Articles of national geographic

There's something about this.
There's a blinking ecstasy
and a fine piece of embroidery
floss stretched between the first fingers
of my hands.
I couldn't tell the store clerk
what I wanted.
I scratched on the bathroom stall
my name.
The tiles on the floor seemed
both straight and crooked--
my philosophy teacher
wouldn't let me live that
contradiction down.
I want to take my sketchbook everywhere
and "drown my sorrows in bacon"
the girl who said that wears flat black
shoes and owns a mannequin.
I love the ad outside my door
speaking stolichnaya,
I love to sing Sweet Chariot
and in the morning
hold my knees against my chest...
I beat independence into me
with a word, or two
(that I made up under a telephone pole)
and comparing Nazi germany
to Jellyfish - pretty and scary
in simultaneum,
I simply read the tarot cards
of my wild coming.

- February 16, 1999