When a weatherman speaks

people sometimes listen. At the church

turned concert hall the sign said
no flash photography, no recording devices

but she snuck in a microphone for Jenny anyway,
that distinct possibility of rain

not even an option in her eyes
blue with wisps of cloud grey,

today could be perfect.

juice box, discovery!

a recyclable
cardboard carton,
corners bent
vein lines indents

gold, yellow, sweet

absorbing the spill
a history book
my parents would
have to pay for

after running bases
brick schoolyard bully
stepped on my lunch

pasteurized, concentrated

the catalogue
of knowledge
now an
autumn breeze
from Vermont.

50 Titles (of poems I would not write)

protein pills
other natural flavors
not really a doctor
whale watching in the rain
vintage contemporaries
do not install backwards
handbook of knee surgery
rejected thank you notes
a fruit with no name
eaten straight from the box
dishes done
this bag is not a toy
bound by the conditions
nexus point reentry
a tape, not an apple
the end of aquifers
operating manual for a segue
mr. clean goes to france
i've got pop-tarts
Oh, Auden said everything
sponge identity
antisocial radar
fight night at the Lenig's
a man with a glass eye
the house that was not level
a beach with mosquitos
bedpan technician
closed doors mean secret meetings
talking behind your back
hard, modern edges
new dirt
the importance of flossing
sex, interrupted
a fruit much like a beer can
complimentary copy
there are no self-serve gas stations in New Jersey.
a day at the craft fair
LOWERCASE
income tax evasion
a conversation on speakerphone with grandma
peeling second-degree sunburn
a trail of carbon footprints
on conserving electricity
that's just too bad.
the moon in full sunlight
a can opener for poetry soup
conditioned air
landfill at noon
licking letters
not valid with any other offers

delayed breakup poem

[feeling a loss of control, I
fall back on my mother’s tendency
to clean and make lists]
..........................spending June on the west coast
..........................escaping you, I replay Honey and the Moon
..........................and remember how you never called me honey
[my mother knows diligence
and anorexia, but I
lack her self-control]
.......................... spending June up north, spinning like snow
.......................... memory on repeat of you brushing your teeth
.......................... never calling me honey
[my mother teaches me
insomnia and to hold on
for the sun]
.......................... spending June in darkness, time moves
.......................... like muted moons, eclipsing me with
.......................... your silence
[one day I find
flowers, my mother’s
favorite medicine]
.......................... leaving for green orange groves down south,
.......................... I forget you and the moon
.......................... and spend June in the sun

Warm December

Sunlight flowers in winter:
one morning you brought them to me
so I could breathe
forsythia.

Yellow salve in the sky
on Christmas Eve. (The next day gray,
we suffocated in its
congested color,

longed for yesterday.)
As if sun tea on the deck,
clear cold steeps ripe red
and yesterdays become

wept pools of snow
feeding the early forsythia.

ghostblogger

blogger forgot about me
as if i were winter
and he'd already moved
on though spring and into
the sweat of summer

in my search for self
i found three other blogs
i'd never created, but all
set to my own email address:
unwritten identities

mylashes.blogspot.com,
379.blogspot.com, and
pbandme.blogspot.com,
all with empty archives and
a total of 15 profile views

in a past life i was a
ghostblogger

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