first steps, new orleans

i hesitate at each step, here
my home away from home
forgotten from all the same angles
along canal, i hear the call, feel
down where the bottom is split with rails and wires
the spirits wake and spit and sleep
my own left hand belongs to me less, that mess
that bad hand, the hands of david she told me on royal,
pulling my hair, virile
i drag my ass to the corner of decatur
heavy purposeful ancient gator
i know disaster is having her way with me
she never gonna let me go
that's so, and so and so, and still i forgot
where her thigh rubs up against the back of my hand,
up along rampart, up along the edges, i forgot,
up along the cemeteries, i forgot, up along the projects, i forgot
up where the road meets the bayou,
up where the shotguns are like dominoes, i forgot
how city park spoke to me in the dark and promised
things she couldn't deliver
how i ran to the river, that dark and muddled flow,
and huddled with my arms around my knees
crying into the rocks and dirt, and
that muddy it took every bit and didn't give a shit
welcome home baby



and i would like to turn the corner and see you,
mickey and oliver, otter and squish, jay and jane and chain, thomai and toni and hans, and ralph and mat and michele, steven and adrain and wash and valerie and rodney and chris and pretty boy jason and lj and jason and jeannette and lee and tod and brian and kate and ade and all the saints...

new orleans, 2008

it all comes back
thick syrup moving me through, moving through me.
i'm crying all the time.
moving me beyond my own memory of place
my streetcar is named remember and it moves at it's own pace
i am this city
my body lights up with the smells
my body lights up with the smiles
my body lights up with the love and acceptance
even in tremendous circumstances
historically accurate
immaculately consistent
disastrously delicious
this place
this place here
i'ma holler atcha
i'ma ask fer ya
alright now
i love you

naushon, 2008

from a wedding on naushon this fall. it reminds me of the image of my son, here.

self portrait, 2007

yes, your honor

1040, 12/15/08, divorced

aka irretrievable breakdown

divorce, 2008

divorce is quiet
not unlike that moment when you roll away from your lover,
when the time is right
after the heat and the fire and the light
reluctantly, necessarily, longingly, still
this visit is over

for charise, 2008

when i close my eyes i still see you
brown
charise
blue jeans
hair and lips
part in the middle
your sweetness comes
smoothly through the fuck yous

on the ceiling a place for your face
as i drive myself home
over and over you let me play
as long as i want to stay

eighteen

phillip's porch

this is phillip's porch. we would hang out between my porch on the left and his on the right. his grandfather, mr. lawrence, was a great character, and a great man. in a difficult new orleans neighborhood he was the firm hand that led to most of his children and grandchildren finishing school and going to college. he was a man who was always working, getting things done. he worked estates in other parts of louisiana, and when he was home he helped my landlord, who was dying of aids, with everything a homeowner would normally have to do. he once went out in his pickup truck with a shotgun to get back a water heater taken from an abandoned property across the street. i had watched the whole thing transpire, saw the men and the heater disappear, but in my new orleans summer haze i thought maybe it belonged to the men who took it. they seemed to know exactly what they were doing. he came out on his porch, as if through some sixth sense he knew something was up, and asked me what happened. i told him. it had been wheeled away in a shopping cart. he went back into the house, came out with the rifle, jumped in his truck and said "i'll get that water heater back". he was back in a few minutes. when i asked him what happened he said, "i found 'em up the road and i said 'put that man's water heater back.' they kept walkin' so i got out in front of 'em, raised the rifle and i said 'you put that water heater back up in my truck', and they did." later he explained that if he let them start taking things then everything in the neighborhood would disappear. there really wasn't much more to it than that.

in december

lustrous evening
put on lipstick
remembered her inner life
drew the shawl over her lofty shoulders
and laughed

still, in the quiet that followed, still
without my friend, i slept
to remember the first death

a handmade scarf
seemed to float above the frivolity

in december