My Life as a Bird

022.

2010-01-25T14:57:00.001-05:00

Numbers crunching better air
while sweating out the smaller share
and spicy mustard colored hair
cannot afford to be aware.

Hello. Hello. Hello.
How can i count the times you're never there?

Many many start to stare
with eyes that buy an equal pair
of undigested frozen kitchenware
for seeing double doggy dares.

Folding. Folding. Folding.
How can i count the lines you'll never tare?

021.

2010-01-25T14:54:00.001-05:00

Catch them on your tiny twinkling tongue while little wiggling wormy ones spin slendid stories, legends of life lived in treetop towers twixt the air and the bare. I know a field, near and dear to here, that will let you feel them falling, small at first then bursting big and boldly. You take two steps off and on and come on to me, feeling the spirits of day returning to burn and fade us. Glowing, blowing, calling, falling, all in an attempt to flee the scene before more of the stars come ashore to the never-ending dark that sinks and thinks and stands. It was nice when little flier fire flies that tasted like light on tiny twinkling telling tongues spun tales of bringing bubble gum.

020.

2010-01-25T14:53:00.003-05:00

Can anyone out there read me?
Can anyone see my sign?
Can anyone out there need me?
Can anyone like my kind?

Can anyone out there write me?
Can anyone give me mail?
Can anyone out there bite me?
Can anyone taste my tale?

Can anyone out there add me?
Can anyone count my toes?
Can anyone out there have me?
Can anyone like my nose?

Can anyone out there be me?
Can anyone catch a bird?
Can anyone out there see me?
Can anyone eat my words?

019.

2009-06-25T12:34:00.004-04:00

My Life as a Bird Poster

edition of 15 on 1oolb cover charcoal brown construction paper from French Paper

12.5" x 19"

018.

2009-05-29T20:46:00.000-04:00

Signal. Signal.

I read you.

In flight.

I see that.

I see you.

I know. You keep responding.

Word.

What are you up to?

Scouting tail.

Are you spotting any?

None worth the dance.

I hear that.

You see it.

It's an expression.

I know.

So, what's the problem then?

I don't know if it really works.

That's arguable.

. . .

I'm going to go picking around.

Picking around for what?

Pickings, of course.

I assumed that, but what kind of pickings?

The usual.

. . . Yeah.

Want to let me know if you spot any tail?

Nah.

Want to perch with me later?

Nah.

Really?

Yeah.

You're a dick.

Nah.

017.

2009-05-25T00:52:00.002-04:00

My cage is on fire, but there's no one here to let me out. I tried to spray the flames, but I'm no good at spitting. I guess I'll just sit here on my perch, watching my world burn. I hope you're hungry when you find me.

016.

2009-05-24T11:32:00.005-04:00

Every day I listen to you sing I lose my mind. I dig and dig until time returns. Each trip back is more difficult than the last. The one that got away, buried too deep, so far away. Little critters should not look that cute. Someday I'll see you in your little red shoes and tell you how much I'd like to meet you. Someday I'll tell you how much I'd like to eat you. The taste I've so longed to know, trapped in mine forever. Someday I'll share you with my friends. I'll tell them all how you make me feel. Forgive me for dreaming of seeing you someday. I can't help how I'll feel someday, and it's really too bad today will never be someday.

015.

2009-05-11T13:10:00.000-04:00

The funniest part of my day was also the saddest, and most likely the cause of my transcendence from stars to Yoshi. I told him, "let's wait it out," but he didn't appear to want my advice. We were doing it now or never. I suppose earlier when I had said that I would follow him to hell and back I hadn't considered I'd actually be doing it, but now was not the time for regrets or second-guessing. This was business, and business is never fun. He told me to follow his lead. I told him I would. He told me that if I couldn't handle it I could stay behind, but I told him I meant what I said. I couldn't stop now.

We entered the room together, a couple of faceless voices with eyes unseen but seeking weakness. We moved from one to the next with our ever-growing heedlessness. Hunting, hunting, hunting. Hunting until we found her. Within seconds we had descended upon her, and that's when the attack began. The words spewed from his mouth and it wasn't long before I was puking just the same. I did not control them; the words, they formed their own way out. This attack, this instinctual ravage, felt like a thousand stars burning within my cage. An ancient, secret language of the universe unlocked by squawking voices. It was heaven, ecstasy, nirvana. But then she said it... she said the words that broke the spell and doused the flames.

I'll never forget that day I followed Ben into that lesbian chat room. My memory of the girl we seduced will surely fade as I'm sure her anger when I told her, "I'm a bird, not a girl," will too.

014.

2009-05-11T13:04:00.003-04:00

Bedtime feels really nice when you think you might deserve it. After a hard day of work the night feels like a mattress. It's cool and smooth and not too heavy for you to think it. The spring of summer; sheets of darkness; the stars are blankets. Unfolding the dreams of passing is looking layers seen. The scent of flowers providing sings me into waters. I am dipping or am i skimming the feeling off worlds? A thousand suns switched on, but it is not here for me. Don't be pressed the times are lapsing into wandering. The wandering can't be left without a look from Saturn. Uncover to deliver for your best luck shows too much. Uncapped for relief of tensions, but without the surface. Lights out now be time for cooking electric wiggle seas. Don't you bother with the cover it's always been this way.

013.

2009-05-11T12:57:00.002-04:00

Meadows can't be left.
Measures always right.
Middle of the sky.
Milky film of night.

Mindless living done.
Mischief in the scene.
Moisten in the tips.
Morals not for me.

Morbid thoughts of birth.
Mortal trips to shore.
Muddled in the waves.
Murder off their worth.

Murmurs bought in minds.
Mystic worms in time.

012.

2009-04-30T13:26:00.001-04:00

I read Mary lion through her teeth,
pretending to cry and spending for relief.
Is this a trick or is it true?
Do I do the deed or leave it stew?

Surely prizes would be nice,
but light in her eyes hides some device.
I think I'll pass on that today
and leave it to her god to prey.

011.

2009-04-30T13:25:00.001-04:00

To be a leaf in the teeth of a leafy-eating lion's mane
has the crunch of tallons telling me my line was gone before I came.
Says the buzzard, "I discovered more in the curls than just a 3 course meal."
"I can't or I shant," butted in the forest. "It's more than thistle, but I insist I must conceal."

010.

2009-04-30T13:23:00.001-04:00

When I sleep I see. When I see I hear and feel the waves cycling over me. Perfect rhythms, forever beating and swaying, quiet the hissing torments of my sobriety. The numbers hold me strong and decisive with their intoxicating aromas relaxing me into blissful submission. I would be, I could be, permanent; cast about in forever to drift and glow and grow and spread, always knowing and yet I am willing.

I am willing oblivion to let me be... feelingly.

009.

2009-04-29T23:03:00.002-04:00

Don't tease me, silly girl. I know how you roll, all roley poley-like. Forget those tricks I don't want anything to do with them. I want to get straight to business, so why don't you give me a smooch and see where it takes you? Oh, come on, it's just one little peck. It's nothing to write home about. Speaking of homes, want to head back to my place? Your place? Any place? We can drink coffee. Tea. Share our feelings... Talk about books we've read? I don't know what you are in to, but I want to know. I want to know everything about you; your name, your number, your favorite dessert topping. Give me a taste. A smell? A brief but descriptive analysis? Show me what you're working with. Are you working? I want to see you work it. I'm asking nicely, aren't I? Please. Do you want me to beg? I'm begging. What more can I do? I'll do it all, anything, everything. Just give me the word. A word. A letter. A noise... Just sit there quietly? Don't move if you love me. Oh my, do you really? Do you really love me? I knew this could work out. From the moment I saw you, I knew you were the clam to my chowder, the glow to my stick, the rock to my.... Oh.... Oh no.... You're a rock. You sit so still because you are a rock, a beautifully birdy-shaped rock with such smooth surfaces and distinct shapeliness. You sit perfectly still, but you sit still because you will always love me, right? I knew it. I knew I loved you and you loved me. I am going to kiss you now. Is it okay if I kiss you now?

At first I kissed her as softly as a single snowflake landing on a freckled cheek, but as the embrace continued so did my affection, excitement and arousal. Our first loving contact became our last as she rocked and rolled down the steep bank and into the flowing stream.

Goodbye, my sweet princess. I will forever remember our time together. Or not. I forgot to press record on my hidden webcam.

008.

2009-04-28T22:27:00.001-04:00

The tiny bits feel like freckles popping their tops, letting the speckles loose. I've lost my place, but I keep write-on reading. There is no use in stopping now. I'm mopping, cropping, bebopping now. The town swells as I swoop. I fell, but my mood is definitely changing now. I wasn't aware that the dark was here, too late to tell what time it is this year. Hear it. See it. Smell it. Tell it to leave cause I need to peep. Peep-peep, beepy-sleep.

007.

2009-04-22T13:27:00.006-04:00

The answer that satisfies was a statement conceived and constructed by a trio of mice in a dark, subterranean dwelling. The absence of light may have been one factor involved in the epic failure of their translation from ideas into speech and eventually into writing. The three mice were the best and brightest of their generation, and at an early age they agreed to spend their lives unlike typical mice did. Instead of spending their precious few years of life fucking and eating and running away from various predators, wild and domesticated, they vowed that they would search out the answers to life's most important questions.

The mice spent their first year learning as much as micely possible about the world around. They explored, examined and observed all the wonders that were life, and when that first year had ended each mouse shared what he had learned about the world with the others. After much debate, the mice concurred that their second year would be spent in private contemplation, and it was. Each mouse lived an independent life, spending almost all his time (not required for daily maintenance) in peaceful cerebration. Each would lie in the shade of a tree, in the tall grass of a meadow or on a rock near the trickle of a stream, reflecting on what he had learned during his first year.

At the end of their second year, the mice came together once more. They began to describe their newly acquired ideas to one another but were quickly immersed in heated debate. They agreed that each mouse had very strong opinions and theories and discussing them would take a long time, so they decided that the third year of their lives would be spent in deliberation. Each morning the three mice would wake up, eat breakfast and then begin their discussions, pausing to routinely eat, and disputing late into the night. It wasn't long before the mice ceased to leave their hole altogether. Their days would consist of only eating, sleeping and debating.

Three days before the end of their third year, the mice came to an agreement on a single unifying answer to all of life's most important questions, but when they went outside into the brightness of day, to transcribe this answer into the written word, they had a horrifying realization. After so long in their burrow together, the mice had gone blind. They hadn't realized it had happened, being used to the complete darkness and safety of life underground, until they felt the warmth of the sun's ray, but could not see the sparkle of the world illuminated.

The micen trio were as equally heartbroken about the loss of their sight as they were concerned about how to write their final, definitive answer. The mice called out, begging for any animal that could write, to come and assist them. A bird, not unlike myself, was the first to answer the call. The mice recited their answer, asked the bird to read it back, recited again, and the bird read it back again, until both parties were positive the message had been translated properly. The mice adorned the good bird with abundant praises, but the fact of the matter was, this bird was not a good bird. He was a bad bird. He did not have any interest in the answer to life's most important questions. Basically, he just liked to party. He was a party bird, and he flew away from the three mice feeling like partying to celebrate what he had just done.

The mice had their answer framed so that it would last for a long, long time, and mounted it on a large boulder that was sure to last. Feeling proud of their lives' work, the three mice went to sleep for the last time.

For many years, thousands of animals passed the framed words and came to know them well, and even long after the frame and its contents had fallen and been swept away, animals remembered the words and passed them along to their kin. To this day I often hear the words the three wise mice never read being recited to me, "Dirty, dirty, likes to flirty, sings his name it's Billy Birdy!"

006.

2009-04-20T13:56:00.001-04:00

The water makes it hard to sleep,
or see the sum of counting sheep.
It’s cool, damp and constant beat
taps on without a blank relief.

The trickles take my time to write
lines within or out of sight.
Telling tales of waking life,
they steal the day and save the night.

005.

2009-04-17T13:00:00.003-04:00

"This is your last chance, Steven Tittle!" I screamed as I armed the switch.

. . . . .

I almost got hit yesterday. It was seriously the scariest moment of my life. I was on this mailbox around three o'clock in the afternoon, minding my own business. Watching the bees pollinate the buds on a gigantic maple tree was putting me in a good mood. I knew it would only be a few more days before the leaves really started to bust out. Big leaves on big trees means party central for me. You have no idea what kind of wild times go on behind the green curtain. Anyway, I'm just sitting there, relaxing, checking out the bees when this wild man comes barreling down the road in his sparkling new Volvo.

"Look at this assh..." is all I got out before the squealing of his tires marked his disembarkation from the pavement, and he began rocketing toward the very mailbox I was lounging on. I kicked off hard, flapping as fast as my little body would allow. I felt the car's side mirror graze my tail feathers, and then I heard the mailbox explode into a pile of toothpicks.

"WTF, BRO?" I was pissed, and this guy was just sitting in his car shaking his head. He didn't get out to see what the damage was. It didn't look like he even considered checking if there had been any victims of his recklessness. He just put his foot on the gas and sped away.

"Oh, great. A hit and run, just my luck," I fumed to no one that was listening. "Did you see the plate? Did anyone get his license plate number?" I looked around for witnesses. "No? Nobody?" No one had.

Fast forward to this morning. I was perched on a fence post a few yards from the pile of tinder that once was a mailbox waiting for a little bastard. A crow friend of mine had identified him as Steven Tittle, the man with a loaded gun that just loved shooting it off all willy-billy. Sure enough that same car came flying around a curve like spit from a shaking dog, but he had to hit the brakes hard and come to a skidding stop. I had gotten some of these shaking dogs to drag a bunch of garbage into the road, forcing any drivers to stop. Fortunately, this any driver just so happened to be Steven Tittle, my nemesis.

"Say you're sorry, dickhead," I called to Steven Tittle. He ignored me, so I yelled it, "I want an apology, fuck-nuts!" He looked at me curiously, like he had never heard a bird yell before. He shook his head and turned his attention back toward the pile of garbage preventing his passage.

"This is your last chance, Steven Tittle!" I screamed as I armed the switch.

There was no response, so I did what any respectable bird would. I blew that mother fucker out of his pretty little Volvo and straight into outer space.

"Tell your maker he's a dickhead for making a dickhead like you, Steven Tittle."

004.

2009-04-16T22:20:00.001-04:00

My heart is beating like a little kick drum. Dum da da dum dum da da da dum. These rhythms rock and roll, intertwined with my movements and the moments I feel the most alive. Like a hammer smacking a nail, I peck my way into the soil. This is where the treasure is buried and I will be the one to find it. "Feed me! Feed me!" I scream at the ants running away in terror. Their fear intrigues me. It urges me to take a closer look. I move closer.... and closer... and closer... until I eat that little bugger, swallowing him straight down to my squiggly stomach. The anticipation is gone, run out of town by satisfaction. There is nothing left to do, so I keep screaming at those little guys. I want them to feel how I feel, anxious, scared and alive.

003.

2009-04-16T22:04:00.003-04:00

She's wondering why I have these wings. I can see it in her eye. I try to call to her over the roaring of the engine, "you know I didn't ask for them, right?"

"What?" she asks. I watch her mouth moving, forming words without sound.

"My wings. I mean my wings. Did you know I didn't ask for them? I just came this way. It kind of just happened like this. No one asked me beforehand what I wanted to be like." I'm screaming so loud my throat hurts. She's looking at me like she doesn't understand what I am saying, but I continue anyway. "I really would have liked to be asked. I think if it was up to me I would be a fish. Not like a regular fish, a fish with legs made for jumping, like cat legs. No, kangaroo legs. A swimmy fish with shiny scales and kangaroo legs perfect for leaping huge distances. Wouldn't that be the number one?"

Her shade of brown compliments the green of the grass in the most pleasing way. I stop talking to take a good look at her. Her beauty is comforting. Staring at the curves and textures sends chills up my spine. I can feel it all the way to my pecker, sharp and beaky. I want her to know I admire her. I know she can't hear me so I dance instead. I hop and skip and flap all the way up and down this great branch. I pick up the pace and really start to feel it. I can sense her eye on me and I know she can feel it too; the accelerated heart rate, the tensing of muscles.

"I'd also want to sing," I shout to her.

"What?" she asks again. The droning overpowers all other sounds.

"If I would have been asked what I wanted to be like I would have been a singer. Not like pretty songs in a beautiful soprano voice. I mean like frog bass. I want to pump that bass line while I dance around in my swimmer's bod and my jumpy legs." I think about the chicks that will want to cluck at me and my new hot dancing and I feel really good. I can see her seeing me. She knows I feel good, and it makes her feel good about feeling good too. I dance some more. I want to add the bass line, but all I can get out is a fast, high-pitched arpeggio. The engine changes gear. The constant moaning turns into a rhythmic duh-duh-duh-duh-dooooo. I dance in time with it, squeaking my arpeggio over top. I can feel my heart starting to adjust its tempo to match.

I am singing. I am dancing. I am feeling real good. I look over at her, laying in the green grass with her brown body, and I love her. I love this girl because she loves the way I dance, and then I watch the lawnmower run over the snake with one eye. I dance to forget.

002.

2009-04-16T10:23:00.002-04:00

Back on my branch, perching with staunch nobility, I can see it. I can see the entire universe, and it is only by sitting perfectly still that I can see them, the little bits that are always invading my world. I can see these little bits making their way from the big ball, pausing regularly to look about. Where they are going I am not sure. I have no way of knowing if they are aware or if they particularly care which direction they are traveling. They are going where they are going, anywhere where lives can be lived.

I see one especially small little bit twirling around as he makes his way down toward the branches. He loops this way and that way, spinning up then down. He laps around branches, pausing when he meets the breeze. I continue to watch him as he twirls nearer to me. I am willing him to move closer. "Join me," I whisper to the little bit dancing in the air. With my beckoning he comes, summoned by words he does not yet understand.

Do the other buggers and flappers see the little bits? Do they feel them coming and going through their bodies? As I sit perfectly still, an inanimate observer of an animated world, I see the other animals run and jump and fly. They bounce and skip and squawk until they are hungry. They eat. They bounce and skip and squawk until they are thirsty. They drink. They repeat, redo and relive, everyday. These thoughts make me shake on the inside. My mind is quivering, and I can feel the tremors moving outward. Before the shakes can take a hold of me completely, rocking me from my perch, I see something amazing. A stem stretches, it reaches, upward, pushing leaves out to the precipice of its space to meet her. The little bit falls gently on the leaf, cushioned by a million tiny veins filled with a million tiny drops of water. They meet, the leaf and the little bit, and are one.

I stop shaking.

001.

2009-04-15T20:58:00.009-04:00

Tweet! Tweet! The prickly pines look especially piny and prickly today. I wonder if it is from the ever-shrinking proximity of the blazing orb in the sky. Sometimes I think that ball is never going to stop getting closer. It's just going to keep coming until it crashes into me. I imagine the goosebump I'll have on my head and I get a headache. It hurts to imagine a bump that big. The size of it, the awesome size of it will be enough to change the orbit of the moon. A lopsided planet swinging a grey ball around in lopsided curves. If the moon is orbiting in absurd ways, what will happen to the oceans? Will the waves and the fish and the dolphins also swim absurdly? I've heard that the moon controls the tides, but what would a bird know about such nonsense?

My stomach rumbles, and I picture a worm sliding down my throat. It's time to eat and the thrill of the hunt excites me. The wind, the sun, the grass and the worm. The hunt is on and I will not turn off.

. . . . .

Would you believe me if I told you I caught the biggest worm I have seen in my entire life?... I didn't think so. I wouldn't believe me either. Exaggeration defines socialization. I read that in a scrap of newspaper I once used to pad my nest. I'm not precisely sure what it means or what it refers to, but sometimes when I remember it I feel better. I feel better about the life I live and the lives of other living things. We walk or crawl or fly or slither or stand and there is nothing to do but talk about how life is so much better than it actually is. We lie, and we know everyone else is lying also. We connect because of our lies. Our lives are livable because the lies we tell each other. I think about this and I feel that everything is all right. I imagine a world with no lies and the urge to peck out my own eyes is unbearable. I sing to forget.