Wednesday, April 28, 2010

twitch

jumping at house shadows
in this familiar space,
i'm internalizing all the voices
that have told me i should fear:
fear the walks i take
in the early hours,
the darkness, the men
who lurk in it, the crime,
the highway traffic, myself
my feminine fact
and i always laugh, say
"whomsoever fucketh
with me
shall receive
his everlasting life
a little early,
assuming
he's earned it"

and i mean every word of it
i ignore what
should spook me,
yell rudely
back
at anyone who assails
me with obscenity,
i am not afraid at all
until later,
when i am alone
solid in my certainty that
i am solitary in this space
which is the most eerie
thing in my life -
rooms
full of silence, a long house
stretching its limbs -
that groan and creak

Tuesday, April 20, 2010

brief explanation...

all of this poetry originally started out on another blog, one i've had for ten years. (yes, i am back-dating my entries, so as to avoid confusion.)

i am liberating myself from this other blog, as it is highly personal, and i wanted a place to put my work (poetry), and only that, instead of the last ten years of the history of my life.

i should also say at this point, that about half of my poetry's formatting is getting lost in this transition between copy&paste, and the way i actually lay it out on a page.

it's highly annoying. however, i don't know enough about computers/text editors/html to really do anything about it, ergo, oh well.

Wednesday, April 14, 2010

dissonance

like a boss saying
"hiatus",
meaning not working
and i say,
"i need rent"
but what that really means is
no fucking way i'll
manage that, but
i have to eat, goddamnit

i don't think people like that
understand poor
like this, and
i'm not even really poor -
desperate enough
to strip my body for money,
but i've never sold plasma, though
i wanted to -
when i know people who don't
pay any rent, and live
where they find shelter
and don't think much further,
because you can't plan for that -

i, with my college degree
have hurt a bit, but
i've never starved unless
i wanted to

our differences are bills
collected in my name,
a years' salary
in loans alone
begging repayment, leases,
until
i'm so sick over
stressing on
how to pay it
i want to run
and forfeit all of it,
not as if
it would do much good,
a fucking headache i swear
i'd trade
to be a punk in the gutter,
choosing my way

Sunday, April 4, 2010

railcars follow the water

there's something hidden in the silence
what we say when we're not speaking
the train whistles echo
off the curves of the river
and i huddle under the covers
beside your still form.
the nights are never quiet here,
filled with freeway noise
and occasional weekend gunshots
the cats running padfoot
from the porch to scatter
to wherever they sleep
and you also, are silent now:
i mouth unintelligible syllables
into the looking glass
there is more to this.
or maybe nothing at all.
this house itself
is permeable, malleable, waiting
for someone to exploit its cracks.
and as much as possible,
i run out for the night,
but when dawn threatens,
i call you.
always you.