Chewing the Cud

A couple of cows, talking in the grass, in Iowa.
A bottle of white wine chilling on ice between them.

They look up at the jets flying low
lower their heads and focus across the fields
at all the cars on the road, all of them on the way
to the Iowa Writer’s Workshop.

“Here come those fuckers again,” says the brown cow.

“Yeah, look at ‘em. They oughta stop,” says the black cow.

“Why do they do it?”

“Beats me. And they call us herd animals.”

“I came up with an acronym.”

“A what? That's a little ambitious, isn't it? Ok,
let’s hear it.”

“CUD.”

“Spell it out.”

“C for conformity.
  U for uniformity.
  D for deformity.”

“That's good. I think I get it. But why the last one?
Why deformity?”

“Comes from the first two, what happens
to whatever they were born with
when they come up here.”

“Well, it almost happened to me. Roll me
some hay. Is hay better with white or red?
I don’t think anybody'd believe that we could
come up with an acronym, as cows.”

“I don’t think they think we could talk.”

“I don’t think I think they can write.”

They aim and open a bottle of red
and the cork shoots straight up into the blue
barely missing a jet full of writers.

“That’ll show em!”

Character Building

The minute I told that macho he-man high school gym teacher to fuck off,
I was free.

All the classes before his were like surgical waiting rooms
and I waited
worried in all of them, with a blank brain as dark and cold
as the inside of a refrigerated truck.

But it’s ok. He’s doing the pushups now.
Daises, I mean.

No barbershops, no MFA

I don’t want my hair trimmed

not to mention my lush, lively, unmarketable eyelashes; 

not to mention my wild, wet grasses

or my high, swinging vines.

Burst of Bubbles!

I saw it all. I am the head chef at
the Trickling Minutes Nursing Home
and I even got it all on my cell phone camera.
It looked like this—

—Oscar, trying to eat his cantaloupe,
which kept sliding away on his plate like a
slippery orange canoe, said:

“You feeling alright, Lester? You look a little jumpy.”

“I think my heart’s gonna blow!”

“What? Hey! Where’s your wife?”

“Surfing.”

“What? At 90?”

“So what? She’s out there on the waves. Hey.
Did you like the Bee Gees?”

“Why would you ask me that in this moment?”

“My ex-wife's ex boyfriend—this was in '78—
he called them The Dolphins, because of how high
they sing. I just remembered that because we
were talking about the sea.”

“Say, I like this new ramp they’ve put in
for us and our wheelchairs.”

“Where?”

“Right there behind you. From the cafe here, all the way
down the hall to the new indoor pool. That will come in handy!”

“Hey. Yeah. Look at that! They put in that red wallpaper
and those yellow lights only last week, not to mention
all the paintings! And I'm ready for a swim, maybe even
today. I never could surf though, Oscar.”

“Listen Lester, why don't you read me from your book
while you finish that omelette. Take your time.
What is it? Moby Dick again? Is there any surfing in there?”

“It’s all I ever read, at this point. Where do you want me to start?”

“At the start.”

“Ok. Hmmm, 625 pages. Fuck me! Ok. Well,
here: Call me Ishmael. Some years ago—oh oh oh. OH!”

“Is this still Moby Dick?”

Lester had picked up his fat hardback of Moby
Dick to read out loud, but he'd picked up an end of
the tablecloth with it, and when he leaned back to relax,
and read—he’d set his wheelchair in motion—backwards
and down the handicapped ramp, taking the table cloth
with him like a long white wedding train.

Oscar grabbed onto the other end of the table cloth and
was pulled along like a panicked bridesmaid—in a wheelchair!

“Hey Lester! You alright? Hang on! We're headed
for the pool! How's your heart?”

“It's beating fast! I think it's gonna blow!”

“BREATHE! Try to meditate before we hit the pool!”

“Oh Oscar, is there time for that? Ha ha, this is fun!”

“It is, but are you alright?”

Lester rolled down the hall into the new blue-tiled indoor
pool room and splashed backwards into the water.
The long table cloth shortened, sort of bunched up and accordioned
into the pool as Oscar rolled down and splashed in on top of it all.

I couldn't see Lester from where I was, running down the ramp.
I threw off my apron and tall chef's hat in order to run faster,
and when I got there I still saw no Lester, but Oscar was floating
and flailing at the water, calling out for his friend.

Then there were bubbles. Bursting up effervescently like
the champagne I'd opened the night before at the
Trickling Minutes Friday Night Chess & Champagne Hour.

Lester bobbled up pink, spraying laughter!
I went back up the ramp and put my chef's hat back on, so relieved,
staying close to enough to hear and film the rest.

“Lester! Catch your breath! How's the heart? Did it blow?”

“Not this time, old friend!”

“I thought you died down there. I missed you already.”

“Not today, Oscar. Not yet. Maybe never, and who cares when it comes!
Isn't this all—hasn't this been—fun?”

“We do have fun. Remember the time we accidentally set fire to the gift shop?”

“Those corny cards and stuffed animals really burn!”

They laughed and splashed and then they looked at me.

“What's for lunch, Captain?”

“What would you like?”

“Well, it's almost Thanksgiving, how about pumpkin pie?”

“And champagne?” I asked.

“And champagne. Yes.”

Gift shop 

in the Dada Art Museum
(1 a.m.)

Snowing outside, the night coming in blue 
and white through the gallery windows. 
Heavy snow, but dry inside in the dark, all the paintings asleep, 
the night guard walking around on his usual path. 

But something new tonight. A light, a flash—
like a signal, unusual after midnight in here tonight
inside the museum.

The guard, in the middle of a yawn, freezes 
like that, moves toward the flash, mouth wide open. 

The halls zig zag like modern architecture,

white walls (even in the dark) go right then left, 
and the flash is now a smoldering yellow glow on the walls 
getting brighter as he steps through the halls, gets closer.

The guard goes on and completes his yawn, 
comes out of the halls to the shiny glass windows of the gift shop
where the glow flickers like a campfire in the woods.
Or an upstairs window
on a snowy homecoming night. 

It’s a nightlight for sale. 

A Van Gogh (self portrait) nightlight. 

“Hi,” says the nightlight, as the guard enters the gift shop 
and goes into another yawn, a nervous yawn, the nervous yawn

of a first date, or the first time he talks to a nightlight. 

But—“Hi,” he says. 

“You're the guard, aren't you? It's good to meet you,” 
says Vincent. “I have a show coming here soon, it's good
to know that you’ll be here.” 

“Thank you, Mr. Van Gogh. But you know, well— 
it could be anybody doing what I do.”

“That’s untrue. Do you like it in here?”

“I do, a lot. It’s peaceful and safe. Especially on a snowy night.” 

“Oh, it’s snowing out there?” 

“Yes. And when I walk around in here, I want to do it too, 
I want to make a painting.” 

Van Gogh’s straw hat flashes even brighter yellow and he says,
“Why don’t you?” 

“I think it’s too late for me to do that in life.” 

“And that is always untrue. I didn’t know that I 
was going to be in art galleries all over the world, let alone
become a nightlight,” says Vincent, looking the night guard 
in the eye. “Go on—when you walk around in here, live
in here, dream in here, stay in here, even when you go home.
But I think you're already doing that, aren't you?”

The guard lives on the top floor of a carriage house 
around the corner from the museum and behind a mansion
and as he listens to Van Gogh, he can see his new brushes
and clean white canvases waiting for him back there in the dark.
He also sees that he left a window open by the bed, the snow is getting in,
and his just-off-work waitress girlfriend's paint-splattered foot
sticking out of the covers is getting snowed on, but—
he feels that everything's going to be alright, after tonight. 

“I only sold one, you know,” says the nightlight. 

Luggage carousel at the airport 
after midnight
going round and round  

Some people have kids and grandkids

and friends of the kids and then their kids

so when these some people are about to die, 
all these kids show up with jokes and food and fun 
and Depends and plans for what’s next, after death, 
sort of: See you soon! Get a good table! 

And then there’ll be us others, kidless old people
like the last luggage on the airport carousel, 

going round and round

in the empty airport

after midnight. 

But, it’s ok. 

There’ll be a new flight in the morning

every seat filled, but spread out,

ALL class
seats soft as clouds almost as pretty

as the white ones out the windows,

like the ones we slept on 
(in our imaginations) as babies,

though these are real

piled up and up and up endlessly

into the blue sky above the blue sky. 

Maybe. 

And maybe is good enough. 

It’s a friendly flight,

endless champagne

shiny, soft, squirting fruit

no seatbelts

laughing kids loose in the aisles

acrobatic, loose in laughter

or sleeping, unalarmed. 

Us older ones watching them and loosening too,
learning from them and going in reverse,
back to before we got hijacked. 

No seatbelts. 

And a long movie! 

No deposit, no return

A little early in the morning

I walked up the beach above Malibu

above the Reel Inn Tavern

the sand, the sea, and the sky all the same color,

and a seagull came down, gently
like a floating Kleenex
landed, walked up to me, and started talking.

I was drunk, but I swear it happened. 

“I don’t mean to hover,” said the gull, “but
I’ve been watching you, and it seems to me
that you’re trying too hard. You’re living so people
can say—at your funeral—how nice you were.” 

I looked away, out at the sandy horizon. 

The seagull walked over to a bottle on the beach,
kicked it over a half turn.

“C’mon buddy, isn’t it true?  You can tell me. 

We all do it. But look at this bottle—can you see it
from there? It says, NO DEPOSIT, NO RETURN. 
Ok?” 

The seagull flashed feathers and got up in blue sky. 

I flashed up there too, and followed her. Or him.