Sunrise Over 7-11

Every day the tarot reader puts on her pink bathrobe
and chain smokes on the sidewalk in front of her shop
with its neon sign in the shape of a palm.

Once a week she hires one of the homeless guys

who hangs out in the 7-11 parking lot

to sweep up the butts she’s tossed in the gutter.

One night we went to that 7-11 for emergency wine.

The woman behind the counter had red eyes

crazed with mascara and bright blue eye shadow.

She seemed frantic, and complained that once again

her replacement had not shown up for his shift.

You reached into the pocket of your purse

and took out a pair of plastic googly eyes

and put them on the counter for a tip.

The woman's eyes lit up and she broke into a grin.

The next morning I was woken up 
by the sun rising through the window
and you were there beside me, warm and real
I got up and closed the curtain 
and curled back up beside you

When I returned to the 7-11 that afternoon

the same worker was there again, or maybe she’d never left.

She was no longer wearing makeup
and didn't seem to recognize me.

As I left, there were no bums in the parking lot

and the neon hand in the window of the psychic

was still dark, even though

they should've opened hours before.

While you napped, heavy with hangover,
I stuck googly eyes on every bottle of pills 
in your medicine cabinet

then pulled the curtains open a crack,

just enough to peek out at the future.

Nuptials on a Variable-Message Sign

 I'm standing in the parking lot of the strip mall

wearing your wedding dress

listening to a corgi bark inside a locked station wagon

The clouds whip by like in a time-lapse film

Seagulls dive into the puddles of mouthwash

that dot the lumpy asphalt,

their beaks no longer reeking of anchovies

Across the street they’re clearing the field of stumps

to build another strip mall

even though this one is abandoned save

for a nail salon and a check cashing place

and a drive-through Wendy’s

The bridesmaids smoke behind the dumpsters,

occasionally removing their heads and swapping them

back and forth out of boredom.
The priest has arranged orange traffic cones
in the shape of a cross, though we asked him not to.

Days have passed and you still haven't shown up

I knew I shouldn't have lent you my tux

with the Houdini sleeves, chances are

you're still at home, struggling to get out the door,

trying to turn that milky glass doorknob with your teeth

while I gaze down at the concrete ring I bought you

with its huge hunk of 24 karat gravel

and absently pat the hand truck I bought

to help you wheel it around

our names engraved in flowering script

across the handle, mine intentionally misprinted

in a private joke which only one of us remembers

The bulldozers and backhoes rumble back and forth

across the street 

The years rumble past as well. 

The bridesmaids have gotten fat on Wendy’s 

and we buried the priest some time ago, there was no one

to say the eulogy

but that Corgi’s still yapping the back seat

of the station wagon, I don’t know how,

and I’m thinking I’m not going to get

that deposit back on the space beneath the underpass

we rented for the reception

Seaside Sushi Lounge (Stick Pokes Eye)

Heading home after a day at the beach

My arms and legs stuck inside

the bento box of a car. My stomach feels encased

inside a cage of bargain basement samurai armor,

Japanese potato salad smeared across my lips

for the seagulls to kiss

Look, I don’t know why I can’t seem to

ever be happy, why I keep poking my eye

with this same stick,  the car only seems

to go in reverse, the hills are alive

with the sound of train brakes screeching

Memories of future wrecks,  my heart…

ah, fuck that thing, that chalky green lump

that wet folded pile of pickled regrets

pungent and greasy as my face I don’t care how much

you cry, I won’t lick your tears, won’t lick

the tree sap trickling down the crumbling

walls of bark, also fuck that guy back on the beach

squirting lighter fluid on the briquettes

and debris piled on the sand.

We stop in a souvenir stand at the base

of beautiful Clearcut Mountain,

pick up some tree stump air fresheners for gifts

Shuriken stuck in the forehead of a chainsawed Sasquatch

standing beside the highway on a bed of rice and pine needles

We squeeze through a tunnel only

to burst out the other side half digested,

dripping wet, marinating in our own juices,

sunspots on my tongue

Blades of light through the trees I keep trying

to roll down the window and shove my appendages

out so they can flap in the breeze can you

smell the seaside yet? Still? My tentacles

tie knots around your knees, ah fuck

the ocean breeze, I’m slathering on

the sunscreen, painting polka dots

on my cheeks, organs withered or

plump and slippery, never roasted just right,

why don’t you just go ahead and hurl that

tempura cookbook over the edge

of the lookout point where the couple slipped

while taking a selfie, everything’s bugging me and

I don’t know why, or probably I do and don’t

want to face it, ah fuck this sky,

this road, pull over here, wait

in the fucking car while I take a leak

against that tree trunk there, this time I’ll be careful

not to get any on my goddamn sneakers

Nebraska

          I liked saying your name, swirling it around in my mouth, feeling its weight on my tongue. Liked gripping it gently between my teeth. The curtain of static parted to reveal you standing in front of the fireplace, flickering in and out of existence, looking at me like you were seeing me for the first time, like you had no idea who I was.

          I had no idea who I was. The fire crackled. The wind ruffled your bangs and you looked annoyed. Through the windshield, the earth was black and the sky was gray and it was all speckled with raindrops. Your thoughts hit me like a tractor trailer and knocked me to the carpet. The highway folded itself in half. The strings twanged hard but never snapped. You'd sliced your finger cutting collards and you held it up and I kissed the bandaged tip.

          Your finger was never bandaged. I never kissed it. I was on my knees my head pressed against your belly as you ran your fingers through my hair.

          A tropical zephyr ran its fingers through my hair. I was swimming through a forest of bleached coral. In Pompeii a buried filly clattered to her feet, trotted off through the rubble. I breathed in dread and breathed out anticipation. Out of the corner of your eye you glimpsed a Buddha sitting and smiling unperturbed beneath an avalanche of river rocks. The fire in the fireplace kept shrinking to a single glowing ember, you got down on your knees to breathe it back to life.

          You got down on your knees to breathe. Angels drifted in wobbly orbit at the farthest reaches of the solar system, hiding behind planetoids every time a spacecraft hurtled past. On the edge of a small town in Nebraska, a couple of guys cased cars in the parking lot, mincing between the silver puddles. My side split open and thousands of little clay figurines made in your image spilled out. When I tried to gather them up they turned to powder in my hands. I had no idea who you were.

          I had no idea who you were. It was like I was seeing you for the first time. You were running your hand along a windowsill covered with Mississippi sand dollars. A chalky lozenge melted under your tongue. Plate piled high with little corn husk bundles. Lemon rind peeled in a single piece, twisted strips of amber flypaper. You were on your knees looking up at me. I reached down and ran my fingers through your hair. The car stopped. I went through the windshield.

            The world went through the windshield. I don't know what happened after that.

         Years later there's the shattered hand, the splintered wound, the splint and the tape and the twine. As you recover you watch the the squirrels bouncing on their circuit from mimosa to rhododendron to corrugated shed to the house we once tore down to build another house from the same wooden planks, then back to the mimosa. The air is chewed to pieces by the symphony of chainsaws and lawnmowers in December. You watch it all through the dining room window, laptop on the table, laughing every time the squirrel almost misses a branch, as in the next room your teenage son dances with the vacuum cleaner.

White Circle

 A piece of chalk

to mark the path

between the pickup truck

and the porch steps,

to measure the distance

from the porch steps

to the straw mat

The wedding guests

wipe their shoes

Heavy lace curtains

A single bare nail driven

into the plaster

Dust on the floor too fine

for the corn broom to catch

Water burbling on the stove

Run your hand along

the smooth, solid bannister

Upstairs flutter of paper

The fathers bicker

as is their ritual

The bride’s thick braid

hangs between the parted blades

of a pair of garden shears

It hangs there a long time

A pail of very cold water

An empty clothesline

The guests shuffle their feet

Cough quietly into their clean sleeves

The chickens scratch in the dirt by the fence

clucking their incessant questions

The ax head buried deep in the block

has only one word with which

to answer them