Health teacher
blindly reading off the slides
of a powerpoint.
"Don't Have *** Kids!"
"Pregnancy"
"STD's"
"Abstinence"
Perhaps if they took a break
from the negativity.
Perhaps if they stood back
and realized that
gasp
preaching abstinence isn't the solution.
The only reason for the
"Pregnancy"
"STD's"
is that they don't teach us
how to practice *** safely.
They make no mention of
Condoms
Diaphragms
Pills
They tell you over and over again
that if you have ***
there will be children
there will be ***
there will be ******.
They make no mention of anything
other than the cis straight white vanilla ***
they leave the *******
off of all the diagrams of vaginas
out of fear that maybe a woman could
gasp
******!
Preposterous!
They preach victim blaming.
They tell the girls
to stay sober
to never put your drink down
long pants
turtlenecks
Instead of teaching the boys
to keep their erections in their pants.
to treat women like humans
that no means no
she is not an object
she did not "deserve it"
she didn't owe you anything.
Ignorance isn't bliss
and Abstinence isn't safety.

Yes,
I threw your champagne glass at the wall.
Yes, the door did hit me on my way out.
I know you did it because you know my secret.
You know why I wear those turtlenecks.
You knew how I scorned humanity,
And the good name of anthropology,
Psychology, and physiognomy,
You could tell I didn't think the lake was so beautiful,
Because I was the only one who notices the algae.
The only one who noticed the pollution from the Victorian chimney,
And the only one who didn't just see you in your reflection,
But your volatile doppelgänger.

Father, Son, Mechanic…
Man, I’ve wanted to talk to you – really talk to you – for some time now.
to see your face in front of me, instead of dangling from necklaces,
or hanging, melancholy, over sexless couples’ beds.

I’ve spent a lot of time reading all that stuff you wrote (supposedly),
and I’ve enjoyed it, Man, I have.
but I keep wanting it to be a letter, when in the end it’s just
a bipartisan explanation – an engineer’s guide to
building a pretty vehicle around a faulty engine.

I always see you, arms spread,
sprawled across the older bitter-america’s steering wheel.
my mama would tease me, saying you’d want me to help some day.
but you and your cronies drove me like a beat-down El Camino,
joyfully taking me through wrong turns and bumpy streets
waiting for my chassis to split.
and once I ran out of gas to offer, you refused to touch me at all,
letting me rot in your cobweb garage.

and all those ******* in turtlenecks and polos popped,
they’ve gleefully branded your logo on their chemical biceps
and gaily explain how close you were.
how they knew you like no one else did,
how you guys didn’t have a connection, but a relationship.
people should only let their mechanics touch their cars, though,
and keep their innards free of oily fingers.

to be honest, I don’t think I’ll be coming back to this establishment again.
it’s a little too clean for my taste, and your prices are way to high
especially when all you get is a little peace of mind and a sense of humbled grandeur.
don’t worry about the car, though – you can keep it.
you’ve sort of spoiled all its good intentions,
so I’ll be buying a new one sometime soon.
I guess I’ll be taking a taxi.
No, actually.
I’ll hitchhike home.

It was 3 degrees outside
She wore a purple fuzzy headband that seemed to cover her entire head
Her large and puffy grey coat went to her knees
A grey turtleneck underneath
And those clunky duck boots
While everyone else smiled at the weekend at 3 on a Friday
She looked confused
I could only imagine what she was thinking about

It was 58 degrees outside
The headband gone
She has blonde hair that’s up in a ponytail more often than it isn’t
The coat is gone but the turtleneck is still there
It’s striped this time
She still wears the duck boots since the snow is melting away
And there are puddles with every step
She’s smiling and laughing on the phone
Trying to explain directions
I can only imagine who she’s talking to

I can see it
I can see my future in the way her hair is flipping back and forth as she walks
I can see my future in the way her face lights up when she laughs
I can see my future in the way she curls her hands into her sleeves
I can see my future in how she tries to avoid a puddle but then steps into a deeper one
I can see my future in the way that puddle ripples around her
I can see my future in the way the melting snow seems to glimmer when she passes it

I learned she got the headband for free once
When she spent too much money at her favorite store
Her grey coat is a family company she’s obviously loyal to
The grey turtleneck is from the place she got the headband from
Obviously, she tells me with an eye roll and a laugh
The duck boots keep her feet dry, even if they’re not very warm
She looked confused because she was leaving economics, her hardest class
She had just learned a new concept that all of her classmates understood
But for some reason, she couldn’t wrap her head around it

She likes that her hair is blonde
But knows it’ll turn brown one day, like her mom
So she gets highlights put in, knowing it won’t help, but hopes anyway
She’s always wearing turtlenecks because she’s always cold
It’s from the same store as the other one
Obviously
The duck boots are her favorite and her feet like them too much to wear other shoes
She’ll never admit it
But she steps in the deeper puddles on purpose because she likes how they splash
She was on the phone with her friend from high school
Directing her to the lot to park in
She’s staying over this weekend

I was right when I said my future was in her
It’s in the hair
The jacket
The turtlenecks
The headband
The boots
The confused look
The happy one
The eye roll
The laugh
The puddles
The snow
My future is her

Los and Lettes,
the horrorcore fans,
the post-******* brats,
the goths,
the stoners,
the metalheads,
Phish fans with no regrets,
To Les Claypool high on toadstool, Reggaeton  block party vets,
To the cigarette carrying beatniks,
Hipsters in turtlenecks,
Fashionable Teens wearing fashionable things,
Armani and Diamond rings,
Business men in formal attire,
Old folks about to expire,
gospel musicians getting higher and higher.
***** alley banter bands, who find their lyrics at the bottom of cans.

At that I had lost my rhyme scheme knowledge dropped on every scene to which i thought i was superior.

Nothing said in so many lines, fines paid for literary crimes.
Like fines levied for a lost library book.

& There she was
the subtle reflection without a mirror
quiet
kept
reserved
strong
my soul sister
with words to offer me
that once choked my esteem
silencing the bull horn full of my insecurities
you are enough
you always have been
you always will be
& the second I tried to question the truth
it spilled out and over me like rushing water
cleansing me of the layers
piled up
from years of laying underneath potential
I can breathe here
above expectations
amongst my faith
I know that life is worth living here
I know because I've felt the air thin
Like rustling paper in a silent classroom
I've been too embarrassed to be seen
too unsure to be viewed
but you
my sister
you ignited the fight in me
stretched my smile  
like turtlenecks over the heads of school age children
more protection then fashion statement
I remember now
That my words pulled the same tears
from my face
from the eyes of strangers
trying not to be seen
in crowds across the world
sitting
while I stood on stage
& stripped myself of all the ill feelings
all the dark nights
and bright moments
short lived
I will never forget why I chose love
why I can't settle for less
than
more
then
a reason to live
I don't know you
yet I'm familiar with me
I, you, we... &
S.H.E

you are everything
you are everyone
you are every cliche
you are the sun,
you are the stifling heat
that cannot be escaped
you are valentines cards
misdirected and misshaped,
you are hotmail,
you are myspace,
you are my face,
hungover and exhausted,
you are lost kids,
you are something that was fun,
you are not getting shotgun,
you are beer
that's been in the sun
too long,
you are a sad song,
that's not been made better,
you are the hole in my sweater,
or my pockets,
you are the chalky sugar that's
passed off as rockets,
you are the first drummer of the beatles,
you are evil,
and i don't mean that jokingly,
you are choking me,
like turtlenecks,
or high stake bets,
made on the wrong team,
you are what seems like
a good idea at the time,
you are past tense,
you are jeans caught in the fence
preventing teens from sneaking in,
you are cold wind on a dry winter's day,
you are Coldplay's last two albums,
you are too much talcum powder
you are convenience store flowers,
you are forced,
you are hoarse
voices in place of song,
you are wrong,
you are the weakest link,
you are outdated references,
you are beverages,
that have lost carbonation,
you are hesitation
that leads to regret,
you are the new york mets,
you are first impressions
that i make on the elderly,
you are Beverly Hills Chihuahua,
you are foie gras,
you are aqua
and their music in my head,
you are cold beds,
warm beer,
empty freezers,
old tears,
fake appeasers,
new fears,
you are the moments
when it feels like no one's near,
you are searching for Waldo for hours,
you are any buildings "bigger" than the cn tower,
you are fake,
you are first date awkward silence,
you are last date awkward silence,
you are violence,
you are hybrid suvs,
you are bees,
you are black flies,
you are forgetting an event is black tie,
you are something nice to forget,
you are socks that are wet,
you are the slow driver in the left lane,
you are fame,
you are fleeting seconds
never to be recaptured,
you are the man on the corner
screaming about rapture,
you are actors selling out,
you are stains on a couch,
you are lost remotes,
you are failed attempts to save face,
you are everything
that has ever graced
this time and space,
here and above,
you are everything,
you are love...

aix, beck's, becks, blech's, checks, cheques, czechs, dec's, decks, dex, eckes, eques, ex, fecks, flecks, flex, heck's, hex, jex, kecks, lecce, lex, meckes, mex, necks, nex, next, peck's, pecks, plex, rex, sheck's, shek's, specks, specs, sphex, tech's, techs, teck's, tex, treks, vex, whelks, wrecks, x, x. amex, ampex, annex, apec's, apex, armtek's, avtex, aztecs, berlex, caltex, cemex, centex, cmx, comex, complex, comtrex, convex, crownx, defex, dissects, duplex, effects, ejects, entex, execs, expects, eyetech's, fanech's, fedex, finex, gatx, gtech's, inmex, intex, latex, memtec's, metex, natec's, nobec's, nymex, nynex, objects, onex, opec's, paychecks, paychex, pemex, perplex, pewex, playtex, portec's, projects, qintex, quebec's, railtex, rednecks, reflects, rejects, respects, roughnecks, scitex, simplex, starplex, steinbeck's, subjects, suspects, syntex, telex, telmex, tenrecs, timeplex, tridex, trintex, triplex, truex, vertex, visx, wall-tex, wedtech's, westtech's adaptec's, ametek's, atx, banamex, between decks, biotechs, bottlenecks, cineplex, cybersex, cytotechs, datarex, discotheques, equitex, eurochecks, gendrisek's, genentech's, govpx, hyponex, intellects, intersects, kaisertech's, malcolm x, medarex, mediplex, megaplex, memorex, methanex, metroplex, middlesex, multidex, multiplex, neorx, oraflex, pillowtex, prentnieks, rolodex, stratoflex, superx, symantec's, teleflex, turtlenecks, unisex, ventritex adaptaplex, ameritech's, audiotex, begonia rex, ****** simplex, solar apex, videotex, tyrannosaurus rex, regression of y on x

We were suckleberry sonnets
Crabapple tree climbers
Little girls in pink frills
With fire drills in our heads
from our mother's
They told us
"don't let a boy touch you"
We were rockets aimed for the moon
We always came a little too short
I always thought it was just me

Part of me always knew
I always knew it couldn't be right
I was nine
I wanted a boy to teach me things,
things my father never could
He was fourteen, I'd known him all my life
I liked his trampoline
But his hands
I ******* hated his hands
They tugged and pulled at me during hide and seek

He whispered
"Stop crying"
(I was always asking for it)
He could see it when I smiled
I guarded my smile like I guarded his secret
My nine year old mind didn't want it anymore

I wanted him less than I wanted to erase it
Erase the things he'd planted so mischievously
I was an empty nine year old casket
I rode my bike like a hurst
I wore my turtleneck like a bulletproof vest
I thought he couldn't hurt me there

I was an angry sailor without a single burst of wind
A single burst of freedom
It's all I wanted
all I ever needed
I needed someone to free my from the grips of the Devil
I prayed to my mother's God
He didn't answer for two years

I thought he would free me like the night
I thought he would let go like a never ending story
But he's always been a part of my story
My suckleberry sonnet
my first love
my broken mother
all my nightmares
Thanks, *******.

I don't let him ruin me anymore
He doesn't own me like he used to
He no longer steers my so easily swayed ship
He's just a piece
(A *******, of course)
But only a small piece of me
I ride my bike like it's a steed now
I don't wear turtlenecks
I don't own a bulletproof vest
He's gone
I'm still here

It is ok to be
not
what you are
still
becoming. She said
"you're not special." Grinding teeth and sodden rails. My car is exhausted--
downwind, held in the air like branches of birches and pines
humming with each blatant engine-stroke
which fall onto that bleakening
icedock and curl-- culled passengers tossed to sea;
unavoidably
sharp veer left, beyond surreptitious and frantic spectators
and through a once-pearl snowdrift straying into my mind.
M
C
M
L
V
Turtlenecks can't keep us warm and soup can't clear my throat.
I choke on
sliced rubber, seatbelts cut halfway-- from
Spring. pluck us like cattails
amongst my marshy solubles.
Exposes my larynx she-- ubiquitous sonnet spews forth.
What contrite aberration, wears Kalapodi temple dress
made of rose petals blown in beneath love's column
and presses with her thighs my vision?
There is nothing more to say-- meals served
raw on Winter holidays. Steaming
spoonfuls dried up on her palate--
Special in the way I left you there.
Special in being the same as I should have been.
And I, no-- I!
I can not talk any longer! The clouds I thought to taste
won't allow me to
rain
be-- once dangling from the ceiling, my dripping prevented
with a pale, cotton daub.
You see
the paramedics
even as they sheath my torso
and hold your head with thorped sieves:
The driver steered his vessel wrong
an action which robbed his passenger's breath.

Dusk of the decade.
Dynamics alternate.
Collective consciousness
On the threshold of change.
A movement had happened.
It was to stay.
That way.
Assumed wrongly.
Permanancy is chalk.
Duster enough to erase.
Decade of contradictions
Revolution leads to war.
Mirror view image.
Evidence of change..
The Seventies became.
Aurora like a thousand searchlights.
Whipping across the sky.
Pulling out all stops to Kingdom come
To stop the atrocities in Vietnam.
Neil and Buzz.
Aboard the Apollo eleven ,
Small step was humility,
Giant leap for humanity.
Bob and Carl,
At the Post.
Navigated by *******.
Investigate Watergate
All the President's men
Final days for Nixon's reign.
Beat Generation, Flower Power ,hippie movement or Counterculture.
Christened by Jack Kerouac and Allen Ginsberg.
Capsuled the mood in the air.
Ken Kesey and the Grateful Dead
Acid Trips taken on a Bus.
Experimental tour on
Music and drugs.
Civil Rights and Dr King
Another battle about the skin.
Won the Nobel.
Proving everyone is equal.
Wars, Marches ,Protests.
Illustrated in bedrooms.
Live television was the boom
Horrors of War ,seen by all.
Casualties of  War Were in every room.
Rock Music explosion.
Nexus with the counterculture generation.
Talents aligned
Bands formed
Music into existence.
Legends born.
Myths created.
Millions gathered
Traditions established
Parables designed
Life altered
Generations affected.
effect felt , effortlessly.
Captivating? fascinating? entrancing? hypnotic?
Words can't describe.
wasted words .
Demiurges  divinity diminished dramatically.
Drastically devoid.
Haight and Ashbury.
Cradle of Counterculture.
Intersection of both.
Became the Cross
worshipped upon
Beatnik a fish out of water.
Took to the crossing like a fish to water.
Contradiction in words
Unity in Society
Gathered in entirety
For the Summer of love.
Civil rights and Vietnam War.
Gay rights and Nuclear War.
Women Power and Human Sexuality.
Sub Cultures and Anti Authoritarian.
Bohemian and Mind Bending drugs
Ikigai for Millions
I'm the Greatest the world has ever seen.
Heavyweight champion and king of the ring.
Rumble in the jungle
Thrilla in Manilla
Foreman and Frazier
Bout after bout
Showed  the world what Ali was about.
Many are called ,few are chosen .
Scandinavian Teenager
Tennis' first rock star
Grass or Clay
Dominated the play
Resembled Chirist
Bjorn Borg was a delight
Raised by women to conquer men
Jimmy Connors became a legend
Winning titles was a cinch
Played 5 generations and 2 decades without a flinch.
Longevity laudable
Point or Life
The offer he made.
Battle of the sexes
The Great Billie Jean king.
Gave the women's movement a zing
Grasping at the straws,
Bobby Riggs the competitor
Remained a spectator
Astrodome witnessed a milestone
Billie beat Bobby
Three sets to none
Quality questioned
Answer given
Inferior no woman
King remained Queen.

Cinema of the 70 s
Greatest ever made
Censorship boundaries blurred
Artistic expression blossomed
Studio system failed
Television boomed
Auteurs and Polymaths
Actors and Superstars
Collaborated .
Symbiosis enriched
Individual and Team. Delighted Disciples  Demanded  .
Studios responded
Classics  in order
One equal to the other
Talent made them timeless
Quality gave them immortality
Excellence brought Endurance.
Warner Brothers and Warren Beatty.
Bonnie and Clyde .
Canadian Premiere.
Jumping off point.
Films that altered lives.
These films have no death
Proved Montreal as holy as Nazareth.
Fashion was about expression.
Androgynous looks
Reigned supreme.
Wearing Tee Shirts and Levi's Strauss Jeans.
Bold and Daring was the theme
Stand out and Fit in
Principle behind the dressing.
Turtlenecks
Heeled boots,  braided belts , Corduroy pants.
Long collared shirts  leisure suits and flowing scarves.
The 70 s was more about costume than clothing.
Hairstyles and Sunglasses
Unique in itself.
Retro and relevant
Stylish and current
Smart and trending
In and out.

***
a word so bad
it didn’t even need
four letters

they told us
to wait for
our future husbands
to treat the boys we
dated as if they
belonged to someone else

that if we wouldn’t do it
with our parents in the room
it wasn’t okay
to do at all

that there was
some kind of higher
spirituality achieved
by celibates and singles
but of course that
couldn’t be for everyone
(as if needing human
companionship made you weak)

******* would send
you to hell and
of course the gays were
already there

that our virginity was the most
important part of ourselves
and losing it before due time
was the worst thing we could do
but all would be better
if we said we were sorry
swore never
to do it again

there were contracts
pledges, oaths
and jewelry
if you didn’t have
a ring you weren’t
doing it right

purity
virginity
words thrown around like
hand grenades into foxholes
as insurance policy against
pregnancy and stds

a barrage against the
onslaught of our culture
morality reduced to making
guys and girls sit on
different sides of the room
and debates in the mirror
over the length of skirts
and scoop of necklines

for something we weren’t
supposed to do
they sure made us think
about it an awful lot

meanwhile
back home in our own
bedrooms all the songs
on our radios and
the movies on our tvs
told us a very different story

somewhere along the line
i got so confused i
convinced myself i never
wanted *** at all
when i finally felt
desire stirring
in the pit of my stomach
it was terrifying

i thought since i
had never felt it
that made me immune
but it really just made me
in deep
deep denial

a denial that persisted
through late evenings
of exploring another
person’s body
learning to trust someone
with my own

they told us until we said
i do
there was no reason
to believe anything would last

and some nights i can’t sleep
with worrying about
some inevitable burning and
collapse of the building called us

i feel my parents’ gazes boring
right through my chest and
hope they never find out
what i’ve been doing

turtlenecks to cover the stain
of love notes on my neck
having something on
my body to hide
takes me back to being fifteen
and the judgement of strangers
a dead weight in my stomach
and sweaters past my palms

but the feeling of your lips
and hands and breath
in my ear and for a few minutes
i don’t care that tomorrow
i’ll be trying to forget
that i’m not as pure
as they once told me
i would stay

but i am no longer
in denial
only suffocating
in guilt

She sits there
And writes
Her heart out,
True emotion
In her pen
Leaking
In the ink,
Like the blood
She bleeds
When she cuts
Deep into the pain,
Adrenaline rushing
Sudden and longing
Like her love
For him,
Burning beneath
Her seemingly
Calm exterior
The boiling point
Is reaching critical,
It cannot be contained
Under long sleeves
And turtlenecks,
Welcome the breeze
Sweet embrace
Pen in her mouth
Imagination
Molding clay dreams
Into her reality,
Her eyes beckon
His lips to hers
Melding into one
Interlocking souls;
Ditch the key...
© okpoet

i guess I just don't understand
how she can hold your hand
and never have to wear long
sleeves or turtlenecks.
maybe to her you aren't a thunderstorm.
maybe it just hurts to know that i never deserved
the calm before the storm.
i'm jealous of her shorts and t-shirts,
i can never look at her without searching
for bruises and crossed fingers.

was it just that I never deserved
to feel your breath against
my neck without your hand
digging into my wrist,
leaving marks of your lack
of tenderness in the same shade
as violets;
i always tried to find beauty in you.

i'm sorry that i could never be enough

Turtlenecks are insufficient for walks on  dunes
as are gifted sandals without enough Dubbin
but I am gazing at your familial wrist, longing on a soothe song,
trying not to imagine a life without you
possessing your smile
with uncharted goals.

I sit on my sectional, a witness
to those vulnerable beings
pulling at scarves,
yanking at gloves
clutching at down jackets
I find great entertainment by this.

They have waited until November
When I have resided in frost
since last October
All       year       long
I held onto turtlenecks of impulsive irony
I bore
thirteen layers exactly
of self pride
I wore gloves religiously
that were knitted out of masochism
and egocentrism
And I drank from cups of hot cocoa
brimmed with whipped irony
during the month of June
I was far to eager

Now these glorious beings
surround me
clinging to warmth and long john material,
sitting closest to the hearth

All I can do is laugh

I searched for a shell
in June
I decorated a tree of longing
in May
I reached for a fringing
frolicking
frock
in July
that would
:gasp:
keep me warm

Fahrenheit resided in
pelvic bone
fingerprints
desperado
and seduction

None of it warmed my bones.

superficiality in my bones
in my thighs
in my smiles and hidden lies
a double ghost, I lost my flesh
somewhere in the unsuspected mess-
Wait a second, don't go yet
I'll lure you in with my black turtleneck
Black Turtlenecks and Kanken Backpacks,
Oxford shoes, Casio watches
Can't you see I'm too cool to forget
I'll carry around this 800 page novel that I haven't even finished 1/10th of
I'll risk the weight to carry on my show
If you haven't deducted quite yet
This is my artwork I'll force down your throat-
A walking masterpiece printed of the internet.

By Ron Koertge

Give up sitting dutifully at your desk. Leave
your house or apartment. Go out into the world.

It's all right to carry a notebook but a cheap
one is best, with pages the color of weak tea
and on the front a kitten or a space ship.

Avoid any enclosed space where more than
three people are wearing turtlenecks. Beware
any snow-covered chalet with deer tracks
across the muffled tennis courts.

Not surprisingly, libraries are a good place to write.
And the perfect place in a library is near an aisle
where a child a year or two old is playing as his
mother browses the ranks of the dead.

Often he will pull books from the bottom shelf.
The title, the author's name, the brooding photo
on the flap mean nothing. Red book on black, gray
book on brown, he builds a tower. And the higher
it gets, the wider he grins.

You who asked for advice, listen: When the tower
falls, be like that child. Laugh so loud everybody
in the world frowns and says, "Shhhh."

Then start again.

from Fever, 2006
Red Hen Press

your papa's got a a camcorder and wants to save some memories but nothing's going on.

the neighbors took the good cartoons from blockbuster so you grab a stick instead.

under this infinite sky you recite the lies from the next grade up. at least jenny speaks to jesus but you still don't like to be alone with the burden of her damage.

a squirrel just tried to talk to you and you pretend to understand. will the day ever come when you finally get what everyone pretends to know?

this is that moment you second guess the hole you'd dig to china.

and now your neck itches.

I used to cry myself to sleep
Used to lay there with endless scary dreams
Used to wonder why it happened
Had I done something wrong?

Now I laugh
I laugh at your name
I laugh at the idea of you having control
But I still hurt.

You know longer have a grip on my life
A hand on my shoulder leading me in every wrong direction
I no longer let you win
But still I’m angry

I grimace at a raised hand
Remembering how you hit me.
I shake at a loud voice
Remembering how you would cuss

I can’t wear turtlenecks or button my shirt to the top
Since they remind me of your hands caving in on my neck
I feel as though I’m choking just by the touch of the cloth
It enrages me to allow this but my mind doesn’t give me permission to ignore it.

I’m still hurt
However not by you
I refuse to let you hurt me anymore
Only by the painful memories my mind will not delete from it’s camera roll

I’m still angered
Not by your actions
But from allowing myself to trust someone like you
For going to your house, to laugh and talk

However, the only one talking was you
As you demanded me to do everything to please you
I would beg no and you would grip my neck until my face turned blue
Gasping for air I reluctantly did as I was told, what more could I do?

I don’t allow myself to trust anymore
I don’t let anyone get close
No matter how much I think I know them, do I really?
I don’t allow myself to feel, because that’s the scariest part

Going numb, like how I felt after you completely took advantage of me
Hiding every emotion because crying doesn’t solve anything
Blocking out all sense of feelings because if I don’t have them I can’t be hurt
Making sure I never look weak, like an easy target.

See you hurt me, but you aren’t hurting me
You broke me, but you aren’t breaking me
I’ll be okay
I’m fine

I don’t think I’ve ever told a bigger lie

Girl, you write like Kerouac
Yet, you lack that style
That flow, that sounds
Like the written form
Of bebop

You lack an age of change,
Of beatnecks in turtlenecks
Of hipsters, coming up from
The shallow depths of hell
To preach the underground

Tell me, where is your voice?
Who is your audience?
Or do you intend to read
Aloud, to a mirror’s reflection?
To an imaginary crowd?
With cooing sounds of affection?

Hot ****, Vanity strikes
Even the unknown,
All you need is a pen in hand
Some ink on paper, ******
Or half-decent, or merely alright
And you’re a god

Stop.

Think.

That era is dead.

When my skin itches
from the inside,
I take it off
and fold it into a hidden drawer
that I've wrapped in spellbound chains
and encrypted two-factor locks.

You'll still see me,
painted with eye-liner and hair dye,
walking in business suits and saris,
turtlenecks and bikinis,
and never know
these costumes
hang
on
bare spirit.

When one has a rough few weeks
She thinks about reverting to old ways
Peeling away the wallpaper she plastered herself in
Ripping open a scab made yesterday, over yesterday
Her world seems to be ripping apart
She can’t change a thing without thinking about it
How easy would it be?
She could go back to long jeans and turtlenecks
No one would suspect a thing during the cold days.

When one has a rough few weeks
She thinks about reverting to old ways
She almost does, then she remembers
Remembers how difficult it is to fix it every time.
She have the scars to prove it.

The sun is setting and I’m not alone—
We hiked to the middle of the Appalachian trail,
I don’t know who I am  
But the colors are moving
Nothing has felt so pristine.

On top of white rocks,
This is not a dream.  
A ridgeline where we lay our coats on the diagonal granite
Hands lightly touch on cold stone
Over pristine valleys of moving trees
Stretching from the blue ridge mountains.

My heart is not falling—it is ascending  
Like the summit,
Like the valley below
Floating in space
On the spirit of boulders, we scramble up with open hands.
Covered in delicate bonsai roots
Connecting the longest trail in the world,
Two thousand miles between us but we’ve never been closer
   In a warm car, floral turtlenecks, squares of paper
  I close my eyes because it’s too much
And the sun is gone.

There’s a version of me somewhere
that is a little goth princess.
Or as a fairy somewhere pretty.
Like a bumblebee just floating along.
Or as country as a scarecrow,
homegrown and strong.
Or maybe I’d live in the city,
turtlenecks and glasses and coffee.
Hopping the train to work at the newspaper.
Or maybe I could try to like me.
A girl who’s not really a girl anymore,
and is completely lost.
Who knows who she’ll be.

Little Stray Hair

She had a stray hair that showed up
in the most unusual places. She’d tried to pluck it. But it

popped back up again. She’d tried to bleach it. But it stood out
strong as white against her olive skin. She took a razor

to it and cut herself. The blood ran out. And the very next
day something was sprouting in the same place. So she

tried to conceal wearing turtlenecks. But menopause made her sweat. So she embraced it, even gave it a name. She called

it Bert. It was her little secret. Sometimes she would cut it with a
scissors, if it grew too long. But she became fond of it.  Like a

tattoo she couldn’t imagine life without it.  It was like Cindy Crawford’s mole. After a while it turned beautiful. She grew to love it.