Matchsticks

2005

I went bare-assed into the battle

–Charles Simic

On her freckled bosom we drew a map of the world 

This dream begins and ends in an attic
Black attic!
Grandfather running with stick!
Hidden treasures!
Baby carriages!
A still living baby!
Burnt bonnets!
The baby is smiling!
We feed it sugar!
It nods its head like a queen
A little queen!
And tiny kings!
Pumping their hands in greeting
Tiny kings who love us!
My king kneels down every evening
My king does that for me
His royal lips uncovering all stories
I have held inside
My stomach
And my king makes a pancake supper
A pancake supper!
For us
Back to the attic
Where we found a living woman
A living woman!
Her throat constricted
Her belly blue!
Her words confused
We found her!
Lying on the attic floor
What glory, what horror, what skies flew over her
Life?
On her freckled bosom we drew a map of the world
On our own living woman
Who was lying down on the attic floor
Our grandfather’s attic
Where he used to roar!

Where are our magic horses that would jump through our rings of fire?

His thighs hold semen inside
From so long ago!
We have to coax it out
Onto his hands
Something we would not
Sing or dance about
She is small and clean
Her bathroom in order
Where are our magic horses
That would jump through our rings of fire?
One trick dog
On 6th street
Broken from riddles
A woman cries from the window
Come home!

Says her mother in a whirlwind

In her pajamas
Her fist full of lollipop
Face tight to the wall
Pure hair revolving
Her mother walks down the hallway
The black telephone rings
On the other side of the world
Her father is trying on a new pair of pants
Trains shrug down the track
Her brother is crying
The angels skip down the street
Her sunny street is turning
Songs enter and exit
Says her mother
In a whirlwind
Says her mother in a whirlwind
Frankly, I was talked out of skipping from cloud to cloud
And the baby’s face blackens
And the moon comes out

Hands fattened, folded

They look in
Her tiny eyes; his fireman’s shoulders
Vodka in hands
Furniture all over
They look
Into my dark and bitter corner
Where are you?
I am in flatland
I am besieged by male animals
I am broken at the hip
I am lied to
I am a liar
I cannot sing
I have a heart that doesn’t beat
Much
I am in flatland
I am without comfort
I walk in the yard like a doll still in her package
I am in flatland
No vacation, this strangled hut that serves as my
Prison
They look in
Hand in hand
Fattened waists, bending
His dull mind clicking
Her smart will to keep on ticking
They look in
Her tiny shoes
Tapping

Blurry, but still having some notion of time

You knew you had it in you
This hurricane sleeps through all the magic minutes
Senorita hands me more tequila
Smiles and yellow walls
And him there
Somewhere, it doesn’t matter
Breathe in the Mexican chatter
She brings you her neck, her fingers
This black-haired brainless gal of a widow
I am broken she says
In broken English
I am not a man
I tell her
Not with boots
Not with a gun
Or a horse
Or even tambourine
Bells are ringing!
Our morning just begun!

You, who I remember

Slept next to me
A nest of small children
Thumbs sucked, bottoms whipped
Brainless, we continued chasing our sex
Huck Finn-style
You, who I remember
On that hill
Brain dead
From too much orange juice
The kind you drink when there is no heroin
And the birds were banal
Even that, even that
You, I remember
Stuck your head in
Said I loved you
In that walk-up kitchen
Bright lights, so bright!

When the music stops

Our merry young lad
Comes in panting
Yellow shorts in a twist
A tiger bit him!
His mother shot his eye out!
A policeman followed him
Into a corner bar where they sat for hours!
His stories go on forever
But I love him
No more
Because time has stolen even the grass in my yard
Even the statues that stood at the door
Even my best dog
And my photograph of the time when
All the music died down
He doesn’t hear my wrapped-up voice
Stuck in its tin can

Now comes a torrent of song

Two crocodiles, tiny
Try to kill me
Someone saves me
I am hanging from a wall
Over a mountain of water
And the tiny crocodiles are hanging on, too
Their teeth bleeding my hand
I am bruised
But still here

Into this tavern where we are holding onto very small glasses

Endless days in this tavern
Mexican road with chickens bleeding
Walking, pecking, his hand in the till
Mexicans drinking
hot water down our throats
In comes Mr. Handsome
This yellow day
Stunned
Our fields growing watermelon and oranges and turnips
Our aprons filled with money
Our women steady-eyed and thin
He is standing on one leg
The other is gone, gone!
Into this tavern where we are holding onto very small glasses stealing glances
Comes this northern wind

All the girls with their slim necks pushed up against their windows

Train comes rolling
Mister hanging off it
Face half black, face half white
His shirt is beautiful
All the girls with their slim necks pushed up against their windows
His heart like a maneless horse, like a frozen daiquiri
Like a man without a hat, like an ant who marches straight into the harsh north!
That’s how we see him
As the train pushes north

The mother’s tale

Says a mother to a man traveling:
Listen up
I will tell you not about milk
Or a chubby boy’s leg
Or how I hopped at the sock hop
Or felt a girl’s fever
Or knelt at the crib while the sun went down in the meadow
Or put my lad on a horse so high
Or sewed his medal
Or how I, one night, kissed his sleeping mouth
Listen up!
I will tell you about
Two swans floating
About a god in the midst of finding his future
About an island of such sorrow
About a house we dream of
About her with the misty eyes
About the way we must kneel
About the heavy weight of an arrow
About the pain of leaving sweet behind
About the rain
About the rain!

We pick him up to see the world

My murky little child
Messed-up lips
Tells his mother a story
About ghosts
His chubby fingers pointed
O farm we love!
Rolling thunder, luscious sun, blue night coming
His large head pushed up against the horse’s heart
Just to hear that song
Our little mushy man!
Pants on wrong
We pick him up to see the world
Over all’s heads
Lightening then bursts
And he turns his head
Toward that burn

At a table our man sits

At a table our man sits
Teeth on his plate
Eyes plucked
Fingernails counted
Hair, each strand, cooking
It’s sweltering in there!
Our hut of all huts
He came back, our man
After such a long journey
Into the heart of nowhere, he laughs
His wrists are blue from all that hurting
I came from that place
He points
The fireplace
Where his boots lie burning

Wife

So much noise
Cars crash and salesmen flatter
My waist
I have no money to offer
An almost dead father
Whose mouth opens without teeth
In his cupboard is nothing
His wife stands on stilts
Her mind gone
In the hospital
His penis empties
How can I tell this story?
But to beg you
My monster
For a map

My mother enters her final chapter in which she is given a hero’s welcome

This house must be thrown away
Horrible smell
Three saints walk in the rain
One is dreaming of me
Her pulse?
123
My father still lies in his hospital bed crying
The prisoner in the next bed
Still has tubes in his nose
I am in love
With the guard
Her stern black glasses
And the hammering of the cranes outside
Is he still alive?
Her name is Thera
And her eyes are silver
And her body small
And her words like flowers
And the needle has punctured his muscle
The nurses run
To see the man
Who is vomiting
Which man?
My father
Meanwhile my mother
Small and unnoticed
Slips past the doctors
In her wig

I, alone, in adolescence succeeded to swim

There was the dog
Who ran away
And the cat who stayed
And the hamster throttled
And the car that stopped
Too suddenly
And the husband
Who went astray
And the storm
And the pastry
And the goat that ate everything
And the path that led to
This
Open wide
If you can stand the stench
For a few moments
She tells the handsome youth
I will tell you of my broken neck
And he waits for her glory
But I, alone, in adolescence succeeded to swim
When the story
Got
Too gory

Someone in an elevator is dying

Saint number 342
Is beautiful
A bell rings
Every time she breathes
I feel like I am in an elevator going up
Up!
Every floor gets us higher
Ding! Ding! Ding!
What floor are we on?
Now the elevator man asks why I am crying
And the saints in the back shuffle
Like timid nurses
Who do not ever want to see blood
And yet there is blood
There is blood!
There is fire!
And the elevator is going higher!
The saints like timid nurses
Cluttered in the back
Holy smoke hides them
Heroes are beneath them
Their gasps like tiny mountains
Help her
Demands the elevator man
Help her!
I look at them
These timid nurses
Shyer than gorgeous virgins
Wings practically rise from their
Magnificently slim hips
Boyish bones crackling
One’s slip shows beneath her fiery dress
Stars burst from it
Should I bend and bow and kneel?
My blood is like a river
Says one
Finally

And our very sweet mothers touch themselves!

In an ambulance
We rush our god
The streets empty!
People building houses stop!
Horses rise to their hoofs!
A policeman ceases beating his mistress!
A girl in a Mercedes looks on high!
A thug kisses the bar counter!
A priest sees the splendid shore!
A dead man brings himself back to the brink of wonder!
An old man surrenders!
Thunder!
A lion stutters
A crocodile buries his head
Some of us bury our dead
We bury our dead
And the clock says it’s time to drink
And the clock says it’s time to sleep
And our babies turn in their urine
And our fathers force their piss
And we look at the weeds
And we drink from cups
And we hurt
And we bear our births
And we walk from room to room
Moving furniture around
And our very sweet mothers touch themselves
While our god goes rushing by
In His ambulance!

I finally kill those around me and then ask for forgiveness

Will it happen?
That I could bite into this apple?