Raining Ice Again

You have been in your head too much
this doesn’t work for you
You are a doer. You must stay busy and engaged
Right now, you are not. You are tired and in pain
Your mouth is dry, your skin is dry. It is cold outside
…You’re an idiot.
I’m bored of this already
This needs to be erased
I need to go for a walk

Off a cliff. dive into a dream of cold water
I want summer in Lake Superior
I want her freedom
Her sweet clean air

It is winter. White and dirty and grey
I slept like shit again last night.
My neck hurts. Blah
That is what I feel like
Blah
Blah blah blah
I am wasting my living
Here
Far away
I am giving it all, for what I can’t grass anymore

Da Vinci

The greatest painter to ever paint
Made sure to fuzzy the line
Where one ended and another began
That is what I am trying with your love
And poetry

This is not the poem I want to write
The poem I want to write is about taking
care of one another
But that poem is boring and nice
It is too polite for us

What the hell are we doing?
Why are we not fucking?
Must I beg for your cock in my mouth?

You are doing dishes and Im pretty 
sure you have fever too
Both of the girls do. 
I can barely stand. We are dizzy
And puking and coughing and shitting 
But you are doing the dishes
You come and check on us
bring water from the other side
of the universe and those cool magic pills. 
Yesterday I went to store 
and got a bunch of groceries. 
you were sleeping and had a fever. 
Then I cleaned. 
Brought you some pills 
And helped the girls. 
We take care of each other. 
When people complain about being married
I want to say, have you tried sucking his dick? 
Maybe if you give it all 
maybe the someone else 
will give it all back to you

As A Child I Did Childhood Things

As a child

I did childhood things

I packed a small bag of clothes

A journal, my one-eyed doll

and fled from war

The fireworks popped houses off the streets

Shattered and exploded

I hide among the debris

When I was raped and beaten

I was the cold mud and the roots

beneath my body, rustic roads

The maggots of the dead were my citizens

The worms, the trains

My blood, the smoke from the chimneys

In the darkness of the ghetto street

I was a ninja in a forgein land

guarded by red branches hiding

as the gun shots ran on window glass

I snuck across the ground under abandoned cars

hid behind old burnt out homes

Flipped over piss stained mattress

A child with missing sneakers

had penny candy by his side

with a bullet in his brain

So I took his candy and savored the sweetness

as I hid in a mulberry tree until the hungry blue

zombies came and went

When my belly was swollen and empty and my back

bare I was a monkey girl and searched

for apples and pears and blackberries and goose berries

I scavenged wild morel mushrooms and dandelions and greens

I sucked up tiny green sour grapes

I climbed and swung

when I found a fruit I’d eat

the core and worms and all

If I fell and got bloodied, I hid it

It was a curse. I didn’t limp

When I found nothing to eat

And a warm AK 47 in my hands

I was a great hero

when I killed the hawk men

and freed my homeland

The people would throw me a feast of roasted

venison and turkey and pies and cakes

With juices and butter and sweet red wines

with songs and dances with large walls and warm fires

I’d have a dry warm safe bed one day,

I would have people, I dreamed as I aimed into battle

felt the sting and pound of the ground

And my fallen brothers coming at me

In the winter snow with frozen toes inside plastic bags

I was the first to explore so far north

I followed the smell of bear and stole into old ice caves

I made a house under the great pines

broke the ice and fished with my hair and beer can

I followed the river and stole north

I stole bitter acorns from squirrels

when I found a dead thing it did not go to waste

Covered in scraps of lost artifacts

I was the last of my exploration party

My one armed doll chewed and rotten

my journal wet and dirty showed the map of my trail

well beyond where dragons or fairies ever go

I pushed on until the trail softened underfoot,

There I stepped into sinking brown mud

grasping for the first of wild leeks,

with rocks in my in mouth

I was beaten with bondage

I was warrior captured

forced to labor for the enemy

I would not shame self by crying out

When the demon goats shoved me in a bag

And throw me in the back of a pickup truck

I did not panic like the screaming

children under me

I found the seam and breathed slow

I did not cry for help

I saved my energy for the chance to run

when I had it, I ran in the shadows

barefoot with only the rope

that bound my hands behind my back

I ran til the city was new

and my legs strong enough

to kill and the rope a bracelet of freedom

I stole food and shoes and diamonds and life

I was a master spy behind enemy lines

I stole until I had enough to find home

In middle of a concrete street

I gave birth to a blue dead jar

it was a tiny fluffy head SOS sent out to sea

riding the waves and currents to bring back aid

It’s dark eyes searching for an island of refuge

a man of honor

When it came again and lived I hid it

and gave it all I could

I gave pieces of myself for coins

to buy it blanket and food

I gave everything

still, I sent it out to sea

Four times I sent an SOS

Until my blood found the riptides and the sea turtles

met the mermaid queen on the corral of the sea

When the sickness came

I could not walk, my knees swelled

my body ached and my scalp was a drum

for the great wolf chief to beat with his tail

I was poisoned by the evil hound

who wanted me for his bone

Under his jagged teeth

I pounded my fists into his mouth

I splintered and my marrow filled his belly

Covered in dirt, wearing lice

I walked hand and hand with my sister

With one mismatched sandal each and bone thin

I was blessed and happy

When the nights were cold I was her blanket

And She, my pillow

We ate avocados and little fish

when luck and pennies were on our side

We were best friends, ladies on a stroll

In the darkness I heard her scream

I tried to hold onto her

Her finger nails dug into my body

Tore my flesh

her hair was in my clenched fists

Her blood under my nails

the dark shadow lizard

Dragged her away screaming

and left me alone in our rock pile home

I was in the shadow of a great temple

writing my name with my wand

To bless the yellow dirt
when a blast went hard and heavy

I could not hear but the ringing of ice cream truck

At the park where children yelled and played

I could taste the metal in mouth

concrete and salt in my flesh

I was buried under the rubble

the stick still in my hand I was a wizard

becoming all powerful but first I had to fall

through the black hole to other side

and find the evil wizard

who had blasted my temple

let blood magic into the world

I had no hair, on a sheet

I laid hooked up to robots

my body shook with cold sweat ache

The vomit came out my mouth

shit and piss was cold and sore on my body

My eyes could not focus

Blurry and heavy all around me was tiny grey

hands holding me down

I could smell their copper and plastic spaceships

The aliens were inside me

trying to harvest my body

I had to fight so I made a clone of myself

climbed in my nose and slayed the creatures

until I could no longer

badly wounded I found my heart

kicked it when slowed

I kicked until my legs fell off

then I punched until my arms rotted off

Then I head butted and finally bit

Until their beeps and buzzing stopped

I could not feel myself

I was no longer a child

Nostalgia for War and Peace

Annieepoetry

I get it.  It was a simpler time

A sweeter time for rivers and old trucks

and tongue flicks

Or it was the music

Or maybe we are magnets

and memory aligns us back

to the crystal structure we were before

I’m not sure.  It doesn’t make sense to me

I’m aware of my ignorance.   I don’t need

everything to fit into hard little rows

It doesn’t have to be simple or straight for me

to swallow it whole and let it keep my stomach warm and new

I love winter. There I said it.  I love the cold, the snow

The bundling up with sweaters and blankets

I love hot beverages and rums and scotches

I love cedar in the swamp toppled with clean white snow

And hot steam from my mouth when I breathe out

In steam visions, touching your cheek

As my feet make a trail along a…

View original post 284 more words

Nostalgia for War and Peace

I get it. It was a simpler time

A sweeter time for rivers and old trucks

and tongue flicks

Or it was the music

Or maybe we are magnets

and memory aligns us back

to the crystal structure we were before

I’m not sure. It doesn’t make sense to me

I’m aware of my ignorance. I don’t need

everything to fit into hard little rows

It doesn’t have to be simple or straight for me

to swallow it whole and let it keep my stomach warm and new

I love winter. There I said it. I love the cold, the snow

The bundling up with sweaters and blankets

I love hot beverages and rums and scotches

I love cedar in the swamp toppled with clean white snow

And hot steam from my mouth when I breathe out

In steam visions, touching your cheek

As my feet make a trail along a doe’s path

Over the creek into the meadow under the apple tree

Pausing to breathe and breathe, happy and sad

I like feeling the relief when I step into a warm home, when I stomp my feet and take off my boots and scarf and hat and coat, the hot fluster on my cheeks. And then smelling the wood burning fire, the chimney puffing up

like my heart for you and our world

I love you. I can’t help it. It’s the music. The step. The waves. The past or the future

It doesn’t matter. But its here. It hangs on.

It doesn’t leave. It isn’t sick or destructive

not disparate or selfish. It doesn’t hurt.

Its not a spring flower, nor a brown crumpled leaf.

It’s a rustic road that runs up north along lake Michigan and never seems to end

That leads to lake superior and cools all the fear out.

You can’t own or fight it. There is no need. It’s here, in my poetry

These silent odes, from an old fat human woman

who is learning to walk soft and dream expansive peace

I don’t want to go to war. But the war is here too.

So now I dream we are holding hands, like little laughing children

Who have not learned to hate or mistrust.

I am transforming myself.

I am focusing my intentions on life. I am forever restarting with me.

I am learning to live free of ego and hate.

I am eating the fear and panic one breath at a time.

It will take times. There is times for you to learn too.

Put your ear on my heart, I am alive with you. What more could we ask for?

[AL1]

I’m all grown up

And it getting to the suck part where the old people are us and our parents are dead and the babies aren’t babies any more and everything hurts

Sunlight on my face in the crisp morning air as I sip a cup of coffee is as good as gets.

If it’s true that old people just get lonely,  I am screwed

I wonder how many dogs I’ll live with

I’ve grieved enough

it keeps coming back up
It goes somewhere and then comes back

But you already know this

This morning smelled like fall
I was relieved
I’m not wasting summer anymore

I think I’m all done with wasted

Dear Mother,

I miss being able to call you
And hear you tell all about your day of weeding your huge garden or teaching English as a second language, or your studies of foreign language for another mission trip or about the new poem you wrote, usually about praising your god.
I could ask you for your oatmeal cookie recipe or crepe recipe or what temperature to roast a chicken and you would take the time to tell me, each time I asked.

I could have looked it up but hearing your voice gave me courage. I suppose it was a way to get your love and attention, even as a grown far away woman.

Now you are a broken baby crab, so diseased and crippled you can barely pick up the phone and can’t talk when sitting and can barely stand and you talk so quiet I can’t understand what you say besides the shuffling sounds of the 1 minute it takes you stand before you say hello. These sounds haunt me and let me know you are alive

I would share this with you but I can’t . This pain is not yours

You struggle in that big house next to the pack of wolves, with the forest and swamp surrounding you, falling and grabbing at the walls, banging off the furniture and wood stove.
You fight to get up.
you fight to stay up.
You fight to sit down.
You fight to lie down
Every thing you do is a battle

And I am afraid of what ails you is coming for me or worse, your grandchildren, zombie grandma

Each day I stand and clean my house I’m grateful. I have been pumping iron and dancing and scrubbing the floor on my hands and knees, smiling as I do it. The harder the better, if I can do it because I know how lucky I am to be alive and able to clean any of it.

I know you want to die fighting alone in your house in the forest of howls but it hurts all us kids to see you do it. One of these falls is going to be breakfast for a bear or pack of wolves but that is your choice and my burden and my brothers to hold dear

One that hurts more and more because it is the end of your fight, dear Mother

I don’t want

Limits.

This language wants to hold me down and make me speak clearly or cure silence

But what I can’t scratch out or won’t whisper in your ear is more important then what I have
This
finite is mine or yours

I’m not sure

If you are capable of love

You are the last
of of my pride
so I  hung on
even though you hurt me
so  bad  – I couldn’t tell you

When I should have let go
I hugged tighter
  made excuses for you
how you were a sick
little baby and needed
my help
how you were stressed
out cat and needed a nap
how you cared too much and were too honest

Dearest Rose,
you made me believe
I was the thorn
For the last time
You probably think
I will forgive you
-say sorry for getting
hurt like I usually do

But you are Shakespeare  to me

Over the worst of it

Life can get so overwhelming that time slows down

Each day on waking you are happy to live and breathe. Your nights are cocoons; your mornings are butterflies. Their suffering shadows you.   They flash inside of you. You don’t have a cure. You can’t give back .  You are an atheist. You don’t pray.

You research all night long, all day long. You do it over and over searching for a cure or a clear path to life

All hope is lost but You don’t give up.  And then there is a doctor that puts his hands on their arm and listens and says, I am going to cure you and then does.

This is the power of science. This is the result of reason. This is the price of love.

Sometimes you have to lose your religion

It was a joke

I was suppose to make you laugh

Then you would relax and start a good time.  Some of the hurt would leave your body and the anger would stop squeezing the base of your neck.

Your fists would relax into a hand
Your eyes would soften out water

But you didn’t laugh. You smashed a beer can on top of my head.

Grind me out when

The tree in the backyard is gone. I had the guys come and take it away

It was dying. I had no choice.  Now the yard is empty.  Next year there will be a garden. But now I miss the tree. It was a sugar maple that branched out and up.  Now there is a stump waiting to be ground down and out.

The wood is stacked up ready for the coming winter

My birthday is coming.  I am going to be 35.  These poems are all I have accomplished.  They are for you, my love, my Henry, my earth, my maple, my sweet, my rock, my baby.

I am not as good as a tree but maybe when I am ground out my stacks will keep you warm

Hawaii, I hope you’re worth it

Tomorrow I am going to hawaii
It is going to cost a lot- The kids are coming.  My brother and his are coming.  But my dog must stay home.  I miss him already but more on that later

I was in hawaii once in the airport on a way to guam. The smell of flowers and feel of humid air has stayed with me and vowed me to return.

That was a life time ago but here I am double checking bags and all the things I needed to do to get ready, ready to pick another pipe dream true

Most of my dreams have come true because of Henry. He is magic. I rub him and ask if we can and he says yes.

And that’s how we got the dog.  And the babies and the house and all these poems, I’ve written for him so he and you will always know that he existed.

My Henry is a real man 

Is there a point to pain?

No. There is not.

Sometimes it hurts so bad we growl out feral death wishes and sometimes it feels like we are soaring fast and high
Invincible to harm or sadness

Happiness doesn’t need sadness or the pain. We would stay joyous and free if we could, forever

But we can’t. That doesn’t make hurt heroic. If someone trys to tell you otherwise, tell them to go fuck their self

From the rest of us

Am I Good enough

Sometimes I think I am wasting my life and am suck ass loser
Who should dig a hole and lie in it until the wind covers me with dirt
Sometimes the inner critic gets so loud and hurtful I can’t do anything but listen as she cuts me into bits of flesh and failure

After a while she shuts up and then I can put myself back together and finish another line

A job

I could have one of those. You know a real important one where people depend on me and look up to me and are jealous about all the big money I make.

If I were smart and hardworking and pretty like you, I could. But that’s you.   I’m a stupid  little toad who writes cake and  eats poetry and fucks up hard

you can have the top

What am I?

There are 2 million genes of bacteria inside my gut but only 24 thousand genes of my own in my whole body.
Those bacteria have more control over my outcome then I care to admit

I think I’m going to find the oldest living person and lick their ass clean

Lost and found

Startled and afraid in your empty house from the sound of your
own foot stepping on an old wood board. Click, then echo,
then the long creek. Followed by another. Followed by another.

First is the swallowing panic, then it is horror,  then the crazed fear grows into the chest gripping, to finally your ears ring so loud you can’t  hear if it is you screaming or a siren some where far off in the next town over

It hard to live soft enough
Not to wake up the fear
that hides in awareness

You are here
And Henry is not

See -its ok

Be soft.  Be gentle. Be

The world is going to beat
the fuck out of you and when
you can take no more you will be
dead

Don’t smoke
I don’t and I feel fine
now