Produce
Posted by Garrett Carey | Filed under Poetry, Print
to
waste a
bounded youth
running from the
cursory promise
of happiness lying
in an untidy room and
licking coffee from the roof of
our mouths, to cattle-prod the hide of
hope and die alone with our cheeseburgers
Simple Plan
Posted by Garrett Carey | Filed under Poetry, Print
I,
like most,
have stories
to tell. And my
stories, like most are
more important than all
others, so I learned a few
big words, practise a few turns of
phrase in hopes of bribing you all to
listen to me more. It’s working so far.
Bryant Park
Posted by Garrett Carey | Filed under Poetry, Print
I don’t know what a girl is
sometimes,
the small of a back
peeking, shy,
a secret spoken in an outside voice;
a good day,
when one should decide
to breathe upon you,
seems foreign, magical.
I see her, lying,
testing the cold grass toe-first
in an invisible patch of Manhattan -
jazz whispers in the background
like a jealous ex-girlfriend,
a movie scene.
I am sure I see her
a little uncomfortable
at the peak of my
dream-woven everything
but I don’t really know what
“seeing”
means.
Kissing is easier. You can feel
the borders
when you reach them,
map them.
Everywhere
there is a misplaced fantasy
forlorn. The hoola-hoopers
are close, but oblivious
and almost Burtonesque
in their brazen eccentricity.
The watchers are
watching. The listeners
are listening. In three minutes,
a siren
will nudge its way between us
as if the world resented being forgotten
even for a moment.
This is a girl.
It is a good day,
or
at the very least,
I think it is.
At Sea
Posted by Garrett Carey | Filed under Poetry, Print
People always tell me
it wasn’t my fault. There was nothing
I could do, her depression
was beyond my control, I loved her
harder and longer than anybody could;
half of life is just
showing up.
It’s natural
to offer a patch of consolation
to a wounded friend
when you, like nearly everyone
lack the needle
or the medical skills to stitch them up,
but there is always something
I could have done, always
some point I can be better,
some eye contact, some curl
of the lip, some honest human
reversion to dopey, sundrunk courtship
with all the tiny wonders
to blur the big looming questions of life
into the background.
I could have found a way
to anchor her to a reality bent and
burning under the millennial pressure
of love too silly to know it has a definite place
in time. There was a right moment
to lean over and remind her
through the gloss of her tears
that she has a favorite flower,
an ice cream shop in Queens,
a first time. To be touched
lovingly is to fold
all of your possible futures
back on to your single, lonely past
and let them crush it out of existence.
It’s simple magic,
honest, endless, cheap.
The truth is
there is no destiny or duty
to a life at sea. Sailors set out
because they’d rather miss home
than be there.
