Me? I love excuses
I think excuses are just another word
For explanations which
Is really all we're after
While in hot pursuit of science
Your excuses are your ology
What factors make you molten make you
Perennially late
A creature that hibernates
See I love knowing the truth of you
So go ahead and let me excuse you.
We're born into this world alone, they say
They who have never seen birth
Noticed the way new fingers curl so fittingly
I mean we're actually connected when we're born
They have to cut us apart
I imagine they're wrong about dying too
Who among us dies alone
There is always someone who has to do the paperwork
And some chair or stoop or stump that catches us
And lets our bodies sink back in the ocean
However long it takes to break down cell walls
For the moment, this body is the smallest place where I can live
My tiny country boasting its adorable traditional dress
Delicious dishes and particular way of saying cheers
I'm here as envoy from the embassy posting this petition to my skin
Let's rescind our borders
Move away from boundaries as means of protection
Security as self care
Tell me, who here has the administrative infrastructure
To issue passports and carry out bio surveillance?
I'm through with the tyranny of sovereignty
I want a world in which without invitation
You all can cross into my territory
Let your kindness carry you to witness all this beauty
Which was never really all mine at all
Grandpa was a union man
I never knew him so
The image I keep of him
Is a newspaper clipping
Of four trash collectors
Leaning over the mayor
Signing Scranton's law
For a fairer garbage day
Frank Hessmiller smiling
Like my father used to do
So in the way I say I'm Irish
To tie myself to the long dead
Legends of Grandma Busteed
Dancing on the shuffle board
I wave at the trash trucks
There are so many people
Who will die without us
Ever getting to know them
More and more I struggle to remember how old I am
I remember wearing the sequined celebrations
And the jokey couplets often hiding real hope -
Twenty-eight, anticipate; Twenty-nine, cats and wine
Thirty in Provence arguing about Brett Kavanagh
With my dying father, showing me the cold shoulder
In a perfume factory. My side of the story: there are
Just some things you don't want to talk about
With your father. On your birthday. In Provence.
His side: sad we didn't have a father-daughter relationship
In which we could debate sexual assault. I thought
I was standing up for myself; I think he thought I was
Standing between some then and now, blocking his passage
Back to a time when he was in control of the left side
Of his body, of the time we had left, of other birthdays.
Maybe I am thirty-four now. This age when I can stand
In my kitchen and look to his ashes on the shelf where
I keep the ashes and the champagne flutes and
And with all my love tell him I am still mad at him.
In the end, you are tired in this ancient world
Though, there are not so many bridges to shepherd
Here where the trains built the nation
And the tracks run like rivers through history
Some things are always lost in translation,
Straightlining arabesques where the meaning lay,
Dammed lands suddenly predictable and wrong
Rang upon rang intersecting for a common claim
To hold water in your hands, do you know what
I mean? It's like the West if the West had water
I mean originally, I mean if you tore apart the land
Like an orange and felt it run down your arm
It's skin splintered and tiny jewels fanning out like
Flames surrounding the Virgin who winked at me
Who seemed to say if I am tired I should stay and
See what color the windows stain my palms
The thing no one says about winter is that
You are so much more likely to see the sun rising
It waits a breath longer for you
To get on your way
To work
There's a kindness to the winter
The soft crunch soft landing underfoot
Blue light haze through ice branches
Foggy glasses giggle I'm sorry I can't see yet
Big blanket energy everywhere you can sit
The thing no one says about winter
Is that the snow dulls the din and you can
Hear the birds that decided to stay this year
Black capped chickadee and cardinal share
The early evening memories robins never make
Already day sinks slower lingering over it's
Reflection in the window holding its own gaze
Gingerly touches these purple puffs, red streaks
It was cold in Albany when we started planning
Eastern bloc beaches and checkpoints
I'm thinking I maybe left something there
Among the wild dill and poppies
And I like the way you see things.
We took up marigold ideas instead
A warm weather scheme cooked up
In the steam of broken hearts in lockdown
Fueled by our own voices playing back
And dark horse crazy bitch discovery
We arrived to where I left you in the rain –
Eastward bound then as now
Wars and weddings not withstanding.
Tell me what the cards say over coffee
Tell me when the say it's time to go.
I'd take you
And your lively little dances
Across all this time
And this distance
I'd choose that song
On my jukebox memory
The one you made
In the kitchen
If you had to choose
Onions or garlic
Waffles or pancakes
This life or that
Well it's waffles every time
Oh, listen, you can force it
Make the beats land differently in your mouth
Across the world our hearts must beat so differently
Otherwise why would our tongues sound so apart
That year in a faraway English class
The teacher asked me to read Frankenstein aloud
To hear the music that is English in her ears
Why, anything can be melody! Monsters are a poem!
Monsters on my tongue. Your heart beats differently
Waiting for me to release them
Remember that year i thought
We'd figure out how to fix it?
That was the day it all fell to pieces.
I suppose things always break
Only when you take them in your hands.
When you squint to see the fissures.
Like this poem, no?
If you read it out loud you'll realize
How it doesn't work at all.
I'm learning about getting older
How it's harder to breath in the water
The future feels like remembering
Awaking to the minor tragedy
Of another Monday morning
I don't really like parties anymore
If I ever did
I'm throwing wider as it's spinning
Still slick lakeshore silt under hands
Opening at the opening of the opening
A vessel made with space for holding
I still wake to the faces of my every lover
Tucked in the folds of yours
Those nights when edges fade and soften
All my minor tragedies caught
In the glimmer of the snowlight
However long it takes
Is how long it takes
I don't believe in much
But the changes in the weather
Take my hat, take my gloves
Take my hand however
Long we have together
Hard to believe in the spring
But I do it without thinking.
I'm captivated by the faces
Outlining where your body fell
All this unexpected tenderness
— the new years day truce
Like a western front rerun
In heart of Cincinnati.
So much feels like war here.
I told my soldier friend I hate America
But what i meant was I know she can do better
And it's hard to watch the loose purple bags
Jiggle under Matt Gaetz's angry eyes.
Standing over the coffin is like
Sitting in the back pew at a wedding
I wish I knew you better so that
I could justify my devastation.
The wood winces in the hallway.
More and more it's hard to find a path
That doesn't rouse the floorboards,
It all aches and wakes the dogs
Who leave the sun to sniff the air.
Beneath the paint is a layer of paint
And painted paper under that,
The walls thick with years of wishes
To brighten in the manner of the age.
This most recent coat is fine as nails
A warm winter white that could pass
As classic or neutral without quite
Arriving at something baptismal.
Last March, double parked and heady,
Fatigue moved steady through our arms
The bedframe left a dent in the plaster.
You winced like wood at the sound.
Now at certain angles of the day I notice
The long-ago layers exquisitely revealed,
Thinning glimmers of everything still left
Just a nail's width under the surface