Little Glass Planet Read online

  I don’t remember carrying you

  home on the plane from Seoul,

  crew dozing behind the cockpit door,

  autopilot engaged—what were they dreaming of?

  I don’t even know what shore

  you washed up on: Busan, Incheon, Samcheok.

  Are you glad we made you a home here so far

  from the sea? is a question I won’t ask in case

  your answer is the one you don’t want to give.

  I love how perfectly you fit in my hand,

  at first cold, and the way the morning looks

  through you, as green and cloudy

  as an unknown we no longer fear.

  But I wouldn’t want to be held up

  to the sun either, not because I’m a monster,

  but because I, too, am translucent and trusting,

  and mistake both for the truth.

  Beneath our lives there are sordid undulations

  and embraces brief and sweet,

  a nearly invisible line connecting us to the fleet,

  with every breath worth saving,

  like the sip of air inside us

  full of an old sea’s grace

  or the ancient word hidden in our lungs

  that once released back into the wild

  will finally set us free.

  What the Cold Wants

  Complete mind control,

  though it might begin Off-Broadway,

  in a simple ceviche, or a mostly believable alibi.

  Generally speaking, what the cold wants

  is ridiculous. The problem with the cold

  is that it comes from more of it.

  It’s divisible only by one and itself.

  The cold is not invited

  to many weddings.

  Among the cold’s lifetime

  achievements: every touch

  of a stethoscope, zero for twelve

  from the beyond the arc, Shackleton’s last note.

  According to experts, the average

  temperature of the known universe

  is negative 454.76 degrees Fahrenheit.

  Room temperature is a miracle.

  That’s what the cold wants you to believe,

  that it’s perfectly normal

  and should be allowed to feel

  right at home as it slithers under a door

  to begin making a meal of your toes.

  Like a hungry predator, the cold knows

  to save the warm, wet heart for last.

  The cold is a form of surveillance.

  Its primary ingredient is time.

  Safe at headquarters, the scientist

  listens to the batteries in the radio collar

  slowly die, but she knows

  the wolf is out there still.

  From you, the cold wants nothing

  but in.

  Substitution

  If only life weren’t so confusing.

  If I can’t leave town with you,

  here’s an old record instead.

  I can’t miss anyone

  who doesn’t adore Slim Gaillard.

  At first I was sure

  I was going to grow up to be a pilot.

  Today I don’t know

  who most of you people are—

  and I thought I was God’s chosen creature!

  Like the piglet raised by a farm cat

  whose mission in life

  has become sunning on the porch

  and acting aloof,

  maybe inside every hog is a kitten.

  As inside every wide receiver is a ballerina,

  and inside every ballerina a swan

  who is really a banished tzarina

  tending to her colony of bees.

  Any sauce comes with a swap out,

  each lunch sack its secrets,

  overdressed greens instead of fries,

  another poem made out of ideas, not things.

  A whistle blows and Coach nods

  at the skinny kid on the end of the bench.

  The figure skater does a double

  instead of a triple and loses a tenth.

  The hydrogen nuclei fuse

  and now it’s helium,

  and when it fills the balloons

  at the brat’s birthday

  his aunt’s house doesn’t seem

  so horrible anymore.

  My heart is a jackrabbit.

  There is no trick: the way to eat fire

  is you just eat fire.

  I Can Do It All in My Lifetime

  If I were to say the subjunctive is indistinguishable

  from the machinations of morning itself,

  would that put me even more under its spell?

  In the repair-shop garage, the most broken-down cars

  sleep on the top bunk, while on the edge of town,

  pylons trim the highway to one lane, stopping traffic

  for miles, all for a steamroller abandoned in the rain.

  It’s as close to forever as it’s possible to know.

  Have you ever felt so alone that it was oddly also

  impossible to be only yourself? Then you know

  what it’s like to not have a name, only a sense of lightness

  and a suspicion that everything is uncalled for,

  and for reasons no one can understand we still believe

  that for our children it will not be too late.

  Ode to the Future

  Of my people, it’s true, I imagine you

  among them, which is as close as I get

  to believing in heaven, so I’m not so alone.

  Fuck this government. Fuck honey mustard.

  Fuck the new advanced whitening formula.

  If this is what I know, does it make me

  anything more than another dumb pilgrim

  who hasn’t lived through a single potato blight?

  Lucky me, I rarely dream about the past,

  nor have I reached the shore

  of Great Conclusions, how long

  will that last? I’m no more done with joy

  than I am gravity, there are things

  I’ll never let them take, there’s a photo

  of my daughter locked inside a safe

  behind a velvet painting

  in the smoky backroom office of my skull.

  It makes my head swell, as if everything is steamy,

  or we’re on a schooner

  without any knowledge of knots.

  There are no do-overs, every moment arrives

  with the sheen of the new,

  so let’s make America a set of problems

  we can admit exists again, and still have the will

  to solve, we can get better at being alive,

  you can learn a lot from being around horses,

  you have to let the fury melt away

  and stand in the sun.

  Fickle Sun, Loyal Shadow

  Another warm weekday waiting

  for an alarm the firemen gossip

  and wash their truck

  a fresh breeze moves in

  to shampoo our murmurs

  language pays the world

  lip service it’s impossible to get

  the same haircut twice

  in the hallway mirror

  the ceiling fan spins

  in the opposite direction

  cooling the next world

  My bugle knows how

  to play one song

  and it’s “Wake Up Motherfucker”

  there’s a lesson in that

  you have to perform

  what you already are

  you’ve got to shake that moneymaker

  the microwave flashes 4:52 4:52 4:52

  a memorial to its life’s great failure

  I have one hypothesis

  you have to be willing to start

  with a guess

  About heaven

  I’m not so sure

&n
bsp; can it really be more beautiful

  than light or breakfast

  in the morning the firefighters

  fill a steel dish with water

  from a filthy hose

  to leave it on the walk

  for the neighborhood dogs

  no one takes a drink

  if you look down into the dish

  it holds the sky

  If I lean back far enough

  and close my eyes I vanish

  no one taught me how

  I was trying to describe the taste of water

  without eternity there is no hour

  and without the hour no moment

  to watch the wind move through

  these trees like Texas politics

  I’m trying to imagine a reason

  to defend both sides in the new war

  these homes don’t have cellars

  the children are braver

  Stepping outside feels

  greedy like freckle season

  is coming to an end

  what have we been put on earth for

  is not a dumb question it’s an invitation

  for dumb answers

  the longer the limousine

  the less wealthy the passengers

  the rudest diners

  choose Sunday for brunch

  I love you so much

  our toothbrushes are touching

  The garage door rises

  but the great red truck

  has already gone I have

  yet to sleep in a bed

  able to contain me

  a knife that lands

  with its blade in the earth

  will make no enemies

  promises use the exact same words

  as lies I can throw

  two kinds of shadows in Texas

  too short and long

  Is there any way to wake

  other than alarmed

  each scent is the memory

  of a previous experience

  the perfumist is a ghostwriter

  for the air

  always smell the left arm first

  it’s closer to the heart

  the fire department tried

  to hire her she said no

  unless you’re fighting

  flowers

  Is there any way to wake

  other than disappointed

  to speak the same language

  as weather leads curtains

  through another dress rehearsal

  a magician licks his fingertips

  the safecracker sands his down

  learn to look down into the water

  to love to see the sky

  and you won’t fear loneliness

  when the Forgetmenaut feels lonely

  he looks up into his sky and sees us

  There’s an old mirror

  abandoned in the alley

  displaying more alley

  but significantly less sky

  where a stray cat hidden

  beneath a parked car knows

  the whole world

  is a thunderstorm

  we’re ancient marine life

  on the move we keep pulling

  fish from the sea and still

  the waters rise

  The orange plyons

  have been pulled from the street

  the cell tower repair

  allows the news to resume

  its wicked speed down

  at the playground the monkey

  bars busy themselves dividing

  sunlight into equal servings

  the toothpaste manufacturer copyrights

  Wintergreen and poetry shrugs

  I won’t take no for an answer

  I asked you if this will last forever

  It rains and the firefighters

  sense an irrelevance

  they can remember the days

  when one of them drove

  the truck and another drove

  the rear of the truck

  each trained to turn the wheel

  away from his colleague

  is steering something the rain is

  so too the sky and not having plans

  with everything falling into place

  solitude is something or is it fire

  Few clues no real way

  of knowing no news

  from the Forgetmenaut

  nothing in the mailbox

  or reason to check twice

  no sleeves to pull

  our hands back into

  during a gentle morning argument

  no one able to lift their gaze

  from their phone

  that bird looks weird

  the other bird sounds weird

  Outside the fire station

  the morning explodes into laundry

  drying from a rusty chin-up bar

  the Forgetmenaut wishes

  he could see you too

  air conditioner drips keep time

  cell phones ping

  with urgent insignificances

  at the market a pickup truck drops

  its ordinance of watermelons

  next to a broken-down car

  playing the role of Someday

  I walked past the post office

  on my way to walking

  past the fire station

  I can’t remember what it was

  I urgently sent

  myself into this world to do

  the great red truck

  is parked outside

  on the driveway for a wash

  they named it Engine No. 9

  across both doors

  we will never forget

  This evening shows signs

  of early onset darkness

  we see ourselves

  as others see us

  in our laundry

  the Forgetmenaut draws

  an architecture of the infinite

  inside her dresser a piano teacher

  keeps a tiny glass bottle

  and inside that glass bottle

  are all of her daughter’s

  baby teeth

  Sunlight swallows succulents

  the birds trapped in the airport

  can’t fly on planes

  I’ll be having the usual

  as if it were ever my choice

  I’m seceding from was

  in order to form a more

  perfect union with is

  or could it be with will be

  the blanket folded at the foot

  of the bed is an understudy

  for imminent change

  I’ve decided I will king this block

  they will greet us with sweets and flowers

  the scene is best performed in the dark

  the suitcase is empty beneath the bed

  the Forgetmenaut reports

  it all looks so fragile from space

  I’ve lost sight of you shadow

  saint of myself

  the next indefinite article will play

  the role of Object Approaching

  a white bike chained to a red stop sign

  we’re fools to think we can tame our ghosts

  The fire station was constructed

  when people and their things

  were smaller though not fire

  it’s still night and it has become

  a still night the quiet sky

  appears to hold one star

  that’s technically a planet

  it’s everything the Forgetmenaut

  promised to us when the great

  red truck backs into the garage

  the ladder scrapes against the jamb

  and makes a spark

  Last night the firefighters forgot

  to bring in the silver dish

  from the sidewalk

  it has become a bath

  for birds while bees in the amaranth

  do their morning work

&nbs
p; there have been signs all along

  Rich Fernandez for Mayor

  Kathie Tovo for City Council

  Piano Lessons for Beginners

  the sign warning of an approaching sign

  reads STOP AHEAD

  I’m one-thousand-and-one birds

  a figment of your imagination

  a shadow that glides over the street

  the sun that pushes it along

  into the next moment

  where time discovers

  a bit more self-confidence

  and firefighters mow the station lawn

  riding tiny red mowers

  as if in practice

  right thought write words right poem

  innocence is not a victimless crime

  This is yours and yours to keep

  for as long as you care to remember

  the Forgetmenaut can’t wipe

  that look off his face it takes a lifetime

  to remember being a person

  is two-thirds being a pattern

  the phone poles here T T T T

  no longer carry conversation

  though there’s still more to say

  I want you to know I walked here

  walked at one point through

  a face full of bees

  They’ve taken the trash

  as far as the curb taken the pledge

  as far as the flag I’ve taken

  your advice and called mom

  time will have its way

  what we can’t see will save us

  sometimes you have to walk

  with a rock in your shoe to learn

  they ran out of presidents to name

  the streets after so now people

  come and go among signs for trees

  beginning with Ash

  Goodnight moon goodnight Ash

  goodnight great red truck

  goodnight late capitalism goodnight Dallas

  over Houston by seven in the third

  goodnight CEOs giving

  one another another raise

  goodnight Forgetmenaut

  making a last orbit of the house

  sounds lost in the air

  each tree dreaming

  of outer space lowering itself to us

  you try to name this or I will

  When our great fire finally arrives

  it will make no sound

  I went outside to see if outside

  was still around and it was

  a lemon tree dressed in December ice

  like a girl in her grandmother’s jewelry

  you can say forget-me-not until it’s empty