BOSH

Still,

I’m looking really good
down here

Under the fluorescents
the afternoon sun
& my bed lamp

I bet you’re jealous
crazy jealous

it’s unnatural
to be this good looking
I know

I am Sad

even as I say it
no one believes me

without tears
I am just a boy

haikus

nontraditional

Baton Rouge

let the sun have
its five minutes of set
tomorrow
we’ll try again

Making Out

close your eyes
all our faces
look stupid between kisses

traditional

Apartment

it’s nice not to be
the only living thing here
the bamboo, the fish

Train

the difference between
grass on all sides & your bed
is twenty more hours

Different Voice Exercise on Little Samuel with Photograph

Momma said my Cherokee blood made me born with feet like leather. I walked the six blocks of black tar to school in my bare Cherokee feet. I had the nicest shoes in Baton Rouge. One day, my Momma quit her job at the factory, purchased three white mannequins in Negro wigs and decided to cut hair. It took a year for the city to forgive her for the first year of uneven haircuts, but my Momma had a habit at becoming the best at everything she did. Soon the governor’s wife was knocking on our shed, where we kept the shop behind the house. My Momma had a habit of keeping her business separate from her family, but when I turned nine she let me sweep the hair up off the shed.

That’s how I met Dolly Sherwood, one afternoon when my little brother had the flu and the doctor’s said he might die.
“Ma’am,” I told to Dolly when I saw her car pull up. “My little brother’s real sick with the flu and doctor’s said he might die. My Momma’s closed the shop until Jesus make him better or Jesus make him worse.” Dolly Sherwood was looking at my shoes. I told her my name was Samuel because she asked. “You have the shiniest shoes in Baton Rouge Samuel. Get in the backseat.” I didn’t know Dolly Sherwood but it seemed rude not to listen to someone with so much power and influence and so my political career began in the backseat with Dolly Sherwood and her magazines. “Driver, to the State Capital building s’il vous plait.” She shook my hand, “That’s how you say please in French, Samuel. I’m Dolly Sherwood. Now say enchanté to let me know you’re glad to have met me.”

japanese rock poem

"I saw you first in the cattails"

& "you are it

not because you're dirty

not because you're clean"

for once don't spill

"I still consider myself very likable"

Process

I’m stood up. I’m made the bed, ate the toast, I’m
upset the birds, can I write now? I’m ten. I’m twelve
can I write now? I’m walked the mile there & back
listened, held hands, made a comment, stirred, saw,
made a comment, I’m fell down. I’m not a hero. I’m
walked the mile there & back, I’m talked to, her. him.
outside, showered, can I write now? I’m goosebumps,
I’m sweater, I’m Illinois, I’m chicken, can I write now?
mother, father, brother, friend can I write now? I’m
thereabouts, logged into, flipped the record, can I write
now? I’m cereal, bottom of a land, nine, ten, eleven
clocks, I’m a better mood, I’m done, accepted, swiveled,
I’m coffee, I’m who are you, full, frizzy, ate the toast,
outside, upset the birds, can I write now?

Radish Sparklers (Revised & Expanded)

The packet of radish seeds stayed in the knife drawer. Every time I went to chop something, they shook like a pair of maracas. The seeds asked me to stop. Or at least throw us away! the seeds complained. Or plant us, I added. I could always plant the Radish sparklers.

There are a dozen other objects she left in the house: the glasses kit, I don’t wear glasses, the cheesy eighties records, she had terrible taste in music, the subscription to garden magazine, I don’t plant things. Eventually, I gave the glasses kit to my friend Charlie, sold the records, with the exception of one, and let the subscription run out, but the Radish sparklers rattled on. Every yank on the sticky drawer put the seeds into motion. When the earthquake hit last winter and the pictures fell off the wall, it was the seeds in the drawer that woke me. They shivered until morning.

There are people you get involved with and never expect it to last. Your split won’t be the tragedy you hoped for. You’ll think, shouldn’t I be doing something awful? Walking there alone, or eating ice cream? It’s never really sad. Only a little quiet at first. Then everything returns to normal. You go back to your computer and call your parents more than you’d like to. When did they start having more fun?

We were in the checkout line when she spotted the seeds. “I haven’t seen these since San Francisco,” she said tossing them into the cart. Everything was about San Francisco with her.

“I haven’t seen those ever,” I said tossing them out of the cart.

“What do you care?” she said tossing them back into the cart.

They were at home when she left them on the counter. “I’ll plant them tomorrow,” she said to no one. When tomorrow came it was raining so I put the seeds in the knife drawer and we both forgot we loved each other.

There are ones who leave and you think, I’ll find them again in New York! or somewhere bright when you both know more. When the timing is better. They won’t do that terrible thing they do anymore, and you won’t ruin the holidays. The two of you will get lunch and do the rehearsed goodbye hug, but the hug will turn into everything you sat on like a suitcase that wouldn’t shut. Everything will turn into your familiar sexual clumsiness and finally, you can both quit your jobs and move to that dry town in the mountains.

A fantasy of reconnect can go on forever. It can’t be stopped.

She called to tell about the new house and the new wedding. I sounded healthy on the phone. I mean I didn’t mention the seeds. She phoned in the late morning, or what she refers to as “responsible time.” The “responsible time” starts around ten o’clock. During this time she would exercise, go to the post office, and fall for someone else while I was still in my pajamas.

I read the description on the radish packaging out loud to no one, “ A nearly rounded Radish, bright scarlet at the top and bright white underneath. Very crisp and tender with a mild flavor.” I grabbed a shovel and started digging a hole. I read the directions. Dig a hole for each seed? I dug several holes. I was sure they wouldn’t grow because they were never meant to be planted. They belong in the drawer next to the knives.

A week later, tiny green haircuts appeared in the soil. I chased rabbits away with the shovel. I installed a small white fence. When it didn’t rain, I watered their red foreheads. I found recipes in cookbooks I didn’t know I had. One morning I woke up and knew they were married forever. I made a salad. I invited Charlie over for drinks. He said he hadn’t seen Radish sparklers since San Francisco.

Jordan Soyka's Reworking of my Poetic Manifesto Read at Teddy's Juke Joint 10.7.09

Mel’s Manifesto

The girl in the black raincoat, wild & written, looks cute with her haircut. Her pockets are in Chicago and her hands are all my friends. Her hands are getting older. Her friends are getting naked.

I will not be
this age again

& despite
emptiness

i’m held

Mexico Forever

The gun wasn’t so bad. I thought either this person is going to shoot me, or they won’t. The simplicity of outcomes. Tomorrow or no tomorrow.

My bank training tells me the typical robber, once in the getaway car, will hide in an unlikely location for a number of weeks, or drive to Mexico forever. That morning I touched a lot of money. More than my job as a bank teller usually requires. I put it all into the bag. I put so much in the bag the robber couldn’t lift it. This would only be funny as we were crossing the border.

After a failed robbery, the robber will either head to the nearest bar, or return home to plot their next robbery. I was given a pink slip and ordered to receive a psychic evaluation from the clinic down the street and return after lunch. I decided instead, never to return.

I found her at the nearest bar, slumped over the table. The simplicity of outcomes. Without the ski mask, she was beautiful. “You,” she said casually when she realized I recognized her. Instead of running, she raised her drink. “You,” I said and met her glass.

“There was a lot of money in that bag.” I told her. She nodded at her mistake. “My bank training tells me a robber has twenty seconds to get the money and get out if everyone follows protocol,” I told her. She nodded again absently. I grabbed her hand. “I didn’t follow protocol,” I said. She looked up suddenly with those blue eyes that once again saw the possibility of money. The simplicity of outcomes. Mexico forever.

switch

I am a princess with taffy going along by the pull.

A littler boy than me catches fire. Who doesn’t know

he is ugly like I know he is ugly. Like one big owie.

Making himself dizzy in the yard like I did once.

The salute of a child.

switch

Day breaks & the moon

& sun act on everything.

A tide of cars washes up.

I will put my arms

around the one I want.

switch

Moving in white corn at the bottom of a planet

really sucks without you.

We were so good at going.

The act of pushing our bodies

from Paris to the south.

This & that was so down the road.

When you wander I wander.

switch

I will not believe the growth of my ears.

Talking to white corn & the littler burnt boy.

Only then I remember the song in my dreams

& know I loved by what I chose.

The Impossible Book Story

this tiny book really has nothing to do with your heart
so don’t get all, like, how you get

I don’t love you yet, chicken

but this tiny book really is close to your heart
like butterfly eyelashes around your neck
like a library sandwich between your boobies
at least its around that general heart area
I saw it!

so I’m going all, like,
left to right
left to right
like how I usually read stuff
thinking this is a really good book

that has nothing to do with your heart
so I won’t get all, like, how I get
there’s going to be a beginning,
middle, & end
reality has never been our problem

before I go
I will sharpen all my crayons
the old green, the old brown
we don’t have those flowers anymore
or those neighbors
I heard of this bungalow
smelling of weather days
child air, child parents
a summer that is Chicago
mayonnaise

a shoe a rock a table a chair

a shoe a rock a table a chair

I feel good about these things

little river poem

time your blue mud sang a solo in hearts 

the city falls for you leftover going night 

people like faucets over gummy time little

river of cold linen buckle today here comes

a house with a daddy a car with a mommy

people look into your glug those incredible

incredibles but your blue got brown & fish 

got dead & some bridge looks silly without

you

Manifesto of Natural History

generally, we are getting older in a young space.

poetry exists in teaching because first I was there & now I am here.

the questioning-people will want poets to be sure of things, but we are not sure of everything.

please remain surprised & a little gay.

the girl in a black raincoat will enter the writing space. everything I do will exist in her pockets for a long time.

people turn the lights on & the sound on. I know I did a poet thing.

more friends get naked. how does the perfect poem lie? the perfect poem lies by telling the truth. how does the perfect poem make perfect poem love? the perfect poem makes perfect poem love by taking the dare. spin the bottle is also fun.

walt whitman, gertrude stein, tristan tzara, orhan veli, gabriel gudding, jennifer knox, jack spicer, harryette mullen, aimé césaire, richard brautigan, aram saroyan, & they are wild & they are good.

all poems are written for a mother in chicago. she calls to tell me, write a good poem about the poodle who just got her haircut. write about how she looks cute with her haircut. the woman at the haircut place raised the prices. your haircuts never cost that much. are you writing this down?

all my friends have names & I love their names & how they did or did not get them or how they did get into a poem.

the poet is already touching the thing without touching it. in a poet’s hand appears a beautiful thing like a bird made in clay.

the poet does not have to think to write poetry but sometimes it helps, to go behind, to assess the ritual.

when a poet asks why do I write? a poet should remind the heart because a poet is good at it. or really, really bad at it. 

when my friend calls about boys on balconies, when she throws down her hair how we fall in love, when my friend tells me the story of music, how he’s getting older & I was there too, how the girl I used to love is happy & my Father travels & my Mother misses us & my Brother is in theater! when I ride my bike to a girl’s with wine to make pizza & she’s pretty using her hands, how my friend meets me for coffee in silly hats & we write, how I am having pancakes in the beautiful home of my friend on saturday, how there are so many tomatoes in the south & the girls wear sundresses in afternoons that last all day, into the next day, where I am twenty-three all year & there is beer in the fridge

we are not gods
when light attacks a sunday
we cannot go home
yesterday

I did okay
I ate my grapes

what else can I do?
but leave the coffeehouse
& go back?

the end of summer handholding people are out
if september & the chill
will have them

the migrant pirate has been shot. show me where says the black baby angel. on the goddamn eye. careful says the black baby angel the devil and god are both gods. call for one in vain and the other answers in your nightmares. the migrant pirate apologizes for his vanity by feeling cold and the black baby angel wraps him in her own clouds for sacrifice. the black baby angel loses her train of thought so a train is a humid spine between places while the migrant pirate collects wrist bands from the bars he drinks among giving him a long thirsty arm. they are not in love. he says no one alive is older than a train and the black baby angel says no one dead is unromantic so now all people fade into other people so don’t miss bad habits. the migrant pirate leans back and shivers as the trees take into Louisiana.  

A Serious Poem for Serious People

we bury our heads in the sand
           to make ostrich love
like spoons through soup
with no sense of soup
like lamps in quicksand
poets will be everything
that go into everything
taken from each other
           I saw a seagull!
        & you beneath a leaf
the beach horizon is percussion
         the breeze is enough
& someone up there
swipes a tablecloth of light
         out from the earth
until the moon is all
next to the buffalo rags of a boy
is his dress
warriors toss shells over my head
tiny mammals fall as souvenirs
go into our notebooks as flowers
something for tomorrow
I touched you
until you became my sister
& I had to go home

this was her who first drove me crazy in my brain in my bed and hoped her would talk to me maybe and then her did and I hoped her would talk to me more and when her talked to me more I hoped her would talk to me more and when her talked to me more I hoped I would see her more and when I saw her more I wanted to see more and when I saw more I hoped her would stay and when her stayed I hope her would stay longer and when her stayed longer I hoped I could stay longer and when I stayed longer I couldn’t stay longer when I couldn’t stay longer I hoped her would still stay and when we couldn't stay we drove each other crazy in our brains in our beds and I hoped that was okay and when it was okay it stopped being okay and I still hoped her would stay and when I couldn't stay we still stayed and when we couldn't stay we still stayed more and when I left we still drove each other crazy in our brains in our beds and when we couldn't see we still talked and when we couldn't see we talked more and when we talked more I hoped her would talk to me more maybe and when we couldn’t talk more we talked less and when we talked less I still hoped we could talk and when we couldn’t talk this was her who first drove me crazy in my brain in my bed

manatee

stop before you get hurt
the ocean is bigger than you
& your heart is bigger than the world

today I almost saw Tracey’s smile
I mean boob
while she was sweeping the old floors
chez dupree
we talk about our Nadja
who draws surprising butterflies
how she isn’t crazy but the world is
okay, she’s a little crazy but the world is
full of places like Paris
like the 20th century
I could take photographs
when all writers were French
bumping into Nadjas at the café
with wild hair & armpits
will the squishy Americans
know what to do with her tears?

New Orleans

killed it on a Monday night in July
in the way some writers never sit down to write
& some musicians never play
she was beautiful in this way & so many others
a city that faces the people

MAGICAL BEASTS

the magical beast who lives in Wisconsin
believes in tiny practicing gods
who take shape in the frozen river, dairy cows
& leaves stuck on leaves
she preaches on birch cliffs
to river cliffs
around the echoes of hikers
who have shame for their cold tomatoes
her icy fur keeps the river warm
& the tiny gods practice their moves
in the snow

consulting

everybody’s everybody
is not your everybody
for our kind of experts
who are the kind of consults
made happy by green pens
& most everything
put into our hands
can be used again

Two Tadpoles in Iowa

please come home to the ye olde pond
said the tadpole to her tadpole lover
I want a divorce
before we redo the master bathroom
or install another fan

if we could just touch everything & have it feel good
things would be better said her tadpole lover

the tadpole felt they were no longer talking about the divorce thing
& wanted to leave Iowa
if we could just go crazy like we did when we were sane

it’s true they were lovers said the voice in the sky
it’s true that most tadpoles are stoic
but most false statements begin with the word “most”
to try & mislead the stoics

please don’t move to Colorado
said the tadpole lover
I hate to see you go