The Color of My Cheeks

the windows were colder to the air
and the little sack of life was in my arms
so that I was an unwed mother
and this child does not have the capacity to feel
so that the tight curls on the shoveler’s face were mosquito coils
burning the air that was warm to the face
the glass’s grain was unbelievable again

straight up in the air
400 tons of slavic steel in cubic centimeter
gnarled into an impossible knit of heatless factories
where the music gets louder because the metal seems irrelevant
to the desire of the pummeler and a hundred men with triangle hammers
smooth out the bumps

the pills don’t work and I blame the rug
because I have glasses now and my hair
would look best in a 16mm reel in millimeters
but who am I fucking around with this stupid song in the air
we all gotta die someday because the pills don’t work

---

From an Admirer

hear the carrots eating worms and diffusing
by what you might call luck I ran across
your particular brand of cynicism (read:scribblings)
and sir I must say it burns like STD cream
and I must say that you would make a lovely daughter

my first love was of course the brass flute
the way a handle and a plunger head met
with the delicacy of pumps on a pipe it was i
who had had it that was that this was then while while while

and it wasn’t a surprise when she signed me up
you see I was always the sort to be volunteered against my will
at night I would hold myself and cry because of it
that’s jut the nature of men with long faces

but what to say except i’ve always been attracted to lights
half way between on and off and i’ve never had enough
of simple images that are just beautiful like germany

sincerely, t stubbs- electrician

---

For My Students

plates of brandy collide like plates can
and my hand gets longer and longer until I can reach
every note at wait and isn’t that the worst
knocking against some of these heads like they’re beside themselves
and I sit around too long until I start to collect ash on my face
which I streak and spread until it becomes the new primary color
replacing red and destroying the context in which plants exist
ha ha plants I am a juvenile and you are supposed to be in spring
how does it feel to be so crushed and canned and fucked each season
to have your kids fucked each season by editors that don’t work
that just want to breathe on hands that paint
to sit so matronly and wither is a crime I shall be jailed for but fear not

when I have it coming i’ll let you know and then it’ll be loin
that gets severed in celebration of birth so that
we can finally walk with limps like angry young men
and skin will be in

I can recommend asians because of their supposed exotic
I can recommend killing your students with a hammer
or I can recommend taking them into the woods and seeing which ones can fuck really hard and which ones can’t walk
I can recommend wedging them into funnels and gluing their heads to literal gutters so they know what they’re talking about
and if they think they’re really rough then you’ve disabled them and done what you needed to do

rakes bring me luck so I carry them round my shoulder
with a strap of maybe leather and play them on the street
against the cafe tables and hidden crevices
which I principally search for when I get really hungry
rakes bring me luck because they look like love and death
and I’ve always liked a girl with good cheeks and dimples
and i’ve always liked imitations and ignorance
so that I can never watch anything I enjoy twice
I’m going to print this out for free this time
and sell it to a guy who can really play.

---

Meat Locked

in case you missed it
there’s a little room in new york
where they keep all the meat
and I’ve been living together
we’ve been together for a long time now

and there are certain parts of the floor
I never sit down on
but other areas have been clarified by my system
to the point where I am comfortable sleeping there
because I know the dried stains and what should be wet

still there’s blood in small amounts
floating around the air
you can’t smell it but breathing fills you up
and I don’t think I’ve eaten anything substantial
but I’ve been full since the second year
of whichever trite decade you have

everything comes through here
and I style myself as a kind of cerebus
organizing the lamb from the bull
and the dogs from the duchess
and I change them when the lights are out
so that they look static and you say

this can’t be
this can’t be
this can’t be
this couldn’t give way

but it was
before I covered it in youth
and nets of pork fat

---

Always Geared for Experiments

he lives inside his mouth
cuts and alley sounds
little homo noise
time for dinner
burns and coddled
cream and dried water
he lives inside a camera
and broadcasts tee vee
to what’s holding it
and lives inside a can in some way

he lives inside a kettle
and makes rhymes you hear
and smile at but you heard them
in the supermarket and the costco
and the sam’s club and the buyer’s choice
like you were a beatnik
but you were an unknown dad
and you could’ve played every tool
like it was your construction
and you could’ve told them about
the hard times when reagan was in charge
and they wouldn’t know what that was
you sly sly ass

he lives inside an ornament
and quotes ciaberta alice
who is a singer of some discussion
and produces documentaries
about augmented sounds in country blessed music
and the meek for they are shallow
inside their sun dried earth
and the meek for they are washed up
when the fat man came to town

he lives inside a poster
coming soon