Street Songs
Some poems shown through the prism of my perception.
Readers,
Here’s some more poems from my debut collection. They have been edited from their published versions. You can find out why I am doing this here:
Yours in the babbling madness,
—C
Ache
What I ache for is a faith in the beauty of my unfurling a patience watching my petals open without fingers prying
Something That Wasn’t
Man. Manly. Manhood. Mankind. Manpower. Manhandle. Who was my father? Did he know himself? A sister that I did not know until I was 30 says she sees our dad when she watches me. A gesture. A thought. “Dad talked to crows too.” He was a ghost. Then he died. Nothing’s changed. How can something that wasn’t live in me? Towards the end he was sometimes homeless. Semi-homeless? One of the homes he lived in was a Gran Torino. I could be homeless. My home could be a Corolla. Culture. Genes. Familial history. Consequences. I am afraid. I don’t see my son every day. I changed. Sometimes he would ask why when he was younger. “Sometimes people fall out of love.” I keep changing. I’m less of who I was. More of what? Sometimes people fall out of who they thought they were. Time ticks faster now. It’s all accelerating. Billionaires, scheming. The oceans, heating. The glaciers, leaving. Agreements, cleaving. Do you grab tight? Fight? For what? Intention goes astray. I could have stayed. I could have pretended. We all pretend. If it was about truth, we wouldn’t recognize ourselves.
Mom’s Hair
For decades I had a photo hung on the same wall in the same room in the same house on the same street Familiar. Ordinary. Predictable. Known. But now it’s out of place no it’s where it’s always been same as it ever was no, no it’s not Now— An eerie doorway. A reincarnated memory. A setting and a dawning. A counselor explains the dynamics of enmeshment I feel a little ill unease roils inside It lights a cigarette, asks how are you doing? It grabs some sharp fragments, fits them together. There. See? That’s better. A little clearer. Then I hear the words emotional incest And I run
The Sound of Faith
Child-me sleepless with terror in my bed I am here, she taps Promises on roof and window Sleep now, you are safe Lover-me softens, abandons the gate All’s clear, come out, come out Her sigh outside free and flowing Coaxing open a little more the door in my chest Father-me fights guilt and worry You’re doing the best you can Her soothing fall, a call That snuffs the firestorm inside my head Writer-me doubting the claim I’ve made Choking on all the words that I suspect don’t exist Her pitter-patter in my ear Shhh…write about me If I have a faith, it is the sound of rain
Built for Chaos
I built a boat when I was a child The land was sinking and the ocean violent Then I did what was needed I splintered The Captain steered with brutal will Determined to survive at any cost Blood offerings the faithful Deckhand gave The sea’s blessing hoping to receive The crow’s nest Sentry guarded Against rogue waves’ ambush The Jester made fun of it all A clever footing for perseverance The Poet-child, the precious cargo Locked away in boat’s hold In darkness, in silence For his protection With sails ragged and boat’s wheel stripped All surrendered to wind and wave Years, for years the seas raged And in this way they became the sway and spray Then the worst— A sea settled befell them Water smooth instead of fist and claw Wind gentle instead of punishing squall And most terrible of all A brilliance left them wincing Its light kissing warm their skin And dancing on the ocean’s face For where curtains of darkness once hung Now blue of two hues met One above, one below Infinitely away Then came a pounding underfoot A pain-laced voice calling for release The Captain howled in alarm "Mend sail and wheel!" "Quickly, To flee this treachery!" Fear nipping at their roles The bow lurched Towards ever-darker grays Towards wicked seaspray Towards danger’s threat Towards their purpose Towards their birthright
How to Fill a Hole
I admit, it kinda felt good I thought, well, let’s see I played along, let them save me Salvation offers a kind of belonging There were themes in which the church and I agreed One was that I was cursed, unclean Childhood trauma makes you believe such things Besides, Irish guilt is in my genes I was already a believer that saving myself was an impossibility Clearly I was damned, but not necessarily by a deity Surely I was lost, but had I been lead astray? Certainly something was wrong, but how to convey? And oh, how the End Times are intoxicating A theme this flavor of church is always masturbating "It’s all going to shit, a whole chapter of the Book is about it. It’s coming SOON! Only Jesus will keep your soul lit!" Within this theme we had a kind of harmony A sense of doom, manifesting A dark destiny—event horizon finality My conclusion non-corporeal, vexing Still, I wasn’t buying this Pentecostal jubilee Even at sixteen it was easily seen Shallow, predictable, fool’s gold Poor white people desperate for footholds Hyper-vigilance has it’s benefits It allows you to see behind the scenes You don’t swallow things easily You analyze words and bodies constantly My last visit was an adolescent gathering We were each given a tiny slip of paper On it one word— “God’s gift,” said the preacher Unique, given to us personally Mine was prophecy The next few years were middle-fingered I volunteered as an astronaut to the ever-after Again and again I invoked Jacob’s Ladder At death’s door I knocked and lingered I came back, settled for something less fatal The intention noble, still, only self-betrayal And to that cause I stayed loyal Planting a make-believe life in thin topsoil
Everything’s Fine and Other Lies
I chose to write these words instead of a career keeping food under lock and key I chose to rent a room over owning a home in the American dream I chose poverty by design, I'm okay and everything’s fine I remember more birds and open fields, the childhood freedom of bicycle wheels I remember my awe of the world and of life, how it all danced and filled me with delight I now mourn its distance and decline, I’m too busy and everything’s fine I wanted to be an astronaut, told I could be the President if I want I wanted to sing and make movies I wanted to draw, spend my days dreaming How’d I end up trying to die and doing time? Oh well, I’m alive and everything’s fine Hate grips White Jesus in one hand, an Orange Savior in the other As the marble veneer is starting to peel and chip, our fabric pulled too tight and beginning to rip Saving science is up to Bill Nye, Hawking is dead and everything’s fine Byrne talking in my head—my god, what have I done Oh no, my beautiful son I’ve brought you in during the closing scene to serve the sentence of our delusional deeds Please forgive me, the world is bound and blind I love you, and everything’s fine
Light’s Path
All I have is the lens of my experience But I’ve always been curious how light bends in another’s eyes
As a child, my grandmother would compare me to my uncle killed in one of the wars. She would say words like this.
“Dad talked to crows too.”
Those words are safe in a treasure chest in my heart.