an octopus in a jar

you outta dig this, thirdworst.

It is a funny thing because it
doesn't shake when you
shake but it sloshes and
wriggles in the jar.

Do they always look angry? asked
the kid.
Well, the thing is... trailed off the mister.

But the long short of it is that
they're like mice - they can
get into anything.
The one in the jar had
crawled through an opening smaller
than a quarter.
Stretched out, it was over
six foot long. They're
supposed to be intelligent, too.
Always wondering,
how did I get myself into this?

And I guess they see well.
Maybe they're more like
us. We can change colors.
I'm in my green shirt, and
look at all this ink.

ds

Re: after I read about somebody thinking something

If you would take any person in
any moment and
picture or paint from
it,

all it might do
is mislead.

We shoot un-
happy faces between
happy ones.
I look at
women when I'm
looking at cars.
Any moment might
not be the minute.
No minute's an hour.

We move so fast I
cannot keep up. I
Cannot keep with
nothing.

Does not surrender its
spinning: the world.
I see what you saw.
All the people in
all the pictures have
a motive that's free
from guess, and
far from know.

ds

today and in 5 years

because someone else said it's cold, it's
cold. socks rolled up. first
smells of the furnace burning from
the basement. empty treelimbs
scrape the siding. I
am inside, but will
have to mow one last time
if the rain breaks.
maybe it won't
break
until May, then
will rain it's own
rain, but to be
followed by warm, then
cool, then warm,
then
cool.

ds

side

so bad that I dreamed you died last night
so bad that I dreamed you died last night
and sat watching television in
another room. this is all
in my head again and again.

come back from Florida.
I like alone but can't stand it anymore.
can you put your head in an electric oven?
these are the things I think for days on end.

ds

IF

IF
I DIDN'T CARE
WHAT YOU MIGHT THINK
I'D TELL YOU THE TRUTH...
AN ABDUCTION
OF THE THIRD KIND
AND IT'S NOT WHAT YOU THINK
NOT WHAT YOU'D SURMISE
I DON'T CARE
WHO YOU ARE
NOW LEAVE ME ALONE...

IF YOU DARE

maybe didn't mean it that way...

But now to
lift
the mood a
little, I
think I'll
read about
the
Battle of
Stalingrad.

ds

A ghost taught me to speak in '96.

I'm not sure which is quicker - a trot or
canter, but either has outpaced the
pace here. Gin
rolls uphill quicker.

Me, I'm just waiting for my sleeping pills to
kick in. So... write words
about words. Spend all day making
adjectives into nouns. small small.

We ate the simplest soup of potatoes cabbage and
kielbasa after we got
drunk making it. The dumplings were
very good.

I can tell what you are reading and
why you sound like you do. Stay away.
People bury themselves with themselves.
If I were meaner I would say it in a
different way. But I will do it.
Find elsewhere.
In the kindest way, find elsewhere.
It looks different. Don't know it.
If I were paranoid that's all I would be, and
only meant us when I said we.

ds

entangled

it won't be long now till it's over:
history is here, and with it those
images we failed to erase

it does us no good to repeat them

but we try all the same,
talking circles into the evening
until there is nothing left but to

stretch our toes, one around the other,
and stand to walk away

old leaves

the pole arrived today, weeks
after the season is over. i shake
the box and sense somewhere between the
crinkled edges that there will
be no more camping for months —
maybe years. but i have this spare
pole now to replace the one that
rotted in our hands near devil's lake,
do you remember?

there were always devils between us.

like that first time you shook your
tent in front of me and
all those old leaves came
tumbling out

apres midi

your body full of such beautiful, but
you are away. I count
four states and many rivers between
us. You said you would be two
weeks. It is a month. The
hummingbirds have left here to
fly to you. In their place is only wind.
Brown leaves swirl in the corners outside the
house. They anticipate the snow. Please,

fly back before autumn is over and we have
not walked through the park on the way
to quiet banks.

ds

shamba

no mysteries.
everything in the open
and reaching

the rattle moving in the middle of dark.
shook shook.
the cars whisper past.

shook shook.

ds

solitude brought

its one of those cold
early fall days
the sun tries to give
light through thick
grey cloud cover
succeeding but then
failing

somewhere out there
i hear someone doing
the last lawn mow
of the year

here's to the optimist

i've been watching my cats
chase each other all
morning the little white
one chases
the big grey one
and then vice versa
their feet sound like
small concrete shoes
across the linoleum
of the kitchen floor

those are the only
sounds here

those and the tap tap
of computer keys

DWC

sooooo...

so having no blog of my own from which to pontificate likes/dislikes and feelings/not feelings, I am appropriating space set aside for my lame poetry to otherwise open my lame mind. I cannot sleep and am unpoetic.

reason: one of the ladies that lives in a group home I oversee passed away this afternoon. kind of suddenly. not neglect. pneumonia.

I'm shook. I don't want a drink.

so for the next indeterminable amount of time, my job will be in the shade of this. housemates, staff, other residents on the mope. I'm already on the mope.

she wasn't much older than me, or anyone else.

our big Halloween party is in a week. I think I'll get a mask.

ds

can't ssss

misspellings are meant

no memory no memory, the cottage
floor. full of the past.
wine all over me.
absolute and alone. is it
moonlight or sunlight? the windows
maybe are open.
the bridge creeks across the river, but
no one is on it.
everybody's sent away. the
radio is sullen and will not answer
when the dial swings.

I sent you away from here. you
left with glad and stomped across the
river. your brother threatened me at
the grocery store. I don't care.
I will be here on the floor.

fall swoops in and the birds leave.
ice crept over ice. wind smells like cold.
I don't want anyone here.
this is the first winter here.

I will not leave. uninterested
in history's ideas
for what comes and what has
found its small place.


ds

Best Poem Ever

Posted on Life Is Art.Sunday, September 30, 2007
Best Poem Ever

As I lay in my bed, with my eyes closed
As I am drifting off to sleep
I compose the most beautiful poems in my head
I assure myself I will remember them
and write them down on paper in the morning
But I never remember them, unlike my dreams
Last night
I wrote the best poem ever, in my head
my lovely little head

sometimes bad looks different

Evening and Slow


I will tell you of the street night and
Peace - late after a storm, and haze on
The corners. The car strolls from
Lamp to lamp. Meets no traffic.
Night’s gotten cool but still humid.
There’s a breeze and a cross
Breeze. I have dimmed all the
Dash lights to nothing. Fog lights duck into
The roadsides and sidewalks and yards.
I see no fences; will not escort alleys.

The beers open themselves. They siss and
Glugg cool and cold. And disappear without alarm.
I am risking everything in the safest way.
The streets must be seen. They are sharing their
Joy with me. It makes me a criminal. The
World only opens sometimes. And now it’s open,
Asleep and alive.

There must be day and night.
Each carries invisible stillness and slow. Sunlight
Shows daylight and everything glow.
Night shows the insides of things.
Tonight is time between the two. Both
There and not there are on the yards and sidewalks.
The whole world opens and receives and gives. There is
Shade in the pole of the street lamp.

Then home calls through haze to come home. The last thing I
Saw was a small boy with a small fire fishing
On the dark bank in the park.

ds

me and me

Details of the Wonder

Something sharp moved in the trees, and I
Knew the easiness was gone from the
Morning. It was time for the end of the quiet.
I leveled off the bore; made adjustments for wind and distance.
The hooves made
Small sounds.

There was a giant sound.

I do not care for the details
Of the thing. We were fed for
Several days. Square meals.
Then we moved down to the river, for
A week of quiet fishing, without liquor, or women,
Or any of the other small worries.

dsds

This one has really been a favorite of mine for a while now, sorry it's not new

The Glare of the Sun on the Water

Momma don't afford us a
Babysitter, but in the summer she
Lets us a pass to O’Connors
Pool. She is nice.
I hold Cody’s
Hand when we cross Washington, and
Ninth, and Huntington. He barks
At the chained-up dogs. I
Tell him its mean.
I worry about him.
I worry about him when I
Go to the girl’s room and
He changes in the
Boy’s room. There’s older boys in there
And they’re mean. We
Meet outside the
Snackbar and find a place to
Put our towels.

The water is warm, and alive. If you
Go under you can hear the
Kicking and splashing. I can’t
Open my eyes underwater, but
Cody can and he says it’s cool. I jump
Off the middle diving board, and sometimes
The short one. They’re both too
High for Cody. He watches
Me dive. I watch him do
Cannon-balls by the ladder.
It’s like the water
Swallows him up. He
Comes back up all
Smiley and blinking.
He kicks with his arms.

Today Cody got in a fight with
Russel. They used to be
Friends but they aren’t anymore.
Russel’s mean. And the lifeguard’s mean.
She made Cody go home. He was
Crying. I walked him through the
Girls room so nobody would see.
Cody didn’t bark at the chained-up
Dogs. He was nice. I held his
Hand across Huntington and Ninth
And Washington, and down the
Sidewalks too.

When we got home Irving was
Awake and smoking and watching TV.
He was mad. He don’t like us
There. Cody tried to tell him what
Happened, and I said it wasn’t his
Fault. Irving didn’t listen.

Irving’s not nice, and he’s
Worse than mean. I don’t know
What he done. Cody cried.
And Irving wouldn’t let
Mommy near him. I snuck in his
Room after everybody was
Asleep and Cody was quiet.
He was so cold. I whispered that
Everything would be alright tomorrow.
That I wouldn’t let
Russel or Irving near him, that I’d watch his
Cannon-ball, that we could
Split a coke.

The next morning they wouldn’t let me
Go to the pool. They said something
Happened, but wouldn’t tell me what it was.
The lady, Mrs. Caston, said
We had to go. We drove down Washington,
And Ninth, then Columbian, then Lincoln.
Then a whole bunch of streets
I don’t know. I tried to tell her that the
Car was big and there was room in back
For Cody. She really didn’t say
Much, but I think she was nice.
I think she wanted to say more.

The ride was quiet, and long.
I thought of the water, and the
Anxious hands breaking the still.

ds

when you're trying to train yourself to write more often and do manage to write but not so well.

you know, I used to sit awake at three a.m. with mouthfulls of poems that I didn't write down. then you wake up terribly old. anyway...

The Face of the Scepter - How Things are Made

I will not regard you, giant, as
A giant. I do not give, and
Will not give you the rivers that
Whisper across our land. My
Tribe is small, but my
Brothers have married well.
You will find nothing here.
Go while my mind is soft.
If you stay a thousand blades are
In the wheat. They will
Meet you. There is nothing here for you.

When you have left, I will send my
Sisters back into the fields, and
My uncles will join me
Under this roof. We will call
You a man of judgement. You
Will have my consent. I will have
Your olives at
The end of the season.

later

ds

evening coda

our bodies, and
now we are in our place.
The evening will
please us. Feel
the warm in the air.

I drank from a bottle of water, then
you drank from the bottle. It
was hot today and dust was
in the air. You
looked like you were looking through the
clouds. You
saw something. I cannot remember
what you
say it was.

Now I am all
tired, and have wiped the
sweat off my face. It is
late. The yellow
moon is over the
west and will go
leaving night
sounds curled under the fence curling under.
I love



ds

dearest third worst - response to your latest blog entry

I notice how well
you create people's lives
from
their face or
something you see in
their eyes. What
you wonder and what you
create. The difference (I think) between us
is you start in
real and drift to imagine. I
start somewhere else and have
less questions. I know less also; only
be.

Your town is three or four hours from mine.
The road is
made of kilometers.
I am afraid of your town, but only
because I have been there. This town
has people. I drink them. They sell me things
and smile or don't.


The world is the same everywhere. We
make our worlds from the world. Then talk
about it somewhere else.

It is time I come to bed. It is tired here.
In the morning
we will carve the earth and
form it into the
shape of
lives.

Just In Case You Thought You Were Special

I remember when I use to want to be a writer. Dreams of Pulitzer prizes danced in my head.

But then I got older, and I started reading the stuff you write.

So I burned all my notebooks, all my hopes and dreams.

And then I realized you were quoting Flaubert and T.S. Elliot.

That you did not in fact write that yourself.

Damn it.