letter 8.26.04

i hope this email finds you in better spirits than the last. lying here on the beach in the cayman islands, while relaxing, is at the same time dreadfully boring without your presence. the small brown women rubbing suntan lotion on my body are pleasant enough, but i have become so hopelessly spoiled by the overwhelming catharsis of your touch, that they may as well be mongrels tearing at my flesh. the drinks, while cool enough, have absolutely no effect on my thirst. i long for just one sweet kiss from your lips to quench my desires, and cannot wait to return home to your arms. i count the days we spend apart, cutting a small notch into the arm of my beach chaise with the corkscrew the waitress left behind, and i have also decorated the slats of the seat with tiny hearts containing our initials. if i remain here much longer, i fear this chaise will be embroidered completely with my thoughts of you, and i will have to pay for it and bring it home to give to you as proof of how completely and desperately i have been missing you.

suffering unbearably,
charles

email 8.10.2004

i awoke from a 3/4's sleep this morning around 4am to realize i had been caressing and attempting to seduce my extra pillow.
it was the moment when i realized it did not have a head that it, in actuality, was NOT you and i was immediately chagrined, and once again amazed at the deep resonance of your presence that remained even in your absence.

a motel bed in bethany

this morning
you rolled the stone
away from the opening
of my tomb,
raising me
with the softest touch
of your hand
against my cheek.

I need no further miracles
to prove
you are my messiah.

closest to the truth

for andrea

there is this brightly colored ball of rubber bands
this spinning cycling undertow
that churns with wankel engine smoothness
this weave and warp of weeds and vines
growing up through the trellises
we screwed to the wall of the garage

there are these perfect silent hands
moving slowly side to side
smoothing out the seams
moving the rocks around in the stream
until the water sounds are music
these furtive fingers massaging the pulses
in the space beneath my temples

there are these delicate scratches in the hardwood floor
from triple step
twists and turns
and other lines living on my back
where your fingernails traced the voltage of my skin

there is the single solid twitch you make
as you fall asleep at night
and the pillow with the silver fringe
that you hold between your legs

there is this unformed embryo of something
that you might find
if you deconstructed me
saw through the tangled metaphors
untied the semantic strands that i have been hoarding
like coupons and crusts of bread

or closest to the truth
it might be a piece of stone
i sometimes confuse with my heart
a piece of jade
i have polished into the shape of an egg
with this golden tongue

and i am offering it to you
hoping you might have the perfect place
to hide it.

when i reached across the table

when i reached across the table
and saw what was happening
in the reddened edges
of your eyes,
i understood
this one simple thing

i have become your onion.

something as timeless

there are no birds in your hands
only fingers
you are not awake yet
but you can hear the city
beneath your window breathing
in the silence
between your dreams
the eggs you are so careful
not to drop
are hiding deep inside you
and your fire escape
has nothing to do
with fire

visiting

when they fell asleep
he couldnt help but hold her
his arm draped over her side
his cock nestling between
the perfect cheeks of her ass
and every morning he had this pain
in the small of his back
from holding her like that
from not sleeping curled as far
into himself as he was used to
but the pain was only there
so he couldnt forget what he had
gotten to hold in for so many hours
the physical pain of her presence
the empty space she left behind

when they went out
he kept a finger in her belt loop
a hand in the valley of her back
an arm around her shoulders
she thinks he is afraid she might float away
like a forgotten balloon
accelerating into the blueness of the sky
but he knows why his hand is there
why his arm is the string
that holds them together so perfectly
he knows if he lets her go
he would be the one to leave the ground
and she might not be able to stop him
she might not notice until it was too late
he would be fifty feet above her
waving to her as if he were on a train
pulling away from her station
he knows the pressure of her skin
pushing back against his hand is all he needs
to stay where he is beside her

unh huh

he still says it
just like he used to
a hiccup of agreement
just like he did
before he got out of her car
and began to run away
drunk and full of his birthday
steak dinner and champagne
and this other guy
whose name she called him
the morning after he got back
from texas in her halfsleep

he still says it
just the way he would
to let her know he was still
listening to her in the dark there
next to her twitching body
wondering if he could touch her
drifting in and out of coffee
sleep mouth whiskey head

he still says it
just the same way she remembers
but he says it from hundreds
of miles away
in a town she doesn't know

they talk about meeting halfway
playing scrabble
and as they hang up their phones
and the lines click dead
at the midpoint between their lives
the last words they said
add up to some final score
that neither of them are keeping

versions

I.
she finds a small apartment in st. louis for herself and her cat, gets a job at a bookstore and makes a few close friends, he changes the oil in her volvo and she calls her parents every week, at first it is so perfect, and then her cat gets nervous around him, it becomes the same old thing after a while, and she cant get him to snap out of it, he becomes impatient and irritable, sometimes he teases her cat, he leaves poems he wrote for her hiding in places where he knows she will find them, poems about this man who cannot break away from what he has become, about how all the answers to their problems are waiting in a cardboard box in a corner somewhere and how they cant stop looking for it, about how someday they will fly away together, about how to be patient, as if his words could change anything by themselves, as if all he needed to do to get something was to want it this badly.


II.
he leaves everything behind except his motorcycle and some clothes, finds a sculptor named luis in minneapolis to apprentice with, he starts making things again, he builds sculptures that try to express his sense of how fragile he is in the middle of everything, he is sometimes overwhelmed by the sense of continuity, by how his life has twisted around on itself and sometimes it almost chokes him it is so tight, he sees her almost every night, showing up at her door covered with rock dust and shards of metal, bathing in her clawfoot bathtub as she unwinds her day, they learn to dance the charleston and tango, staying out late friday nights when she doesnt work dancing and sweating into each others arms, she looks for grants for the two of them, and they stay up late writing out reasons why they should get money to go away together to foreign countries and write poems about the exquisite pain of the things they cause in each other that they sometimes call love, he buys a set of learn to speak italian cassette tapes and they stay up late repeating the words together to each other, good morning, how are you today, what are you thinking ?


III.
he writes her letters, joking about running away with her, just to see how she reacts, but she doesn't, her letters tremble on as usual, overflowing with images of fire escapes, and motorcycles, and tears streaming backwards from the wind, he calls her apartment when he knows she isn't there and talks to her cat elizabeth, he asks her what she knows, if she ever hears his name slip from beneath the bathroom door as her owner masturbates in the bathtub, elizabeth's answers are all very evasive, she speaks only of the weather and how she doesn't get enough attention, he tries to sound sympathetic, but when he hangs up the phone he feels this strangeness in his neck, a tickling that keeps him up all night coughing, thinking of her in fever dreams that don't let him rest, this feeling that he has only been talking to himself tortures him like a hairball in his throat.


IV.
they go on like this for years, meeting halfway every twelve months, meeting halfway between their lives, some years she has a boyfriend, sometimes he is spoken for, one year she is engaged, on the odd year they are both temporarily taken, but they meet anyway, she dates a man who rides an old bmw motorcycle, he becomes involved with a woman who knows six different languages and jumps out of perfectly good airplanes, she falls in love with a chiropractor, he becomes infatuated with his neighbor, but they meet anyway, they have to share this perfect ache they have been cultivating separately together for so long, this bitter thrill that is the idea they are truly, romantically, eternally star-crossed, why else would they keep meeting like this, why else would they have to live so far apart.

(written with rebecca stewart)

the second part

the second part
says you are too young
to be thinking backwards like this
run away with her
it doesn't matter where
find out what happens
how the story ends
do something, man
there are the keys to your truck
you know where she lives
and how to climb the fire escape

there are the keys to my truck
and between them
and the door of my apartment
is the flexibility of fantasy
and i can see how it twists
and chimes in the wind
always making the exact sounds
i want to hear

the first part
is this string around my ankle
that is tied to you
across these hundreds of miles
it grows taut
until i can almost hear your voice
carrying through the line
i can almost feel you twitching
in your sleep

eventually the string relaxes
like the tide easing away
from the shore
like how your hand fluttered
away from me
on that hot iowa morning
trying to say something to me
that only now
i am beginning to understand

i have become the raccoon

i have become the raccoon
that broke into your green cooler
at the campground
the raccoon that ate
your last two loaves of bread
and the rest of the potato chips

i came home with you
hiding in the trunk of your car
next to the sleeping bags
you were so tired
when you got back to your apartment
that when you unpacked everything
you carried me inside
by the scruff of my neck
and didn't even notice what i was

when you go to bed at night
i creep out from behind the bookshelf
and search for the cooler
trying to remember as i look for it
how to pry the latch open
how to open the lid
and how to eat what i find inside
as loudly as possible
so that you will wake up
and find me
with my head buried
in these things i have found
that you could have only left
for me

anyway

he calls her
one summer afternoon
his call wakes her up out of a nap
and she's not all there yet
and all he says is
i miss you
and she doesn't even have to think
it just comes out
just like that
i miss you too
and they both sit there in the silence
for a moment
as she continues waking up
as she pulls the rest of herself
out of the dreams he interrupted
and then she says
who is this

cuttings

for lilla

the top cut off a pineapple
sitting in on the windowsill
for weeks
and you waiting for it
to take root
not just one time
but over and over again
and each one rotting away
under its stiff green leaves

the golden pathos
stretching its arms around
our apartment in st. paul
so far across the walls
that it had to stay behind
when we left
and when we came back to visit
six months later
you went to get a chair
from our old neighbors apartment
and i didnt go in
but you told me later
how you had seen the pathos
dying in their living room

the succulent i gave you
as an anniversary
that we have left behind in pieces
maybe two years ago by now
and us never knowing
how long it would take to fade
but it grows and sheds its leaves
and starts tiny green buds
where its not supposed to
and still looks ill somehow
and every time i see it
i see the same tired struggle
of growth and decay
i see us turning to each other
looking to see how far the roots
have dug themselves
into the soil behind our eyes.

transom

it is this man
looking in his empty mailbox
for bits of skin and teeth
folded up on paper
skin he can touch
teeth he can feel
clamping down tightly
on his collarbones

he pretends to pull the letter
from the box
tears it open
and holds it in his hands
unfolding it slowly
creasing the folds backwards
so it lays flat
but as he tries to read it
he sees only his hands
held out in the air
in front of him
trying to feel the weight
of the paper
they are supposed to be holding

his hands become agitated
pretending to fold and unfold
and trace lines across a page
that isnt there
they move so quickly
with such force
that the man realizes
they are no longer his hands
they are wild birds
tearing themselves from
the ends of his arms
and flying though the transom
over the front door of his building

the birds fly north
loud and black
with wings the wrong size
for their bodies
and the man rushes outside
after them
shouting directions to them
an address in minneapolis
a name
and something else
that by now
they are too far away
to understand.

surrogate laughter (cover design)

            special thanks to cover model Ethan Lebovics

falling down the stairs

i'm sitting at the kitchen table
trying to end a letter to a friend
of mine when i hear her

yelling to me from upstairs

she says

i think i'm going to fall
down the stairs

she says i'm standing here
at the top of the stairs

i'm standing on one foot
and i think i'm going

to fall

and i'm trying to think of what
else i want in the letter

what i need to say before it ends
and she yells to me

she says

did you hear me

i said i think i am

about to fall down these stairs
and when i do

i'm sure it will hurt me
a great deal

and i don't know how i should
end the letter

what i should write

just before i sign my name
and then i hear her again
saying oh my god

here i go

i am falling down the stairs
thump bump thud

and then nothing

i am just about to close it
writing something like

i miss you.

or i am thinking about you
as you read this

but i stop when i hear her again
saying

i have now fallen down the stairs
she says i am at the bottom

of the stairs

lying here very twisted and broken

i get up out of my chair

take the unfinished letter in my hand
and walk down the hallway

to the stairs

and look

and there she is

standing at the top of the stairs
her arms crossed over her chest
tears running down her face
she says

i think my neck is broken

i can feel a puddle of blood
forming underneath my head

i hold the letter out
towards her so she can see
and i ask her

do you think i should say love
at the end of this.

forwarding

he rolls over and puts his arm
around the thick tangle .

of sheets in his bed

he kisses one of the folds gently

his tongue sliding along the wrinkles
and he murmurs softly to himself
something about this envelope

he is hidden inside

something about fingers prying along the top
ripping it open

and gently unfolding him
dragging him from his bed

he pulls his sheets along with him
he wraps them around his body
and walks out into the street

and then the wind comes

the wind with fingers allover his body
fingers pulling him into the air

and he is flying

he hugs the sheets tightly to his body
ashe murmurs something to himself
about how the words in letters change
as they get closer

to where they are going

about how he is like those words
how he is writing himself a letter
and flying along with it inside him

she sits on her porch

she sends envelopes with pieces of
blank white paper in them

she thinks by the time they arrive
the words will be there

she puts a stamp on each envelope

and addresses it to someone she doesn't know
someone who lives somewhere far away
somewhere she has never been

and she sends them there

the man flying over her house
holding his sheets

finds one of her letters in his hands
and moves them to open it

he lets go of his sheets to open the letter
and the sheets fall fluttering

through the sky like punctured clouds
falling at her feet

she picks them up

folds them and takes them inside

she walks up the stairs to her bedroom
murmurs something to her uncovered bed
about holding clouds of smoke

inside of her heart

about flying thru them every day
and getting used to it

she unfolds the sheets

pulling them across to the corners of her bed
she tucks them in

smooths out the folds

and then she hears something
somewhere in the sky above her
she hears the sound of someone
reading one of her letters out loud
in a sky she knows only by

the things that it drops

when she distracts its hands

with a letter she didn't write

with a letter about this man

flying in the air above a woman's house
a man reading a blank piece of paper
over and over again

about him going to sleep beneath the crisp folds
about him hugging them tightly to his body

as he flies

with her name on it

   

i see a woman i don't know
walking by in front of my house
and i run out grab her by the arm
and drag her inside

i lock the door

and sit her down in a chair
i introduce myself

and say how nice of you
to come by and visit
how are things

she reaches for the phone
picks it up and dials

a nine and a one

before i can get it

away from her

she gets up and heads
for the door

but i throw myself
between them

i say won't you stay
for just a minute

i'l1 make some coffee

i have some fresh strawberries
in the kitchen

i'l1 bake you a cake
with your name on it

and that gets her attention
she smacks her lips and
heads towards the kitchen
rubbing her hands together

i slip out the door

lock it from the outside

walk around to the kitchen window
and watch her as she searches

the crowded shelves of my refrigerator.

one man's treasure

   

i take out the trash

and come back inside

and my wife is getting

into the kitchen garbage can

and she tells me to take her out

and put her with the

rest of the trash

so i pick her up by the

handles of the garbage can

and carry her out

and put her with the rest

of the trash

and she looks very happy there

and i wish i could join her

bu t she tells me

it doesn't work that way

someone has to put you here

she says

someone besides yourself

she says

she cannot move until the

garbage men come

on thursday morning

to pick her up

and take her to the promised land

and then i see what its all about

and ask her

how can she leave me here

all alone with everything else

taking out the trash

every day

thinking of her

thinking of how one day

i took her out with the trash

and set her free

and i see that she is crying

and she is saying she is sorry

that it had to be like this

and how great i was to

do all of this for her

that she knew i would

and that is why

she loves me so much

she keeps sobbing those words

sobbing

that's why i love you

i stand there

looking at her

sitting there in the trash

telling me that's why

she loves me

and after awhile i go back inside

and read the paper

fix myself some dinner

have a drink and go to bed

i don't even hear the garbage truck

when it pulls up in front of my house

i don't even hear the garbage men

setting down the empty cans

on my driveway  

it is this man

lying asleep in bed

dreaming the same dream

all night long

dreaming that he is

naked and running

down streets he does

not recognize

that he has been

seduced by the pure

instinct of flesh

against pavement

pulling the world

from under his feet

he wakes up

to the sound of

running footsteps

going by outside

in front of his house

he puts on his

bathrobe and slippers

and goes to the window

but the street is empty.

he stands at the window

all night long

shifting his weight

from one tired leg

to the other.  

seat yourself

  

you wake up

at the wheel of a car
and you are driving
down the highway
with the radio blaring
the heat on high

and you

wondering where

you are going

you take the next exit
find a truck stop

park in a parking space
five times as long

as your car

and walk inside

you seat yourself
at a table

in a corner

and a waitress
comes to you

and you almost tell
her about how

you woke up in this car
driving down the highway
with the radio blaring

and the heat on high

and you

wondering where

you were going

about how you ended up
in this truck stop

telling your story

to a waitress

she asks what can
she get for you
and you want

to say that all you want
is to know where

you are going

but you settle

for a plate

of ham and eggs

expecting

   

Early in the morning he wakes
me up with the doorbell

My wife has gone to work

so i get up and go to the door

where he is standing holding a package
tapping the toe of one of his boots

on the floorboards

He hands me his clipboard

as he walks past me into my house
and asks me to sign it

The paper is blank

so i ask him where to put my name
and he tells me anywhere

He sits down at the living room table
sets the package on the table

in front of him and fingers

one of the doilies set at his place

He says how something to drink would be nice
so i go into the kitchen and come

back with two mugs of coffee

I set his down on the package

and he quickly picks it back up
inspecting the box for moisture damage
He runs his hand over the spot

where the mug had been

and he looks at me like i'm crazy
he asks what's wrong with me

why am i trying to ruin the package
he brought me

He asks me don't i like it or something
and i tell him i don't know

i wasn't expecting a package
i don't know what it is

so how can i not like it

He sits there for awhile
blowing on his coffee

running his hand over the top
and sides of the box and he says
that some people are happy

to get things like this

He says people send other people things
because they care

He asks me why don't i care
and i tell him i do

but i don't know who sent it
i don't know what it is

and he shakes his head slowly
pushes his mug away on the doily

leans back heavily in his chair and sighs

He says it's not supposed to happen like this
i'm supposed to thank him

tear open the box and exclaim

all sorts of happy things when i see
what is inside

i am not supposed to argue with him
about who sent it or what it is

He looks down at the scuffmarks on his boots
and the floor that is all around them

He puts his weight on his feet

and pushes himself back and out of the chair
His hand moves across the top of the box
once more and drops to his side

as he walks out of my house

He gets into his truck

and drives slowly down the street
his hazard lights still flashing

I watch him from my porch

and when his truck is out of sight

i hear my wife's car coming down the block
bringing her home for lunch

I turn around and walk back into my house
and i see the clipboard sitting on the chair
where i left it with one piece of paper on it
with my name on it

floating in the middle of so much whiteness

My wife walks in and sees the package on the table
She asks what it is and i tell her i don't know

She wants to know who sent it

and when i'm going to open it

and i don't say anything

I don't have an answer for her
and she knows it

She takes the delivery man's mug from the table
and walks into the kitchen with it

saying to me that most people are happy
to get packages. 

coming up

just the two of us were not enough so we made her we 

invented her out of the words we had saved like toys too 

delicate to play with and there she was and us moving around 

her carefully to avoid the eyes we had given her she didn't 

know her name until we spoke it she was lost she was in a 

parking lot looking for a car she didn't have and we told her 

we would drive her home

we asked her where she lived we knew she didn't but asked to 

let her know so she could feel it for herself where do i turn how 

much farther but no response just her eyes searching the street 

signs for anything familiar but nothing and we knew that and 

we told her it was alright that we would take her home and we 

smiled thru her at each other these thin smiles she could not see 

but they went right thru her she was that faint

 

she grew solid as the days went on she became the stories we 

filled her with about who she was about when she stood in the 

backyard for five days in the rain her skin peeling like old paint 

until we brought her back inside how we scraped the loose 

pieces off and covered her up again

 

we gave her a history like moldy books in our basement holes 

where bits of her life should have been and the holes were the 

only truth in her she was made of holes we left them by 

accident falling from our hands because we could only hold so 

much they were hers she was there just behind us picking them 

up eating them smiling feeling the weight in her gut her skin 

growing out around her bones

 

we got home at night so tired from filling her with stories we 

undressed with our eyes closed and couldn't find the bed alone 

we hadn't touched each other in weeks and didn't care we had 

her but she was wide awake stronger now opaque walking 

quietly around the house recognizing things in the dark

 

we were so tired we slept until the next night and woke up to 

nothing to what we had gone to sleep to get away from and her 

sitting at the foot of our bed saying the sun stopped coming up 

that we had been asleep for days when it happened and now it 

was always dark

 

she touched our skin wrinkled thin like paper she told us we 

had to move slowly so we wouldn't tear she looked at us sadly 

told us to lie down to sleep again she told us she would wake 

us up the next day

 

the next day came of course dark like an empty closet and us 

inside asking is there a door she told us what we said in our 

sleep how we screamed at each other how we never listened 

and only spoke when someone else was speaking and we 

believed her we held the corners of the sheets in tight sweating 

hands and we believed her

 

we waited for her stories like fish in a tank too small for us to 

move when we tried we splashed the only drop of water onto 

the floor and she cried a single tear over our dried out bodies 

we ate only what she told us we were at the top mouths wide 

open she fed us anything she wanted to and we ate it and 

smiled and opened our mouths for more

 

she ran out of tears out of food out of whatever it was we 

wanted her to want us to be and then she left gathered up her 

holes and walked away one morning just as the sun was 

coming up

 

it blinded us burned our skin thru the sheets the shades the 

windows it lit us on fire like puddles of gasoline shrinking in 

the middle of a parking lot that never ends.

when she is driving home

she sees the lights
in the sky

like so many other nights
when her father was driving
and she and her sister

were sitting in the back

like so many other nights

when they would follow the lights
until they found them

beaming up from so many

obscure car dealerships and

grand openings of gas stations

all that has changed now

she doesn't follow the lights

she knows the kinds of places
they are coming from

she has been there before

she knows that a woman
just like her

is standing at the center
of the group of lights

watching them burn out into the sky
waiting for someone to drive by

for someone to find her

turn off the lights

and take her home.

sometimes we meet like old lovers

   

sometimes at a hidden beach
at lake calhoun

where a man in a brown speedo
piles up rocks

at the edge of the lake

and splashes water on them
so they glisten

in the late afternoon sun

we sit on our towels
drying off

wiping the sand from our feet

the piles of rocks get bigger
and all we agree on

is that it is getting darker
sooner every day.

letter to hannah on valentine's day

   

dogs

bury

bones

people

bury

dogs

people

bury

people

but

dogs

just

bury

bones  

amerslan

- for rebecca bremner

as you make each sign

birds of human flesh

fly from the end of your wrist.

they flutter inside our ears

telling us

that as we fly

our wings become unbroken.

tightly

   

you grow tired of the plain white walls

you grow tired of the pale flesh on your body

you grow tired of the still grey calm that is your bed

you cover your walls in streaks of crimson

you paint your skin the color of pregnant clouds

you draw arrows on your bedsheets

you stand in the middle of it all

watching the color peel away

from the walls dripping

from your skin falling

off the edges of your mattress

you stand there

staring at the

brightly colored floor

and you feel a yawn

somewhere deep inside

you hold it there and go on with your life.  

spin

   

i'm downstairs in the laundry room
waiting for the washer to stop

so i can put my darks in the dryer and
start my whites in the washer

and i'm listening to the washer

going thru its final spin

and it's making these noises

as it spins and i feel the rhythm

of the noises and i find myself
moving with them and i'm dancing
around to the beat of the washer

lost in the sounds of this metal box
with my darks inside shaking quietly

on the basement floor when my neighbor
walks in with a basket of dirty clothes

and i stop dancing and look at him and he
just stands there holding his

dirty clothes staring at me and the
washer clicks off and my

clothes slowly stop spinning
slowing until they are stopped

stuck up against the insides of the machine

i walk out of the laundry room

out of the basement and out of the
apartment building into the street
moving slowly away from my neighbor

away from my darks and away from my whites.

thirst

   

he wakes up

in the middle of the night
and gets out of bed

to get a glass of milk

he stumbles into the kitchen
and opens the refrigerator
and as he is reaching

for the milk

he sees his picture

on the side of the carton
and the caption

that says he is missing
and has been missing
for years

he takes the milk
from the refrigerator
opens the spout

puts it to his mouth
and tilts it back
until the last drop
has drained down
his throat

he puts the empty carton
back in the refrigerator
and goes back to bed

he dreams that he

is at the supermarket
pushing through a
crowd of people
around the dairy case

he dreams that he has
made it to the front

of the crowd

and he is looking

at all the milk cartons
looking at all of the
pictures on their sides

he dreams that
he has found one
with a picture of
someone else

someone else
who is missing
just like

him.