Sex Life of Birds (abridged)

Setting: A forest glen 
Scene: Two robins sitting in a tree

Robin number one: Sing me a song.

Robin number two: Quack.

(Beat.)

Robin number one: You’re fucking another bird.

Robin number two (terse): We’re not geese.

Number one:  Mother was right.

Number two: The best part of your mother is now in an Eddie Bauer down vest.

Number one (hopeless): I don’t know what you ever saw in me.

Number two: You got the cutest cloaca.

Number one: Really?

Number two: You put the breast in red-breasted robin.

Number one (swoons): I’m gettin’ a hormone surge.

(They DO IT.)

Number one: That was fast. Even for you.

Number two (irritated): Performance pressure. All those other birds watching.

Number one: They’re forming a line. . . . Thanks for stopping by. Good luck!

Number two: That’s it?

Number one: Remember, we’re not geese.

My Kids Wanna Know Why I Have a Metal Pipe Next to my Bed 

I like shiny things 
I love the cold smooth surface
of this three-foot pewter toned
steel goliath
people have different things next to their bed
like a book
crucifix 
perhaps a vibrator 

Me, a pipe
I don’t wanna bust their bubbles
as we safely sit 
under this cathedral ceiling
in our five thousand square foot space
lined with trees 
and pruned bushes
when the doors or windows open
our alarm announces
front door open
patio door ajar……technology is wondrous these days 

But the pipe…..
goes back to 
growing up in Queens
the back of our home adjacent
to the schoolyard
the crackies finding
their way into our basement
to steal tools
or shimmy into the kitchen door
the many strange men
our mother tried to rescue 
reform
salvage
who wandered around
with a menace in their eyes
that kept us awake for years

When shit went south
as it always did 
just never knew
what you would wake up to
Mom in a pool of vomit
piss on the floor
two or three “friends”
seated at the table
sprinkling lines 
Jack and coke 
a cig burning the formica
someone sitting in the torn up
brown chair
staring into space
sweats
low mumbles
night tremors
or when someone 
threatening
would blow out a windowpane

Many times 
when 911
took too long 
we had no choice 
either swing or die

A Performance Poet

He told me that he was 
a performance poet, 
he had three poems 
under his belt – 
but each one of those 
had been tweaked 
to perfection, 
over a series of 
painstaking months. 

I asked him 
where he’d performed? 

He’d told me that he’d 
visited several places, 
but was looking for 
the right venue. 

I asked him if he’d 
submitted to any journals? 

He told me that, 
that wasn’t really his thing – 
but he’d uploaded several 
videos to instagram 
and then deleted instagram. 

His focus wasn’t really 
on writing new material – 
as he told me,
it was to read his poems 
on the festival circuits to
start making some cash.

A performance artist 
he most definitely was. 

If Bukowski Worked at Trader Joe’s

If Bukowski worked at Trader Joe’s
We’d know who ate all the hash browns
If Bukowski worked at Trader Joe’s
He would never make coffee in the breakroom
If Bukowski worked at Trader Joe’s
He’d call out sick all the time
If Bukowski worked at Trader Joe’s
The CEO would commit suicide
If Bukowski worked at Trader Joe’s
Its stock would go up after he died
If Bukowski worked at Trader Joe’s
He’d crap his pants just like I did writing this
If Bukowski worked at Trader Joe’s
The Horse Racing Form would replace the Fearless Flyer
If Bukowski worked at Trader Joe’s
He’d sell booze to everyone without an ID
If Bukowski worked at Trader Joe’s
The restroom would be flooded with beer shit
If Bukowski worked at Trader Joe’s
There’d be no health insurance
If Bukowski worked at Trader Joe’s
Everyone would transfer to Safeway
If Bukowski worked at Trader Joe’s
Two-Buk-Chuck would become One-Buk-Fuck
If Bukowski worked at Trader Joe’s
He’d call HR and ask to speak to Sean Penn and Bono
If Bukowski worked at Trader Joe’s
A “Wow” customer experience would be throwing up on them
If Bukowski worked at Trader Joe’s
His name tag would be a shame tag
If Bukowski worked at Trader Joe’s
You could sample the new products off his shirt
If Bukowski worked at Trader Joe’s
There would be porn mags at the registers for an impulse buy
If Bukowski worked at Trader Joe’s
Your receipt would be typewritten and contain a poem
If Bukowski worked at Trader Joe’s
The grocery carts would have whores in them
If Bukowski worked at Trader Joe’s
He’d only last as long as a short story
If Bukowski worked at Trader Joe’s

The sales floor would look like a cheap hotel room
with the room lights permanently off

And there would always be classical music 
and cigarettes to smoke, until…

“You’re fired!”

Professor, Please Tell Me!

My English professor is a tentacle, secretly.  Wears a plaid flannel shirt and a babyface.  His glasses — white mirrors — reflect the distracted/fragmented glow of androids.  When he speaks of poetry, he will tip-toe down the aisle like a ballerina, twirling, his hands out as if hugging an old friend; the mirrors reveal hidden gifs, faces of the bored, faces of the absorbed, the word “sestina,”  unless the poet is Sharon Olds, then he strides like a cross-bearing altar boy.  My thigh, molded in blue jeans, is etched ecchi across the lenses.  With a sour apple flash his eyes peer over the rims, asking “how do they do it, the ones who make love without love?” and he swallows hard as if digesting a fantasy made of broken glass.  I suppress a smile and bite down on my lip so hard that my nose bleeds a single drop. A small pool of green slime hugs the heel of his red converse sneaker and an emerald tendril peaks out the bottom of his black khakis, flirtatiously. I am the only who notices; I am the only one pining for an answer.

3 A.M.

Here,  
at the Devil’s hour,
in the room made void
by your indentation
(my lamentation),
Sleep tantalizes,
echoing infernal lullabies
of leaky faucets
and bathroom-mirror punchings— 
my cradlesong. 
drip…drip…drip

My love—red and hot—
sprawled on motley white walls 
and the cracked basin, 
like graffiti in disappearing ink, 
cascades to the sobering tile,
below—
like icicles during Spring thaw—
leaving specters and tragedies
stitched in hands (and time),
rank with the smell of sweat and pennies.
drip…drip…drip

Its 3:15—
knee-deep in the Devil’s hour—
only a quilt of coppery ghosts and shadow 
to keep me warm.
Where’s your affection
(my confection)
that silences the symphony of raining glass 
and pleas from my mind
(and scars),
crying for a new page? 
drip…drip…drip

***

Originally published at Fugitives & Futurists

Just to Keep Him Happy

‘He asked me to wank him
whilst I breast-fed
our baby daughter.
I found it disgusting but
he wouldn’t stop asking,
so I did it,
just to keep him happy.
It wasn’t nice for me,
but I love him and I know
that he sees other women,
he tells me, brags of it,
I know he uses me and
I can’t tell you of the pain
when he fucked my ass!
I asked him to stop,
maybe three or four times,
but he said he couldn’t stop
and carried on; I felt so dirty
and self-disgusted.
It’s been four months 
since I saw him last,
he may be dead, murdered
by a jealous husband!
I hope so,’ she said, 
lifting her little girl
to kiss and stroke her
soft and beautiful face.

passion 

a bed lay in tatters 
from a night well spent. 
two lovers coil 
together 

the room remains hot, 
a/c cannot keep up. 
rain beats relentlessly 
against motel walls 

i light a cigarette, 
take a long drag, 
blow smoke through 
a cracked window 

a gray fat horizon fills my eyes,  
storm clouds thrash in anger. 
thunder sounds, but lightning  
never comes 

progress 

i always 
answer his call 
his text 
his time 
limited 
but he wants me 
needs me 

sometimes i sneak 
in his backdoor 
creep past  
family pictures 
on a wall 

sometimes i answer 
his knock 
on a seedy motel door 
wearing a jock strap 
and a smile 

sometimes we sit 
and talk at a restaurant 
over lunch 
about the future 
about things that will never occur 

the last time 
i met him 
at our motel 
on the edge  
of the town one over 
far from our own 
he tells me 
i love you 
and i wonder 
if those three words 
are the same lie 
i’ve heard before 

send pics 

i contort my body into strange positions 
take pictures with my cellphone  
ass, cock and balls. 

i am too old for the game  
but there are those 
in the queer crowd that request 
proof before letting games begin. 

and i really don’t have anything better to do  
on a Friday afternoon. 

fucking  

there’s not a lot of planning 
forethought 
putting things together 

pants to ankles 
bent just enough 
press it in 

fucking 

his weight pressing 
onto me 
hot breathe on my neck 
nothing spoken
grunts and moans 

pace quickens 
he’s close now 
i think of winter 
holiday gift giving 
a long vacation to Jamaica 
or France 

fucking 

he tenses 
freeze 
stabs deep 
releases his poison 

he zips up 
mutters something 
i pull myself together 
he says, 
thanks 
and 
see ya later 

i sit in the corner 
watch crows peck at dead cowboys 
i lick powder from a mirror 
load one last round  
into a gun

Lady UPS Driver

She
is a blonde destroyer
of antiquated gender norms.

Resplendent 
behind the wheel
of that iconic brown truck.

And that 
iconic brown uniform
fits her perfectly –

I’m tempted
to blow the rent money
on stupid shit 
I don’t even need.

Stupid shit
I don’t even want.

Just to experience 
the utter bliss 
of having her handle
my package.

Frownland

Your semi-liquid remains trickled down from the cross 
Formed pools of black sludge in the cracked dirt

I writhed on the ground before you in pain and disgust 
Your promised return a poem gone to fuck

You spoke of the God inside the pus in your brain 
The Devil that gnawed at the valves of your heart

I sucked your flesh and drank your juice 
You tore at my eyes so I’d be blind to your rot

As they dragged you away your deified 
Face shot me a look as sure as a cock

With cruel bliss they plied me with ant covered 
Snacks and a bedspread of xanax and spikes

Then I knew they had won so with  pleasure and pain 
I spewed up our hate that you called our love 

Now I sit by a chemical lake plastic shovel in hand 
Digging your grave and licking the coal from my heart