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Poetry
Illness And Literature
In those cold rooms with the blue plastic chairs, / sometimes the human condition / is an old Texas redneck with a brushy mustache / reading a Louis L’Amour novel / while waiting for his chemotherapy
February 2018The People I Work With Don’t Talk About Trump
We’re janitors, but we’re called floor-crew technicians. / We work at night. / Darius lives in a trailer with his dad / because his dad has cirrhosis and emphysema.
February 2018Ode To Fat
Tonight, as you undress, I watch your wondrous / flesh that’s swelled again, the way a river swells / when the ice relents. Sweet relief / just to regard the sheaves of your hips, / your boundless breasts and marshy belly.
January 2018
Mindfulness
I practice a very special / form of mindfulness / called not-minding-ness. / This has brought me peace and purified / my soul to the point that it is almost / possible to live with me.
January 2018Stage Four
Now I believe in everything. / Aromatherapy: peppermint and sandalwood / and lavender and especially frankincense, / because, you know, the Three Wise Men. / Mindful breathing, I believe in that, too.
December 2017Selected Poems
— from “To My Husband At The Beginning Of The Holy Month Of Ramadan” | Even though you no longer believe, you wake with me / before dawn. You prepare my breakfast: porridge, sliced banana, / a cup of tea, a glass of water.
December 2017My Father’s Hammer
After he died, my mother gave me his toolbox, / saying he would have wanted me to have it, / the hammer kept inside as if in a little grave.
November 2017Grief Runs Untamed
In one hand the exiles hold a bundle / with a blanket, medicine, and a comb; / in the other, a door handle. / They attach it to every mountain and wall, / hoping the handle will conjure the door / that will open and let them in.
November 2017A Stranger Visits
A man in clothes the shape of sleep / pushes his battered bicycle, / wire baskets front and back, / halfway up the drive and stops.
November 2017I Was Reading A Poem
I was reading a poem by Ryōkan about a leaf, and how it showed the front and the back as it fell, and I wanted to call someone — my wife, my brother — to tell about the poem.
October 2017
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