a thanksgiving prayer

my fingers smell like orange peels
i have been eating clementines for minutes on end.

in the sink there are little barnacles
of toothpaste.

from outside the cold has a smell
independent of car oil or burning wood.

all of these things are here with us today.
and also several take-out menus
for which i am very thankful.

your eyes are flashing like airplane lights

“i am at times terrified of you. of a rising violence in you
or your eyes growing large and you chasing me around the house
with your arms stretched like the wings of a plane.
and this terrible bleating sound coming from your mouth.”
this is what i think watching her sleep in the morning
when i think my heart will break at any moment
as i plan the escape route out with window with a sheet
or maybe like tapping her at several point on her face
causing confusion and maybe momentary paralysis.
i wouldn’t want to shoot her or do something that could not be undid.
or rile her up any more. in theory.
i feel like if you’re going to bring a gun into things
than you’d better make sure they get up, because i imagine
that being shot would hurt, and make a person very angry
and far less likely to have sex with you.

blood in my eyes for you

The other day at work I was gutting a bluefish and inside it was an octopus. “MATTY” I called.
“What,” he said.
I pointed with the fillet knife to the octopus I had yanked out with the gills and the guts. It was stuck. It was wrestling an anchovy but the anchovy was already dead. It had a golden beak. It didn’t. Squids have beaks. It had a golden sac that was moving in and out very quickly. “He’s scared,” Matty said. Matty went up and dribbled water on it from the hose. The octopus’ tentacles loosened. It looked very tired. We both sighed. Then the octopus leapt from the cutting table to the sink and lifted up the drain cover and dove straight down. We imagined it in the sewer, growing bigger and stronger, covered in gold. Sending it’s arms up any pipe it wants. Having hundreds of children and seeing them all married off. Losing its memory with the bad parts going first and dying before it really gets bad. Or not dying at all. Raising an army. Hiding. Squandering its potential. Farming Soybeans. Who knows? We didn’t. We don't. Plus, Matty says he isn’t certain this happened. But we both know. The anchovy knows. There is blood in its eyes as we speak.

leave me the way i was found

i shot into the sky at the stars
i knew they weren't stars that they were planes
and that i didn't really have a gun
but it felt like something i had to do.
as i walked back things seemed to lighten
the less i thought about them. there was a long time
to get things done. the planes were in the sky. fish
were in their tanks, baseball was the national past time
i had little more to say on this. warm and cold fronts were moving
right at each other. something big was going to happen.
i could feel it. i could feel the cold too. it had a smell.

i have been trying hard

i thought i was something else.
like a small pearl handled revolver or a stained tooth
or the sort of thing that swallows other things whole
or a bird that eats things you need
but not necessarily good things though
or the dead, the undead, an afterlife,
i was up in heaven it was cloudy
or a definition in the dictionary, that seems solid
like a sturdy thing or an old country singer
surrounded by weeping strings and pedal steels
and weeping women singing and everyone weeping.
sometimes, she says, i don’t know what you are talking about.
i feel the same way. i say this in my head. i also say in my head
that it is good she lets me get things off my chest like this.
the other day i thought there was something very heavy on my chest
like an anvil but when i opened my eyes it was a bandit crouching there
and that turned out to be a dream. it was raining.
big surprise right?

i am starving!

i talked to my brother the other day i said
oh how is he
he’s fine he just said he never wants to have to read
or write anything or ever think about anything ever again.
so midterms were rough she said
no i said he says he doesn’t have any tests. just papers. and talking.
oh. that is what she said. oh. oh well.
i know that one day she will come home
and break all of my limbs. that she will take me to the beach
and we will get swallowed by a whale there
and inside its belly i will make us a home
and everything there will be safe
and a little damp. we are used to the damp, i think.
the sink is damp the washer is damp, but not the dryer.
oh the dryer. i am thinking about pinocchio i say
is it because you are worried you are not yet a real boy she says
yes i say. that is exactly it.

i will love you the best that i can

she says if you leave me
i will make this house disappear.
i will take every coyote in sight
and place them out of sight
and they will whisper to you night and day.
she said i will watch as you ride into the sunset
and it will burn out my retinas.

a note on the happy couple

they made their home across from the creek bed
and i watched as every night
she knit socks around his bare feet
until he was covered in them.
when they lit a fire it smelled like cap guns
planes flew overhead
disguised as vultures. whales could be heard
but never seen and not once did anything there smell like rain.
not ever.