Three Poems

Lines Composed Upon Awaking In James’ Apartment to a Long Disheveled Form on the Couch, Its Head Lolling over the Couch Arm Revealing a Glistening Wig of Curls That Had Me Reaching For My Scalpel Inside My Doctor’s Satchel

Shane and his cheeks are a big old karoake hashtag
He’s all like “I look like Kurt Vonnegut” and
I’m “No, no, you crashed my lemonade stand
with your jet ski
You’re a basketball hairdresser
Shampooing a wedding cake” 

The trail was nutty with buttercups and cardinals
When do you sit with your chin
Down to your knees, Mr. Moritz?
Spill.

Any minute now Tom Cruise is going to
Walk in and fire everybody.

I toot your bubbling fantastic
vibrating in the beer spill neon
Your dance tells me where the best flowers are.

◊

Where The Road Peters Out Beyond the Old Sawmill

Lacking shoe
Gone disturbing
9 miles of Needmore

You know the vibes are right
When the balloons
Cling to the wall

Having cordial relationships
With wax figures
Drowsing in the oil flame light
Noses plopping in laps

Bic lighter and tank top
$2.95 Schlitz 6 

She sleeps like a
Washing machine spin cycle

◊

Things To Do Around A Wild-Eyed Drunk – Climbing Snyder’s Armature 

Wrap up in a blanket and just read.
Practice writing Chinese characters with beer tabs.
Paint pictures of the police outside.
They are not there for you.
Repeat to yourself.
Put out salt for deer.
Stare at iron oven and wish you were better.
Hours off hunting twisty firewood, thinking
      where morbid clowns could hide or
      guy wearing his mother’s face could pop up.

I made bargains with Ruth about which Grand Canyon mornings
I’d rise for sunset and which I’d sleep through.
Even wrote a schedule.
She ignored the schedule.
Sunsets are mercy for everyone.

Rolling blackouts.
The books the dog chewed.
The many books the dog didn’t chew.
Old Reader’s Digests left behind.
We’ll soon be in the clouds.
Oily saws wrapped in musty weather.
Forest Service sleeping bags retain
     the form of bare girls.
I can’t name the peaks, I
Tried to enjoy the climbing.
I end the night foggy socks,
a shallow pool of snowmelt.