Really

Really

Genevieve was talking in her sleep.

I thought she said, "What is real?"

"What did you say?"

She repeated, "What is real?"

"What? What is real?"

She answered, "Really."

Jesus Saves

This is a poem to be made in the future.

I read a George Saunders short story to my class today which was basically about Jesus loving the least lovable kid, a kid who desperately needed someone to find him beautiful, someone willing to die for him. A kid who's breath stunk. "The end of Firpo in the world." Great story.

And then, after their shower tonight my 6 and 7 year old daughters came in the kitchen, where I was cooking, wrapped in towels, still dripping wet, with impish grins. Sofia said, "Jesus loves you." The girls giggled. Then Lucia said, "Especially when you fart." Then they ran out of the room.

Where did that come from? It felt strangely good to hear. A funny joke, probably from Jesus himself. That joker.

This note is probably just for me.

I think I'm becoming a believer again. In the idea of Jesus. Made flesh. In us.

Good to see you at the Whitney. Thx for the inside scoop. Here’s a poem for you...

This is a poem to be made in the future.

I read a George Saunders short story today which was basically about Jesus loving the least lovable kid, a kid with terrible breath who desperately needed someone to find him beautiful, someone willing to die for him. 

And then, a few hours later, after their shower, my 6 and 7 year old daughters came in the kitchen, where I was cooking, wrapped in towels, still dripping wet, wearing impish grins. Sofia said, "Jesus loves you." The girls giggled. Then Lucia said, "Especially when you fart." Then they ran out of the room.

Where did that come from? Must’ve been straight from God. It felt weirdly good to hear. That joker.

EPITAPH (for Margaret)

She who loved the trees of goldengrove,

Her cares +lessening like the leaves falling,

Until all that are left are leaf-bare branches,

    Will love no less for all the loss

    The life at rest under winter frost

    The promise of spring's first songs.

+gathering

+increasing

This review for Promes

http://jacketmagazine.com/40/r-berrigan-a-rb-degraff.shtml

It was an unexpected day. I want to write about it but I'm falling over. I got stuck in Atlanta. We had to evacuate as there was an electrical grid outage. Long walk out through dark corridors all the way to baggage claim, must've been a mile walking through dark terminals filled with electrical smoke. Surreal. People having panic attacks. One person had a seizure. 

But then, amidst the chaos, in this one corridor, there was this beautiful art from Zimbabwe, stone sculptures, and I had stop and look. I couldn't not. I thought, if this hadn't happened I would have never seen this art, nor would it have meant as much.

Finally got out of airport and into a hotel shuttle. We all got to talking in the van and I mentioned that I was going to miss my grandmother's funeral and there were warm sounds of sympathy all around. Then a grandmother said that she was going to miss her granddaughter's birth and that felt like poetic symmetry. Soon afterward this same woman had a kind of belated panic attack, laughing and crying uncontrollably and taking off her clothes. We rolled down the windows and she calmed down. After a long silence one of the men asked her if she was OK. She said she was fine now and he told her a story about how he was in the elevator with his grandmother when he was young and the elevator got stuck and she panicked and began to take off her clothes. So he said he'd been there before and he was cool with it. She said that was good to know.

Later in hotel I watched a very intense and surprising documentary about peyote on Viceland, then flipped to an old Perry Como Christmas special, with special guest stars The Carpenters. The special was my grandma's choice. Anyway, I kept feeling like my grandma was there watching it with me. Peggy Fleming came out spinning on the ice in a diaphanous white dress, a winter fantasia, and she was -resplendent- I could see why Charles Schultz always talked about her in Peanuts. Good choice, Grandma.

Afterward I walked down to the only restaurant around, Ruby Tuesdays, and they were so overwhelmed with unexpected customers that it took a couple hours to get seated and served. 

Meanwhile I danced on the scary path next to the restaurant. See pictures before and after below. 

Still waiting, I made a sculpture out of the lawn art at Ruby Tuesday's. Again again. The security guard came out and frantically told me to stop. I said, sorry I wasn't thinking. Ha ha ha ha. 

The salad bar was great and they kept bringing around free margarita shots so it was all good. Plus there was the live version of "a Christmas story" on TV. It was laughably bad, though Maya Rudolph almost saves it. 

I was seated in the singles section and we all ended up sharing stories about the night. Lots of cathartic laughter all around.

It's Funny, I Write

It's Funny, I Write

 

For the love of words 

For the first reader

Like, for instance,

"Like Kith to Karen is Mrs. Maisel the Marvelous" I just texted Karen M

like a text inside a textbook example of a textbook about texts might look 

and that all rolled well enough didn't it 

no matter the context 

Oh no, here we go again 

Go slow

You have nothing to say

It's okay

Take the typewriter and go into the basement

Find the crack in the cement 

Go in. Say hi to Larry the roach

Larry said to give the Berrigan brothers his regards

Go into the sewer pipes. Take a wild ride to where? 

Endless cycles of water and earth and sky and shit- 

Water cleans itself out eventually. But it also goes away.

More is coming. That's a good thing, right?

We're just going to have to build a bigger boat.

Drop the mic 

No, pick it up

First you have to pick it up 

Up the mic pick  

Smile, say goodnight 

then you drop the mic 

This writing