I take off my shirt and she giggles

 

I take off my shirt and she giggles

Trainee, a med tech who looks like
a high school girl in a white lab coat.
Treadmill, a stress test to measure
my heartbeat while I stride. First
she reviews a sheet of instructions.
Looks up, and she giggles.
“Excuse me but I have to shave
your chest hair so the electrodes
will stick.” Behind her a nurse, older,
arms folded, watches scowling.

From a can the tech squirts Barbasol
in white foamy circles, then scratches
with a BIC disposable razor, pink.
“Am I hurting you?”
I assure her it’s fine, it feels like the belly
of a mouse running over my chest.
Looks up, eyes wide.
“Does that happen often?”  

Leans in, brow furrowed,
tip of tongue at corner of mouth.
Her breath on my damp skin
like the touch of butterfly wings.
Works left-handed, razor between
thumb and middle finger which seems odd
until I notice her index finger is missing
above the second joint. I want to ask
What happened? What accident?
Am I your first chest? but such questions
seem somehow too intimate even as
her razor is circling my left nipple.
For the first time in my life I wonder
how my nipples compare to other men.

A throat clears.
Trainee and I both swing our eyes
to the nurse who grins and says
“Next time you’ll use the electric shaver
like the rest of us. Okay?”
Trainee puts hands to mouth.
Then bursts into laughter.
She’s been hazed. And by chance, I.

A doctor opens the door:
“What am I missing?”
Nurse says “Nothing. I’ve got this.”
Trainee presses electrodes to my hairless skin.
Adjusts a dial, flips a switch.
Already she’s older.
Tells me to match the pace of the machine.
Ready to test my heart.

…..

First published in Broadkill Review. Thank you editor Kari Ann Ebert

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Chocolate Fudge

 

Chocolate Fudge

Gently we shake the quilt,
wake the boy who sleeps with
Chocolate Fudge, a bear.
Through dark streets we drive
silent bear and wide-eyed boy
without a sip of water or bite of food.

We act normal as if there is a normal
while in a bright room the nurse offers
boy and bear a choice of gowns,
blue or white. Choices—
we wish for more.

Nurse lets the boy push the big button
opening double metal doors to surgery.
In his too-large blue paper gown,
blue paper slippers, hair sticking up as usual,
he enters, pivots toward us—a quick
goodbye wave—a smile. Doors close
with a sound like a gulp.

We hold Chocolate Fudge
wrapped with blue crinkly gown
in a grip so fierce he might die.

…..

First published in Sheila-Na-Gig. Thank you editor Hayley Mitchell Haugen.

Note: Boy and bear, now age 43, are fine. They are also fine musicians. The instrument the bear is playing is an electric mandolin, built by boy long ago. 

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@joecottonwood

April 22, Morning Walk

 

April 22, Morning Walk

Panicky cheeping to my ears.
A dozen ducklings in a storm drain
deep as I am tall
can't climb can't fly can't escape
except down the big pipe.
Mama duck above the drain
stands frantic, flapping and quacking.

So I lower myself
into gloppy gunk over my ankles.
Scoop with my clasped hands
twelve fuzzy wigglers
with underbellies of slime
one by one
and set them above.

Mama duck warns of discipline
as smelly ducklings in a peepy line
follow her to cattails, and gone.

I resume my walk in mucky shoes,
socks stinking of rot.

Had to do it. Right?
Happy Earth Day.  

(And some day, when I’m in the drain
will you do it for me?)

…..

First published in Storyteller Poetry Review. Thanks to editor Sharon Waller Knutson

photo by Alexis Fotos

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Dear crazy-ass librarian: Thank you

 

Dear crazy-ass librarian: Thank you

for removing book jackets
because, you said,
covers were slick, slipped, took up space,
would get lost anyway
and we nasty children might tear them
but worst of all they sometimes lied

which was asinine, my mother thought
while she volunteered there
so she brought fresh covers home
where I read them
my sister crayoned them
my brother made airplanes of them
and then we cut, we joined
into big collages smelly with paste
until the school fired you, librarian,
after parental revolt
and your replacement wanted
all the covers back.
Oops.

Here, the ragged covers and ever after
please may we uncover new ideas.
May we color each day crayon bright.
May we fly on fancy,
may we connect meanings
to a larger pattern
and then with thanks
may we give back.

…..

First published in I-70 Review. Thank you editors Maryfrances, Gary, and Greg
Note: My mother and the book jackets is a true story. This happened in the 1950s when most books had plain dull hardback binding with colorful paper covers. Nowadays, the hardback binding is often just as colorful as the paper wrappers.

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@joecottonwood

Cathartes aura

 

Cathartes aura

April, three weeks into lockdown
and the phone rings in California.
A doctor in a Manhattan hospital informs us
Janelle has been admitted with Covid-19.
We’re next of kin.  

Atop a fence post outside our window
a turkey vulture hunkers down in the mist,
red-masked as if for virus protection.
Cathartes aura has an acute sense of smell
for ethyl mercaptan, the gas produced
in early stages of decaying meat.
Can it smell New York?

Cathartes means “purifier”
from the Greek word, same root as catharsis.
And aura is also from Greek
meaning “breeze, breath.”

The brave doctor holds an iPad over Janelle
enclosed in a clear plastic womb, Facetime
to say goodbye. She’s barely alive,
low blood oxygen, a white mask over mouth
but maybe we see a wan smile. Maybe not.
We end with “Hope to see you soon”
because we mean it.

On the fence post Cathartes aura
spreads wings to dry like laundry on a line.
Branches sway softly, a puff of pure air.

…..

First published in Califragile. Thank you Wren Tuatha, editor.
Photo by V J Anderson

Note: It’s true. A vulture, in fact about 9 vultures, perched atop a redwood tree outside our house and watched us as we watched “Janelle” breathe her last breaths in New York. And I ache, remembering those times.

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@joecottonwood

Fuel

 

Fuel

Wildfire we escaped
with only the clothes on our backs
and the phones in our pockets

We lost pajamas, photos,
heirlooms, gardens,
love-letters, toothbrush, car—
lost the entire house,
the physical structure of our lives
now ash, now rubble

Lost the piano
but not the song
Lost the pen
but not the poem

Structure of spirit
still stands—

We burn
with a different flame

…..

*The “we” of this poem is not me but the voice of beloved friends and family who lost everything in the LA fires. 

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@joecottonwood

Leaf Tattoo

 

Leaf Tattoo

A boy named Craig in second grade
shorter than me but stronger
lifted a stone size of a hubcap
and dropped it on my head
digging a divot of hair and flesh
lubricated by red blood
astonishing us both.
Craig picked up my scrap of scalp
and dangled it dripping from fingers,
couldn’t answer why as teachers came running
but it was the last we saw of Craig.

From that day
I had a bald spot, a scar like a dead leaf
top of my head
which seemed not part of me
but carried by me
inanimate
detached like senseless violence.

A bold girl named Betsy
touched it once and let me
touch her nipple. Just one touch,
one nipple. Then we threw stones into water
to watch them splash and sink
and disappear.

Sometimes yet in autumn
when the leaves let go in breeze
with a sound like Betsy’s whisper
I see that nipple a tattoo that glows and grows
giving, giving
against the luff of air
as we flutter, as we briefly fly.

…..

First published in Black Coffee Review. Thank you editor Dave Taylor.

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@joecottonwood

To a hummingbird warrior

 

To a hummingbird warrior

Sparkling you hover,
staring into my eyes. You intimidate
with har-oom of wings.

This coffee my only nectar
with a squirt of canned whipped pseudo-cream
which embarrasses me, my love of fluffy crap
while you, tiny bird, need glucose to survive.

A man with weed whacker
clears a drainage ditch by the road,
works nearer, nearer whining like a
giant mosquito in a cloud of gasoline fumes,
nearer wearing bug-eye goggles,
bright orange ear guards,
nearer bright yellow safety vest
like a toxic flower.

Zip a green bullet you fly.
You poke his face. A gloved hand swats.
Winged syringe, you stab his neck.
He lifts weed whacker as an ungainly club
swinging mortal combat to your fragile bones
but the cutting string slaps his leg.
Startled he drops the machine and—
Zip you fly toward our rose garden.

Har-oom har-oom.
May my coffee be so sweet,
my life so pure, so tiny brave.

…..

First published in Sheila-Na-Gig. Thank you editor Hayley Mitchell Haugen.
Painting by Katie Col

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Bury Me in a Redwood Forest

 

Bury Me in a Redwood Forest

May redwood roots tickle my bones.
May my blood rise as tinted sap.
May my arms lift as limbs to sunlight,
    may I embrace the rain.

May these muscles bear massive growth,
    may they bend and flex
    through squall and storm.
May the once-abundant hair of my body
    become filaments of shaggy bark.
May fingers and toes become needles of green,
    may the chickadee clutch with tiny feet.

May my dreams flow to cones, become seed.
May my words whistle with the wind
    spreading stories, tall tales.

May the hawk build a nest at my crown,
    may the fox hover at my hollow.
May my unworthy spirit surge
    with the glory of sequoia.

May I resist the rot, repel the insect,
    and when at last I fall
may I be sectioned, milled, notched and nailed,
may I become the soul of a house
    peopled with children,
    crafted with love.

…..
From my book Foggy Dog

First published in Red Eft Review—thank you editor Corey Cook
Photo by Casey Horner on unsplash

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Rough Cut

 

Rough Cut

Let us praise beauty imperfect.
Tough lumber, stubborn
resisting the blade.

Fallen trees, local,
plus driftwood of the northern coast,
free for salvage.

Crazy grain
from growth against the odds
twisting for sunlight.

A crafter’s hand and mind,
a little rough around the edges.
Heartfelt.

Sanded, oiled, yet
flawed. Please,
don’t change a thing.

…..

Note: I’ll dedicate this poem to my dear old woodworker friend James (Jim) Adams. He died this past week. Here’s a link to more about him: James Adams, Local Salvage

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@joecottonwood