rainy

days, windy days
maybe snow

demi-tasse, please
--a little is not too much
to go on

i'll, i'll
--oh, i admit it
on the intake of breathe
when you, silly, didn't count
letters between letters

ill
my fortune is not so ill
in a hurry i mark down
up, yes, wall, green
gray, lady, stay

i'll
say, that's better. look

the birdcage in the bottle
stings
but see, the sun rises: yellow
feathers brush and
he sings

parthenogenesis

messenger or mercenary, these

angels appear

proving certain things can slip away

and give a simple answer 

"do not ask. everything

can come from nothing

and this is not a dream"

i sense the familiarity of

contracting ribs, like bruising

and the threat of pressing

tiny bones into powder

but these are just decorum

in the glow of listless power

and the unity of extremes

i want to believe

there is no meaningless love

to do as you say, i want to do

more than just come close

and i want to know it is right

or at the least, alright

i am not sure what it is

you're telling me, but

if i listen hard

"you go on ahead

and hush now, child

it's nothing to you

you go ahead and close your eyes

and sleep and do not dream and just believe--"

just believe--

life in a northern town

35 minute miles
from one charm to the next on a
necklace of fence posts
painted with snow
with miles to go, tying up daytimes
when we are frosted in

the lukewarm wash water
swirls around ears
swinging the storm, the settee and me
we are daughters of liberty
thoroughly modern girls

come along with me
when i run away to the south
where the heart is, where we can find
the brightest blue eyes
and learn the face value of saving grace
then dream of miles before we sleep
and fall so deep
into longing for frost and floorboards
and our sleepy northern town

today for me, tomorrow for thee

it is not an epitaph. i refuse

because i fought for my fight, for my
body, my dance, and you are the one
who exists in a state of romance
but it was the couch cushions which saved you
and it’s not that i don’t understand
but when there are so many people who
would hold your hand
you should take one
or more
and just try to stand on the floor
where, perhaps, the pain would go away

just try
and i know it was in your head
but mine was in my stomach
because i’m a moron
but never on purpose

so i keep trying to say “hush”
to all things bittersweet
hot sweet, and just sweet
and i try so hard
but she
just wants me to be small
and how the hell is that fair
to let so much bitterness poison the winter air
as i pull my red fingernails through my hair
kiss the window
and wish i could say

please, just once
cause a riot for me
build me a fort to hide behind
protect me
like i have a hundred times for you

mimosa

i seem to remember a time
when other things lived in ink
and burned my blood
with a killer’s instinct
a victim’s instinct

mimosa: i have just learned
that is the color of the year. yellow
for the stars that shine for you, or
more probably for cowards who cut and run,
cut chem, and
can’t count

perhaps the art supplements
or the black! white! black! white! nature
of one side’s view of nature
made me wonder about bravery
red cloaks
and funny boots
or wonder if there was any time when the pleiades
signified pleading reality
if i can handle the kid gloves
and what the hell even happened to me

mimosa? please

lucky fourteen

he glared at her
playing her russian roulette
when he was ten feet tall but
not quite ready yet
for seven days of possible snow

he ordered a white russian
while her underwear spelled the week
and she bewildered herself
bewitchingly
seeking seven-day salvation

when he pulled the trigger out of her beautiful hair
he saved himself for the saving
and the touch of two sweaters
and i won

white lion

do it again, silly
one page per wall
so that i will only see the middle part
beneath a thin
layer of grease
at the white elephant sale
after i have spent my very last cent
so yes, you are clever

i gave you pretty white
rabbit ears
and never knew it was the foot you needed
and meanwhile
i did not write
in pink for you
and green does not match your hair
nor does remembrance
so perhaps it is not fair

to see you above water
with all the pages spread around
spinning
in an umbrella, upside down
and opened outdoors only
when it was so crucial to see a face
and admit crimes i would
never actually commit
and allow you to condemn that which
(in theory only)
mattered to us then

hush.

in the lightless chill
i found you and your damn sweater
see i just needed a talk
but you
wanted me to live
you and your Lola
and your damn white horse
and i regret to say for me
it’s not too late
never

so i lived
far from the brink with her voice
and mine, and it is all a soft and cozy “hush, dear”
when the wall of the temple is our skin
and sacred is far from certain, to
the point of sacrilege
when “she’s so…”
becomes
“shhhh”

and when
forever or just tonight
this can never, never, never be right
or i am wrong
whether in the style of silence
or song

a-string

sugar

when i burned my clothes
the black left
was white right
white light

and please, stay
see refugee camps are temporary
like statutory
stone certainty

i could say
in the night i wonder
if i’ll have no roots like yours
after all this trouble to dig
if i’ll find only twigs
and you’d say i was wrong, that’s
not at all how it would go
and i’d hope so

the daughters of

we swept the dust and the purple pebble
under the big carpet, mama,
to chase them away

yes and
we had our wind-up mice
when the friends at the window weren’t so nice,
when it rained,
but they wouldn’t come in,
and our white dresses
wouldn’t go out
but nellie was here

when will i feel better mama?
you say you’ll tell me
when i’m older
you pat my shoulder

there are such wholes
in my throat, mama, there are such
whales
in the sea,
two,
three,

two vases, and me,
four, no more!

oscar and olivia

but i didn’t
though it matters not at all to me
if you leaf through

and i dig too
blowing hill-grass off my shoulders
with two red marks on my
lower lip
as if i was kissed by a vampire
this morning
and i bled

you see it’s impossible
to lie for very long
and never long enough
especially for those of you who live
too much
to live long

and you may as well be wild
if you are also simply doomed
but i would rather be like you
than be like this

blue topaz

in the end gold was right
and no breeze, no waves
on a flat sea, steady beat
on medium heat

and the right day was
yesterday
and also today

today for nothing left to linger
the curl of a little finger
on the stem, chrysanthemums,
a little white wine, your place and mine
when the bright gold means
you’re not too old
just bold enough
and perfect like i always promised

i'll go first

my fingertips touched
between shining strands of her hair
in a dream
after they
bled on bark
teasing an old spark
before they slid
so lightly down his arms
for no purpose but their own
they want a permanent home

okay that’s
not
what i meant

illegality

gold foil rises in a cloud
and i was no part of that
only grainy photos and
what i could do
diamonds don’t fall or shatter
just well up
and make a good story

it makes no difference if you are
almost not a transition metal
or not a metal at all but a poison
and spread through nobody
but it makes a difference if you are
almost
because the cigar will still be there
but not everything will

i wouldn’t lie to make it a loop
or any other careless thing you say
but i should have lied for this
to get the very same result, but point to the
flashbulbs and say
“those are mine”

groundbreaking

refugees don’t lose everything
breath stays
and bones don’t break
they still know the truth

the urge to throttle rises upon
hearing of their losses, but
they walk away
even when nothing
nothing, nothing, ever, ever
could be more desirable
and they know it
and will never not know it

they veil the truth
more and more cleverly
to tell it less and
less pitifully

refugees lose their assumptions
leap from the sinking
raft and live
clinging to the rope, to the
high road
and then look down and see all those things
slide through the slats
and sink into the sea
all the things they’ve lost

but it’s not everything
it’s not even close

falling back

flames burn to pursue
and i just couldn’t tell you
why there are three separate pieces
some that want to fly, some that want to be lost,
some that want to get lost together
when the sunshine floods in
when another autumn day
slips in and slips out

i was a child without it
but that man who played the fiddle
lived and died without ever once possessing it
freedom

i want to follow you to those shores
when the moon is there
when it’s my choice
to tell you the truth
and hear only those pieces which you say
whether in the highest or lowest extreme
and pick between the prison and the rose
and allude to everything
that has ever brought a tear
i just need it all
when we’ve all been too lucky for too long
and i love it too much

he won’t ever forget you
if he knows for certain and forever
that you don’t want him to
and you keep the old slang
and let the blood come from your heart
if the burning keeps you warm
even if it’s not as good as something
because it’s better than nothing

don't be a runaway

for all of you
when everything dusty
inside threatens to blow two thousand
miles away
before you see it go and
settle into the sea

don’t be

don’t be a stranger
when you check the box
that says,
“remember me,”
and breathe a full pause in
and out

and doubt

: don’t

and when you
are jazzy and blue
and i am blushingly
secretly red,
know that i don’t
disbelieve
anything you've ever said

i just don’t think you can finish
so soon

so don’t
because you,
you,
and i
none of us would ever
really lie

my name is spencer too

i will not write
an opus
as you say

on staying unbiased
dry capsizing
or slant rhyming

nor on flashy socks
or electric storm shocks
or climbing rocks

i will also not write an opus on
dry lips
and your fingertips
and tar pitch
and never finding the itch

i will never write
an opus on the fate of the prodigal
yellow plate,
nor on lindsay’s yellow eyes,
nor on
morons

but i am also spencer
even if you are just
a little bit more clever

lucky thirteen

tell me why her pulse changed if
she doesn’t recognize the sideways faces
if even eyelashes don’t tickle
and words will never line up side by side

tell me when the calm before the storm begins
if she will only follow whims
and if little words don’t whisper
that’s when i’ll really miss her

riotous riley

indigo
smeared between the palms
of gentle bones
and ink-black butterfly wings
between waves
and red boats
and every other thing that floats

indigo
smearing the snow
where they found yeti
in tibet
and they’re not free
yet

it takes skill to see
just one drop in the changelessly
changeable sea

and murder mercifully

and smile at me

swing voting with noah and annie

skill falls in balance,
glass falls in panes,
teeth fall not far,
and i’ll fall for this

inclination is king
but we have no ruler
and they erased the chalk for us,
so i wouldn’t sneeze,
so you could cure any disease

and i
could never prove anything wrong about you
so you’re alright
tonight and any other night

because in the land of life philosophies,
we are the purple states
the only ones who need to listen to the debates
while up and down
prove their height
and depth to us
and yesterday i learned to listen
and not to listen

because we’re used to playing with
the bright planets
and we’d never be satisfied otherwise

it’s not a mask
i’ll have faith in anything you ask

christmas

blinding little eyes in the sun
i'll come

now there's a window on the wall
little lights
from the white
unmorbid stones
and the rings of trees
and motionless bees

who sting for rent
and consent

and sparkles fall from
all the way up
to right down here
on a midnight
clear

i'll give you proof
of bells ringing
dry leaves clinging
to the roof

i like knowing it's the truth

what the hell

it makes no sense not to smile
for all of you
so i do, meaning
it mostly
and gifting myself with the power of
captivating myself
to have something to rely on.
i crowned myself with the right
to feel what i want
so i don’t feel this.
ice melts but
december is soon
and i won’t because
if i did i would want
to dive 30,000 feet into the past
drag the opportunity back by force
explain to myself what i would learn “in due course”
pull you towards me by the hair
and forget all about “fair’s fair”
i admit it
i want to never have lost it

hallows or horcruxes?

i caught the spoon, anyway

did you just crack? i felt it
up here in nutso-land where i’ve
decided to permanently reside
balancing on a soup-can until
ten is less than ten

i know what he picked but it’s
hard to choose to crush instead of create
a monster that might just kill you

my feet are cold and indecision
gets old

allison cameron

awkward girl,
i kind of love you.

in the clean lobby you pause at
his eyes,
and i want to be the scarf.

you smile everywhere
like claudius,
but no lies,
and you are nearly
always wrong.

curls and
waves on the sand,
and a wave of the hand,
and another try,
bleeding it but
why?

it changes
everything.

and i love

your shiny hair…

Moїra

i am sure you told me there was snow,
monsieur, i am sure

and i know that it was blue when you
could have turned away, mais

n’importe quand, i guarantee it meant
more to me
than it did to
le monde,

monsieur, and do you see
how late i stay awake? it was never
just responsibility,
nor ever simple civility.
you see

tes yeux sont bleus
and mine
will be green
tomorrow,
and that’s not why,
nor is it all,
when entire worlds
swallow me whole
and bury me in the tide
dans la mer which is
infinitely wide

Dover

it’s
deep

but i
won’t look

maybe just up

just why is this so
halfway there
when wales
is really floating in the air?

because i’m afraid of whales

and fairy tales

and i’m a chaser

i want to be
closer, when the air
is so thick
and the ceiling is
not there
and it’s all just
pink

i want to fall
up
the white rock
and forget the clock