Summer is a Difficult Fish to Catch: A Collection

The walls in this new space seem a bit empty, so I'm going to decorate a little by throwing together some stuff to read, all previously published on my old blog, and compiled from the summers of 2007 and 2008, and sharing the theme "summer as the cruelest of seasons." Call it a highlight reel, call it nostalgia, call it goddamned creative recycling. I'm personally calling it Summer is a Difficult Fish to Catch: A Collection.



"Eviction Notice" (A Requiem for a Generation)

We live with woe.

We drink and smoke to avoid feeling things
or living long enough to risk feeling.

We shoot each other
because it's the only lanuage
that everyone understands.

We talk with our fingers.
We love with our symbols.

We listen to musicians younger than us,
in a format that isn't tangible
and we pretend to understand it.
I listen to music I can't touch,
and because it's too loud,
I touch people that I can't hear.

We drink coffee at night.

We're pretty sure there's no such thing as Hell,
but if there is, we're going.

We medicate.

We don't vote, or, if we do,
we don't know who we're voting for,
or why we bother to do it,
but it makes us feel like adults.

We will refuse to grow up and become responsible,
but it will sneak up on us anyway,
whether we're ready or not.
We're not.

We take pills for everything.
We take pills for nothing.

We hate our parents,
but want desperately for their love.

We are the oversexed,
underloved,
overfed,
underdogs.
The over-stimulated,
underappreciated,
over-priveledged
underlings.

We wear makeup so that people will notice us,
but we claim to hate it when they stare.

The drugs have changed.
The users have not.

We get married
because it's the only way
we know how
to maintain relations.

We have lived through disasters and tragedies
but we refuse to think about them.

The girls all love Jim Morrison
but they've never heard "The End"
The boys all love the girls,
but only know how to show it through sex and awkward compliments.

We're the bridesmaid and the bride
the entire fucking bridal party
The widow and the widower
The bullet and the gun
The white and the red blood cells
The music, lyrics, and bad reviews,

The eviction notice on the door
of the end of the world
that reads
For unpaid rent.




"There's Perfection in a Rain Like This"

There's perfection

in a rain like this

The way strangers huddle together beneath door frames

strangers who may never have noticed each other

now commenting on how "We needed the moisture,"

when what they really mean is

"I needed a reason to talk to someone."



There's perfection

in the way the droplets of water

form on a windowpane

and slide around aimlessly,

in gravity's delicate dance

until they collide with each other and fall,

like clumsy young lovers, grasping for each other

in the dark.



There's perfection

in the way the white noise of the raindrops

cancels out

the murmer of the automobiles,

the hum of the computers,

the sickening static of FM radio.



There's perfection

in the way we slow down and think

about when we felt loved,

when we looked at the sky

and saw more than the reflection of unnatural light,

when we remembered

what walking in the rain felt like

before we were scared of lightning and hail.



There's perfection

in the way her hair clings to her cheeks

when she's standing in a downpour.

And the way she looks at me

through the haze

makes me believe

in the perfection

of the rain.







"The First Rule of Fight Club is You Don't Talk About Fight Club"


So you'll hand him your red-headed Gabriel

with a note that says "Handle With Care"

And he will.

He'll clothe it in bubble-wrap

cover it with tape

tightly tied with tinsel and string

(make it look pretty for Mommy and Dad).

smother it with glitter

water all the plants daily

work out at the gym

three to four nights per week.



You're so close.

Please try not to lose control.



He'll say things like "I miss you" and "Have a good day,"

you'll never even guess that all along

He's not even really breaking a sweat anymore.

This, he thinks, is just too fucking easy.



Lightning almost struck the flagpole today.

And I was standing next to it, paralyzed

Not with fear of being injured,

but with the inescapable dread of

missing something

that felt real.



And the red-headed Gabriel laughed at me

from his corner where I put him after I finally succeeded

in breaking him.

His eyes transfixed on my tragic flaw

unclothing my reason, raping my sanity,

telling me everything I can't bear

to tell myself.



Make him look the other way.

Distract him.



The flagpole buzzed like the quiet taste

of a television left on for days

that your senses pick up on when you enter the room.

The hairs on my arm vibrated with anticipation.



There's two big rules in this game that we play.

The Quiet Game: First one to speak loses.

And then there's that rule about eye contact.



"So do you think that we could work out a sign,

so I'll know it's you, and that it's over, so I won't even try?"



And Gabriel

laughed again.

And the flagpole

was still.







"A Life in the Day (Part 1 [of 1])"


As I balance precariously on the precipice of an unexpected summer,

the sun sets on the tattered visage of today's spheric slideshow.

A field mouse scurries from his hidden confinement,

across the cold, sterile, white linoleum floor,

and under the door, out into the bitter, smoke-tinged evening air.

He doesn't seem to know if he's running away from this moment

or toward a new one.



I know how he feels.




"That Ghost Just Isn't Holy Anymore"



I know that spirit that swims in your dreams.

She's there in mine, too,

and she never goes away.



You don't have to explain;

I already know:



What it's like to press the knife in

the frustration when it's not sharp enough.

I know what it's like to pull that razor blade out

of its shaving-kit sheath

and wonder how deep you'd have to go

to make the difference.

To wonder what exactly you could tie that rope to

that could support the weight

of the fall.



Someone told me he had used a plastic bag

and tied it up with tape and twine,

that it was like drifting off to sleep.

But his sister walked in

removed the bag with her thin, bony fingers

and she never mentioned it after that day.



I know how Matthew felt

when he went to his father's gun cabinet

and loaded the shells

and the courage it must have taken

to pull that trigger.



Maybe that's the difference.



We're the lucky ones,

because we never wanted to stop feeling something,

we just wanted to know what it felt like

to feel something real.

Razor blades are tangible.

Blood is thicker than love.



I see you sweating, hiding in your shirt,

and wonder if that's what I looked like

wearing a turtleneck in the middle of summer

to hide those burns.



That spirit's still there, always,

in the stillness of the hot, lonely nights,

staring at me from her perch

in the winter of my mind.

Her face has become familiar,



but her divinity

is in question.



So the conclusion we've learned to live with:



Sometimes it gets hard,

and it never truly gets better,



but it's okay.

I love you.

It happens.



(It just

can't

happen

again).





"It Didn't Feel Like Summer Until Tonight"

We're obvious in silhouette
awkward, bathed in natural light,
but thankfully,
no one is looking.
The thick, heavy spaces between the words
are filled by the choir of crickets
and the hiss of manufactured rain,
and blessedly,
no one is listening.

I know this feeling; I've been in this spot before,
but, like all recurring dreams,
it's always a bit different.
Vaguely familiar and sentimental,
distinctly foreign and fascinating.

The rush of chemicals down a well-worn stream:
heart, brain, lips, fingers, skin.
Then:
skin, breath, eyes, hands, heart.

The prickle of mysterious, cold wet air,
soft, silver cigarette smoke,
faint floral perfume.

Skin like the surface of the water.

I find a pleasant spot to fixate on
perhaps the slight, curved dimple of the clavicle
or the gently jutted angle of the hip
and trace it with my fingers, over and over
trying to read her skin's delicate poems
written in Braille.

The sun is rising;
tomorrow looms, the city awakens below,
but honestly,
we're not looking.





"Fuck-You Haikus (204 Syllables Memorializing a Merciless Summer in Casper, Wyoming)"


a photograph of
you has a hole beside her
shaped a bit like me

transfixed on your face,
i didn't even notice
your eyes drift away

silver spiced rum flows
down the back of my dry throat
draining my heartbeat

ignoring all sense of
rational thought, i dove
into that abyss

summer's golden hue
a lost beam of sunlight fades
to night's cool repose

houses i used to
inhabit now seem devoid
of recollection

the people i knew
are gone now, scattered like the
ashes of letters

rage and blow, you clouds;
cataracts and hurricanes,
drown this city whole!

a new clarity
eludes my periphery
until the morning

i won't refrain from
giving up the gentle ghost
as much as i wish

laramie, awake!
austin, draw your shades all back!
the storm is coming!

these seven years are
a subtle reminder of
life i can't reclaim.





"Red-Dirt Cowboys Under the Blacklight"

The first thing I noticed about this town
was the red dirt
that smothers the narrow, unpainted
streets and sidewalks
like a faded crimson cloak
of silt and dead skin cells from drifters
passing through in the limbo
between childhood and "life."

No one stays here very long;
it's a college town
with two flea markets,
each filled with furniture pieces
that scream of stale keg beer
and awkward sex,
two bars that compete for the name
"The Cowboy,"
and two Starbucks
to remind the trendsetters of home.

A drunk girl with short, straight, black hair
and an angular face
who looked like a Sharon
(but was likely a Colleen)
looked pretty under the blacklight.
"What's the worst that could happen?
It's Wyoming, right?" she asked me.

I squinted at her, half-smiling
through the thick haze of artificial smoke
and the sense-numbing thunder of the speakers,
and for a moment,
I even considered telling her.





"Maybe I Would've Been Something You'd Be Good At (Dialogue for 1M/1W Who Were Once Lovers)"



"Tell me a memory of those old days."

"Most of the best memories are... personal."

"You've got to have something to share."

"I do? Mandatory reminiscing?"

"I'm just curious to see what you remember. We had some times there."

"I remember New Year's Eve on the roof."

"Me too. We had been fighting, though. But being on that roof with you was beautiful."

"But why had we been fighting? God, it was so cold."

"It was freezing. You had told me you had to work late. That was when I wrote that song for you."

"I was supposed to. There had been some huge New Year's thing planned, and almost no one showed up."

"I was drunk that night, and I sang to you on the roof."

"You did. I was so sure you were going to fall off, because you refused to hold still."

"I almost did. Did we kiss at midnight?"

"We did. And we had a shouting match with some drunk guys across town."

"I remember. It was perfect. Did we make love that night?"

"We did. To music. But I don't remember quite what."

"That's beautiful. I remember trying to make it perfect, because I knew I was losing you."

"You were. But that had started quite some time before."

"I was desperate for you."

"Why?"

"I loved you. I was desperate for us."

"It still gets me that it took you that long to see us falling."

"You had left long before I ended it, I know."

"It started when we went to Sheridan that day."

"I know. What Jake told me."

"But I also know that neither you nor myself ever let that go, you wondering if it was true, and me wondering if you believed it."

"I should have let it go."

"What baffles me the most is how after so long and so many other things, I still can't get you out of my head."

"I find myself thinking of you as well."

"Yet we ignore it."

"We have to. You know, before I left Casper, I went up to our spot one last time. I sat up there all night, thinking."

"Why there?"

"It's quiet. I liked it there."

"I still do."

"I'll meet you there someday."

"Might not. Casper has nothing for me anymore. I don't know if I'll go back. I tied up all the loose ends I needed to this last time."

"What about your family?"

"They'll come to me."

"So I won't ever see you again."

"You can come to me, too. Seattle is a good place. I'm not saying I'll never go back, but there are barely a handful of people anchoring me there."

"I know how you feel. Maybe we'll meet again. Life is funny like that."

"I didn't expect to see you when I was on leave, that's for damn sure."

"It was good to see you, though. I've missed you."

"As have I. I definitely hope to see you again."

"We will."

"...in every single letter..."

"...with every single word..."

"Take care of yourself."

"You too. Goodbye."