poem

My Body

I.

My ribs are trusses

Preventing the collapse 

Of my body 

On top of my heart.

My liver is an innocent bystander

But never tells anyone 

Everything I've done.

My bones are small and hard

Like little league bats.

My eyelashes are long and thin

Like the disarticulated legs

Of harmless spiders

My spleen plays hide and seek

With no one looking so it stays

Hidden forever, unearned,

Unless you happen to run into it

By mistake. Then it bleeds and bleeds.

My bladder is a bota de vino.

Tonight’s vintage literally

Tastes like piss. 

My glands are actually lymph nodes.

Call them by their proper name!

Show some respect!

The weird mole on my back

Gives my immune system

Some really bad vibes. 

My skin use to rash

When mom and dad

Were going through divorce.

My ribs arch a high-

Ceilinged shelter around 

My lungs and my heart.

My pancreas describes

Its lived experience

As fast and moist.

If my adrenals

Were any larger 

The world would need

New shadows

And a much larger cave.

The less said about my 

Muscles, the better.

The more said about my mind

The more insufferable I’d be. 

My dick is pure vexation.

There are versions

Of life as a eunuch

Both better and worse

Than the life of the erection.

The top half of my face

Betrays a certain impish charm

While the bottom half belies the extent 

Of admittedly modest accomplishments.

My ribs are a shield

Protecting my heart

II.

The heart has four chambers:

Blood enters the first chamber 

Exhausted and small and blue,

Huddling together like prisoners

In a frozen gulag at Reveille.

All it offers is a place to gather,

A place of brief rest.

Signs adorn the walls

Apologizing for the wait.

The second chamber of the heart

Receives its charges 

With anxious proficiency

Lining everyone up

Like flight attendants 

Just before an emergency landing,

Offering drinks and snacks 

To maintain the illusion of a lost complacency.

The third chamber is just happy to be alive.

Every single cell that bursts through its door

Is welcomed as a conquering hero.

There’s couches and hammocks 

And rows and rows of books

And an open bar that serves until dawn.

The fourth chamber of the heart quickly 

Whips them back into shape

Because it’s time to get back to work.

Everything that follows depends on 

How well they can follow simple instructions.

The heart will keep doing this until

You tell it to stop. 

My ribs are a prison 

Incarcerating my heart.

My heart is a bird

That fits through the bars

But stays as long as you like. 

10/18/26

poem

 The Debt

The old surgeon is on call again

And no one can figure out why 

He does it after all these years.

He had a good career.

He paid his dues,

Worked hard, offered quality,

Was always respected. 

Isn’t it time to coast a little as he gets 

Closer to the finish line?

But he has a secret 

Reason no one knows—

Statistically speaking, ER call

Represents the most efficient method

Of putting a surgeon in the position

Of potentially saving a life—

Mesenteric ischemic

Ischemic bowel

Perforated ulcer

Free air

Strangulated hernia.

He drives in. He saves the day. 

Another notch in the belt

Holding up the world as he knows it.

Every year he gets skinnier and skinnier.

You should eat, his wife says

But he replies:  the more I save

The faster I pay off the debt that remains

From the lives of those I have lost.

Honey, I’m always in arrears

No matter how busy I get.

We’ll probably die as paupers.

Everything I’ve earned

Was always earmarked 

To be remittance on a delinquency

That can never be paid back.

The best I can hope for now 

Are those fleeting moments 

Amidst the flurry of action

In the OR when I almost forget 

How much I actually owe.

10/18/26

poem

 Presbyter

There once was a man who so loved the universe he refused to accept the truth of the last prophet as his savior unless it was guaranteed that everyone else would be saved. No matter what. Give me the hell and pain of eternal fire, he said, and for no one else instead. Not one soul deserves to suffer for even a tenth of eternity, no matter what, even the devil. Even the most cold-hearted killer. Even Stalin. Even Judas Iscariot. Everyone gets saved. No exceptions. Given an infinite series of random exchanges even the devil is statistically salvageable. Instead of a benediction he recites his favorite poems. Instead of certainty he offers hope. Instead of hope he offers his hand. Instead of martyrs we patiently listen to what everyone has to say. Instead of a catechism we practice good manners. Instead of god he asks you to love the world. Instead of presbyter he offers you a handful of dirt.

10/18/26

poem

 Bookmark

I knew a girl who used a thread 

As a bookmark— a single black thread

Snugged against the inner spine.

How that was enough

To mark her spot 

I’ll never know 

But she never lost her place,

Always picked up right where 

She left off.

From across the room 

You couldn’t ever tell how far along 

She was in her novels 

Until one day she’d show up

With an entirely different book 

And you never saw the other one again.

Which doesn't mean she read 

Everything through to the end 

Only that she was done 

With that particular one.

If she ever stepped out for a while 

I was afraid to check her progress

Lest I pull the thread from its place

Like a hair on her head 

And all the pages loosened 

And fell to the floor

Before she was done with it. 

Sometimes I find her hairs

Entwined in my fingers after

A night of love together.

The first thing I do is check

The floor for scattered ribs 

Then the pillow for her head.

And there she is, still sleeping 

With the look on her face of a woman

Who knows exactly where she is.

10/18/26

poem

 Rituals of Love

Rituals of love—

Making the coffee,

Getting the flowers,

Remembering things

You’d otherwise forget.

You have to be water

Flowing downhill,

Finding the low places,

Filling the cisterns

Without ever knowing 

What is meant by wetness.

That’s one theory—

Knowing what you are

By your effect on others.

You have to pay attention.

Look, she’s reaching for a towel.

Her eyes are closed. 

Her body glistens.

Her raven hair drips.

10/18/26

poem

 Bloodwork

The doctor has ordered blood work. Vials and vials of tests. They take so much blood you feel dizzy. They give you a snack. When you call for the results she refers you to a specialist. He shakes his head in disgust and redirects you to the proper subspecialist. It takes 6 months to nail down an appointment. In the meantime your blood counts fluctuate. You laugh and cry and rage. The price of gas dominates the front pages. None of your friends ever had to give blood. Something seems amiss. On the day of your appointment you get lost in the parking lot. But there were never any spaces. The valet is rude and demands to see your papers. You never see your car again. Just inside the building you have to hand over everything you own. Your pens and poems and scraps of receipts. Your wallet. Your keys. The list of names to contact when you’ve passed. The password to an account containing $17. The matches from a restaurant in the valley.  Your phone. Your memories. The waiting room is a large hall with a high arced ceiling made out of treated wood like a midwestern non-denominational church where the pastor plays the guitar. The chairs are all broken. The line for the check-in spirals around the room 3 times like a chambered nautilus. A man behind you is crying. He keeps saying I’ll never leave over and over like the words to a morning birdsong. None of us actually do, says the sparrow behind him. When it’s finally your turn at the window you find out your appointment has been cancelled. She tells you to go back to the end of the line. The look on your face halts the clouds. Her finger hovers over the button to summon security. But the doctor feels bad. He remembers what it was like.  He ushers you into a special room where you wait and wait. Here, the walls are pure white and the ceiling looks like an upside down well. The only way out is to jump straight up as high as you can and hope you land in water. 

9/28/26

poem

 Weather

No wonder I bury it.

When it surfaces

Everything breaks

Like porcelain figurines—

Delicate, but fierce beasts

Barely bridled on narrow muntins.

Shame passes through 

Me like the militant winds

Mistling down from northern lakes

In a hail of steel arrows.

I’m never ready for it

No matter how often 

It winces my defenses.

Just the other day,

Startled by a howling squall,

It bucked the bit

And dragged me 

Where it wanted to anyway.

How quickly a small crack

In the frozen foundation zig-zags

To the opposite shore

And we all fall in.

It’s best to relax

As it moves through you,

Let it have its way with you

Like any regular weather.

Then when the sun

Pulls back the shades

And shines down on your life—

Look around for fresh sediment

That’s how you bury it 

9/28/26

poem

 God Complex

My glutes are nobody’s business

I’m everything I purport to hate

Trees are not property. Nor the stone nor the

The rushing winds.

Look you’re a man now

And I haven’t finished 

Telling you everything I know.

Only one tree is left

The others have been evicted

Absence pending appeal. 

When you come back here

Someday you’ll find

I never stopped trying.

In a way we’re all biding our time

Waiting for the great technological breakthrough

That obviates the necessity of our own lives.

In my dream home the staircases

Are all spirals. Straight up, straight down

Curving round and round 

Until I’m just where I started 

Only higher or lower.

When the pilot light goes out

You can either call a professional

Or get down on your belly 

In the haunted musty basement 

And ignite it yourself.

The theme for Christmas this year

Is the O. Henry story 

Where I suddenly become very lazy 

In order to spend more time with you

While, unbeknownst to me, you 

Take on a second job in order to afford

To take the certifying exam 

That, if passed, will allow you 

To come to the hospital and work

As my personal surgical assistant.  

To salvage the holiday season, 

I give up alcohol in order

To be on my best behavior

While you agree to laugh at all

My mean-spirited, unfunny jokes. 

That woman will never be enough!

Says the woman who will never

Be entirely satisfied herself.

One teaspoon of total protein

Three pinches of the salt

That dries on the crook of your neck 

After you’ve been working out.

On the down low I have been

Lifting some weights myself

Focusing on biceps and pecs

So I can overhear some kid say

Hey, he looks pretty good

For an old guy.

After hours of deep critical thinking

I have decided to save only the photographs 

Of me taken in black and white.

If I start with geology

And then move on to higher maths 

(While sprinkling in St Ambrose of Milan

With a spritz of Julian of Norwich)

I will have become the most interesting 

Grandpa no one listens to, of all time. 

I would have liked to have changed the world

For the good but

Nobody ever asked me that.

I would have said— just give me that chance!

Like a prodigal son whose

Father now suffers from dementia.

Then I could prove that failure 

Is also a great redeemer.

Yessir, I take full responsibility

For everything that has happened 

Lay your sins upon me 

All is forgiven

9/20/26

poem

 The Gift

When it’s first received

We play with it 

Like a toy

Then we want it to be just like

Everyone else’s toy.

So we dress it up 

In costumes and wigs.

Paint on a new face.

Voila! We can all pretend 

To have fun together! 

Then comes a long period of

Growing very attached to it 

No, we realize, it isn’t just like

Everyone else’s.

So we treasure it. Protect it.

Seal it in a laminated box.

Tend to its every shrieking need.

You have to. To save this world

You’ve come to think of as home. 

But it isn’t fun anymore.

Then one day you see it 

In a brand new light and fall in love

All over again, only this time you’ll 

Do it right, not like the last time.

This time you see it doesn’t belong

To you. It’s everyone’s. 

Your error is a common illusion.

Hearing this articulated out loud

Reduces you to ictal laughter

Which, if you’re lucky, 

Goes on for quite a long while

Until you settle down and start

Paying closer attention

To everything that surrounds it.

Then, just before giving it back

You play with it

Like a toy

9/20/26

poem

 Versions

In one version of events 

I sold what I could and gave

The rest away in exchange 

For one single moment

Of absolute clarity.

Then I found a clearing

In the woods 

Where I set up camp

And waited for it 

And waited for it 

To never come.

In the other version 

I locked it all away

In a secret drawer

And swallowed the key.

Every night I’d tug

On the handle 

To make sure it was safe.

In the fake version

I had lost my faith

And started to wear

A crown of qualms 

That pressed new sulci 

Deep in the folds of mind

In my version 

I tiptoe around the edges

Of an infinite series

Of abyssal trenches

Without either falling 

Into the dark fathoms 

Nor rising to the surface

To breathe 

9/20/26