Poet Wrestling with Happy Little Clouds
—After Bob Ross
We try to make our cities last a while. By beating
the devil from our brushes. & highways. My B
creates programs & code. The kind that makes strangers
see. The little distant trees {as}. Living. Far back in the distance.
My husband tries to make things. Better. He tries to fix. He tries. To realize.
Other people’s intentions. When I am with him. I feel I could make a city.
Forever. & serene. As wet-on-wet painting. That takes centuries. To dry. & realize. Orange
-stone. Façade. Steel. Interstates. A little pink. In the sky. The rest, all little X’s. Glimpsed
{from bullet}
trains. Yet think. On such a world, high-speed & purely. Civil. How we’d put in so much detail
passing everything. So quickly. A world so advanced it’s only. Form, shape, basic
color. We try, he. & I. Making our city last longer. As a way. To explain.
Away. Why we left nature. Only to return. As otherworldly. & traitors. I’m sorry
{& foully,}
fluffy little escapes. My B always has a plan. Since I never do. Since I’m more
like you, errant & uncaring & quite often oblivious of specific well-
being. Since when I write I’m ripping apart & shedding. From unorthodox
brushes. & little string clouds that live. Right. In those highways. Here I can do
anything that I want to, any old thing. But my B. Tries To make. Our cities.
Where still water is always level. While I. Whatever any illusion you want. & I don’t
know where any of you go— it doesn’t matter. Maybe a city is a thing already
dying. Until naked. As a bunch of skeletons & rotten wiring. Hanging out
here in your eyes— but even then, my B would still believe. Who I will be. As who
I was. When.
Tomorrow, as sure as a row
of gravestone. & maybe I’ll fall
too. Like what was done to you,
{made} acid
& sulfuric, wearing down all that came from
what you grew, what we can only hammer
& chisel & scribble
unto. Such desperate, desperate.
Love. Who knows then just what
& how I too
will erode.
The very good words meant
to summon a me. After you.
How we will cleave. A few. 1s
& 0s
{tap, tap}
falling
on bared knee
