Day 5/30 (we'll catch 1-4 later maybe)

With thanks to NaPoWriMo for the prompt:

This country is a child with a grandfather’s history

and here, I am a newborn.

So the light blinds, life’s soundtrack deafens, each new smell becomes

an instant shared taste while phantom electrics prickle my flesh.

I feel the smells. I taste the lights and the sounds

dance in the air.

In Táiwān, my name is Freedom. Zìyóu. from the motto of Clan Wallace,

and here, I am a grandmother.

Who on this earth loves their chains?

My whip is only three or four horses;

because of this I am always outdoors.

“Nǐ hǎo,” they say, or if they really mean it, “Lí hé.”

The genuine greeting of a people mixplaced.

Snaking roads take you straight to where you should be

and I fly with my horses to every home I find.

Zìyóu and her tiny team of horses

will never tire of traveling here,

this raucous country, these patient beaches, these smoking hills.

Born 150 degrees from here but this is my home.

Lí chia̍h pá bōe? Chia̍h pá-ah!

My three horses together are one humble scooter, carrying me like a newborn,

a grandmother, feeling the language on electric skin.

Day 5/30: What is here

Here is a queen-
sized mattress floating in a still ocean,
dozens of pillows,
just enough breeze.

Here is the way a ray
of sunlight falls across
a purple orchid growing outdoors
beside the creek
in southern Taiwan.

Here is the sound
of piano coasting down
from some window the next
building over in the late
afternoon.

Here is how I feel:
with my head on his shoulder,
with my lips on his cheek,
with his arms around me,
when I ride, arms flung wide,
drinking in joy on the back
of his motorbike.

Day 4/30: There are some things we know about the devil:

Not that he is evil, red, or even for that matter
a "he."  Not anger, not torture, no flames.
The Devil is patient, and kind, speaks slowly
and always looks both ways at the crossing.
The Devil rewinds.  Crosses all Ts and dots
every I.  Takes a pie to the new neighbors
and always has a spare cup of sugar to lend.
The Devil will tell you when there's food
in your teeth, will help you put up signs
for your lost pet, is really interested
in your latest art project.  Brings you a plate
after Thanksgiving, keeps your secrets,
always has jumper cables in the truck,
is a wicked fast change of a flat. The Devil
doesn't even need to lie.  One sly smile
and you'll deceive your own self, lie down darlin,
rest your weary head
neath my arm.

Day 3/30: Eulogy for the Disinherited

Some things must first be cut away.  From behind my knee,
an old Victrola, playing your song.  An antique key pulled
from under my tongue, and like that: I've forgotten
your name.  There are birds that must be shook loose
from my ears before I knock out the sound of the beach
the night we built that fire.  Once the smoke clears,
the entire city of Tucson.  The name of the street
on which we lived, and then the real challenge:
my Hydra heart.  Each time I cut out the parts that loved you
two more hearts grow in their place.  Until I am left,
blossoming vines blooming from my chest, growing over
all the rubble, one thousand new organs that have never
sung your tune.

Day2/30: Three Attempts

Attempt the First: Screw around with proverbs.

When the going gets tough, the tough unravel. Undress.  I'll cut off
my own skin just to show I'll
do it first.  My knife is mightier than my pen.  I stay in a stone house
throwing glasses out windows
just for the sound.  Diamonds are for never. Better never than early.
I invite my birds of a feather to dinner, but go to bed
with my enemies, holding them close and closer.  Make them omelets
for breakfast without breaking any eggs, all my eggs
in one basket, counting chicks, then scrub up:
cleanliness is my key to damnation.  I'll fix anything not broke.
There's no time like the past to do it right, by myself.

Attempt the second: Take the final word from each line in the previous poem, make them the first word of each line in a new poem.

Off with my dread instead.
I'll find you, I'll creep from house to
House, say I won't, peeping in
Windows, mail slots, chimneys, keyholes,
Early in the morning, early enough you're still in
Bed.  Without me, of course.  Cold enough for
Omelets in the morning, scramble the
Eggs like your thoughts, wishing for a proper punch-
Up, get too drunk at the evening, fall off the barstool,
Broke as a whole stand-up act.
Myself, I'll just lean back and laugh.

Attempt the third: Take the final letter from each line in the previous poem, make them the first letters of each line in a new poem.

Don't.
Only
In
Sin can I
Never
Remember
Every
Hateful
Lie.
Truth
Halts.

To the ex who said he didn't know what it meant

 Recorded in bed before falling asleep

enough soul and a home

enough soul and a home
after francine j harris

Every soul deserves a good arm
chair. and a grave.  The soul says,
no more cell in my living room.
in my grave.  There's a christmas tree
still up in the corner, in May, garlanded
with teeth.  and souls.

Take it down, says the cell.  to the grave.
I stopped listening to the cell.  Carved
off my ears with a wooden spoon,
put them in a soup
for the soul.  for the home.

No one eats in this grave.

What a kitchen it is, the way these souls
are made up of cells. in the hallway
a dirt-garland shovel falls.  echoes
in its cells.  Rotting flowers

for the souls, and in the bedroom
souls lined like soldiers on the dump
of a bed.  I can't hear them any more

in our home. After all, there's enough windows
here to open every soul. This hissing
and thump are the cells.  are the sounds
of cells who can't let go.  are the song
I cannot hear.  Is it finished?  says the cell.
says the soul.  as it loses another hand
in the sink.  in the cell.  Don't let go.

We'll home together soon.  We'll all
home our souls good for good.

29/30 baltiMore

There are curse words far worse
than Shit
or Fuck
or Cunt.
Let these words be so despicable
that no one ever utters them again.
Let them be so foul in the mouth
that no child may ever bear their names,
let these curse names be removed
from the census, from any history book,
let their mothers unbirth them, let
their birth certificates be burned.
Do not say the name of a white cop
who murdered a Black citizen
again.  Let these unholy syllables
be not spoken nor printed
any more.

There are images far more filthy
than any X-rated film.  Do not show us
more photos
of Black bodies
in the streets.  Thinking
of a thing gives it power.

Stop.

Black children safe in their beds, amen.
Black fathers saying grace at dinner, amen.
Black mothers laughing in harmony, amen.
Black sisters skipping double dutch, amen.
Black brothers cranking open fire hydrants, amen.
A Black gay couple adopts their second child, amen.
A Black foster child finds a loving Black home, amen.
Two Black lesbians smile across a Black-owned cafe,
amen.
A Black grandmother calls her Black
transdaughter by her chosen name, amen.
A Black bus driver takes care to help
a Black wheelchair user board, amen.
Black classmates learn ASL to befriend the new
deaf Black student, amen.  Think of Black people
with love, amen. Think of Black people with life,
amen.  Think of Black people alive and empowered,
amen.
All Black Lives matter,
amen.

Bitchcraft (28/30)

I finally fell behind after being ahead or on time all month...

Bitchcraft:

Text your sisters.
Bring lipgloss and sweetgrass --
mix glitter in the circle salt.
Brass knuckles in the wine glass.
Cunt blood in the cookies.
Curse every ceiling between you
and becoming a star.
Curse the man who touched your ass on the subway,
the boss who winked
when you asked for extra hours,
the boy who came too soon,
the one who left too soon.
Burn their names, use the slips
of pink paper to light your cigarettes.
Toast the women with you.
Bless the wild bitch grandmothers
who sang you to life before you were born.
Hold hands.  Gift gratitude.  Kiss
your sisters with lovewet warrior lips.

26/30: Two Bad Ants

for Dan

I've just found
one ant
in my sugar bowl.
Not moving.
What a beautiful death.
I stir neighboring granules
into my coffee. Her friends
will say of her, She died doing
what she loved.

I drink my coffee.
Outside the strong sun
is bragging.
A full orchestra of flora
casts cooling shade all over
a slender highway
dancing up a mountain.

I go outside.
I crank my motorbike.
I do not put on my helmet.
I punch
the gas.

http://www.amazon.com/Two-Bad-Ants-Chris-Allsburg/dp/0395486688

25/30: exhausted

I am Tired:

of being angry about houses
I don't have the tools to rebuild.
I'm tired of waiting for flowers
to arrive.  Tired of looking
over shoulders not my own.
Tired of counting and counting,
and counting things I need to be
counting.  Tired of math
and of language, tired of all
the things I don't know.  Tired
of not sleeping enough
and of sleeping too much.
Tired of sleeping around.  Tired
of Quit Playing Around And Get
Back To Work.  Tired of
Just Because You Write A Thing
Doesn't Make It True.
Tired of Mr Right Just Kidding Mr
Wrong All Along.  Tired of politics
and people tired of breathing air.
Tired of ain't got what I need, tired
of cain't get what I want.  Tired
of wanting and needing at all.
Tired of pay this and buy that and earn
earn earn tired of disparity
tired of depression and anxiety
tired
of exhaustion
tired of writing
this poem.

24/30: anger

I am Mad:

as a swarm of curses, mad
as lightning, mad as ice.
I'm as angry as a mother bear
who never had a cub.  I'm
chewing bricks and spitting rivers
of molten plasma that are rushing
to your door.  This fire in my eyes
is peeling paint, frying eggs:
dogs in the street are fighting
without a Why. I could kick
through a wall, tear a door off its hinges
just to hear the hinges scream,
tear the door to shreds just to see
what's not inside.  My heart's been swallowed
by the fury; every eyes that meet mine
are begging threats.  My fists are triggers,
curling back, thirsty to shoot.  This spiral fire
in my stomach is a mandala of rage.  I'm
a bloodsniffed shark, I'm original sin,
I weapon and wardrum and scythe.

I'm a chorus
of hornets
and you're rapping
on my hive.

23/30: word bank

Your honor, the fault lies
somewhere between her floating breasts,
the way she sirened me into driftwood,
how the hooves of her lips left me dead silent,
rotting and rotten and ripe as an ivory 
corpse. O yes, I surrendered, 
half-blooded, and gave her my wrists
raw as fish: she plucked the lights
from inside and wove them into a rain
that rivaled the moon.  If I say there was liquor,
will that help my case?  I was living 
just for her goodnights, each beat 
in her voice its own lantern.
When you're marking
down the facts:
say I tried.

Day 22: Suppose

SUPPOSE
after Maureen Micus Crisick

Renisha's knock had been met
with a neighbor saying My God,
you look terrified, please, let me
help and tea and a blanket, and Jonathan
got that chemistry degree after all
and married his girl and became
a high school football coach.  John
made it to the barbecue and Rumain?
Rumain came home all by himself
and served his family dinner and not
one cop shot him dead in front
of his babies and his girl.

What did I say?
I said: what if Trayvon makes it home,
and Tamir is playing on the swings
in the park even now, and Kajieme lives
in a world that believes he is important
and treats him like it, too.  Suppose cops
become social workers, and the first time
Aiyana Jones rides in a horse drawn carriage
is to her high school prom. Eric and Eric
are still breathing, funeral homes go out
of business, convert into
amusement parks, guns dissolve and explode
into rose bushes. Suppose bullets
are bright foil balloons
and Walter Scott comes home with two
for each
of his four sacred children.

21/30: lasts

The first time she picked me up I was
a fraction.  Less than a tenth, surely.
Swaddled, capped, or maybe still
covered in blood and shit and god
knows what.  Not one tooth to my
new name.  Yes, there was a first time
she held me. Who could forget it?
But there was also

                          a last time

she set
me
down.

20/30: the train ride

here is a mess of dishevelry:
a frizzy woman on a crowded train
cross legged in the floor     beholding
     out the left windows:
ragged green mountains tattering thick
dark lint-puff clouds.
out the right: a jagged coast flirts
with a choppy ocean creating
a chorus of blues.
smoke rises from her tangles.
soon the train will pass on the winding
road, a tousled lank of a man mounting
a charger so classic it qualifies antique.
it rattles and rumbles beneath his
knotted thoughts.
what precise magic, these
transient intangible connections.
every person between them is their own
trash bag of dreams.  they know that they
will pass but can't won't know
when it happens.

might one catch in one's mouth
     an atom of the other's breath?

a day before they stood
on the edge of a wild mountain
listening to the same wild music
ringing from thickets and vines
whispered rather than speaking
pockets full of jade shards as they breathed
     deep together
inside a passing cloud,
inconsistent rain pattering the mad heat at bay.

she sits among tattered cardboard,
kicking babies, old women pissing
their pants.  the speakers crackle, announcing
an upcoming station.  the train passes
the motorbike.  she singes.  she flames.
she burns.

19/20: What do you remember about the earth? -Bhanu Kapil Rider

I remember the entry:
the red, wet pain of it,
the exploding in my lungs.
I did not remember it while I
was still there, but here
now, I can feel it.  The slap
of light, the deluge, the shit
and shit and tears.  An opening, a bang
of sweetness.  The years that followed,
as muscles bettered and nerves mored,
as thought thicked and beautied.
Til I could make and speak and run
and make and love.  Til I made
love and unmade love and love
unmade me.  I do not remember
the exit.  I was there, and then I wasn't:
just so.  What I miss most
is the fertile black of it under
my nails, the hot rain soaking through
everything, breezes strong enough
to buffet a body, the visceral, the honest,
the bliss: to stand on the side
of a mountain, silent, breathing every
atom in.

18/30: Verbatim

Hi!  Today I'm writing (or, tweaking?) a "Verbatim" poem, which my friend Taidgh Lynch introduced to me in this post.

My Verbatim poem is coming from "Uncovering Grammar" by Scott Thornbury.

Grammar, Grammars and Grammaring

The focus of this first chapter is to argue
that grammar is in fact a verb.  Or, at least,
that there should be a verb
to grammar, to go along with the noun
grammar.  Just as there is a verb to rain to go
along with the noun rain.  Or to walk and a walk.

To use an analogy:
an omelette is the product
of a (relatively simple
but skillful) process
involving the beating
and frying of eggs.  The process
and the product are clearly
two quite different things, and we
could call one making an omelette (or
even 'omeletting') and the other
an omelette.

In other words, grammar is not simply a thing.
It is also something that you do. Or (as we shall
be arguing later) something that -- in certain conditions --

                                         happens.

17/30: tell the story backward

Today my prompt is to tell a story backward.

After living two years in Taiwan, I flew back
to my childhood home where my father nursed me
to poor health.  The longer I stayed the more I wept
and the less I ate until the last two weeks I ate soup

or nothing, and never left the house. Your electric words
hatefulled me half to death, so of course I put myself and my dog
in the car and drove two days straight to you
without stopping.  Crept into the house while you were away:

you came home and went to sleep while I hid in the other room.
That night I tried to kill myself.  Came home and we had
a spectacular fight.  Had it again and again for two years
until you started to fuck me again.  You started to love me

again. After we made love, you'd take me to dinner.  Our last date
you asked for my number, we talked for hours outside a closed bar,
then went to dinner where we laughed about wearing the same color shirt,
then went home.  I opened a message on a dating site, looked

at your photos, and marveled how little they looked like you at all.

16/30: Catching up, and a silly ode

Today I woke up and my friend was still dead.

I took off work yesterday.  Keith and I hadn't been close since I left the Hot Springs area, but he was always someone who had significantly impacted me when I was younger, and you don't just lose that.  I was some sixteen, seventeen year old punk kid who tried writing and was scared, and he was one of the people who encouraged me.  He and a short list of others made me believe I had value, my voice was worthy of being heard, I should continue trying this crazy thing called art.  We'd catch up whenever I went back to visit, but he always seemed a little distant.

I guess now I know why.

Depression is a motherfucker.  And that ain't the half of the reality.  It KILLS people.  Don't think of suicide as selfish.  Think of it as tragic.  It is not something people do with the intention of hurting others.  It's something that happens when people cannot possibly hurt any more.  I wish I were back home right now, I wish I could gather with everyone who wants to honor Keith's memory.  I wish I could shake his daughter's hand and tell her how honored I am to meet her, after hearing so much for so many years about her, about how much Keith loved her.

My friend isn't coming back.  When I go visit home next month, I won't see him.

So I have to hug the ones I see even harder.  Love them even louder.

I love you.

Hi!

So you're reading my blog!  Wow!  Every year I get more readers, more views, more comments.  I remember once, talking to an ex-lover about something I wrote and said, I mean you probably haven't seen it---

He interrupted, "I read everything you ever write."

What kind of mad praise is that?  My whole heart sat with that and still sits with it.

I saw one day last week I got nearly two hundred views. In one day!  I mentioned it on Facebook, and a few different people said they'd been poking around, catching up, reading old posts... Think about how much it means to be SEEN in this world.  To know that people are looking at you.  On purpose.  Because they want to see you.

SO many of us don't know this feeling.  I think Keith didn't know.  If he'd known how many of us read his book, how many of us looked forward to seeing him again, would he still be here?  Would that have been medicine enough?

You are my medicine.

Say something.  Leave a comment here, or on a past post you enjoyed.  Or one you didn't enjoy!  One you hated!  Tell me what's working for you in the piece, tell me what isn't working for you and could be tightened up.  Tell me what you miss.  Tell me who you love.  Let's communicate and celebrate - we're still here on this side of the ground.

Yesterday's poem was part for Keith and part for all of us with depression and life-threatening mental illnesses.  Today's poem is part for Keith and part for celebrating life and part for poutine.

Yesterday was hump day.  The 15th of the month, out of 30 days.  So now we're coasting downhill toward home.  Why not write a silly poem?  I've been serious all month.  Today let's celebrate something that made me happy.  Today, that thing was a poutine burger from A-Chi, the best burger joint in Pingtung and maybe even all of southern Taiwan.


I neglected to take a photo before I dug in. I was too excited to have it in my mouth.  Halfway through I thought, I should write a silly fun poem today, for Keith, and took a photo.  No "after" photo because you've all seen a blank plate before.

Ode to the Poutine Burger at A-Chi:

Behold the meat patty,
so full of potential,
so undirected: raw
in the cold air, behind
a tightly sealed door.  Behold lettuce,
ripe tomato, white onion thinly sliced.
Pickles bathing, relaxed,
in their vinegar.  Behold cheese
and bun.  Take all of this and you would have

a burger.  But today
is not just any day. Today we add
mashed potatoes, brown gravy plus cream
and mushrooms.  Today, I glut.
I debauch.  I celebrate another day
on this side of the ground with
GRAVY.  There be no tidiness
here. No means to dainty my way
through these pillows of exploding mash,
these gravyfalls of deliciocity!  This
is bliss, and it's all over my face:
someone once
told me
a terrible joke.
I will now suffer it upon you.

What's the difference
between pussy
and mashed potatoes.

Pussy makes its own gravy.

BUT NO PUSSY EVER COVERED MY FACE
LIKE THIS.  Oh, poutine burger, inappropriately
named, in this country without curds I don't care
what I look like, seated outside at the table
in front of the restaurant, I wear you without shame,
I wear you with prize, nose to neck, sweet sweet
poutine burger, I left my last wife,
the chili cheese burger with real pickled jalapeños
FOR YOU, in this country with no chili
and no pickled jalapeños, for YOU, oh my love,
there can be no other above you, no day of work
is too terrible that you cannot wash
it away with your sauce, gravied potatoes, gravied
bun, gravied lettuce and gravied onions, gravied red
ripe tomatoes, oh my god, gravied PICKLES.
The occasional saucy mushroom tries to escape

but my fries are at the ready.  POUTINE BURGER,
never leave me.  POUTINE BURGER, never die.
POUTINE BURGER, only you
can stay
my wandering eye.