2011
09.27
He says, you’re good for my mental health.
She says, you’re good for my metabolism.
He says, tomorrow I could try
waking up without you, as she piles
two handfuls of sand on her half of the bed.
They smuggle inside his pores – solid earth stars,
like teeth, fluxus shape. Now she is everywhere:
not inside him, but between him. She wants to start
a collection of residue left over from tender acts
between two people: cut hair, international currency
(three shekels between her fingers, whittled down
to bargained sliver-ghosts), lost & found composure.
Some people christen it garbage, she prefers favors.
She wonders: what flavor is she? He says, lime or smoke.
And what color? He says, skin. Not sand?
No, he says. Not sand. Her body is made up of different colors,
she doesn’t think he realizes this. She draws a color-coded map
of her body: topographical attention beside each
areola bump. The body is seventy percent
clean water. The body cleans his eyes, he says.
2011
09.24
What’s the worst that could happen to me if I refuse to take the poison? I will remain an odd thinker. I will continue in a psychotic frenzy. Why can’t I remain this way? The poison pill will destroy my creativity. If I lose that, I lose my identity. I could make a deal with you. Maybe I will take a sleeping pill to knock out. Sleep is what I really need. I would not mind a little vacation, some hibernation like the bears take. I gain so much weight on the poison you guys prescribe. It is not easy to shed pounds without trying to starve myself. The food here is terrible. Perhaps you could hire me as a chef. I am going to need a job when my hold is up. I don’t like to receive government checks for being labeled a mental case. I want to earn what I get. I make a good hobo scramble with round potatoes, bell peppers, and onions. I could prepare sandwiches, salads, and make chicken soup. The slop in this place is not helping the patients get better. Through the stomach many things are healed. I am not taking the poison pill without guarantees that I could work here when the doctor says I’m all better.
2011
09.21
I want to go on a date with Norman Bates
Have dinner with him; ask him not to bring his mother
She wouldn’t come anyway; she’d assume we’re having an affair
Go on rounds with him; help him wash sheets, make beds
I’d take a bath rather than a shower
We could take the bath together; I could keep an eye on him that way
I don’t drive, so there is no car to push into a swamp
He may not want me to meet his mother
That’s fine; I don’t want him to meet mine
We could spy on the occasional room occupant for fun
He could teach me how to taxidermy birds
I’d never try it, but sharing in his interest is enough
I’d listen to him like no one ever has before
And one day he’ll show me his mother
I won’t run away, I’ll stay; he’ll lose his fear of abandonment
We’ll dump her in the swamp together, do everything together
He’ll know he’s of worth, because I’m with him and no one else
That’s all he needs, just another person, a real person
Someone who cares
2011
09.17
I read Carver mostly and Bukowski (still)
at those crucial times when I think the walls are breathing me thin
rubbing me out
and the dullness of the gin doesn’t help
I used to advertise that
but it contributed to the agony
There were always the usual queries
why do you only read men
why only those two men
aren’t you a misogynist like those men you read
And so on into a thick humid night
several nights running
Usually my mistakes ended in some kind of smashing of something
plates bottles paintings
one time even the old Underwood
(that one really hurt because I didn’t have the money to buy another
machine)
So now I don’t say anything
I lie
I confess to watching TV
like most of the people I know
But still there are the usual queries
which show
which network
at what time
why do you always watch TV
shouldn’t you do something more productive
I have this apocalyptic vision of all the inquisitors
they drive in from work
up their driveways
into their garages
the automatic doors slide down shut
before they even get out of their cars
they go inside their homes through the utility door
and start asking questions
until their loved ones one day pack up and leave
for good.
2011
09.15
I asked him several times to wear the hat. It reminds me of home. I asked
him what he wanted to be when he grew up he said a street preacher a
magician a crooked politician. I said those are all the same. He said who
cares I want someone to believe in. I said you are not ordained then he said
I want someone to believe and you ruined it. I told him we were John and
Yoko.
He turned up the radio.
I sang songs to him until my lungs collapsed. His wife never cared for my
singing. When his son was born I remember sitting in a bar listening to cold
turkey eating salted french fries and methadone with gallons of brown ooze
talking about nothing watching each other wanting each other or maybe just
me hungry wanting him. I remember losing my shoes vomiting warm puddles of
brown ooze and methadone and salted french fries on my husband’s new carpet.
I said fuck it your mother will clean it. I gurgled songs to my husband’s
best friend wished it was his carpet I was puking on. I found my shoes in
the street the next morning a bag of six orange wafers shoved in a toe.
I kiss his son when I see him. I changed his diaper once and said to my
friend who insisted on locking herself in the room with me and the baby and
would not come out because she has mother issues I said this kid is hung
like his father. I no longer change diapers but I do kiss his son when I see
him and urge him to come by and paint with me. I think if we painted he
would for a moment at least feel free and I could see his father and feel
free too.
I read his father’s cards once but I lied I told him that the jets would win
yes that is what the cards said the jets would win. He knew I lied because I
smiled and I never smile and I never told him that the cards sent him back
to my home without me and a woman with paintbrushes and dried rose petals
and moist brown eyes waited here for him. I ran to my room and hid my face
cried in my husband’s sheets like the day I ran out of methadone or the day
I found out the wife was going to have the first baby his little girl who
died the wife carried her dead still inside for three months. Her womb
delivered death my husband’s best friend took a polaroid that now hangs from
a beatles magnet on their fridge. I bit at the linen and mattress knocked my
tooth loose punched screamed tore clumps of hair from my head bit off all my
nails and the jets lost. I spit blood into a bowl of mashed potatoes snuck
out of the kitchen window tripped the breaker in the back of the house and
left everyone in the dark.
My friend with mother issues does not come over much any more if she does
she stays in the closet or the bathroom and will not let anyone in. She
calls me from her cell phone from the bathroom floor or the closet talks
about puppies and one night stands. I talk about how I explained to a whore
in a car in an ice storm that I was a man and my husband’s best friend was a
woman and I loved him more than any man could ever love any woman. We slid
across roads we could not see and she gave me her number on a matchbook. I
learned her name was pie. I searched her motel room for an answer but all I
found was blood and shit and a crack pipe fashioned from a ball point pen. I
cringed to think that she thought she was something to be eaten. She
smelled like moth balls with a tinge of something sweet I could not place it
but it sure was not any pie I had ever eaten more like lemon pledge.
My friend sometimes lets me touch the tips of her fingers through the crack
at the bottom of my door.
I set fire to a photograph of my husband’s best friend prayed to a god I do
not believe in unless I need something to have my way. The candle exploded I
nearly shit and my hands shook I apologized to a god that I do not believe
in unless I need something I burned my own hair clumps instead. I chanted
every time he listens to music he will think of only me. I chanted every
time he listens to music he will think of only me. I chanted every time he
listens to music he will think of only me.
I told the boy’s father once during a concert that he is all I think of and
he asked how do you live. I said please please please lets get this over
with let us finish what we started years ago so I can get over you give your
best friend my husband the love he deserves so I can be the man and he can
be the woman. My husband’s best friend rubbed my cunt through my jeans and
said through clenched teeth it would only last five minutes the first time I
closed my eyes and said that is all I need to get over you five minutes and
he laughed and rushed the crowd danced until he sweat I lost him then found
him then chipped my tooth on a beer bottle. He bought me three shots of
tequila and a pitcher for the pain. I vomited in his car but took care to
avoid the baby. I gave up drugs then but miss them. I sent my husband’s best
friend a postcard from rehab that had four regular stamps on it not cheap
postcard stamps and it said I love you Yoko. The wife called my husband said
keep your dog on a short leash and asked if they could bum some weed if we
would watch their three diabetic kittens while they went away on vacation.
My husband’s best friend gave me a euro when they got back. It is worth a
dollar fifty.
I wished once that my husband was the boy’s father I cannot give him a
child. They both have yellow hair but my woman the boy’s father my husband’s
best friend is brunette. I hug and kiss the boy and think maybe when he gets
older he will learn what I did how I feel who I am know what is wrong hate
me my hugs and kisses singing and painting. Now he says you are my favorite
girl. He does not like the girls at his school.
The boy’s father calls every Sunday when his best friend is not home. He
asks for him and between long pauses I say he is not home. He says that my
home will always hold a place in his heart. He says he will live there again
and if he does I will go visit buy him a drink. I say between long pauses
you will look like a silly old man with your hat and your bible. I do not
tell him that I would tend to him I would let him sleep late and not work
while I wait tables in the city give him money to drink smoke I would buy
corn on the cob for him gouda for him dark chocolate for him rose wine for
him even though I do not like those things. The wife tells him to hang up
the phone she has to call her mother. I think he whispers save me I whisper
I cannot. I hang up the phone write down the message. I have a picture of
him in the hat with the boy I wish I could see the father my husband’s best
friend’s face more clearly than I do. I do not know the color of his eyes I
have no idea what color they could be.