Take Comfort in Roadkill

She is more sad than roadkill. Her chirps more mournful than the screech of tires. Her energetic movements more wrenching than the glazed eyes that litter roads. Her and roadkill, victims of progress, unrecognized sacrifices for no higher purpose. Both there, neither understanding why. Roadkill and her.

I spotted her in the Hilfiger department, perfectly perched, juxtaposed in front of an advertisement. A clothes line, a crystal sky, a lush field. Judging by her beautiful song and energetic movements, she probably thought spring had arrived. It hadn't. Outside of the false stale heat of the department store, it was still crisp, frigid winter. Out there, the roadkill froze. In here, she thought she found refuge. Of course, with her birdbrain, she thought wrong. In here, she found a song far sadder than any sung before.

She flew in from outside, attracted by the warmth of the mall. She dipped over the glass windows, zipping through a small crack where a rafter met a pane. The moment she entered, drawn in by the dull hum and sanctity of warmth, her fate was sealed. She didn't know of the translucency of glass, or the probability of finding another crack. She only knew warmth.

Below, the froth of humanity flowed back and forth, bubbled up elevators, rippled through aisles and aisles of clothing. Purple shirts. Red pants. Corduroy, denim, plaid, pleated. Spring jackets, winter coats. Shirts with birds on them. Pants made from road kill. A million articles for a single purpose, warmth.

Having already conveniently solved that problem, she flitted around without a care on her small heart. She sucked into the department store at the end of the mall, dancing around, pecking at the gum on the carpet. Unfortunately, the food court sat at the other end of the mall. She'll never find it, or the pet store, or giant fountain, or any other part of the mall a bird might enjoy. She'll never find that crack, that ticket outside. She'll never find her nest, or her mate, or a branch, or a cloud.

Because no matter what instincts God gave her, no matter how many times she had flown before, today was her last flight. No amount of skill or instinct could guide her to that small chip in the window. She's lost. She's chirping now. Eventually that will change. Within a few weeks, just as the dirty snowdrifts in the parking lot are melted by spring, she will fall silent. The pretzel crumbs and candy wrappers will no longer sustain her. She will die of starvation. By the time her chirps turn to screeches, real warmth, not false, will have brightened the outside. By the time her curious pecks at the gum on the carpet become desperate, winter will have dripped into spring. By the time she dies of starvation, lost in a world of Hilfiger and Kaufmanns, I will have alreayd forgotten the fate of a poor bird lost in a department store.

There are fates worse than roadkill. To go quickly, ignorant, never knowing of the entrapment in a larger web. That is something we can all hope for; a peaceful spot between the yellow striped lines where we are gone before the second car even passes. But to be lost, truly lost - therein lies the life I fear. Trapped in a world of commercial posters, neon signs, corporate fireworks. Never actually recognizing the difference between the beauty of spring outside and the spring on the Hilfiger ads. Becoming so entranced in the sights and sounds of a developing world that we lose the crack in the facade that lets us back outside.

That is more sad than roadkill.

Float

yingling_creative4
Originally uploaded by jsyingling.

I never wondered if the butterfly was landing or if the shoe was taking off.

I believe that schizophrenic butterflies emerge from the cocoons of claustrophobic caterpillars.

I think smoking a butterfly would make me high, even if science couldn't prove it.

Flippy

Nope. Never thought I’d be writing this when I was cleaning duckshit out of a baby pool with a hose in fifteen degree seven a.m. conditions. In case you are wondering, that’s cold enough to make the greenish-white dribble freeze to the fluorescent plastic. I had a spatula reserved for mornings like that. Or maybe you are more interested in the duck than in the shit. Flippy was her name and she was nothing more than a duck, in fact, she was less: she was a runt. But when I wasn’t cleaning up after her I think I loved her. She couldn’t quack, only imitate broken squeezie toys. And she couldn’t fetch, only half waddle with a bum wing and the cutest

pair of polished eyes ever bought at the glass bead store. She was scared of water and ran around confused and pooping whenever we filled her green pool up with the hose. Yea, Flippy was special. She might not have known she was a duck but she knew me, loved me and not just because I was the first one to see her and her watery deposits every morning. When that raccoon or fox or beast came to get her and the other duck we raised, she said “this one’s on me, this is my family.” Pretty brave for a stunted little duck. Hey Flip, I know there's lots of toast and crispex up there, but in case you've paused to wonder, you were my family too.

Catch and Release

My dad’s keychain was a fish out of water, resin scales and glass eyes and chipped paint from years of ins and outs of denim pockets, driving to soccer games, hardware stores, golf courses, but never fishing. That, he never taught me, but not for lack of knowing. He had his fishing stories. His voice flowed through the lighter parts, rippling when it spoke of loss; Grandpa passed, maybe, ten years ago now. He said I could have his tackle box but that’s not really what I want; I need

him to know he taught me everything one can learn from blackberry hued morning water and the delicacy of weighted lines without ever going fishing. I don’t know what the whirl of currents means or where to land the sinker when the water is cloudy, but I do know that this life is about respect, patience. I know that the pond isn’t half empty but half full and that no matter how hard the fight or big the fish, sometimes, it’s right to just let him go.

Infinite

Infinity equals two graduates and one hundred seventy five grams. Their imposter marching band mans our field, their parents are permanent tenants that rent our stands. I remember thinking high schoolers get younger every summer. Strange, their present is our past two weeks former, but some sonorous sights are familiar foreigners, echoed brass booms of hollow air made full. I remember knowing their band was mint, but we were golden and we were infinite in that dimly lit bowl. I remember feeling their gaze on our smooth lazy throws, their elderly envy of our

youth. The frisbee flew from the hand of a graduate, a highlit dove scattering moths and bats, impossible streaking satellite or startrail, shooting, sprinting, shining, brightening the sky and blinding the stars. I remember head down, fleet, burn, my feet churn chase the disc but he calls “short, short” - turn, about face to see it fall back down to mortal curve of earth. Surely, it was too long, and had already belted the world. I remember growing to face the impossibility of our mortality under the eyes of our replacements.

Leftovers (revised)

Fish bowl –
..........everything evapor
................................ates.
......(they never could keep it alive)

Three socks –
...lost........without
.........................mates.
......(she thinks she’s only missing two)

Ink hearts –
........scrawled on un
......................washed skin.
......(he doesn’t need her reminders now)

Sheet stains –
...........wrappers........in a
...................waste.............bin.
......(they did that more than laundry)

Whiteboard –
...................felt....tip...love
.................notes un............erased.
......(she might not mean that anymore)

Hair ties –
.........now lost,.....not mis
....................................placed.
......(he liked it when her hair was
................................................ down)

Dust –
....and dead
.........skin.....how
...............many are....pieces.....of us and how
............many.... did she...caress......and how
....................many..........................did I kiss?

Exposure

Two things in this photograph (space and matter) distance
between bodies and a heart that feels emptiness
in mouths and tongue that seals shadows
from windows and eye that sees gaps
between fingers and flesh that fills
matter turns to space in black
holes but space disappears
whenever we touch this
matters and I can’t
get my mind
over your
matter
one
.

Spark (revised)

I.
You’ve got that feeling, it’s electric, boogiewoogiewoogiewoogie.

II.
Take two charged wires, two inches apart, and sparks fly.
If only our lips were conductors and love a current
that complied to laws of electrical attraction.

But no. Sometimes sparks don't fly.
If two inches doesn't work on Tuesday,
try on Wednesday. If three don't work
on Thursday, try nine on Friday.
Never kiss her without the spark--
it will be your last
because the love is dead
on the table. No paddles
can revive you.

III.
People want last kisses
like they want old
batteries. Lips are cold
in last kisses -- it's how
we know the warmth
is gone, how we know
the rubber insulation is
stripped exposing
cold cruel copper
wire.

Intervention Incognito

Are you innocence or inner thighs,
could we incapsulate your innate lies?

Before I’m incinerated
infernos and innuendos.
Before I’m incarcerated
inshrined and intertwined.

There’s inner beauty in this innovation,
is this an injury or an infatuation?

Blistered Mysteries

It was merely a moment,
monumental in what it meant,
momentous in its break with
the monotony of her blistered mysteries.

No longer your history versus our present.
No longer his poetry versus my content.
No longer new romances versus second chances.
No more need to decipher glances or fear the advances,
from his hands into our plans,
that cull, instigate,
dull, disintegrate,
your morale integrity
for all we be.

For a moment, no more
me wondering if she meant assured.
when she insured our love
as she wanders on adventures.

Why no insurance fee on your assurance
of the honesty of our romance?
Why assure me you like me the best,
turn this into a contest,
when we know you've said it to the rest?
What were you sure of?
Isn't the whole fact
that we can't preach about each intact shore
as long as time can breach the barriers,
from sands and sparks to hands and hearts?

Love needs no insurance,
no fee for the transferance
of enough of you into me
to complete me.

Honestly, for a moment there was
no more competing,
no more past repeating.

At last
for a moment,
for what it meant,
you could reach me,
and I could teach you.

It wasn't you and me and all the other people.
It was us and them
then just us and him.

Then, for a moment-
justice, just us.
No versus,
just verses of us.