Sense Making Mission
potion of hope
of skill and conviction
low-key with a need
I bend my knee to move closer to the floor
its warming magnitude a guide
humble position of salutations
low-key with a book
next a record player
a red velvet couch and the majority of cushions make a fort
this is not an enterprise or an escape
this is a vase filled with plastic flowers
my poem making content so fake and in need of rapture
I tie my hair into a bun and pretend to pray
I pause and think about birds
then about shrubs
a shrub inside a meadow isn’t a shrub it’s a field
I wanna date myself so I can learn to be a better person
when the moon finishes waxing it’ll be like full on a dude named wayne
don’t take me seriously if you want to survive this pandemic
I’m not a truth-teller I’m a truth taker-awayer
a nay-sayer with billfolds tucked into my magician’s cap
tall and handsome tends to thread this domain
if only all heroes were bandits and heroes and bandits alike
this measuring device isn’t practical
I’ve not wheat or yarn to conduct electricity
fire me before I hire you
dear manager, who do you manage
manage me?Â
curtain closes from this brand-new scene
can benefit from the debris found in the sea
its oxidation qualities aren’t consumable or part of renewable energy
but they’re elastic and not plastic
I’ve been working with metal since 2003
I’ve grown to know and understand only about 50% of its materiality
I’m not a specialist
the effort it takes to bend, form, mold, chase, clean, cup, bang and begin is too eventual
eventually it’ll become something we can use
eventually it’ll become something we can wear
we can display
am like damn the neolithic people had so much more time and patience
such an abundance of time that the threshold with which to develop materials like swords, spears, shields and tools with ornate detailing was more common practice
now we just hold a phone and barely lift a hammer
can’t outlast eventuality
can’t extend a life vest to an uninvested subterranean debutant
the back shakes out
the sand falls through the floor
we’ve been improvising with glass for vessels
we carry water to each
other
we’ve tried to cup it in our hands but it’s not enough
your lips are cracked like you’re wearing a bronze age mask
a face full of cinema
Shakespeare would be so proud
his words have lived the longest out of any words
only maybe religious texts before them
here maybe hope can be rekindled
or something less serpent like might crawl out
I have hands cupped again and am trying to carry the words across the page
some slip through the cracks
so dome-like
tall in a heap like a snow cone that’s too much ice to consume
I touch your knee and you move closer to me
we improvise and it’s no surprise that it takes so much effort to rise from bed
just to be a person
you can’t give up on
Oars of Sand
I feel like I should never write another horse poem it’s so easy tho
it’s not like I’ve much attention for horses or its instances
I’ve not grown to know them or breed them
or harness them or ride them
or glide my hand with brush across their mane
I’ve no knowledge of horse
yet I’ve found myself making poems of them
huge instances of luck and free judgement
sound countryside
side saddled
and ladled
with a saltlick
Yesterday My Math was like an Algorithm for the Dead
huge impulse to shatter glass!
huge need to fracture a rib!
to be in a cocoon of unabridged sadness
to be mistaken for wisdom-making-person when you say poet
but really just funny elastic nonsense
that bounces back with improvisational impressions
you see we don’t qualify as reason-making-machines
but it seems ppl are needy and they want a wedding poem
they want a funereal poem and they want you to write it for them
they don’t have ideas of their own to make into poem and they don’t want to use one they’ve found on the internet
they want you to give them a new poem written by a real poet
preferably a living poet living in New York city
see so if you learn all the techniques to write the perfect grief poem but you’re not in a grieving place yourself- that very lack of authenticity will make the grieving ppl all the more marketable to because you can use your poem making trickery to sound so sad and relatable
the content making machine that you will form formidable alliances with stand-ins for community-based supporters so maybe even now you will know showmanship and can pledge a glass on a donkey
huge hero that you are! shatters the glass ceiling!
