Allergic girl with curled hair
Has her thoughts--they scare
her to death. And she loves
to be away from the shoves
and commands of her old
friends. I remember she told
me that she wasn't afraid
of death, only debt to be paid
afterwards. She's gone to San
Diego now and I know I can
write letters to say "hello"
because I want to say "hello."
Not because I'm obligated to
but I really, truly would like to.
She is my absent caress, I know;
A violin without my bow:
(so cliched I know)
but cliches only go to show
that things are real still.
I come across one--I'm thrilled
to know that I'm not alone...
I'm with someone.
A host of angels crowd the Baptist church by the old, dry river bed. Rain drifts misty down on the bald men smoking outside: spiderwebs in children's hair, just enough for headlights and windshield wipers. In a blue Toyota traveling east on St. Thomas, the radio plays to ignorant ears draped by anointed hair that weaves through graceful lips and plays games with the wind. A rosary hanging from the rear view mirror swings out of time to her parents' music. At home he writes love letters to unknown women for fear of life (or death) alone. He plans every step of the perfect romance. The card table is set up in the basement, the light bulb cold above lit candles; a tenor saxophone slithers around the walls and up the stairs to the couch where he waits for her to pull into the driveway.
Too Quiet: Who knew a state highway could be so quiet. The window half down. Radio off. Blinding yellow trailing backward. For me, the way home from school is the loneliest time in my life. I know that I'm driving away form the tall Catholic girl, the odd mirror boy, the happiness king. I'm driving away from the old brick schoolhouse pregnant with neurons and friends. Neurons shooting like love form eye to eye to ear to mind; jumping electric from each hair on each head. Long dark hair and deep brown eyes full of neurons to protect and serve. At least I feel this way. Step lightly for the Beaver watches with a sacred vigilance to keep. He slips on his grey sweatshirt with all the holes in it. He sings of lunch, of 4th period, of jello and the force of gravity. She stands small and flat. Since the years have slid away, her chubby cheeks have almost gone. But the bitter insults explode in her skull. They hide on the underside of synaptic pathways waiting to be remembered. They wait. And in the back of a brain is a tall, stark stalk of sixteen bitchin' years that teases the wind with pretty perfect ears and bends to sway for the sake of time. Bored by porcelain parents leaving her alone in a crowded house, her neurons jump from weed to weed to weed looking for the one clover hidden on the hill--through wolves and bears and long curled hairs and to only God she prays. And by the speckled floor we are watched by millions of tiny people straining their necks to see the giants reflected in their tiny bald heads. He shines their chromish domes everyday, with the magic custodian wand in both hands: 8 fingers and 2 thumbs. All men have thumbs to work magic in the custodial way. There's a girl who vomits and plays guitar and has big eyes walking like a boy. How pretty. To each his own and to me, the awkward Brown boy. Flames of misunderstood misfortune flame their flame from atop his head. There never could be more of a real person behind those three shirts. He would be my lover if he lacked the balls. I thought I loved her though: champagne sized body with modestly natural hair. Neurons fly and crash under her scalp. They twist and mangle themselves and in the end realize that it doesn't really matter. I accept it. I wait. And the absent caress, drawn away by her intellect. A violin in exile among new friends to show that she is the prettiest girl I know. He says she's not, but he is commonly a whore to everyone. "A heathen they tell me, " and she lives in Texas. Two years ago she sat on the second or third tier and became a member of our family. Young, small, and talent oozed from her nose and mouth. She danced after everyone rode that train. I was bored to be without the Catholic comfort; with friends I was unsatisfied. And my man, so Catholic in his own right, strides his silent stride with short black hair crowning his moral insecurities. Beside him she looks up and she looks down to find a lovely love too old to be young and too handsome to be unattractive. Or the short Michigonian with divorced parents. A man trapped in humorously shelled anguish. What a contently depraved man. Voodoo is afoot. Shhh!.... lesbians. Too quiet.
It's all electric: Each circuit bursting out of each vein and crawling toward the sun. Time is electric, electronic: Filed away under the grey brain of an empty music. Electric waves blast under my nails and shoot through to the depths of spinal apathy. Scraping against moral walls of faithful containment, wires cross like broken hairs crushing objects; making way for new lines drawn on the front of a new generation. In grows breath. Make way for the new green; the new light. None is forgotten nor forever alone.
My child valentine
is mine
has a heart
from k-mart
loves with eyes
(she tries)
and cartoons scour
like flowers
on her flat-bred chest.
she's best.
There's a nasty yellow cat who hangs around our house. He limps most of the time and his right eye is always half closed, probably because Ralph slapped him around a few times, poor kitty. All he wants with us is to be fed a few times a week. We give him some leftovers every night and he's happy to sleep on the deck all day. All he knows is that he wants what we have and we're the only ones who have it. So he sticks around all night and all day staring at us, and sometimes he tries to run into the house when we open the door a little. We don't invite him in, he just knows that the comfortable places are with us. He's jealous of our cats. He sees them getting loved and touched all the time and wonders why he doesn't get the same attention. He's sad, but he can't see that he's a pretty nasty cat. We don't know where he came from. We don't want to have this weird, hungry cat rubbing against us all the time. But I took the time one day to talk to him a bit. He stared back at me and let out a little meow and stood up looking at me. Eventually we became great friends. He was just this nasty boy cat who wanted some attention. Now I know him to be a beautiful guy with great ideas and a well-meaning nature. He's just looking for a best friend, poor kitty. So I do little things to let him know there's still someone who cares. I say goodbye every morning before I leave and hello in the afternoon. I pat his nasty cat head from time to time, and even ignore my own cats sometimes just to be with him. I just do little things to say "I love you, nasty yellow cat with no name." He appreciates it, poor kitty.
Juliet: Your dress hung straight over jutting hips and soft round shoulders--lavender kisses dripping over all that you are. Brown, bloody eyes so clear in conception shone toward the sidewalks as we walked in Manhattan. I know because I watched you, and at night I closed my eyes and we danced for hours through the rain. I found God in your face. I found God in your voice, your eyes. Three days I found tears in my mouth. First while you were asleep next to me: "My God, it all has to end sometime." Next when I saw you in line at the park: "I love her anyway." And again for what you said. Slim arms wraped around my waist, I held you afraid to let go. Still, I'm afraid to let go; afraid of being nothing, afraid I'll never have a word with you again. I can write you into rooms that never happened and think you into times we've never seen. But then, in Manhattan, we held hands as we walked down the sidewalk, silent, together, and forever apart.
We ride muted in an old convertible car with the top down, hair streaming everywhere and lovely. Happy "Frente" piles through the air and we're happy with it. We run with the greatest, bell-bottomed love through antique shops and antiquated orchards. You flatten our musty blanket on apple tree roots and there we stare at each other forever. Only God calls Night to usher our leave. Things are gatered and thrown in the back seat of our car; and I gently swing open your door with a kiss. And I take you home and we sleep in our different houses thinking of each other with catchy pop music drowning out reality.
