School of Fish

from School of Fish

MERK

There’s too much light in my life

there that’s better

the street people recommend

don’t let your brother fling his

leg & arm around you like

you’re his girlfriend. Humpin your

kneecap, stuff like that

the vilest smell of all tonight

is human food

it’s November when the moons switch

places. White is bad

black is good. Food stinks.

Carrying their buckets of soup

to their stupid abodes

furs around their necks, beasts.

What do humans eat? Dogs, more or less.

Ripping fruit from the vine

snipping the crop

maybe vegetables would like to

let their baby be too

and never never eat the human

that is a crime. Push my machine

to see what nazi called

me. Go out and kill her with my teeth

I’m a bored outsider

the season is cold

everywhere doors are slamming

and look who you’re in the

room with now. Someone to eat

I hope. Think of Goethe

Werner Goether with his leg

flung up on a rock in

Italy. Take a bite

of that fat calf.

He’s like a big posing gondola

what’s the idea

every poet I know is a partial artist

the lucky ones are dead

naturally incomplete

but look at everyone you think of

hanging on to some misapprehended

particle of modernism, all

plumped up with pillows

there’s nothing

after a modern idea

for poets. All they do

is think & eat. If you call

that making something

& I don’t, I don’t call that art.

We must offer ourselves

up as food or eat

someone. If you can make there

be less of someone else

or someone could take

a bite out of you

then you could join in the incompletion

or excess of your age

I’m sick of seeing dunces celebrated

that’s the job

someone that looks

good in ribbons

someone surrounded

by their editor’s

arms. Love object

of a lesbian

but not being

one. Particle board

potential screen

play, plastic

hair, translates

well, millions will hold

you on the train

bite me now

bite me forever

in your two strong

o eat me read

me something

I am the daughter

of substitution

my father fell

instead of the dresser

it was the family

joke, his death

not a suicide

but a joke

how could I accidentally

get eaten

slipping into your

sandwich or refriferator

sort of a dick

that crawls

up from the bottom of your

ice cream cone

it’s too late for some

of us, but for others

it’s never late

enough. Tonight

when they moved

the lights and everything

looked completely

horrible for

a change

I was looking

for sympathy

and you asked

me for the menu

I have escaped the unseemly

death of the alcoholic

yet I keep my ear so close

to the ground & I know

what they know

I begin to smell

funny, another fate

it was as if I was falling

last night

but I imagined

myself a bit

of food

& I was safe

in your mouth

& I would

never die

it is the legacy

of my family

to change in the air

& smash as something

new

not a woman

but a chair

full of flowers

not a poet

but a donut

or a myth

go up there

& get me a cracker

darling

& proudly

I walked

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