the aphrodisiac, drinking the aphrodisiac
with a solid man who didn’t
know my mother.
She leapt too soon.
Is she touching down now?
In Tucson I remembered her birthplace.
I buried the thought of her and wandered
the tired desert.
Fallen spines cracked under my feet, permeated
the dual soles.
I pretended in every corner of the world,
lapped up her sickness
and let it become molasses.
•
Sometimes I awake at 3 a.m
and see that an asteroid
has grown between my teeth.
I spit—just softly—and watch it sink
deep into the ground between us.
Bobby Lynn Taylor
Lift
The component of the total aerodynamic force acting on an airfoil or on an entire aircraft or winged missile perpendicular to the relative wind and normally exerted in an upward direction, opposing the pull of gravity: lift. (https://www.thefreedictionary.com/lift)
When the air above moves faster than the air below: lift.
I’m shaping my wings, now that spring is here, I don’t fear the cold as much: lift.
And when those voices say that I am trapped in some yesterday, when they crowd in on me while dancing in their Easter clothes: lift.
Drive me down into the ground? No. I’ve grown there before; I’ve torn out my roots running from that hammer on my head. The faces, the tiny me in retreat, No, that will not work: lift.
Whether it be Jesus or Buddha or Ginsberg or Hank Williams or Van Gogh; or coffee or masturbation or calculations or predestination: lift.
With big metal forks that move under two ton palates wanting them placed somewhere else; the hydraulics working, the battery sending out its power to the point of transference: lift.
And these anti-humans, with their bloat and their blame, blasting past the gospels in their chariots of gold leaf—trying to impress the crowd—they notice if you’re loud: lift.
Lift me out
by my own power
in these last hours
of bondage to, through, and true—
Lift me, Sift me, Riff me like a jazz break on a Saturday night
with nothin’ left to lose
nothin’ but the blues
and a whole lot of chains around my neck and back and ears and nose and mouth
Lift
Lift
Lift
Neon
twenty-five gallons of vanilla ice-cream
40,000 freckles
six ounces of orange hair
I stood out
so clean, so white, so perfect
straight A’s in math and science
but not p.e., or english, or history
don’t ask me to remember correctly
or to live in my body
and you won’t be disappointed
the things I remember clearly
are private
still
the deacons’s daughter
maybe thirteen
I wanted in a wholesome way
until
the deacon’s son
told me how
he had sex with his sister
when they were alone
I believed him
I did not think of it
as incest
or rape
then
I wanted her more
when I learned that
she was dirty
like me
I did not have to pretend to be righteous
anymore
I wanted to see her holy naked sin
that’s all I could think about
for years
I was ashamed
I had been
so
naive
she chose my best friend
sat by him
during church
I still wanted her
when I was pumping
the girl
who gave me
accommodating
sex
she wasn’t bad
she just wasn’t
wrong
enough
I fed the lust
neon
liquor, lies, dope, and smoke
sunday morning spirit
saturday night binges
with guitar
philosophy
prophecy
olympic drinking
I pressed my brain
into a vice
of throbbing
flesh
a light, at long lost love last
sin into zen
I graduated my body
through the bedrooms
I needed
to qualify me
if I ever
found myself
alone
with the deacon’s daughter again
she sent me a friend request
last night
lit up in cyber
neon
Red
Jammer-slammed and welded
into the air
fire sand invisible to the human eye
Watch the velmen hide
and sleep ’til the storm passes
I cared too much
I tried to give you my arm
for a pillow
for a shelter
We both were lost
breathing in the red
exhaling our ghosts into the sidewalk
it doesn’t mean
it shouldn’t mean
it has to mean
This is the end of our
carbon date
The particles are infusing now
adhering to the helix
changing our DNA
blisters of gold are rising up on the inside of our veins
This is the curse of the high country
when the air is tripped
on a wire
-set for measuring fools
Fools who are only ignorant
of the symnobolic rattle of synotics
rebute the robaakan
rhindal the wrecautious
We have regumed our lungs with Red
It is Opening
Out in the streets
shouting
into vacant cracks of midnight
dust and garbage
piled up in a scab
gray scaly skin
breaking apart
the ground up
the living veins
sleeping beast wakes
we thought dead
It is opening
all those who know the power
are praising the day
stopping
putting off
letting go
the corporate kings go without
for a while
Let them wait
It will be a while
before they realize we are missing anyway
the managers will notice
try and make everyone stop rushing
to the portal
Then
when that fails
they fear for their jobs
run to tell their bosses
Bosses
sleeping off
last night’s feast of fools
They get rich when it is closed
but it is opening
It is opening
a vagina stretching out
making ready to deliver
bread meat wine
to people
living
on corporate cans
of potted meat
left over from butcher parties
D. Ellis Phelps
Five Poems
i
i wake
the night
screaming
in this house:
a man
—my father—
stands
where he
should not
be in
the door
—a sheath
—a sheet
covering
~
i wake
the night
screaming
in this house:
he
—coming—
in the front
door
not locked
not safe
not sane
—memory
exhumed
~
i wake
the night
screaming
in this house:
a child
—myself—
beside me
get the poker
i say
from the fire
go!
(because i
know because
i know)
~
but she
—an aqualung
unplugged—
does not go
~
i wake
the night
screaming
in this house:
my mother
—a knife
on the stand—
and me
in the bed
by the wall
—a number
i should call
ii
i have mown
this lawn
& set sprinklers
out—sentinels
stepping off
each inch
this staccato stitch
—banal bliss
~
sun slants across
this clean cut
& satisfied
i sit—cold
concrete blessing
my skin
~
in the kitchen
—my mother
singing—
though hers
is not
a fresh wound
the hen
still bleeds
~
at the table:
sweet tea
white bread
crisp silence
~
is this
the night
my lungs
unplugged
her body hurled
her head
—a thud
~
& i awake
a witness
unwilling
iii
in the kitchen
by the door
to the den
blue cabinets
where you keep
whiskey
— decanted
in cut crystal
its li
d—a ball
round & cool
in my small hand
~
before you
come in
my mother
and i
sometimes singing
sometimes silence
~
today she is tired
so i sit having tea
with dolls
(white
lace—worn
with time
tiny pearls
holding
fragile folds)
~
the back door
sucks open
what will it be
this time
~
blue cabinets
by the door
to the den
— reach in
swig the brew
take the sip
that changes
you
iv
november comes
a flush
of cadmium &
sky
this month
—you said
i do
the two of you
certain of love
~
november comes
this sun
—a low southern
slant
warming age
spotted skin
& i
am captive
of this
stiletto:
the night
you slammed
her head
(it was
something
she said)
and would not
stop the cabinets
—clapboard—