this is one I sort of stole, it's kinda' like a found poem, I reworked

Graduation

Phil and Jonnie and I used to push our boat
and its engine about as big as my fist
through the back swamps of Lake Lagunita,
shooting guns,
drinking beer stolen from our parents.
Sometimes two of us would stand in the shallows,
scum around our knees,
holding a cotton rope fastened to the back of the boat,
and Phil would drag us around the lake.
I got blisters and rope burns, skinned my knees on floating things.
Jonnie squealed dolphin noises,
sometimes made it up to his feet,
walked on water.

Jonnie got in a wreck
the other day, some girl was driving
on good old Red Ridge road,
the road we used to take to 7-11 to sneak a few
more smokes before going back,
back to what was home,
what we called home, then.

The girl was wasted, so drunk she couldn’t stop
talking about the blood and her hair said the cops.
Jonnie was thrown out the back window of the truck.
broken jaw, broken clavicle, broken
wrist,
possible
high femur fracture, punctured lung;
other things inside flattened or gone.

I haven’t visited him yet at the hospital.

I can’t see it--
flying out the back window of a truck.
I’ve had to break into mine
when I locked the keys inside, cut my arm on the glass.
Squeezing through that
small window is impossible:
I’m telling you.

Go to my new zine! Yes, please! And none of the links work yet, but you can submit to holdingmytongue@yahoo.com.

Joy School
for Joseph Cornell

Why is it that when people speak
of joy or paint
its substance the canvas is a vast
blue sky or an acre of snow broken
maybe by a few black boughs.

My joy teaches me small.
It is tiny and dark with delicate moving parts
in the shadows,

like the ripple of a salmon gill
under the river
or a small vintage machine
with obscure purpose and many
tinny whirrings.

My joy is not made in the huge
bright handclap of God.

It is made by tiny mice paws
in the mud. It is made of straw
and teeth,
with a few white feathers.

The Underneath
I keep a pet
woman under my bed.
She’s small
and feisty, with sharp teeth.
I make her
wear all the clothes
I hate; high heels, garter belts, clingy velour.
I feed her chocolate and wine
from a box. She glares at me
as she twirls the curling iron through her brown hair.
I let her out once a week
for a bubble bath.
When she’s PMSing
she kicks the bottom of my mattress
to keep me awake. I punish her
by taking away her cable.
She pouts,
spends all day looking at her mirror
instead of me. I get her a fist
sized disco ball:
we kiss and make up.
She’s so small
I can fit my tongue
all the way around her neck.
She tastes of vinegar and honey.
When she’s been good I let her sleep
at the foot of my bed. Sometimes
I wake up
and she’s in my mouth.
I chew her
hair softly, like a cow would,
if it had the heart of a wolf.
Then I put her back in her cage.
She cries and dresses
in white
until the moon
breaks.