24 Poems ~ 24 Hours
I imagine long nights of love making
You entering and exiting, welcomed or by surprise.
Experimenting.
Exchanging smirks and kisses.
You try. I try.
How did we end up here?
Not long ago
You were just a cordial ‘Hi & bye’
Now we’re each others highs & lows
Sweaty embraces. Bodies shaking.
You in me.
You glare at me with your eyes
And then turn back away from me
Because you only saw
An ugly face
Starring back at you
With a open heart
Full of a lingering love
Inside a genuine art
He wrote, talked about man
the existential loneliness of
man I suppose, or was he
hungry for a peach out of
season he could not afford?
The prices asked for imported
fruit and vegetables! He grew old
he grew old, he grew old, he knew
where cheaper trousers were often
sold to the oldsters pawing through the
Goodwill offerings of discarded books,
colorful straw boaters, scarves, bric-a-brac,
what-nots salvaged from another man’s
lyrics. What is this diatribe about you’ve read he wasn’t very nice,
an anti-Semite too, he grew old, in disfavor, unhappily
married to a manic depressive, who was put away. She grew
old and barely ever complained she dared not eat a peach.
We need more images
a chance to dream; imagination.
we need time to think.
***
we need to process
too much running around
we need to keep breathing.
what a thing it must be, to be grown for beauty; to attract // to serve
the purpose of catching an eye, turning a head, inviting a smile // existing and
subsisting with the sole intention of brightening and blooming, even when rudely plucked from the whole // looking at you, I feel all of my plans quite abandoned; sure that I shall live my life forevermore with roots extended and drink my fill – face to the sun // and dissolve.
Looking out over Phnom Penh,
Watching over the rain again,
Not chasing the gold,
But the opportunities, two-fold,
Could we stay one more span?
Factor this into our plan?
I see so many,
Keep moving on after a one-year trip,
I’m about to see my sixth year hit,
No longer than two years in one place,
But this may change due to that one and only face.
I’ve seen it change in the past two years,
Just like this city we have come to call home,
There are always these kinds of fears,
But together, we know we could actually, anywhere, bloom.
So, whether it be in Phnom Penh,
Or another place again,
Looking back here,
Or even further to New Zealand,
The best thing is we can be together,
And wherever we end up it could well be forever.
We’d build a home in a ravaged land,
The static high in the sky,
It’s tasting like the steel of your heart,
The soft mechanic pull of your breath,
We are building up the disaster here.
I wanted you to disappear,
But I see there is hunger there in your eyes,
Wanting so much, but never going after it,
It’s never enough for your soul.
I know, I know these things will inevitably change again,
And we last, oh god, we last in the last remnants of the day,
But the day has only begun,
These thoughts fill so stupid,
Fuck, I hate the sound your name makes in my throat,
And on my lips.
We would build in these ravaged lands,
Because the mess is the image of us,
And there is a hunger here, for you,
Always you,
A hunger for change, and you.
Remember the days
When a night of movie viewing
Involved a trip to the local video store
There were VHS tapes
Lining the walls side by side
In different genres and themes
It was important to get there early
When this movement first began
And hope there was a VCR available to rent
When I think back to the excitement
Of an at home movie night
And a Popingo suitcase VCR
It still makes me smile
Remembering the stack of cassettes
With the bold stickers- Be kind, rewind.
The clouds are calling out to each other overhead,
anger flashing between them,
and the remnents of their words coming down to us in a cacaphony.
Sometimes I wonder about what they must be arguing about,
or if some of it is just a show of force to those of us on the ground.
Reasons for us to not taunt those beyond our understanding,
and so far up above our heads.
They must have really high opinions of themselves,
or they wouldn’t be so loud when they choose to be.
I think they like the attention that a bright light or a loud boom gets them.
Or maybe they’re just lonely up there,
and want to be seen again,
since cloudwatching has become such a lost pastime lately.
They miss the admiring eyes of those on the ground looking up,
and seeing amazing shapes and creatures in their midst.
