The library is, for me, punctuality’s greatest weakness.
Especially Auckland’s public library, a carefully laid, intertwined system of so many books in so many libraries dotting so many corners. I can’t seem to sweep my gaze from east to west without spotting a library.
They call to you.
My dreams are the dew on the
morning grass and the sound of the drops
‘neath the leaping grasshopper.
It seems the cold darkness of a swallowed
night blessed the condensation of what deeply
matters; that which shines bold against the
thousand thrashing insects. I wish I could
say thank you, say anything, really, but the
sunshine is blossoming over my closed eyelids
and all I know is warmth.
Goats climb high on bamboo branches
attempt to avoid the electric fence and
I’ve got to say
we have that last bit in common.
Their switch is to my left and I flick it off.
I wonder
to whose left is my switch.
It’s consistently on—
a quick jolt on the left arm, a
sharp buzz through the kneecap I don’t
know the pattern I just screw up eyes
and tangle knuckles in fists.
I’m a solar powered rubber duck
hurricane; I charge in that purity
and I do not stay submerged for
long, I have no fear of what you
might name me nor can I drown
in your thoughts of inadequacy;
Here’s the thing about
saving my life; I’ve wandered
about for far too long
to just hand over the
chain to this anchor to
give you the key to my
bike lock to introduce you
to my journals. I’m an
uncracked egg, eh, and I
Continue reading “What You Need to Know”
I’m not going to tell you what happened.
Not about the woman I met, nor the shades of green on the hillsides against the coal black sand dunes. That’s not what you want to read about. I know this–I think I know this–because that’s not what I want to write about, either.
“No man really knows about other human beings. The best he can do is suppose they are like himself.”
I write these words on a half-broken park bench in hip Ponsonby district in Auckland. It was the only one in the sun–the park bench, not the district–and the reckless three-quarters of me wants the half-broken bench to break completely. For the sake of closure. The other quarter of me wants a warm glass of milk and a different bedtime story than last night’s. (Reckless me wants to spike the milk with vodka and read anything by Nicholas Sparks to get the one-quarter dizzy and no longer interested in bedtime stories at all.)
But; to the point.
I share some commonalities
with their misconceptions;
(we both think) I am
naive and blind
when it comes to international news
and various accords in varying shades
of political drama.
(We both think) I am
perhaps too hopeful for my own good,
(too much a dreamer
to watch the traffic as I should).
(We both think) I have
grown up in a world which placed
blinders on me at a very young age
condemning peripheral vision
as nothing more than a passing fantasy.
I sometimes look at myself
(the same way) they look at me;
(one lone eyebrow raised high like a flag
and tight pursed lips grown pink
in the cold).
They don’t think I notice
(but they hope that I do)
and we have that in common, too.
Continue reading “Mutual Misconceptions”
Those dimples sing songs
galactic songs dance tall and open
sport their own sleeves tow their own
bullet holes. God never looked so gold
celestial seasoning dip low in the sky I
stroke a blade the whole field
jiggles. No lead sheet please too busy
jiving see the animals they chop silly
we giggle loudly. I coulda zipped a bit
tighter but what did it matter. Hands wave
high brow high tea blood flow heartbeats
in the roof of the mouth the heat
is lazy.
It happened while I was emptying the tank
in the city center train station bathroom
my pink backpack clinging to life on the
silver handle kicking up legs so as not to touch lava.
I lower myself,
eyes glassed and mind grated open gushing my eyelids like door hinges set to the beat of
reggae
with the skin on my face, so still and quiet
no matter how firmly they shout my ears are past the gates and the doors are locked and I am
here in my
inner citadel.
Blood flows.
Eyes hinged. Lowered. Beats.
Continue reading “The Inner Citadel”
Last Friday I, laden with my backpack and some food poisoning, took to the skies from Jakarta and landed 19 hours later in Auckland, New Zealand. The little flight from Jakarta to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia was relatively painless, as sleepy Josie conked out folded like a taco against the seat-back tray table. But from Malaysia to Gold Coast, Australia was a 7-hour feverish vomit-y nightmare. And again, the 6 hours from Gold Coast to Auckland.
I’d never thrown up on an airplane before, so it would have been sort of exciting (something to tell the grandchildren, eh?) if it hadn’t been such horrific timing.
Continue reading “What are you doing over there?”
What is it that I have?
I have nothing, really,
if one counts somethings as one counts apples
plumping in a tree or pine cones in the outdoor slippers or
little birdie heads that pop up and down on nests
made of the dog hair
brushed out of Lila this morning on the back porch;
as if something is something that simply fits
and I, because I’m an I not a me, must agree.
I’ve got none of those somethings.
Continue reading “Sorts of Somethings”
