i can see your bones

outside it was dark and the wind made me feel
like my eyeballs were made of x-rays
like i felt like i needed a bandana
to hide my breath.
a plastic bag from cvs rolled down the street
like a tumbleweed.

i will set you on fire

i dreamed i had to put my name on all the things that belonged to me
so i didn't lose them.
good morning i said.
it was like when you're a kid going to school. or how in kindergarten
all the objects are labeled. but it wasn't. it had nothing to do with that.
it wasn't like cattle branding
and it wasn't like oh i don't know. it just feels like it's slipping away.
we sat there and waited for it to pass.
i will set you on fire, i thought.
i will cover you in very cold water while you are showering.
i will hold you in a way that makes it difficult to move.
i will bathe you in milk and honey for i hear that they are comforting.
i will send you all of this in a note
that i will never write down.
what are you thinking she said.
i didn't know what to say. i thought about nothing at all.
nothing i said. i am not thinking about anything.
a mouse trap closed. i went for the sandwich bags.
the feeling of an empty word bubble
worked its way up the back of my skull
and to the front.

in a hanging several things can happen

i read something today about scotch tape and xrays
but i didn't really understand it.
today at work someone said they were astounded
which was pretty great in itself
but that they were astounded that there were people
who did not want their fish to taste like fish.
i have not a hard time, but some difficulty wrapping my head around the whole subprime mortgage thing
i have a hard time focusing on one thing for more than a few minutes. like one or two.
i have a hard time caring about several things.
my masturbatory habits range from average to frequent to average. i find it very hard to nap.
if i set you on fire would you understand that i was paying attention?

i will lay siege to you

i had a dream that we were holed up in this old building
made of stone, and that there were soldiers everywhere
and it felt like chewing gum for way too long. your parents
were somehow involved, and there were fires.
it ended with you telling me you were not a fucking dead horse
and i was not riding you any where
any time not in the marital bed not into town
not no fucking way fucking how.
she gave me a look that i decided meant she'd had the same dream
and it too had touched her deeply
in ways we couldn't yet talk about.

o the dreadful wind and rain

my teeth felt hollow and empty.
at the foot of my bed i imagined
was a very small whale
slapping its tail against the floor
and trying very hard to blow water out its spout
with little success. i closed my eyes again.
in the relative dark the radiator sighed
the pull down drapes sighed
the bed sighed
the pile of boxes in the corner sighed
i don’t know why.

i was thinking about something else

next door the hose leaked a swimming pool in the alley.
i could hear it.

i kept shifting around and she asked what i was thinking about
i said the kind of tub you can take a real good soak in
i said what are you thinking about
she said i am waiting for the lights to come on
like she was talking to me from deep inside somewhere else
like a traffic light or an office building or a dream or her mouth
and then i feel asleep, so it didn’t much matter anymore
where it was coming from.

at night i wake up with the sheets soaking wet

i wish that the idea of setting my heart on fire and handing it to you
didn’t sound so melodramatic and silly. it isn’t.
sometimes the entire sky looks like it is on fire
and i love this.

what are you talking about?
what?
just now. what were you saying?
saying?
yes. saying.
nothing. i wasn’t saying anything.
oh. was i dreaming?
yes. go back to sleep.

i tell myself it is time to go to sleep
it is time to go to sleep it is time to go to sleep i
am now asleep. the radiator is asleep the bed is asleep
the dresser and all the clothes are asleep the stairs are asleep

go to sleep she says. right now.

i'm sorry for the things i've done

when i came home in the dream i went straight to the bathroom
i had to pee in a very real way.
in the bathtub there was a very good looking woman
and i was going to ask her what she was doing there
but at the time i was holding my penis
she said to me i am here to create order
and to cleanse. i had the sense i had seen this before
but it was still sort of very beautiful and then
she was startled by a sound like a knocking at the window
but it was alright
because the window was not in the bathroom.

one balloon and four airplanes moved overhead

i think about marrying some farmer’s daughters
four or five of them giving me twenty one sons.
i imagine frequently using the word toil
in my head.

i imagine a swarm of children releasing their balloons all at once
the flags shaking
as their balloons went all the way up
one child began to cry
and the others quickly silenced him.

tonight i plan on seeing lightning strike a television aerial
even though the weather report
has not given me any indication of this
during today’s forecast.

lemon hill

people in down vests sucking hungrily
at water bottles on trains. various billboards.
not a one of them for aquariums. a cluster of four
story houses covered head to toe in aluminum siding.
i think it was supposed to be elegant.

what in the world are you trying to tell me she said.
i said i am trying to tell you about my day. about what i saw.
why i said what did you see today?
she said i saw apples blooming early on strong branches with buds
on streets people were sweeping clean
i saw well-maintained hardware stores
i saw several clean looking ponds with pretty yellow ducks in them
i saw tall buildings that weren’t too tall
i saw friendly faces and horses everywhere.

where was this? i asked.
cleveland. she said
i said you went to cleveland?
she said no. she said she saw it. on the tv.

these stars like so many low-flying planes

i sat in the back yard on a tree stump.
my feet were on the concrete.
i thought about moving to a folding chair
to have something to press my back against.
in the kitchen it was four degrees cooler
and upstairs it was fifteen degrees warmer
but these are just guesses.
the planes moved overhead
loudly. the christmas tree lights hung around the windows
looked nice. it smelled like it had just rained.
it had. straight ahead in a window i watched
as a woman turned a very bright light
on and off.
i called my mom and told her to build a veranda.
i said there weren't enough verandas being built these days.
she asked me how i was doing.
i told her i was getting over a cold that yesterday i thought i'd gotten over entirely.
we talked about the last time we'd seen constellations.
i said i had to go, and that i loved her, and i hung up.
i didn't have anywhere to go.
i watched the skies, and thought about if certain things
were something else entirely.