IN THE HOUSE OF GRAPEFRUIT AND CITRUS
In the house of grapefruit and citrus, my emotions peel away
like I am the hybrid utensil.
Questions are asked and a little like a Pearl Jam song,
I don't know what to say.
Rain lives in my eyes half the time and umbrellas twirl in my cornea,
it's a very crowded place.
Do I say something inarguable and trite
like weather is a reliable topic in many states on many farms.
Do I say let me count the ways
with a mirror in one hand and a lasso in the other.
I thought I was on the same train, going to the same station
in the same city, but my map said up and your map said sideways
and our cities became blurry.
I've walked till there was glitter on my heels.
Sidewalks told me their stories.
Street lamps told me their songs.
I heard something on the wind that felt like home
so I made it a scarf and wrapped it around me.
I felt a memory deep as wood, old as silver going into my trunk.
Like I was a tree, and life was an ember.
If I hadn't felt your breath on my soul, trust me, I wouldn't have sat
in the diner.
I know the menu by heart.
But here I am someone asking what I want today
and do I want pie with that
and I am in the diner with a sandwich named after me
and you are cooking something special
and frankly, you make whatever you cook special
and I eat it slowly savoring every bite
and each bite is a fortune cookie
and each moment makes me a tiny bit hungrier
and each taste seems handpicked for me.
Uncanny how that works.
MOTORCYCLE MUFFLER
Waiting 5 years at the SCA Gallery on Thomas Street,
the motorcycle muffler grew into a rhythm.
Studied abstract expressionism on Tuesdays.
Ceramics on Thursday.
Philosophy on Saturday.
The muffler had gone 'round the world, at first it had visited volcanoes
and folk festivals.
The muffler was the proverbial nerd wrapped in a copper
and rust t shirt.
Of course Easy Rider was always playing in the motorcycle lounges,
but this muffler also had a soft spot for Bergman and Truffaut.
Making snap judgments is sheer folly, always.
The muffler had ferried across the sea many times,
giving lectures on botany.
Mufflers and plants have a sort of secret admiration society.
Mufflers used to grow on trees, like persimmons, like music.
Trees used to grow everything in ancient times.
Then things became specialized.
Mufflers went where all the motors went.
Boat and airplane engines used to host soirees where people danced.
Of course everything talked in ancient times.
You could have a great conversation with a chair and no one thought
you were the slightest bit odd.
It was natural.
Sofas could quote Shakespeare, tables could cook you a mean soup and
deal a deck of cards all at the same time.
People felt slightly threatened by the renaissance all around them.
Lots of mufflers and old divans got put in rust yards,
but they whisper long past dark of all the things they used to do.
Memory scrapbooks atop the heap archive the moments.
Amidst the dust of a landfill is the history of this
and the archaeology of that.
Miniature cities atop each other, like modern ruins and thankfully
what is safe from ruin.
Every year the muffler celebrated a birthday.
After a million, the cake became more candle than flour.
Today was just another day for the muffler, Russian lit reading
the morning away, listening to the Bob Dylan show
on Satellite Radio.
If you asked the muffler how it was, it always answered fine.
Inflections told the rest of the story.
One sigh and it had gone back to the years on the tree.
Two sighs and it had remembered the day the tree was gone.
The muffler was nostalgic and loved old movies.
I was walking by on Nov. 21st, 2009
in the world when the earth was a symphony of fruit and water.
I grabbed the muffler and ran down the stairs to where the concert was
about to begin.
When Tommy met the muffler and the muffler met Tommy,
all the muffler's memories of ancient times returned singing.
Hard to believe, 5 years, one thousand eight hundred
and twenty five days had gone by while the muffler,
though hardly idle, waited.
Yet, this is a true story.
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