Radicalize This
listen up
pedestrians
I cut short a freight train of misadventure
to set this down for you
anything bigger and badder
has the Ultimate Right of Way
at the coffee counter I am Lola
café americano for Lola
Lola is iconic
Heather an invasive highland weed
where bad decisions smolder
indigenous species re-root
beagle strays from hunter
I’m trying to tell you something
about our lives
you’ve become monocular
you’ve read too much conceptual poetry
you haven’t licked a stamp in years
you’ve flirted too much
with a vocational plateau
open air acts of entanglement
how many times can you say
you’ve crossed
the International Date Line
how many times have you crossed
a sidewinder
understood most things cut
in one direction understood
most times you need only
a needle and razor
to make it through the day
how many times have you crossed
the stranger
walks hard
and she is me
§
from Baltimore Notebook: Drone Edition
I told my girl Audrey, “I’m having a hard time distinguishing the stars from the drones.”
She replied, “That’s silly, Heather. The drones always have a rope ladder.”
animal catcher
I used to be angry about drones.
Then I met the perfect drone.
The fellows at the proving ground call her Aberdeen Aerostat.
She is everything a drone should be: shiny, perky, silent.
Better yet, she is always watching me. Watching over me.
I figure, when you’re living in a shithole, it can’t hurt to have something watching you. Over you.
Consider the word drone derives from the Greek for dirge.
Dirge is innocuous enough. It’s plodding, maybe a bit boring. But certainly not sinister.
Consider also the drones of the bee world.
Legions and legions of mindless male workers serving a queen.
It’s downright utopic.
Then, of course, all the drones mate with the queen and die.
I used to be angry about drones.
§
lie down with dogs
Who knew coveralls came in skinny. Charred & busted out mass transit blocks the street to commerce but dogs keep filing thru. Hope draws the medic to the ashcan; doubt fixes her. Josie G. says that’s how people do. Who hoards lidocaine, 2×2’s, parks a pickup in broad view. Last week, I tracked Patient Zero all the way to Myrtle Bog, imagined an Aberdeen Aerostat amour. (Can it see me naked beneath the covers?) This week, my handiwork is for shit. All this infirmity, here & in the trauma room—it’s plain indulgent. I’m not cool enough to talk torque in front of Red Emma’s or lurid enough for the hipster butcher. By speaking aloud my bicycle has the right of way, the magic of the universe surrounds me. The bars closed early. I can’t make myself go home.
§
drunk driving drone
when she broke her tether the word was
things get finished more quickly
without drinking
does the bandaged bird stop dreaming
of flight?
set a goal: fold 1,000 paper cranes
make 100 snow angels
you must prepare for fever climes
gang planks
a perpetual cliffhanger
§
mission creep
the God particle is in my B-movie body
in my mind the great collider
survival so much like free money
and snake oil on the back end
near bout what we deserve
so sorry
science beats the piss
out of romance