WHY DID THE POET CROSS THE ROAD?
For John Dorsey
They say a thick skin
can get you through anything.
Harsh winters, harsh words.
But resilience deflects
more good times than bad.
Hercules never had a lazy Sunday.
No smell of fresh biscuits,
honeyed crust. No slick armor
of grease all the way down to his knuckles.
Keep mine thin.
Fried golden.
A healthy mixture of dark and white beneath.
____________
TRULY, I’D PUNCH NINETEEN-YEAR-OLD ME RIGHT IN THE FACE
For Dan Wright
Dan is sick of people
hiding behind almost.
Their intentions weighing up
to a certified, though long winded, zero.
Me? I’m tired of “used to”
and the promises to start up again.
“I used to play in a band.”
“I used to eat better.”
As if any splinter of my old selves
would have any fucking clue
what we’re supposed to do next.
It’s not like we’d listen to them anyway.
____________
THE WEEK BEFORE I GOT SOBER
“I am growing up, no more poems
about cigarettes and wine.”
I pour a glass of wine. I need
at least two before my throat
wises up, remembers that the
acrid taste of a menthol
is almost certainly followed
by a humming joy, flashbacks to its youth.
I light a cigarette and remember
what Tony Hoagland told me.
It takes me too long to realize
he’s never told me anything.
Maybe, it’s how we read,
the way we tie cords to the strains of beauty
so we can find our way home.
Makes us feel as if we’ve made a friend
every time we visit the local bookstore.
It all unravels. I go down the list:
the poets I haven’t crossed paths with,
the fathers we suddenly don’t have in common,
the tundrous nights they didn’t get me through.
It was just me, a blanket,
an unrequited call for help. Caring is a choice
sometimes and I guess I have to decide.
I start coughing, blaming the cold
hanging onto the end of October
for the sharp cough, the subtle smear of tears
across my eyes, like two sallow
reflecting pools in a courtyard
no one has ever visited.
I flick my cigarette into the grass
and regret my lack of foresight.
I regret my impulsive leaps into the night,
the way my knees feel when I fall,
my lack of interesting things to write about.
Rusty Truck 