Notes on Oranges, No—

When you’re peeling your orange,
The one you chose after squeezing one—no—two—no—three—no—

yes; 

The one you placed into your satchel like it was crystal, resting it
on that stack of six-for-the-price-of-four toilet paper rolls: a bed. An altar?

The one you rinsed gently in cool water when you got home, then dried—
careful to get every nook—as though you were shining crystal,
and placed in the center of that fruit basket you always felt made you look more adult—
or would—if anyone were to come by to see; 

When you bite the skin to get it started with just the right force,
when that first hit hits your nose,
when the spray from the peel you weren’t quite ready for hits the top of your cheek
and then your mouth, now open, eager to receive it,
and the waxy rind coats your fingertips,
and you dig in and you dig, and the pith starts to clog up the space between your nails and your skin; 

When you reveal that slice, the one you choose to be first after examining the lot, 
and you bite it through the center, and that bite,
isn’t it something?

Isn’t it this little perfect thing that takes you somewhere, 
to summer, or morning, or a time before you wouldn’t have worried
that if someone were watching you now,
they’d see your joy, and they’d find your joy pathetic?

But if someone decides an orange is the thing to be eaten on the train 
during the morning commute, when the doors are closed;
if they’ve chosen to eat their orange across the way from you, 
and you’re clutching and crushing your bag to your chest 
like it’s holding all your most valued possessions, 
and the only thing you want to think about now is not making eye contact with anyone here,
but that someone there is tearing into the flesh like it’s a sacrifice,
like it had been so long they forgot what an orange was like, and that smell,

you can’t take it,

you’ve got to get out of here, to go anywhere else,
away from that person, and that orange, and these people,
and you’re thinking, I didn’t choose this. 
Isn’t it torture? No, pathetic. Isn’t it a funny thing? No—

yes.  
Isn’t it?

Small Talk is a Virus

If you want to feel what feeling small is, 
Be so unseeing as to acknowledge how the sun out there 
feels against your cheeks—

Like just-dark-enough toast on Sunday morning, 
like the just-soft-enough butter you smother on the toast—
And you keep smothering even as it melts and the toast sags,
because it’s getting too heavy, but you can’t stop,
until you check to make sure you’ve gotten every inch—
Like the cinnamon sugar you sprinkle on top to make it just perfect.

Like when dad takes out the grill for the first time that summer;
Like crispy hot dogs and grainy mustard; 
Like putting the radio up even though it crackles, because it’s too old, 
and you’re drinking mom’s iced tea on the wooden benches 
grandpa carved and glued and painted that burnt sepia color himself;  

Like how grandpa would feel if he were here, 
if he were seeing you and dad and mom and everyone there still taking the grill out
and drinking the iced tea from those frosted glasses, tall with blue and green stripes,
And sitting knee to knee on the benches he made.

As this sun, it takes you somewhere other: 
where the fear of subway poles and handshakes and missing a count
as you scrub your hands until they bleed—20 one thousand—
where this isn’t the only thing filling your mouth,  
and pouring from your nostrils and clogging the radio and the tv and every inch of all of it,
making everything so heavy, so much to hold for you, and him, and her, and them.

If you want to feel small,
be so unfeeling as to tell him how that sun feels to you

as he churns out your cinnamon dolce latte with almond milk, 
yet another under fluorescent lights;  
As he says, “I wouldn’t know;”
As you choke out, “Try to take a little break;” 
As you ask if he can sprinkle a little cinnamon on top, 
And neither of you is sure he’ll get out there

before it’s already too dark to feel it
or see what’s just ahead.

Bears

Beware of babies, they said. 
With the babies, come the mamas. 
With the babies, come the fear.

Even if they glide toward you when they see you, 
Stop, then sit, at your feet, 
Gently cock their head to the left, 
Straighten their ears, 
Look you in the eye; 

Even if then they cuddle up beside you,
Tufts of brown fur teasing your skin,   
Stroke your leg with a paw, 

Like an artist’s hand against clay, 
Feeling its way across the curves and bumps, 
The sockets and lines, 

the pores and the hairs,  

Inching slowly, 
And feeling, 
Feeling, 

As if asking the medium to tell the hand where to press, 
What to pull, how much pressure, where to stay; 

Even when they nestle their head in the crook of your knee, 
And you can feel their breath, warm and heavy—
but it’s no bother, 
but it’s just enough to melt the wall 
that might have been standing between you two before— 

When their lips are gently pursed, mouth gently open: 
An oven, ready to fire whatever the clay was meant to become.  

Even when you think: how sweet. 

Beware of babies. 

The mamas gave them teeth,  
Housed inside open mouths, 
Beared, then bearing down, 
Sharpened. Tried.  
And proven. 
Proven. 
Proven.

Proving.  

The mamas gave them claws on the paws that stroke, 
Then tickle;
That stick and dig,  
Digging in skin- and spirit-deep.  

And if you care to stroke them back, 
To feel once with your hands,
To look a little left, or down,  
As they desperately try to keep your gaze, 
You’ll find the fur is matted in patches 
Too many to count, 

And there are sores, 
And wounds, 
And evidence. 

Beware of babies. 
Hey, baby. Baby. 
Right here, baby. If you just look — and smile — 
Baby,  come here. 

Beware. 

Because with the babies, come the mamas: 
The thoughts  And intentions 

The intentions 

 And the goals
 That bore that baby 
Long before you came into view.

Q&A

“They say the way you feel about your favorite body of water
is the way you feel about sex,” he says. “Go.”

“Rivers.” I say. “They can guide you home if you’re lost. 
Or remind you.”

“That?” 

“That you are.” 

The M63

“There were no teenagers in cut-off jeans. No leather jackets.
Smoking cigarettes. Not fucking on every corner. That was a class that was invented.
But no one knows. Those who do—they have to know to survive.” 

"I’m going to be squished here, now, you standing right behind me.
I guess everyone is afraid to go up. There. To. There. Everyone is afraid—” 

“Big step now. Yep. That’s right. And another. Big step. Good boy!” 

Here, each person’s chatter fills everyone’s damn space, 
conversations held with self without knowing, with air,
with invented enemies, and children who haven’t yet learned to fight. 

Here is a place without inhibition:
a place that’s like that bar you call your local, 
but it’s not just on your corner 
in your neighborhood 
with your drinks 
served by your bartender, the one who calls you by name. 

This local has been built to your dimensions—
can’t you see it?—
The curve of your lips, 
The cadence of your speech, 
The notch of your height, 
had a friend or lover etched it onto peeling paint in the archway of the entrance to your living room, 
the way your mom used to do when the only things you were sure were yours
were her and time. 

Yes, this local, you see,
has been built with doors designed to fit your height, 
to serve only your drink,  and play your music, 
and take one ID: yours. 

In this kind of local, 
you can be drunk without knowing.
Or knowing without paying mind.

You can sink yourself into a cushioned seat, 
crusted and frayed, faded by the yous who came before; 
build yourself into a world of memory, or fears,
or histrionics, or milestones, or hope,
for as long as you need to, until you decide to stop—
and if you don’t like it, get out of my way—
because to you, the world you’re building yourself into was always already here.    

Here, every you sees this as theirs,
each one more sure than the next, 
each body posturing to fit the space,  
each voice rising to tell everyone, “mine.” 

Each of you is sure that this is yours—
but none of you ever made sure to check.

Inside Sweet

How could he know,
as he wipes that wasted chocolate from the corner of his mouth,
coaxes the un-savored crumbs off the table and onto the floor,
that another man’s hands are now sore from rolling that dough?

Untitled

It occurs to me that a sweet potato has it pretty good:
Pleasurable without need of dress-up;
Soft, without inspiring judgment,
And most valuable, most beautiful, with its insides exposed.

What a Death Feels Like

I had heard people say,
“The beginning is just a fantasy.”
“The first hit (the second, fourth, the hundredth)
all rainbows and being lifted so high you question
if you’ve gone past the boundaries of the sky—
a hallucination.

Yet from me it was still:
“I want you here, like this,
just there, forever,
tucked into the nook of my neck,
and inside my back pocket,
the crease where my waist meets my hip, too,
and inside my ear, and behind it, if you can,
and within me, in here, deep.”

You never said it back.
To me, you in all my spaces said enough.

But incongruity is a sly enemy,
convincing in its mask:

As the clown I knew I should bow at the feet of
at that fifth birthday party,
the squeak of the dachshund that materialized, poof,
from a limp rubber balloon;

As the lilac tutu I knew to prance proudly in
at that first recital,
the slippers dyed to match,
catching my eye as I pointed,
trying to remember,
reminding me that this—
me, today—
is something big;  

As the Big-Apple-Red polish
for prom,
for Annabelle’s wedding,
and Molly’s,  
and Heather’s, too,

and the silver on my eyelids
and the Spanx under my dress;

As all of it convinced all of me
that it would all always be

as good,
as true,
as this.

I couldn’t have known, then,
when days were like candy,
sweet and filling,
to be both shared and hoarded,
both carrying you somewhere else
and planting you wholly in this place,

I couldn’t have known that the clown
would make me cry as his makeup came off,
that my feet would fail the choreography,
that the polish would chip before the main event,
every time.

That all that,
all that made me fall in love in the beginning,
that made me sure forever was a thing,
that made me need that hit—

that hit,
that hit,
that hit—

That all that was given would be taken away
by he who gives.

I couldn’t have known that you were,
from the beginning, a monster,
just waiting in the shadow of my devotion.

That your fickleness, Life, is the only thing
in which I should have ever placed my faith.

That Thing

Like the doorman at 13th and 4th.
Always: “Good mor-niiing!” with an upward spin,
the way the hot dog man sells dogs at Yankee Stadium,
like the way that hot dog man smiled from first to third
when the man buying the hot dog tells him to keep the change,
when the lady buying the hot dog tells him to have a good day,
when the kid buying the hot dog says, “thank you,” and eyes
and grabs and gobbles the hot dog like it’s the first time
and the last time a hot dog will touch his lips.

Or how on the first of January, February, April,
your best friend says she’s going to start that diet,
but she has the burger—double, mayo, rings—anyway
and she doesn’t explain it to anyone, including herself,
because right now is worth her weight in gold.  

Like the way that one woman at Prospect Ave.
always wears a dress three sizes too small (you’d say),
and heels three inches too tall (you’d think),
and her hair is in knots (you can see it).

And you haven’t even had your first sip of coffee,
or come to terms with having to step through those doors,
but she walks down the platform like she owns the damn station,
like she owns the damn train,
like the whole city was built for her to run.

Wasn’t it?

That’s the thing they call living.
Free. However she damn well pleases.

I Know You. I’ve Seen You Here Before.

Big Man. Small car.

Big Man. Denying that the weight of you
puts pressure on the seat,
that the faded wheel turns now only from force,
that the windows would open themselves, gasping,
heaving, had they the choice.

Perhaps that little car hadn’t known your intention
when you opened the door.

“Only a test drive.”
“A gift.”
“He’ll turn himself away.”

Perhaps the car had.
Perhaps the car had thought she was big enough
to take you
where you both needed to go.

To show you a new way of seeing,
a new way of living.
with no plan but to live.

Big Man, you.
Thinking you’re so big
you can make anything fit around you.

Your chest as big as your belly,
a globe designed for spinning
but left—denial—to stiffen in the dust.

Thinking all you need to do
is push and squeeze and inch your way in,
inch after inch, until you’re so deep
the car can barely remember herself
before the heaviness of it all.

Thinking you will show all of ‘em that this little number
belongs to you as you drive around town,
paying closer attention to the eyeballs eyeing you
than the signs that warn: stop.

Big Man, alright, thinking you can always get yourself in,
but not knowing that if the car you chose
because to you she was so small
chooses not to move with you,  
you never will.

You’ll die there, man, just where you’ve always stood,
covered in the dust she’ll leave behind.

For What it's Worth

Minutes are my currency,
Traded with myself in the war on unrest.

Minutes counted, cherished, down to seconds.
Minutes I carried on my back in seasons untold.

They were precious.
They were lost. Or stolen. I can’t remember.
I remember they were scattered on the pavement beneath my feet.
My knees are still scraped and bruised, nails broken, from clawing at the remains.

I saved some.

I place what are left, one each night, on the pillow beside me,
But they are always gone by morning,
Lost in the pillow’s whisper: you’ve been here before.

Once, minutes were worth moments.
Gasping and echoing. Glowing. Hot.
Lighting me from the inside out like a firework
That makes others stumble, lose their breath.

Now, there is gray: clocks and countdowns,
Crossing my fingers for it to end.

Now, there is more work than time,
More hoping sleep presents itself to me like an offering given to God,
Like a bill drifting from the pocket of an unknowing man,
Landing at the feet of another who’s already rich.
But you can never have too much (enough) time.  

Now,
I value my life in terms of sleep.  

Just wait a minute,
Just one damn minute—just wait—
Life should happen in the moments between sleep and sleep,
Between sleep and fighting the next sleep because there’s so much to do right now,
There’s so much I want to do, so please, just let me stay awake for another minute,
Just give me a few more—

Now, life happens in the minutes of sleep,  
In colors like neon; in sounds like screeching;
In sensations that are not ever quite that full when I’m awake.

There are not enough minutes to make moments,
To answer, “When will I sleep?”
To know if I’ll ever again wake long enough
To win the war.

Even Now (for Grandpa L.)

I wonder how many puzzles we had figured out together.
Which was the first? The last?
Why didn’t we keep track?
Why did we walk away?
Too busy, maybe. Too old.

I wonder if he would have ever stopped if he thought we hadn’t wanted to;
if even when those morning walks with Jacques became just mustering the will to walk
from one room to the next, and it felt like mile 26 for him,
I wonder if he would have joined us at the kitchen table, if we had asked,
carefully separating the edges from the inside pieces,
before bringing them together around the perimeter of the wooden backing
he had made especially to fit that puzzle’s size.

I wonder if, even then,
he would have sprayed the thing,
when it was all said and done, with that special glue only he seemed to know about,
then, carefully, carefully, bringing it into his garage, and building a frame,
and painting it the perfect hue—matte? speckled? ombre?—
to complement the picture, now in full view,
before hanging it just right in just the right spot in the Blue Room, his room, 
alongside all the others we had completed in years past: our legacy.

Maybe not then. but right before then, or until then.
Yes, until then, he would have, if we had asked—yes, of course, girls, yes—
Because even then, when he asked us to, please,
remember the time when he could do anything he wanted,
when he asked us to remember what he used to be,
when he asked us when he stopped being human,
and all we could do was say, “Never,” and “We love you.”

Even then, 
he loved us sometimes without a word, but a wink; 
he loved us like he had invented love, like there were no limits,
in this way that came from so deep you could trace a line
right back to his neurons and protons and electrons and to every vein and platelet,  
or squeeze it out of his bones like lake water from a soaked towel—
he loved us without asking anything in return but a kiss on the cheek
whenever we came and whenever we went—don’t go so soon, girls, don’t go—

He loved us 
like time and age were constructed by people who were looking for excuses 
to say goodbye—but not him, boy, not him—
because he was always looking to stay.

He was the one who always kept all our pieces together
Even then
Even when it was all said and done

Even—