The Dozen For C.

You smile and
I see--peering through the window
From my POV, you’re inside, without me.

Our secrets are few, and If
I were less vain, I would conclude
you smile, alone at some phantom tap
at the corner of your brain
producing incoherent yet
consistent warmth.
that you are tickled by
such a simple fact of your life,
abstract as it may be;
that with your worry
ambition and
heartache,
I spy with my own two eyes,
from the vantage point of our back porch,
a private smile that detects
the threat of capture.

what you truly see
I can only guess, for our POV's
meet uncertainly.  though we
are at times so similar as to
induce a shudder
that is crushed by your skin,
when you hook our legs and mount me like I’m
some pious, reasonable, hard working,
farmer.

peering through my own window
enjoying your private moment,
in which, I daydream,
I am the principle actor.
I am witnessing a reverie:
that husband of mine, you think,
and smile, teeth bared, alone,
in that moment as you can never be when I’m within your POV

You are perfect alone
in the forest I cannot see
the bears,
or the sun
coursing through the canopy

strange town, familiar smell

the sign on the door says
Believe in Jesus
Christ Be Saved.
By God, 
I knock and score

enough for me 

and my friend Ben, 

the suicidal Chihuahua,

to get tranquilized
alley-wise over by the Walgreens.
between dumpsters
lie wicked dreams:

deposit me in the passenger seat

of didion's yellow corvette 

screaming down

early sunday morning streets,

one of flannery's peacocks

winging the wheel.

intimacy gone stale 

as a half box of cracker jacks

in an Aztec time machine. 

piss on that smell.

George Carlin said 

we should die first

spend our last nine months on earth 

in a womb and

finish as an

orgasm.
I guess that'll be the safe word,
I says,
to a rat wearing a leather mask

who 

is rumored to infect 

his sexual partners
with a nasty strain of optimism

Notes From Ben, The Suicidal Chihuahua

Stalking the white kitten

through Longhorn cattle pens

road side sign says

Believe in Jesus

Christ Be Saved

By God

I rustle up enough chocolate

to choke a greyhound

AutoZone dude helps me track a lead

for old school antifreeze

huffin’ the sweet stuff

alley-wise behind the Walgreens

between dumpsters

tranquilized

wicked dreams

treed by a peck of pigeon-toed

cat-hounds

Didion screaming at the peacocks to shut Flannery down

Sunday morning pavement

cloudy  thousand yard stare

a  mutt I used to run with.

sniffin' that ass

well

piss on that smell

no safe-word today

I say

to Madam Bull Shark in her lovely

studded mohair wrap

Concrete

In the kitchen
expiration dates present
olfactory opportunities
sounds of soffritto and mirepoix linger
clamoring to dignify
our wilting intentions

At the sink
she stink-eyed the wet plate, dripping dirty dish water
indicating a spot on the rim where I missed these toughened little clutches of melted cheddar.
I left her hanging
plate in suspension
refusing the offer,
formulating events I could immediately identify as worse,
far worse,
than a nearly spotless dish

that slipped from her grip
and crashed at our feet
Fuck, what the fuck?
watch it, wait.
Damn you, we thought,
as I sucked my bloody finger.

In the dresser
the diminishing significance of her undergarments

In the bathroom
pain and pills

From here to eternity
kids and bills

conclusions based on highly connotative words.
absent atmosphere, pretext and subtext will fall the same rate
but I need  a bowling ball
dropped on my foot
a claw hammer straight to the knee
my pledge of allegiance to abstract ideas
betrays the concrete she.

It Don't Rain In Phoenix

Rains again like every day the day before

10 different ways

streets as slick as glass

and the green light glows

dusk gives up the ghost for now

my bones stay cold and I'm feeling how

the desert sun is calling out my name

I tell them where I met you

underneath the Coal Creek Bridge

they look  at me with sympathy

when you whisper

the way you enunciate

polyvinyl acetate

makes me think you are more agile than you appear

operatic in her grandeur,

plumpuscular, muscular, absolutely glistening

 with slime

 one misty Sunday morning,

 coal creek running after rain

 I saw the biggest, blackest, coldest, slickest, slowest, slug there ever was

she said hello

clap clap

She said I’m Black

clap clap

I’m sure you never ever met a gal like me

clap clap

I take my time

clap clap

don’t cost a dime

clap clap

I am divine

clap clap

I’ll make a squeamish weeping willow sapling scream

She eased me down from off the ledge

didn’t need as much whiskey to get right in the head,

 she sorted out my day with something good

then one night the phone call came, she could tell when I walked way

leaving her to fret alone in our tiny livingroom

broke it to her like poetry,

the dusk gives up the ghost for now

my bones stay cold and I’m feeling how

that Greyhound bus is calling out my name

she said, but it don’t rain in Phoenix

and when you get to sweating it burns a like hell

we’ve had a good time baby

didn’t expect I’d ever have this much to tell

It don’t rain in Phoenix

I might melt in the sun

there ain’t no slugs in the canyon

there ain’t no “us” on the run.

so I put her on my shoulder,

hiked back up to Coal Creek Bridge

lifted up a rotten log set her down

in the patchy fog, slime trails

starlight bouncing off bubble frogs

balls strung so tight I couldn’t see no way around it

hitch up my grocery sack

cans and clothes and a folded map

grab me  a seat all the way in the back,

diesel fumes make me hungry for some eggs

I wonder about my hermaphrodite,

she made me feel half way allright,

scorpions can’t do it near as like she did.

Repairs

fence posts were rotten
with slobber and mud,
rain and grubs
so they snapped, but
reinforcements are en route.
until then, while de fence is down,
neighbor,
let us lick
away
the infection

Lunch With Uncle Barry

Lunch.
Stoned. Early, waiting
 sweet tea looking
NHL finals (chicago and boston) on a
volkswagon TV.
motherboard
birthed others of its kind, each
beaming sport.
Spurs and The Heat
battle on to game 7.
Damnations.  Dude shows.
family.
guys like this tick faintly til thier tiny hearts barely explode.
questions, reveal
mine.
desperation, guessing who has the juice.  But I sit
in judgement. secure
simple lunch date, repeated
unreturned calls,
once from a different
number to throw
me off.
Uncle Barry. Ahhhh, s'ben a long time kid (Me: '72, He: '69)
reunion, wife number
9 in tow, cow-eyed, still
 ignoring the
notion that this whole thing was a huge load of
shit, it was.
Not two weeks already he’s walking
ten steps in front of her.
stopping, waiting. turning. eyebrows, open mouth