Midnight Ride

When I first met her,
that red haired,
cabbage patch kid of a girl,
she was sitting on the edge of the couch,
sticky hot with Los Angeles all on her.
We were shooting on the hottest day of the year.
Radiating lights, equipment
filling my apartment with hotness from inside
the sun baking it from without.
She held her legs and arms wide,
a curious stance.
I asked her why and she stated simply,
if no one part of her body touched another
then, magically,
she could stay
the oppressive heat.
I understood her with clarity.
When you meet someone who speaks
your language
it is always like this.

The second time we met
we took ourselves on an adventure
via bicycle,
the skirts of our dresses whipping
the night sounds of skid row.
Zombies jeered our path
attempting to knock us down
but we ran red lights
our silence supporting us
against all odds.
Thirty miles without speech
only the sound of our toes
pushing down on pedals.
We weren’t suppose to be alone,
together left behind.
Children who raise themselves,
sisters who raise their siblings,
raising ourselves up and over the hills
of downtown,
broken streetlights and
prehistoric rats chasing roaches down
stinking, cracked sewer drains.
Thinking the same thoughts.

Now she is east,
I am west.
She asks my address
to tell me
we are exactly 2442 miles away
closer than ever, she says.
We see the best of ourselves
in strange jewelry
old postcards.
Roy Orbison sings
and we dance tipping
the continent back and forth,
back and forth
so we can feel the weight of us.

Perigree and Apogee

When I hold her hand,
Talk,
Hear the night breaths of my mother,
I check on the moon.
Is there a darkling brume,
Rivalry as in love or aims,
Reproach,
Grief over wasted time.
Cancer.
Or tiny platelets gathering in congress,
So intent on duty.
The mission clear.
Sometimes the best laid plans.

When I swim out in warm waters
I feel the moon pulling.
Salt stings me blind and
The din of a million tons of seawater
stops my ears.
I am plankton, seaweed.
A Monk Seal approaches;
Powerful jaws.
He blinks at me with intelligent eyes.
Yes, I know.

Then uninvited, a chill.
Water rushes the sand
Sinking through its porousness.
I choke against the pulse,
My limbs are not made for this.
I can feel a looming aspect
Antediluvian, massive.
It is not there,
It is.
With me.
I clamor up the sand.
And know,
I haven’t learned to float without fear.

The Night Before Driving To California

You splay your fingers wide,
An iridescent peacock tail of a hand
Waving, waving in front of my face
Like a bag that suddenly flies
At your windshield
When you’re driving too fast;
You tell your body
Be still.

I make you this
Thing of mine,
Of paper cups,
Chopsticks, term papers,
The rubber soles of my shoes
Glueing them into amalgamated form
In order that I may hold it up over my head.
So huge it’s blocking the sun,
Encompassing the entire sky,
Limitless in its immensity,
The universe wrapping around it,
Attracted
To the magnetic force it exerts.
Here it is,
I put it at your feet.
And i wish i could stop.