You whistle at me outside
Stata, wave your arms
in a salute. I cock
my head towards you as I move
away from a sign post.
I say: Was that for me?
And you say: Well, I saw this
hot chick. If I was in my car,
I would honk. We laugh until
we are close enough to touch
and then you swallow me
in your arms. I say: You give the best
hugs and you lead me in
to the maze of the MIT monstrosity
on the corner of Main and Vasser,
let me try out your thousand-dollar
chair, and for the next twenty
minutes, we live like we are what
we never and always were: together.
You show me the uncomfortable
couches after I reenact shoving
shoppers. You teach me
the new word you made up
while I spoof the dialogue on Sex
and the City. We spend more time
in back story, limitless jokes taped
to our insides, barely finishing
sentences, letting phrases linger,
finished off by deft winks. On our way
out, you say I like strange things
and I shrug under Stata’s awning
and smile only for the you
who whistles and holds me tight
Saturday, March 28, 2009
In Concert: Boston/November/2002 (poem)
Suddenly I hear my guitar singing
and so I start singing along
and then somewhere in my chest
all the noise just gets crushed by
the song... Ani DiFranco, “Imagine That”
The tickets have seat and row
assignments, but when we get inside,
it is standing room only,
and we are pressed, body against body,
to get close to the stage. I stand back
six heads deep from the microphone
and think this, this is good
enough and wait for another
hour in a sea of bobbing lesbians
who pride their spiky hair and unnatural
piercing and seem excited to be
close enough to other females to brush
their asses or touch their arms under
the guise of “crowd.” But it doesn’t bother
me tonight -- me, who despises people
in general, let alone mobs of girl-on-girl
love, allow the lesbians to yank on my pigtails
and step on my toes because I get to see
Hammell on Trial. At least, he opens the show
and makes the first round of solo guitar magic
seem beautiful and grotesque as he
offers us his pulse because he thinks it
will be useful, sings a song about killing
his girlfriend’s son and then another song
about how god said “thou shall not kill,” and I
am glad that I understand the irony.
His guitar looks like the only true victim
of his homicidal tendencies: battered
and babied with what he repeatedly
calls “Berkeley Tough Love,” whatever
that is. He shakes his face like a bowl
of jello and at the end of his set, sticks
his guitar pick on the peak of his sweaty
forehead. “Give it up
for Ani,” he says, before jabbing
his guitar in the air one last time.
The lesbians cheer, and so
do I. It is another twenty
minutes of female compacting
before the main event. And I
think I’ll die from the exhaustive
heat of standing, still wearing my coat
because there isn’t even enough
space to lift my arms to take it off.
I listen to a groupie behind me tell
her cohorts about how the crowd has changed
since Ani got married -- to a man, no less --
how now straight couples have the nerve
to ruin the air of raucous, liberated women
with shaved heads and a taste for cunt. And I
almost want to turn and apologize
for the intrusion, except I am there
with my female roommate and am not
the obvious sore thumb in the audience she
is referencing. How dare the
straight people invade their bisexual
musical goddess’s inner-space! I shift
my weight and try not to laugh at her
blatant unacceptance of heterosexuals
and bounce jokes of reverse discrimination
off my brain until the lights fall
dark and the pressed body of the crowd
cheers in one breath, with one arm reaching
towards the stage as the lights come up
to reveal a hobbling Ani DiFranco, apologizing
for breaking her foot last week, and then sitting
with her guitar in her lap, playing “Back Back
Back,” one the lesbians and I can sing
along with and the true concert is underway.
I close my eyes and tongue the words
in the back of my throat, think about how
I’d used them like a one-night stand and left
a line from the song on the digital doorstep
of my would-be boyfriend, tell me boy boy boy
are you tending to your joy or are you just letting
it vanquish? And I scream those same words now
into the back of the neck of the tiny lesbian
in front of me, wondering if the simple phrase
had meant as much to him as it does
to me, but I lose sight of him
in the sweaty pulse of the crowd
gasping to the beats of a single woman
on a stage with a solitary guitar, her
hair in twisted blonde dreadlocks, her
fingers banded with black duct tape
and plastic nails that provide her with a pick
on each finger, ultimate artistic control
over her guitar. One nail breaks
and she takes a moment to bow her head
and pray towards the Mecca of Crazy
Glue, saying “It’sallgood” and winking as
the nail sticks in her thick, knotted hair.
She talks very little between songs
because she’s left with nothing new to say
since she says it all in her songs, since she hides
nothing in her lyrics. Her words are like vitamins.
Her life is as open as her sexuality, and why should
she rhapsodize between songs when she can
put her life into lyric and beat her tough fingers
against the steel flesh of her guitar? She sings
and invites us all to sing with her, smiles
with an open mouth and dilating eyes, throwing
her entire body, as restless as her mind, into
her melody, even though she can’t rise
from her chair. I take in the scene, smell the sound
of a felt song waft through the air and see
what I’ve heard for years in her captured/
recorded voice. She’s almost too honest to trust,
but I’m sucked in, and I rock with the current
of unity in the space. I feel the words, even
the ones I don’t recognize, from within my skin
and want to take up room because I can, want
to sweep the sea of the room into my pocket
to take home and swim through later when I’ve flushed
the salt from my eyes and taken the time to see
that she does, indeed, have the kind of beauty that moves
and the capacity to level me with her words. Magic
is cliché but the sentiment is not. There is an amazing grace
about this woman, this performer, this artist
who doesn’t think it’s right living for what she
can’t define. All that’s left for me is to sing
with my eyes turned up towards the smoke-infested lights
and allow myself to get lost in the sea of bobbing lesbians
in the middle of a dance floor, standing room
only, to see Ani DiFranco, live, in concert,
one woman, one chair, one guitar, one night -- god,
this could never be long enough...
and so I start singing along
and then somewhere in my chest
all the noise just gets crushed by
the song... Ani DiFranco, “Imagine That”
The tickets have seat and row
assignments, but when we get inside,
it is standing room only,
and we are pressed, body against body,
to get close to the stage. I stand back
six heads deep from the microphone
and think this, this is good
enough and wait for another
hour in a sea of bobbing lesbians
who pride their spiky hair and unnatural
piercing and seem excited to be
close enough to other females to brush
their asses or touch their arms under
the guise of “crowd.” But it doesn’t bother
me tonight -- me, who despises people
in general, let alone mobs of girl-on-girl
love, allow the lesbians to yank on my pigtails
and step on my toes because I get to see
Hammell on Trial. At least, he opens the show
and makes the first round of solo guitar magic
seem beautiful and grotesque as he
offers us his pulse because he thinks it
will be useful, sings a song about killing
his girlfriend’s son and then another song
about how god said “thou shall not kill,” and I
am glad that I understand the irony.
His guitar looks like the only true victim
of his homicidal tendencies: battered
and babied with what he repeatedly
calls “Berkeley Tough Love,” whatever
that is. He shakes his face like a bowl
of jello and at the end of his set, sticks
his guitar pick on the peak of his sweaty
forehead. “Give it up
for Ani,” he says, before jabbing
his guitar in the air one last time.
The lesbians cheer, and so
do I. It is another twenty
minutes of female compacting
before the main event. And I
think I’ll die from the exhaustive
heat of standing, still wearing my coat
because there isn’t even enough
space to lift my arms to take it off.
I listen to a groupie behind me tell
her cohorts about how the crowd has changed
since Ani got married -- to a man, no less --
how now straight couples have the nerve
to ruin the air of raucous, liberated women
with shaved heads and a taste for cunt. And I
almost want to turn and apologize
for the intrusion, except I am there
with my female roommate and am not
the obvious sore thumb in the audience she
is referencing. How dare the
straight people invade their bisexual
musical goddess’s inner-space! I shift
my weight and try not to laugh at her
blatant unacceptance of heterosexuals
and bounce jokes of reverse discrimination
off my brain until the lights fall
dark and the pressed body of the crowd
cheers in one breath, with one arm reaching
towards the stage as the lights come up
to reveal a hobbling Ani DiFranco, apologizing
for breaking her foot last week, and then sitting
with her guitar in her lap, playing “Back Back
Back,” one the lesbians and I can sing
along with and the true concert is underway.
I close my eyes and tongue the words
in the back of my throat, think about how
I’d used them like a one-night stand and left
a line from the song on the digital doorstep
of my would-be boyfriend, tell me boy boy boy
are you tending to your joy or are you just letting
it vanquish? And I scream those same words now
into the back of the neck of the tiny lesbian
in front of me, wondering if the simple phrase
had meant as much to him as it does
to me, but I lose sight of him
in the sweaty pulse of the crowd
gasping to the beats of a single woman
on a stage with a solitary guitar, her
hair in twisted blonde dreadlocks, her
fingers banded with black duct tape
and plastic nails that provide her with a pick
on each finger, ultimate artistic control
over her guitar. One nail breaks
and she takes a moment to bow her head
and pray towards the Mecca of Crazy
Glue, saying “It’sallgood” and winking as
the nail sticks in her thick, knotted hair.
She talks very little between songs
because she’s left with nothing new to say
since she says it all in her songs, since she hides
nothing in her lyrics. Her words are like vitamins.
Her life is as open as her sexuality, and why should
she rhapsodize between songs when she can
put her life into lyric and beat her tough fingers
against the steel flesh of her guitar? She sings
and invites us all to sing with her, smiles
with an open mouth and dilating eyes, throwing
her entire body, as restless as her mind, into
her melody, even though she can’t rise
from her chair. I take in the scene, smell the sound
of a felt song waft through the air and see
what I’ve heard for years in her captured/
recorded voice. She’s almost too honest to trust,
but I’m sucked in, and I rock with the current
of unity in the space. I feel the words, even
the ones I don’t recognize, from within my skin
and want to take up room because I can, want
to sweep the sea of the room into my pocket
to take home and swim through later when I’ve flushed
the salt from my eyes and taken the time to see
that she does, indeed, have the kind of beauty that moves
and the capacity to level me with her words. Magic
is cliché but the sentiment is not. There is an amazing grace
about this woman, this performer, this artist
who doesn’t think it’s right living for what she
can’t define. All that’s left for me is to sing
with my eyes turned up towards the smoke-infested lights
and allow myself to get lost in the sea of bobbing lesbians
in the middle of a dance floor, standing room
only, to see Ani DiFranco, live, in concert,
one woman, one chair, one guitar, one night -- god,
this could never be long enough...
Bridal Fiesta (Ashland, MA) (poem)
I watch babies crawl
across suburban carpet
and listen to mothers talk
about wanting to move
back in with their mothers.
I think: where am I?
This is not what I want.
One baby can stand and talk.
One baby falls off the couch.
One baby boy clomps around
in a baby girl’s shoes.
This one cries. That ones claps.
Others inspire cameras to click.
I watch it all and sip
my frozen margarita, deep
red, like sealing wax, and I try
to suck out the alcohol.
What do you know.
Alcohol brings out the poets
and behind me I hear two women
talking about form. Not babies.
Count me in! But even they shift
to small talk about boyfriends
and big futures, while all I’m interested in
is grab bags and One Acts.
My friend is the bride-to-be
and she’s got a feather boa
around her neck. I have a fake
paper pineapple falling apart
on my straw. And I want to get closer
to the reason I’ve come,
but ever step is blockaded
by some mother’s big baby.
across suburban carpet
and listen to mothers talk
about wanting to move
back in with their mothers.
I think: where am I?
This is not what I want.
One baby can stand and talk.
One baby falls off the couch.
One baby boy clomps around
in a baby girl’s shoes.
This one cries. That ones claps.
Others inspire cameras to click.
I watch it all and sip
my frozen margarita, deep
red, like sealing wax, and I try
to suck out the alcohol.
What do you know.
Alcohol brings out the poets
and behind me I hear two women
talking about form. Not babies.
Count me in! But even they shift
to small talk about boyfriends
and big futures, while all I’m interested in
is grab bags and One Acts.
My friend is the bride-to-be
and she’s got a feather boa
around her neck. I have a fake
paper pineapple falling apart
on my straw. And I want to get closer
to the reason I’ve come,
but ever step is blockaded
by some mother’s big baby.
Absence Makes the Heart (poem)
Nine hours, thirty-eight
minutes, or six hundred
thirty-four miles apart,
I knew I loved you
when I told a stranger
in a bar. A stranger I nearly
kissed, his warm, stubbled
cheeks, so much like
your own, gripped in my light
fingers. Closer and closer,
he and I, two seconds
or one centimeter apart.
“But I love a boy named --”
I said, never so sure, releasing
him back into the scene.
Tonight, I told you everything
in three syllables: I-miss-you.
And you said we’d see each other
again. I don’t know, though,
I don’t know. How love is.
So far, like a pit.
minutes, or six hundred
thirty-four miles apart,
I knew I loved you
when I told a stranger
in a bar. A stranger I nearly
kissed, his warm, stubbled
cheeks, so much like
your own, gripped in my light
fingers. Closer and closer,
he and I, two seconds
or one centimeter apart.
“But I love a boy named --”
I said, never so sure, releasing
him back into the scene.
Tonight, I told you everything
in three syllables: I-miss-you.
And you said we’d see each other
again. I don’t know, though,
I don’t know. How love is.
So far, like a pit.
Fall is in Season (poem)
I.
Something is broken.
It might be me.
II.
Not so long ago
in a very near land
lived a girl who loved
a boy and the boy loved
the girl and everyone knew it
and no one was happy.
III.
Maybe there really is no one
like me—occasionally suicidal
with thoughts of thoughts of death.
Passive masochist. Maybe I am
brilliant and glinty like a fresh faced
chandelier. Maybe I’m unreal.
IV.
Really, I am.
I am, I am, I am.
The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath.
Now stick my head in an oven
and step on the gas.
I was doing just fine
until a man stepped in my path.
V.
Yeah, I love him
and, yeah, he loves me.
But that’s the easy part.
Something is broken.
It might be me.
II.
Not so long ago
in a very near land
lived a girl who loved
a boy and the boy loved
the girl and everyone knew it
and no one was happy.
III.
Maybe there really is no one
like me—occasionally suicidal
with thoughts of thoughts of death.
Passive masochist. Maybe I am
brilliant and glinty like a fresh faced
chandelier. Maybe I’m unreal.
IV.
Really, I am.
I am, I am, I am.
The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath.
Now stick my head in an oven
and step on the gas.
I was doing just fine
until a man stepped in my path.
V.
Yeah, I love him
and, yeah, he loves me.
But that’s the easy part.
Escape (poem)
There is always an open window
so there is always a way out.
Why, just this weekend, I found
an old metal escape ladder,
in case of a fire, lumped in a trash can
behind a displaced door in a closet
I have never opened.
Bring on the fire—I can escape!
There is no doubting my insanity,
my extreme confidence, my solitary
vision of life in tempered speed.
Today I am calm.
Today I am clumsy.
Today I am catastrophe.
Today is nothing without yesterday
or tomorrow.
I avoid all the nothing
by ignoring the doors
and lighting out through the window.
so there is always a way out.
Why, just this weekend, I found
an old metal escape ladder,
in case of a fire, lumped in a trash can
behind a displaced door in a closet
I have never opened.
Bring on the fire—I can escape!
There is no doubting my insanity,
my extreme confidence, my solitary
vision of life in tempered speed.
Today I am calm.
Today I am clumsy.
Today I am catastrophe.
Today is nothing without yesterday
or tomorrow.
I avoid all the nothing
by ignoring the doors
and lighting out through the window.
Song About the Weather (lyrics)
for crm
I met this girl on a Saturday night
It wasn’t long ‘til we got tight
My girlfriend hated her, we’d get into fights
Somethin’ about this girl, she was all right
Refrain
Now she’s my best buddy, not a homewrecker
Even though people don’t get it – they don’t get her
This song’s not about her, it’s about the weather
Cuz my new girlfriend might think it’s funny
that I wrote a song about my best girl buddy
Thunder and lightening and falling rain
She cheers me up when I have a bad day
Sunny or cloudy or misty skies
She gives it to me straight cuz she’s not shy
Refrain
Now she’s my best buddy, not a homewrecker
Even though people don’t get it – they don’t get her
This song’s not about her, it’s about the weather
Cuz my new girlfriend might think it’s funny
that I wrote a song about my best girl buddy
Sometimes we get into a fight
Neither of wrong, of course, neither of us right
But in the end, we’ll always be best buddies
Because she knows all my secrets… Just kiddin’, honey!
Refrain
Now she’s my best buddy, not a homewrecker
Even though people don’t get it – they don’t get her
This song’s not about her, it’s about the weather
Cuz my new girlfriend might think it’s funny
that I wrote a song about my best girl buddy
Yes, she’s my best buddy, she’s so good-lookin’,
One glance at those dance moves, whew, nice as home cookin’,
She’s as smart as she is funny,
as bold as she is sunny,
Yessir, she’s so money,
Oh, my best buddy,
she’s no homewrecker
but there’s one more thing to get here:
She wrote the lyrics to this song
Yup, she wrote them all, so get up and sing along
Refrain
Now she’s my best buddy, not a homewrecker
Even though people don’t get it – they don’t get her
This song’s not about her, it’s about the weather
Cuz my new girlfriend might think it’s funny
that I wrote a song about my best girl buddy
I met this girl on a Saturday night
It wasn’t long ‘til we got tight
My girlfriend hated her, we’d get into fights
Somethin’ about this girl, she was all right
Refrain
Now she’s my best buddy, not a homewrecker
Even though people don’t get it – they don’t get her
This song’s not about her, it’s about the weather
Cuz my new girlfriend might think it’s funny
that I wrote a song about my best girl buddy
Thunder and lightening and falling rain
She cheers me up when I have a bad day
Sunny or cloudy or misty skies
She gives it to me straight cuz she’s not shy
Refrain
Now she’s my best buddy, not a homewrecker
Even though people don’t get it – they don’t get her
This song’s not about her, it’s about the weather
Cuz my new girlfriend might think it’s funny
that I wrote a song about my best girl buddy
Sometimes we get into a fight
Neither of wrong, of course, neither of us right
But in the end, we’ll always be best buddies
Because she knows all my secrets… Just kiddin’, honey!
Refrain
Now she’s my best buddy, not a homewrecker
Even though people don’t get it – they don’t get her
This song’s not about her, it’s about the weather
Cuz my new girlfriend might think it’s funny
that I wrote a song about my best girl buddy
Yes, she’s my best buddy, she’s so good-lookin’,
One glance at those dance moves, whew, nice as home cookin’,
She’s as smart as she is funny,
as bold as she is sunny,
Yessir, she’s so money,
Oh, my best buddy,
she’s no homewrecker
but there’s one more thing to get here:
She wrote the lyrics to this song
Yup, she wrote them all, so get up and sing along
Refrain
Now she’s my best buddy, not a homewrecker
Even though people don’t get it – they don’t get her
This song’s not about her, it’s about the weather
Cuz my new girlfriend might think it’s funny
that I wrote a song about my best girl buddy
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