When I get to that place
Where my world falls apart
Every night at 330 am,
It's your face that I so plainly see.
While the tiles all fall around me
And the whole facade
Collapses just out of my reach,
I realize that it's here I have to be,
Because this is where it all went horribly wrong,
And this is where I must return
To start my journey right again,
To reach the beginning
And make a new song out of my life.

Here, where the moon
And its reflection meet the water,
Here, where tiny bubbles rise
To meet the midnight air,
I swim upstream
Midst frantic fins,
Midst other sons and daughters,
To find that place where I, with them,
Must spawn.

And if the night should shine just right,
And if your heart can find you,
And if the things you've said to me are true,
Then maybe you can find me there
And swim with me to Heaven,
Or maybe, just show up,
And I'll find you.

-jenn

After two broken collar bones
And six concussions,
My season ended,
In fact, I've retired from
Armchair sexuality.
I'm going to spend a few years
Here on the couch with the Colonel.
And then, maybe, if my
Personality heals,
I'll go into broadcasting.

-jenn

It's one of those things no one wants to hear,
But it comes so innocently
From the mouths of babes
"When's your Baby due?"

And then the falter,
The hesitant thud,
"I'm not pregnant."

-jenn

I numb myself
For the Christmas extraction,
Extravaganza of pain and loss.
A sharp shot across the bare nerve,
And all is well.

But in the dark,
I sing unknown 'hims' and praises,
And while I do,
Somewhere, in a parallel universe,
It all comes true,
And the tooth fairy brings me the glittering gown I've always longed for.

And so tonight I smile.
I'm very happy,
For I know that the unseen things
Are more real
Than their sensible counterparts,
And that the riches untold are hidden in them.

- jenn

Turn left at the graveyard,
Down two blocks,
Right just where old man Brown's house burned down,
To the barb wire fence,
With the gate that drags,
And creaks on it's rusty hinges.
I'll be at the pond
By the charred smokestack.

I'll wait for you
With yore fishin pole,
And my grip all packed,
Wondrin
Why so many things burn around here.

-jenn

I've been in the presence of my people today,
A sweet humbling moment of love,
A river so deep, one can't help but drown.
I felt myself going under.
I saw my tears mingle with theirs on the way down.
Every life I've ever lived,
Every person I've ever wanted to be,
Was present in full regalia'ed vitality
Before my open heart and eyes.

My son took my hand and pulled me up
From the baptism of awareness
When he said he felt the very same way.
He had gone down, too,
And someone had snatched him out
Of the rushing waters
By the dark chestnut brown of his hair,
By the starry dimples of his great night smile.

"People don't mess with the Cherokee, anymore," he said,
Shaking his long hair like a dog.
"Because there 's such a thing now as 'suing,'
And there's a word
Called racist."

-jenn

The sun comes late for work
Decembers days.
Sluggish and aloof,
Sky stays gray.
Lunchtime finally comes,
And one o'clock
Brings the first smile of the day.
He's already thinking night is on its way.
A stiff drink,
Forget about the numbers,
Stumble up to bed
Where cold dark slumbers.

So let the others dream
Of figgy pudding,
Sugar plums and jelly beans,
I'll bundle up tonight
And pray for Spring,
Where sun comes bounding for me
From his bed
And wakes me with sweeter visions
In his head.

-jenn

Our future comes to fix our past.
Our kids
Remind us of the things we did
And didn't do.
We love them more than we love
Ourselves
And would never wish the hell
On them that we went through.

But we understand that we
Also err,
And their children will have to come
To bring repair,
And so we waltz loosely
Into time,
One step up with Bach,
Two back with Sondheim.

Thus we allow the new to come
Cut in,
And dance us around the floor
Anew,
Again.

-Jenn

From the brooding nebula's womb
The stars are born.
From profound urges of love
And sex,
Something cosmic mates,
And fiery bursts come forth
And grow into Suns and Daughters.
Plasmic warmth and life take form.
Brilliant indescribable colors and shapes
Move upon the deep,
And dark energy craves
Inadmissible desires.

And, yet, it is from this unspeakable perfection
That you and I
Live and move and have our being.

We stand face to face
In the same Love,
The same Gracious Multiplicity,
The self-same singularity
That stands alone in the face of doubt
And states universal truths:

We are perfect, too.

-jenn

When all you're fine China
Winds up outside
With the dogs lapping up what's left,
Don't ever despair!
Accept the fact
That your cooking is not appreciated!

A moratorium to cooking then!
'I'll cook for myself,' said the Little Red Hen,
'The rest of ya'll can go to McDonald's!'

-jenn

Unaware,
Or didn't care
That scrap of trash
Escaped her window
Cracked for air
Inside her smoky luxury SUV.
But it happened to wrap
And thunderclap
Around my old a.m. antennae.
I reached out at the light
And held it tight
In my cold fingers:
A receipt for a rockstar energy drink
And a pack of Virginia slims
With a lipstick print
Of her ruby doobie lips
Daubed carelessly.
And at the next light
I pulled up beside
Her, and handed it back
And said, 'I believe you dropped something.'
Am I bad?

-jenn

I didn't know
How singed my heart had grown
Until you dropped your thought conditioners in,
And now, as white bubbles effervesce
I see,
How love can color
Any reality,
And make it gooder.

-jenn

The church is a fortress these days.
One you can't get in.
The windows are locked
And reinforced by alarms.
I just wanted a place to get warm
With you.

You kissed me here once,
And I had never been kissed in a chapel.
But now the law has come.
I won't forget
The smell of stale sterilization.
Moldy cleanliness
Leaves a mark.

-jenn

The neighbors were angry.
I'd taken a picture of their ornamental cabbage
Without their express permission.
I thought it must've been licensed,
But it was their therapist.

So it wasn't a surprise when things took a turn for the worse at their work.
Eldon offered to help the missus get on at the post office.
He said he figgered she was bright enough to pass the civil servant's exam,
And what with her walking the streets all day, anyway,
And we all knew
She was so close to going postal.

-jenn

Oil and water do mix
If you add a cup of sugar,
One egg,
Some flour and some baking soda.
Cinnamon is always good,
And vanilla is especially nice this time of year.
Then you can have your cake
And eat it too.

-jenn

I'm just a little garnishette
On a silver tray,
An angel made from frilly winter kale
And garlic.
My halo is a frozen shallot
Gone limp from all the jostling
And the languid temperature of the room.

And just as all my components pull
Away from the toothpick underpin,
A brilliant gleam admires my raisin eyes.

The light bent from the snow outside
And off a diamond earring
Stuck to the oily jaw of a feaster here.

And though every furbelow dreams
Of being consumed,
This wasn't what I had in mind.
But I guess beggars can't be choosers.

-jenn

Your smile put its feet up on my bench.
The twinkle in your eyes took off its gloves,
And the comfortable gaze we shared
Inspired me.
But when I looked back,
And you looked down,
My heart put it's coat back on
And stammered it's confessions
Outside in the falling snow.

Come great heart of expectation.
Come and look me in the eye.
Be my sparring double.
Let us joust in friendly air
And make each other better.
Grapple with me in the sky,
On my couch, and in the shadow
Of love's center ring
Until the bell rings,
And we have our true turn.

-jenn

We are just alike you and me,
Except you're better than me in bad ways
And worse than me in good.
Or do I have that the other way around?
I tend to think you're too good for me.
And that kind of thinking makes me wonder
If I'm too good for myself.

It also makes me wonder if I'm healthy enough for sex,
Or sexy enough for health,
Or if me and my cat are just too curious for our own good.

But somehow I think
Maybe we really do deserve each other.

-jenn

I'd sue someone if I weren't dead!
I choked on a Chinese hundred year egg!
But the one who prepared it so
Also died a long time ago.
So what's a girl to do ?

And now, too late, I think of it,
Arguments and hairs I split
With others now passed and gone.
And if this message finds you alive
My advice would be that you only strive
With your brothers and sisters
In cases of extreme importance and need,
For all of them and us must die.

And what will be so critical then?

-jenn

Love has struck!
The big hand on one,
The little hand runs amuck.
Did I hear ten bells or none?
Have the minutes come
Or gone,
And will sweet time return for me
If I miss my train again
As minutes into hours glow,
And hours turn,
And teeth and tongue
Begin to show,
And kisses melt
In undrunk glasses of wine?
Now twelve bells ring
And sing of morning time
And more sweet trains to come.

-jenn

I pretend to sleep at night.
Sometimes it's because
I don't want the world to come
And interrupt my dreams.
Sometimes it's because I hear you
Mumbling sweet convincings
In my other ear,
And I want to hear them again.

Your little ways make me smile.
Your big ways drive me wild.
So come, tell me again
Why we should.

-jenn

I miss my delusions.
They were grand.
They took me out to dinner.
They took me for a ride
Into the dazzling sunset
And the silent countryside,
And sometimes if the moon was right,
We would 'run out of gas,'
Kiss until the stars came up,
Make love til night had passed
And another day had dawned.

And it really did seem like the sun came up.
It seemed that the sky was blue.
It almost seemed to matter
That I showed up to work with you.
Who knew that the earth was turning?
Who knew the market would crash?
That interest rates and Father Time would repossess all that trash?

But as I sit and watch the waves
Roll over all this sand,
I miss you
And my delusions,
Oh,so grand.

-jenn

He threw his hairbrush in the trash
Because the dog slobbered on it.
But I have seen the dog muck other things
That didn't get thrown away.
And I thought, "Now that's all I've ever wanted,"
To be worth something to somebody,
To be handled like a Love Goddess
Instead of a lovesick cow.
It's easy to idolize people from afar,
But in real life you just have to love them anyway,
And sometimes that involves digging them out of life's garbage heap
And wiping them clean with love.
And sometimes that involves
Not judging them from the other side of the fence,
Where the grass is oh, so greener,
But just sidling up beside them
And bellaring the love sick blues
By their side.

-jenn

As the world turns to the sun,
I turn to you this morning,
My Light,
My Warmth,
My Yang.
Do me this way.
Do me that,
And I will turn again.
I will live and die
And sleep
And wake again
To you.

-jenn

A little water in my cup,
Stale at best,
And I'd drunk up
Most of it anyway
Because of a deep thirst.
I took it out beyond the steps
With me and stared into
The blue sky reflected in a pond
Where lilies grew and dragonflies
Zipped and darted, and surmised
That this water held a life its own.
And so I bent to dip
My cup into the mirrored pool.
My hand went through the cattail
And the lily vines,
And water poured in
And overflowed,
And blessed am I,
For no one has told me this,
But I have tasted the best
That was saved for last,
Water, turned to wine.
Cheers.

- jenn

In Santo

I eat the DNA of troubled corn.
Its chromosomes divide
And are reborn.
I feel the burden of its pedigree
Recombine and try to replicate
Within me,
But the hybrid nature of it's seed
And the patent held by law degrees
Won't let it multiply or divide,
And so it keeps its secret kerneled up inside.
It's not nutritional or digestible,
Just institutional,
Not re-growable
In the native soil from which it sprang.

Its sadness starves me
And makes me want to eat
Anything and everything I see,
But wheat has already died within my soul,
And something deep within me
Bids me, stop, and eat the the scroll.
But as I stop to try to digest the corn,
The only thing I glean
From it is abortion.

-jenn

Gray Eyed Athena

Athena's eyes were blue
Until she saw the world
And knew how it worked,
And then she cried
For one eternal night
And one eternal day,
And then blue ran out
Of her eyes til they were gray.

Pallas Athena, you are wise,
But there's no joy,
For you know
That you weren't born a boy.
Yet, you sprang, full grown,
Right from Zeus' thigh,
And so you are a god
And will never die.
Then again, you may.

And so her eyes are gray.

-jenn

I was crying
'Cause I was feeling
Like I always let everyone down.
So I went into the bathroom
In the barbecue joint down town.
And I saw a picture of Elvis
Hanging there on the wall,
And I knew
Why he ate peanut butter and banana sandwiches,
Why he sang the blues.

I'll be sitting in the wintergrass
When they come for me.
Maybe I'll still be crying,
Maybe I'll just be dancing
With a wry smile in the rows of grain,
Clutching the image of Elvis I stole
And set free from the picture frame.

-jenn

So I'm explaining how 'heat' works
When a dog goes into it,
And how the blood shows that she's ready to get pregnant
And have puppies.
And my son,
Who has seen a pad in the trash
Asks me
If I'm in heat too?

"Ummmmmm,
It's a little more complicated
In humans,"
I admit,

And shake my head,
And hope
That the child
Finds a lovely woman
To have babies with him some day,
Because the world really does need
A lot more kids just like him.

-jenn

I woke up with glass in my eye.
The sandman's sand had vitrified
By the flow of my hot tears.
And the clay that had been my skin
Was hard and cold as porcelain,
Frozen by fears come true.

And it's too late for me,
But maybe
Someone a little back in the pack
Of time and moving forward
Can see and be set free.
Don't look back.

Back is here.
The future is too,
Staring into time
Will blind you.
Just look at the people you love.
Don't get down.
Don't get above your raising,
But let your fate carry you,
Sweep you into a place you don't strive,
A place where love makes you feel alive.
Stay supple and green,
Like bamboo,
Then your glassy eye can see
What to do now,
And not the stack
Of should've beens.
Don't look back.

- jenn

My time in Minske

The first day I followed subject for one block,
And when he turned left, I turned right.
The next day I met him at that block
And followed him til he turned left again.
The third day I met him at that point,
But I can already see where this was going.
So fourth day, I didn't bother getting out of bed.

And when my supervisor asked
How the surveillance was going,
I bribed him with cheap cigars and vodka,
And invited him to come to bed with me,
And he accepted.

-jenn

So I've got a mere 50 pounds on the leg press machine,
And I'm pushing, pushing.
And I lean my head back on the rest
And I close my eyes,
And instantly I'm in a place
Of pain and joy mingled together.
I'm very present suddenly,
And I relive the birth of my second son.

I remember then how the pain
Forced my mind to go somewhere else,
How I thought of mountains I'd climbed
And rivers where I'd swam.
Sweat beaded from my brow and dripped
Until my cotton hospital gown
Stuck to me
The way you used to do.

Eleven years has come and gone,
And finally, the pain I thought I'd forgotten
Revisits me.
It chuckles at me,
Pushing a mere fifty
To lose a mere ten.

And I wonder where I'll be
When now catches up to me.
I'm sure I'll be trying to forget this.

-jenn

I was terrified to tell her how beautiful she was,
But it was something she desperately needed to know,
And it was a smooth stone dropped
In the ripples of the still water,
Caused by the smattering of other rough rocks thrown in hard.
But this one, dropped gently,
From a high place,
Ordered the chaos to quit
And sent out a message
To remind her of her original mission here.
And some of the ripples splashed up on my skin
And reminded me of mine,
Of my own beauty and strength and divinity.

And so you see that even though I was terrified,
And didn't say the words at the time,
How important it is that I sit by this river
That flows backwards into the past,
Back into life,
To utter quietly the powerful prophecies of de javu,
So that I myself may live again.

-jenn

I've got debris in my intake arm.
It's the closest thing to original sin
I've seen in quite some time.
But can I blame my car?
Is it then the driver's fault
Or an engineering failure?
Do I need to know?

Or should I just youtube it
And figure how to clean it out
And get back out to live in the passing lane?

-jenn

My serpent mound is vulva soft
Composed of fallen leaves and grass
That I have brought and offered here,
Arms full every time.
And as I travel back for more,
Along a trail that's littered by
Decomposed fallen leaves and grass,
I see it's all the same.

The offering, the offered one,
The one that's left, the other one,
The me, the not me,
All part of the same great whole,
All part of the scriptures
That one doesn't need
When one has unction
And sees the Great Life lived everywhere.

-jenn

I bought a season pass to celebration city,
Paid for it all by myself.
But when I got in,
They informed me that
The roller coaster was closed,
The ferris wheel was inoperable,
And the tunnel of love unemployed.

I just want it to feel good,
To rattle the windows down at the fun house,
To spin the cotton candy high
And get it everywhere.
I want to laugh
With my mouth wide open,
Giggle from the tips of my toenails
To the blondest parts of my hair on end,
With my pupils dilated and nostrils flaring,
And when it's all over, to do it again.

Is that too much to ask?

-jenn

I dreamed of a car that was promised to me,
An orchard full of pecan trees
That sits on acres of sand that's to be mine,
Of a horse I shared with a brother I had,
And even of "my" own mother and dad,
And all the while it stormed
On my sadness and my fear.

And all the while the horse ran free,
And bucked and galloped beautifully.
I watched her prance as lightning danced
And pecans and rain fell down.
And then I knew
That nothing in this world is mine
Except the joy I feel when I shine
And prance through the storms
And the rain and the sun,
And enjoy my life til my work is done.

And then I'll go back from whence I came,
Where I belong, where even my name is mine,
Where all things have always been mine.

-jenn

Come and draw equations
On the chalkboard of my heart
With your powdery anabolic chalk.
Doodle until the visions synthesize,
And in one grand swirl of exclamation,
Give expression to your love of me.
Then take your magic pen
And draw the markings on my skin
That you will find appealing
In the end.
Tattoo me with the secrets
And the x's
That mark the places where your treasure hides,
And I will go and take with me my
Extra diamonds,
And secretly,
Invest them there with you.

-jenn

I spell your name with light and dark,
But the dark is silent.
I dreamed about you once
While wide awake.
But someone far wiser than myself
Explained it all so psychologically
That the picture of you in my head dissolved.
But when I went to sleep that night,
I saw the silent letters.
They began to dance and rearrange,
And as they moved,
A singing hush fell onto the dance floor.
The stars hummed,
And I remembered you.

-jenn

I went to bed weighing 135
And woke up weighing 130.
I guess it was my dreams that evaporated.
I thought that they were bigger than that,
That they were large and magnanimous
And could cover the expanse of my vicissitudes.
But now I see that they are gone,
A trifling 80 ounces,
Nothing to lose a night 's sleep over,
Nothing to you.... Or to
Me.
But standing here now on the holy scales
Within the sacred equation I wonder,
If nothing is ever created or destroyed,
What weighs more,
A pound of feathers or a pound of lead?
And in the greater scheme of things,
Which is heavier,
Troubles or dreams?
And where in the universe did they disappear?
Oh well.
My pants sure zipped easier this morning.

-jenn

I can imagine this place before houses,
Before the sidewalks and busy streets,
With only the prairie grasses blowing
And shadows of the native trees.

I can imagine the drylands shifting,
Changing the course of the river's line,
But how far do I have to go back
To see when you were mine.

I can't imagine a time before music,
A time before physics,
Space without rhyme
Where clouds hang like still life paintings,
But then I have no sense of real time.

I can remember bright super eight movies
Without any sound, and clothes on a line.
I remember this wind always blowing,
But I can't remember when you were mine.

-Jenn

Come look into my naked face.
See me plain as day.
Search my eyes
For vestige of a race,
And see that none has ever been denied.
All of me is of the universe,
And universal is my plea to you,
To know and be known,
As simple as the rays of light
That shoot out from the living sun.

Appeal to me
As the orange does.
Peel yourself and
Set yourself apart,
And let me put you back together
With my teeth
In some strange and noble art form,
In a new way that you have never seen yourself,
And let the fractal shapes and signs
Live unto themselves and unto you.
Inspire the world,
And make us whole!

And this will be my promise in the wind,
That as birds sing
And rivers run so true
To join the ocean's great anonymity,
I, my friend, will always be for you.

-jenn

I have always wanted to be exactly who I am today.
So thank you to everyone of you my friends, my family, my loved ones,
My enemies, my haters, my antagonists,
For all of you have contributed ingredients into this recipe that has made me exactly what I am, and I am thankful for every last one of you!

For the compliments, for the cut downs, for the encouragement, for the you-could-never-do-that-ers---
Thank you thank you thank you!

I love every last one of you
Today.

-jenn

Come transcendent one,
Pick me up
Into the sun
Til I am warm and free.
But let me gaze into your silver pools,
I shiver,
And chills tingle again
On skin that was asleep.
I find something deep
Within me stirs.
I've pulled myself back
From the brink of love twice,
But now
I find I'm going down,
Drowning in some forgotten sea
Of yours.
I can smell you
On the salty breeze,
The intoxicating scent
Of Hermes Trismegistis
Turning lead to golden sand.
Mmmmmmmmmmm,
Come take my hand
And walk on it with me.

-jenn

We were children playing in the park,
Until the night fell slowly on the ground.
In the darkness we slept high
Upon a rock,
And I was soft for you,
And you were hard.
And stardust lit upon us
And seeped in,
And changed the very nature of our souls,
And when we woke we found that we were grown,
Yet we stayed, for it was fun---
Children playing in the park.

-jenn

Ohhh my transcendental one,
You pick me up
Into the sun
And I am warm and free,
But if I stare into your silver pools,
I shiver,
And chills tingle again
On skin that was asleep.
I find something deep
Within me stirs.
I've pulled myself back
From the brink of love twice,
But now
I find I'm going down,
Drowning in some forgotten sea
Of yours.
And I can smell you
On the salty breeze,
The intoxicating scent
Of Hermes Trismegistis
Turning lead to golden sand.
Mmmmmmmmmmm,
Come take my hand
And walk on it with me.

-jenn

I want to be so perfect for you
(But I'm not),
(But I'm not).
I want to
Be the night wind
You throw yourself to
When you sleep.

I want to catch the dandelion seeds
(That you blow),
(That you blow),
Plant them in the middle
Of my garden
Til they grow,
And bring you the yellow flowers
And the kisses, honey sweet,
Lay the velvet petals at your feet.

I want to be
The one you reach for
(In the night),
(In the night ),
Be the book you press yourself between
In the mornin light,
The pages that you turn
When you want to get it right.
Baby, dream,
Dream sweet dreams of me.

-jenn

The Geiger counter clicks away
Fast and furious
The closer I get go the utility room.
Everything is drawn out in here.
Spagettification has occurred.
It all seems to be coming from the dryer.
The clothing particles accelerated while going round and round,
And if I could reach the dryer door,
I could open and stop it,
But I can't get my stupid feet to move.
A part of my brain has taken over,
A diabolical genius,
That hopes somehow
If just one of your t-shirts
Could collide with a pair of my jeans,
The rainbow bridge of Asgard
Might reappear.

-jenn

The Latin word for 'pussy' is 'pudenda,'
Which means 'something to be ashamed of.'
Which, literally, the Latins were much more technical and precise in their misogyny,
And they would have never ended their sentences with prepositions.
So, technically, it means,
'A thing deserving of shame.'

And here is where I will pause, and smile,
And tell you that it's OK,
Because we've come along way, baby!
But in truth I'm not sure we have.
I'm not sure we've come at all.
And I also think until we evolve as a species
So that babies are not conceived unless the woman has an orgasm too,
That we might be in trouble
Leaving it to love alone to make the world going around.
But I guess for now,
We can be happy that we've come far enough,
To be able to say the word 'pussy' in public,
And I guess we can take some comfort in knowing
That the Latin word for 'penis' is ...  'penis,'
Which means 'tail. '
So maybe us men and us women are all in this together after all.

-jenn

He butt dialed me,
And I sat and listened for a long time.
I could hear the way he spoke
To other people when I wasn't around.
"He's really nice," I thought as I eavesdropped.
A gentle voice, an easy laugh, a quick wit,
A kind heart.
It made me love him even more.

-jenn

Interview With A Midwife

"I wish I was white
Like you,
And didn't know nothin'
About birthin' no babies !
I wish I never had cut the cord
Or ever slap no baby's behind til it cry.
I wish I'd never seen some of these man
That got up in here and got these girls in the family way.
Makes me want to slap the world
And reattach it's umbilical cord,
Shove it back up in some primordial vagina from whence it came,
Back up into the womb to gestate some mo',
Cause it ain't ready.
It's premature,
And it ain't gonna make it, y'all,
Unless it has time to get right,
Develop up to a point
Where it can survive it's upbrangin'."

-jenn

I'd like to think he's crazy,
But I talk to myself, too.
I didn't feel the need to impress him,
But rather, the need not to.

If I could exist in a vacuum,
And feel everything else sucked away,
Until I was stripped bare
Of clothes
And hair,
Of likes and tastes and proclivities,
And simply be
Myself.
Then I could be that one
That can stand alone
In your presence
And offer nothing,
Until you feel for yourself
That same stripping away.
Then you would be free, too.
And then,
We could talk
To each other.

- jenn

Just because it wasn't rotten yesterday
Doesn't mean it ain't bad today.
Things change ya know.
And there are certain things you should never eat by themselves,
Because once you get that undeniable whang in your mouth,
You can never find the taste palatable again,
Even when mixed with other things
You used to enjoy.

I personally never should have gotten a taste
Of this gluten-free crust
Without the sweet pecan pie filling,
Or religion
Without warm love.

-jenn

Everybody's burning breakfast today.
I can smell the charred remains as I walk past house by house.
Must be that some breaking news on the television set
Caught people in the middle of scrambling their eggs,
Grilling their ham.
Someones even left the water running in the sink.
The drain has clogged and this trail of suds
Has trickled out the front right window.
This next house has milk spilling out it's front left,
Someone so stunned
While dousing their corn flakes
That they stand in perpetual pour.

And the two windows
From the two houses
Are two eyes on one face.
One cries milk,
The other suds,
But both weep as best they can
To cover the shock and sadness.

Or, someone is filming a very cheesy commercial,
Probably for the express purpose of next years Superbowl.

-jenn

There are those who walk amongst us
Who live in a coma based reality.
They like to fight and criticize
Things they know nothing about.
Something inside of them has formed
A delicate tipping point,
And they prefer to dump their animosities out on other people.

But I wish you'd seen the room before you entered it,
And noted the peace,
The  camaraderie,
The nonjudgmental encouragement
Of all of us others who acknowledge
That we, too, put our pants on one leg at a time.

You'd have seen that we didn't need a ramrod,
Or a head asshole,
Or even an assistant to the ramp supervisor.

We were actually doing just fine!

-jenn

I want something for nothing!
Because the spirit of bum has got all over me.
I'm tired of livin somewhere between
The American dream and the American nightmare.
I don't even want to work for food!

But all these Bradford Pear Trees produce here
In the Chase Bank parking lot is leaves,
Inedible ones, I'm sure,
And the non-bearing mulberries stain  my point of view.
Nothing grows on my street except crabapples,
And nothin or no one tries to digest those
Until they ferment long enough
That a few reprobate squirrels decide
To get together and run along the fence intoxicated.

So smile, orphans, and be very happy,
To live in the mundane migrations
Where real food still grows.
And have no fear,
You will never have to strain your brain
Over a catchy sign
Designed to harvest spare change
From the good people who drive up and down Western Avenue
In their towncars.

-jenn

It makes me happy
To hear you knocking.
Knock knock knock
Upon my door.
I know your smile,
Your friendly jostling,
The laughter that awaits me, poor,
Yet makes me rich,
And brings me plenty,
The energizing warmth you bring!
I open my door.
I hear you sing,
Feel your warm embrace,
Your sun shines upon my face,
And I am whole again,
My friend.
I am whole again.

-jenn

I trained 364 days
For the iron man triathlon.
I sweat and I bled and I cried
And I came in one hundred and thirty-eighth
At 11:59 pm.
I ached all night
Alone in my tent,
And early Sunday morning,
I peeked out at sunrise
In time to see
People already biking and walking
Swimming and jogging
Along the course for fun.

They were doing it for fun!
It was all just for fun.
It had been
All along.

-jenn

He took to his bed.
He used to sit in his garage
With the garage door up on nice days,
And he'd wave to me as I walked by.
And nice days became good days,
Until finally I'd just see him on his good days.
And now the garage door is down
And the shades are up on his bedroom window.
And I know he's in there looking out,
So I still wave to him when I walk by.
But he's took to his bed,
And I'm walking by eating my tums,
Knowing I'll take to mine someday too.

-jenn

The phone rings early, Wakes me from a dream. It's my own personal bums. I'm so lucky. The woman tells me her roof is leaking and her husband can't do anything about it. I set the phone down To see what all the clatter is about out front. It's just lunchtime at the summer camp. "Do you want a ride?" someone hollers at me as they drive by on a golf cart. "No. I think I'll walk," I say. I get down to the cafeteria, And the food is inedible, But I sit and listen to the string band while everyone else eats. One man has a neckless banjo hanging around his neck . He plays it beautifully with both hands. It sounds angelic, like a harp. The other guy in the middle sings directly to me While he plays his mandolin "Is he flirting with me," I wonder, "Or just performing?" Lunch is over! It's back to Life. I walk back towards it all While carts speed past on the muddy lane, Spitting hard bits of dirt onto my legs and face. I wish I would have worn some other clothes. Some carts tried to get off the path and got stuck in the mud. I nod as I walk past them. When I get back home, I see that I never hung the phone up. My personal bum is still talking, Complaining on forever, But now I know how to answer her. "Your roof is leaking? Mine is, too. Your spaceship broke down? Mine is, too. You need money for parts? Me, too. You're hungry and homeless? Me too, Honey." Cause we're all just somebody's personal bum. -jenn

So I'm trying to re-landscape an old country club, And I'm working an old backhoe, And it's faulty. (Of course it is.) And there's an old lady in the cab beside me, And she's bitching and griping about every single thing I do. (Of course she is.) And the generator ain't Jenin', And the hydraulics ain't tippin the load over like it's supposed to. (Of course it ain't.) So I crawl out on the arm, Straddle the bucket cylinder With my feet swingin free. I start pickin' the rocks up out of the basket by hand And throwin them down on the ground hard. It's kinda fun. (Of course it is!) Then an old man screams at me! Tells me he made those rocks himself! (Of course he did...) Along time ago. (Of course it was.) He's got something special he wants to do with them someday. (Of course he does.) And the carburetor ain't carbin'. Suddenly, it dawns on me, That if you DO ANYTHING, Someone's going to criticize, So you might as well do what you really want to do, So at least you can enjoy that. I'm taking a long hard look at this mountain, Because right now, My pistons, they ain't working either. (Of course they're not.) But I also realize, I never really wanted to move this mountain anyway. I only wanted to sing to it. (Of course I did.)

I don't care about Fifty Shades of Grey I don't care about black or white or tan I just want something to mix into all this blue And make it into something else I don't care about money But gold would mix with blue to make a precious green Royal red could give me purple And I love me some purple But what I'd really like is to mix my blues with yours and somehow come out with turquoise ....

So they showed a nice, wholesome movie At church, a good, old-fashioned Wizard of Oz. And when it was done, The children's minister smiled Sweetly, like Glenda, And said, "Well, what did anyone get out of the movie?" Which one should never ask, Especially in the case of children, For one lad in the back spoke up, "There is no God." "Well," he continued, in answer to the gasps of the faithful, "If witches can die, And monkeys can fly And the great all-knowing, all-doing wizard Turns out to be an old man who needs glasses, Who hides behind a curtain Pressing buttons and pulling ropes, Then yes, I'd say the message of this movie is, "There is no God." Next week they're digging a little deeper in the well. The bulletin says they'll be showing a Three Stooges marathon (With no questions at the end.) -jenn

Puma in the shadows Waiting there for me. Quiet and black and crouched, I see him there When I close my eyes. Only a golden outline Of his glowing eyes I see. He blinks when my eyes open And opens his eyes to see me When mine are shut. He sleeps while I am watchful, But at night when I'm asleep, He prowls around the darkness. He prowls all over me And waits for me to fall. But when I do, He will too, Into some new reality. Maybe there We'll be creatures of the light together, Or creatures of the night together. We won't care, As long as it's the same. - jenn

There was an incident, A mystery in the night, And vainly I babbled, Tried to describe the unnatural, The pieces of the thing As I had seen it. The other six stood silently, Never offered to explain Their points of view. Only now I see, They're not blind like I am. They knew it was an elephant All along. -jenn

God sent you an angel To carry your load, Take it completely from you, To allow you to walk in peace and leisure. But you were afraid of the angel, Declined the help, And I was even wearing a white hat. -jenn

It was about to rain, But a train came And caused a Doppler wind to blow The gray skies back to blue. The clouds hitched a ride to the moon, And so I think if we want it to rain again, We'll have to ban trains. -jenn

I polluted my pure pecan pie With chocolate chips. I did. I confess. It was a delicious mess. So I had another. Sometimes it's a good thing For one's pie to be in the sky. It's much harder to eat it that way. But I am a greedy corporation. And nothing shall be impossible for me. And I find the pie on the loftiest branch to be the best. And so I'll find a way to climb the Tree of Life And test such pies, And pollute them if I wish, And put them on a painted dish, And slither down And offer it to you. And...what you gonna do? - jenn

I still think of you At night When I'm all alone And cold And want to be warm And whole And want you to hold me And when I close my eyes I see That you are you and I Am me And we Are really the same person That's why We communicate Without words And fly Without feathers And I thought you were too good For me And you had the same Insecurity But we Are really the very same person

The bird didn't feel any need to fly, For it could hop faster than I Could run, and so it fled me on it's feet. But I had to eat. And so I found another gear, A hunger that was fed by fear, Got close enough to salt it's tail And found the the old wives' tale was true. I caught that bird that didn't think That I was worth escaping from, But lucky for him, I was willing to share the crumb That he'd found earlier that day. And so we dined there Together, toasting day and night. His beady eye regarded me And mine him as we Locked elbows and drank To health and wealth and many future crumbs. -jenn

You keep my chin up,
Even though my cheek bones sag,
My saddles bag,
My crows get feet,
And my double chins beat.
My muffin tops.
My belly flops.
But I saunter like a queen,
Cause you're the best I've ever seen
At making me feel beautiful.

My knees knock.
A kid told me my socks
Were wrinkled,
But I wasn't wearing any.
I won't mention my granny pannies,
But I'll just say
That any day with you,
Is better than any regal review
Or nip and tuck,
Or....
Well I'll just suffice to say,
Thanks for loving me anyway,
Warts and all.

-jenn

I tell ya what I'm gonna do.
I'm gonna take every love song I ever wrote for you
And go and sing em
For the world,
And seduce everyone,
A thousand lovers under the sun,
Like breakfast every day,
And I'll never even say,
"What's your name?"
Or "what's your sign?"
Or "will you be mine?"
Cause I won't care.
I'll be everywhere
And nowhere all at once,
And I'll stream all this love
Out
Like light I've absorbed,
And the careless dishwasher
Will slosh me about
Like a walrus with no sponge etiquette,
Getting everybody wet
And effervescent
And absolutely drunk
On their Love Butts.

-jenn

Come bees, and sting.
Remind me of anything but him.
Come and buzz and pout
Fly about and worry me
While I try to see
What's written on this ancient
Earthen urn from Greece.
The translation comes to me piece by piece,
But I forget my place
When tears stream down my face
And my skin welts--
Two stripes for any one time I felt good.
I really should go in,
Call it a day,
Pull the screen door shut
And say enough,
But I'm so tough,
And have learned so well
To tolerate hell--
It's icy fingers
And burning stingers.
But I'd just really like to know
What this perfect Adonis said here
Before he gave that discus such a throw.

-jenn

Do you want to creep into my mind
Like the ivy along a twine,
Up into the intimate sunlight of my day?
Do you want to feel the shine
That glitters in the summertime,
That beckons butterflies
And ripens watermelons?

Feel the heat that makes the okra bloom,
The hot summer wind that blows broom corn
And pollinates it.

Enjoy me with me
As I enjoy you.
Let me see a smile or two,
And maybe a giggle,
And then as the dirt
Cries out in thirst,
The clouds rise up,
The thunder bursts,
We can run
And dance through the august rain.

-jenn

He mouthed off a lot to me.
Most of it was deleterious.
He offered me an occasional compliment
To try to keep me around.
But it's all forgotten now,
Except for this one thing he told me,
For I felt it was true,
I have perfect tits.
Well, I do.

-jenn

I come and I go.
I blow the sand off your desert laden chest.
I listen as your worries increase
And anoint your head with oil.
I have lived 1000 times,
Always coming so close to the margins of religion,
But only ever made it as far as a temple prostitute.

But when I look into your eyes I see
The purity of the holy flame,
And then I know,
That's only as far as anyone
In a human body can get,
And much closer than most will ever know.

-jenn

It's going to be ok.
I have gone back into your past,
Back into the long sinews
Of your innocent legs.
I have wanted you there
And planted the seeds of wantability.
You are now wanted.
I want you.
I have loved you there,
Stroked your soft, dark hair,
Strewn rose petals around your lovable head.
You are now lovable.
You are lovable now.
And everything will be ok,
Because I have dreamed it.

-jenn

I pass all boundaries without adversity,
From neighbor good
To neighbor hood,
Every language spoken
And understood.

Yet I walk without a word,
Without a judgment,
Only a wisp of nothing am I,
A shadow of the cloudless mist,
A breath of possibilities still unkissed,
Who is,
And yet is not.

But speak and I appear.
Dream and I will draw you near.
Burn with desire and I will reach
Deep into the treasure chest
To stoke the fire
Which forges every wish,
And Love will come
And breathe its very soul upon your breast.

-jenn

Come sing the song of the warrior.
Today you will fight for your life!
Arise to the sun,
Steel to the one
Who would come
Take your living from you.

There are those who would kill you.
What's worse are the ones who would come
And make you be something that you're not,
Steal your joy
And your soul.

But your smile is a dazzling weapon!
Your teeth are the two edge swords
That both provoke minds of the jealous,
And gird up your loins
To fight to be true to your self.
Don't let your heart be conformed
To some diluted version of your personality.

-jenn

The osteoblasts build up the bones. Hollywood makes the icons.
Medical companies fabricate orthotic knees.
Surgeons replace and replace them.

Osteoclasts tear down the bone.
Police come take celebrity spokespeople away,
And lawyers come to clean up the mess that the medical industry has made.

And we wish we could find just one graven image
To show us what our god looks like.

-jenn

He's deadly at an arm's length,
Black belt in judo,
But if you watch him from across the room,
And his eyes catch yours,
He 'll look away first,
Because he's a green belt in the Art of Love.

-jenn

Those rich white men

Give her lots of tips.

They like her bleached blonde bounce,

Her childbearing hips.

They don't know that she's shacked up

With her baby's daddy,

A big muscly black man.

She smiles as she bends to hand them their food.

Their mouths water looking at her boobs.

They're all about the same age

As her dear old dad.

That's why she doesn't feel bad at all

For taking their money.

-jenn

Haiku

Cat and mouse grew old
So the game of cat and dog
Proved more hair raising

My cat has feathers.
He's evolved.
His tail has split,
Or else he's grown another.
He flits about up in the trees,
His scissored tail snips the air behind him.

And now atop a high-line pole,
He sneers down and drops
The words he's cut with his tail.
He despises all mankind,
Their lack of wings, their one mere life,
Their inability to change.

-jenn

It's a big house.
It sits up on top of a hill.
The rooms are spacious,
With sparse and mis-matched furniture.
I cleared out most of the rest
So that my grandchildren would have room to do cartwheels if they wished.

I walk down the wooded trail
That follows a winding creek
And lose myself in the shadows and the sun.
I walk until I smell the pines.
The aroma wakes me from my trance
And whispers, "It's time to go home."

But when I climb back up the winding way,
I find that there is nothing there,
No house, no rooms, no children, no grandchildren.
I find that I am not back where I began.
The earth has carried me to a different place in the galaxy.

No one can step in the milky spiral twice,
And this is why our laws of physics stream such margin of error.
The hidden motion of the mechanics
Has not been taken into account,
And truth has not been furnished quantumly.

-jenn

I like to watch you in my rearview mirror
Because you're closer than you appear.
I have the sense that I'm safe,
With full permission of the illusion
To acknowledge that your effect on me
Is greater than I can know.

But the funhouse terrifies me.
The bulges make me think you're pregnant,
And the baby isn't mine,
And I can't tell my own appearance
From that of the clowns or bearded women.
I fear being absorbed into the mirrors
Along with everyone else,
I fear the unknown intangible distances of their universe.

And now I settle for a glimpse of you
That shines from your reflection on the water.
I see you ripple and disappear,
Return again, just as you promised,
While my own image fails,
Falls to pieces under the troubled surface.

-jenn

"I don't care."

"I know.
It was more of a journal entry.
Maybe someday,
Someone will care.
I don't care.
I care."

-jenn

I always liked the foot of the bed.
My toes hang down, out from under the covers,
A taste of freedom if only in the night.

But what does it matter?
That part's taken.
And I'm tired.
My weary head flops over, face down,
Way up at the crown of the pillow.
But my toes pop out from the side of the heavy quilt,
Still searching for the edge.

-jenn

I wander through my life ,
Night and day,
And time doesn't really matter to me
If it's dark, and my heart says, 'walk,'
I do.
And if it's day,
And my love says, 'run away with you,'
I close my eyes and dream
In the sunlight.
And when the clock strikes two,
I feel my way,
A.M, P.M,
Makes no difference to me,
Just the same wind
To cast my heart beats upon,
And wait for the dawning
Of now.

-jenn

Tryin too hard?
Never been accused.
People that know me
Know it's not true.
People who don't,
Come to see,
That I peeeee
Poetry.

Always a stylus
In my hand,
Decorating napkins,
Whatever's at hand,
Yellow streams
Under the stadium,
By I. P.
Poetry.

And if you'd come
And lie by me
I'd listen to your history,
And love every mysterious depth,
And ink your skin
With odes and hymns
And golden showers of love,
For I pee poetry.

-jenn

I'm pitiful today,
A pitiful pile of clavicles
And hay that the baler couldn't reach,
Lying out here in the sun
Like a beached whale.

But if them dry bones of mine could walk,
I'd pick myself up,
Dust off the chalk from the lines that have already been drawn,
And be glad the baler neglected me,
And thankful this world has rejected me,
And leap for joy at all my tendencies,
And picture what I'd be with ligaments and tendons hooking up all these clavicles of mine,
Stringing 'em up in a fancy line and wiggling
And giggling and dancing off into time.

-jenn

Why do I miss you so bad
When I've barely had a taste of you?
When my lips so chilled they're blue
Shiver from the coldness of the world?
When my puppy love with eyes not even open yet
Knows enough to oonch up
To the only source of warm it's ever had?

Why do I miss you so good?
Better than I've ever missed
Meteor showers or being kissed neath the moon?
Better than my acing grades?
Better than my denim fades
In the sun and acid rain?
Better than I bring a spoon of honey to my lips?
Better than I ever knew I could?

Oh I miss you...

-jenn

The guttural grunts our ancestors made and heard
Became words,
And when we say or sing
Them we can feel the ancient vibrations
Of the things,
The emotions of humanity.

And now I'll speak for English.
Words like rush and push and hush
Have movement in their sound.
Yes even hush has a feel
That you have stopped
While everything else around
You moves quietly on.
And dawn and yawn and lawn
Stretch out across the horizon forever,
Especially if you're mowing one,
And itch and bitch and snitch and twitch
Cause an erethismatic glitch
In the part if the brain that senses irritation.
And words like wrist and fist widen our eyes to fear the strong arm gist
Of the heavy handed,
While words like honey,
Sweet as money,
Shine and drip like a sunny day,
While cares and dares we share
Tear away
And leave us bare
To truelove
For which there is no pair,
Or any true understanding.

-jenn

If you really know
What you want,
Why do you bother
With Eeny Meany Miney Mo?
Just grab that tiger by the toe
And go.

And if you wanted General Tso
Why did you go to
Mama Carrinno's?
Ravioli ringlets ain't even
The privates,
Much less a Five-Star brush,
When you wanted a seasoned tryst
With a fiery rush.

And if you wanted beans and sprouts,
Why come to me with your heart hanging out,
Singing my blues all night?
Everyone knows I'm Baby Bear's porridge,
And I'm so.....
Just right.

-jenn

Wow! I was just wishing for toilet paper
When what should appear,
But eight tiny reindeer?
I asked them if they had a problem with poo stickin to their fur?
And they said
YES!
And ran away.
I guess they'd heard that old joke about the bear
And the rabbit.
So here I sit
All broken hearted,
Knowing that if I just wouldn't want anything,
Or ever ask,
That all my wishes would come true.
But something there is about living
Provides a humbling need.
Could anyone be kind enough
To spare a square?

-jenn

You're a mystery
Wrapped in pale lilac sheer,
Standing behind a dark heavy curtain
That light won't penetrate.
But I see your eyes,
Darting like a bird
That flew mistakenly into a warehouse.
They're veiled, too, behind rose colored glasses.
They peek at me
When they think I'm not looking.

I fumble for the hidden latch
That clasps your gilded cage.
How I long to unfasten it.

-jenn

The stars are spelling your name
In the darkness of my heart.
They're lighting my sky with you.
The brightening brings thunder,
And lightening brings day,
And I'm smiling.
I'm smiling again.

Come to the palace of my heart!
Help me find the pea,
Like the grain of sand in the oyster,
My world of mattresses proves
I'm a princess,
But I'm smiling.
I'm smiling again.

-jenn

I scare people.
It's in my job description.
It's what I do.
Come,
Let me scare you.

My DNA was crafted thus,
The potter's clay, the ash, the dust
All came together just so,
And my eyes, Athena blue,
Will cast their grey and burn a hole
Through you,
And you'll be terrified too,
Cause that's what Tiggers do best, baby.

My favorite place to scare people is Walmart.
The sock aisle, or the magazines.
The good folks as they drive to work,
I scare them too.
They honk at me lots,
And I'm not sure if it's because
I'm driving slow,
Or because I'm just almost (s)topless.

-jenn

I wander the garden on a cloudy day.
A wistful breeze blows the weeds apart,
And I spy colorful fruit just ripe for me.
I gather six black cherry tomatoes and a small sweet pepper,
Two bright yellow pear tomatoes
And a baby cucumber.
It's more than this lazy gardener needs
On a day like today,
When I'm thinking of you,
And so thankful for the scripture that says,
'He who looks back
Ain't fit for a plow.'

-jenn

I see your head craned north of here.
I know you ache to go,
But I pull you down into the night with me,
Deeper into the darkness where
Faint stars pulse and glow,
But you have to close your eyes to see,
That you're worth it to me,
And I'm proud of you.

You're in another time zone now,
Maybe even a different astral plane,
But the mating humpbacks know the way.
They submerge as bull and cow,
Undulate as one in wax and wane
Until I see stars now, even in the day,
And you're worth it to me,
And...I'm proud of you.

-jenn

Do you pray?
Do you seek the truth?
Or have you settled into the lie of the adversary?
Oh we all want to think we would have never eaten the apple in the garden,
But we are eating it as we speak,
Talking with our mouths full of apples,
Bitter fruits,
That draw our faces down,
Make our eyes water.
But we're not crying,
Oh no,
And we're not praying either.

-jenn

If I could time travel,
I'd be here one minute and gone the next.
I dance naked on the lawn at 63rd and Penn
And vanish like a ghost just as
They would come for me.
I'd swim on the shores of Waikiki,
Touch every standing stone at Carnac France.
I'd pose alone and tiny
On the giant stones of the Trilithon at Baalbek
And wave Bon Voyage to every ship
That departs west from the rocky roughs of Hebrides,
And then I would sit
Up high on the cliffs above your head,
And blow kisses down on you
Until the rings of Saturn melt
And every moon is blue.

-jenn

We can?
We can do it the easy way
Or the hard way?
Ahhhhhh, I remember them both
So well.
Oh well.

Or, I could blow it out your tailpipe
Of great indifference I guess.
But what does it matter?
I'll still be this plate of food that you don't want,
You'll still be,
Not the elephant in the room,
But the room, itself,
That wraps me so tight I warp,
That holds me inside,
Staring from wall to wall to wall
Wondering at all the strange construction,
The artifice of carpet on the floor,
When I could be outside
Picking tomatoes
Or which row I want to hoe.

-jenn

Ahhh yes, my expectations are too high.
I want to sleep in my own bed.
I want to have my cake and eat it, too.
I want to star in my own autobiography,
(And I'd like to survive it).
But from what I can see,
No one survives their autobiography.
Some footnote goes on to describe the ending
After the ending,
And a dash between the years
Indexes for us everything they did
Between birth and death.

But I don't want my Hundred Yard Dash to be a run,
A smoking jolt from the starting gun,
And now we're off.
I want to walk in peace
Along the shore,
Enjoy more,
And hurry less,
And worry less about the lesser things,
And sing
A song of glory to the great,
And be very on.

-jenn

When new toasters
Are for new crustomers only,
Old crustomers crust.

-jenn

Love is a dark word.
It's a dark matter,
Dark energy.
It's not the part that you can see
Bowing at centerstage.
It lives and breathes within the fibers
Of the velvet curtains.

Love is a word that comes from under the tongue
And behind the teeth,
More at home
From deep back of the throat,
Like a guttural 'baroop' of the bullfrog,
Or the bawl of a cow
Bellaring to her calf.

But when the stage has been cleared,
Even as the empty prairie grasses blow,
Parting like the wind in your hair,
The quiet stands surreal in the spotlight.
It puts it's tongue behind it's teeth
And whispers a roar that can only be felt.
And the wave of it presses me down in my seat,
As I sit, the lone audience member,
And my heart throws open it's sashes
And sings along with you, "Love, Love, Love."

-jenn

I don't know what you want me to do.
I never have.
I guess that's why I've always disappointed you.

But now that I've given up,
I sit, like a jack-o-lantern,
The day after Halloween,
And let you poke holes in me with a pin,
Like we did, as kids, to that poor pumpkin of ours.
We practiced our nursing skills,
Telling it, "This is going to hurt you
Much worse than it will me."

-jenn

I'm going to learn from the cutting
Taken from the top of a good plant.
I've been severed and dunked in rooting hormone
And carefully placed in nutrient rich soil.

I've taken root here,
And I'm going to spread,
And cuttings will be taken from me as well,
And that's good.

It's all good.

-jenn

You know that part of your pinky finger
The doctor cut off and threw away?
That's me.
That part that was always in the way,
And couldn't quite escape the reality
Of the big machinery, the swather,
Coming down hard, trying to connect prematurely,
That part that got smashed,
That part that bled,
The part that had to have an abortion,
And you shook your head in shame and wondered why,
That part that needed sex,
Because it never had any love to compare?
Yeah,that's me.

And I know you'll never miss it.
You'll go on just like before,
Making jokes so everyone sees how tough you are,
But I wonder if some rainy day
When you sit at the kitchen table
And reach for another sip of coffee
From your old green coffee cup,
If you'll notice that part of you
That's not there anymore?
That's me.

-jenn

Ohhhhhh his love is pure and sweet.
He doesn't want me to eat
Hydrogenated fats,
But he doesn't mind if I smoke a little after sex.
He's so sweet, he even checks
Very closely,
To see if I do.

-jenn

I have no will to live today.
My bloom has blown.
And if the wind would come
And take me off,
And I could fly softly
Into some other world,
Even with it's unknown slings,
I'd go as quickly as the day goes black,
As simply as I go to sleep
Before my head can hit the pillow.

And as for you,
I'd miss you as I do today,
And all the days I realize
That you are here and I am there,
And time, itself, with it's strong hands,
Will always be between us.

-jenn

The can sat smirking,
Clean as a whistle.
At the cup that overflowed.

-jenn

The Oui Bears (or...a New Mother Nature Takin' Ovah!)

The Oui Bears lived
In the woods of France
And love to swim, climb trees, and dance,
And Mother Nature came and said,
"Tis time you bears were off to bed."
And the Oui Bears said, "Oui! Oui!"

And Mother came
In spring again,
Woke the Bears
With her soft hand
And said, "Time for breakfast!
Spring has sprung!
Come fill your bellies, lives, and lungs
With the fresh and bitter greens!"
And the Oui Bears said, "Oui! Oui!"

And Mother Nature
Will come for you
And ask you out,
"Dinner for two?"

And you better damn well say, "yes,"
Or she'll feed you to her Yes Bears!

-jenn

I want to live out west
In those desert places
Where it still gets dark at night.
I can breathe and sleep,
Dream deep of other worlds and places
That exist in the microcosms of my blood,
In my cells and the microscopic working organelles
That grind them into gear.

The city lights drown them,
Fade them away,
Before I can lay my grasp on them,
Before I can realize that they are part of myself.

-jenn

I'm like a cat
Watching my master
Take up the trees
And strum them.
The flowering bushes
Vibrate untouched
At the sound of his low E.
And I can't always
Make sense of the music,
And so I close my eyes
And remember
The deep look of his face,
And wait
For him to pet me.

-jenn

My eyes graze the morning news
Of your latest peradventures.
While I drink my orange juice,
My heart gropes in the dark,
"Where is he?"

The mail runs and my fingers tear
The envelope to pieces.
I frisk the pages for your words,
The ones I'm starving for.

I eat them, washing them down with coffee,
And autonomically my parasympathetic nervous system
Takes the rich supplemental bits,
Pools them in my breasts
And genitals,

And my heart is reaching blindly.
It can't see that you're not here.
"He's near. He's near!" it cries.
"Where is he?"

-jenn

Bows on Hicks

Your 'I Love You's'
Are bows on hicks
Particles in my hillbilly world
You may not realize
Just how they turn energy
Into matter
Or how they whisper
In return
'I Love Use, tooooo.'

But if we're honest
We know it's not the bow
That tied this knot of knowing
And maybe it's not
The Boson-Higgs
Behind it all,

But maybe love really does make the world go around after all.

-jenn

The queen attends
Content and approves
Of the offerings the artisans bring.
Well most of them.
Her army keeps the boundaries watch
So that she can listen
To the greater wisdom
Of the air.

But the queen is thinking
About how she thought
Her panties were white,
Until she saw them up next
To your white skin,
And how surprised she was
At the relativity
Of time in the face of
The constant speed of life,
And .....
....fun.
And ivory is the new virginal.

-jenn

I watch them play chess
But one of the pawns is glued to the chessboard
It's become part of the landscape
They maneuver around it
Like the elephant in the room
I wonder how it would change things
If the glue wore off
And the pawn got up on its own two feet
And waltzed right out of the game

Maybe they wouldn't call it chess anymore
Or bored

-jenn

He traded me for a milkshake,
Swallowed with his mouth open so I could see
Ice cream melting on his tongue,
Creamy white rolling over his taste buds
Like a cud.

He had traded me thus
Many times
And now, finally today,
He saw me through a different lens,
And wished, as he slurped,
But was unable to do anything else.

-jenn

Did she think I was a bum,
About to hit her up for money?
Or maybe she worried I would try
And steal her boyfriend away,
(Though I'm thirty years her senior.)

Well, he was lookin at me and smilin.

But I watched fear shock her face into some cubist form
Of her former innocence.
Three hairs turned white on her young head,
And one year of her life she traded
For the luxury and habit of needless worry,
For I would have taken them only
Under my down as baby chicks
And protected both of them there.

How often has Love wanted to take us,
And we, unwilling, won't be led.

-jenn

The sun sprays onto the faded wooden privacy fence,
Somehow splashes fractal prism'd rainbows
Shattered by the wall.

And while we're hidden,
I stick my nose in middle of your business
And breathe,
Close my eyes,
And buzz on your freaky berry buds.

See the love kaleidoscope?
See it take me to worlds unknown?

I'm a stranger in a strange land here,
In this place where I'm wanted,
Cherished, and watered
Even by the dry sands,

-jenn

Alimentary, Dr. Watson

I sat and watched you eat for ten minutes,
Studied you thoughtfully,
Watched you chew,
Noted your intolerances
And cravings,
Which parts you wanted,
Which you eschew.
And in this microcosm you call lunch,
I was able to ascertain
Your obsessions,
(With peanut butter and jelly)
Compulsions,
(For the perfect chicken strips)
And just what it is that turns your brown eyes blue---
(Not enough French fries.)

But I'm fighting the urge to sprinkle your cupcakes with vitamins....

-Love,
Mom

Potatoes would bake at this angle.
Squash would peel itself to jump into this casserole.
Onions would caramelize!

Maybe some would grow frigid
Waiting for the plot to thicken,
But I'm slaving away over these hot griddles,
Stirring the rue away,
And stirring in the love.

-jenn

My car went beep beep
Just as your car said beep beep beep.
Our eyes met
Across the crowded parking lot.
We exchanged hasty glances as our cars sighed into their rest.
My car reached for the remote control.
Yours, for a glass of wine.
Could it be?
Some cosmic connection?
Or did we merely press our key fobs at the same time?

-jenn

I hated to throw that towel away.
It was the only thing I had of my grandma's
Besides her love of chicken and dumplings
And her laugh till you cry mentality.

What was I supposed to do?
Frame it? Put it in the closet and forget about it?
I decided to use it,
And I have for almost 15 years.
70s brown, with two big burnt orange flowers on it,
It's faded now, and almost see-through.

Using that towel has kept her in the forefront of my mind,
And so many things I didn't understand,
I've thought about deeply through the years
While being a mom myself.
I've often wanted to throw in the towel.
I've looked instead through its threadbare holdings.

And so today, I've taken the towel
And folded it three corners.
I placing it on my rosewood dresser,
And I'm going to leave it there for a while.

-jenn

Nothing in my life's the way I want it.
Sometimes I can wonder why,
But deep down, I know
That I built my foundation on pleasing you,
And there's no doing that.
And so today the shifting sand appears,
Great drifts of it in every room of my house.
But maybe if I blow the fuckin' house down
And run away with the wolf,
I'll be happy for a minute...
Just one fuckin' minute.

-jenn

I ain't afraid to say 'hallelujah.'
I ain't afraid to say 'fuck you.'
Somewhere in the middle
Is my theology.
It swirls in the vortex of my thoughts of you.

But I want to know what the gods believed.
I want to know what they believed in.
I don't want to be one or two steps removed.
And if that's too much to ask,
Then let me be like the squirrel
Who worships his tree
And his daily nut.

Deepest irreverence brings reverent epiphany.
Suddenly 'holy' really means something.
Your eyes stop at mine.
They're blazing!
They burn me.
Then you whisper,
"You're hot."
And now I believe.

-jenn

I want the crazy that's not contagious.
But it's really hard to get.
Some crazy comes after you,
As if its only cure for lonesome
Is to infect you,
Recombine its DNA inside and
Make you like it,
So that it will cause a twin,
Have someone to talk to,
An equal to wrestle with when boredom sets in.

But I've seen a beautiful nut job
Talking to herself,
Singing a new song of joy each morning.
She hears the percussive rhythms of the birds and the motorcars,
Is mindful of it and remembers it all day.
She shakes her ass to it,
Even in the grocery store.
Yes even, and especially, the hoity toity grocery store,
Where no one wants to catch her particular brand of crazy,
Except me.

I wonder if maybe it is contagious after all.

-jenn

There was Sherry and Linda and Betsy and Billy,
But something was wrong with Betsy.
She quit talking about age 5,
And they labeled her retarded.

And Sherry and Linda and Betsy and Billy
All went to the little school in town,
But something was wrong with Betsy.
She had to go to special classes
That they called title one.

Sherry and Linda and Billy grew up.
They went to the prom and got married
To people who treated them like worn-out shoes,
But something was wrong with Betsy.

She didn't take that shit from anybody.
She stare 'em back right in the eye.
She'd slap them if they got close enough
Or didn't stop their teasing.

But then, something was wrong with Betsy.
Or, was there?

-jenn

Some days ago, in sometime past,
That rash road rage act of yours would've offended me.
I might've felt disregarded,
But not today.
Because today I know
That I'm secretly Stevie Wonder's Cherie Amour.
I'm under Frank Sinatra's skin.
I'm Michael Jackson's PYT again,
And Ray Parker's other woman.
I've heard all my lucky songs today,
And I've heard the deep voice of The Singer say,
"This is MY daughter, with whom I am well pleased."

-jenn

I know it's going to be OK.
But today all I can see
Is that stage of the cake
Where the eggs are blooped in on one side like three big lazy eyeballs,
And the teaspoon of vanilla isn't wanting to mix with the oil,
Or the milk.
The salt and sugar ain't that happy together.
The baking soda pouts, still clumped up in the shape of the spoon that dumped it,
And looks like a plain white boil on the butt of humanity.

But I'm just going to go ahead and keep on mixing it,
And one of these days, I'm going to have my cake,
And I'm damn well going to eat it, too.

-jenn

It's my luck
To be so sweet in bloom
The mandrake blossom
The finch the loon
Come to drink my nectar
Exotic and rare
It's my luck
To be stuck
Here in the rain
Neath this mango fan with you
The fruit heavy and ripe
And wants to be picked on this very day

But the rain will stop
And people will see
Me with all this mango juice on my mouth
And hands
Face and toes
But that's how it goes
It's my luck

I'm writing my love
On clouds in the sky,
Hopeless as cheat notes,
Chords of love songs
Written on the palm of my hand.
Blue ink is getting all over my guitar,
But I don't need to cheat.
I know this song
Like the back of my hand,
And the front of your face,
Your sweet mouth.
And I don't need to tell you
That I love you,
And the clouds don't need to rain,
Because this is West Texas,
And smoke doesn't always mean fire,
And cumulonimbus clouds don't always mean business here.
But you and I,
Always mean Love.

-Jenn

I didn't meet the Buddha on the way to the market.
I met a beetle dying on the sidewalk at McDonald's.
It was lying on its back,
Kicking its feet helplessly
And wallowing in the suds
Of the very detergent
That had been used to try and wash the grimy walkway.
I saw a little bird hop up and look at the bug,
But the bird could smell the surfactant that covered the beetle
And knew better than to eat it.
The bird hopped back away from the temptation and looked at it long and hard
With his beady eye
Before he flew.
I sat on the other side of the glass,
Drinking my tea like a shard of excommunicated Mongolian glass,
And decided that maybe I had met the Buddha, after all.
And so I stepped on the bug on my way back to my car
And put him out of his misery.
I'm on a roll.
Who wants to be next?

-jenn

It disappeared in the water.
Whatever it was,
The universal solvent solved it,
And the riddle was no more.
And it had been ugly,
And had caused me terror,
Even if just for a millisecond,
But now, even my suspicions were gone
As I looked deeply into the cup of life and saw
That even death had been swallowed up by it.

-jenn

Automatic doors don't open for me.
And the people in the store
Stare through me as if I don't exist.
I wait and wait at the deli counter,
But no one asks if they may assist me.
But then I feel the need to pee.
I make my way to the restroom.
I glance at the mirrors on my way to one of the stalls,
And sure enough, there's no reflection.

I stop and stand in front of them.
I will myself to be seen.
Slowly an image vaguely appears,
But it's hard to hold.
It fades quickly if I don't concentrate,
And it's just as well,
For I don't recognize the creature looking back at me
With its wings and flowing mane.

But I've gotten a good enough glimpse to wonder
If I might be able to fly.
I'm going to try,
But I'm sure,
That I'll have to work that, too.

-Jenn

Well I guess I have arrived
At the ripe old age
Where cashiers and waitresses
And other people that I don't know
And who don't know me
Think it's cute and flattering
To call me 'young lady.'
But I'm tellin ya right now,
Y'all better cut that shit out
Cause that is pissin me plum off.

Love always,
jenn

I share my dinner with a fly.
I wish I didn't know
That it regurgitates on everything it lights upon.
I wish I didn't know about a lot of things,
Like eyebrow worms
And itch mites
And insults
And that disregarded feeling one gets
From sharing her dinner with a fly.

-jenn

I remember one day that my grandmother braided my hair
In an old world style,
A Dutch braid, as she fashioned it.
She used a million bobby pins,
Because my hair was what she called 'flyaway hair.'
I felt her hands scrabble across my scalp
Picking up strands of my hair like a peanut combine
And laying them back down in harvested rows
Poof! I was transformed into a goddess,
A junior one, at least, for I certainly didn't know how to make this braid
And couldn't have done it by myself.

Now please don't get the picture that this was an every day occurrence.
It was not.
This was something very rare and very special,
And I wished the braid would last forever,
But in just one hour,
My flyaway hair proved
Too much for the old world braid,
And just how useless bobby pins are
In the hair of a post-postmodern six-year-old at play.

And I think my grandma saw that too,
And maybe that's why she never bothered
To braid my hair again,
But only brushed it for me now and then
And let me and it fly.

-jenn

I puzzle you.
Because you're from Reality One,
And I'm from Reality Two.
And I've studied your syntax,
And understand you,
But can't bring myself to speak
Back to you
In that tone of voice.
It's considered voybal abyoice
Where I come from,
And we buffaloes that roam
Prefer encouraging woyds.

-jenn

I strut because my joints are filled
Half with gas and half hydraulic fluid.
I limp because I've wrestled with a god.
My headlamps squint because I majored in sunspots
And minored in calligraphy,
And I squeak because my alternator belt's completely off.

I'm running only on my battery.
I've had to shut all my extras down.
I coasted until the radio quit me,
And that's how I found out
That it was the music that had kept me going
All along.

-jenn

I learned a lot from looking over your shoulder in a dream--
"How to open the double secret compartment
Where people comment what they actually think,"
By taking the notebook and turning it over and sideways,
Then flopping it over again from the bottom twice.
Well, it looked classy the way that you did it,
So never mind it didn't work for me,
But while you were reading, I could see
What you actually thought about the actual comments,
And better than that,
I got cookies all over your browser.

-jenn

Are you trying to say
That the stardust I am made from
Wasn't created in the Big Bang
Like yours was?
That you have some cosmic leg up on me?
That my matter can't turn into energy,
Or vice versa,
Because somehow I lie outside the margins of physics?
That I have no right to breathe
Because all the air is your air?
Well I have news for you.
Not only do I put my pants on
One leg at a time just like you,
But I've just put one of my legs right into your pants,
And I'm about to wear them to town
Without any suspenders.

-jenn

I go back to see the place
Where you made love to me.
I can't find it.
I can picture it in my mind
And am desperate to know
Where to go again
So you will love me.
But they've turned it into a dorm,
And young people chat in loud, empty voices there,
And laugh in nervous titters.
And so I go back to my room
And pour the rainwater out of my typewriter,
And start over.

-jenn

I listen carefully to the rain.
There's a rhythm to its fall.
A wave of drops drumming soft
Patters on my rooftop.
And when I close my eyes I see,
The rain is dancing down on me,
Doing an ancient rain dance on my soul.

And with that, my pump is primed,
My hearts pours out with love
In time with its tympani.
My body longs to rise and dance
Along the horizon and sing
The chance lyrics of old
That I can recall.

But mostly I want to turn and bow,
And ask you for this minuet now,
And see
If you will come and dance with me
In the rain?

-jenn

Sometimes I know things.
And I knew
that I was in love with you.
And maybe I thought
Love lived in one corner of the brain
On a nice clean lot,
Self- contained behind a picket fence.
But what I didn't guess
Is that love prowled untamed
In every strand of DNA,
And longed and pined and chewed its leg
and could never be contained.
And I didn't know
That I would want to fuck you so,
That I would be lit with a burning fire
And melt from the inside with the desire
That you spawn in me,
That I would do anything,
Anywhere with you,
And want to engulf you completely inside me,
That I would run free
Like a rabid she-wolf in heat,
Wanting, needing to breed, to merge,
To combine with you,
The primal urge to replicate your DNA too.
I had no clue
That you
Were the one who would evoke
And stoke
And stroke and poke
Such earth mama feelings out of me,
But I discovered your secret identity
As the sexiest earth daddy this world has ever seen.

-jenn

When my mind is right
And I relax
And let my body hum
At it's natural frequency
I close my eyes
Your face overwhelms my insight
And then I know
That the only thing more right than this
Is to somehow be more present in your life

Thoughts of you unravel my DNA
And as it blooms
I unfurl
I want to wrap you up in myself
Bring you back into me on my tongue
And taste your sweet love as you become a part of me
That will never die

"Thank you for shopping at Walmart,"
The automated cashier thang says
As the doors are already slipping open for me to exit.
"Please use the pin pad to complete your transaction,"
I hear it say to the next in line,
And soon, they, too, will be hearing
The automated valediction,
A pure enough sound,
Though something about it
Rings more attune to "Hit the road, Jack,"
Or, "Don't let it hit ya where the Good Lord split ya."

-jenn

How do you say, "pull over," in Spanish?
Cause I think I've really got to go.
I made a mistake and drank a little water.
Ehhhhhhhhh.
Ohhhhhh, I really should have known better.
Some proverbs are true,
And we should heed them,
While some, however clever,
Are only designed to keep your heart in a ditch
And your soul on pepto bismol.

-jenn

It was an unwanted gift,
And so it sat unopened in the nursing home room.
And as it went,
There became less and less carbon dioxide in the air
And more and more of oxygen,
And finally, the strange homeostasis of death.
But all the woman had really wanted
Was to be loved,
And thought of often,
And visited with kindness.

And now someone has bought the gift at a thrift store
And delivered it to me,
And the wrap has sat so long
That the tacky ends won't peel,
And I couldn't open it if I wanted to,
Which I don't,
For I , too, just want to be loved,
And thought of often,
And visited with kindness.

-jenn

I dip my fingers into the moon on the water
And silently stir the light into the deep
Slowly the outer light becomes insight
And darkness parts like a veil
And understanding like sleep
Comes over me

And how many things have come from nothing?
And how many times has time covered the trail
Of ripples that began as something
And vanished as if nothing had ever prevailed in the world
Except your unpredictability

But tonight I see that every tear I've cried
Has been saved in a bottle
And every time you said I took it wrong
I cried again
And all my teardrops are quantumly entangled with reality
And finally the pull from deep within and out there very far away
Aligned
And I see that I was right

-jenn

I weep for you, my friend,
Because your troubles never end,
And you can't see clear
To know that they are caused by fear.

But everyone should start out as a mother,
So everyone can see themselves
And see each other
And know
That love is the beginning of all things.
Love is the meaning.

And every child should grow
From Love's great base,
And feel the sun shine sweet upon her face,
And be understood and known
In his right hour,
And feel the serenity and power
Of living courageously.

-jenn

I'm pretending to sleep
So you can sleep,
But you're pretending to sleep
So not to wake me,
But I feel the tell as we spoon together,
A swelling in your sweet emergent self.
Your relentless side cannot lie,
And I can see,
You want to cut down the cherry tree with me,
And tell the whole world about it.

So come and nuzzle the back of my neck,
And cup my breasts in your tender loving hands,
And whisper, sweet, the prayers into my ear,
The sexy words you know I want to hear,
"Are you awake?"

-jenn

This used to be an Avalon
Until it started hanging out with the wrong crowd of cars,
Hyundais and Volkswagens.
Then it got a tattoo on its bumper,
And it's bonnet got pitted from racing into great clouds of bugs on the interstate.
It got to huffing gasoline
Until ethanol wasn't enough anymore,
Moved up to the hard stuff--
Nitrous.
And now I don't know who it is anymore.

-jenn

Do you dream of me at night
The way I dream of you
(When I sleep)?
But when I lie there awake,
I think about you, too,
(And I wonder)
Should our thoughts and dreams meet in the air
Over some mountain whose granite could magnetize
The iron in our blood to form
Snowflake patterns
And join us together as one,
Would we,
(Could we)
Be so happy there?

-jenn

A thousand years ago
A culture flourished here
His body washed up now
From all the rain
Buried in a mound
At the age of 40 years
A man who lived his life
Here on these plains.

They called it the new world
But it is not so new
There were people here from long ago
They called it the virgin land
And offered it to you
But bodies buried here will let you know

Pyramids and ancient carvings
Called by other names
People made to seem like savages
So that those who came out west
Would feel no guilt or shame
For taking turf and leaving damages

But there were people living here
One thousand years ago
Eight thousand years ago
And before 'time'
And just whose land you're standing on
You may never know
Until you climb the mounds
And drop your pride

-jenn

I've read enough to know that dialogue is dangerous with you.
Your conversations are monologues in disguise.
And your feet are planted firmly in irrationality,
Though you seem to be the poster child for logic.

But when the day with you is done
And feelings weighed,
Your side of the scale will fly
With nothing on it,
While mine will drag with heavy bags of
Something I can't put my finger on.

And so tonight my soliloquy
Is short,
To put up with your shit
Or not.
And tonight, I think , "Not,"
Therefore, I am.

- jenn

If my heart is dry,
It's because it comes from an arid climate,
And if it waterlogs in rain and love,
It's because it learned to get by on barely enough,
And if I can't accept sweet invitations,
It's because salt flats are all I've ever known.

But if you can stand in the rain and watch,
You'll see that I'm the son
That told the father, "no,"
But then went and did what he'd asked me to do,
And in-line with this form of obedience,
I'm listening,
And I will be there
In the selfsame hour
You wish for me.

-jenn

I was mad at you until
I saw you riding your bike upside down
Your knees pumping up almost to your ears
And elbows almost akimbo
Then I started to feel sorry for you
For I saw you were trying to get somewhere

They say one never forgets how to ride a bike
And maybe one can't forget
Even how to ride one wrong
It makes me question the depth of free will
But I think you ought to know better

But suddenly my fear of you
Has melted into something else
And I will discern in my own good time
What this emotion is
But for now its comical
And the relief liberates me
And I've needed a dose of this best medicine
For a very long time

-jenn

I will sing tonight a song of the hills
A prayer from my deepest hearts cry
I will sing my love of the winding Trail
The Cherokees lullaby

Chorus: Hush my baby hush little baby
Please don't cry tonight
Tomorrow we will cry when the sun comes up
So our tears can shine in the light

The stars don't care they are too far away
The ancestors too far gone
Expose your shame to the light of day
Our only hope is the Sun


To cry in the night is a shameful thing
Like a dream one fears to tell
But to cry in the day is brave and right
And preserves generations from Hell