The sun will tell you
it is too early for destruction
continue to shut the doors and
windows to keep the house from
coughing on your misery
Basket the ripest apples and set them
on your neighbor’s porch with
a recipe for pie crust
Funeral his picture beside
the thickest root where
the moss refuses to grow
Rake a wreath of dry leaves
for kindle and smear mud into
the grooves of his carved name
Evacuate the birds and squirrels
say a prayer for the ants along branches
there isn’t enough time to save them all
Soak the tire swing in kerosene
swing back and forth against gravity
and light a match across the bark
Ignore the smell of burning flesh
let your lungs breath slow and
listen to the scream of leaves
– Karla Cordero …
...continue reading
They’re always throwing goodness at you,
But with a little bit of luck, a man can duck.
—Lerner and Lowe
‘If you’re six four and weigh two hundred eighty pounds, maybe you should give up your dream of becoming a jockey.’ Those are the immortal words of the mythic Prussian martial philosopher, Hans Aough, and I’ve tried to make them my words to live by, in governing my own dreams. The thing about dreams for the future is that they have to be elastic because they usually have a whole lot of ass to cover with just a small patch of chintz.
I never dreamed Times Square could be ruined, but it was.
Used to be, you could go down there, score porn, find a hooker, black or white, boy or girl, didn’t matter.…
...continue reading
St. Mark’s Place at dawn, trash blown, summer light’s perfect clarity so good for artists, wasted here. Lower Manhattan, brick walls remain, black-painted window sills. Somehow I thought the old world hanging on here had some right to peace, even if then or now, there was no peace. From Alphabet City I walk, young enough to be thrilled about it. He lay: rags, or a bag of trash. But a gray-brown face. But black pants, legs bent, shoes gone, one foot bare. I crossed the street. He looked asleep, but something lay too still. The street rose up around him, a pavement’s song, linear harmony, dun and straight. I saw death, & dancing toward the Village, I wondered what this conversation meant: am an urn to filled with flecks of ash, broken centuries later on the floor of sea amid rotten keels, home of colored fish, or, a funnel for all senses, piling cryptic lines like off-kilter bricks in a sagging building?…
...continue reading
Cassius O’Haloran was a loyal customer of Matlock Savings Bank. He opened his first account as a youngster to deposit the pennies he found in the street, the same account seventy years later holding over one million dollars. In the interim he opened numerous checking and savings accounts, personal lines of credit, credit cards, investments, a safe deposit box and a home equity loan that nearly caused him to lose the house his father built. Safe to say, Matlock Savings Bank made a great deal of money off him. He didn’t have a family and he enjoyed going to the bank and talking with the tellers, whom he treated like the grandchildren he never had.
Cassius took a trip to the bank to order checks and sat with the new banker whose upside down nametag read Alana. …
...continue reading
You predict that running into the other woman will be traumatic, catastrophic, a ripping of the sandy earth beneath your feet. You’ve studied enough Jerry Springer reruns to know that a millisecond of the meeting might prove exciting, the pulled hair and a nervous energy that drags you into actions you’ve never felt capable of before. Your body will instinctually discern how to throw a punch, fingers curled into a fleshy puppet bent on exacting revenge. Time will slow to a crawl while you savor every word you say, every inch of respect you reclaim.
Except when the moment happens, nothing you expected plays out. It is sickeningly comical how mundane the incident is. The apartment, his apartment, smells like dust and mildewed soap. The other woman hangs back behind a spare bedroom door, because there is no bravery or excitement present. …
...continue reading
Cold rain stammers on lines of street bricks, worn ideas in rows, stained with tar or blood; read them at your leisure, coffee smoldering in her cup, your sweater bunched at the elbows. Eye shadow left open on the sink. Of tears there is a novel, or dictionary of smudged intentions. Here is a man, there a woman. That’s all the franchise needs to boil. Someone coughs in the night. Match snaps fire, lights a face for a moment. You gave up piano years ago, regrets are fool’s cash. A car door slams. It’s time to leave. Or time for two men to drag you out. Where the trees recline in winter. Dirt garnered, a congregation praying above the dug hole. The only prayer you’ll get or need.…
...continue reading
Margaret’s friend Joseph visited her regularly in that lonesome hour between supper and bedtime. He always sat across from Margaret on the lounge suite.
“Do you know why I enjoy you coming, Joseph?” she asked him one night, early in their relationship. “It’s because you don’t know anything.”
Joseph raised an eyebrow.
“I mean, you don’t claim to know anything. You never jump in with advice or criticism. You just listen. That’s why I can tell you things.”
“Thank you,” Joseph murmured, with a nod.
Joseph talked quietly and his nodding was thoughtful and sensitive. Margaret knew nothing about his life. He never talked about himself. She didn’t ask where he came from or how he could materialize in her lounge.
She knew she felt safe with him.…
...continue reading