“This End Up” said the lettering
On the package.
What was inside?
A gorilla?
An assassin?
An apple pie?
Twenty apple pies?
The head of Jerry Lewis?
I left it alone.
It didn’t belong to me.
*
There was a year
In the distant past,
1969 or 1970,
When everyone
Looked like Richard
Brautigan.
I would buy American
Cheese for my sandwich
And Richard Brautigan
Would hand back
13 cents
In change.
What was that
All about
Anyway?
*
You are driving home
Down the gravel.
Temperatures are starting
To cool. The day’s
Sweat is drying
To a salty powder
On your skin.
The sun sinks red
To your tired eyes.
Bumping over
The train tracks
You see
An orchard pond
Glittering.
*
Sitting under
The sycamore
Across the street
From the demolished house,
Behind me
In a picnic shelter
A woman tries
To write something.
Another
Different woman
Walks by reading
A letter.
She stuffs it
In her handbag
And keeps walking.
The cicadas stop
All at once.
*
Twenty cigarette butts
Scattered beneath my feet
In the dry
Powdery soil.
Sitting on a bench
With the plaque:
“In loving memory.”
August 10th,
As chilly as autumn
This morning.
There are 200 people
I’d rather not see
Today.
The Burlington Northern/Santa Fe
Rolls through,
Empty cars rattling.
*
This is the day before
The day before
The day before.
The chairs,
Arranged in six rows
Of students,
Occupy a lecture
Of silence
And softly stirring
Air.
The mountain
Would rather watch
Us
As if she were reading
Lines from a play.
*
A student
From an exotic land
Walks in the library
With her book
And asks me,
“Is there a place
I can read
My book?”
She is sitting now
At the table
With the smart aleck
Who likes to Skype
With his empty office
Back in Los Angeles.
Some innocent birds
Fly against
The window.
*
I am waiting
For the mystery
Female Asian
Bicyclist
To enter the east door.
So far, nothing.
The actors scream
In the theatre
Adjacent.
They are being
Eaten by a giant
Venus fly trap.
It is a power
Stronger
Than itself.
It is an accumulation
Of all
The August evenings
There ever were.