Short Poems from Christmas Eve

Birdy Our Jack Russell Stumbles Into Trouble

The dog barked
at nothing; it was
her friends, but
the car's lights
were bright and
alien--they were
beams, explosions--
and though they
sat still they did
break the darkness
into many halves
of many things,
and the shapes
frightened, as
strange things do.




Waiting Just Inside The Chinese Buffet

At the Rose, as I have learned
to call it tonight, though its
real name was and is "China
Rose," there were only
several others with the same
idea as my mother and I.
We stood sheepishly near
the fishtank and Buddha
statues. Mom talked about
getting Izzy, the family fish
that's somehow survived in
the kitchen bowl back home,
to move to this black hole
vortex restaurant, where the
tank is much bigger and the
fish bigger too--bright with
large fins of oceanic colors.
I listened to her silly words,
words that are really calming
deep down, and I thought about
how much stranger every post-college
visit back home to Maine
becomes, and I thought about
how I visit for each holiday,
holidays I've learned to forsake
with a toothy, gapless smile,
my grin's yellowed teeth shining
the reflection of the Asian
lamps. I struggled not to pay
attention, dreaming about returning
outside to the wide spread of snow.




Murder and Mystery

Kate watches the television
while clutching the tired dog
to her lap. I sit with the
laptop on my lap, and I think
about how it might be another
type of dog, another being
that should be praised more
than it is scolded. Scorn and
an elderly disappointment is
what you get for dependence;
get ready for what you take
for granted and it will eat
you alive, until you are dry
skin, beady eyes, arcane doom.

Mother went up stairs to bed,
to prepare for presents and
ritual--she will still wake up
early as she always does, and
my admiration will stay muffled.
Robert is in the darkness of
his room, paralyzed still, more
than ever probably, now that
he can walk a little, move around,
and see that life is now so much
different than it ever had been.
The lights are duller, even though
everything is newer; a gritty
reality sets in and I dream of
novels with this laptop--large
novels that stretch ages and can
track entire personalities.
All is black outside. No more cities.
Death to all the cities; no,
death to the rural, the jackpots
and taverns and disconnected poor.
Body rubs and busy streets--laughter
and scorn and eyes watching each
move--where have all these powers
moved to in this life, strange
chorus of snails, strange beings
of withering faces--forgive me.