Salt

In the event of a blizzard
There is period
of impending blizzard
Where trucks spray salt
on the streets
And Doppler radar monitors
the motions of the front
Moving, heaving,
crawling across the Midwest
And even though we watch
the weather — we know
exactly where, and when,
and how it will hit us,
its movements all a pattern —
We can do nothing
Not one thing
to stop it
So we salt the roads

But I guess
Somebody
I guess, one
morning, I guess
Somebody forgot
to salt the street
by my house
And the road was blanketed
with this frozen carpet
so pristine
and pretty and yet
Even though it was
beautiful there were
lines underneath
we couldn’t see
Two vehicles
on a collision course
And did you know
that snow is
a little bit like space
so that they
crashed
in silence

Coffin Haiku’s

I’m working in a haunted house for three days, for five hours each day, in a coffin. While I was in there tonight I had a few ideas for different writing projects, which I’ll flesh out and post later. I also made a few terrible haiku’s that I’ll post here now for my own twisted sense of amusement.

Mufflers
People with mufflers
Are the worst kind of people
Vroom vroom, now fuck off

Friendly Neighborhood Psychopath
Love poem from me
Your neighbor, Alexander
You know, the psycho

The Cat People
Cat people smell like
A romance of hot piss
Not my kind of thing

My One True Love
I wish I could say
You are the love of my life
But I love food more

Slam: Sometimes I see you

Sometimes,
even though I know you’re a thousand miles away
I see you

I see you walking down the bricks
in your plaid flannel shirt
and your brown hair is
just long enough
and that backpack, it’s
just black enough
just square enough
to be yours

I see you at the picnic table where we sat
that afternoon when you
broke an apple in two
with your bare hands
and offered me half
In that moment—a juxtaposition
Adam handing off to Eve

I see you on the sidewalk
on couches where we used to surf
on the trail I like to hike
with autumn burning on the trees
the fire roaring in our ears
skipping rocks by the shore
you making ripples on the
smooth surface
shattering the sunset into slivers
of gold

I see you in the Chinese restaurant on the square
where I learned how to eat with chopsticks
and now thinking of you is like
trying to pick up grains of rice with those two twigs
my fingers too clumsy

I can’t drive down 70
without you sitting next to me
drifting through CD’s
I can’t sit at the McCafe
and order a latte
drink it in peace
without a piece of you
floating in the mix
I can’t go anywhere in this shit stain of a town
this quintessential black hole America
without someone or something
pulling the trigger
point blank into the temple
where Eve takes the apple
at the picnic table in the sun
the wind crisp like the sound
of us biting down
breaking the skin with our teeth
I can’t lose you here
because you are everywhere

Boys
with brown hair
and plaid flannel shirts

When will they stop being you?

New Discovery: Mona Lisa Saloy

True story.

My intern buddy and I were asked to write book blurbs yesterday. One of the books was a new collection of poems by Mona Lisa Saloy called Second Line Home. Neither of us had ever read anything by her before, so we were given the manuscript and an earlier collection published by the press called Red Beans and Ricely Yours.

Seriously. Get it. That collection should be on a required reading list for human beings.

I read the first two lines of the first poem in the book and my head exploded:

Word Works
I’m about how words
work up a gumbo of culture

My buddy and I literally sat in our little intern-corner for hours reading her poetry, ooh-ing and ahh-ing and drooling (metaphorically) all over the pages. This woman is the hottest thing since sliced bread, and now I’m on a mad quest to discover if the press has any “hurt books” they can give to me for free so I can take them home and love them forever.

Amazing.
I am in awe.
If I was in her presence I might actually swoon.
Hopefully someone would be around to catch me.
If not though, that’d still be okay.

Just wanted you to know.