from Unsolicited Stories of Ex-Boyfriends

Morton repeats his stories of naval days again to no one in particular as he chain smokes in the room where we are seated. I was on the USS Missouri when the Japanese surrendered, and there are the black and white photographs on the wall to prove it, he sputters pointing with the tip of his cigarette. Though everyone in the photographs is about one quarter inch tall and I had little to no knowledge of history much less ships or sea despite a decent high school education. His wife holds an ice cube to my left ear as she prepares to pierce the virgin lobe.

Their son, my crush, cruises the neighborhood to score a five-finger baggie of grass which will likely be mostly stems and seeds. Back then we were only so particular. Morton is three sheets to the wind at 4 o’clock in the afternoon and gets mighty angry when interrupted. Their charcoal myna bird in a cage in the corner of the den repeats family expletives. After a while this isn't charming or even funny anymore. I wonder today why I was there alone with these people and where exactly were my friends, my net, and my understanding.

The television is on and yet no one is watching. I feel a slight stab though the connective tissue is numb. Orange juice stands at ready in a jelly jar with a drawing of Pebbles and Bam Bam on it, in case I feel faint, and Morton's daughter who is my age walks into the room with pink curlers in her hair. She makes a face at me behind her mother's back as if to tell me to run, get away while I can, and then exits through the garage because rarely did we use the doors that were right there patient with their dirty knobs and silenced doorbells.

Comments

Shameless Early Promotion

My poetry book, The Fiction of Stillness, is available for pre-order now on Barnes and Noble. Official release date August 1st, 2024. Here's a taste: ... The table is smooth and round symmetric The chairs are haphazardly placed at the end of this day I have breast cancer I say into the receiver [communities must] pool resources How to produce the sounds of the imaging report into sentences that resonate with months of postponement weighty contrast on my right side computing and comparing IM ratios for greater insight not sufficient to prove the efficacy of screening ...

Vessel

Inside I imagine puckered cups of butter cookies nested in paper that releases a sigh But instead there may be fiction within wishes never reciprocated Playbill of redundant arguments One black glove found fraying This vessel on an emptied table solo temptation is labeled with another’s name Guarded initials as if carved in melting snow A tool unsuited to the task of prying open Not yet valentine

Broken Bits and Mending Tape

S acred stones roll around on the floor of my car, carried in over years of scavenging. Pocketed. Parceled. Placed on dashboard or grave. Markers of present coloring past. The sun bathes the windshield just so and the secret messages written in mud or snow show themselves for the innocent blessing that they are. I walk into this side street café with my bruised heart in a purple and black satchel and am greeted by a circle of banjo players and one free seat against the window. Chairs like we inhabited in elementary school when things were still made of wood, grafted together at the corners with metal, corners rounded and smooth. We kept our notes in desks and lockers, wrote whispers of names we adored on the plain brown wrappers around our math books. Took broken bits and mending tape, carted cassette songs of guitar players who have since died or changed their names. Like mantras, directions to the river canyon where we could picture the rough rope as magical swi...

As Mourning Doves Persist

Search This Blog