Morning Poems

I Think / I Believe / I Am

/ Arambler / 5 Comments

I think I am touched
by patterns in the dirt.
I believe I am a dirt eater.
I am New England dirt.

I think I am touched
by the way you think.
I believe I can touch you
with the soft side
of a thought.
I am only touching
your skin in a dream
I had four years ago.

I think I am the alphabet
recited backwards
underwater. I believe
I am underwater
hoping to stop fearing my words
will rust. I am a rusted inner hull
of a houseboat tethered to a dock
in the 79th Street Boat Basin.

I believe I am a map
of New York City
drawn with lipstick.
I think I am being memorized
in my sleep. I am all the dreams
I can’t remember when I wake.

I believe I am a sad cedar
in a ghost forest waiting
for someone to make me laugh.
I think I am saltwater
that has kissed too many Midwestern rivers.
I am a freshly dug canal on an island
that turns out to be the kneecap
of a giant soaking in his tub.

I think I am still moving too fast
down a gravel road
in a speeding car. I believe I am
one little scar
beneath my left eyebrow,
another faded on my right cheek.
I am a station wagon way-back
harboring two restless spies.

I think I am a memory
of two guys named Matt mooning us
from a Rabbit as it raced down a boulevard
of beer and 20-year-old bravado.
I believe I am a rabbit
in an otter’s body.
I am really just a fish
with arms and breasts.

I think I am unlicensed.
I believe I am unlicensed.
I am unlicensed
to do anything but this.

I think I believe I am
you. We
are all
a little bit touched.

Lift Bridge

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A firefly hovers over a waterfall.
A hard-won contrast in the river valley
after dark. This tiny flashlight
directs her to the bend
where womb meets tomb whispers bomb.
Not a wrong note, a controlled explosion
relived in too tall echoes
that bounce against packed dirt block walls.
Somehow the bleeding stops. She smells
cattails, moss, yesterday’s morning rain,
knows his hand will swing to reach her soon.

I Am Always Giving Away

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my power
even when the recipient
doesn’t remember
to take it
confusion about how
to operate those levers
a hidden mechanism
someone whispers
tavern wench
from another darkened room
my power
will drop ten stories
to break open on a sidewalk
like an egg
unfertilized and precious
my precious power

Attack

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Everyone stop talking.
I can’t hear
the grief hissing
in my head. It begins

in the heart,
spreads to the lungs
into the throat,
releases behind the eyes.

Not always exposed
through tear ducts.

I can’t hear
your laugh
leftover from the last time
we saw each other.

Decades ago. Drinks
and dancing
inside Euclid Tavern. Yes,
you were dancing.

I was always dancing
back then. We were
on again off again
in high school.

Old friends by the time
we got to that night.

You were destined
for love, marriage, children,
cooking, sailing, cycling—
a life lived large.

For me, the night
to end all nights,
dance to end all dances,
kiss to end all kisses,

you get the idea,
had just happened
in the Flats
the day before.

It would take years of too many
drinks followed by no more
drinks to discover a life
to be salvaged in a northern town.

Everyone stops talking. It has ended
with your heart.

I Have Some Decisions to Make

/ Arambler / 1 Comment

translates to

farewell to undressing
in the evergreen wood
through a prairie wetland
under a natural bridge
beside a drained creek

farewell to hiding
inside an abandoned
boathouse waiting
for familiar voices
to fade away

farewell to believing
your shame
is love

farewell
my love

Hey Virginia

/ Arambler / Leave a comment

Get this:
Chloe still likes Olivia
Chloe loves Olivia.

Chloe proposed to Olivia
right there
in the laboratory.

Chloe and Olivia
are getting married.

Everyone’s invited.
Come back, come back,
Virginia, just for this one day.

Like Tom Waits

/ Arambler / 1 Comment

I can taste
the bourbon
when you sing.

The beads of sweat
forming on my chin
contain salt, yes, but

a sweet
lyric too.
I whisper

savory nothings
to the framed
picture of you

I hang
in my mind.

You are the lost
song I know

by heart. I should/will not
erase the burn.

En Route

/ Arambler / 4 Comments

“Musicians and night-club proprietors lead complicated lives; it’s advisable to check in advance to confirm engagements.”
—The New Yorker

There’s a poem in there
somewhere if

I can just unbuckle
all the belts

wrapped around
our faulty limbs
and hearts. I think

of death and dying
to be born
when I read

exquisite poems. I do
die a little
when I read yours

is another way
of saying

there’s sex
going on
between those lines.

Rapids

/ Arambler / 2 Comments

First impressions
lead to fully swinging a quant to shake all
the low-hanging apples from the oldest
tree in the park. Pears

are another story.
He wouldn’t let her put them
in the fridge. She wouldn’t let him turn her
into a fish

to hook and release. No
punts. Seeds float on the surface
of the creek. It moves

so slowly this far north.
He wasn’t the one
who took her by force.

Quench

/ Arambler / 2 Comments

Don’t take this strong
black coffee
from us—the ones
who have fallen
from branches,
the ones who land
on our feet, the ones
who count bruises
as little blue blessings
about to bloom,
the ones who may become
overripe. We’ve been so dry—
don’t take away this thirst.