Licking Her Wounds

Licking her wounds

New found freedom of bare chest

Heartbeat so close, delight

A woman without her breasts

Newfound freedom of bare chest

As a girl child, born again

A woman without her breasts

Is fully sensual, free of weight, liberated

As a girl child, born again

Without shame, openly exuberant

Fully sensual, free of weight, liberated

Memory of suckling baby, objects of infatuation

Without shame, openly exuberant

Fetish exonerated, "boobs" they are called

Memory of suckling baby, objects of infatuation

No longer a sex object, freedom

Fetish exonerated, "boobs" they are called

Heartbeat so close, delight

No longer a sex object, freedom

Licking her wounds

Boston

Swan Boats in the Public Garden,
Quincy Market, Faneuil Hall.

Taxis take sidewalks,
dart around double-parked

cars. Drivers follow the rules: horns
first, sign language second, breaks

a last resort. Cobblestone streets,
Cambridge across the Charles.

A city where the word sure is five
syllables long and Can I park your car?

doesn’t translate to the page. You must go,
experience the language, accents, attitudes,

see potholes in winter large enough
to house a family of five. North End,

South End, Italian, Irish, integrated,
segregated, Boston.

Flashbacks

The memories arrived in little staccato notes, lingering in the air, in front of the window of her eyes, un-scheduled, interrupting. She had tried to censor them, to re-direct them, but they seemed to obey some higher order, some greater regulation.

She had read that the great successes in history had controlled their thoughts - with meditation, with focus, with directed and determined thinking: no space or time for guilt, regret, or memories of tender scenes with those now gone. A practiced art, a determined skill, mental muscularity. You could call it 'concentration', and 'linear thinking', and 'compartmentalization'. But those words were not true. The truth was throw away those dragging, clinging weeds of memory and exist in the here and the now.

There had been times when she was sure she had mastered this, at last, her mind finally maturing, taking command of her reality. But then, suddenly - boom - a flashback would thrust its way into her sight to show her the power of her non-control: his chin as he threw his face back laughing; a smiling man laying in the hospital bed, rapturous with the powerful drugs, yet aware of the miracle of his life - before the true trials began.

She thought of them as flashbacks and did her best to move them off her inner screen as quickly as possible. Click, she would think, delete. Then click again, and again.

She dedicated her mind to seeing the bees and flowers - today, only, and the soft feel of rain - today, only, on her skin, and the soothing sounds of frogs, and distant city traffic, and running water and the peacefulness of the breeze moving the top of the red maple tree - today, only. To be a perfect instrument to experience the wonder of the world.

And then, renewing her instrument, breathing in the clean air, she felt her breath enriching her blood with oxygen, which rose to feed her brain, wherein the complex gray tissue sat, the tissue that had taken millions of years to invent and refine. The tissue where savored former flowers and bees and trees resided, alive and fresh. And real.

And she saw that she was her memories and that they were her.

Winnemucca

We broke our roadtrip rule that day:
Off the road by three o'clock at a motel with a pool.
We were ready to get home.
After the ticket in Yankee Blade
You swore you would never complain again
When I told you to slow down.
Promises are made to be broken.
Black thread of road in blackest night
Connecting mountain to mountain
Through long prairie grass.
We almost killed a cow.
Couldn't see her in the road.
When we stopped at the restroom
And I ran in
I understood what trust was--
You in the running car behind the wheel,
Me with my pants down in nowhere,
Ten miles out of Winnemucca.

Odd Jobs from Jenn's Tues. memoir

I really don't remember how long it was before I removed my head from the sand to take a peek at the wonderful world of telemarketing again but believe it or not, I wound up answering another tiny classified ad for magazine sales.

They'd been quick to point out that these were popular, reputable magazines, I guess just in case anyone was worried they might end up selling porn. In retrospect, maybe that might have been an improvement.

The office was located just outside of downtown LA in what might have once been a cool building. Now it was just another faceless run-down low rise. I don't remember what the actual outfit was called and I'd be amazed if they were still in business.

It wasn't much of a workers paradise, but the guy showing me around seemed pleasant enough even if he was a little gung-ho. After the Leukemia lady gung-ho was fine with me. And as far as truth in advertising went, they did actually sell magazines. I'd only heard of a few of them like “Jet” for instance. They were all geared towards different minority communities with names like “Asian weekly” or “Chicana”. Okay, so far so good.

After filling out the requisite piles of new employee paper work I was shown to my little area, one of a handful with a battered second hand desk and a simple black telephone. There was a long legal size 'cheat sheet' with a suggested rap that was supposed to be a real crowd pleaser. Where it started to get confusing was the list of suggested names we were supposed to use for each magazine. Apparently we were supposed to use an alias for each one. A matching 'minority' alias.

It went some thing like

Hello Mr/Ms /Mrs---------- this is-- (see below right)* from-- ( see below left)

*Adrian Gonzalez
Chrissy Chung
La Shonda Williams


*Chicana
*Asian monthly
*Jet


Eeeeyew. How totally humiliating for all of us.

Looking around me, none of my fellow workers seemed to have a problem with it. Seasoned hustlers, I watched in amazement as one woman not only hopped from name to name but accent to accent as she racked up the sales. She looked like the girl next door, if the girl next door weighed 300 pounds.I sit with my black telephone and my leads dialing for dollars and counting off the minutes 'til it's time to leave.

I remember driving to Oklahoma with the Oosterwijks to camp for a long weekend. It was October, not really the time anymore. The mornings in Dallas were hard-edged with frost. Layered in my standard grunge flannels, for once the uniform would be functional. Dad got a dusty sleeping bag from the garage. I took my Walkman with my stash of favorite cassettes: Cure, Pearl Jam, and U2. The Oosterwijks were Dutch and considered quite scandalous, disseminating Harlequin books to the neighborhood girls. However, they were Catholic, and this was a Catholic-Jewish neighborhood, united against the Baptists.

We drove out to Indian country and pitched our tent in the woods. We roasted apples and bananas in the fire. I hear a lot of waxing poetic about skies choked with stars--but I tell you, when you are a child of light-polluted megacities, the first time you behold that explosion of diamond lights against the velvet coal, you will freeze in place. It was the most frightening thing, all those stars. They vibrated, they were hot and cold, they were hurtling at me from the past, their light would suck out my eyes. And it was quiet, so damn quiet. The horrible stars, like beautiful demons. I’m thirteen, I don’t get scared. But I want to cry, all this darkness, this eerie quiet, the stars blazing in expectation. What the hell do they want from me?!