Spring 2008 snippets

"With this on one hand
and that on another
I could never find the words
to get across the boxes
I only knew the letters going down
and in the space between
each note, the silence between
the sounds my heart follows
the beats of the songs and poems
never read, meeting a dull ache"

-

A tornado is formed by two things:
cold and heat
the frosty cold front blows from the
North and dances with the warm dust gusts
from the South waltzing in a circle
the hiss of steam on the
cold lips of the Canadian front
as they kiss releases a vortex
of rain and wind, a whirling dervish
loose across the prairie,
chased by vans and satellites

-

The worms weave themselves
over the magnolia leaves
glistening like ribbons from the ground

moon light hits the sodden boughs
creating fireworks around the dying
flowers perking up for one last kiss
from the rain.

But you don't see any of this.
You're asleep, away, alone.
And I am awake, aware, alone.

Watching the worms weave over
the magnolia leaves, pulling the
petals into the ground.

-


Like a dug up miscarriage
you're nothing like you could have been
concieved in shame and born in sin
your half formed bones peeking out
fomr your skin, half human
half reptilian.

Yet as I stand above your little mound
hands colored with the grime and ground
my curiousity is sated.

You're not the beautiful baby I've been mourning;
You're the monstrosity I hated.

Half torn, half born
rotting in the ground
half formed, half born
you'll never be found.

Tom Noyes

The universe is a barbershop quartet, one ongoing medley that won’t be interrupted, even for applause. When you get a red light, someone else gets a green, and it is good. The traffic flows. If you dig a hole, the next thing you do is fill it up. You inhale then you exhale. Too fast you faint, too slow you suffocate. You stay in step despite yourself.

St. Patrick's Day in Boston

There are bombings in Belfast
but in Boston, it's still.
Stars dance above Charlestown,
the Moon balances on Bunker Hill.

All of the troubles an ocean away,
we drink our pints of Murphy's and Guinness,
toast "Erin Go Bragh!"clad in green,
and wear pins that demand other's kisses.

In Belfast, black cabs drive the tourists by
IRA men that are painted, enshrined on walls
Above sayings like "Ulster forever, Protestant or die!"
while the Catholic's revenge echoes from Falls.

In Bean Town, it's a great day for the Irish!
Dance the jigs, sing the refrains.
Oh me? I'm 80 percent, on my father's side.
We've even got one of the old tribe names.

Pass the beer, tinted Green,
Dance a reel on the floor,
It's a great day for the Irish!
My lovely, could you want more?

drabble

The apples were shining with the condensation of early morning sunlight. Overhead, a distant crow called forlornly into the crisp air. From somewhere off in the distance came the whistling lull of cars passing through puddles.

George laid on his back, looking up at the light reflecting off of the leaves and fruit above him. His back was stiff and cold with the chill of morning. It almost ached beneath him (or was it inside him?) as he breathed disappearing wisps of smoky breath. He had no knowledge of how long he had been laying there. The dullness of his bones made him feel that he had been there most of the last night.

Last night there had been cider, spiked cider. There had been the taste of apple pie on a lover's lips, sugary and sweet, warm like a kitchen fire. Last night there had also been yelling. Had there been a fight?

Yes, George thought, pulling a night's worth of spiderwebs off this memories. There had been a fight.

This solid memory awash in a morning that seemed so cold and frail, moved George to sit upright. The spinning of his head reinforced the memory of spiked cider. He looked at his hands. Bruises there reinforced the conviction of the fight. A knuckle, swollen and red so that it resembled a crabapple, throbbed steadily beneath its frigid dullness.

struck

your lips a bow tipped
with an arrow of nose

I whisper your true name
Eros
into my pillow

Reciprocal Functions

6 billion people on this Earth.
That's 9 zeros. Ten figures.

In such a wide data set
it's hard to see the fish
for the sea, or ride
the sine waves of information, hoping
the torsion of distance will shrink
over time until A meets B.

And of course, we'll meet
tangentially. You'll be the spurious dot,
no correlation.

They'll say we have great chemistry
but really it'll be that your gravity
pulls me in, falling at -9.8 m/s2.

I'll be the valent electrion orbiting
your element, vaguely negative but
ready to bond, to build, to create
ions of being. Our constancy
adding together our lives
subtracting our fears as we
multiply, making two into three or four
sharing our love exponentially.

I'm looking for something you can't measure.
Something integral to existence,
an infinite but not imaginary number.

I'm not saying that our equation
will always make sense.
Numbers can be odd and even
reciprocals can't always be right.

We'll fight, we'll divide, we'll miscalculate.
There will be plenty of variables to confuse us.
Ones to carry.

But I believe we'll get back on track,
meeting at the X and Y axis, so it's all equal.
and we'll laugh at the origin of our problems.

I'm aware that numbers aren't real, they're irrational.
That the answer to my theory relies
on the acceptance of the very first premise.

The universal law that states
we can do this,
if and only if you want to.

Saranac Lake

Gravel digs into fingertips
carpet and old fast food cups
thrust into a young face

Smaller, thinner, small
like the pebble lodged
in my palm.

Beneath the pushing
of a Mother
beneath a musty blanket

Through fingers
through rough wide stitches
the outline of Father through glass
walking past in the snow.

He blows on snow frosted fingers.
Hands that could tuck you in.
Hands that made breakfast
and pancakes
in the shape of snowmen.

Walk away on the other side.

Beneath the blanket
Mother's hand relaxes.
Spines are straightened
balls of flesh, unfurled.

But the red hollow of a pebble
leaves an impression on the palm
of a young girl.

The Ballad of Patrick Creevey (draft)

Patrick Creevey, seventeen
full of heart and full of dreams
set out to sail on the open sea
to pay for a golden ring.

His lady fair Molly McGee
worked night and day in a bakery
her hardened hands smelled of yeast
and only wed would she be free.

So it's off to sea with poor, young Pat
'least a fortnight 'til he rows on back
She'll marry him when his ship comes in
and Creevey's baby be.

Three weeks on board, no sign of shore
scrubbing red hands and knees on port
a man named Jack dear Patrick met
who offered him a tempting bet.

Jack, a man dressed solemnly
all clad in velvet of ebony
inquired of Pat why he chose to be
across the waves upon the sea

Patick, resting the soap on deck,
replied that he'd money to get
for a lovely lady Molly McGee
who was a-waiting for his company.

Oh, it's off to sea with poor, young Pat
'least a fortnight 'til he rows on back
She'll marry him when his ship comes in
and Creevey's baby be

"If you best me in a game of dice,
I'll double your wage; you go home to your wife"
said Jack brushing of his veleveteen,
to the sound of his pockets jingling.

Oh, it's a game of dice for poor young Pat
with a quick throw, he rolls snake eyes
She'll marry him when his ship comes in
and Creevey's baby be