Nomady

wind chimes break the day

cat obeys, summoned to a

window- raise nose to smell air

An Ode or a Memory

I fell asleep last nite w/ vanilla

sensations burning longer than i could,

the wix still lit in the late morning of

hangover and the throw up remnants

of before and orange juice. I fell

asleep late last nite drunk and

powerless, shunned to the couch w/

my comfort coat as my pillow. It’s the

tan suede one w/ fur cuffs and fur

lining around the neck, the coat I

had to live without for nearly two

years. The coat that wrapped her love

around me- my lonely, shivering body on

rainy Mondays in March and April outside

NYU or the Bowery, while tippin’ the

rose that is my wild eye, and trying

to smoke a joint w/ wet matches.

 

It’s the same coat I wore drunk again,

back then- beyond drunk and lost in

the maze that is the Financial District (Manhattan),

in desperation, searching for gold street

like a street rat. I spoke to the

garbage man that nite, I tried to speak in

Spanish to him when I climbed up into the

truck. I understood when he said

he liked the fur, but he didn’t

understand me when I told him I was looking for

gold street, or to direct me towards the

bowery coz I had a place to go there.

He drove me around the maze a couple more

times and ended 2 blocks away, maybe, from

when I first spotted the truck.

 

I’m not sure, but I don’t think

I was wearing my fur when I was

kidnapped by hospital, though I wish I had coz

I wouldn’t have awakened so alone,

in a drunken wonderment,

concerned about where I had

ended up, hoping it wasn’t the psych ward.     

But then maybe the people I met from bumming dollars 

for the metro, who did put me on the train

after I was released,

after they fed me at Veselka,

the Polish diner at 2nd Ave & 9th St.,

wouldn’t have, wondering why I needed a dollar

wearing a coat like that.

 

In retrospect,

I’m sure I looked like a train wreck myself,

and I was just another naïve lush

to melt inside the nitty gritty fibers

of New York City- smeared make-up, unwashed hair,

my tattered, wet coat, my skin looking

jaundiced and drunk

existing merely in a delusional

fantasy world.

I wanted only to be the

new slum goddess.

 

Oh, my suede love! My furry, extra skin!

Where have I been without you? I hope I’ve

taken care of you better than myself

and I hope you don’t mind the

William Blake bloodstains in yr pocket coz

the red bound book saved me in NYC, just as you,

in the cold rain I felt Blake’s bloody

dye seep into the fabric and threads of you, Coat,

yor pocket flapping open more

each day from overuse,

The Fly I read religiously.

Poetry Victims

lost fone

The pacific ocean gives me
spine chills like
i want it always.

Mountains over there,
the winds make me feel like
ebb and flow,

and
the rawr lasts forever.

“to do” list

Contemplatively

eat soup

with eyes rolled

down to nose,

stare out window.

lost dogs

I walk down Armitage in Lincoln Pk.

nearly every day.

It’s a nice place to raise yr kids,

cutsie little shops for all those

living nearby

in the cutsie little big mansions.

They seem to have an influx

of missing pets- cats, dogs mostly

and the occasional missing person

will pop up.

Someone you’ve never seen before,

but now you know them well enough

to recognize his or her photo or stats,

well enough you mention it to someone

like it is somehow personal now,

like it is yr own friend,

yr own absent brother.

Before you know it yr walking down

the same street, at the same time

and the familiar face has been replaced

with Fido’s in mind now.

(The sun still shines)