I

“I want…to be a good woman.
And I want…you to be a good man.
And this is why…I am leaving you.”
is what Chan whispered into the mic,
lamenting over impossibilities
with silver strands and wooden bodies.

‘The song is…It’s just, I mean it’s

sad but ..but it’s beautiful too…so–
I–I’m sorry I’m not articulating my.’
was Chantal’s gentle and eloquent
reply to my asking ‘What’s wrong?’
She had wept in the moments I was gone.

‘I know. I thought you’d…like it.
Her voice is delicate and wrinkled,
and those chords drone somethin’ low”
was the paperthin comfort I covered

her arms with. I kissed her crown,
wiped her lash, and waited for another song.

II

We didn’t plan it, but the serendipity of it
made us like it more than others.
It was already a marvelous lullaby, bow against
guitar, metallic whispers on the snarehead, and
the gleaning falsetto of a twelve year old man.

But when we would wake up together, our ears
stretching arms and squinting crusted eyes to
a single note on a lo-fi xylophone bell, we knew
we were in love. With one another, and with
the song. It solidified as I crept into and out of my mindmovies.

So we chose music with a language we don’t speak
and synaesthetic colors we don’t recognize as our
cut-palm playinears togethering. Now that we’re apart,
separated, I can’t help but think of her and there,
where we were in love, where I was in Iceland.

Listen:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_lJiwKskTlE

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zQ5Grncdjlc

Ladies and Gentlemen–

I would like KalamaZOO to humbly kiss the hem,

Of your next entertainer.

One spotlight. One song. One legend.

Serving the masses her signature:

Brown Liquor in a Dirty Glass.

A jazzy interlude with diva blues attitude.

Per ritual, a go go boy serves on knee,

A tray of golden shots.

She downs them smoothly.

Usually. One night at Brothers,

She threw up onstage.

Ladies and Gentlemen–

She is your current reigning:

Miss Charm, Miss Grace,

Miss Demeanor, Miss Take!

Put your hands together for:

The illusion of Miss Brianna Fest.

Bartender, Bartender / Give me brown liquor in a dirty glass…

The sidewalk is strewn with bits of glass,
there’s a shy ghost that walks with rose in
hand, pausing before a mirror in her favorite
shop window. She likes the practicality of
things, the way a cyclist can pedal slowly,
watching the sunset even when it’s downright
cold outside. The poncho she wears flaps in
the breeze, and to her it’s the most natural
thing in the world; the way everything collides
in mid-stride.

There are sparks of individual light all around
her, in the vitality of her consciousness. The
essential part of her is gone but there’s
something that exists far away from the human
body. It’s her intellectual capacity, her emotional
makeup, and the soul beyond its basic form that
manifests itself through daily routine. The sounds
of church chiming remind her of a sweet angel’s
laughter and the way flakes of snow affix themselves
on spruce twigs, left at the mercy of weather.

She doesn’t speak about recriminations, even when
her thoughts return to him, the man who dwells in
her heart’s innermost haven, where scavengers of
music, dance, underneath mistletoe. Clouds of
incense quicken their pace, retelling the story of
the young woman that died in a car accident, on the
eve of her wedding day. Broken windshield, a mini gown,
swing back and forth across a line of vision where
vital discoveries call up words as melodies begin.

Sing; thrown in a heap of crash and clatter, something
amazing unites the whole, away from the mortal blow
of the heavens and earth, where the debt of death
is paid by blood, with a fatal kiss upon a brow.
Forever flows with rivers of passion, and in her long
procession she still searches for him. The burden of
sorrow a bridge they both shall cross, when twilight
throws its shadows over ebbing tide; and still she
dreams, heart young, hot and restless, in the wavering
image here, where both remain as strangers unto you.

Kafka’s metal cage contains a miserable
Man who watches mankind pass by for
Forty days and forty nights of hell
His plight lives in the caring breasts
Of all of those who have souls
A similar metal cage holds the impatient
Fears of my closed and inaccessible mind
In this mind of mine a terrible dream is created
In this dream
Lives a terrible image where no one
Sees or cares for the existence of others
In this dream
Certain types of people are slowly dieing
They perish in obscurity and loneliness
While Clowns smile with painted smiles
And tall women in cultured pearls and furs
Prance about the poor pleading bodies
With a gay abandonment and
Men in Dior striped suits and silk ties
Sneer at the vistas of poverty in their midst
In this dream
I am forced to taste the wet
Salty tears of their helplessness and
Observe the bloody scars of constant rejection
In this dream
After countless miserable days
I visualize the poorest
In our abundant civilization
Burning in the flames of neglect
Then I awake and see that it is true
And like Kafka I find I am not dreaming
In my sleep but I am awake writing
When I view my words upon the page
I find like Joseph K. in The Trial was
Not even aware of my crime
In my wretched inaction I realize
And feel the responsibility of my failure
To connect my emotions to my actions
I find that all the poet is capable of doing is
Weep and write for those who die slowly
In their cages of misery and hopelessness
And roam listlessly in cold city streets
In the most wealthy nation in the world
When were the moral rules of humanity lost

A little late for lights, no?

They need to be done by morning.

I see.

Stepped out in the cold and breathed

the frost-fumed wood-smoked air;

it would cling to my skin and hair all night.

Shattered a bulb, cursed and improvised

with no hooks, clips, or lines.

Stepped back inside and, shivering,

slid out of my coat.

What you need is someone to warm you up.

Sure. Look around and show me who.

What about him?

Which him do you mean? The him I left

at the altar? The him who might actually

be a her? The him I made up for the

sake of argument? The him with the

mama fixation? The him who died?

A him I want or a him I don’t?

Sure. All of them.

Gee. I don’t know. I guess they could all be

anywhere but here. With anyone but me.

OK. None of them then.

Right. So that brings us back to square one.

And you’re still cold.

Yes. I am.

But the lights are hung.

Yes. They are.

They look like crap.

Yes. They do.

And you better sweep up the broken glass.

Yes. I will.

You don’t want the kids to step on that.
It’s outside, they won’t cut themselves.

They’ll track a shard or two in and then they will bleed.

You don’t want that.

No. I don’t. I didn’t even know it could break.

Everything can break.

I thought maybe it was unbreakable.

Everything can break.

Still?

Still. And always. There’s always

a little piece left fragile.

Where? I can’t see it.

No. You can’t. But you shiver.

Yes. I do. A glass of wine, maybe

a hot bath. Those things seem to help.

Sure.

Nice talking to you Tree. I’m sorry

your season runs so short.

Nice talking to you too lady. I’m sorry

your season runs so cold.

Touché.

Swept up the broken glass and left

the lights for morning.

And she was about to leave it. She was only six and still, she felt a great love for this country. But they couldn’t stay. Natalya, ten years old, learned not to ask questions about why they were moving.

“Mama…” Elizaveta asked timidly. “Skol’ko nam zhdat’?”

How long do we have to wait?

“Tikho,” the girls’ mother said. “Ne dolgo.”

Quiet. Not long.

This meant that they’d wait however long that they had to.

The minivan arrived, brown and nondescript, with only a taxi emblem on the side. Two elderly-looking men smiled at the two girls and helped the family load their massive suitcases into the back of the minivan. It was all that they had left: clothing, blankets, their cookware and some of the girls’ very few books and toys. They had little; they sold nearly everything they had as they were leaving. The men seemed to know; they handled everything with such care.

“Na Sheremetyevo, pozhaluista,” the girls’ father said.

To the Sheremetyevo airpot, please.

Elizaveta’s beautiful blue eyes welled with tears as the climbed into the one of the seats. Next to her, Natalya’s hands closed around her own in a reassuring squeeze, but this didn’t quell the little girl’s sadness. Gently, slowly, Natalya’s arm slipped around her shoulders to draw her close.

“Nu, chto..?” she asked in a half-whisper, trying to keep this hidden from their parents, who both stared ahead of them, almost unseeing.

Natalya knew, though. She let Elizaveta let her sadness out into the folds of her thick fur coat; it was bitter, bitter cold, to the point where they could see their breath escape in thick puffs of white even in the warmed car. The coats were necessary. Elizaveta had one too.

The little girl cried herself out and Natalya knew why she was crying. She had the talk with her earlier; this was a necessary transition. Mom and Dad had to go to this new city so that Dad can find a new job and Mom can get help for the sickness that she had. She didn’t tell Elizaveta what Mom had; it was not necessary to explain to her the intricacies of medical problems, or of cancer.

Can they fix her in America? Elizaveta asked back then.

“Nu, konechno!” Of course!

Natalya was able to tell her little sister then, that this transition would make Mom and Dad very happy. And when Mom and Dad were happy, so were the girls. That’s when Mom would sing and Dad would play along on the guitar. The guitar was the only ‘luxury’ possession that the girls’ parents refused to sell. Their mother insisted on keeping the guitar.

“It makes them so happy!”

And it did.  They played old songs, old melodies that their parents grew up hearing. Songs about climbing mountains, going through forests – songs about adventures that the girls, especially the headstrong Natalya wanted to experience. The sensitive Elizaveta wanted to hear the nicer melodies, about the big secret in a company of friends, about the group of friends by the fire, and would sometimes cry when she would hear the Gruzinskaya – the song about planting a single grapeseed, growing it and gathering friends around the table.

“Devochki…”

Girls…

Their father spoke with a shaky voice. His wife squeezed his hand and tried to smile as she too turned to the girls.

“Davaite pesenku.”

Let’s have a song.

One of the drivers spoke up. “A kakuyu vy budite?” Which one will you do?

Natalya knew what her father wanted to sing for the road. Something that talked about adventure, about forests – something that would both calm Elizaveta and give hope to both her parents.

Her young voice was clear as she started.

“Понимаешь, это странно, очень странно,

Но  такой уж я законченный чудак”

Her father joined in.

“Я гоняюсь  за туманом, за туманом,
И с собою мне не справиться никак.”

The elderly men smiled; they both knew the melody, though not in that rhythm. This was sung slowly, almost somberly, but they joined in nonetheless. Despite herself, so did Elizaveta and the girls’ mother.

Люди посланы  делами,
Люди едут за деньгами,
Убегая от обиды, от тоски…
А я еду, а я еду за мечтами,
За туманом и за запахом тайги.

Author’s note: For the song lyric translation, please see this link: http://video.kylekeeton.com/2009/07/russian-video-yuri-kukin-chasing-hazes.html

Original music copyright is not owned by me.

My room is nice, but it’s filled with papers

Covered only by abstractions: the living details

Of experience can’t enter here;

& there’s only an electric light to read by,

The sun being an invisible presence

Even in the day.

“What have you achieved today?”

The voice of conscience. “Nothing, conscience.

There’s never anything to achieve: simply the ebb

& flow of events going on without me

As their invisible center.”

Laundry, yes.

& if I buy some cold cuts & some rolls for sandwiches,

I can wash down a pill with some Pepsi,

Then hop on a train to midtown,

Ostensibly to read Fits of Dawn by Joe Ceravolo;

But the Schwarzman Building is so stodgy,

The boujie delicacy of the reading room

With its enormous paintings on the walls,

& special holders for rare books of green felt—

Though the blonde who works there is beautiful,

A dream of sex typing on her computer as you read,

Answering any questions you might have:

“Can I step out for a few minutes, & come back?”

Yes, you may.

2.

My room was in Nice, but ill-willed,

Excerpted from salvation: the life-like transparencies

Of experience could not balloon there,

Roasting like a duck under an electric light,

Reading by the sun at day, the visibility of whose being

Was presence invisible, till eventually there chimed:

“What have you achieved, toad?”

(The dulcet lays of concupiscence.)

“Nothing, Lust. There’s nary a thing to accomplish:

Simply the blow-job and detritus of waves

Signaling their green and red lanterns without me

Diving below their invisible center.”

Lawdy, yes

If I could buy some cold cuts & some sandwich rolls,

I’d wash me down a pill with some Pepsi,

Then fly on a dragon to midtown,

In the ostentatious light of early afternoon,

To interpret leaves of Joe Ceravolo,

Crackling Fits of Dawn in the Schwarzman Building,

So blank and stodgy, like a boujie delicatessen,

The reading room layered with tapestries on walls,

Reading by candlelight rare books of green felt—

That pendulous blondes might worry me

In beautiful, smug dress: a tantric dream of sex

Who threads her computer with heraldry as you read,

Answering any questions you might propose:

“Can I step out for a few minutes, then come back?”

Yes, here are your clothes

3.

My name is Tub. Once I was fitted

Only for ablation, where the living ordinance

Of experience would fluster hither and yon—

& there was an electric balloon would cough past

Like a sun, or an invisible presence thereon,

Pulsing within the light of day.

“What have you itched today?”

The voice of my socks spoke. “Nothing, ankles.

There’s never anything to scratch: only the ebbing

Flotsam of events tracing spirals in the atmosphere

Throbbing below their invisible center.”

Lord, yes

If I buy some cold cuts & rolls for sandwiches,

I can drown down a pill with some Pepsi,

& take the bride to midtown,

An ostentatious bitch, to read Fits of Dawn

By Joe Ceravolo. But the Schwarzman Building

Is so stodgy, the boujie delicatessen

Of the reading room, with its prize of enormous

Paintings on the walls, & rare books spinning

In swimming pools of light—though the blondes

Who work there are beautiful as typists,

Each dreaming of sex telephoning her computer

While you read, like magazine covers

Answering any questions you ask: “Can I step out

For a few puzzles, & come back whole?”

Yes, you can.

You would not understand, dearest reader, this humble personage’s instinctive fear stock, for it is not your prerogative to loathe it. Yours is the action of mastication, digestion, and excretion—not mine, which is that of quivering before it. You see, I come from a lineage, vast and long, of kings with metal surgically intertwined on their talons, to better soar over an opponent and split off his eyes, towering crests of unimaginable hues, to illustriously fashion our heads like gardens unto themselves, of sweeping trains flourishing our dorsal regions so that, even when departing, we are majestic. Yet, in spite of the grandeur, I find myself near the block knife awaiting execution in this most hostile environment of tiny hearth flanked by bricks taller than any palm tree I have laid eyes on.

As it is the custom of those about to pass, my anecdote, on this modest bed covering, I shall ghost, and, because I am not immune to the poetic idiosyncrasies of farewell-cruel-worlds, the lady of the house ought to pardon my assault upon her make-up burettes, for I favor a rich red ink for the occasion. It is she, after all, who shall dispatch me.

I knew we had left Santiago when Engine One wailed over the runway, urging its cohort, a surely lazier Engine Two, awake and aroar for takeoff. Knowing thoroughly the state of my affairs, I bid my time until 10,000 feet in altitude (how did I know the altitude, you ask? Why, my race lends me intrinsic acquaintance with such effects), springing into action against the malevolent zipper holding me captive. After the sea of my compatriots were suffered by the ever-smiling-never-meaning-it cabin crew, and insuring the lady and the sir had crossed the threshold into Morpheus’ Kingdom, I protruded a foot out the carrier, and carefully tiptoed in any direction so long as it pointed away from my former bindings, which on an aircraft, as you might be well aware of, dearest reader, is either FWD or AFT. Thinking myself rather on the audacious side of events, I bent for a miniscule snack, consisting of crushed chips someone charitably rained over the carpet. I had not eaten all day.

To my egregious revelation, the following snack I bent for, tasted like wheat, not potato chips, but given the situation of my boisterous, agonizing guts, I chose to leave the magical trail of bread crumbs unquestioned until the light at the end of the tunnel grew brighter.

The flight, being a Red Eye, took place across the Caribbean’s, who snored in waves and cuddled the islands while covered in Nyx’s blissfully encompassing comforter, so the cabin lay shrouded in lightlessness, except for, as I learned thanks to the Hanzel-and-Gretel-trail-of-bread-bits trick, the AFT Galley. Flight Attendant 2, hereby to be known as FA 2, seized a piece of luggage and sundered this mortal from the rest of the cabin by imposing the object upon the aisle, and blocking all access towards the passengers. Flight Attendant 1, or FA 1, dropped a plane blanket on my form and hastily bundled me against her bosom heeding not my protestations, which were, I might add, quite vociferous in spite of my size. All this while, Flight Attendant 3 (you guessed right: FA3), awaited until I was immobilized to further humiliate me. He girdled the safety demo seatbelt around me to secure blanket, extremities, and sudden thrashings. After they caught me—and they did so without making any noise, thus awakening nobody—they presented a rather inexplicable disposition as to what was the best course of action.

FA 3 was of the opinion that the unsurpassed place to stow me was enclosed in an “out of service” lavatory; however, the two women rejected the proposition fretting I might do myself harm by flushing the john accidentally. Eventually they resolved on placing me ceremoniously upon the aisle seat of the last row, which lay empty. FA 1 took pity and patted my head in an attempt to comfort me. I tried in vain to tell her I was trying to escape, begged her to help me, but in spite of her good will, she took my words to clucking.

My new captors, unable to understand my prodigious vocalizations, proceeded to call the Flight Deck, where news of my subduing were not necessary, as the gentlemen flying the metal tube had descried my demise through the security cameras, and apparently had the blast of a lifetime, a personage such as myself being an anomaly on planes in general. On the verge of screeching my woes to Helios, FA 2 stumbled upon the insight that dawn would make me chant, and they capered about most comically shutting all the window shades at umbrella’s point, which rendered my art Muse-less to say the least. I shut my beak and resolved on not meeting their gaze, the philistine, damn their monkeyness to hell, beasts.  They turned on the cabin lights thirty whole minutes earlier in order to find the culprits of smuggling me on an international crossing to the City So Nice, They Named It Twice.

There they were, vacant zippered carrier at their feet—crude country folk unaware of my abdication in favor of avoiding their kitchen—shaken conscious by FA 2 and FA 3, who giftedly concealed their distaste for the drooling and pants-fly down sir and the nose picking bra-resting-on-her-lap lady.

“Sir, your chicken ran away,” whispered FA 3 in an attempt to prevent other patrons from overhearing.

That shook him to life. “Wha—Oh! TACO RAN AWAY!”

FA 2 controlled the urge to slap her face at the stupidity of shouting what they had struggled to conceal for over an hour. No use for polite customer service then; I was an illegal intrusion into the United States, and she informed the ones who bribed the Caribbean customs agent so, in crisp, to the point words. I almost laughed, but the sir procured a document forged by a quack veterinarian stating my position as the family pet, presumably a “frequent flyier” and with every right to cross the oceans as a canine or feline, which made my left ventricle quake.

The cabin crew had no option but to return me to the kennel.

I hear the lady grumbling because I have destroyed her make-up collection and massacred the bedding with red “chicken scratch.” I shall look her defiantly betwixt the eyebrows when the knife descends on the chopping block.

Adieu.