Fagots*

The anger that nourishes, more than hot milk or breath,
Resides in a hollow
Scooped from the chest.

The substanceless fire lends tongues for a spine,
Wraps,
Licking up your breasts.

The red fang that flourishes, inside fodder so lithe,
Pauses,
lovingly,
To dance in ox-bow pools
Cupped at the crest.



*Fagot (noun): a bundle of twigs bound together and used as fuel.

Letter to Charles Bukowski

Women. How could you do that to me?
Pull me in, speak in promising and beatiful simplicity, and then
dehumanize me.
A dead man stomping on my skull.
"Big Pussy, woman's greatest sin." Becuase, of course, I am reduced to the sexual pleasure I can offer you. But
, Of Course,
the sexual pleasure is not enough,
and I must also stroke your ego by submitting, by degrading, or by demonstrating some monstrous appetite for semen.

Big Pussy, Bukowski? There are about 3.25 billion cunts in the world right now, and they aren't made Big. The insides of a cunt, they close in and kiss each other all day long. There are no cunts out there whistling wide open, presenting a gap bigger than even the smallest of penii. There are no cunts out there with tissue limp and all give like some half-inflated flotation device. No, no, no.

But there are cunts out there with integrity. Not frigid. Not virginal. But women who want to experiment with their sexuality and who wish to maintain their integrity. Or not even so much wish, as are utterly incapable of yielding their integrity for the sake of an orgasm. Not yielding their integrity, of course, is defined as not being able to orgasm for a hung-over fat man flopping around inside their cunt the first time they have sex with him. For the same reason they don't orgasm while watching a mechanic cursing and flailing around on the underside of a car: It's not stimulating.

Big Pussy? No, no, no, Bukowski, let's name it properly: You had inadequate substance. You were swallowed whole in that girl's sexual desire, and your floundering around was the result of you being entirely too small as a man--not a penis--to support the simple demands of her sexuality. But you knew that already, and so had to name it, cast the blame outward, and accuse her of having a Big Pussy. No doubt, you meant for the accusation to cut deeper than an insult to her anatomy.

This makes you the scum floating around the rim of my toilet bowl.

I could have loved you, thought you immortal, absorbed you whole. But you threw that away, having never even met me, and presumed the right to stomp around on my skull.

Battered Woman

The intimate connection of pain,
To a thing.

In some houses, human flesh
Is a delicacy.
The finest of translucent pink oysters
To whet the palate.

The flesh of another watering the mouth,
rolling down the throat,
pumping through the blood
Marries their bodies.
In some houses

Blue Bruises live inside the skin,
Snapshot of a fist.
Hits the base of the skull
Recalls pink ripping cries
Stakes a claim on the heart

With a thick

Black

Chain.

Ocean Liner

Wordless flotation devices are strewn about.
One hisses its deflation into your face. The smell of sweet new rubber makes your mouth water. You grab another and another, but they are all flatulant, empty. The pile of limp polyurethane is growing high behind you, but you can't stop grabbing one, and then another, mute white floatie.

Revolution

He says, "I don't do things," with a wan little grin. With the smug almost-satisfaction of a man who can almost-function. Man? Man? There is no man here. Certainly no boy. What is this thing, limp wet rag. He wipes his superior's ass and later insults the man to rinse it out. Even trying to capture him in words is gross. I can feel him sliding slimy beneath the surface, the node of him avoiding the pressure of my finger. This way and that. I don't understand him. "I don't do things"? And he's proud of this?

We should be specific. Though it's impossible, we should try. "What does not doing things mean to you?" Because while not doing you can work, function, graduate, marry, give birth, start a career, get promoted etc, etc, etc. These seem like actions. They are not. Not for the person who never once dared to want any of these things with a reckless passion that felt like it would destroy them if they didn't get what they pursued.

My pain is being connected to this limp rag. That I have to establish him as Other at all. But it's because I have never dared to want anything with that reckless passion either. It's because I still call a consuming passion for something "reckless" when it is not. It's because I share more experiences with The Rag than the Other. But not for long.

Atheist

Do you heeeaaarrrr the thundah?
I said, Do you heeeearrr the rumbuhle?
Prraaayyyzze be to God on Highah,
Because He hath shined the light on mine own eye-ah.

Rolling iris lands on fat fat rafters,
lands on sagging spread eagle,
lands on sweeping spring alb.

Communion wafers that dissolve on the tongue
Made your mouth water when you were youngue.
Left it all behind when you lifted your head
What will you put in Paradise' stead?

Spring (in the tradition of Shel Silverstein)

Plath was the Breath

Rand was the Fire

Morisson the Joy

Marquez the Desire.

Rilke lent his Hindsight

I had the Pot.

They came and brewed together

I am a blooming forget-me-not!

Soft Proofs

Heathen breath on foreign shores...

No, no, more like the McGraw McGrain McDraw McDrain. Do you see? Do you see?

Don't be stupid.

More like the fall of leaves, dying, on graves.

But have it you're way, cuz I'm lovin' it. Me encanta.

Maybe you could manufacture me?

Assorted stitched limbs from the dying trees

Barbie doll hair strangling out of a perforated head.

You could

Take a survey that tells me how to be

Or enjoy the shade of a sycamore breeze.

Letter

I would say to her, "I tried to write you a letter once about how much I love you. But I was on aderrall, and the words vibrated right off the page." I tried, though, I tried.


I would say, "You think that I don't want your affection, that I am disgusted by human emotion, sadness, 'the funk of life.' That was true. But only of my own funk. If funk comes oozing out of us like molten lava from cracks in the crust, I thought that my flow was toxic, virulent, shameful. Like a veneral disease. I didn't know that it was burned clean and utterly desirable, just like yours. I really didn't know that. So while I was embracing your funk, bathing in it, wallowing in it to show you just how much I loved you, I didn't see the insult implicit in refusing to share. Share my funky disease? My cluster of erupting blisters, oozing putrid puss?"

Shepherd

She is

Smoldering embers in autumn.

The fire inside a chill, the smile that binds,

The muscle that pumps

Life to us all

In her harem.

But in her chest are flayed roots, septic and exposed. And I cannot treat them.

Easter

For the swan legs beaking to the ground. Swollen hipped tables. Egg toes swaying across the sitting room floor. For the golden threaded clock swaying the time of day. You must stay here. Write. Wait.

Sway, sway, sway. This is the word to capture the undulating of the brain in the moments of shyness. When the voices are clear and happy, and you are uncertain that you can contribute to that. Before the first shining light strolls into your room. With your stuffed chair, and you writing. Waiting.

So much Patience!

Sarcasm? Exasperation? What is this exclamation?

Introductions

What you need to know about me.

From my bedroom window, I can see all of Austin. All of Austin that matters.

From my bathroom, too, I can see all of Austin, and nothing is so disturbing as to be a middle class American, sitting on your toilet, and looking out at the world while thinking, "I shit upon you World." This hits a little too close to the truth, and being in that vulnerable position does nothing to shield you from the deep genital shame this induces. The source of all shame--our genitalia. I kid, that is far from being true, but it's easy to believe.

I have an ever-growing list of fatal ailments which "I know I don't have." I don't have a weakened blood vessel running near the base of my skull that will eventually betray me to aneurysm, I tell myself with conviction. No possible way will I learn of the tumor in my spine only after it has metastasized beyond hope. No way because I don't have a spinal tumor. Yes, I pretend to be very much in control of my hypochondria until those brief sweet moments when I imagine what life would be like if I weren't dying of uterine cancer. At such moments, my dimentia has obviously exceeded the bounds of rationalization, and I have the good sense to enjoy the respite my imagination affords me. "Ahhhhh, what if..."




Anyway, the last thing you should know about me is that my dog is at her element when playing the martyr. As is evidenced by this picture of her receiving a bath. She has never looked more in character or displayed a more fully developed personality.