Improvement

My neighbor walked up to my front door and rang the bell.
When I opened the door,
that's when she tossed the landscape material at me.
"You lost this," she said.

Well, I hadn't really lost it. I carefully
placed it there, at the edge of my yard, after
all the weeds had been pulled. I held
it down with rocks and planned to cover it with some
sort of bark.

Turns out it was her side of the property line.
Turns out she had planted something there and the weeds,
well, she just hadn't got around to them.
Turns out I had yanked the whole mess up.

After she gave me back my "improvement" she
turned and left. But I had to tell her I didn't mean to.
She just kept walking.
I followed her.
I had to ask her to be reasonable.
I reminded her our kids are friends,
but she just kept on.
That's when I shouted out that she was mentally unstable.
And then I yelled across the yard after her
that she should go home
and have another drink.

She is a drunk, after all.
And I was having a bad day.

mice

they shit at the top of the stairs
outside my bedroom door
because they are afraid to go in.

but they dart around the kitchen
and they sleep behind the booskshelves
and they follow me in my garden.

how long

a little thing

this morning catherine and i painted this. we are quite proud of it. it looks lovely in front of our newly yellow house with white trim and flowers in baskets. i can guarantee you that there is not another polka dot mailbox within many miles of this one. makes me think of lemons and making lemonade and baby blankets and being thankful. no matter how much i want it, i, most likely, will not have another baby before i die. but maybe a baby will be born because of a little thing i did. a little thing that led to other things. and a polka dot mailbox.

options

i gave him every opportunity- every option.
a little- a lot- whatever he wanted.
but he wanted everything. he said he wanted everything and i believed him.
looking on it now, he was just seeing what i would do.
because he did nothing.

well, he did do something, but not for me.

and now he wonders why i've gone.
this isn't about my life.
this isn't about what i am willing to do.
this isn't about me.

what he once told me and my reply

Departure

Seen enough. The vision met itself in every kind of air.
Had enough. Noises of cities in the evening, in the sunlight,and forever.
Known enough. The haltings of life. Oh! Noises and Visions!
Departure into new affection and sound.

Deserts of Love

This time, it is the Woman whom I saw in the city, to whom I have spoken and who speaks to me.
I was in a room without light. They came to tell me that she was there: and I saw her in my bed, all mine, without light: I was very moved, most of all because it was my parents' house: distress took hold of me! I was in rags, and she, a woman of the world, was giving herself to me; she would have to go away! ... I took her, and I let her fall from the bed, almost naked; and in my unspeakable weakness, I fell upon her and rolled with her among the rugs, without light! The family lamp reddened the adjoining rooms one by one. Then the woman disappeared. I shed more tears than God could ever have required....

I understood that she belonged to her everyday life; and that the turn of kindness would take longer to come again than a star. She has not returned, She will never return, She who gave herself to me in my home, -- something which I never would have presumed to ask. True, this time I wept more than all the children of the world.
Rimbaud

3/19

you are looking for something but what the hell are you going to do with it? you have a good life, kurt. i have a good life. i like my life. i am not going to get in the middle of your family. i am still not over a single fucking thing that has ever happened between us. yes, everyday. maybe just a fleeting second and sometimes a thought in the back of my mind that goes on for days. but i am getting along just fine anyway. after 20 years, it is like the color of my eyes... i know what it is and it is a part of me but i don't think about it alot. it's just always there.
have your family. have your happy life and i will have mine. meet me in a city a couple of times a year for a couple of days. any city. it will be like when i came to minneapolis. maybe we will find that it is all in our imaginations and we can put it to rest. maybe we will find that we have something and a little is better than this crap we have been doing for so fucking long that it is indistinguishable from what we were born with.
yes, it is dishonest to ones we love but isn't it anyway? i'm with someone too, you know?

I stopped writing for years, and only really started again when I set up my blog. It was just therapy I suppose - it was like writing to you years ago, but I didn't get the feedback. I've never been able to figure out our relationship, if you can call it that, but I've never felt as comfortable with a person as I did with you. I said what I thought did what I did and what I wanted to do wrote wrote wrote read and read and you were interested - truly interested - I know that. I don't know what I'm looking for, you're correct. What if I find it? Fuck. I doubt if I'll recognize it. I don't feel old at all. I don't feel old but age/time is reality. I think about Minneapolis - why was that so special? I don't know, but it's a moment in my life that sort of owns itself. It's it's own little era. I have a good life. Not necessarily happy, but good. I love my son like I never imagined I could or would. He's a beautiful, sensitive and smart kid. I have a decent job and make decent money. We live in a nice house in a beautiful neighborhood. I'm a good citizen. Really. I'm not really me though. It's hard to explain, but I've been someone else for 18 years - I've been the person someone else wanted me to be. Unfortunately I haven't been that good at it. The only time I write in my blog is when I'm in a hotel for work, and I've spent months in hotels over the last few years. I'm sorry this has happened - I don't want you to jeopardize your happiness or that of your family. Do you know what really scares me? That 10 years from now I'll still be thinking about you every fucking day. It isn't an obsession, it's just as you described it - just a part of me like the color of my eyes. Always there. Since you're with someone maybe I shouldn't send anything to you. Tell me not to if that's better. Maybe a little is better than than the shit from the last 20 years.

trash

i am someone's trash. i am the bi-product of someone's relationship. i am a happy person. a good neighbor. a good mother. not really. i am trash. i am no longer of any use. someone thought they might need me but it turns out they don't and, well, what to do with me now?
what to do,
what to do?

i am someone's trash

if this is you please write. please.

i need to write to you. to send you music.

please.

born to lose you

The guilty undertaker sighs,
The lonesome organ grinder cries,
The silver saxophones say I should refuse you.
The cracked bells and washed-out horns
Blow into my face with scorn,
But it's not that way,
I wasn't born to lose you.
I want you, I want you,
I want you so bad,
Honey, I want you.

Dylan

settling

"Once my friend found out that I took so much pleasure in the big weeds, she told me that I could just go ahead and pull all the big ones, she would come behind and get the small ones."
Catherine

but it's hard to get enough

thistle

a cell, a casket
a green and yellow basket,
it doesn't really seem to matter
what carries this pain.
that the pain thrives to thrust
it's thistle and leaves skyward,
that the milk filled taproot bores down-
this is what will tell the tale
to the end of the day.

want

where is the line?
i fight every day to save
myself
and then i just forget it all
thinking i can save someone else.
pull that machine back from the guard rail.
put that razor back in the drawer.
there's less failure in failing
someone else
than yourself.
why the hell do i have razor blades at all?
people who don't save
themselves
don't want to be saved.
don't want to be saved.
don't want
to
be
saved.

my post secret

i lied.
i cancelled our weekend because he is still living with his wife and he hasn't filed for divorce.
i have no where else to be, and i ache to be with him,
but i can't keep doing this with a married man.

i am disgusted with myself for lying to him.

begin

"when I explain myself,
I'll be talking geography"