Book o’ Verse

Lying in bed scooping a little more sleep into my bowl, like soup until the soup goes cold and starts to overflow onto the table. There’s the metal of the ladel and it clinks as a thin carrot wedge rotates past following the current toward the table edge.

Twee birds, rumbling boat horns, rough timber movement rolled up for the night into a living room carpet spiral with socks and cat toys, spoons, string, lost chopsticks. Leaned sideways through the timeline, bending toward a corner wall. And then shook out at new light. Dropping like 6 am jacks onto the hardwood floor.

Jane won’t eat pears. No matter the context. Stranded on Pear Planet. Attacked by toothy pears. Armed with only a pear fork. Peckish. Oh, she’ll kill ’em. Oh sure. She can be savage. But she won’t eat the flesh or drink the juice. And she doesn’t want to talk about it.

They went driving in the rain. They watched it fall down on jelly-eyed twenty-eight-years-olds in gold paisley coats, side-burned thirty-seven-year-olds in suspect camping gear, fit fifty-year-olds wearing thick, graying furs plucked from cardboard boxes. Early on, almost at the very first beat, the rhythm section took their jackets off. Red shirt, tan shirt. Suspenders. Brown … Read more

They’re building a flock of geese out by the base. For six months now they’ve been working on it, piece by piece sun, wind, rain. First came the bones. Then the organs, the muscles. Fat and flesh. Last week they put on a soft undercoat of feathers. Then beaks. (Honk.) And I was like: “wow, … Read more

I remember frogs — feeding them, caring for them pressing that spot on the base of their spines… Small frogs, caught by the creek cupped for a moment, captive, fluttering released open-hand. Huge store-bought bullfrogs kept in shaded back-of-garage aquariums. I don’t remember naming them. But I do remember holding them close looking down their … Read more

Put it in a box and bury it by the side of the house with a few friends, a eulogy. Soft voices and a turning embrace. Gone, like our grandmothers and grandfathers. And not coming back. No matter how young we are inside. How frolicking. How ready to go to the circus. But it’s gone. … Read more

Saying the word “doodle” out loud — “Doodle.” “Doodle.” — makes me feel three months more young, light, and lean three months less gassy and gray. Noodle Poodle. Streudel. “Doodle.”

Five minutes after the lights go down I hear a familiar rustling two seats over. Someone’s making things happen. I’m a little stressed but not surprised when a hand in the darkness offers two white pills. “No thanks,” I say, false cool, thinking: “I am old dude.” The hand withdraws. A minute later, I ask: … Read more

“Live for today,” he said “We’re all going to die.” “Especially you,” she replied. It was a short conversation.