a change of plans

I was going to swim
this morning
but then I found
a dead bird
in the pool
so I went inside
and ate four cookies.

ALIENS

by Kim Addonizio


Now that you’re finally happy
you notice how sad your friends are.
One calls you from a pay phone, crying.
Her husband bas cancer; only a few months,
maybe less, before his body gives in.
she’s tired all the time, can barely eat.
What can you say that will help her?
You yourself are ravenous.
You come so intensely with your new lover
you wonder if you’ve turned
into someone else. Maybe an alien
has taken over your body
in order to experience the good life
here on earth: dark rum and grapefruit juice,
fucking on the kitchen floor,
then showering together and going out
to eat and eat. When your friends call—
the woman drinking too much, the one who lost
her brother, the ex-lover whose right ear
went dead and then began buzzing—
the alien doesn’t want to listen.
More food, it whines. Fuck me again,
it whispers, and afterwards we’ll go to the circus.
the phone rings. don’t answer it.
You reach for a fat eclair,
bite into it while the room fils
with aliens—wandering, star-riddled creatures
who vibrate in the rapturous air,
longing to come down and join you,
looking for a place they can rest.

it is easier to hide imperfections during the winter

women tend to gain at least
five pounds during the
cold months.

luckily we can hide beneath
chunky sweaters, scarves, boots.

the chicago wind
causes tomato red faces,
i don't mind because
the lack of sun allows
me to hide freckles.

i don't like the way
my freckles are splattered
up-down-around my nose
like a pollack.

i wish i had perfect skin.
you know what i'm talking about,
the snow soft skin of the lilies
displayed throughout my aunt's home.

home. is it possible for people
to have more than one home?
i think i have three.

i might be imagining
like when i was young
and i would hide in my
grandmother's closet
pretending to be an orphan
on the run.

CRUSH

by Ada Limón


Maybe my limbs are made
mostly for decoration,
like the way I feel about
persimmons. You can’t
really eat them. Or you
wouldn’t want to. If you grab
the soft skin with your fist
it somehow feels funny,
like you’ve been here
before and uncomfortable,
too, like you’d rather
squish it between your teeth
impatiently, before spitting
the soft parts back up
to linger on the tongue like
burnt sugar or guilt.
For starters, it was all
an accident, you cut
the right branch
and a sort of light
woke up underneath,
and the inedible fruit
grew dark and needy.
Think crucial hanging.
Think crayon orange.
There is one low, leaning
heart-shaped globe left
and dearest, can you
tell, I am trying
to love you less.

A Workout of Epic Proportions/Love at the Wrong Time

Most mornings, I rise before (or with) the sun.
Not that you really care, but I have the same
routine every morning.
I won't get too detailed because I would like
to maintain some privacy.
(Some poets spill too much
onto the pages of poems.)
I eat a banana with soynut butter
before I head to the gym
for a workout of epic proportions.

This "Hollywood" gym
is not exactly full of beautiful people.

To my left, a man riding a stationary bike.
To make less of a mess, he neatly placed
newspapers around the bike
for the kind and simple use of
soaking up his puddles of sweat.

Upstairs, an Asian woman in too tight
black spandex shorts, pink-white striped top,
bright blue chuck taylors
swings her arms as she runs on the eliptical
as though she is about to take flight.

I have two friends at the gym.
The Schwarzenegger-looking trainer--
I don't know his name, but he looks like a "Brad"
or maybe a "Mike"-- and Sandy.

Sandy is probably 75 or 80 years old,
he has never been married,
he was almost married a few times.
Marriage is not worth it, he says,
how can you be with one person forever?

Sandy is a good looking man.
I can tell by the twinkle in his eyes,
he used to be quite the heartbreaker.
He tells me that he only wanted to date
good looking girls, no big mamas.

We both know this gym is not
the place to meet anyone of interesting
character.

Driving home in a sweat soaked t-shirt
is not exactly the most flattering attire.
Today I wore my yellow "Indiana" shirt--
I hate that state and so does Dean Young.

i never cry, but your poem made me cry

joe's poems make me almost cry,
but the tears never actually fall
like the giant los angeles rain drops
that hit my car on the way to work yesterday.

i do cry sometimes.
i just don't usually let people
see me cry.
it's private, you know.

i think you saw my tears once.
it was the night that i threw a bottle
at the ceiling, ripped up old photos,
and crushed the last dead rose.

Oh No, Dwight Howard

I am no sports wiz. I know a few things about a few teams. And when I don't know anything about either team, well, then I pick which team I like best based on the team colors AND/OR if the team has any especially good looking gentlemen.

I do really love basketball. I have been following the playoffs, and really only missed games when I was truly unable to access a television. But I did check the scores on my always faithful blackberry.

The Bulls-Celtics series was unreal. It brought me back to the glory days--the days when the Bulls dominated, when we knew they would win no matter what because we had Jordan, Pippen, Kukoc, Kerr, and even Bill Wennington. The Bulls almost beat the defending champs, and my second favorite team in the NBA, the Boston Celtics. Crazy, right? In fact, it's so crazy that I put off doing several papers because I wanted to watch the Bulls school my man, Paul Pierce. We all know what happened: the Bulls lost and I finally got my homework done.

Now I was going to whole-heartedly cheer for the Celtics. That was until I discovered a new found love for Dwight Howard aka Superman. Some of my friends and family know that it is my dream to marry a professional basketball player because I want to be able to wear heals. My friend Jene told me that, I could have ANY professional basketball player except Dwight Howard. Dwight is her man, and he's off limits. Apparently, Dwight is everyone's "man" because I know of a few not-so-single ladies who are his biggest fans. Anyways, I wanted to remain true to my Celtics, but I couldn't help but secretly root for the Magic. I'm sorry Paul, but there is now another man in my life.

Once the Magic defeated the Celtics, I didn't have to feel guilty about being an unfaithful fan. Everyone, including King James, thought that the Cavaliers had it in the bag. There was no way that LeBron James was going to let the Magic take the series. I bet my brother five dollars that the Magic would be the Caves. I'm not much of a gambler, but I should have bet him $500!

Everyone was saying, "Kobe v. LeBron in the finals will be like Jordan v. Jordan." Please! No one, I repeat, No one will ever be as good as MJ! King Jordan, not King James.

So here we are. My new man, Dwight Howard, made it to the finals. And there he is, looking so good but not playing so hot. Game 1 of the finals was tonight in LA, and needless to say, it was painful to watch. Lakers 100. Magic 75.

Dwight, I know you have a lot on your mind. Game 2 is Sunday, and you have much work to do before then. Maybe in your free time you Google your name just to see what people have to say about you, and maybe this post will come up. So, here it goes: You are Superman! Get it together. Get out on that court and dominate. You hear me? Dominate. Phil Jackson doesn't need his TENTH ring. And Kobe, oh gosh, please don't even get me started on Kobe. I can't stand him. You show Kobe who's boss. You got that? Remember: Dominate.

NOT THE PLASTER CASTERS

Fiction by JANICE EIDUS
From UNBEARABLES (AUTONOMEDIA)



I WAS NOT A MEMBER of the Plaster Casters. I was a free agent. Although—on the surface, at least—I did exactly what the Plaster Casters did. That is, we all made plaster casts of the penises of rock stars. But the Plaster Casters got all the glory, all the publicity. Even though I did it first.

The Plaster Casters, you see, did it for the power they thought it gave them—the power that would lead them to the fifteen minutes of fame they wanted so much. Which they got. Big deal. Fifteen minutes.

I wanted no glory, no money. I didn’t need fifteen minutes. I had a lifetime, and another far greater, agenda. I never hired a publicist, never contacted a journalist to write up my exploits, nor to take photos of me looking wacky and sexy, stirring up a vat of my plaster mixture with a come-hither look on my face, or sitting on Jimi’s lap, or cuddling up to Rod. I was as different from the Plaster Casters as Picasso from a greeting-card illustrator.

I was an artist, with an eye trained to recognize natural beauty when I was it. And rock stars were definitely objects of natural beauty, with their lean, hard bodies, their long hair flowing down their backs, their bejeweled ears, necks, and fingers. Rock stars were like Greek statues with attitude.

As so I created homage’s to them. My sculptures were vehicles through which I rendered both them, and myself, immortal. I isolated their most beautiful, most artistic feature, and I re-created it, re-invented it. Like the poet said—art is about making it new, making it your own. And I certainly did that: when I was finished, after the rocks stars had gone, I gave each plaster cast my signature. I painted my initials—the initials of my real name, my given name, the name everyone but me has long forgotten, since everyone else now knows me as Not the Plaster Casters. I used a shimmery, otherworldly silver, a shade of my own creation, a shade that nobody else can ever copy or match. And each initial looks exactly like the letter it is, and yet simultaneously, like a female body, as well, a sensuous female with full breasts, slim waist, and perfectly balanced, rounded hips. My signature is the symbol for me, of course, for my own erotic beauty; again something those homely Plaster Casters with their chubby bodies and scraggly hair just didn’t have, couldn’t measure up to.

My ageless, creamy-skinned beauty—which has only been enhanced over time—is such hat the rock stars would beg me to sleep with them, would grow keenly aroused as I patted the plaster firmly onto their members. But I never gave in. I never slept with a singe one, and, believe me, there were times I desired one or another of them so much I could hardly breathe. But I had no choice: I had to be pure, objective. What if I had fallen in love? My art might have suffered, and that would have been intolerable. Besides, my body never went hungry. I had my ways.

Meanwhile, I was doing them all, all the greats: Jimi, Bobby, the two Keiths, David, Mick, Paul, and so many others, all colors, all sizes.

Even Janis wanted in: “Can’t you do a boob this time?” she asked.
“For you, okay,” I agreed

Her face lit up with her kooky, lopsided smile.

In fact, I ended up doing both her boobs, which turned out, surprisingly, to be small and delicate.
And Janis, Jimi, and two Keiths, and all others—all of them—they understood the difference between me and the Plaster Casters. They knew the Plaster Casters were mere publicity-seekers. But after all, they wanted publicity, too. So they let those clumsy girls paw at them and poke them this way and that, but never respected them or found them erotic, never thought of them as anything more than dumb groupies. With me, though, they were respectful, in awe. Together, we sought immortality, not just a write-up in Rolling Stone. After all, compared to immortality, an orgasm isn’t that big a deal.

Their desire to let me sculpt them came from a place deep inside, a place not sullied by commercialism and greed, he very place where their own are came from: Jimi’s wild guitar playing, Janis’ raw, untamed voice, David’s androgynous personae. Bobby’s esoteric lyrics. And to this day, only they—these beautiful, fierce rock icons—are ever allowed to see my work. Dealers are banned from my studio; the public is never invited in. Only the rock stars themselves, so wide-eyed and respectful as they follow me from sculpture to sculpture. And when, at the end of their tour, they ask me what the silver initials stand for, I tell them they’re not initials, just abstract silvery shapes. And sometimes one might add, “Well, you know, those silver shapes also look a lot like a woman’s body—like your body, Not the Plaster Casters.” But I merely smile enigmatically.

I’m always distancing myself—planning the next one I’ll be doing, for instance, ever as I’m casting the member of another. After all, my work is never done. Not by a long shot. There are new ones to conquer, new ones all the time, new ones whenever I blink. And believe me, I know how to separate the real ones from the wannabes, the pretenders, the flashes in the pan. Next week, for instance, I’m doing Michael. The week after, Bono. And the week after that, there’s Axl on Wednesday and Slash on Thursday. Madonna—like Janis—also wants to pose. “I’m bigger than Janis,” she bragged over the phone. I didn’t deign to reply; my art is not about size or competition. And Bruce and Rod and Billy all want to come back, to do it a second time, to “re-live the high,” they say.

They all call me. They know where to find me. I’m never cruel, but I’m always honest. Sometimes I just have to say: “I’m sorry, but you don’t have it, that star quality, that beauty, that thing that I, as an artist, require.” I had to tell that to Michael’s brother, for instance. Some accept my refusal with dignity. Others weep and beg. Others hang up abruptly, stunned and ashamed. It saddens me to hurt them, but there’s no room in art for pity.

The ones I say “yes” to, though, are euphoric. They grow over-eager. “When? Tonight? Tomorrow?”

“Whoa,” I tell them. “Slow down.”

And then, on the given date—sometimes I make them wait weeks, or even months—they fly in from L.A. or London or Seattle, and they arrive at my private studio, way up here, far away from any big city, high in the mountains, where I can best maintain my distance, my anonymity, my purity.

“You look so young,” they always say, when I first greet them at the door.

I smile modestly, and then show them around, giving them the tour. They grow silent, too much in awe to speak, as I lead them from sculpture to sculpture. Sometimes one might whisper under his breath, “Wow, that Jimi, man,” or “Those Plaster Casters had nothin’ on you,” or one might even sniffle and shed a tear or two, but other than that, they’re as quiet as if in church.

Then, when we’ve finished the tour, I showed them where to stand, where to hang their flannel shirts and baseball caps, their lycra biking shorts and headbands.

They begin to strip—some slowly, some hurriedly, some with bravado, some with a sheepish grin.

Meanwhile, I stir up the plaster, watching them all the while, assessing their size, their shape.

“Really, you look as young as I do,” the baby-faced ones from Seattle always say, as I mold the plaster onto their flesh, firmly yet delicately, with my special touch.

“It’s the art,” I tell them. “It keeps me young.”

Then, as I stroke the plaster gently, smoothing it down, I add, “It’s you. You keep me young.”

Of course, they want to sleep with me, just as their rock forefathers did. They grow aroused and needy. “I want you,” they all say. “You’re so sensuous, so ripe.”

I thank them, and then I explain that for the art’s sake, I can’t.

“I understand,” they sigh. “Your art is bigger than we are.”

Again, I smile enigmatically. And when it’s time for them to leave, I allow them one kiss goodbye, but no more than that, even when my body craves much, much more. “Goodbye, Not the Plaster Casters,” they wave, when I finally see them on their way.

“Goodbye,” I wave back, standing at my doorway, watching them walk down the long, winding mountain path.

“Goodbye,” I wave a second time, when they turn around for one final look, hoping to preserve me—Not the Plaster Casters—forever in their memories. And I don’t begrudge them that final look. After all, I already have them with me forever, here in my studio, hardened and perfectly formed—to do with what I will. And that—like my silver initials—is my secret, the part of my artistic process I keep all to myself, the part that really keeps me so beautiful, so eternally young, so eternally ripe.

There is a parallel but no protection for a heart too filled with love to wait its season that might never come. She stands there in an uncertain climate and, like the early blooms, relies on an inner warmth, responding to an older rhythm than logic, and relishing in the simple glory of risks."


--Derrick Bell

she's still waiting in line

when we were young
you climbed to the top
of the tallest tree
in the yard and
told the neighborhood
you wanted to fly
like navy-blue crows.

i promised to remember
for as long as i could.

we don't remember
the wind that lifted my skirt
and the way you
looked at me though
thick frames.

grandma always said
there was no room
for imagination.

the trees burn in hues of yellowblue

the couple inside
the off-white house
are smiling
only because they have to.

you (and rousseau)
always said
the outside makes
us who we are.

sometimes i wonder
what we do this for.

The world’s dumbest girl

is screaming on her phone about some “freakin’ bitch” who did something so “freakin’ stupid” that she cannot even “freakin’ believe it.” Oh my god.

I can’t hear the details of the conversation, but either way I’m sure that the alleged-bitch did something so incredibly, terribly, dramatic, and life shattering, and like the worst thing ever.

She goes on and on about how she isn’t just some 18-year old girl. She is someone. She has a purpose. Mr. Wrong is getting an earful about how she’s “pissed” because he didn’t say goodbye this morning.

It happened again and again and again.

Slams the phone down and begins to text message (a more private outlet used to cause drama and deliver unheard I love you’s).

To The Anonymous Lovers [Kelli Watson]

She wore a red sweater.
He ate 3 pickles, then napped.
It was fate.
Ambiguity blanketing young lovers.
Who knew? It's only Thursday...

Jay & Ray: Poetry in Motion

To The Woman of My Dreams [Jeremey C. Watson]


Her name was a faint echo.
Was it the gusty wind or the autumnal breeze.
She left.
Sage bronze and gold adorned her attire.
The air was dry.
No recollection.


To the man of my dreams [Rachael L. Altman]


I can’t remember your name.
Maybe it began with R or S.
We danced.
You wore a blue shirt.
The night was a bit fuzzy.
I think.

a spider moves across the ceiling as the sun sets into a sea of crimson-periwinkle

they left
undrunk glasses,
vacant shoes.

she finished
dressing
among furniture.

We forgot all the names we used to know

Some may consider it
dangerous to show
so much skin
on a day like today.

You have a face that lies.
I secretly hope you
choke on your teeth
while you spew words to the moon.

I have waited twenty-two years
to accomplish my purpose,
but I forgot
all I used to know.

Today, I want to know
what it is like to live
in the snow, away
from sparks snaps flashes.

Your old man always said
there was something there.
Something he kept in his pocket
for a gloomy day.

We didn’t listen,
we were young,
only interested in the way
the wind carried umbrellas.

we were born on logan street

we have eyes like embers,
and hands of history.

my house is unknown.
names cease to grow.

i am atmosphere,
unacknowledged presence.

i am new relationships,
unrealized secrets.

we need something to believe in.

anyone, of course, could see her, could see her eyes

i used to believe in everything
but it is lies that teach us how to live.

i would like to take my fists and beat you.

i don’t like looking at strange eyes
when promises of slumber have been broken.

you want what you want,
nobody else can have.

one deception will always prove another.

Dedicated to my best friend, Jeremey C. Watson

The Four Tops sang about Bernadette, but that’s only because they didn’t know me


I am not Nikki Giovanni.
I am not revolutionary,
but I have something to say
about those beautiful Black men.

Baby, you send me.
I could build my whole
world around you
when you wear bright
red, green, purple,
Bluetooth in ear.

I am not Nikki Giovanni.
I am not revolutionary,
but I have something to say
about those beautiful Black men.

Out of sight, funky beats, hip-hop style,
I get this feeling,
proves my theory:
Black men look good
in just about anything from
Armani suits,
poppin’ Crystal,
playin’ basketball
in sweaty, dirty, ratty
sexy old clothes.

I am not Nikki Giovanni.
I am not revolutionary,
but I have something to say
about those beautiful Black men.

I have straight hair,
my skin is white rice,
but I can’t help myself,
I want you and nobody else.

Let me say it again:
I am not Nikki Giovanni.
I am not revolutionary,
but I have said my piece
about those beautiful Black men.

In a locked car outside of JR’s Liquor store, Harvey, IL

Jeremy was a better looking Gary Coleman.
He said it was safer for me to wait in the car.
A tall, lanky white girl,
did not belong in the -gated window,
swisher smoking, brown bag drinking- hood.

Five years below legal, high on life and substance,
we slammed 40’s of Steel Reserve and King Cobra,
mixed drinks, and races,
chain smoked packs of Newport menthols,
rolled blunts, packed bowls.

If our parents only knew,
we thought we had them fooled.

Shopping with The Pornographer’s Wife

My mother never left me with a Cuban mamacita named Titi
while she worked it with the trainer for five hours a day.
Weekend- table dancing trips to Vegas, dropping ten grand in New York,
flaunting her chemically enhanced body, and frozen face,
Mrs. Vivid has one job in life: look better than
the other girls in the family business.
She parades through the streets of Malibu,
nanny entourage on duty to care for two well behaved, well dressed children.
Being a mom is the greatest.

We promised to remember for as long as we could

I like change, as long as I remind myself that I like change.

The time has come when eyes stopped dancing,
sleepwalking through dreams, looking for places never known.

My eyes are smaller now, full of hopelessness.
Laugh-lines are deeper, I have seen the way words tear.

I still don’t like water, but the sea is a good place
for thinking without going over the edge.

the fine line between love and safety

i watched an elderly couple
eat dinner in silence.

a man sat in a subway car
searching for what he already has.
i watched him move,
and wondered what looking is for.

maybe we are here to look
in the other’s face every morning,
eat each other’s cookingand say it was good

To the man of my dreams

I can’t remember your name.
Maybe it began with R or S.
We danced.
You wore a blue shirt.
The night was a bit fuzzy.
I think.

I remember pulling the sections apart

It mattered more than anything had ever mattered before.
He said, bitterness does not suit you well, my dear,
I can hear it running through your veins.
The familiar sound of clinking bottles
hit the perfect note of disharmony.
You knew it was gone.
The uncontrollable impulse to scream,
knowing laughter would make it all right.
Life went on exactly as before.
It was as though a match was stuck
illuminating secrets of shadows.
I feel like the oldest person in the world.

The sky was filled with cicadas

When she was young she cared for nothing
but the way raindrops slipped down leaves of weeping willows.
Down by the water’s edge she would lie in the grass,
big greengray eyes twisted with the sun.
She would sit there for hours thinking about the
cold indifference of her father’s dreams.

Darkness is home in the middle of the day

They can be heard throughout the city
with the same irritatingly irregular clicking.
Heads down on streets, nobody ever stops to talk
as though they found the meaning of life in their
coat button or the sidewalk.

I am sure everyone is someone.
Someone important.
We all want what is beyond
boardrooms and tapestry patterns.

He smiled once, a jewelly reflection
like the gloomy yellow light
flickering in the window.

the smell of lemon and lavender

He always wondered why her hair got shorter with the absence of earth’s colors. To make life more exciting she wore blue tights. He never really noticed. The tears ran down her cheeks ruining a dress she wore for him. He didn’t notice that either. The purple light that once reflected from his amber eyes faded, or perhaps she could no longer see beauty. His words were not a question, but had exquisite texture. Her front teeth touched when attempting to hold back. A crushed heart is not as easily mended as a tin can. Her mother said, I would never want you to have what I have.

Your mother always said you were a gray hummingbird

You catch fistfuls of moonlight and gather hackberry leaves
collecting dust on the bookshelf we built together.
I can’t remember your face when you are away.
How strange is the garden of memory,
fashioning our lives around an ideal.
It was actually the bookshelf you built while I watched and thought
how you once believed in love, but most people are blind to such things.

Yes, I am a blogger

I probably do not have anything terribily interesting to say, but I figured I would give blogging a try. Words & Things will be dedicated to poetry, books, and the other things that float around in my head. Enjoy!