Necking with Death

Death gave my neck a kiss.

Sweet and small, a peck,

a smudge,

it grew, longing to eat me up,

as some kisses do.

His jealous foe, bound by oath,

unsung old hero,

cut it out like a bullet,

like a tongue and now

it heals into the shape,

the blush, of a fresh hickey

or rosy mouth smashed

and swollen with kissing,

spitting out its teeth

of stitches.

Circumstances

The doc and I talk

Rush—a shared love of prog rock.

Needle in his hand,

he fashions a scar,

thread closing the eye opened

on my neck, now lashed.

Stitches stagger, leap

in tense, strict asymmetry,

a lone boy dancing

near teen me singing,

hunched over an inner sleeve,

Closer to the Heart.

With thanks to Dr. J.S. for being human with me on a tough day

Note to non-nerds: The title and last line of this poem are Rush songs I found intriguing as a teenage girl trying to make sense of the world. I know people love to make fun of Rush—their intellectualism and supposedly soulless musical precision, but they were my obsession, my introduction to poetry, a heady, earnest alternative to the shitty glam metal of the 80s my friends loved. I dare you, sweetheart, to listen to their entire catalogue, to watch documentaries of their incredible decades together, and see if you’re still too cool.

Shared Fruits

Too busy to net the cherry on time

or repair the hole in the netted plum,

too relaxed about generous apple trees—

we married in the fall of the year

that summer squirrels and chipmunks—

prolific after last year’s bumper of pinyon nuts—

celebrated by stripping and storing,

gluttonously feasting on every last fruit.

Wedding Owl

Exiting our wedding trail

we stood, golden, awaiting friends,

khatas draped like gentle snowy hills

over our shoulders.

Greeting us with hugs and bright eyes,

several exclaimed, “Before

the ceremony, a great horned owl

sat in this juniper near the trailhead,

swooped over us starting up the path!”

We laughed in disbelief, shook our heads.

They heard it before they saw it.

I thought, My mother’s mother. My dead sister.

Sage, my daughter, saw it too, framed

by a forked branch, perched there, who-ing.

Owl tattooed on her right foot, child on hip,

she pronounced, “The owl of our maternal line.

Grandma made it after all.” Of course.

My mother, still alive, her memory adrift,

silent night owl searching, searching

the yellow woods, her daughter’s day.

No photo as auspicious proof.

Just the word of women, our inner who.

A History of Cool

I was cherry tobacco in a pipe cool

Puffing on the coal with my girlfriend

in Crown Pub cool

I was memorized Tom Waits growl cool

I was four-inch sole black Sketcher boots cool

Thrifted 70s suede leather long coat

strapped with a waist belt cool

Lingerie camisole as a summer tank cool

I was clove cigarette then menthol cool

Half a packa Camels a week

on the steps of grad school cool

I was drop off my toddler at her dad’s

go to the literature department party cool

I was toke, sip PBR, smoke

and spin in my head on my bed till I puke cool

I was sleep with eyes open

with a street man cool

I was drum on the plaza with my posse cool

Smoke a cig with my espresso

at Paris on the Poudre

with my daughter in Guatemalan prints

on my hip cool

I was run to the window

where a longhaired musician

was knocking

to whisper you can’t stay here tonight

I’m sorry, cool

then run back to the poet in my bed cool

I was exhausted by cool

I was build a cabin in the woods cool

Fend off advances of the neighbor boogeyman cool

Buy a .38 special for protection cool

Fall in love with a poet musician

12 years my senior cool

I was toke before sex cool

I was bear two sons rarely high cool

I was stay at home mom

and pretend I’m a goddess or buddha

when sober for sex cool

I was stay with a good man for the kids cool

I was wilting inside cool

Experimentally poly cool, unfaithful cool

Divorce cool, drive the kids to and from

Two dads cool

I was Hungarian Buddhist manboy lover cool

Sleep on his friend’s floor mattress cool

I was why did I blow up my family for this cool

I was I’m my own man now cool

Power-snake roots from my own septic line cool

Pursue and screw a married poet cool

and fuck his narcissistic shit cool

I was got to get out of this redneck town cool

Fall in love with a Black man I met online cool

I was choose to love no matter what this time cool

Live on a small farm, raise pigs and chickens cool

I was let’s escape barn-sized Trump signs cool

I was let’s leap into remote mountains cool

Teach art, college English and greenhouse cool

Walk to work through the greenbelt cool

Ski with old hips and knees as long as I can cool

Now I’m five years till retirement cool

Obscene SUV payment to drive hybrid

through my golden years cool

Finally marry him by a mountain creek pool

when our ages total 108 cool

Achey hand learning the ukulele cool

Mark time by visits with grown kids

and kiss kiss kiss my grandson cool

outage

electricity blinked out

I fantasized

it never returning

silent house

opened Atwood poems

napped

swept pine needles

off flagstone

visited seedlings

tossed rolly pollies

to chickens

Last Us-ie

In this photo

this us-ie

my face echoes

your shapes and shades

curved long chin

soft blue, bent-almond eyes

the hair, oh the hair

our brown armor

glinting copper

in the brightest light

curled long and hiding

crow’s feet

and full cheeks.

Since then, your hair

has thinned

to tufts across your skull.

You refuse to trim

long strands still flowing

down your back

tenacious trickle of pride

vestige of easy beauty

you tuck

into your wig

the one your daughter

wore in her casket

before we tugged it off

to touch the velvet

of her head one last time.

Mom, let me run

my palm

over your stubborn

wispy crown—

this new wisdom

the you of you—the way

my ears gulp stories

you repeat over and over

before they too

fall away from you.

Grease

I couldn’t recall the name

of the yellowbreasted

blackwinged

orangeheaded bird

surprisingly still lingering

in mid July

Northern… Flicker… no

wide beak…which species…

and now

Western Tanager, just now

my brain, that hunk

of flesh

brought your name back to me

like suet to an empty basket

my attention

having pecked at leftover

grease for two days

Poets and Minstrels Radio features Walking the Burn

My brilliant friend Barbara Ford is not only a gifted poet but also a poetry DJ on our local radio station, KHEN 106.9. I was honored to join her on July 10th to take turns reading poems from my new book on her show Poets and Minstrels. Enjoy, friends.

Fish Fry

Before I found her curled

like a giant muscular leaf

the old goldfish—flat orange

scales the size of fingernails

no longer a shifting glow

in the murky depth—

lay eggs in the lily pot

submerged like a watery nest

still, hovering, I feared, near death.

The huge male Shubunkin, orange and black

spotted, lay there too over the pot

and worry tested the water

chemistry, perfectly fine.

Faith in science unshaken

I went about my terrestrial days

until the morning I found their fry

funny name for a hatch

of tiny goldfish, more like mosquito larvae

or sea monkeys than fish

already flown the lily pot in open water.

I photographed them like a new grandmother.

Joy quickly rotted by next day’s discovery

their mother newly dead-eyed

stiff, already putting off a cloud

of particles, her babes

swimming there in the fog

filtering her death through tiny gills.

Next morning, already wary

of their father flicking angrily around

the pond like a prowling shark

looking for his mate, desperately alone

and hungry, they retreated to the roots

of aquatic lettuces, lacy floating foliage

of water celery drifting around

island planters, a forest in which

to hide, slowly outgrow, the size

of their father’s mouth.