Righteousness

Righteousness

Undoubtedly, by definition, if nothing else,
the most righteous are the most right.

If not the greatest problem the world's ever known,
this is arguably that second, and the first remains,

that there is no second,
if the first.

c. Ciprianowords, 2009

Honesty

Honesty

It's one of life's conundrums, like standing outside Carlsbad,
watching the bats fly out.
A scientist, furiously tabulating. Wingbeats per second,
multiplied by square footage of cavern-entrance-hole.
Jesus, no. There cannot possibly be that many in there --

And so you are telling me stuff, and to the very degree my
ears hear, my eyes shut, and I keep saying [to myself]
"It's not possible" and you're not at all finished, while I'm
thinking "You could sell tickets to such an event."

-- And one, honest to God, got tangled on my head.
While I flailed about and screamed, Professor Angstrom
assured me, "These are not rabid or poisonous at all."
But you know what?
I did not care. I just wanted the damn thing out of my hair.

c. Ciprianowords, Inc. 2009

The Promised Land

The Promised Land

I did not ask for this. Nor did I question
my role as ladder-holder. But I now fear
my eternal destiny.
If Motive be judge, I am safe.
Innocent as yesterday's sparrow, hatched.
But let Desire hold the gavel.
This wizened vulture did not circle twice
before descending in his spiral,

toward that which was above.

For as you climbed the steps, so did I.
My wayward gaze fell upon that which
should not be seen unless shown.
The land of milk, oh yes, and honey.
My trembling hands upon the rails shook.
And my eyes, longing to weep,
seemed [wickedly] unable to do so.

c. Ciprianowords, Inc. 2009

Not In Me

Not In Me

It's not in me to win a bout, my Love.
Your eyebrows, or how you say chocolat
as if you know other words in French.

The little chirping sounds when you're hurt.
Your unique al dente rules for spaghetti.
Your sock-folding ways and love of oral

hygiene. The way you floss, and toss.
The gloss on windows when you're done.
It's not even fair at all you should know

when it comes to anything knock down -
drag out, the referee will be slapping the
mat thrice, and holding your left arm high.

c. Ciprianowords Inc. 2009

Due

Due

Wind blew in today, a bad one.
Some said twister.
I was playing snooker at Sing-Loo's.
He sells cigarettes to all ages, for 5 cents.
We heard nothing. No ripples in my draft.

Three blocks over, Mrs. Ludder's roof left town.
And the cross on St. Brigid's skewered
Jim Blidwort's Holstein.
Rack 'em up, Eddie.
That cow was due for the abattoir.

c. Ciprianowords Inc. 2009.

Proximity

Proximity

In the crotch nearest our head we rub a stick
hoping that later that day the nearest person
will not notice that unless they did the same
we will proportionately move away from them
at a rate consistent to that in which we now
experience them maintaining a safe distance.

© Ciprianowords Inc. 2009

Her Cottage

Her Cottage

She said that I had the key to her cottage.
So I checked my own array, no, all of these are mine.
Car. Apartment. Mailbox. Work door. Bike lock.
I’ve really only got a few.

But she’s the opposite of flippant.
As I am, also, so I knew that something else was said.
This is not about steel on a ring, or a wooden door.
It’s something pumping.

Pulsating, I realized that cottage is the wrong word.
And here is what I know. If I had such an access,
privilege, I would never press something so hard,
against her heart.

© Ciprianowords Inc. 2009

It Seemed That Way

It Seemed That Way

I can see how it seemed that way.
When I looked away, shutting my eyes,
did you see that part? My eyes shut?

What you said was so politically wrong.
No one knew this more than you
in the moment, wanting it all back.

But that same one, that same moment
was, for me, the very opposite
of regret. I searched in it for similarity.

Had to close the lids of me and ask
if I’d ever done anything half as gutsy.
Opening them, I saw yours, closed.

© Ciprianowords Inc. 2009

Fifteen Directions

Fifteen Directions

If I recall it was your idea, your uncanny brilliance,
part of your overall scheme of overall improvement.
As if the water, no, drifting on it, fifteen directions
a minute was going to save us. You fell into the bow,
my oar tempting me to push you to the other shore.
But I climbed into the ass of the thing. Shoved off.

Canoeing. Who the hell, in the last hundred years
does this, unforced? When I asked, you sprayed me
with what I’m sure contained caviar. Forepaddling,
I returned the favor, and you turned, a glaring Satan.
Lake dropped from your hair, while you calmly said,
Don’t paddle on the same side as me, for Godsake.

The clouds quit moving. What is it called? A moment?
Where you kept looking at me, swabbed your forehead
and smiled. Oh, devil! I knew then, you were pure evil.
Once an angel, but fallen. And later that night, in bed
I watched you sleeping, smirk. We’ve been here before.
Eleven. Twelve. Thirteen. No. Maybe fourteen times!

© Ciprianowords Inc. 2009

Ape and Essence

Ape and Essence

Machine against desire is no contest,
that’s really what the thing is about.
But no one does this, no one reads it.
Up until this day, this very afternoon,
[and how intent you appear to be] I’m
the only one to get to Bantam’s 152.

Brave New World I can see, or even
Point Counterpoint -- Eyeless in Gaza.
But this one? No. Required reading?
You’re too old! It’s making no sense.
Woman is the source of all deformity,
that’s really what the thing is about.

You reach for your coffee and I mirror.
I sip, as you flip the page, and a vision
arrives. Of you telling me he died when
Kennedy did. You know this? And just
as we begin to discuss his obsession
with hallucinogens I realize I’m an ape.

© Ciprianowords Inc. 2009

Flight

Flight

I ran with you, we collected them in a jar.
Together we gathered each glowing, living star.

Your recitations were quenched with a kiss,
And then I told you I have dreamed of this.

I have lived this moment before, in a dream.
Hush, you whispered. I too. As though I seem --

We both looked at our lamp then. No shade
could ever have dimmed the fire we had made.

Yet, without a word you let them go. We knew.
Freedom was the thing for me and you.

© Ciprianowords Inc. 2009

The Green Light

The Green Light

By eight, I smiled that smile, the one
resigned to living the most boring night.
Tonight, it would take place. An epitome
of inanity, the new high in lows.
The food was good, and the drinks, well,
drinks are drinks. But all topics are not
topics. Some, more nauseous than those
preceding, make you shiver, and sweat.

As I was doing, on both counts, until,
from three seats closer to escape, a dispute.
About, of all things, the green light in Gatsby.
Can this be real? Intrigued, I turned.
Both of us, disgusted with everything
walked toward a terrace, and on the way
my one thought was, She cannot possibly
look like that, in that skirt.

© Ciprianowords Inc. 2009

Tabula Rasa

Tabula Rasa

There is no such thing, unless
you actually are a chalkboard.
Even then, two options emerge.
Recently erased, or never written upon.
No one is a clean slate.

If you are reading this, too late.
If you have ever seen lightning
however distant -- wrinkled your brow
before, or even after, the thunder.
Too late. Toolatetoolate.

© Ciprianowords Inc. 2009

What You Gave

What You Gave

One of my gifts to you was macaroni.
I withheld it, as those busy hands
unwrapping the inferior things, tore.
The bracelet you set to the side, and
how it swallowed the candlelight.

The Hotel New Hampshire beside it.
The button-up sweater, the very one
you thought did not exist --
how it kept your other treasures warm
as I reached, and the flame wobbled.

Handing you that rattly rectangle,
the eyes I saw seared my soul.
You were five kittens, and the laugh
that killed the candle between us
I would swim oceans to hear, forever.

© Ciprianowords Inc. 2009

Bookmark

Bookmark

The malls, subway tunnels, airports.
All have those curtained booths.
People giggling huddle.
Climbing into the frame, snap, snap.
Tongues out, eyes crossed, snap.
Snap.

So I buy a used book, and you were alone.
Reading Fitzgerald in the park, I noticed.
The strip of photos, it’s just you.
Placed there, in page 123.
No laughter or tomfoolery.
Witchcraft.

Unnoticed, when I paid the $2.99.
But there you are, four times.
A strip of you, smiling, with this book.
Another four shots, in the other hand.
You did this twice.
Why?

© Ciprianowords Inc. 2009

My Universe

My Universe

It exists for me.
It exists without me.
Key words, for and without.

Let’s start with for.
Was it before me, the universe?
Yes.

Moving on, how about without.
Does it need me?
No.

Maybe we should re-direct.
Focus on the word “my”.
What does that mean?

© Ciprianowords Inc. 2009

Famous Girl

Famous Girl

Guess what. I am famous.
I once used to breathe that sort of air,
the kind you do.
With all kinds of oxygen in it.

It is difficult to remember a day
that was mine. But I have people
that remind me of it.
Almost like having my own calendar.

Tonight I was ushered from a hotel
and fell flat inside, fearing. Will I ever
meet someone like him, again?
Things once left
for nobility to worry about.

Boy in the lobby, leave me.
Please, I am someone different, now.
[Hide me Bigg, from that camera
goddam it, it’s what I pay you to do…]
as many click, and flash –

I am crammed in a car and driven.
Scared of my own image, told, told,
told, told, told, told, TOLD.
But you asked me several things.
You asked me.

© Ciprianowords Inc. 2009

That Branch

That Branch

It was the inauguration of you, perhaps.
Your address to me, so unplanned -- Stealthily
I followed you into that bracken, for kindling.
You thought me the other direction, and soon
I feared my voyeurism would be discovered.

As I was about to deliberately step on a branch
you bent for one. A sacredness descended,
not unlike the second that ticks before the fawn
bounds. Seeing this piece too green, “Fuck”
you said, firing it against a moss-covered rock.

I turned, that branch spinning in slow motion.
Before it landed, I was already back at camp,
stoking my own twigs gathered on the way. You
brushing the forest from your sweater, and me
knowing. This was a fire God could not put out.

© Ciprianowords Inc. 2009

The Real Dream

The Real Dream

I once thought in these terms
which means I guess I dreamed this way,
also. We think how we dream.
The trick is to begin dreaming different,

I guess. Not since the Big Bang
has there been a single living thing that is
black and white. My guess is that
the original mass contained more color,

than any eyeball has ever evolved to see,
yet. That I may transcend that hindrance,
is all I ask. No seagull has ever been
two colors, not while flying against a sky.

Let me see all of that.
No penguin is two colors.

© Ciprianowords Inc. 2009

Mother Mary

Mother Mary

It’s incongruent, the amount of unbelievers
that summon her. Mother Mary, they say,
knowing full well that even her own son
thought her but a mother. [Luke 11:27-28].
In other words, nothing special.

No. That is a misinterpretation.
She breathed the breath of God, obeying it.
As did yours.
There is no such thing as nothing special
when it comes to mothers.

© Ciprianowords Inc. 2009

Beginning of the World

Beginning of the World

For months I have been such an animal I wish I would see one.
So I could eat it. No understanding of what comes next, the
stuff in stores is rotting. Morning is day, and day, night, no one
is anywhere, and the most useless thing would be a calendar.

I walk. Wondering why I survived, and then sleep, freezing.
Keep thinking that someone has to be somewhere.
Not a moving bird in days, this is why that flicker of white
startled me. Springing to my feet, I crept, crept, half-running –

and then full out, as I rounded that caved-in building. Were you
an Olympic sprinter, when such a thing made sense? All I know
is that minutes from now, we are pulling potatoes from this fire.
And you stand, beautiful, coming over to my side of the blaze.

© Ciprianowords Inc. 2009

Don't Wake Me

Don’t Wake Me

Caught between pinch me and no, don’t!
Because if this is a dream, you know the next line,
right?
I came to the conclusion that I prefer this state,
crazy as it is, last night at the tree lot.
Because I knew it. There I was, admiring symmetry.
Full green triangles. You drifting like a snowbank
toward the orphan section of things.
And I saw you ask the guy with the sock on his head,
how much? No mystery that one’s on sale.
It’s worse than Charlie Brown’s.
I knew then, among other things, that very night
I’d set a star on the highest twig, you holding the ladder.

© Ciprianowords Inc. 2009

A Thousand Ears

A Thousand Ears

I lost you in that cavern of a monstrosity, mad as hell.
Me – I was mad. You – you were oblivious.
No, worse, you were the nether side of evolution.
Before sight, when worms in sea-vaults were eating
sulphur, waiting to grow fins that would become legs.
In some Guess store. So I went to the Mall Security.

Announcing your name to a thousand ears, I noticed
the gash in her nylons, and imagined the microphone
recoiling from her breath. At the top of the escalator
I saw you, below. At least one of the thousand ears,
was yours. And two of them, right then, were mine.
I had never been so happy, to know I had found you.

© Ciprianowords Inc. 2009

Thirteenth Night

Thirteenth Night

Two weeks in all, to leave now does not seem possible.
These last midnight waves, offspring of that first afternoon.
How they roll within us, anticipation turned to experience,
memory breaking on the beach under a sea of stars.

Tomorrow we shall leave. Tomorrow we take it all away,
because we go together. Nothing will be left behind.
None of these evenings, my love, have been sunsets.
It’s the world that moved and spun as we kicked the sand.

© Ciprianowords Inc. 2009

Caw

Caw

Fog of the day in mind, I punch three digits
and leave the building. Alarm set.
Clicking yet another device a lock lifts,
and almost to my car, I stop walking.

So assured of its rightness. Free of constraint.
You will never get from me why I stopped.
But overhead, as black as the set sun
it repeated itself. And looking down, I listened.

I knew what it was, as anyone would, but
for the first time I wanted to know the words.
What sort of declaration was this? Why expend
so much energy while flying, if useless?

For an answer, I looked, but there was only sky.
Now driving, I reach forward to kill the radio.
Oh, to hear that sound again.
We assign three letters to what no book contains.

© Ciprianowords Inc. 2009