i cheat at mini golf

I've been burning things on the stove all week.
Today I discovered that we do have a fire alarm and it works.

Been reading a Jane Hirshfield book of poetry and I'm struck by the precise order in which her poems lay. Particularly Mathematics.

You see today what I burned on the stove was pasta. The rotini kind because I feel the corkscrew whole wheat curls pocket in all the sauce or pesto or whatever I season to taste them with. And that made me think of a few summers ago when I would make that pasta with that olive oil, chopped walnuts, garlic, s & p, and parmesan and serve it up to whomever was around. And that cream colored table where J.E. and I sat one afternoon staring at each other as my dear roommate was getting in another fight with her ex. It was good to have someone with me that afternoon. Other nights I would leave and lay on the grass outside, staring at the tree branches blooming above. I'd listen to Navigator's Throwing Tongues album over and over. (I never told you that, did I?)
There's only so much you can do for people. They've got to take care of themselves.
And you know, eventually she did.
And I stabbed the book Twilight and burned it with E and her sister.
Because I'd hurt too much to see and hear all that to read that even for a laugh.

Anyway, it was a good thing I had already decided I would eat some Indian food for lunch today.

PS. I saw Babies and How to Train Your Dragon. I liked them both very much, I did.

fork in your neck, oh child, oh child

One January I went to the Sundance film festival with a bunch of chums. There were six of us in a little '98 mustang. We took turns having one of us lay across the others' laps in the back seat. In Park City we wandered up and down the streets, my best friend SVo and I crossing our fingers that we'd see Adrien Brody and Nicole Kidman. It was cold and none of us knew what we were doing so we wandered the afternoon away with pink noses and hands, hiding our fingertips from frosty air in pockets and gloves. I would stare at the creaky beautifully painted houses that sat all over the twisty roads and tried to ignore the snow seeping into my boots. We found a shop and the owner told us stories of how P Diddy shopped at her furniture store. We walked up a long road through wooded woods back to the car that night. The sky was clear (the air was clear!) and there were twinkly stars abroad. Our love-birded friends were up the road (slowly), their silhouettes being outlined by a passing car's headlights. We were about to drive to Salt Lake to see the film we had tickets for. It was my turn to lay across everyone's laps and I looked up at everyones' chins tinged with starlight. It was like living one of those cinema magic moments that are sung out by Nick Drake or Sigur Ros or something other ethereal.

We're young and alive.
ba-dum-dum-dum.

I love religious art. If I were to get a tattoo it might be of the Virgin Mary.


A(n) [Old English] poem by anonymous called "Jesus Comforts his Mother"

"You met him on the streets. And he gave you his card... Snap a picture because you'll never be there again"

There's something to be said about nannying. People write books and make movies about six year olds pulling their pants down. They make some nice sum of money on their darndest moments. Maybe I should get in on this.
The children, or los monstros as I think of them, are making me remember a lot.
1 The first time I tried vanilla extract even though I knew my mother wasn't lying to me that it didn't taste good. (Last week, "Crisco doesn't taste good." "Just let me taste it." Ok. you taste that Crisco.)
2 Mom's distaste for Shoots n Ladders. "Now I get two turns." "No you have to play fair otherwise no one wants to play with you." "Then I get three turns." "Then I get three turns, too." "Ok...or no you just get one turn."
3 Richard Scary books
4 Mom's Camelot record as she explained about the weather in Camelot.

I'm still amused that the older monstro cautions me to be careful so that I won't break a nail.

I ate a cheese burger today. I haven't eaten a burger in two years.

i'm from a different country where they call you cosmonauts

I’m apt to get sentimentally attached to things. Everything comes along with a string attached to it (an unbleached cotton string, the kind that comes all wrapped around a cardboard roll and was always found in our kitchen drawer at home) to tie on memories. Like kite strings with all the little flags. A story parading through my brain as I ride around on my bicycle (which is what I mostly do these homeless days). Raisin toast always reminds me of sitting on the back stoop of my Grandpa’s when he’d take us out and point out the stars. Maybe he only did it once but it’s stuck in my brain and so as I’ve sat these last two days munching on raisin toast I think of constellations and warm nights and green carpet and white cinderblock walls. Maybe I’ll even remember my Dad’s stories of hiding beets so he wouldn’t have to eat them or maybe I’ll remember that one Easter when I left hints EVERYWHERE that all I wanted was a loaf of raisin bread. I was thinking about being sentimental because I was finishing up a movie* when I was eating the last little bites of raisin toast. It had this song**, the kind that plays through credits and makes you want the film to go on and on because it’s pulling at you and ties up a million kite strings and sets them afloat.

I learned how to gut a fish last night. It’s a good thing.

A poem that leans nigh unto tartuffe but I'm the hypocrite:

I'm from a different country where they call you cosmonauts
I'm from a different time o they don't let their garbage rot
I'm from a different kind of place where space and time do not exist
oh not as yours or mine or theirs but merely someone's its

It's not too far to walk to school or the little corner store
We sometimes pass the time by remembering there's no more
and what you do is not of yours oh not your chores and not your choice
but part of one well mechanically smoothly flowing voice

oh east germany
what you do to me
you know the best of bands
and maintain local brands
but you've tied up all my hands

at the stately parties i'm feeling super fly
because we've all got the same suit, shirt and tie
just one, because we're locally conceived
convictions of sharing and looking how we all believe

I was going to add in another line but I don't think i will.
The end.
DC al fine.


*Goodbye Lenin!
** Summer 78 by Yann Tiersen