Triple decker

Troubling slapstick on the train

mu-doom-a, salon, saloon, dining car.

Public feast, gravitational feats, the ne' switcheroo.

Whirling trainers,

a glimmer of hip flask,

its latent shower of hope.

OLD FRIEND

you know that flower is named love-in-a-mist

you know that’s my one and only party trick,

no, I’m lying, I’ve got  tons

and we were both around

when they were worse,

and I employed them more –

the problem with recovery is

it’s harder than ever

to tell when you’re being

a jerk

I worry about that

If I were

Lightning is traveling sidewards
                not staying long enough to say
                and gone before I get to
         
               is a blueberry pie bursting through
               and staining the picnic blanket
               not steady like you

              bites into a plum and sees itself
              would be the cosmos
              won't put down roots

Little and Large

Life is full of the little and large

Pleasures and pain 

all small and big and massive and minute.

From the stomach ache to heart break

Indigestion to revelation

Tears of breaking

to tears of insane happiness.

Our lives are balls of all of these things.

Strings of memories, regrets, dreams, wrapped again and again tightly.

Building a life from the little things

to the large.

NOT YOU, NOT ME

My tongue heavy,
I am choked
Grasping for salt water
bodies sweet.

the distance grows
thick
like black milk honey,

An omission.
chapped lips, and vertebrae in
all the wrong spots

something clearly lacks.

In It To Win It

Smooth floor this, you could drag me by the ankles along it,

Until the skin on my arse puckers and erupts

And I have to go in the bathroom to calm down.

I'll be in there a lot and I'm sorry, so sorry for that.

The trite sticky inside of a food blog,

An infinite glossy gurgle recounting the back rubs,

A big domestic piss to one and all,

Urban experiment, borough branding,

Sloppy candle,

Renewing what's love,

Rejecting the handles.

THOUGHTS IN WINTER, ABOUT OTHER SEASONS

ever since the grass turned brown,

each day has gotten more 

and more cold.  I walk with you

boots scuffing on the pavement and the swish of

your heavy parka. Thick glass eyes

stare back at me

and I can see the start of an infection,

a thin bloody line running straight from the tear duct.

Nobody is sweet anymore.

No body is sweet anymore.

There was only one person who would wake up in the middle of the night and kiss my back when they thought I was sleeping

and it's not you 

sticky treacle running from your lips.

a short song begging for god's mercy

sunrise

part one: do something

in bed, fear encompasses

fight fight put it down

easier to do what is already being done.

giving in is the safe choice

regret encompasses parts two and three

repeat/don't repeat

Floating

nostalgia fills my nose
with the smell of fish soup

i am five years old
sitting at abuela's dining room table

i take breaks between sips
of clear yellow broth

to run back and forth
from rough green carpet

to kitchen-brown linoleum
to peek tippy toe

as i lift the top of the pot
on the stove

and giggle at floating fish heads bobbing
up and down and fish eyes that stare back at me

i am five years old
and i love fish soup
 

by Mariposa María Teresa Fenández

Twelve Pots

bones achin'

throat burnin'

ears ringin'

floor's turnin'!

12 pots 

12 pots of water

[boiled on the stove, just like old times]

carried carefully up 1 flight of stairs

up and down,

All to catch a cold

from getting bad.

And so colds happen

on frozen and white

January nights

& mischievous winds

thoughtlessly

extinguish pilot lights.

A CLEANER YEAR

alone when the booms went off,

I didn’t know the time,

didn’t know the year,

couldn’t tell if I was asleep or awake,

better or worse, and I didn’t care.

(dust leftover from the habits of dead people.)

(the stray hairs of animals who kept every secret they were told.)

(people I’ve asked to leave.) (people who’ve just left.)

(an orchid the healthiest plant in the house.)

I don’t ask about the odds.

I can’t stop asking for perfection.

don’t laugh.

not even my nightmares scare me anymore.

SHINE BRIGHT LIKE A DIAMOND

The tinsel twinkles 

on Jackson Avenue

holiday caution tape

protecting virgin cars

I am little girl robot

driving 

I am broken xanax 

in an REI  backpack

The tinsel twinkles 

on Jackson Avenue

one man walks, white leather,

through the night

Carrying an Old Place

How do you get mad in a new way?

In the wooden room last week, much like any library

I finally felt the weight.

When I go to the Yiddish archive,

I am the only person in line at the metal detector.

no one talks to the Concierge and

two women people greet me at the security desk

take my ID and hand me a name tag with my picture on it

walk me to the next room to check my coat.

I ride to the third floor

the librarian gives me a key for the locker, for my bag.

and I fill out a form with the call numbers

and take it to the other room

and wait an hour and

recieve my book.

For the self protection here, all these texts must be holy- and aren't they?

today, the hebrew orphanages of post-war new york.

last week,The leather tanners association, photos of socialist youth.

what use is echoing that everyone should know these things?

that somehow we should learn to carry history and not just its strange shadows.

the coat rack is almost empty

and the front hallway is empty

and the staircase is empty

and in the library, just a few.

What bias makes me not surprised?

I know these places must be full, sometimes, 

and I know the danger is real

but, 

I ache, here, in the security cocoon.

This place is the state of the world. I can't blame-

but history and knowledge and holiness

I thought, were to share.

drippy ice, throw that away when no one is looking.

Later the same day

Earlier the same day I ran into my first serious boyfriend. 

You smiled, your top lip 

peeking over your jacket zipped all the way up, 

at me as a I squirmed in avoiding him twice. 

We arrived at the big event early this year and 

wandered in and out of the crowd chanting USA. 

It was cold on the beach and the sand was stiffer than in the summer. 

I emerge from the shallow freezing water and see you 

shaking out the towel, 

getting ready to wrap it around me.

Later the same day the towel is wet 

and folded neatly on the subway seat next to us. 

Your head pushes down heavy on my shoulder

and your words are slow. 

Sex Dream?

how we started on the topic
I do not know
many questions he wanted to ask
calmly
how do i do it?
i don't want her to think
"why is he doing it like white people"
he told me
and how could i tell him without revealing too much about myself
that not all white people
are horrible in bed

I used to think a cigarette dropped
on the ground
was a victory for the forces of good.

When I was a kid
I believed everything I read.
When I was a kid
I didn't know there were bad books.