Tuesday, January 29, 2008

B4

So I hit my second grade teacher with a ruler and barely missed her eye. The story long, boring drenched in old school racial slurs and mordent postmodern spirituals. I often wonder the trajectory of my life, had I been a better shot, or a male child. Surely a stint at Spofford. My opponent, Ms. Burger a throwback of a woman, thought I to be a monkey swinging thru the African bush, and shared this freely with my six year old mind. Yet it was she who resembled a wart hog. Her slur though heard by one and all not grounds for a dismissal. Instead we were forced to rumble in cage match stillness dividing up macro fractions with my hands now folded "neatly on desk."

Thus began the arduous task of schooling Shorty left-hand. The teachers grew afraid of her complicated "airs" tried to package her intellect and ship the girl off to prep school with speeches of grandiose American dreams. Pint-sized Shorty left-hand could barely carry her rage-filled notebooks and had no time for dreams of any nationality, she pragmatic slide rule pitcher.... Legend grew when pops almighty entered the schoolyard with a length of tan leather wrapped in righteous indignation and beat her in front of the assembled - Ms. Burger spinning with delight. The lips did not quiver nor did she shed a tear, her legs bloody as a kill on the African savannah.

The story unfinished as Shorty would live to fight again, defending her young soul from project dope fiends, cracked-out perverts and assorted trenchant ills born of the urban jungle. She grew and prospered a lone reedy vine on parched desert plains. Silently thanking the rabid wildebeest for her awakening.

Monday, January 28, 2008

The Big Kid

He grabbed me from behind, by the scruff of my neck, tearing the collar of my fake fur coat. Dude wanted money of which I had none, and to rub breasts I did not yet possess. Inhabiting my scrawny nine-year old form were remnants of chicken wings, hominy grits, and hope. Too young to trade with money, my currency that day, three #2 pencils and a prized gilded protractor.

Placed in District 4's newly created gifted program, I now walked to school alone. Running late this particular morning, I inhaled the crisp November air and decided to take a short cut thru the basketball courts on Park Avenue. Maybe he knew me or had watched my pigtails move, as is the case with his kind for he swooped down and bound me in an instant. I knew nothing of sex or the evils of men; but his breath told the story of ages.

My screams immediate loud pleading...skyscrapers standing in silent vigil as he tossed aside my belongings. Cars whizzed by, smug drivers ignoring my shame. The steel cold sharp against skin, but it would not surrender. Punching blindly I fought for my very soul and for the souls of girls who could not. Clutching boots and coat I ran barefoot and screaming into the oncoming traffic. No one stopped and no one cared.

A little girl's innocence forever on the auction block - where are the tears and loathing?

Wednesday, January 16, 2008

Ha!

I fucked him cuz he
needed it
and wanted to go
higher.

I did it with my
pity clit
the one without
desire.

The one with no
deliciousness
her flesh devoid
of fire.

The sex that
never ever was
a loveless fuck
of ire.

Tuesday, January 15, 2008

Fragments of self -pt 1

i lie awake tonight
full of sex
with thug brother X

who did not "mean" to
hurt me

thinking of new love
in white knee socks
and playgrounds
of spent broken
glass

Tuesday, January 8, 2008

Angelwings

he came to me
at the appointed
place
a time divined
by the aged

his touch white
hot agony
gave life to
arid souls

we kissed softly
as he turned to
dust magenta
inhaling deeply
his magic
at last my
soul replete

Monday, January 7, 2008

In the Looking Glass

alone at night
in this copious space
i dream of killing you...

blade sweet sweet surrender

licking the blood from my
fingertips I chuckle

it tastes of cherry-apple
koolaid scorched
by the August sun
still warm and sticky
running down the sidewalk
to the edge
of my existence

Saturday, January 5, 2008

Big Foot

From what I've been told, he often walked the length of Prospect Park with machete in hand. My husband a glorious free spirit filled with painful memories of abuse, remanded to a 72 hour lock down. By me. Our marriage young, tender finding it's way began fraying at the edges as reality escaped his grasp and horror became a constant companion.

Rumor had it.. he lived in the park and would enter our apartment while I was away at work or school. I circled back one day to find him at the kitchen stove, a mangy apparition, unrecognizable. I quickly called his brothers and they physically cornered my lovely Sasquatch and spirited him to the hospital. Locked behind glass doors, strapped to a gurney, he said he heard voices telling him to kill - me. Three days not enough time for a healing. Doctors released him two weeks later with various hand-made leather accessories, a pot belly, slurred speech and a shitload of toxic prescriptions. A cocktail of Lithium, Thorazine and various mind altering medications his only sustenance.

I wiped his brow and held him closely as he trembled through the night the descent into madness complete. Went to therapy with him religiously, while his doctor, an old-world misogynist harangued me about wearing pants, attending college and breathing while female. Our relationship once precious now defiled. Crippled by side-eye glances, fanatic interlopers, daily terror and unrelenting dread - it collapsed (as did I) under the weight of his mental illness.

Retrieving my dignity and spirit, I placed hope in a jar as the final credits rolled on what remained of my innocence. This like other scenes from our wedlock, a grainy sepia-toned mess, filed, ripped and tossed aside onto the tree-lined streets of old Park Slope.

--

Thursday, January 3, 2008

Random Fine-ness

Have You Seen Her?

She runs from her past
Dodges her future
Lives on the edge
of present

Dangling from a
Precipice of fear
She jumps...
to oblivion