the east:
it must feel... satisfying to known that
a foreign entity might have enslaved
"you"... beside the people of shared heritage...
what with whatever serfdom was...
hardly a matter for deciphering
cobbler professionalism...
a man as limb: limb the extension of
some other's peruse of... unforgivable pleasures...

i still make a killer of a mango curry...
thanks for the recipe...
i'll see you in New Delhi... perhaps... never...
i have to: come at "it" full throttle...
it's an agitating prospect seeing
zombie-esque drone partying up slogan
chatterers...
i'd be willing to break my jaw...
and my nose... just to hear them shut up...
i'll sooner **** on a kidney bean
seed and watch Jack imitate Jacob's ladder
than... whatever is left with: that than...

no wonder... the 2nd bottle of wine will be drunk
in under 2 hours... i'll fully lubricated...
relaxed enough to spew...
if only race was as fluid as ethnicity is
absent in the case of Brazil...
or for that matter...
all of south america: with the exception of
Argentina i suppose...
why? hiding ageing Nazis...
it's not like Joseph Mengele ever faced a firing
squad...  or hanging...
well... what he did face was...
having a brain haemorrhage while
taking a dip in a swimming pool...
i guess you might call that: double-drowning...
the gods really invested themselves
in that death...

oh i can imagine the.... breaking of the bones
while still revelling in doing
a puppet show... as the ****** drowned...
he'll be dearly remembered... just for that...
my "tale" is hardly tall...
but... if you haven't been involved:
the currency of duping manhood
with a pharmacological cocktail of...
chemo-soup: to match up to the brain
being all fat and: the proteins are ****** at...
only and only at the proper release point
of invitation: via Alzheimer's...
that's when brain tows... muscle! ugh!
killer proteins that solidify liquid fat
of oil into: curd-esque cheese clusters...
wonderful ingenuity... who might need
a ******* insect parasite...

why not turn to dieting?
women diet a lot...
i don't know: well: i do...
i rather burn off the calories than hide them...
women can diet all they want...
i tried it once...
out of sympathy for the cult she joined...
i lasted for about 12 hours...
it was already too much that
i drank my coffee black without
any sugar...
give me the ******* plough!
let me exhort and exalt the body...
i don't need to diet: to feel this creeping sensation
of a thousand non-existence "things"
nibbling at my fat reserves...

it's bad enough already: than seeing this pan-African
movement and...
it's like me visiting Kenya: visiting the macaques
feeding them sachets of sugar and tea
trying to escape the sun:
feeding the shade on a balcony wasn't enough:
some Muhammad with a crocodile farm
while his daughter: clad in a niqab swimsuit...
sure... "racial equality":
me... porky skinned:
in the full glare of equatorial sun...
i'm hoping for a rash...
come the night and the ivory beauties...
with skin as molten coffee mingling with
chocolate... buttered up...
smoking marijuana... i can only imagine
the brothels of Mombasa...

race is one thing: ethnicity: another...
but then again:
i'm pretty sure the african-americans
in their "congregation" of southern-Baptists
can't tell a hammer from a sickle
from a ******* horseshoe when it comes
to the ancient disparities between...
Nigerians and Kenyans...
just like whites are supposed to...
call me a ******* Russian one more time...
German? eh... the historical relevance of
the Wends... i won't mind...

the Hebrews... oddly enough: they're not a race...
they're an ethnicity...
you can mistake an 'ebrew for a European...
or a Mediterranean olive skinned:
somehow pseud-Greek... somehow pseudo-Roman:
st. Augustine.. Tunisian in disguise?
the race of the Baltic Sea people...
tell them they're all expected to eat
Baltic sushi: or raw-herring in a creamy dill sauce!

the world came knocking at my door...
my peace... mein nacht...
2 hours spent drinking a bottle of wine in comfort
with the wind caressing the tree...
like my hands weaving the nakedness of a *******'s
body... each groove where the flesh and muscle
"weakened": where the bones were left:
exposed... at the knees...
at the elbows... the collar-bone...

someone of a continental persuasion will tell you:
don't guillotine the head
of the beer...
in England you're expected to be cheated
when drinking a pint without a beer's head...
the foam...
i too want the beer's head moustache...
unless you're drinking Guinness...

if all these african-h'americans had a quencch
of "thrist" knowing they were...
said X... or said Y...
money is worth as much as tomorrow allows...
to spend it: rather than invest with...
personally i'd like to know the name
of the warlord that traded our limbs
for the precious stones...
then again: it's not like picking cotton
was anything akin to mining coal...
so... what?

now all this propaganda by the:
i hate them... they're ha-ite...
why why... urban liberal anti-racists...
i hate anti-racists... they have no knowledge
of metaphors... or for descriptive language
to begin with: their knowledge of physiognomy is
half-wit short of Picasso's impressions
of how: Africans see their faces
without the use of mirrors...
how they see themselves in masks...

to hell with your ******* "ally": too!
i'm looking at the most degenerate of my supposed:
degenerate of the specimen...
such... classy... high primed:
individuation: quotients...

- who hurt you? oh babe... who hurt you?!
- baby... i think i hurt myself...
years later i noticed she was still hung-up
on that one morbid swan of the highest kept
expectation: widow Zeus...
at Loch Lomond...
thank god for that Turkish *******:
she finally gave me an inkling into
how to tell apart: limp from limb...
toe from tongue...
i wouldn't want some... pigtailed
imitation schoolgirl dream, either...

give me the proper *****: the armchair...
the respectable: glass of wine that i might sip
and there would be... rivers of it... working their way
into my beard and down my neck... onto my chest...
give me... the thirst never to be quenched!
cheap romance novels for girls...
newly knighted phantoms compensated with:
***-mad dogs readied to be relieved of
being broke by: a leash of
sacrificial mundanity!

ask a girl twice... Thai: not a "surprise": an authentic Thai
bride... so no ****-in-a-lacklustre...
what the colour of my eyes were...
this is still biology class...
in high-school... that's before i shunned a tonne
of weight...
she didn't guess... grey? blue...
oddly enough: they're still grizzly... GREEN...

- as i write this... from a consensus agreement:
the ****-boys can have all their
shifting harem-caurosel all they want:
and eager have...
you have to cycle a while to spot all
the flavours of solipsism:
the empowered women alone in their cars
singing along to songs no one
wants to hear: my heart overflows to drift
into a quasi-sympathy... for a millisecond...
before i'm reminded of something
by a shadow cast by a a tree...

i want to return to a grave that's best
pleasing the colour of my Iris...
the world keeps knocking at my door...
however real or however metaphorical...
i'm not answering...
it's all... pretty much... custard...
thick splodges of it ruining the concern i have
for pin-pointing the knife
at the focal posits
of where to best insert a knife:
since... simply shooting myself
in the head with a shotgun is generally
agreed upon at, as:
a ******* bad idea...

     i wouldn't dare... or even convene myself
to later somehow, bother...
**** the ethno-masochism of english girls...
not that i am in any ways "welcome"...
if they're going through that:
**** a black guy phase...
  thank god i don't earn enough
to keep one "happy"...
thank god for a many a great a number of "things"...
Turkic women: who's hair as black as it is...
raven black teasing blue...
blooming blue teasing at...

i'm heading to a "somewhere" from where
the Mongolian breath arrived at: arrived at to begin
it's.... original migration and: receding culminated with...
i don't need these blonde anglo-saxon wash-ups of
mythology... to hell with Helen!
last time i heard: she only fakes not enjoying what
later: becomes apparent...
i'm not saying she's implicitly gagging for it...
but she she's not...

she's not exactly toying with the ascetics...
she's having *** as an aesthetic...
she's always having more fun:
even in the process...
she's mediating the third-person voyeurism
more than the person she is having ******* with...
it's hardly a person by then... piston works?!
piston works... ergo: piston works!

i can't compete with her already achieved experience...
i could only come around finding...
someone more experienced:
a nymphomaniac *******:
someone who could spell it out to ne
directly: i would be taking the back-seat....
i'd have my arms amputated when
she performed her oyster-*******-trick,,,

coming in at £2 per minute...
oh sure... hear me bemoan all the injustices of
the trade... when... there are some....
on only-fans... not filling to touch!
i squint my eyes...
i squint my eyes even more...
i'm left with ******* a lemon...

                 what?

[the poet tries to convince herself she’s not time traveling in her sleep]

there is no time dilation in dreams. if that breaks your heart, i’m sorry. (LaBerge, 1986)./ mood ring in the shape of a man gives me a gun./ a clock watching time does weird things. the other clock (Einstein, 1907)./ outside they’re celebrating moonlessness, and i don’t know enough about time travel. i do know one thing about time travel: we’re way too big, man. we gotta get smaller. there would be a door. maybe even a bunch of doors. but i do mean small. god of dust dreams of dust. moteish./ savage garden of the mind… but the body!... the mind…? the body…? (Descartes, ?)./ i don’t even drive this car. i have lightning in a bottle. spaced out techno jelly. a brain. anyway, god is not me and i am not my body. two clowns, one car. no steering wheel./ my friends, let us think, again, about God. (Leibniz, 1714.)/ clowns? no, clocks. and how big

really, can the mind be?

[diptychs]

i
deer headed
hand puppet
licks
a bellybutton

ii
the bear takes
a picture of
me sleeping
with my thumb
in my mouth
and shares it
with his friends

-

i
when did you stop saying
you
in your poems
when
did you start

ii
if it seems like i was gone it’s because i was
not from the field
not from the pilot
neither of which
i thought were real

-

i
god says
go with grace
but i haven’t
put my makeup
on

ii
the universe
drops her joke
like a skirt

[untitled]

god
i was so
art to the
nth degree

so neon

starved
but so

able to hunt.

chewtoy
bubblegum

for some
chosen

tooth
mouth
tongue.

i’m here from the future to say nothing has changed.

[untitled]

i ride the thigh of a
tinman

all slow like there is
music

but there's not the sun

**** yellow on this
cracked

earth

-

the lion is

fierce
in its fantasy. we

have found
an excess of corn

and i
am an artist

-

we have the same shoe size

me
and that pigtailed girl  same

sort
of freak storm

do you think she looks sad

-

won't write about the scare
crow

think i took something from
him