"What you call love was invented by guys like me..."

now

After Grief

This year, the dead father chose.
This year, the dead father manifested
Himself. This year, the dead father said:
Fuck ghosts. This year, the dead
Father was the moon protruding
From the sky like a half-buried
Bulb. This year, the dead father
Was the owl that hooted through
The grey afternoon after the tree
That held her nest was blown down.
This year, the dead father was that
Starless night. This year, the dead
Father was that storm. This year,
The dead father was the dead leaf
That chased after me like a dog
That had lost its bone. This year,
The dead father was that scraping
Sound. This year, the dead father
Was this poem I carried inside
Me all autumn, a stone fetus
That rattled and moaned. This year,
The dead father was my shadow,
A shape, tall and familiar yet strange.
A shadow attached to my feet
Even After the sun went down.
I think I know, I said. To the shadow.
Eight years later, now, I think
I finally know what love was.

October, October

1. An owl's voice booming through the night; not a question, but an imperative: Who. Goddammit, who.
2. Gathered on the damp lawn at dusk, ravens and geese; a murder and a flock. Rename them: Family. Clot.
3. The moon's the only one that knows all of my secrets. Tonight, he's an albino chimp trying to tear my face off.
4. On the side of the road, a rain-soaked cat, dead and black; not an omen, just a body. Not me, you chant as you drive past. Not me.
5. Tonight, a single cricket sings the loneliest song; I search for the moon but find only clouds.
6. Tonight, the moon is high and bright, a bone snapped in half or a tooth knocked out in a fight; I wish I could be that perfect, that unflinching in my solitude.
7. A hand rested briefly on the back of my neck--why was I afraid to write this? Mistaking it for a dead leaf fallen from an otherwise bare tree, I brushed the hand away.
8. Tonight, the goddamned moon, again, staring down at me like a dead father; not unfriendly, necessarily, still, not a friend. I wonder if he’ll ever leave me alone.
9. I drive fast into the black, the street slick and glistening with wet leaves. I can’t see through the windshield. Still, I driver faster. I am the rain; I am the night. I am speed.
10. The shape of a cat dashes through my headlights. I was a witch in a previous life.
In a future life, I’ll be the body that poisons the well.
11. Aren’t you tired of treading the same salty water? Find a fresh body. Preferably, one with no heart, no limbs, no tears.
12. The old cat basks in the October sun like worn out god while the young cat runs across the frost-tipped grass chasing every leaf that falls.
13. It wasn’t a tiger burning bright, or your soul, for that matter; just a series of orange leaves falling down through the night, letting go.
14. On random nights, the dead father tosses pebbles or rain or hail against my window;
no matter what, he finds me everywhere I am not and am.
15. I can’t stop asking myself: Is a poem really enough to fill a moment? A body? A heart? A soul? A hand?
16. A ghost cat wandering across the patio stops and peers through the sliding glass door. No one home, no one home, the ghost woman chants. But the ghost cat already knew that.

"If the children don't grow up, our bodies get bigger...

...but our hearts get torn up."

I know a monk or an angel when I see one

Hello

This is a poem about the holy
Toad that hopped across the patio
Last night to hunt for bugs
Beneath the porch light
Where he bumped into
Literally my fat cat Bob
Who proceeded to poke
The amphibian in an attempt
To figure out exactly what the visitor
Was. Something to eat,
Perhaps? No. A toy to bat about?
No. The white cat during his assay
Was the color of a moon or a ghost.
The holy toad was the color
Of a dead leave or an old man‘s soul.
The holy toad, being holy, patiently
Became invisible by pressing
His nose into the wall.
Having never touched a holy toad
Before, I picked up the visitor
Who greeted me by peeing
In my hand. Unlike my cat, I know
A monk or an angel when I see one.
So I put the holy toad back down
On the patio and watched
As he hopped off into the dark
Into the night into his journey
Into his life. As my cat and I watched
The holy toad go, I almost said
Goodbye but said instead I said: Hello.

I keep g(l)o(w)ing back

I Glow Back

My white cat glows in the dark
On this first fall night like snow
Glowing on a new moon night.
He glows the way I hope a ghost
Would glow, with the same light
That a dead dad would glow
If he ever came back to life.
Not that I hope a dead dad
Would come back to life. No.
The dead should not be revived.
Your time is your time. You live.
You die. Lazarus smelled
Like the grave for the rest
Of his life. Who wants that?
Not that I hope the ghost
Of a dead dad would come back.
I saw his light that night.
We poured his ashes into the waves
On a brilliant blue skied day.
That night, way out, a green light
Blinked on and off, on and off
Saying hello and goodbye
At the same time. I said hello
And goodbye back. Father,
I had already let go of you
By then so many times
That I did not cry that night.
So, tonight, when my white cat
Glows in the dark like snow
Or a moon or a ghost or a dead
Dad or hope, I smile. I glow back.