The Artist’s Opening

“it is amazing how many people
volunteer to pose for my brush
but why bother ?
my own body is right here
always moves the way I want it to move
holds it’s hand up so like this
and we tire together,  hand and my body
and we understand this beauty
alone ours digging to the light
with brush strokes”

acrylic bees buzz around her head
she pinches a single honey maker between her fingers
and tells me
“it is a political statement”
and of course!
it must be

maps and compass points retrace her path
cover  breasts
heiress of the islands
feet bare to the wind
legs bare to the wind
the sign around her neck says
out will return

Ceramic Cat

First he turns his fears into a team of white sharks
and then he turns the sharks into snow.
Oh poet, fair poet, wherefor art thy metaphor?
Does it hide in the plastic garden beside the cat who plays the cello?

tonight my fear is a ceramic cat
he plays the cello on the widow’s shelf
if we screech down the scale it is by accident
among the scratched random chord and low vibe bass line
that hums me into calm sea
deep, my fear is white sharks
snapping at the cat on deck
praises be, she will never dive!
fiddle dee dee
shark, cats and me
pop in three more amino acid pressed powder pills
washed down with a capsule of fish oil
ah my fear slips through the glycerine sea
yes, yes
my fear
turns to snow on the ocean

500 word bio

understand: this poet
likes to write about herself
in case you were not impressed
with the witty-feministic-twisted
hollow doll referenced poem
perhaps you might like to see her photo?
here in Paris
in black
or one from when she was 23
straight from the march down dc
I have written a hundred books
since then
“I have a dream someday”
someone will want to make love
to my voluptuous bio
pay for pages
rape me as I doth protest
too
much

Medicine Woman

She tells me my people are not well then she
tells me I cannot buy her healing powers, that they
must be given. She tells me I am cursed. That we
are all murderers. That we do not understand how
to live from the land and assumes we never have but
she is wrong. She does not know me. She does not know
how we to were pulled away too quickly and with a violent hand
that shook the soil of native land from our roots
leaving us starved for the nutrients of the earth of our
forefathers. I want to tell her, woman, you are not so different.
My grandmothers too knew which plants would
heal, which would feed, my grandfather’s too prayed over
their kill with soft blessings and used every ounce
of their hunt and harvest. They too gathered with music
of their hands and voices with ancient chanting I hear
but cannot recreate. Yes, we too have lost our way.

Woman, I know how to teach my son to be kind and generous. I know
how to help him see the beauty and importance in the differences
within humankind. I know how to teach him to listen to the still small voice.
I know how to teach him a gentle touch. But I do not know
how to teach him how to be a white man. How to understand
why people will always see him as a master of slaves,
killer of native peoples, represser of women. I do not know how
to teach him to love himself in spite but not because of his skin,
his gender. How to help him understand why we still wear the sins
of the past and never allow them to be made again. Tell me,
wise woman, tell me how to walk in these shoes because I see,
I see you are wearing them too.

Pier Side

I do not dream of San Francisco
swimming bay to barge
with sailors smiling in disbelief.
No, I stand summer grounded with coffee,
chocolate, papers.

Always it was you who wanted to escape
face to sky
shark under mind.

You who pressed on faster further
until no one could reach you
without paddle or motor.
You, pushing distance racing time
like some kind of Einstenian death trick
your mitochondria pulse
pulse with the power of the first sea
woven into each cell.

You who taught guards their stroke
mothers how to set limits
women how to loosen strings.

I watch the waves lift you,
lower you, lift you into ease, isolation.
My feet are dry
I hold your towel, wait
like the splintered bench I have become.

Not This Year

Carson D. is up in the soundbooth
looking below at the millions
and right there in front of Dick Clark
and everyone he announces
how much people depend on virtual communities

and suddenly I am there with my cock in my hand
and we are all there caught cock handed and dumb-founded
internet porn and gore news chi-ching in our eyes like
the casinos they put up all over the state
to rob the poor my father says
but mom argues they can’t manage their own money anyway
better to just take it and take care of things from the counter

but don’t you think, says Carson
this is some kind of sign
reaching out for human contact
motion in unision

the whole crowd red with matching hatsChevy
Chevy Chevy!

from down the square the news woman
takes a poll
who’re you going to kiss at the strike of twelve
family
friend
lover
stranger?
and these girls Carson they just want you
he says
“I will take them all”
news girl provides the smooch sound effects
while they blow kisses

12:02 my husband makes his way over to my chair
we kiss upside down
it has been a good year
now let’s go giddey up
find me someone to adore
and god forbid my dreams come true?
no no no
don’t you steal my dreams
don’t punish me with the wildest
fuck, I don’t even think my body can bend that way

You dominate my thoughts

somehow we let Milan Kundera’s
lightness of being float off
as heaviness of reality
pulled lip corners low
we catch stars
only on the way down
down
down burned
into dust in the sky
can we believe his words

once

is

nonce

and pretend this never happened?
you have Ayn Rand on your side
I have Anais Nin on mine
did she give you permission
some kind of intellectualized reason
to snap me into non-existence
erase me, the one who no longer followed suit
in your pursuit of happiness

last I heard you were in an accident
and I wonder if your life tripped
through an accelerated slideshow
and could you reduce me into a
a single screen capture?

you answered with silence

and then more silence

leaving me to invent myself as in your dream
and wakeful memory until all goes black
except me and Anais and our colored notebooks
reporting and revising your fingertips
that strung down my ribs as you asked
“Fernie, when when are you going to open up to me?”
trying with half a heart to untie corset laces pulled tight
tight into forced breath

my scene: you in the white towel
our scents fresh erased
I watch from the bedroom
you forget to put on that famous smile
your face, fallen, sullen, shows your age
as you tuck in the remnants of the evening
and wonder how it moved so fast
you, already in tomorrow without me

and Anais tells me
no! don’t fret so! this is not our Henry
we were ready to let him go
don’t you remember?

we cannot fold back into days of dominated thoughts
gobbling down each other’s words and fingers for breakfast
I didn’t think you would figure us out so quickly
and I do not suppose
it would be within your philosophy
to call goodbye
down from that straight and narrow path you walk
as you train for perfection
without a moment free to
kick down a sharp rock
break my circle
give me my laces back

I do not remember calling for you

but you heard me anyway, come
come meet me in the vacant lot down
down down where paper flowers
hang, sun-faded in latched windows
their insides facing, blue

working the room like royalty

something about crowns
and jewels
and the ease with which you place them
into our metal fingered settings

we touch hems
catch moondogs
we sway on heel spikes
wait our turn

this artist, empty plates

she swallowed Wallace Stevens
but could only cough up seven blackbirds

pie or no pie
we still count gold
teased with honey
pull feathers for the tar baby decoy
she said she said she said
this will only hurt
if you can feel it

cabin 2
secret get-away
for those like us
who need to get a
way to forget

dearest Three, I am sorry
but Two cannot come to the phone
please try again later

she paints four boat tail grackles
they strut by, eye us up
looking for the one who is going to pay:
he is she is they are
always the next in line
for the crown

our five year old reveals:
the legend of how crow got her rainbow feathers
is actually the legend
of how she lost them

VI.
because you are a perfect number
I will give you this verse properly labeled

you who divides by two or three
with equal ease
what is better
than a table
set for six?

seven, seven
seventy-seven
your extra syllables
tripped up our elementary rhythms
like January and February
like the step you missed
at the bottom of the landing
expecting something more