New Poems Fall 2009

Ointment

Ointment is intimate.
You or
somebody else rubs it
into the spots that raise
the dead.
I rub it on my throat to poison
a cough. Never works
right away.
It is sloppy wet on my neck-
Helping me breathe-
like life support.
I can feel it in my nose.
Everything else-
feels like television commercials.








EFS

This girl
Sits next to me in media class
Has this tattoo behind her right ear
Says EFS
It’s faded
It goes down the back of her head like this:
E
F
S
Everyone Fucking Sucks
Every Fading Second
Ecstatic Flustered Stunned
English French Spanish
Exorcism From Spirit
Easy Fuckable Sexy
Early Five PM Sunset
Ears Fear Saying
Eric Fucked Sarah
Emily Fingered Scott
Everything For Sale

I’ll never know.





Birds, Bees, Sparrows, Spiders

Those scared birds need to stop squawking. They are all so prude.
I ask about a sparrows favorite musical group.
Heavy Metal. Cornell’s voice. Rock n’ Roll.
I said she was a sparrow before, but she wants to adopt a seal, like a black family
adopting a Mexican girl. I am a spider. I don’t have antenna, to pick up her vibes, only poison to slow her down. A bird is a meaty catch for a spider. I spin a web in front of her, my mouth wide open, to look sexy. I spin silk. It twirls like prism batons.
She’s got healthy feathers and flutters the right one lightly, drinking.
My web is complete and I am high and drunk. The sparrow is not high, she is not waiting for me. Your web is very pretty, but I don’t understand it, she says. That’s really cute
you like seals, I say.