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authorCase Duckworth2015-03-01 17:52:37 -0700
committerCase Duckworth2015-03-01 17:52:37 -0700
commit3ec50c15dbbc8725271d707a33064002ad64a33e (patch)
tree6566d206998c392a53db9ac159dc6f492f0f69f3
parentChange template: linke epigraphs w/o attribs (diff)
downloadautocento-3ec50c15dbbc8725271d707a33064002ad64a33e.tar.gz
autocento-3ec50c15dbbc8725271d707a33064002ad64a33e.zip
Add poems from the past year
-rw-r--r--src/100-lines.txt108
-rw-r--r--src/call-me-aural-pleasure.txt50
-rw-r--r--src/cold-wind.txt24
-rw-r--r--src/creation-myth.txt44
-rw-r--r--src/ex-machina.txt48
-rw-r--r--src/finding-the-lion.txt32
-rw-r--r--src/found-typewriter-poem.txt40
-rw-r--r--src/i-wanted-to-tell-you-something.txt54
-rw-r--r--src/index.txt10
-rw-r--r--src/january.txt54
-rw-r--r--src/largest-asteroid.txt36
-rw-r--r--src/last-passenger.txt32
-rw-r--r--src/listen.txt16
-rw-r--r--src/no-nothing.txt60
-rw-r--r--src/nothing-is-ever-over.txt24
-rw-r--r--src/plant.txt110
-rw-r--r--src/seasonal-affective-disorder.txt29
-rw-r--r--src/sense-of-it.txt30
-rw-r--r--src/something-simple.txt26
-rw-r--r--src/stayed-on-the-bus.txt21
-rw-r--r--src/the-night-we-met.txt34
-rw-r--r--src/the-sea_the-beach.txt35
-rw-r--r--src/time-looks-up-to-the-sky.txt33
-rw-r--r--src/when-im-sorry-i.txt29
24 files changed, 979 insertions, 0 deletions
diff --git a/src/100-lines.txt b/src/100-lines.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..c7bd99b --- /dev/null +++ b/src/100-lines.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,108 @@
1---
2title: 100 lines
3genre: verse
4
5project:
6 title: Autocento of the breakfast table
7 css: autocento
8...
9
10Whenever you call me friend \
11I fall down on my knees and cry \
12because I know it's the only thing \
13never to happen before in this \
14life is something you can't see \
15it's a pillow under a hook shot \
16I want to tell you something anything \
17but you are there and I am here \
18we are trapped inside ourselves \
19and the distance is too far \
20you are something that I would tell \
21would be nothing before too long \
22you are not the finisher of dreams \
23you are the beginning of nightmares \
24or waking but I'm not sure which \
25this letter is for you in the future \
26it will lead you on the path \
27of goodness or of rightness or of \
28wrong people and right meanings \
29or the meaning will be hidden \
30or wrestling the demon I will have become \
31restless under the starlight \
32it's too bright here to think \
33the negatives would be pitch black \
34darkness of a silver mine \
35there are no trees here \
36where have you been where are you now \
37I am no longer here or there \
38you are anywhere or are you \
39up in the clouds is a ghost \
40he is white and blue like a cloud \
41he paints with his teeth \
42he paints the rainbow before midnight \
43that you can see from your window \
44staring out under the sunlight \
45through the gauze curtains \
46over the high mountain far away \
47that is covered over with snow \
48past the rivers and forests \
49that lie awake under Orion \
50hunting the bull that runs forever \
51just out of his reach \
52pointing the way for the two of us \
53to join together in song or dance \
54or that other thing and sing \
55the Grinch down off Mount Crumpet \
56his heart breaking his chest \
57thumping with the beat \
58his little dog too running running \
59with the bull full of laughter and blood \
60he can't see it anymore because it's become him \
61we are trapped he says we are \
62trapped in ourselves it turns out \
63that all along it wasn't you or me \
64but he and her or her and him or \
65he and he or she and she or they \
66even they tell us that nothing has happened \
67even they know that it's a big joke \
68one more thing to know before the death \
69we are crying like alligators \
70before their loved ones' coffins \
71we are bellowing with grief like buffalo \
72on a berth of wild oxen \
73we are wailing our clothes are in rags \
74we want we want we want \
75but never can we get \
76what is it \
77we don't know what it is \
78but it's something it's anything \
79it's too many people or not enough \
80it's too few trees we need more \
81beavers to build riverdams we need \
82grapes too or plums from the ice box \
83or an ice box even would be nice \
84all I have is this cube isn't that right \
85or is a sphere a cube a donut a coffee \
86cup your hands in mine yes that's right \
87now bring the water to your face \
88clear and cool and \
89full of something \
90what is it wanting \
91or yearning \
92I can see in your eyes they're clear now \
93they are as clear as a running stream \
94or the sky that's clear right \
95or the water that is in the Bahamas \
96because I hear that's clear \
97you're as clear as the sound of a bell \
98you're as clear as the braying of horses \
99you're as clear as the glass in God's eye \
100and I \
101I'm as dull as an ox plowing \
102through fields in his yoke \
103I'm as dull as clouded amber \
104I'm dull as you find me \
105tonight after dinner \
106I'm reading the crossword \
107you're sitting beside me \
108you're watching TV.
diff --git a/src/call-me-aural-pleasure.txt b/src/call-me-aural-pleasure.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..a4b4dbf --- /dev/null +++ b/src/call-me-aural-pleasure.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,50 @@
1---
2title: Call me
3subtitle: aural pleasure
4genre: verse
5
6epigraph:
7 content: |
8 compiled thru Facebook statuses of the author
9 link: 'https://www.facebook.com/kittensruleforever38'
10
11project:
12 title: Autocento of the breakfast table
13 css: autocento
14...
15
16Like _40_ as I challenge anyone to come too! \
17It's like you're the epitome of lame! \
18She's all _I am SOOOO CONFUSED_ \
19Aw yeah she got word from yarn. \
20---but technically it's a pretty sweet, huh?
21
22Dude we were going and delicate fragrance of arguments get based off of are not try \
23dropping glasses in such an emotional rollercoaster you \
24and yes, I'm cocky enough to do anything! \
25I am as good as Phineas and make another picture symphony \
26This is a modification of a young woman to try \
27groups disband after they get your Meacham stuff please let it \
28RJ Covino, own statuses that'll be a great
29
30MY OWN afterbirth than do that \
31I am 2 we can be KISSED ON THE page. \
32You know I'm not sure that \
33Ben & Jerry's FTW \
344/10 would not be able to vote, because I gotta do it \
35This is going to be sad about what \
36Rush Limbaugh comes forward with sunglassesbut at least I wasn't wearing a messenger bag or skinny jeans! \
37The cooler THAN Facebook \
38Wine is the best. \
39
40YES I was surprised at first, but the train one, definitely. \
41
42Also Valhalla is a dumbass... \
43But we can get based off of course, Jon. \
44We watched this \
45CELEBRATE FRANKSGIVING TOO! \
46That didn't get started on that \
47FRANCIS OF VERULAM REASONED THUS WITH the courage to reply. \
48Anyone wanna watch out \
49I am cranky from Bro a good as a way to hijack my hand. \
50Afterbend was not to produce photographs.
diff --git a/src/cold-wind.txt b/src/cold-wind.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..1281b10 --- /dev/null +++ b/src/cold-wind.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,24 @@
1---
2title: Cold wind
3genre: verse
4
5dedication: Justin
6
7project:
8 title: Autocento of the breakfast table
9 css: autocento
10...
11
12Man of autumn, cold wind, \
13blow down the trees' leaves. \
14Fire on the ground. The sky \
15perfect water, frost-cold, \
16rippled only by flocks \
17of black birds flying, gone. \
18Their brightness can blind \
19an uncareful watcher, work him \
20in a froth of hands, not-wings \
21that ache with the loss of flight. \
22A tear is flung faithfully \
23to the ocean of air, slipping in \
24slowly, is as gone as the birds.
diff --git a/src/creation-myth.txt b/src/creation-myth.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..faed75d --- /dev/null +++ b/src/creation-myth.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,44 @@
1---
2title: Creation myth
3genre: verse
4
5project:
6 title: Autocento of the breakfast table
7 css: autocento
8...
9
10So two hyperintelligent pandimensional beings \
11walk into a bar. One turns to the other and says, \
12"Did you remember to check the end state \
13of that simulation we were running?" The other \
14says, "No, I thought that you did?" To which \
15the first replies, "Oh shit, we missed it. \
16I suppose we must do all of this again. Barkeep,
17
18two beers please." The bartender nods in that way \
19that bartenders do, pours the two beers, \
20expertly, by the way, just so, and hands them \
21to the first hyperintelligent pandimensional being. \
22The second one pulls a few singles out of his \
23wallet, places them on the bar, and the pair \
24turn around and begin walking toward a table \
25in the middle of the mostly-empty bar. The bar- \
26tender picks up the money, fans it out, frowns, \
27and calls to his patrons' backs: "Hey, this \
28isn't enough!" The two turn around simultan- \
29eously, with parity, and stare at him. A beat.
30
31One of them, the one without the beer, breaks \
32the silence by exclaiming, "Oh dear god, I'm \
33sorry! I didn't know your prices went up since \
34last time. What do I owe you?" The bartender \
35says, "Oh, just another dollar-fifty." The being \
36reaches in his back pocket, slides out his \
37wallet, looks in smiling, and frowns when he sees \
38it's empty. He looks to the other and says, \
39"You got a buck-fifty I can borrow?"
40
41The second hyperintelligent pandimensional being \
42considers this. He sets the beers down \
43on the table, pulls out his own wallet, opens \
44it, and frowns. "I'm broke too," he says.
diff --git a/src/ex-machina.txt b/src/ex-machina.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..131b4b3 --- /dev/null +++ b/src/ex-machina.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,48 @@
1---
2title: Ex machina
3genre: verse
4
5epigraph:
6 content: with lines from National Geographic
7 link: 'http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2013/08/sugar/cohen-text'
8
9project:
10 title: Autocento of the breakfast table
11 css: autocento
12...
13
14Bottom of the drink: they had \
15to go. The Coke machine, the snack \
16machine, the deep fryer. Hoisted
17
18and dragged through the halls \
19and out to the curb, they sat with \
20other trash beneath gray, forlorn
21
22skies behind the elementary \
23school, wondering what their next \
24move would be. The Coke machine
25
26had always wanted to live \
27the life of a hobo, jumping trains, \
28eating from garbage, making fire
29
30in old oil drums. It had some \
31strange romantic notions of being homeless, \
32is what the deep fryer thought.
33
34Its opinion was to head to court, \
35sue the bastards at the school for early \
36termination of contract. It was
37
38the embodiment of justifiable anger. \
39It believed privately that it was an incarnation \
40of Nemesis, the goddess of divine
41
42retribution. What the snack machine \
43thought, it kept to itself, but it did say \
44that nothing ever ends. The others
45
46were confused, then angry, but finally \
47understood, or thought they did. The snack \
48machine's candy melted in the sun.
diff --git a/src/finding-the-lion.txt b/src/finding-the-lion.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..b0a7535 --- /dev/null +++ b/src/finding-the-lion.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,32 @@
1---
2title: Finding the Lion
3genre: verse
4
5project:
6 title: Autocento of the breakfast table
7 css: autocento
8...
9
10Tonight, as I look up, the stars \
11hide themselves in shame. There is no moon. \
12The sky is black, like my desk,
13
14nothing like a raven. The streetlights \
15look on the scene disinterested. \
16They have their own small gossips of the dark.
17
18I came here to find the Lion, old \
19friend, but he will not show his flanks, his \
20paws, his shoulders, his mane. I
21
22can hear him laughing from his hiding-place \
23behind the moon, nonexistent, under \
24the cold dead earth. The mountain is in front
25
26of me now, a hole of stars daring me \
27to pierce it with my sight. The lion's still \
28laughing; the streetlamps talk about
29
30me amongst themselves, and go out. There \
31never was any lion, they tell me. \
32You only hear the wind on the mountain.
diff --git a/src/found-typewriter-poem.txt b/src/found-typewriter-poem.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..8771100 --- /dev/null +++ b/src/found-typewriter-poem.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,40 @@
1---
2title: Look
3subtitle: a found typewriter poem
4genre: verse
5
6epigraph:
7 content: |
8 Is he older? I asked her.
9 And I never got an answer, because at the moment she disappeared in a puff of smoke.
10 I like to think nothing ever happened to her save that she went over to the spirit realm.
11 I usually know better though.
12
13project:
14 title: Autocento of the breakfast table
15 css: autocento
16...
17
18
19Look, I say---look here--- \
20at this old place \
21where nothing changes. \
22Look at the people \
23who pass by. Look at \
24the trees. The flowers \
25full of wanting: look \
26how full they are with \
27color. Look how they mock \
28us, empty people who \
29must fill themselves \
30with changes---emptiness.
31
32"There is nothing to be \
33but happy. There is no \
34sadness to fall down \
35like cherry petals."
36
37The trees don't under \
38stand: they are too \
39tall to see the germ \
40of discontent in us.
diff --git a/src/i-wanted-to-tell-you-something.txt b/src/i-wanted-to-tell-you-something.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..ad9a1c1 --- /dev/null +++ b/src/i-wanted-to-tell-you-something.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,54 @@
1---
2title: I wanted to tell you something
3genre: verse
4
5project:
6 title: Autocento of the breakfast table
7 css: autocento
8...
9
10I wanted to tell you something in order to \
11explain the way I feel about the Universe, \
12its workings, etc. But I couldn't yesterday \
13---I'm sorry---I wanted only to ball \
14myself up and cry all day. It was the sixteenth \
15day in a row this happened to me, and to be
16
17more than two weeks waiting to cry is, \
18especially when, the whole time, I wasn't able to, \
19absolutely horrible. It was no sweet sixteen, \
20I'll tell you that much. Unless at yours, the Universe \
21kept telling you to quit having such a ball \
22and that you should have died, like, yesterday.
23
24At first, it feels like you're winning--that yesterday \
25you really were meant to die, but since you still _are_, \
26you beat the system somehow. But the Universe bawls, \
27"No, I meant you should've crawled into \
28a hole and fucking _died_!" And then the Universe \
29punches you right in the gut, something like sixteen
30
31times, and all you can think is, "Some sixteenth \
32birthday! Maybe I will go die in a hole." Yesterday, \
33at times like this, is a luxury the cruel Universe \
34refuses to give you. This is when it's a pain just to _be_, \
35when that Marvell line about "rolling our stuff into one ball" \
36just seems glib, when you don't want one body, let alone two.
37
38Something else that may come as a surprise to \
39you: over the past more-than-a-fortnight, these sixteen \
40days, I've had nothing to eat but crackers and a cheese ball. \
41(That's not entirely true---yesterday \
42I had some candy, peppermints and Jujubes.) \
43Maybe this is why I'm so mad at the Universe---
44
45because all it has ever wanted, this Universe \
46that gave me life, fed me from its breast til I was two, \
47and even before that, made a place in which I could be--- \
48all it's wanted was for me to take the sixteen \
49steps to sobriety, fold the Eight-Fold Path over yesterday \
50and step around it lightly, as I would an exercise ball,
51
52but the problem is, dear Universe, there's no way I could be \
53something as hard as all that, to wake up yesterday \
54morning, stretch over my sixteen selves, bound out like a ball.
diff --git a/src/index.txt b/src/index.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..dc2def6 --- /dev/null +++ b/src/index.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,10 @@
1---
2title: Autocento of the breakfast table
3genre: verse
4
5project:
6 title: Autocento of the breakfast table
7 css: autocento
8...
9
10[Ideas are drool.][]
diff --git a/src/january.txt b/src/january.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..c715a8a --- /dev/null +++ b/src/january.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,54 @@
1---
2title: January
3genre: verse
4
5project:
6 title: Autocento of the breakfast table
7 css: autocento
8...
9
10January. \
11It's cold, and I don't like it. \
12I prefer warm weather, \
13although I like sweaters. They are the one \
14warm spot in an otherwise shitty season. \
15But fall is better sweater weather. So be patient,
16
17Patient, \
18while waiting for the end of January. \
19A change of season \
20brings a change of mood along with it, \
21although I never thought I'd be one \
22to believe that SAD junk about effects of weather---
23
24weather!--- \
25on a person. Who becomes a patient \
26just because of one \
27month of snow? I did say of January: \
28"It's cold, and I don't like it," \
29but I hardly think it's fair, knocking whole seasons,
30
31seasoning \
32your conversation with demands for better weather. \
33(While I find it \
34nearly impossible, it's my mission to be patient \
35while waiting for the end of January.) \
36Oh, but how the long nights do so tax one!
37
38One \
39warm spot in an otherwise shitty season--- \
40all I ask, January, \
41is one warm day. Do you care whether \
42I'm a person who becomes a patient \
43in some psych ward? This just about does it.
44
45I.T., \
46although I never thought I'd call one, \
47is fair and patient \
48when I call. They talk with me, season \
49my conversation of demands for better weather \
50with an argument for the white beauty of January.
51
52They know it's hard; they say each season \
53has its detractors. One day, they say, the weather \
54will be controlled - until then, patience in January.
diff --git a/src/largest-asteroid.txt b/src/largest-asteroid.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6428620 --- /dev/null +++ b/src/largest-asteroid.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,36 @@
1---
2title: The largest asteroid in the asteroid belt
3genre: verse
4
5project:
6 title: Autocento of the breakfast table
7 css: autocento
8...
9
10What secrets does it hold? \
11Can it tell us who kissed Sara \
12that night on the veranda, or \
13who Joey is really in love with? \
14We all know it isn't Sara, we \
15mean look at them Christmas eve \
16and he's staring whistfully \
17at the stars, or the largest \
18asteroid in the asteroid belt. \
19She's staring at him, sure, but \
20she sees the twinkle in his eye \
21is not aimed in her direction. \
22The reflection of that reflection \
23will beam into space, lightyears \
24of space, dimming slowly each \
25second, until it dies out like \
26all of Sara's hopes for something \
27resembling love in this life, real \
28love that takes hold of her by \
29the throat and refuses to let go, \
30love that makes men travel for her \
31and only for her, love that launches \
32space ships to that asteroid, the \
33largest in the asteroid belt, that \
34jewel of dead rock and ice, harboring \
35something that could've been life \
36and nothing that actually is.
diff --git a/src/last-passenger.txt b/src/last-passenger.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..71d1382 --- /dev/null +++ b/src/last-passenger.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,32 @@
1---
2title: Last passenger
3genre: verse
4
5project:
6 title: Autocento of the breakfast table
7 css: autocento
8...
9
10Memory works strangely, spooling its thread \
11over the nails of events barely related, \
12creating finally some picture, if we’re \
13lucky, of a life---but more likely, it knots \
14itself, catches on a nail or in our throats \
15that gasp, as it binds our necks, for air.
16
17An example: today marks one hundred years \
18since your namesake, the last living passenger \
19pigeon, died in Cincinnati. It also marks \
20one year since we last spoke. Although around \
21the world, zoos mourn her loss, I'm done \
22with you. I mourn no more your voice, the first \
23sound I heard outside my body that reached \
24into my throat and set me ringing. But that string---
25
26memory that feels sometimes more like a tide \
27has yoked together, bound your voice to that bird, \
28the frozen, stuffed, forgotten pigeon---my heart \
29is too easy, but it must do---to blink, to flex \
30its unused toes, slowly thaw to the wetness \
31of beating wings, fly to me again, and alight, \
32singing full-throated, on my broken shoulder.
diff --git a/src/listen.txt b/src/listen.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..39f15e9 --- /dev/null +++ b/src/listen.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,16 @@
1---
2title: Listen
3genre: verse
4
5project:
6 title: Autocento of the breakfast table
7 css: autocento
8...
9
10If you swallow hard enough \
11you'll feel the stone \
12the one we all have waiting
13
14Once I found the stone in \
15the sea it kissed me as \
16the sea pawed at my back
diff --git a/src/no-nothing.txt b/src/no-nothing.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..e81d70b --- /dev/null +++ b/src/no-nothing.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,60 @@
1---
2title: No nothing
3genre: verse
4
5project:
6 title: Autocento of the breakfast table
7 css: autocento
8...
9
10| While swimming in the river
11| I saw underneath it a river
12| of stars. Only there was no
13| river: it was noon. You can
14| say the sun is a river; you
15| can argue the stars back it
16| like shirts behind a closet
17| door; you can say the earth
18| holds us up with its weight
19| or that it means well or it
20| means anything.
21| There is no
22| closet, nor door; there are
23| no shirts hanging anywhere.
24| There is no false wall that
25| leads deep into the earth's
26| bowels, growing warmer with
27| each step. Warmth as a con-
28| cept has ceased to make any
29| sense. In contraposition to
30| cold, it might, but cold as
31| well stepped out last night
32| and hasn't returned.
33| Last I
34| heard, it went out swimming
35| and might've drowned. Trees
36| were the pallbearers at the
37| funeral, the train was long
38| and wailful, there was much
39| wailing and gnashing of all
40| teeth--though there were no
41| teeth, no train, no funeral
42| or prayer or trees at all--
43| nor a river underneath any-
44| thing. There was nothing to
45| be underneath anymore.
46| Look
47| around, and tell me you see
48| something. Look around, and
49| tell me something that I do
50| not know. I know, more than
51| anything, that the world is
52| always ending. Behind that,
53| there is nothing, save that
54| there is no nothing either.
55|
56| Nothing somehow still turns
57| and flows past us, past all
58| time and beyond it, a river
59| returning, to its forgotten
60| origins deep within itself.
diff --git a/src/nothing-is-ever-over.txt b/src/nothing-is-ever-over.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..c0d179c --- /dev/null +++ b/src/nothing-is-ever-over.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,24 @@
1---
2title: Nothing is ever over
3genre: verse
4
5project:
6 title: Autocento of the breakfast table
7 css: autocento
8...
9
10Nothing is ever over; nothing \
11is ever even begun. The foundation \
12hasn't been laid; how can we hope \
13to put in the plumbing? The bed \
14is unmade, not even made; the wood \
15hasn't been cleft from the tree; \
16the seed hasn't been cast \
17out of water and growth and sun, \
18which itself hasn't started shining. \
19The cock has never stopped crowing \
20because he never started. Peter \
21betrays us again and again with \
22silence. Christ wakes up at night, \
23choking from a bad dream, wrists \
24aching from a dreamt, torturous pain.
diff --git a/src/plant.txt b/src/plant.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..06be535 --- /dev/null +++ b/src/plant.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,110 @@
1---
2title: Litany for plants
3genre: verse
4
5project:
6 title: Autocento of the breakfast table
7 css: autocento
8...
9
10I need a plant. I need a thing \
11to take care of. I need \
12a little green brownspotted \
13blackdirt growing \
14quietness. I need a sunlit \
15dawn knowing my name filtered \
16through a thin green window. \
17I need chlorophyll \
18working its magic on beams of \
19grassmade early morning dewdrop \
20sweetmaking green. I need \
21the dark earth sucking water \
22from a black crevice \
23its black magic churning \
24wormilled rockturned starblind \
25darkness and cold into \
26the opposite of dust. I need the heat \
27to blind me. I need the dumb making \
28to charge my coldened blood. I need \
29the dropturned leaves to turn again \
30their faces to the windblown sun. \
31I need millions of tiny years \
32summed up and burning out some unknown \
33new growth into the air. I need four \
34hundred feet of dark red gnarled wood \
35and needles glistening wetly on goldheaded \
36branches hoisting themselves \
37to the sky. I need ten strong men \
38to fail to bring you down. Old one \
39I need the peace that comes with knowing \
40something sacred holds still \
41in the world. I need your green tongues \
42of flame to lick at old wounds \
43stitching us together away from ourselves. \
44I need your brownbranching grasp \
45to keep me from drifting off \
46into unknowing terrible sleep. I need \
47to know the snake hanging \
48from your branches. I need to watch \
49the dropping of flesh massful \
50onto the ground from a height. I need \
51the gnawer at your root to strike \
52a vein to quicken old brown stone \
53to movement. I need jeweleyed venom \
54barking new greennesses into the bark. \
55I need a knocker of dark secrets hidden \
56in the dark bark hiding a smallstone \
57smoldering pearl in the knot. I need \
58that pearl held out in a hand like an offering. \
59I need the hand to be a plant's hand.
60
61I need a plant. I need a growing \
62growler groaning toward heat and air. \
63I need a green thin stem surprisingly strong \
64holding up the weight of a plain \
65of fallow greennesses of creases and caresses \
66of tiny worldmaking hardworking grandeur. \
67I need a singer of life crying \
68forward into old roads covered over \
69by dead trees. I need the rasping of root \
70in dirt. I need the unfurling of fiddleheads \
71to sing forth a new symphony. I need \
72fruits swelling large for the harvest. \
73I need yellow light shining through white bark. \
74I need juicecrush flowing waterlike \
75through valleys percolating up \
76through the ground. I need springs bubbling sap \
77into cabins of wood fought for by labor. \
78I need snow on the ground with shoots \
79dotting the melting patches. I need two \
80leaves on a thin stalk shivering \
81in moonlight. I need robinsong warbling \
82over the heads of small seeds sprouting \
83to enliven their growth. I need rings \
84of woody material widening to push \
85the ground out of their way. I need \
86new greennesses pushing out from \
87the brown dark bark gnarled. I \
88need the robin to build its songfilled \
89nest in a branchcrotch. I need \
90the fecundity of fungi on the branches. \
91I need quiet of the sunlight shooting \
92through thousands of branched leaves \
93quivering. I need whisper at dawn. \
94I need burrows underground foxholes. \
95I need duff layers eaten through \
96by worms. I need brooks murmuring \
97through crooks of roots. I need small \
98fish swimming in their schools at \
99midnight. I need oldnesses giving way \
100to youngnesses giving way to oldnesses. \
101I need dapplegray yellowshot ashbark. \
102I need the crunch of dead leaves underfoot. \
103I need snowquiet deadbranch mourning. \
104I need those purple mountains majesty. \
105I need a walk between trees in the dark. \
106I need that moment when stopping to rest \
107it suddenly seems that all the weary \
108forestroads in all their meandering come \
109to rest their heads at my astonished \
110feet, none of them needing more than me.
diff --git a/src/seasonal-affective-disorder.txt b/src/seasonal-affective-disorder.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..ef14309 --- /dev/null +++ b/src/seasonal-affective-disorder.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,29 @@
1---
2title: Seasonal affective disorder
3genre: verse
4
5project:
6 title: Autocento of the breakfast table
7 css: autocento
8...
9
10On your desk I set a tangerine: \
11a relic of a winter quickly passing.
12
13I'm reminded, fiercely, of a summer: \
14I watched the cemetery grass on my stomach.
15
16You hate the wind blowing through buildings: \
17the coldness of fire, blister of a mountain stream.
18
19When you broke down that night: your aunt / you \
20never have been / you shook that night /
21
22Seasonal affective disorder is real: you \
23mutter under your breath on the highway.
24
25The ant carries an orange peel past a headstone: \
26it carries her nearly as often.
27
28I set a tangerine on your desk: \
29an engagement ring, winter-returned.
diff --git a/src/sense-of-it.txt b/src/sense-of-it.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..1be59e1 --- /dev/null +++ b/src/sense-of-it.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,30 @@
1---
2title: Sense of it
3genre: verse
4
5project:
6 title: Autocento of the breakfast table
7 css: autocento
8...
9
10I only write poems on the bus anymore. \
11I sit far in the back to be alone. \
12I mark black things on white things in a black thing. \
13I try to make sense of it.
14
15Every time I see a plastic bag in the wind I think: \
16This is the most beautiful thing I've ever seen. \
17Most of my life I relate to something on the TV: \
18This is how I try to make sense of it.
19
20The Talking Heads song ["Stop Making Sense"][stop] \
21is about a girlfriend caught cheating and willed oblivion. \
22The song's real title is "Girlfriend is Better" \
23but lying about it is a way I try to make sense of it.
24
25The day after I lost her I found you again. \
26Your face made a plastic bag of my heart. \
27Your eyes were the wind pushing the bus forward. \
28I couldn't make sense of it.
29
30[stop]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9r7X3f2gFz4
diff --git a/src/something-simple.txt b/src/something-simple.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..0065c34 --- /dev/null +++ b/src/something-simple.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,26 @@
1---
2title: Let's start with something simple
3genre: verse
4
5project:
6 title: Autocento of the breakfast table
7 css: autocento
8...
9
10in mammals the ratio between bladder size \
11and urethra is such that it takes \
12all of them the same time to piss. Take \
13for example the fact that Fibonnacci \
14numbers show up everywhere. How can you \
15look at this at all of this all of \
16these facts and tell me to my face there \
17is no God? And yet there isn't \
18you murmer quietly into my ear over \
19and over like a low tide sounding \
20its lonely waves on an abandoned beach. \
21The ocean that birthed us holds us \
22still. We are tied, you and I, together \
23in her arms. The [moon, caring father,][moon] \
24looks down from a dispassionate sky.
25
26[moon]: moon-drowning.html
diff --git a/src/stayed-on-the-bus.txt b/src/stayed-on-the-bus.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6d9e867 --- /dev/null +++ b/src/stayed-on-the-bus.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,21 @@
1---
2title: Stayed on the bus too long
3genre: verse
4
5project:
6 title: Autocento of the breakfast table
7 css: autocento
8...
9
10It was a gamble \
11I lost---thought I could get closer \
12than the library, stayed \
13on past the admin building, \
14back down the hill to my beginning, \
15the driver's second-to-last stop. \
16I have to walk now, \
17through the wind and sun, past \
18traffic moving merrily along \
19taking their own gambles \
20staying on or getting off \
21too soon.
diff --git a/src/the-night-we-met.txt b/src/the-night-we-met.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..4a9dc93 --- /dev/null +++ b/src/the-night-we-met.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,34 @@
1---
2title: The night we met, I was out of my mind
3subtitle: or Lying in the dark
4genre: verse
5
6project:
7 title: Autocento of the breakfast table
8 css: autocento
9...
10
11My head is full of fire, my tongue swollen, \
12pregnant with all the things I should've said \
13but didn't. Last night, we met each other \
14in the dark, remember? You told me time was
15
16pregnant with all things. I should've said \
17something, to draw you out from your place \
18in the dark. Remember, you told me time was \
19only an illusion, and memory was only
20
21something to draw. You, out from your place, \
22I out from mine, that night, I believed in you. \
23Only illusion and memory were one, lying \
24down on your couch, through the night you drew
25
26me out from mine. That night, I believed in you \
27when you told me you loved me. I lay \
28down on your couch. Through the night, you drew \
29a picture of our future together.
30
31When you told me you loved me, I lied \
32in the dark. Remember, you told me time was \
33a picture of our future together. \
34My head is full of fire, my tongue swollen.
diff --git a/src/the-sea_the-beach.txt b/src/the-sea_the-beach.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6a4e88c --- /dev/null +++ b/src/the-sea_the-beach.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,35 @@
1---
2title: The sea and the beach
3genre: verse
4
5project:
6 title: Autocento of the breakfast table
7 css: autocento
8...
9
10Waiting for a reading to start \
11when there's nobody coming anyway \
12is like waiting for the tide \
13to make some meaning of the beach.
14
15The sea doesn't know or care \
16what the beach even is, let alone \
17its cares or its troubles, its \
18little nagging under-the-skin annoyances \
19that make the beach the beach.
20
21Sandworms, for example, or those crabs \
22with big pincers on one side \
23but not the other. Those really get \
24the beach's gander up, but the sea \
25doesn't care. The sea
26
27only wants to caress the beach \
28with its soft arms, to tell the beach \
29how much it's loved by the sea, \
30that complex of water, salt, and \
31the moon's gravity, the mercury \
32rising up and down slowly, like a yawn.
33
34The sea only cares about itself. \
35The beach lays there and takes it.
diff --git a/src/time-looks-up-to-the-sky.txt b/src/time-looks-up-to-the-sky.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6c43786 --- /dev/null +++ b/src/time-looks-up-to-the-sky.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,33 @@
1---
2title: Time looks up to the sky
3genre: verse
4
5project:
6 title: Autocento of the breakfast table
7 css: autocento
8...
9
10I wish I'd kissed you when I had the chance. \
11Your face hovering there, so near to mine, \
12your mouth pursed---what word was it you pronounced?
13
14When I think about you, something in my pants \
15tightens, and my thoughts run, and I realize \
16I should've kissed you when I had the chance.
17
18I want that moment never to be past \
19like Keats's lovers on the grecian urn: \
20his mouth pursed, her figure turned to pronounce
21
22her hips in ways that are not feminist. \
23But time strolls mildly on, not glancing at my \
24wish to kiss you when I had the chance,
25
26whispered like a beggar to a prince \
27outside his palace: time looks up to the sky, \
28purses his lips, and hears what I pronounce
29
30but pays it little mind. If he would just \
31turn back, bend down, and follow my design, \
32I would have kissed you when I had the chance, \
33as your mouth pursed and you pronounced goodbye.
diff --git a/src/when-im-sorry-i.txt b/src/when-im-sorry-i.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..af1d059 --- /dev/null +++ b/src/when-im-sorry-i.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,29 @@
1---
2title: When I'm sorry I wash dishes
3genre: verse
4
5project:
6 title: Autocento of the breakfast table
7 css: autocento
8...
9
10Your casserole dish takes the longest: \
11it has some baked-in crust from when you \
12cooked chicken last night. Washing it \
13allows me to think about this poem's title \
14and the first few lines. Now that I've \
15written them down, I've forgotten the rest.
16
17While sraping at something with my finger- \
18nail, I catch myself wondering again whether \
19you'll thank me for washing your dishes. \
20I realize that this would defeat the point \
21of my gesture, that this has destroyed \
22all good thoughts I've had about saying
23
24"I'm sorry." This, this is the reason why \
25I am always apologizing: because I never \
26mean it, because there is always, in some \
27attic, a thought roaming that says, insists: \
28"I've done nothing wrong, and I deserve \
29all I can take, and more than that."