A Poem by John Casquarelli and Aimee Herman

vacuumed sequence of non-committal   

 

I keep breaking down mountain landscapes

to subjects and predicates

 

call upon lineage        within line        wrinkle         mourning

 

hang on roots and branches

study some meaning that has entirely changed

 

today: hatred        unconfirmed traumatic        mothers' sick grows louder while baby still forms lashes and opinions        later: love       or skinny        or bone structure reveals homo sapien finger swallow           tomorrow: cancer     or a way out of hair comb and breast swell

 

say okay in a noncommittal voice

 

hand over cliff notes version of self

place napkin upon folded lap and nod

agree to hate because love is too messy and expensive

 

always have a lover on the side who will do the things the Bible disagrees with

 

do whatever it is I like

 

but what I like can be both

fact and hallucination

dream sequence or invasion of privacy

 

only after a long period of time          do women wonder why gender is pressed against bathroom doors

 

this isn’t rare science

common sense

just plain stuck avoiding you

 

there is decision in indecision      in fragmented opinion      in reduced price vocalization

 

at the worst possible moments            toenails curve up toward skylight

 

but a branch of our river

that runs past old sawmill town

to front porch and twenty year memories

 

but a growth on the side of a road

on interstate twenty or route nine

swells beneath tires and rubber rib cage

 

besides

 

there is such a thing as quality

though completely irrational

after many turns you dig your feet

into the soft duff of needles edgewise

or you’ll slide down

burn like grass surrounding trees

scatter and collapse into shade

 

we’re too accustomed to hand filled promises

of oxygen laughter over jazz radio that

floods miles of empty horizon

 

sit with line in water

and turn away from pine odor mid-afternoon

hidden beneath the braids in your hair

“closeness has nothing to do with what is asked,” I said

you have to be in a certain mood to accept bad advice

with little practical value

the kind that makes your lips bleed

at the canyon wall where the wind freezes

there’s a name for this kind of semi-desert

but I don’t know what it is

why every word quivers off the glass door

each time you motion to me

 

“glass wheels have no religious preference/   glass eyes have no directional pattern/   glass sip has no language requirements/   glass woman has no idea where her hips are/   glass word has no choice but to fissure/   glass womb has no comfort in its supper/   glass man has no limbs beyond his weapon/   glass house    glass spit    glass animal    glass empty    glass collapse    collapse    synapse    sinking    skin graft ” 

   

every marriage should come with an interpreter

merge both classic and romantic understandings

about what looks good

you in that dress looks good

you with that paycheck looks good

you and that mortgage and these diamonds

and a maid and weekly flower delivery

and leather furniture

and stainless steel appliances

and surrogate body to house our children

and monthly appointments of cosmetic enhancements

looks good

scrub small patch of emotion when you’re absent

                                   hoping for some answers amid ocean trenches

                                   of self-awareness

dinosaurs are obsolete

though you're bound to discover

plenty of them at almost every job

conversations with no point or purpose

other than to ditch rocky gorges in dry country

maybe it's just the usual late evening letdown

but if you're a sloppy thinker five days a week

then why should you give a shit about the weekend

 

 

 

 

John Casquarelli is an English professor at Boricua College in New York. He received his M.F.A. in the Creative Writing program at Long Island University. He was awarded the 2010 Esther Hyneman Award for poetry. His work has appeared in several publications including Downtown Brooklyn, Kinship of Rivers, By The Overpass, Brooklyn Paramount, Pulp, The International Rebecca West Society, and Sun’s Skeleton. His first full-length book, On Equilibrium of Song, was published by Overpass Books (2011).

Aimee Herman, a queer performative poet, has been featured at various New York venues such as Dixon Place, Wow Café Theatre, Public Assembly, and Sidewalk Café. She has performed at reading/performance series such as: Hyper Gender, Sideshow: Queer Literary Carnival, and Red Umbrella Diaries. Her poetry can be found in InStereo Press, and/or journal, and Polari Journal. Her first full-length book, To Go Without Blinking, was published by BlazeVOX Books (2012).