from ABOUT THE HOUSE 



The Studio 

the plants grow at strong angles 
toward what winter light   
staring at the wall of books starts
mild vertigo     an original floor board
soft a snuggery for treasure         the step stool
creaks as do bending knees        these lives 
are solitary      but    alive   &     polyphonic 

Monteverdi record sleeve hit the floor
a day in December       ghost train  
			               or a fact

dropped pencils roll east

             gold upholstered chair
hips inclined      “how are your hips?”

			               “mammoth-marrow”

where I have soft reckonings 
the fifty-plus heart beneath this crepe chest 
              so noticed this morning in the bathroom
be not every bitter archer boy     
defending their legends



The Living Room

this is a film about the wheel of fortune 
(Elevator to the Gallows)     Jeanne Moreau’s 
expression is the same before the police get wise
and after    I AM MAD    the long takes encourage us 
to empathize with madness 

six days since the ball dropped in Time Square 
but you and I don’t count that way 

six days of French New Wave
animate black and white photos of us in high school 
we are lovers on a spree for a day in 1986
	
therapeutic-watching of Cleo from 5 to 7
hate-watching Jules and Jim

(mesmerized by the new presence of TV
a motionless child on its lap
life with TV resumes after a decade gap)  

it is absolutely necessary to die… for the lightning quick 
montage it performs on our lives!



The Dining Room 
	
another smashed Radko ornament 
                                                 life-sized red onion 

this collection can’t continue
                          too large for a miniature pine in a pot 
	
now in the bay of plants getting a second
chance 

	    tall thin glass of amaro
		         taken at the dining table

has not yet aroused dreams of my dead 
                                     as another poet said it could 

inherited dinnerware 
                         taking up a shelf     where books would be 
                                                                                  could be

a podium holding 2500+ pages of 
             Leopardi’s collected notes 
                          badly coffee stained

                                      or whatever other book is on my mind 

this room is slow-
             ly breaking with histor-
                          ical precedence
	  
                                       TABLE: 
                                       where’s my better half?

one by one the chairs have marched 
to the attic 
		         the chairs gather there 
			              a weekly ghost oration

                                                              CHAIRS: 
                                                              who my friends in New York?

midway along the journey of our lice  
							

                                                                           AMARO: 
                                                                           dispel! dispel! 

it is safe
                        to withdraw the movement of our hearts 
	                              clear the way for what comes

						  PODIUM:
						  a natural course about 
						  the house (natural as defined by the widest part of you)		



The Ghost Poem

                                                  I leave the lights on 
                                                  and my shoes on
                                                  like my father
                                                  I forget about daylight 
                                                  savings
                                                        	I yell at the oil
                                                  man to stop

                                                  if you require my subservience  
                                                  you’ll never see the inside
                                                  of the house  

                                                  if every visit is an in-
                                                  vasion…
                                             
                                                  such a spirit won’t know the stair-
                                                  case in the purple dark
                                                  where the orchid
                                                  hovers 
                                            
                                                  I remove the Civil Song broad-
                                                  side from the hall 
                                                  and place it nearer the drip
                                                  drip drip nearer the stereo

                                                  if you are still seeing through org
                                                  colored glasses I am unworkable 
                                            
                                                  I rest on a couch held up
                                                  with bricks l sing ballads
                                                  to help me shit 



The Basement

going down for the shovel 
going down for the bag of salt 
	    the salt ended up being outside under the plastic bucket 
	    beneath the bag of soil
going down for the ladder being careful to not hit my head
going down for something else and noticing a collection 
	    of abandoned plastic sleds 
	    now that it has snowed + the small hill 
while I was down there I thought to read the oil gauge
            which said ¼ and it’s only January
            and miles to go
while I was down there I felt afraid of the subterranean light
	    modifying a wooden chest that says PAIN 
            or PAINT if you can see a very faint T 
while I was down there I thought of Shirley Jackson’s mind
	    and raced upstairs with the old mop and some batteries 
	    I’ll try again another day
going down for the drill and the apron 
going down for something else and noticing 
            an old pulley and rope
            and a pile of old doors to the house 



The Attic 

whatever optimism within released 
a clutch of balloons up to the peak of the roof
while my feet release creaks
this and that in reserve upon its wooden flanks 
the ones that aren’t upended in disrepair

something of value lost for 20 years is found in a house I never lived in
something of value cannot be found in the house I live in 

and it made my legs give out 

the lost valuable thing recovered 
the other thing now conceptualized as floating 
a thing with different terms for friendship