salvaging

Keep falling for boys that can't love me,
trying to salvage what's left of us,
children of the age where the war is never won—
like backroad trucks pulled by magnets away from ourselves,
sold for spare parts.

To distant from that loss, of being wantneeded in the world,
I salvage
other things—
cedar planks by the railroad tracks
where bone-thin birds nest—
these once were a barn,
held sweet hay, thickropes calmcows
some young man's livelihood.
Piling them in my truck, each splinter
is a hail mary, a curse I let rest
against my teeth. The house of love
is not filled with velvet or satin,
covered in glitter or stripped clean of
bright hair, or even bound in black leather...

As a child I saw houses collapse in upon themselves
like trees falling, some ghosts's life
imploding nail by nail,
sometimes for years.
Houses came down and fences
went up. Dad told me how lucky we were,
to have redwood fence posts,
their invincibilities
while my life continually crashed down
around my ears, left my sparrow bones
ringing shrill as bells.

I could barely see over the
blessed golden grass
that fed each sweet-eyed cow of ours,
clambering over russet posts
I thought I could smell the sea,
the shaded dirt, baby ferns curled
like sleeping cats—I thought
why not build
with this
as the years got leaner and leaner
and the boards on windows I looked through
were torn at by breezes and typhoons,
sometimes pulled off by pianist's fingers and
doe-eyed promises. Saving relationships--
with my father, girl-dog, old car,
these boys that come to me all soft hands
and words that twist like willows
is a dusty age-long fight,
a journey by bus and foot pushing
a shopping cart, folks avoiding
your crusted crinkled eyes, and you trudge
up the road towards a dirt floor
and missing walls and sagging cross beams
and a single chair you could never find
a cushion for, thinking why am I trying
and how will I eat tomorrow,
staring at a pile of redwood planks
as boys leave helplessly,
wordlessly,
one by one.

Some step on nails,
some I send the dogs after.
They never think to bring tools
but termites, magpies come in their wake,
a reverse plague of reminders and constant cleaving.

When the fences go down
the houses will still
be falling, ravens always at the door
as I struggle to lift one
last beam
one steady once-tree
to keep the roof from caving...

a response to: people who say I worry to much

for acs

to worry for her,
einstien of strings and written word,
is to fall into a groove--my addiction to
defending what I hold dear.
A high school career spent in
worry and wonder,
my stomach flips when her parents name
flashes on the caller id
hoping it isn't time yet...
it's a habit habit habit I can't break--

spent hours last night staring at
our empty phones,
the clock in my head - 12 1 2 3 - he whispers in the dark
she hasn't come back yet
what are we afraid to say?

her mother at my doorstep,
have you seen her
our worries twin in the gray morning light.
teenage frantic phone calls,
clawing myself apart with anxiety
fear of and for another's life -

mis conmigos family of soul energy
intertwined like branches and shared sweatpants
all our mugs filled with bitter coffee.
always those I turn to, those I think I can walk away from -
how far would I have to go -
the reason I no longer need Adonis,
no more honey-eyed savior-heartbreakers for me--
Only my firefly self and lightbright friends

Listen:
if you found your wolf-spined lady,
your lion-eyed summerlovergirl

woke without them

what would you do at midnight?

spent last night dreaming of
the dark rain world outside,
a night haunted by men worser for
the year's wear
our naivete
what I should've done - should have asked for numbers,
called the house,
should have given her my pepper spray -
pray and how close those words sound
both defense and plea

my fire-souled manic girl of stringed things
would you have loved yourself a little more
if I had said it sooner?

better safe than sorry darlings -
how to say or show it? I love you and
I don't think I can ever worry enough--

North Prayer

I give thanks for the fish my man-family greedily steals; far over the limit though not beyond what we can eat. They gloat over sizes and granddaddy stories, whine about aching feet and I know we could have afforded another meat for our supper, but even if our bellies are filled their souls will only be stilled by the rhythm of the fly rod, the focus of the deep pool and softly-loud stream. Is that not need? I ask the corn mother, and yes, she says, men with unhappy day jobs and concrete between their toes seek to be gods on the weekend pursual of innocent bucks, the rocky silence of wilderness and brash backslappings of boys.

Where else can we be men? they ask, and sky father answers, All places under me—but they do not hear. This thankless ungrounded society deludes them, tells them men take and take and power over and beat down and conquer, and they carry this harsh unhonoring with them, from degrading their mates to chasing the antelope until their aging bodies throb, then go back to the cabin full of cheap brews and steaks that died afraid, where they will scrape out their gut-souls with more granddaddy stories and feigned fireside anger. Men? I ask, and as His bearded breeze sweeps through the aspens, they quake with Her laughter, they carry away my whispered prayers of gratitude as I stand by the tail-gate, enraptured by rainbow scales and cold eyes trapped in a Ziploc—brown trout, fingerlings, rainbows, people earth-darker than I say that their wisdom comes from always knowing which direction home is.

Even in my father’s oil-stained hands the hooked trout twists strong as a snake, as a bent willow, seeking the water, the upstream. My boy-family is as out of place in cities, in Wal-Marts and strip malls, but where is their fight to seek the ground? Ten minutes ago this fish was slipping through the stream beside me, unaware, and now lies on my plate floured and browned. I never enjoyed eating fish, and I still don’t. When they take fine-boned meat within themselves, what do the men-boys learn, I ask? Plastic, uncaring, downpayments and empty screens—how much more can my father take, how does he keep his gills fluttering so long away from the hills and the oak? With this, the trees murmur through mud in my jeans, the wind coaxes answers from my creek-washed hair. And I give thanks, for warm muscle sliding down my throat, for my father’s fumblings, for the quaking aspen, for the lies that drive us to seek the intensity of these long hauls and payless days, this condensed, desperate forest loving.