Magic Plastic Glitter and Chocolate

I want you to take a shiny
platinum credit card from your wallet

hold it between your thumb
and your pointer finger

then make it disappear

*

It’s not so hard
since when you turn the plastic gem
on it’s side it becomes so thin
as to virtually not be there at all

there may be ten thousand dollars
floating mystically inside the injection molding
but it doesn’t really exist

*

So look at the thin side of the card:
the angle where in the right beam of sunshine
the platinum vanishes

now blow at that empty space between your fingers
like extinguishing a birthday cake

watch:

first out is the glitter,
the kind you find at party supply stores
a silver cloud whirling to your lawn

then come the rusty pennies
the fruit flavored thongs
the white pickets
the weed killer
the vitamin water
and the chocolate communion wafers

and finally your spouse emerges
holding a thin sheet of paper
indicating interest payments you can’t make

If you’re scared
just turn your hand and watch the card
magically become something like real again.

The Sensitive Machine

The body is a sensitive machine
susceptible to green neon muses
held together with holy glue
brimming
brimming
with the threshold of words
and images
and memories tossed backwards
like sopping wet notebooks

ghosts of giraffes inhabit my dreams
and I see them through the rear view
mirror
in my 1998 Ford Taurus

Driving over clay vases
inside of the cappuccino cafe:
I’m amazed there is room to drive

(())

This is what happens
when you wake up at night
sweating:

Your dreams have washed over
and off of your sensitive machine

That’s why you shake your head,
sitting up at the end of the wet mattress

(())

Sleep
sleep
sleep
is a good, good thing

Though apparently
too much of it means you’re depressed
and too little of it
means you’re overstressed

(())

Again-
My car has vanished
but I’m ordering a latte from a barista-
she doesn’t know how to make one
so I jump the counter
and make it myself

(())

Listen-
the night through the window
the crackling of metallic mosquitoes

the slow wind and the distant highway

Wildebeest (Panic Attack)

In this rain
slanted sideways
all people wash out the same

wet shadows

losing focus takes more effort
than keeping it
moving about the block
trying to forget such a trauma
in such a storm

a wildebeest escaping a pillow
dreaming a languid lion
patiently tracking behind bent dumpsters

head down hands in pockets
crashing away from bed
choosing the safety of neon slicked pavement
over cotton sheets twisted in anxiety