Born in the Year of the Butterfly Knife: 1 Read online

  Most people don’t know it is larger than the Titanic, and was later revealed that it cut an American Naval ship in two and had to let the sailors drown due to approaching U Boats. I think it’s haunted. I think you’re haunted.

  Downtown Long Beach is a woman

  packed with heavy ghosts

  in heavy coats

  who aches when the gulls pass through her.

  She is woman, surrounding us in night fog

  loosening our tourniquets with sultry mist,

  healing wounds by directing embraces to the gasses of starlight.

  Tonight, a telescope points toward her high-rise fingers,

  spying the open windows for the last place God hid my ignition

  for the last place I tangled the sex in your shadow.

  Tonight, there are no knives.

  No reason to pull the razorblade

  out from behind the library card in your wallet.

  No reason to soar from the green spine

  of the Vincent Thomas bridge.

  No reason to collapse

  in the rusted regret dumpster

  behind the Reno Room on Broadway.

  Orion awaits over Avalon.

  Remember how we wanted to water ski there,

  all the way to the island

  on the backs of the aquarium bat-rays?

  And remember how I haggled the rays into it

  by giving them back their stingers?

  And remember how hard you kissed me

  as we mounted onto their slime and leather wings?

  And remember how the rays swerved us recklessly

  through the Pacific oil rig pylons?

  And remember how the sensation made you feel so close to death

  which made us feel more alive?

  We raced under wide Catalina stars

  until the lights over Pine Street called us home

  to a tired sailboat harbor

  where masts creak and sway like a brigade of crosses

  marching nowhere.

  You said Let’s steal the Queen Mary!

  We’ll watch her sweep through the August glow of red tides

  Drinking in the tiny green fireflies of the sea.

  I told you your kiss made me feel like Winston Churchill

  and you said- powerful?

  and I said- drunk.

  Today the Queen is at rest-still unmoved,

  rusted, boilers removed, gutted and ready to live.

  I spend my days looking for anchors

  plotting courses to deserted ports

  attaching more telescopes to my sailboat

  in hopes that I will catch that siren

  combing her fingers through the shocks of hair

  that falls from her head like thousands of wet rosaries.

  If I spot her

  will I see

  the scars I left in your back—

  mazes of amazement and black, frustrated passion?

  Vanishing tattoos.

  Slow halo-generator woman of Long Beach—

  I will watch and wait for the look to return to your face—

  The look you used to give as an Aquanaut close to death

  Head rocked back

  Eyes pinched full of twilight and drunk fantasy.

  When the morning laughs out loud with big teeth,

  When the asphalt smells like a melting Buddhist,

  the devotion-the prayer-the heat-all you.

  I know that the city holds you as one of its lost.

  Lost for now—

  never forever.

  BLOWTORCH SONATA

  If I was king of some land, I would break a bottle of champagne

  against something everyday. If I christen you on

  the head, you have to leave.

  This night the stars hung like suicidal icicles—

  bright

  lynched albinos in headlights

  I went solid and sneezed

  fascinated

  at the empty green 7-Up bottles of your eyes

  I wanted the bar fight of my heart—

  irrational,

  to break those bottles upon us.

  To christen us as battleships against.

  Foolproof.

  An empire of bon voyage.

  PLEASED TO MEET YOU YELLOW,

  MY NAME IS BLUE

  After reading in Laguna Beach, a woman came up to me and said ‘I liked your poem but I used to live on a farm in Wisconsin and to tell you the truth, blueberries don’t float.’ I said ‘Well, to tell you the truth, I don’t hover a few feet above the Pacific when I am sad. It’s called suspension of disbelief. Get off me.’ This is one of the few poems I have memorized and I recited it to couples when I used to be a gondolier.

  You came swiftly across the sea.

  I hovered there,

  thirty miles outside of Galapagos,

  placed myself in the screams of rival winds.

  I hovered there for years alone

  feeding on everything blue,

  shark fins, sea spray,

  desire, memory and floating blueberries.

  But you came swiftly across the sea

  took away my death (though I guarded it).

  Held my defeat by the neck and outsmarted it.

  The ice in my breath floated before you

  a crystal field of all my fears…

  I was just getting used to the blueberries.

  But you spun that warm ginger light.

  Sent it spilling from the gold blaze of gasoline eyes.

  Melted my breath.

  Melted the soloist.

  Melted the pumping thing inside.

  You said, ‘Hello Blue, my name is Yellow.’

  and I said…’Wa. Wow.’

  I was stricken, I was struck

  I was a bad joke about a duck who was down

  that no one ever laughs at—

  but Yellow she laughs-she’s a laugher

  and she’s not even drunk!

  I say Yeah Yeah!

  “I want to be something ridiculous and wonderful and Yellow”

  She says, “Do you mean like margarine?”

  No, I mean I want your firecracker smile Yellow,

  I want your jacaranda kiss Yellow,

  I want your timelessness

  inside my eyeballs Yellow.

  The way snow falls to earth,

  Yellow whispers to Blue—

  “Would you be Green with me forever?”

  “I do I do I do… “

  CAROLINA

  The 82nd Airborne is always on a cycle called Division Ready Force, which basically meant we could rarely leave the base or travel at all in case of a conflict somewhere in the world. When we could we would head down to Myrtle Beach and we knew it was stupid but there wasn’t much else to do. What else is this about? The view out of my window of the soldiers that left the 82nd, their jump boots were the last thing they’d toss onto the telephone wires. I would stare at them every night. The part about ‘you’re a champ’ was actually heard when my buddy Fitzgerald was getting busy and I was on the floor of the motel room. Wouldn’t you giggle a little? Don’t ever say ‘you’re a champ’ to someone during lovemaking, unless they’re a prizefighter or small person. This poem is for the ladies of Myrtle Beach.

  Their eyes know no Harlem.

  Their hands know no Calypso.

  Their hearts know no whispers

  But those that the night let go.

  You are Myrtle Beach girls.

  Cruising the strip,

  moving like horny groceries

  on a bloodshot checker’s conveyor belt.

  Chant into girldom

  with your Cyndi Lauper anthems

  donning all that the malls will allow

  How can we not fall as men

  with your wine class of Coors Light la la.

  I will Koresh your body.

  I will sew your skirt into an evening Dresden.

  Your
chick packed anti-hoopty

  with the ridiculous neon lit undercarriage—

  chain-smoking the fear

  of the stiff-chinned Raleigh boys on the corner.

  Waffle House accents, homophobic jeans,

  and Abercrombie haircuts.

  They don’t have a chance against the camisole heart attack.

  The gals are hungry to ride the backs of motorbikes in mini-skirts,

  the u-u-umbling engine teasing them into moist devil’s dew cake.

  The hot wind of Anais Nin

  racing lines up their now snail-glossed legs.

  You will not love him.

  You will embrace him out of fear, excited.

  You will cry out into the hotel night near the bathtubs full of ice,

  “You’re a champ! You’re a nameless champ.”

  I found a pair of panties in the streets of Myrtle Beach.

  I did not turn them in to lost and found. No way.

  These were not the kind of garments that just fall from luggage.

  They were manna.

  I carried the exceptional panties for two years—

  I made people think I was somebody.

  I told stories back at Ft. Bragg about how “my girl” in Myrtle

  rarely writes because of her asthma and tennis elbow.

  She made me carry these panties in memoriam

  or she’d cut me off from her bulbous spandex tantric lust.

  Slurring to the soldiers, sharing Crown Royal

  we made ‘chill all love’ and

  I of course started cracking up.

  Lacking the imagination that comes from experience,

  when they in what sexual position she liked it

  I would say, “normal position.”

  At night from the drunkenness of my barracks window

  with one eye closed,

  I’d watch the wonderful white flares grow,

  skidding into the night

  over the jump boots hanging from stale licorice telephone wires.

  I’d slow them incendiaries down.

  Play them backwards.

  Exit them from my mouth

  feel them as a kiss from phantom war harlots.

  These white flares—

  that told us to avert our eyes to retain night vision—

  I would soon stare into

  begging the light to take me somewhere…

  to the kind of black-haired faceless woman

  who would toss her underwear

  from a moving vehicle…

  just because the night told her to.

  CHERRY

  The names of the dead soldiers at the end were friends of mine,

  fellow soldiers who were not confirmed killed.

  I think terror, true terror, is born from the feeling of helplessness.

  This poem is for John Condliffe.

  “C-130 rollin’ down the strip

  64 troopers on a one-way trip

  Mission top secret, destination unknown

  Don’t even know if we’re ever goin’ home

  Don’t even know if we’re ever goin’ home”

  —ARMY CADENCE

  I BELONG TO A PROUD AND GLORIOUS TEAM

  THE AIRBORNE—THE ARMY—MY COUNTRY

  I AM CHOSEN

  TO SERVE THEM WELL

  UNTIL THE FINAL VICTORY

  - excerpt from The U.S Army 82nd Airborne Creed

  The most memorable burger I ever had:

  March 23, 1995.

  Damn skippy I’ll never forget the taste.

  C-130’s, C-141’s on a training day

  The Great Gray Whales burn over the North Carolina sky,

  300 paratroopers and the Pope Air Force Base.

  A priest would come to pray over us before every jump,

  bless the runway.

  Prayers come heavy

  like piles of unopened chutes.

  He passed out ‘St. Michael’ necklaces to the boys:

  “guardian of paratroopers.

  ”

  The Father ended the blessing,

  said if we prayed as much as we drank

  there would be no war.

  Some laughter.

  St. Michael

  St. Michael is waiting for his boys.

  Here, on green ramp, we would wait to chute up—

  board cargo planes to dump us into unknown drop zones

  It’s not just a job—it’s a clever advertisement.

  I VOLUNTEERED TO DO IT

  KNOWING WELL THE HAZARDS OF MY CHOICE

  This adventure—strapped in like a madman,

  105 pounds of gear

  Waiting to waddle to planes like insane penguins

  in camouflage straitjacket killstuff.

  I slowed down my chute inspection to pull back

  observe this unknown ceremony

  I saw what the German officers called “The Devils in Baggy Pants”

  The unrevealed fear

  The wildman face paint

  The aggressive practice jumps off the dock

  into the chunk chunk wood chip pile

  The heroin puns as they chute up

  Charlie battery singing:

  “The helicopter’s hoverin’

  it’s hoverin’ overhead

  it’s pickin’ up the wounded

  and droppin’ off the dead

  Airbooooorne shoot, shoot shoot the sonofa bitch”

  American urgency of movement.

  We had spirit.

  A rigger’s hands move like three-card monte :

  Chute on back, check.

  Reserve in front, check.

  Kevlar secure, check.

  Weapon in place, cash.

  Chemical mask on side, check.

  Rucksack at knees, check.

  And a nice tap toward the ammo and canteens hanging off your ass.

  ‘You’re good, Airborne.’

  MY GOAL IN PEACE OR WAR IS TO SUCCEED

  IN ANY MISSION OF THE DAY

  OR DIE, IF NEEDS BE, IN THE TRY

  I could see how that part might slip from a recruiter’s speech.

  DOODLE LOO DOO DOO DO

  DOODLE LOO DOO DOO DOOO

  The catering truck pulled up late

  playing that Dixie song that came from the horn on the General Lee car.

  Everyone rigged, on their backs except for me.

  The envy of all.

  “I want to get everyone a pop, two Twinkies, some M&Ms

  and a fudge bomb for dessert…”

  Cheers.

  “But I only got a dollar.”

  Rowdy man laughter bellowed.

  Smittie yelled, “You better split that shit 64 ways

  or you’re gonna get the bath, Cherry.”

  The guys with only five jumps were cherries.

  The bath was a collection of filled barf bags

  snuck to the man next to you

  dumped on your pants one minute before the jump.

  You would inevitably vomit in midair from the stench.

  It’s a beautiful indoctrination.

  St. Michael is waiting for his boys.

  When I got to the truck he only had one burger.

  It was so ugly

  but hunger does not know beauty.

  At the beginning of the runway

  A C-130 and an F-16 on an approach pattern

  trying to land simultaneously

  mistakenly

  side by side.

  Sometimes an illusion,

  sometimes…

  The giant C-130 wing bumps the small F-16

  and sends the fighter spinning

  toward the earth.

  An unconscious diver

  limp and spinning.

  I could see these two little specks

  eject—eject—eject—

  All the statues of St. Michael.

  and nothing to control the wreckage.

  It came

  like a
meteor

  like a ball of tinfoil

  you sprayed with your momma’s hairspray

  and lit on fire.

  The raging color and demon sound of sirens melting.

  A drag racer’s fuel and steel spitting into the stands.

  I was safe

  but the men on Green Ramp could not escape

  could not run

  strapped down

  restrained

  bound by the weight of their oath

  certain screaming scrambling on their backs

  “Run, you sons of bitches. Run!”

  With speed

  you could quick release your gear in 12 seconds.

  They had 10.

  The way they laid there,

  faces of surrender.

  PFC Stephen Addington—

  shotgunned Old Milwaukee beer and knew plants

  Sergeant Jimenez—

  drove a Camaro from upstate with no seatbelts

  Private Aaron Fitzgerald—

  found his wife in Korea and missed California

  Staff Sergeant Jaime Interdonato—

  still had 2 pinhole scars from his mother punching in his bloodwings.

  Specialist Roberto Sanchez—

  couldn’t dance sober

  Private Jeffrey Farkas—

  would mute the T.V. and invent the words

  Corporal Mike “Smittie’ Smith—

  the tightest hook shot since Kareem.

  I stood there.

  I stood.

  Hands at my side,

  squeezing the burger

  unable to move.

  The rabid, meteoric, howling metal

  ghosting them one by one

  I just stood there.

  All the statues of St. Michael.

  WHY AMELIA EARHEART WANTED TO VANISH

  This is one of my favorite poems because Amelia is one of my favorite people ever to have graced the sky. I heard she had her first flight as a youth here in Long Beach. She was kind of manly and severely beautiful and I would stare at her on the ceiling of the boat I lived on before falling asleep.

  Amelia asks for forgiveness,

  looks down at the table like we are playing chess.

  The larger pout of her bottom lip is imported from

  Uruguay: Ooo—doo—guy.

  Her R’s and the A’s become dizzy ghosts when she says it.

  Distance.

  The bottom lip

  simple as a sentence.

  But the upper lip,

  a complex creature.

  Amelia’s youth-suitcased in the upper lip-ready for wrinkles.

  Lipstuck lipstick lipstock residue in flushed hue

  like she’d been kissing madly,

  like she walked off the set of an MGM ending