Out of Breath: A Literal translation (An Ode to Owning Things)

I will not play at tug o’ war—I’d rather play at hug o’ war
Don’t leave, he says—Sounding like her now
But thinking of logistics—The practicality of rope
Legs braided in the unmade bed—And stomachs
With so much to say—So happy to see each other
They won’t shut up or settle—And we don’t get
Their sick jokes or know the meaning of—Their sounds
It’s like watching a foreign film—Probably French
Given the circumstances—Of dialogue and overt chauvinism
Soverignty spoke tender—And there’s revolution in the air but
You can never tell— With women these days particularly
Women with short hair—They’re absolutely unpredictable
Come closer just for a second—So the line is loose enough for
I—Would like to tie you to this banister and
Kill you with my kisses all night!—For if you
The— End

Sex-isms

Women are like chores,
easy ones get done.

Afterwards, it was awkward. We smiled
and she cries, “You never

take me
seriously.”

Waking up to the open refrigerator air makes
morning wishes for a carton of
milk without an expiration date—

which is pretty pointless
considering how quickly it goes,
but it’s a lot easier than
owning a cow.

I’m sorry I’m always tired.
I’m sorry for getting tired.

They say that orgasms will make you
believe in God, but, I don’t like ecstasy,
and already stomach enough guilt with the subject.

Some girls say I love you when they’re happy.
Some say they can’t come.

Both of us spent the rest of our lives
wishing that we never crawled out
of the bed;

where we made a mess
fingerpainting all night with our judgment
significantly lowered.

Other bedrooms get the best of us.

Terrified of our shadows we turn out the lights
and make love to blankets.

Your eggshell skin rolling onto the bed
with my cautious self. Who came first?

We’re both scared but you’re pretty
but you’re smart and smart girls scare me.

We drove home from the beach quiet,
grinding sand in our
teeth.

Timing is everything.

You praise the telephone and
everything that happened during the day
until the doorbell finally rings. Anticlimax.

Every man is God when he says things to get laid
and young girls swear by them and turn them in
to pillars of a faith.

Every girl is (becomes)
a planet, a country, a home.

And we’re all the bastard children of a
someone who doesn’t love us.

Le Saboteur!

thursday morning/afternoon after
the night before/ early morning
two tired bodies/ happy birthday!
cigarettes smile/ always tensed
it’s getting late/ do you like your present?!
Noon thursday? do you like

breakfast in bed/ cigarette cereal
lips still tipsy/ strawberry champagne
orgasms are okay/ something glib
spread like jam/ the toast is burning!
two toothbrushes spoon/ scrubbing ash off teeth.
Burnt toast in bed.

late at night/ early a.m.
she’s been waiting/ oh oh ohhhhh!
where’d it go?/ it’s hard to miss
horseback blues/ goodbye
until morning/ please come.
Oh! good night, are you done yet?

dust mouth/ driving south
jokes bone dry/ barren balls
rolling over/going along
skeleton bush/ sarsaparilla saloon
passive shrubbery/ shrugging passion
Tumbling tumbleweed tumbles

at the end of the day
we never wanted algebra

we’re kids, we like rock n roll
and repeating ourselves and staying
up late and other things that
don’t really exist, but we believe
with all our heart in what’s under the bed-
spread like strawberry jam over the morning

Unprotected sex is the only kind worth having

Early morning spoils
left out with last century’s milk
and all my poetry turns

into this sky broken out
with stars again itching
and burning through 2a.m.

There used to be a god for this
but hes buried in france or italy

where his mourning women are beautiful
and drunk and naked with purple stains
on their skin running wild and moaning.

Here under the western sun
we’ll lay curdled in the brush
of young america with raspberries
in our thighs and backs and
dirt in our fingernails

then burn our offering
of penicillin in the incense tray.

I spent the day in bed listening to Joshua Clover
and a good friend in Europe talking about how
uselessly American I have become over the years
of watching teen flicks and stumbling out of cars
with ash all over my pants or Southern breath.
Its dark at 5: 30 p.m. making it seem like its at
the other end of day, so right now I’m writing this
poem from China right after the genocide at
the opium dens where the weary went to
lay on the floor and look sad as hell while
the Lumiere brothers made a thirty second
movie about, well, anything that they could.
Did you check bbc.co.uk today? while I was
reading The Map Room because it’s the only
one of his poems I could find online;
Has the internet become the new moon?
In that case, ill read the horoscopes off
the freckles on your back and be anything
but a Taurus because I cant change when
I was born and I don’t believe in any of
that bullshit anyway but I want to lay next
to you knowing or not knowing that
tomorrow will be there,
laying next to me.

Review of Gran Torino

Quotable Quotes:
“And who was that
goofball guy you were with?
Was that a date
or something?”

"Get off my lawn."

The Film:
An aged Clint Eastwood does his best
to smile, or not smile, the same old
grimace. this time almost. falling off
his face. Rough life, lonely now;
since the first. scene at her funeral.
Character development, analyzed and
edited into camera angles and panning
shots, developing through swearing,
gestures, and throwbacks to outlaw
past lives. He clings to almost
antique guns from a time when shooting
someone meant something. Our hero sits in
a dark room with a cigarette and glass
in his knuckles. Decisions to be made
implode and string the audience along
until the end, which is, like the beginning,
a funeral.

The Movie-Going Experience:
I couldn’t follow the first fifteen
minutes because all I could think
about was how I wanted to move
up the armrest out of the way.
That son of a bitch cradled you when I
could have been and bumped my elbow
when I leaned. Or maybe I
was just too high. It’s hard
to tell.

Final Words:
I need to buy me a rifle.

Oh! Fuck!

Its been a week now and im tired
not of you at all i just havent slept
since Sunday but this is what happens
when you live off nothing but coffee
for a week straight sewing machine foot
and a stomach ache so heres the question
then will more help us stay awake or
give us the caffeine blues which is
pretty much just laying in bed awake
feeling like glue waiting to happen—

a horse that aint gonna be racing
because of a bad leg

a high school football injury

Whats the term im looking for?
Invariably lame?

Photojournalism

I burned the negatives. The camera
makes you uncomfortable. Coat pulled
up over your face. You turning towards
the wall. Just misses

the chance to remember you. It’s
become a game. One quick snapshot
for someone to bag. But you… you’re good. You
put Polaroid out of business, when you restarted
the Trojan war in the living room.

Arms reaching out and flashes banging
blue picture shows inside my eyelids. I dove
like secret service in front of a Nikon that had
its eye on your silhouette from behind the couch.
You were staring down the crowded hallway,
lined with stupored soldiers booming chorus;
war songs from older days.

well I’m a-walkin’ down the road
with my head in my hands,
lookin’ for a girl who needs
a worried man. only one kind
of favor I’ll ask you, just
allow me one more chance.

We made our way,
through the corridor filled with drunkards,
downstairs to the porch,
to smoke a cigarette
where the light showed right on your face.

You were wearing that hyacinth dress.
You were soaked in champagne.
You looked into my eyes.
I looked down
and dug into my chest.