1/31/08 Snow Man

I have a plastic snowman
face down in my front yard,
and I can't even stand it up
because it's frozen to the ground.

And that really is
the least of my worries.

1/30/08 Hot Wheels

I love when Cookie lays on the floor
on his side and quietly plays cars.
His car world is so very real.

I love the spectrum of sounds he makes
under his breath, but still intensely:
the roaring engines, grinding gears, acceleration
and fast turns, squeals and screeching brakes.

But my favorite part of car world
is the whispered smack talk,
cocky challenges and counter-challenges that pass
between all of the teeny tiny drivers.

1/29/08 Waiting

If I start writing this
with nothing in particular in mind,
how long will I have to wait
before I think of something?

And do I keep writing
in the meantime?

I feel like this is how I do
my whole life.

Still waiting...

1/28/08 Alberta Clipper

An Alberta Clipper
is kind of like
childbirth.

You think you know
how shitty it is
because you've done it before.

But it is so much worse
than you have capacity
to remember.

The shittiness
is actually
unrememberable.

1/27/08 Bleeding

If a woman says she's on the rag,
she may not respect her own fertility.
(But most of us do.)
If she says she is menstruating,
she probably takes medicine for the symptoms.
(Like power and magic?)
If she says she's a dragon,
you may imagine her in a child's hoodie bath towel.
(It's much more complicated than that.)
If she says she's on her moon time,
she probably sits in her garden without bloomers.
(Well...)
If she says she has her period,
she likely doesn't let it disturb her daily routine.
(Throw it out the window!)
If she says she is bleeding,
someone will probably offer her a band-aid.
(It wouldn't stick anyway.)

So, beautiful women, what are we gonna call it?

1/26/08 Survey Question

Are you the hugest jackass
on the face of the planet?
(circle all that apply)

a) Yes
b) No
c) Depends on who you ask

1/25/08 The Cat on the Lap

I always wanted a lap cat
that I could pet and stroke and scratch
and it would just sit there contentedly,
like in the movies, I almost said,
but couldn't think of any movies
where that actually happened,
but then I said it anyway.

But the cat on the lap,
like so many other things,
is much better in theory,
the theory being that in fact
I don't have anything to do and no reason
to ever get up at any particular time,
which is almost never true.

1/24/08 Waiting for Ama to Sleep

First I give her milk
and take off her little socks.

Then I cuddle her in
and curl up around her.

One finger traces her cheek
and jaw and chin over and over
while I sing the na na na
song I made up just for her.

And when her eyes start to close,
that's the best part.

She snores a little even before
she's all the way asleep
and she's soft and beautiful.
It is so wonderful.

1/23/08 Water Eyes

Each of your eyes
is a pool of water.

The deeper I look,
the more I can see.

And when the sun shines into them,
they are clear and bottomless.

1/22/08 Manic Depressive

In my experience
the people like the manic
much better than the depressive.

The manic is like
the fun grandma's house,
and the depressive is like
the other grandma's house.

Everybody wants to go to fun grandma's house.

1/21/08 Monkey Brain

I had cleaned the filter thing
on this machine of mine
and was trying to fit it back in.

It wouldn't slide in there.
I pushed harder than I should have
and I banged on the thing.

And suddenly I felt like
a really, really advanced primate
that could almost do all the things
that human beings can do
but really can't do any of them.

1/20/08 Haiku - Take Two

A haiku is just
chicken, boiled down into
a bouillon cube.



Note: this is the first time I have ever known how to spell bouillon.
And also, I suck at haiku and will never think of it as a shortcut again.
I will try not to ever think of it again at all.

1/19/08 Note to Self

Sometimes I think
I need to tie
a little red satin ribbon
around my index finger
to remind myself
that I am still talking
and that I should stop
now
or soon
and that no one is listening
anymore
or shouldn't be
and also
that I already finished
saying what I was going to say
a long time ago
and that if there's nothing else to say
that I should just stop
and be done
like
now
ish.

1/18/08 Mental Health Nature Walks

This idea was promptly abandoned
the moment I realized
that its effectiveness
was inversely proportionate
to the temperature outside.

As the temperature falls
(to 20 below zero for example)
the mental health effects also fall
to the emotional equivalent of 20 below zero.

Wait, that's not inverse.
Then it must be versely proportionate.
Either way, it's way too damn cold
to be outside walking.

1/17/08 Morning Drivers

I watch cars go by in the morning
and I can tell where they are going and why:

That kid is gonna be late for school.

That girl is, too, but she doesn't care as much.


That woman has to drop off her kids at daycare
and she has so much to do when she gets to work.

That gentleman is clearly retired. Why is he up so early?


That guy has to go to work again this morning, but if he
drives slowly enough maybe he won't ever have to get there.

1/16/08 Mittens

When it's cold out I put on my mittens
and imagine a woman in Bangladesh or India
sitting at a sewing machine piecing them together.
Mitten after mitten after mitten.

I wonder if she knows I'm thinking about her,
if she knows how important her work is to me.
Because sometimes my hands get so cold
they turn red and won't bend and they ache.

I wonder how useless mittens seem to the woman,
as useless as a snowblower or a remote car starter.
I wonder if she ever thinks about me.

1/15/08 Hazelnuts My Ass

Today I bought a coffee locally.
I thought it would taste better.
It actually tasted like hazelnut flavoring,
which I didn't order and don't like.
But it did taste better to my conscience.

I drank it and thought about hazelnuts,
or filberts, as they are sometimes called,
or empty ernies, as my parents made me
believe they were called when I was little.
Lying to children is always good. And funny.

I used to live in the hazelnut capital
of either the country or the world.
Either way, impressive. Springfield, Oregon.
I never saw a single hazelnut there.

I would have thought that the hazelnut capital
of the country or the world would be full of hazelnuts.
That everything would be built out of them.
Or at least that there would be one hazelnut structure.

Like the corn palace.
Hazelnut city hall.
Or hazelnut mini golf.
I mean, Jesus Christ.
Walk the talk, Springfield.

1/14/08 Camp Neche

I went for a walk in the woods today.
As I parked I thought about psycho killers
and rapists in the trees and I was a little scared.
I started walking.

A small brown owl flew right across my path
and I felt like Artemis, the wild forest woman.
Birds called and cawed and I started thinking about
my ancestors and forests and wolves.

I imagined being encircled by a pack of them,
their paws in the snow, snorting in the cold.
I could feel them hiding. I looked for a stick to swing.
I got to the river bank and sat down in the snow.

Snowflakes landed on my skirt and didn't melt.
Two black and white ducks flew away, trailing their feet
along the surface of the water. I listened to the ice and
the cracking of cold tree trunks, and I thought about lions.

She would be warm in her coat, a huntress lounging in the snow
just behind me in the bushes, her yellow mountain eyes burning.
The water flowed over the ice and under it, and I imagined
her smooth teeth sinking into my shoulder.

You know, a heart flows like a river.
And fear crouches like a lion.
Winter comes like a bird.
I'm glad I have found you after so much searching.

1/13/08 Barfilicious

After another long night in front of the corn stove,
I have encountered all different kinds of elucidation
(that's Tracy's word not mine - mine is barfilicious).

Like, for example, you can't I-Ching the bible.
Try as you might. Doesn't make any sense.
Old testament, new testament, tried both - no good.

It's like the longest list of words that don't go together.
Next time I'm going to try it sober,
but I'm not terribly hopeful.

1/10/08 Problem

I just realized the problem with posting these poems.

When I am feeling something that I (perceive as) shouldn't
or need to share something that I (perceive as) can't
then it gets ugly fast cause now I have to
still do the thing only fake it.

And believe me when I say
when I started this I was not
looking for another thing to fake.

1/9/08 Love

There isn't anything else.

Love is the whole thing.

But why is it so scary and circus-y?

1/8/08 I Have 5 Minutes

This should be easy.
This is what I'm good at.

Fast and witty, creative but quickly
before school gets out, I have 5 minutes
here at the computer while I'm
doing this printing project
while the baby is still sleeping.

Here we go,
but see, now I have to
go wake her up and get her shoes on and put
more paper in the printer, warm up the car,
jackets, hats, turn off the lights and
I'm off.

Little short on wit,
but otherwise a poem.

1/7/08 A Little Haiku

I want to say some
there are not enough syllab
I can never fin

1/6/08 Why I Hate Video Games

I know that people who love video games
love video games
more than they love me.

So that's my official answer.

My unofficial answer is that I think it is so absolutely bitchin
that my six-year-old practices high speed car chases and ramming
police cruisers for 30 minutes every day after school. Rad.

1/5/08 Beer in my Fridge

Yesterday I became concerned
about the ratio of beer to
other things in my fridge.
It appeared to be about 1:1,
which, for the record, is not the ratio
at which I consume beer vs. other things.
Usually.

My metaphor bank is low for beer,
only naughty comparisons come to mind for
that most phallic of all beverage containers.
Why are those bottles so phallic?
Is it for the ladies?
Or is it for the men?

Anyway, there they all sit,
chilling, if you will,
my army of little glass soldiers waiting
for someone to feel the need for refreshment
and break their ranks, while all the time
my apples don't have a prayer, and
my bread waits in the bright recesses
for it's big chance.

1/4/08 My Houseboat

My houseboat is white with a white railing
and you can climb on top of the roof
and hang out up there.

It's tied to the bank all summer
on the Mandan side of the river.
It's actually not mine.

If it was my houseboat I would untie it.
I would sleep there every night,
and always wake up somewhere new.

I would go inside and make lunch,
and then bring it out on the deck and eat it
while I floated. You could come along.

1/3/08 sad and drunk (just scroll down through this one)

Is it better to have it a little bit than to not have it at all?
Is there a seed of happiness somewhere that I have
planted deep in the fertile shit pile of my accidental humiliations?
Maybe when I can see what I have I might stop wrecking everything.
Embarrassment and begging, and self-degradation and then
some more begging. There is a poem in here somewhere.
Just sit with it and in the end I may be a better person.
I may be a stronger soul, someone who can ask for what they need
or who can accept what they deserve. I will stop begging
and I will find the beauty inside of the living. This is my stupid poem,
so happy 2008. 2008 is great. 2008 is great. 2008 is a march
into painful knowing, which might hurt less than not knowing.
So happy fucking knowing.
Happy 2008.
Happy servitude.
Happy halfway.
Happy better luck next life.
I will probably live every single day of 2008.
And maybe that's enough.

1/2/08 Not You Are What I Need

There are not enough words
in my mouth
for me to express
how much not you are
what I need.

1/1/08 Jigsaw You

I can see the angle as your eyebrows
furrow down toward your nose,
and the eyes like water underneath,
the widow's peak, thin black sideburns,
jagged lips pursed down and in.
My mind can draw each piece, a neck,
a wrist, the cheekbone, the back, from two inches
or across the room.
But all the pieces just float and swim
and will not shore up
into a picture of you.