It has been a decade since Matt Sheppard was beaten and left to die alone in a Wyoming field because of who he was. Contemplating the atrocity, I wrote this last year as a prompt to the word "scarecrow."
Left in a field to bleed,
to disappear,
you looked across the Wyoming night.
Your eyelids were heavy,
your head a meteor of pain.
Did you witness yourself stand,
disoriented but intact,
and meander down the dusty road
like a drunkard
almost but not quite
past the point of no return?
Did you see your mother
dashing from her 4x4,
coming to cradle your head in her hands
and carry you to the safety of your home, your room,
plaid flannel bed sheets,
posters of Kurt and Madonna
to watch over you as you slept?
Did you see a mob,
a line of scarecrows
shouting obscenities,
shouldering clubs, rakes, shotguns,
marching toward you
to finish a job
two other boys couldn’t?
As light overtook the plain,
did a million flowers bloom,
daisies, bachelor’s buttons,
mountain pinks and purples?
Did you smell the sweet pea?
Taste the honeysuckle?
Did you feel the touch of a lover
beneath your chin,
bringing your gaze to meet his?
Did you hear him say the words?
Did you raise your fist in anger,
pound the ground beneath you
in an impact such that
shock waves shot through the globe
as they watched us
and shook their heads again?
As your eyes closed,
as you exhaled
and the pain faded
from your fractured skull,
did you know?
ewr
11 October 2008
20 September 2008
Homemade Fireworks
My father died five years ago on September 17, 2003. The funeral was held on September 20, and it was one of the worst days of my life due to our choice of eulogizer. I wrote this poem about that experience, and my father's passing.
Among the spiderwebs
and exoskeletal remains
of endless insect victims,
Dad kept gunpowder
in the back of the garage,
and jars of copper shavings,
iron, other metals
for color.
I watched him many times
pour the volatile concoction
into a cardboard cone,
the tip plugged with a wick of rope,
seal the bottom with masking tape and cardboard,
and kiss it for good luck.
I wonder why we never exploded.
The sparks flew
illegal and exciting
on black summer nights
of chirping crickets
and an elite circle of
invited neighborhood guests:
Aunt Ella,
the Fishers
from down the street,
Mom's friend Ethel
and her husband Dave,
a towering man
with a towering nose.
He called himself a friend, too.
At Dad's deathbed,
Dave preached forgiveness,
confession,
accepting Christ as savior,
which Dad had done decades before.
He didn't say,
"Remember that time you guys came over
and we all ate stone crabs and pasta?
Wasn't that a blast?"
At the funeral,
Dave prattled on for an hour,
stomped around that parlor floor
ranting about gays gone wild,
abortions for none,
war is great, war is good.
Nothing about spaghetti dinner
or homemade fireworks.
ewr
Among the spiderwebs
and exoskeletal remains
of endless insect victims,
Dad kept gunpowder
in the back of the garage,
and jars of copper shavings,
iron, other metals
for color.
I watched him many times
pour the volatile concoction
into a cardboard cone,
the tip plugged with a wick of rope,
seal the bottom with masking tape and cardboard,
and kiss it for good luck.
I wonder why we never exploded.
The sparks flew
illegal and exciting
on black summer nights
of chirping crickets
and an elite circle of
invited neighborhood guests:
Aunt Ella,
the Fishers
from down the street,
Mom's friend Ethel
and her husband Dave,
a towering man
with a towering nose.
He called himself a friend, too.
At Dad's deathbed,
Dave preached forgiveness,
confession,
accepting Christ as savior,
which Dad had done decades before.
He didn't say,
"Remember that time you guys came over
and we all ate stone crabs and pasta?
Wasn't that a blast?"
At the funeral,
Dave prattled on for an hour,
stomped around that parlor floor
ranting about gays gone wild,
abortions for none,
war is great, war is good.
Nothing about spaghetti dinner
or homemade fireworks.
ewr
23 August 2008
My Friend, His Wife, Their Son
2006
ewr
Michael stands outside his house at night, staring at stars, nothingness.
Karen stands in the kitchen staring at him through hot-water windows.
Timmy stands in the bathtub staring at the showerhead.
Michael shifts his fingers in the pockets of his trousers, vaguely wondering how it will all end.
Karen shifts dishes in the sink, vaguely wondering which knife would do the job.
Timmy shifts his weight to the left foot as he grabs at the showerhead, vaguely wondering how anything could fit inside of it.
Michael wants a worldwide cliché of peace and harmony but realizes that is about as likely as being abducted by space aliens.
Karen wants the damn ceiling fan to be fixed and the dog to be fed and the doors to be locked but realizes that is about as likely as being abducted by space aliens.
Timmy wants to unscrew the showerhead to let the thing out but realizes he's too short.
Michael disappears into the woods behind his house.
Karen disappears into the basement.
Timmy disappears into his bedroom.
ewr
03 August 2008
Dawn
A year ago, my childhood friend Dawn's daughter Gabrielle was killed in a devastating train accident. I wrote this in the wake of the tragedy.
Asking if you could come over,
I wrote a note to my mother
with a pictogram I drew of your last name
because I couldn’t spell it yet.
Brenda dropped you off
in the pouring rain,
your face wrapped
by a pink hoodie
strung and tied tightly
beneath your chin
in a slipknot.
We played with the off-brand Barbies
my grandmother had stocked my room with
and watched Tom and Jerry on channel 29.
My mother fed us
PB&J with the crusts cut off
and milk in Grimace and Hamburgler glasses.
We ate off Dad’s old Lone Ranger tray tables.
Later, while my mother distracted herself on the telephone
talking to Nancy the ninny,
you and I crept up creaky stairs
to the master bedroom
and rifled through her vanity drawers.
You applied a shade of lipstick
so purple,
it made your corn-silk hair
look like yellow crayon.
I opened a stick of rouge
and dotted my cheeks
with smears of the clown red.
Bored with that,
we forsook the makeup
and headed to the poster bed
for a round of Moon Walk.
We jumped so high over the mattress,
we bounced off the taut fabric
of the canopy
before my mother stormed the room
and yelled at us to knock it off.
We screamed like little girls,
ran downstairs and out the back door, giggling.
The sun had come out
and dried up all the rain.
We ran past Daisy in her dog box
and the overgrown lilac bush
into the field of cucumbers
thriving on Jack Eckart’s property.
We skipped rows and soiled our sneakers
as we ran and ran away from the house.
We didn’t stop until we reached
the railroad tracks
where they crossed Backline Road.
You stood on one rail,
and I on the other.
We faced each other
and didn’t say anything.
Your eyes were big, blue marbles,
Your lips iris petals.
Neither of us felt the vibration
beneath our feet.
ewr
Asking if you could come over,
I wrote a note to my mother
with a pictogram I drew of your last name
because I couldn’t spell it yet.
Brenda dropped you off
in the pouring rain,
your face wrapped
by a pink hoodie
strung and tied tightly
beneath your chin
in a slipknot.
We played with the off-brand Barbies
my grandmother had stocked my room with
and watched Tom and Jerry on channel 29.
My mother fed us
PB&J with the crusts cut off
and milk in Grimace and Hamburgler glasses.
We ate off Dad’s old Lone Ranger tray tables.
Later, while my mother distracted herself on the telephone
talking to Nancy the ninny,
you and I crept up creaky stairs
to the master bedroom
and rifled through her vanity drawers.
You applied a shade of lipstick
so purple,
it made your corn-silk hair
look like yellow crayon.
I opened a stick of rouge
and dotted my cheeks
with smears of the clown red.
Bored with that,
we forsook the makeup
and headed to the poster bed
for a round of Moon Walk.
We jumped so high over the mattress,
we bounced off the taut fabric
of the canopy
before my mother stormed the room
and yelled at us to knock it off.
We screamed like little girls,
ran downstairs and out the back door, giggling.
The sun had come out
and dried up all the rain.
We ran past Daisy in her dog box
and the overgrown lilac bush
into the field of cucumbers
thriving on Jack Eckart’s property.
We skipped rows and soiled our sneakers
as we ran and ran away from the house.
We didn’t stop until we reached
the railroad tracks
where they crossed Backline Road.
You stood on one rail,
and I on the other.
We faced each other
and didn’t say anything.
Your eyes were big, blue marbles,
Your lips iris petals.
Neither of us felt the vibration
beneath our feet.
ewr
13 July 2008
The Day My Mother, at God's Behest, Stepped into My Room
2006
She sits on a bed,
springs creaking like memory
in a room
paneled with brown splinters
beneath posters of bands
she shouldn't have let him
listen to.
She reads of her son's sexuality
in a letter addressed to anyone but her
and cries her real tears.
Her grandchildren,
with whom she planned to begin anew,
are choked by sentences
typed into rope on a page.
Her son's beauty doesn't die,
it never existed.
She remembers him,
a charming baby in baby overalls
against a soft blue background.
Trying to coax a smile,
she dangled keys in front of him
to stop his crying.
His eyes sparkled
at the rainbow trout keychain
that fluoresced blue and green,
sometimes purple.
He looked up,
his mouth wide in awe,
and was blinded by the flash.
ewr
She sits on a bed,
springs creaking like memory
in a room
paneled with brown splinters
beneath posters of bands
she shouldn't have let him
listen to.
She reads of her son's sexuality
in a letter addressed to anyone but her
and cries her real tears.
Her grandchildren,
with whom she planned to begin anew,
are choked by sentences
typed into rope on a page.
Her son's beauty doesn't die,
it never existed.
She remembers him,
a charming baby in baby overalls
against a soft blue background.
Trying to coax a smile,
she dangled keys in front of him
to stop his crying.
His eyes sparkled
at the rainbow trout keychain
that fluoresced blue and green,
sometimes purple.
He looked up,
his mouth wide in awe,
and was blinded by the flash.
ewr
His Kiss
This was first written in 1991 and has been revised several time since then. The version below is probably from 2005.
It lingers,
like cigarette smoke
in hair and clothes,
stale and familiar.
It insinuates,
a drunken whore
uninvited to a party
but showed up just the same.
It’s a spider,
black and hairy
scaling the back of my neck,
threatening to pierce a vein with its bite
and inject a venom
that makes me cold,
robotic and static,
loving only him.
ewr
It lingers,
like cigarette smoke
in hair and clothes,
stale and familiar.
It insinuates,
a drunken whore
uninvited to a party
but showed up just the same.
It’s a spider,
black and hairy
scaling the back of my neck,
threatening to pierce a vein with its bite
and inject a venom
that makes me cold,
robotic and static,
loving only him.
ewr
The Criminal
1990
I wanted him,
so I stole him.
I stole his friendship
with those same antiquated clichés.
I stole his trust
by telling him what he wanted to hear.
I stole his love,
and along with it,
hers.
I stole his semen,
as if only to prove that I could,
and in so doing,
I stole his self-respect.
I stole his family,
though they were through with him.
After me, anyway.
I stole his friends.
I stole his money.
I stole his laugh.
I stole his vanity.
I stole his favorite things.
I stole his hands, his hair.
I stole his smile.
I stole everything from him
and once I had,
I gave it all back to him,
wrapped in a package
of deceit and disappointment.
Because once I stole everything from him,
I didn’t want him anymore.
And what I can’t figure out
is how many times
I can possibly steal him
without stealing myself.
ewr
I wanted him,
so I stole him.
I stole his friendship
with those same antiquated clichés.
I stole his trust
by telling him what he wanted to hear.
I stole his love,
and along with it,
hers.
I stole his semen,
as if only to prove that I could,
and in so doing,
I stole his self-respect.
I stole his family,
though they were through with him.
After me, anyway.
I stole his friends.
I stole his money.
I stole his laugh.
I stole his vanity.
I stole his favorite things.
I stole his hands, his hair.
I stole his smile.
I stole everything from him
and once I had,
I gave it all back to him,
wrapped in a package
of deceit and disappointment.
Because once I stole everything from him,
I didn’t want him anymore.
And what I can’t figure out
is how many times
I can possibly steal him
without stealing myself.
ewr
Low Tide, Grassy Sound
(thanks to Bob Rohrenbeck)
2005
Low tide,
grassy sound,
broken boards,
painted hearts.
Hints carried into an empty house,
dropping saltwater clothes
to the sandy floor
on the way to a stolen bed,
an unfamiliar moment.
Laughing gull,
tidal loss,
chest to chest,
skin on linen.
Cold blue summer sky
a security blanket
lifted, ripped away,
abandoned to a place
with sno-cones and beach buckets,
starfish and seashells.
Greenhead sting,
fog horn,
bitter tastes,
undertow.
Childhood eroded
as wood degrades in the acrid air
of an ocean mother
perpetually stripping her shores
of youth and life.
ewr
2005
Low tide,
grassy sound,
broken boards,
painted hearts.
Hints carried into an empty house,
dropping saltwater clothes
to the sandy floor
on the way to a stolen bed,
an unfamiliar moment.
Laughing gull,
tidal loss,
chest to chest,
skin on linen.
Cold blue summer sky
a security blanket
lifted, ripped away,
abandoned to a place
with sno-cones and beach buckets,
starfish and seashells.
Greenhead sting,
fog horn,
bitter tastes,
undertow.
Childhood eroded
as wood degrades in the acrid air
of an ocean mother
perpetually stripping her shores
of youth and life.
ewr
07 July 2008
Daniel's Heart
(for Daniel Hale Williams)
2007
His ginger hand holds the scalpel
and incises the chest.
With the serrated saw
he fashions a rib-bone birdcage
and waits for the heart to flutter out.
It pulses weakly, but stays put.
None has witnessed this wonder.
The stiletto stab pierced the pericardium
but left the blood muscle intact.
He pauses.
Who has the hubris to hold a human heart as I?
The white mask filters his heavy sigh.
He sews stitches
and sutures his ego simultaneously.
ewr
2007
His ginger hand holds the scalpel
and incises the chest.
With the serrated saw
he fashions a rib-bone birdcage
and waits for the heart to flutter out.
It pulses weakly, but stays put.
None has witnessed this wonder.
The stiletto stab pierced the pericardium
but left the blood muscle intact.
He pauses.
Who has the hubris to hold a human heart as I?
The white mask filters his heavy sigh.
He sews stitches
and sutures his ego simultaneously.
ewr
02 July 2008
Fly on a wall
(an etheree for Dave)
2007
As
Dave reads
poetry
at open mic,
It's difficult to
concentrate. It's not his
angst-ridden verse or his dour
demeanor. It's that I'll have to
wait until after his performance
to tell him his fly was down the whole time.
ewr
2007
As
Dave reads
poetry
at open mic,
It's difficult to
concentrate. It's not his
angst-ridden verse or his dour
demeanor. It's that I'll have to
wait until after his performance
to tell him his fly was down the whole time.
ewr
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