Author: poetryfest

I am no traveller from an antique land.
I am land itself
I am the Earth
The thing that grows and crumbles to
dust
Ashes painted over cave walls by firelight
Mixed with water, daubed on faces and canvases and buildings.
I am the sand that your footprints press upon
And the wave that washes them away.

I am the last thing Ozymandius saw back when he was
Just Ramesses
I was the stone his body became
– Atherosclerosis ; Renal Calculus –
More than mere Nephrolith

I made him monolith
Hardened him from Earth and
Gave him centuries
Turned to steel then
Took him away
Chiselled him down to rubble
Nose down to a stub
Turning
Feet to sand
He crumbled from the bottom up
To be found and then spoken of
Later
By one teller to another.
Crushing
myself to black
Spreading
Thin over mesh into paper

Together
We gave him more life still.

I am all of this and so much more.
I am History.
With hands and tools
I am the ropes that bind and pull him
up,
And then reverse myself
To bring them tumbling back down towards me.

Colston; Columbus, Kings of all Kinds.
Despite them,
So alive am I
Beyond story and memories and Earth.
I am What shall remain,
Even when the truth cannot.

Hey
Did you hear about the new Restaurant?
No?
Well, it’s Rich McCormick’s new place
It’s a new fast food place
Amazing service
With no adult employees
All kids aged three and up
As long as you’re potty trained
You can work there.

When customers come in
They greeted with a five-year-old cashier
I hear she’s getting better at counting to ten
But she has experience using a tablet
So she is good at getting your order right with each click
Just don’t expect any change back
Because she likes the feel of change going up her nose.

We have three eight year olds in the back
They’re flipping burgers
They haven’t been able to see over the stove yet
And we’re still currently working on them
Not using the spatula to scratch their butts
At least they learned not to put their hands on the stove.

Now the newest recruit
She’s three years old

Our counters are sticky from soda
because she can’t hold the cup yet
but she tells us she can do it
oh, and I hope you like floaties in your diet coke
it’s booger flavored.

Ah,
My chicken nuggets are ready
They’re cold and with bite marks
Just the way our fry cook like it

Need to complain to the manger?
I wouldn’t bother
He will spit raspberries at you
And call you a poopy head
While burping in your face.

Doesn’t sound realistic?
A little more realistic
Than running the streets of New York to pick berries
Or throw an imaginary newspaper from their bikes
At least if kids worked in fast food they could get a meal
Since you’re determined to take away free meals from school.

Hey Rich Mccormick,
With your fake smile
And fake car salesmen suit
I have a better idea for you
How about you go home and watch reruns of leave it to beaver
And dream of the idea of the 1950s that didn’t exist
While everyone living in 2025 make the decisions

A still, moonless night
I lay my head down on your chest,
And listen to your heartbeat,
Slow

And your breath steady
As you drift away
A moment of sleep
Then, out of nowhere
You flinch, awake
And hold on to me.

When I ask you if you’re okay,

You nod your head
and tell me you felt like
You were falling
Asleep!

And the only thing I can think of
while looking into
these dangerously deep eyes
Is the inescapable feeling that
I am falling too!

I would try to maneuver myself so I could focus
on the horizontal sliver of sky.
– Barry Lopez

I bought a
one-dollar
copy of
Arctic Dreams
and carried it
to the truck,
cradled in
both hands.
Turning south,
homes melted
to open fields,
rain-soaked
beneath a
slice of
horizon.
Voices of
Oregon Public
Radio rose through
the cab, prolific
and award-
winning author
Barry Lopez
died yesterday
in Eugene. My
mind lit upon
an autumn
evening, small
circle gathered
’round Mr.
Lopez, frail
then, we spoke
long enough
to give thanks
for his work,
his definition
of prayer,
continuous
and respectful
attendance to
the presence of
the divine. In his
grasp, my palm
felt worn and
clean. Maneuvering
toward the edge,
I held both
hands open, ready
to receive
a sliver
of sky, blessed
body, broken
and
given.

I covered my face in makeup.
Earlier, I met a bird with his back to a brick wall.
I crouched.
Two animals blinked at each other until
I walked away with my head turned down
From the cold sun.
I didn’t count, but if I had I might’ve
Counted twenty blinks until
I walked away with shame curled up in my puffer jacket pockets.
I’d thought about smiling without showing
My teeth so he knew I was no reason to be afraid.
But I am and he was, so I’ll remember him when I curl into bed.

There are some things that a person never forgets

Like their first funeral
A 19 year old girl
Who lost her battle to opioids
I was 14, but her little brother was 9
I remember his little face
So confused and upset
The sound of my aunt
Grieving her only daughter
The look on my moms face
When her name comes up
Watching my family pretend to be ok
8 years later

Or the look of defeat
When my grandma knew the cancer had won
The feeling of hugging her for the last time
Skin and bones
My dads voice when he said her fight had ended
Watching a family
That just lost its foundation
Struggle to recover
The sight of my grandpa
Placing flowers on her grave
Saying it was supposed to be him

Watching the life slowly leave
My childhood pets’ body
The energetic rescue now unrecognizable
So sad, so tired
Riddled with cancer
My sister held his paw until it was over

They were the hardest goodbyes
But one day they’ll be the best hellos

Preface:
When I was seven, I ate soap to see how it tasted. Soap doesn’t taste good, but it was fun to
have bubbles come out of my mouth. Now, many years later, bubbles still escape me—
fragile, fleeting, but no longer playful.

———-

And if I had the words to tell you,
I promise that I would.
Words seem to fail me again and again,
phrases put together carefully,
only to pop and vanish like bubbles from my mouth,
never to be seen again.
Words, they always fail me,
so I stick to my own thoughts
like a criminal contained to the jail of screaming silence.

In my mind, the words flow unbroken,
but they cannot breathe this air,
cannot stand the weight of being heard.
So when my bubbles pop,
I pick up my pencil,
worn, taped up, and old
(perhaps from carrying the weight of what goes unsaid)
and taint the papers with my forsaken words,
and suddenly the pages are no longer pure white.

They carry my words so I don’t have to,
but only so many bubbles
can be placed on gentle paper,
and only so many can swell inside my head,
until something is
bound
to
break.

And so I wanted to love you.
Is that so awful?
Last time I saw you
You were dancing like a skeleton
In the light of a signal fire
made of darkness and bone
Did you think it would scare me?
Turn me away to learn
That your mouth spews shadow
Or I would leave you alone? No.
Give me your body
Lend me your heart space
Let me love and live in
Every part that feels dark
I just wanted to give you light
I just wanted to give you life
Is that so terrible?

Horsing around outside the parking lot.
Up to my chest in the grass
The fire spread so fast
My world was so small in those days
And in seconds that fire took it over
Blasting me from all sides with its hurt
Like it hated me for the person I would one day become
So… in a way, the fire felt a lot like home
As it charred my flesh to the bone