Pretty Bird

1/11/08


"Pretty Bird"

She's crazy
or homeless
or both
I thought she was a man
with a mowhawk
but she is a woman
with a ponytail
tearing apart the tall plant
that separates
the 'Safeway'
parking lot
from the street
occasionally
she yells something
I can't understand
but mostly she appears
to be hard at work
separating
the tall stalks
as if she were searching for something
lost
then hacking at it again
tearing
off a piece
and using it
to hack some more
she stops long enough
to spit a large disgusting blob onto
the end
of the piece
she tore
then
she bashes some more
bash bash bash
all her strength
and then reasons with someone
who is not there
she could be me
or you
if we
had no people
if it turns very dark
so dark people felt it was
contagious
what if our sorrows
like hers
had been viewed
like whooping cough
everyone running
to save themselves...
left you
alone
to reason with
and abuse
a plant
in the parking lot
at Safeway.

Temporary Care

1/10/08

I sit in the old
minivan
holding the old
latte
waiting for the old
baby
to wake.
We are in the parking lot
again
we are in the parking lot a lot.
Todays parking lot is at the doctors office
in the poor town
near the teetering on the edge town
in which we live.
Its odd that here,
in the current
murder
capitol
of America,
the buildings are all brand new.
It is a
cement
tent
city
thrown up tout sweet
by corporate
forbes-list
free-from-woe
never-go-there
men.
Thrown up
to quickly
leach
the last
from the least.
These big cement squares
hold big business wears
at prices these
citizens
can't refuse.
No, really.
They can't refuse,
refuse:
suck them quick
then let them crumble
the buildings and
the people.
I turn my ring around:
diamonds in.
I will be the only mother
wearing them in
the waiting room
of the baby's doctor
in the bad part of town
where my insurance
sends us
(ends us).

....Baby's still still
I have to wake him soon.
He'll have to get a shot,
maybe,
more money
for the silent
Oz.
Poison: to save him they
say.
He still doesn't speak.
Save him with poison
and be greatful.
I have to wake him,
poor thing.

Pity Wine

Had I know this would happen to the skin
below my right eye
I would have taken a picture
every year
that I was young
and the skin had not yet
betrayed
my story.

I would have documented my beauty
so that now
I could hang it on the wall,
and remember to those who may wonder
that, yes, I was young
with all that comes
once.

Now women buy me wine at restaurants.
Single women.
Women who pity me and laugh
at what they imagine to be
their good fortune,
their dodged bullet.
Women who made different choices
they see me and wonder
in awe,
maybe at the crows feet
under my right eye,
or the skin below my chin
that used to house a plump
double
and now drags down to comfort
a fussy toddler
in a busy Chinese restaurant.

I thank them as I leave.

We are all making choices.

However,
had I known,
had I only known,
this would happen to the skin
under my right eye:
I would have take a picture every year before
a testament,
a record.
a monument to my empty pointless youth.

As it is now
I sit with my crows feet
and the hair growing out of odd places,
and the skin comforting my son,
and marvel
that his favorite song
by far
and he loves many many songs,
but his favorite
that he can play
with the push of a button
manufactured in China,
his favorite of all
is
"ode to joy"

cr 2008