micael thomas swanberg
I am sitting considering lifetimes
With the women who walk by
Would that blonde be the one
Who throws my shit out the window
In classic style while I
loosen my tie Scream please don’t
Even though I know im finally free
maybe glad she really did it
in fantasies I tie myself down
To a life that’s harder then mine
To something known among those
Who have suffered
And would that hippie girl wake me up
with the grey morning
make me walk two blocks
To her favorite coffee house even though
I don’t drink coffee
And would I consent to follow
My hands stuffed in pockets
Not talking because its too cold
Always walking a foot behind her
Offset to the left.
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I begged for redemption
In January streams
My hands breaking ice
so I could wash away lives
I had wasted
All that time spent
And she knew what I was doing
but never being religious
she didn’t try to stop me
she would kiss my lips
help me back into my clothes
and wonder if she could love
someone who believes in a god
of streams and silences
a god of headaches and broken promises
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you sat drinking captain morgans
straight from the bottle
because world war two was over
and youd never get to fight
in anything like that
we wanted something so much larger
than ourselves as we sat in your basement
watched porno on silent and talked
about our girlfriends
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if you came to me
with hands like roadmaps
I would fold them
Put them someplace safe
And ask you to sit down
We would carry conversations
Like baskets delicately balanced
On the heads of African women
With skin so pure it captures light
With teeth white and inviting
And I would follow them to colorful markets
Trade the clothes on my back for trinkets
Walk barefoot in the dusts of civilization
Where we considered only desert and disease
And if you came to me
With hands like roadmaps
And eyes like hardwood
I would close them both
Lie next to you
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How do you start a love poem
When it takes place
In the lobby of planned parenthood
And it has more to do
With magazines I read while sitting
Then the fact that you were taking
A pregnancy test
That could have changed our lives
A poem that
Has more to do with my fears
Of being a bad father
Than it does with the look you gave
When she said I couldn’t go with you
Into the back
As though some things should remain
Unshared between us.
And we walked back to my car
Holding hands
There were pills in your purse
That were easier to swallow
Than the idea of children
And I was just glad
You were smiling again
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HALIBURTON
She taught me the weight of words
By using so few to destroy everything
And even less to rebuild
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I used to believe
There were invisible strings
That tied us to every place we’d been
Every person we touched
And the whole planet was connected
In a way we couldn’t see
But everyone felt
And when the wind blew through the strings
It made them hum
and in that resonance we all were one
just breathing, living as though unaware
that everything has specific gravity
that all things pull into themselves
and those strings have connected me
to so much that I have tried to leave behind
places that defined me more then I wanted
places that left a mark on my skin
but even now I feel the dull pull on my back
from the pacific
and a girl I once loved tugs on my sleeve like a child
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we got to talking and he explained
how love was blinded
by all that eye for an eye bullshit
that left a thousand angry pens in its wake
because once your hurt, all you can do
is pass that hurt onto others
and they take it like pamphlets
they lose it in pockets
and then that hurt surfaces
by the grace of
a god
that I only thank before dinner
and that’s if my parents are there
a god
who other wise goes unnoticed
until I need to find my keys
which only unlock doors
to places
I
Already
know
nothing new is ever gained
by entering them
and all the locks do
is keep other people out
so we never use them
he and i agreed that if anyone
wanted what we had
bad enough to come in
and take it then it wasn’t ours
anyways
so far all my books have gone untouched
all my writings remain in my drawers
----------------------------------------
all the things appear untouched
the books stacked on the shelf
in away that all books long to rest
in a way that speaks of a something
much more important
of a room that remains
in the delicate balance of a still life painting
where nothing ever changes
the shades and colors
the sun and shadow
and if she picks up those books
im sure she puts them back the way they were
as though the poems inside could know
that how they rest upon each other
is much more than just whim and gravity
that in the off light of any November day
we would appreciate them just the same
and the candles on the table rarely burn
im sure
but they sit patiently waiting for a chance
to put a different light on everything
to change the painting if only until
the flame, like everything else
takes one final breath
-------------------
We gathered together
Mixed drinks with our fingers
And started a log of things remembered
Of people and places we were
Before here
Of shoulders we kissed in bathing suits
Hands that found rest on piano keys
Fights that we had never fought
And Those we often tried to win
And in our carelessness we never once
Considered the boys who put their fists up in battle
Those who pushed against us at the gates
Those who rode darker horses to bleaker lives
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If this poem finds you on an afternoon
When everything has gone right
And the sun remained always in that one place
That casts those long shadows you love
Then let me be the first to kiss your cheeks
Give you my blessings
But if your like me then this poem
Will hit you when most do, it will find you
In the mirror scrutinizing your face
It will sit with you on the end of your bed
While you lace up shoes
Sigh feeling almost nothing
This poem will remind you
That its just a dull grab for language
A need to quantify life in a series of lines
A need to open and close understanding
This poems recognizes that you can
Return it to the shelf it came from
If it says anything you don’t want to hear
If it says your heart has four chambers
Split up like a compass rose
Southwest is full of regret
Northeast vodka
The northwest is all salt
And the southeast in a fine clay
That works its way below your fingernails
That dyes the bottoms of your shoes
And if this poem finds you
It will not be afraid that you will push it away
It knows how to form love out of absence
It learned long ago to put up walls
To keep everything out
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It was not out of love
That I took her kisses
Let them fall on my mouth
Inaccurate
Drunk
It was not with love
That I moved my hand
Below her waist
And listened to her pant
It was something so like pity
Something foreign to me
In the way that missionaries
Baptize a tribe
I was trying to convert something
And when she moved to my belt
It was not out of love
That I stopped her
put back on my shoes
and lina said once you make a girl come
she’s always around
but she only knocked once
and I never answered
-----------------------------------
towards the end I was always crying
because when I did she comforted me
made that sound with her mouth
like the ocean
and kissed my eyes
and I was so like a child in her presence
needing so much
giving so little
grabbing for whatever I could hold
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we could have closed our eyes
and woken up anywhere that summer
---------------------------------
I will lay my palms on the thighs
Of my days and calm them
Run my fingers over the denim
Imagine a system of fabric like city grids
Expanding towards t shirts
Socks and skin
She handed me a story called
Death of an island
Thinking I was one
Thinking I would understand
How feelings come in waves
Wash away almost anything
That isn’t connected with
intricate roots And boyhood jump ropes
with plastic handles
Lifetimes just float away
