jonberger

The kid in the back seat
asks about the sandwich bag
packed with powder
in the seat next to her.
"That’s not powder,"
I say, "It’s ash.

"That’s my father over there."
The kid doesn’t know
what I’m talking about.
Me either.
"It’s some of my dad’s cremains,"
I explain,
"I take him wherever I go."

The kid asks:
"Do you take him very far
as you travel in your car?
Does he make the voyage fast?
Do you think cremains will last?"
I smile and state:
"I’m always looking for places
to leave my father.
"We’ve dropped some
at his birth street
and where he moved to
and the other buildings where he lived.
"We’ve left some at some offices
and with some friends
and we’re bringing some
to vacation homes
– when we go on vacations."

The kid grins.
"So he’s more
than the some of his parts?"
"Very punny," I reply.
Kid doesn’t seem freaked
by the body in the back with her.
Death might be natural
when you’re young
or when you’re twisted
or when the form of death
looks a little like
something you might sniff.

We don’t talk about the bag anymore
on the trip.

The umbrella is bigger than the girl
and with every gust of wind
she risks flying away
going off to some wonderworld
where her umbrella might stab some vampire
or a grasshopper will steal a hat.

All kinds of adventures can open
for one so plucky as she
in checkered galoshes
and bright yellow cap.
The planet is there for her plucking
should she choose.
There is huge potential
for that sweet young thing
struggling mightily to stay dry
on this dark and detestable rainy day.

I’m sorry sometimes I’m weird
but some days
I just realize how ugly
how awkward
how inappropriate I am
and it makes me act creepy
or loopy
or sometimes borderline-stalkery.
It’s not how I want to come off
– anything but.
But sometimes
all I can eek out
is that inch of unworthiness.

Sometimes
your presence sets me straight
and I can see something in myself
that maybe you might see
but it is less frequent
than the weird clumsy
freakshow that populates so many of our days.
I’m sorry I can’t get it right.

But I’m worshipfully glad
that you constantly do
and hope you are willing
to guide me away from the weird
in many times to come.

The instructor by the beams
at my baby girl’s gym
is a tight little number
who exercises my imagination
and stretches my erotic neuroses.

As she twists and bends my little girl
into barely imaginable positions,
she revs me up
turns me on
gets me going.
She provides us both aerobic workouts
in very different ways.

She shows care over the kiddies
and occasionally looks my way
possibly noting my popped eyes
and slight drool.
She doesn’t look away.
That’s something.

I would like to say something
to the hot instructor by the beams
but it might distract my little girl’s routine
and the wife is coming around
to pick us up
any minute now.
Maybe next week.

Please take my couch.
It is still in good shape
and looks wonderful
but I no longer find comfort
on this sofa
that my girlfriend and I
used to cuddle on
now that I am aware
of all the sex she had
with my cousins
when they were in of town.

I will help you take it
to your home
or the dump,
whichever you prefer.
I simply cannot live
with this couch
another minute more.

Certainly
it must be gone
before my cousins come
for a visit
in the Fall.

Recently I broke up with my dog.
The bitch just couldn’t take my yapping anymore.
She still looks fetching
but I would snap at her,
all the time,
some crap like,
“What you’re looking for?
It ain’t me, babe.
“You’re barking up the wrong tree.”

So we’re through. Still,
she sniffs around me,
making sure no other has my scent.
She still digs me
and I can’t stop thinking about her;
like a dog with a bone
something keeps gnawing at me.

Is this just a seven year itch
when this puppy sporadically needs time off the leash
and flees in search of greener pastures?
I don’t know.
I just feel
like these are the dog days of this relationship
until maybe
the next time I’m in heat.

Please, let this not be the thing
that brings about the end.
Let this not be the day
that kills me.
I can take a lot of things
but one day,
it will all be too much.
Let it not be today.
Let me die another day.

I don’t ask a lot of you, Lord.
Just wealth, health
happiness
and the painful destruction of mine enemies.
Can we not simply add to the list
a little functional immortality?
Is that too much to ask?

I know some day
my whole house of cards
will come whistling down
but please, God,
help me delay that
as long as inhumanly possible.
Let me live through another dawn
or, with grace,
a thousand more.
Let this one
not be the day
that kills me.

I don’t look through my albums
anymore.
I know the images too well
have thumbed through them
far too frequently.
I no longer need sight to recall.
I know in my cranial palace
which pictures set my heart racing,
which make my pulse flutter,
which yield fastest tears.

I know my books
better than the hours of the day
and spend no time reviewing the works
when I can simply think back
and remember.
All of that past
is etched in my memory
too deeply to go
but I like to look at the shape of the albums
the fading colors on the spine
to trigger everything inside.

If I lost the books
it could all go away
something I will not risk.
I treasure those books
even if I never look at them again.

I’m sorry
but though you’ve told me “No”
in four different languages
with a dozen different dialects,
I still maintain a glimmer of hope
in our eventual future.

No, you explained quite well
how we are a bad idea,
unwise and unheralded,
and you couldn’t in good conscience
go out with a thing like me.
You said it again
after your third drink
and then the fifth,
over a series of smoke breaks,
and in between a variety of stories
of boys and girls who did you wrong
in the distant present.

I am happy
to be added
to the list
of mistakes you need to fix.
You are, after all,
so very good
at holding on to bad habits.

I was telling Jocko about our date the other night
and he offered some insight
that I previously lacked;
he heard my words, took the facts,
and restructured thoughts in my head.
I guess I feel compelled to ask
about some things he said.

If you wanted to fuck me
you could have told me so.
If you wanted to fuck me
that would’ve been OK.
It’s kinda clear you wanted to, according to Jocko,
so you should have come right out said it to me right away
and then fucked me.

So, the way Jocko sees it
you were coming on to me
at the end of evening – and right from the start.
Letting me in your place
while you got all put together
then showing that collection of lace, chains and leather?
You gave me a kiss after I handed you wine.
Signs, says Jocko, that you wished to be mine.
You were fine in that outfit: so trim and fit
and when you bit your lip
my slacks almost split.

If you wanted to fuck me
you could have let me know.
I didn’t need to learn it during Jocko’s blow-by-blow.
You might have given me the word;
Had you whispered, I’d have heard.
The only thing still left for you was to have ventured
to fuck me.

Look, it should be obvious:
I’m bad about the hints.
If a girl – sorry. If a LADY
doesn’t hit me over the head
and pull me by the hair back to her cave,
I just don’t see how I’m gonna see any part of her
involved with any part of me,
if you get what I’m getting at,
and if you do, could you tell me?

So, I must admit, Jocko’s take is second hand
and just because he thought we were a one night stand
in the making doesn’t take your faking out of the equation.
The possibility he raised? A revelation.
It’s true: Jocko’s suggestion wasn’t off by much:
The lips, the lean, the tease, the tilt, the touch.

If you wanted to fuck me, it’s ok by me.
I don’t get chances like that regularly.
If you wished it, I’d reciprocate appreciatively.
It’s the least I’d do if you agreed to go out with me
and fuck me.
Yeah, fuck me.
I’d really like you to fuck me.
Like Jocko suggested, I’m already home-erected.
If you gave me a grasp, I’d go off at half-a-gasp.
I could happily die, if you decide to try
to give a chance on our second date romance
and then fucked me.