he’ll buy a package of corn-dogs
a bottle of ketchup, seven boxes
of macaroni and cheese
a newspaper. A spider weaves
a hammock across the trophy,
he won in a third grade spelling-bee.
A fly buzzing around the room
crashes into the blinds over
and over again; he chuckles,
life melts like ice cubes
he chews
to forget
hunger.

He wants to be cremated:
no obituary notice, no flowers
no grave marker, just ashes tossed
indiscriminately into the wind.
After the days’ second AA meeting,
he assures himself that good times
are waiting between the serenity
prayer and the horizon, so he
keeps walking past gas stations,
laundry mats, parked patrol cars
back and forth across
the same bridge
six times
as the sky turns
dusty feet sore.

Back at home, he waits for the spider
to notice the fly, twisted in the web.
For a brief second, he considers
running his fingers through the web
to sever the fly from its fate
but he knows better than to prolong
the struggle, instead he walks
to the window, peeks out through
the blinds to count the cars that pass by.
He considers the icicles clinging
to steering wheels, hopeful fingers
starved
and searching
for direction.
(originally published by Zygote in My Coffee, August 2006)

Our Thunder
For John Dorsey

I want to understand
your spaces
so I run my fingernail
through your words
like a astronaut
stirring cream
into his coffee,
wondering why
they voted against
Pluto’s planet status.
All maps
become obsolete.
All words
lose muscle mass.
I regret
that someday
they will inform us
that we are not worthy
of words, but
you can keep
your spaces,
there is depth to them.
Even when
time has covered
all wounds
with leathery scars,
the universe
will still not be ours
to define.
Someday over
drinks, we will
construct a theory
that will outlive us,
we will feel important
like Clyde Tombaugh
until someone takes away
our thunder
leaving an awkward space
a pause in our approach
something we will not
be able to protest
from the places
we were sent to.

Cathedral

on again off again,
relationship with the sky
taunts the tear ducts
of scorned lovers.
Through the windows,
we watch clouds turn
the afternoon sky gray,
the color of dust balls
collecting in un-swept corners.

Again, you search
the length and width
of house and mind
for the missing umbrella,
hidden beneath the kitchen sink
beside empty vodka bottles
and rusty apologies.
If you leave now,
bacon and eggs
will never fry over the coils
of this stove again

and our regrets will sit
heavy like fat priests,
clouds in the sky, heartburn
and lightening. You turn
the faucet on and let
the tap water run through
cracks in your cupped hands,
this is how you pray.
Splash your face,
what’s hidden under our noses
could jackknife into the sky
like a shiny crucifix.

Centerpiece

Where daffodils push through the soil
there is promise
a petal for a petal
shot after shot.

This will be the first spring without him.
Over the winter, Stevie and I severed
our mother from twenty-two years of memories
one carload at a time.

Once the contracts were signed
another family moved into our old lives
like a new flower blossoming from an old bulb.

We try to push through the days;
there will always be setbacks:
late frosts, deaths, binge drinking and relocation anxiety.

We'll throw mulch over our mother's garden
but the weeds will still find their way through;
there are so many things we have no control over.

After a few shots of whiskey, we are tempted
to climb the oak tree beside our childhood house
to spy the new family moving through our memories
breathing, cooking, sleeping, laughing
where we once did.

Narcissus, it's futile to think you blossom
just to raise our spirits; the shards of grass
that reflect your shadow shift in the breeze.

The air that blows through your trumpet
disperses into the wind; eventually
your crown will grow too heavy; your petals
will perish like memories and ashes.

We dig our heels into the essence of this moment
pull gray hairs and flowers out at the root.
There will always be another family
another flower, another poison and another spring.

The centerpiece on the kitchen table
speaks of our challenges:
three white collared daffodils
standing in a fifth of whiskey.
(Published in book by sunnyoutside "Dream Big, Work Harder")