dear diary

where am I?
it's night the bugs are silent
but this: go about my legs
scheduling, sucking at my blood
well, turn around slowly, fat body
move about, checking
for degree of lost
for debris I've lost
I slap
bet you squash it, you
everyone else talks about how
the winter is coming for them
but no winter comes for me
I'm bare legged, short skirt-did
I'm sheeny, I'm shy
I'm processing ponds
little pools of poem in my head
my arm stay open
my legs spread
I'm a constant in this pool
I'm a constant sweat
it gets dark early
that's the only way to tell
there's a change
can see more stars than you think I can see more stars than you think.
you'd be surprised at the recognizable constellations I see
the same as they're at home, or whatever
its all open late
arms all open late groping
groping at the full night the full  night
my warm wet me
where am I?
I'm a big open wet glad sack
and I got all
that I smile
and I schedule
and schedule
and scuttle
and sad, at it all
but really not
at all

things we think of alone

in the stars & bars, the neon bikini
wet from river,
it sucked me in
this is how drunks drown
the water black linesnaking across
I wouldn't have fallen in there in daytime, too dangerous
wet home, always the sprinklers on the greenbelt between 3 & 4 am
things we think about alone
the dry eyes, the good goodbyes
the dreams I have about masturbating
always a mother or stepmother figure to embarrass myself in front of
the geminates: double rs, double ss
the ending of sentences with prepositions
I'll let you sleep all day, I'll tiptoe about you
find you coffee
watch your skin on the butter sheets, your shorts of a dusty salmon pink shirt
long pretties
I get jealous when I overhear things sometimes
but alone on a bike in the dark, feeling cold, wet, driving fast to beat it
coming alone in the heat, it's nice like winterblanket
it makes a sigh smile across me.
thinking of your leaving, of my staying put
I'm putting out even in sleep.
get in me
you did, once, many
I'm alright with that now
so I think it
so I build it true.
now

raise me up

in haunting backs, smashed up
all of the compliments
I have to go visit my mom for some first time
I have a whole family
to share my pits with, my grub
to not smoke in front of
to smile at
to not get too shitfaced, to keep it together for
to let know my excitement
they might make me go rafting, or something
which will be pretty
it's one of the prettiest places on earth, Hailey, Idaho
I'll sleep under the stars, I'll read my kafka & my baudrillard & my sontag in lamplight
I'll think of your haunting back
long smooth brown, because I'm romantic like that
of your mouth, the prettiest part on you
with a mole on a lowerlip
Do you like it?
I do, I do
I compliment you freely, no one likes compliments
  because they don't seem free
I'll drive alone, no
just me, my brain riding in the scrub seat
I'll say goodbye
I'll say hello to a secret you
  when we last met in the tropical bed drinking rum, running our bodies out each other
  but that was years ago.
  and we're brothers again.
all of my brothers, then
  and I'll be the failed aunt daughter sister
whispering, bye byeing at Idaho
    you little sucker
bye byeing at the mountains & clear summer waters.
see you soon, future turn, let me let's go peacefully, wrap my brain up
wrap me good, my little passenger

cruelbod

the teens are sitting on the bleachers at the highschool
but they aren't teens, anymore, basically 30 now
kelly is arched back in a vermilion haltertop
and tad lays flat, looking at the stars.
she graduated from highschool
and comes & drinks rose on ice
on the bleachers
she does reverse cowgirl on the bleachers
tries to pee between steps
as latenight athletes run the track.
God, why aren't YOU running with them, she accuses tad
who exhales smoke
and sips rose, ice clinking in his plastic cuppy.
I know, right
kelly sat with brody
on the highschool bleachers
when she was pushing 30, a couple of augusts ago
she was wearing a white dress and a denim jacket
and brody was drinking a big beer
he was trying to convince her to just drive with him all night to nevada
so they could get married
she thought that sounded like fun
but they'd just met the day before
and she knew they'd get sick of each other halfway there.
she never sat on those bleachers when she was in highschool,
just after she moved begrudgingly back after years away
and it was only twice, and past midnight
with guys named tad and brody.
kelly only fucked brodys, now
she was done with seths and aarons and todds.
she is feeling pretty superior in her vermilion haltertop
she is looking good, teenlike
she tells tad about the jeremy she'd been harassing
and tad tells her, kindly, that she's been humiliating herself.
she is gleeful
she doesn't care, has nothing to lose
she claims a lack of cruel organs in her cinnamon bod.
but she's a liar,
and pathetic,
and she's alone in life and she's mean
so she smokes & she chugs
& she takes her shoes off and pees freely.
she's got those good strong outside peeing legs.
she says Whatever
I'm Me
never growing up
just justifying her moves
with evil eye glimmers
and secret, hopeful tears

I'll b your crying shoulder

love's suicide? I can't remember who does this song
but,
regardless:
your fingers and wrists and hands are waking me up
up inside me, waking up
sweatless, sweetsmelling
my back the length of a bridge
foot me
I'm covered in it
I want to wake up your breakfast
I like the sitting under stars in perfect summer
what will I have to talk about when summer's over? maybe it will all be over
haha I'm not sad, I just don't have anything to say
haha
I'll bet you're a nevercry
I like your eyes downcast
boylashes
symmetry face
gaunt
like a balloon letting out
up high in your kitchen
I found gift certificates for a hot air balloon date
they expire in december of this year.
they were written out two decembers ago
when this summer wasn't invented yet.
you said you would try to buy them
from your basement roommate who teaches churchy preschool
I am not dressed churchy today at all
but I'd be churchy if we took a balloon date
I won't be here in december when the gift dies
but I'd get up early
make some mimosas or something, whatever you drink in a balloon
I'd like to do it in the air
but some old man will probably be there, so
I doubt it.
I'm a fun float date, I'd guess
I like the fantastic world
I can be a good time in it, above it
I took a hot air balloon ride once, over lake tahoe
above the epic deep turquoise
so let's sky before our summer dies
rightly

I threw a vase of flowers in the hills last night

I'm still a dream
I hear the morning and I'm still a dream in it I am the morning and I'm still a dream and it
I can't sleep anymore
sleep
long sleep sounds long
I was dreaming of this to other places
in the desert now
you've probably never even seen each other
the desert
I know you see me
we missed Mount Rushmore
I don't know that we missed anything
I have a good time up there in the hills
I make a pretty calm out of it
I wrapped many things up
the ground me
the brush me
the Coors under the stars
doesn't the sky
make you hotter than I do?
I love my eyes in the morning water
I am soft down bird today
and my chest is a pain
rocks & ridges
  recognize my voice
we can be the best winner I think
it's nice to think of you first thing in the morning
it's oh so daunting
and a little bit
death

help me find my necklace

little hero,

I too want dog-running dreams

four paws bending

dainty twitch at the wrist

sidewinder against the wall

catching triscuits over a mountain jumping a grave

I bought bananas as revenge

I wake up with my mind over the range

burners low

or mountains separating forever. That's the biggest distance I've ever seen

further than space

is

stay in space

space is pretty pleasy

I'm sorry about my body

It's falling apart inside

strings to pull out of me,

whole parts, globs, gushes

pretty pleasy things going out from me now

it's a mess

and it's a broke trust

nothing going in

nothing going on

no saving, doubling

exponentialling

I'm sorry 

but I can't get high as the sun

as stoned as the stars

wasted as states away

fucked-up as a time zone

blood is in me

like new blood everyday

new little blood wishes when I wake up

old little blood wishes

just wish question wish question wish question wish

like where's the wants to see you again

what's ours is ours

what's mine is mine

I used to like the inside of your head

but where has it gone?

is it okay if I change some things for you

is it okay if I change my smell, to us?

subtle to change my life with you

is it okay if I do some coke, would that bother you

is it okay if I say I love you

is it okay if I show you my brain

is it okay if I change my mind?

I'm sorry about the bananas,

that was impulsive & now they're ripe so I don't know what to do with them.

I wrap around this fur body in springmorning

very close to the dirt, face in

the roots

the gentleroots

gentleman earth

I am a bloodbath

an old babe,

with bloodcurtain as cape

my mouth a twist, a smile, a hellow-honey

my shana punim

my hot-air balloon

my beautiful dreamer!

 watching you sleep is a shame & watching you wake is a slaughter

bags

I keep on having dreams you're talking to me about grace

and that I'm falling you

following you around from room to room

Always your head, the back of your head for sure

Always your slow stately bringing it up

  like the notion of grace stuck in you repeating

  or you secretly seek my advice on it

and you haven't anyway to work yourself around it.

I am also in a boat

in a cockpit

in a mall

in s america

and I can see your face as the back of your head slides around.

I am not a pretty girl

I am not intended

I wait for summers to come

I wait for bad news

I try to get some 

I try to wait

but I haven't any patience.

I wake up with kafka, breton, sanford, nelson, even nin

but I haven't swallowed anything, still just still just still just.

I got a sunburn, I want to pretend it's a cinnamon tan

I asked my friend if he wanted to get a manicure with me

because he always says he wants to do that with me

he paints his beautiful gold nails

like chitinous beetles

but today there's nothing I'd less like to do than that

like normally

like acetone

like $$

like filipino muzak

like a woman holding my hand, not speaking to me

like all of the problems of our national celebrities

like the stars are just like us

they bring their own to-go jars

they secretly compost in the bushes

they drink stale coffee

they drive home drunk

they wake up and write bad poems

to prove that they are bad, or that they're helpless

like I'd rather peel my skin off

peel my hair out, have a happy saturday

a good may

a pretty week-end

partysoul

throw yourself a soul party

maybe I'll get all high on drugs or something

or maybe I'll be a yuppie

with a shaved border collie at the farmer's market

in swedish clogs

just like the stars when they're just like us

or maybe I'll be an artist

I'll throw up on my nostalgia

and my sentiment will break me out

I did throw something away, you know.

It was a baggage tag for an airplane flight

it said 28 November 2006 on it

it said C A's name on it

it was from the last trip we ever took together, we went from Chicago to Montana

I remember it was 9 degrees when we left Montana

and we listened to Music for Airports by Brian Eno while we waited for the plane to come

and he took photos of me sleeping on the airport floor.

Apparently I'd been dragging that baggage ticket around with me for 6.5 yrs

I'd say that's pretty fucking impressive, Molly Stoddard

o god, o no

things we talk about 

sex, quesadillas, nostalgia, shirts, buttons, sweat, hair, sandwiches, swimming, drinking, dogs, smoking, love, breakingup, drugz, shoulders, legs, popmusic, lust, depression, beards, loneliness, julia roberts, sleeping, comfort, salad, tuna melts, football, stars, family, shoes, feet, eyes, bazooka joes

when i am 28

I knew the tune which lacks in roots

I knew the tune would be here. And in this cool place where I live, legs beneath layers of down, and blankets, too, and the impending sun of autumn. The subtle morning brain is like a muffled country and western performance, the light tingle of the mandolin or the hesitant whine of a slide guitar. I can feel it up and through my veins and feelers. My spine is filled with the music of stars. The ones hid, now. Last night's cloud sprays, the quiet dark. My warm wet body pricked in the fresh, an opened dress. And now, like a mushroom, grown overnight in these crevices, waiting willfully to be uprooted. Even to uproot that which roots lack.

also,

I was given a few books! To my joy and surprise, on the inside cover of Anne Frank's The Diary of a Young Girl is written my name, Molly Stoddard, in feminine thirteen-year-old script complete with hearts, stars, and exclamation point. And even more worthwhile is the original copy of William Goldman's The Princess Bride, a truly exceptional book. I started it again last night and haven't stopped from smiling. The opening sentence: "This is my favorite book in all the world, though I have never read it." Ah ha, intriguing, no? What else is here: Cat's Cradle. I read Jailbird and liked it but is it too late for Kurt and me? The cover art is brilliant, vermilion background with a small inset of pink hands holding the all-important cat's cradle strings, the going-off of an atomic bomb, and a confused psychedelic sun. "Call me Jonah. My parents did, or nearly did. They called me John." Mm hmm,  pretty Clever. Ah, well it's about twentyseven pages long so I could just suck that down. IF I WASN'T so busy sucking everything else down. You know! What else, oh if it isn't Percy Thrower's How to Grow VEGETABLES and FRUIT by god!! Depicted is Percy Thrower himself, wrinkled oldman brow and long elegant pipe... it appears to be unlit. He's fondling a large & impressive yellow onion, and showing off with this sort of licentious look on his face a wheelbarrow just full of delicious treasures from the earth. Mm hmm we have potatos, radishes, beets, tomatos of all flavors and persuasions... oh, and they're so damp and dewy with earth and newness! how hungry you've made me. This book is filled with images of hands using tools and breaking off beetgreens. In fact, there is a bookmarked page I've just opened to... the Beetroot. Just delights.

I have to go now, to rinse my hair... let the solemn ballad of poor Lonesome Susie leave you charmed.

back of the night, autumn most touchable

I likened the stars to views in kitchens and living rooms, the blue glows, the faces facing & talking, the movements before ovens and in cabinets, fiddling silently with a lightbulb, a lit lamp. The dark of grass, of a road, the impressiveness of a damp dwelling and an unlit garden. And over it the softness of an impending summer'send. Lovely how they change & grow. O, september.