She's the sun of my life
Who melts away the lead walls,
Tickles out the smiles, and
Brightens up my overcast.

Burn so green. Burn numbers, burn
faces, burn like Montag did so many years ago
-- mulch their ash until they are food for whiskers
between your toes. Fold the paper in origami
shapes until they are blades and bulbs and
branches; fold the paper into hats and planes
and quilt them into blankets for lovers.
Strip them of colour and print Bibles on them,
drowning them in water that will not dissolve.
Pull them tight across lips and blow on them
for reeds like thick blades of grass until
they hum like the wings of hummingbirds and
bumblebees and fill the air with audible chaff.
Send them covered in poetry in a brown paper
bag with that pretty girl you married long ago
for her lunch she didn't expect on that tired morning.
All this because you are blood and soil and earth,
and allow no less to tame you.

Let's take our pants off and eat
Dripping pancakes in underwear and
Flannel --
Let's have bookshelves full of
Heller and Hemingway next to
Seuss and Silverstein --
Let's criticize cartoons like their
Animated contents of all the
Louvre --
Let's get bent out of ******* shape
Over light pollution and not
Seeing the stars --
Let's lay on the couch head to foot in
Checkered socks and Five Iron tour
Shirts and play ska all day --
Let's let the living room be the
Ballroom full of nothing but you and
Me and the radio --
Let's drive my PT Cruiser like it's
A classic car that all the kids
Envy --
Let's play swing music like we're
The Squirrel Nut Zippers re
Incarnate--


Let's be friends, oh you,
My favourite person.

When the Seattle rain falls and
Pings on the mailbox --
The chill outside jostling the
Doorknob to find it locked --
Our rooms will be grey with overcast.

The TV will hum and thrum, and
Fuzz around our heads
While the ***** socks lay off
The foot of the bed
With us buried deep inside.

Her glistening eyes will sit inches
From mine, gingerbread
And coffee dripping in thick caramel
From which the gloom fled
Like tsunamis back out the windows,
      and

Like braille under my fingertips I'll feel
The goosebumps of her skin,
And we'll lay here like it's the place
We've always been, with Yossarian's
Tail thumping the floor.

The Sun holds her chisel ever steady
In her warm tan hands;
She presses the warm steel
To my face.
She is obsessed with time --
Knowing she's getting
Ever older.
With every circle I dance around her,
She etches another tally
On my face,
To remind herself how old she is
In me.

It was the Watermelon in your hair --
You know,
The way the red juice dripped
Off your draping curls, and spilled
On your shirt.

It was the way you sat with me while
We watched fireworks --
A love I couldn't yet feel while I was
Still so Alone
-- and before that when we
Sat at the park, listening
To ****.

It was the way it was you and me,
Laughing over a small screen
Away from the others; the way
You made me feel so wanted.

It was the way you snorted when
You laughed, and lifted your
Nose to give me piggy
Kisses after each and every one.

But the it was never stopped.
It never will.

On a bench at the park, in
The last light of day,
I wring and fling my tongue
Like a brush full of paint --
I beat it and the dusty words
Fly from the old red rug.
The splatters and droplets
She uses to paint a smile, gorgeous
And colourful, and she wraps the
Rug in her own, wringing
The dust out of both.