the northern air cooler / wolves / pale bedsheets

'the northern air cooler'

she spent two weeks with her sunglasses on, in late september,
coming home from graduate school. her parents seemed smaller
than she remembered, the northern air cooler.

in the islands, the sun was much lower than in california.
the three of them drank moderately: father, mother, daughter,
sailing through cold blue straits and wicked fjords.

the bars of los angeles waited for her return
like earnest high school boyfriends. she didn't think of them much.

instead she slept alone, against an AM radio's gentle waves,
coming up the west coast, piped into the boat
by an antennae connected to the mast.

her dreams were too full of cocaine taquerias and scary weekend discos.
everyone aged at alarming rates. she tried to stop time with her eyelids.

late at night, she smoked on the bow of the boat at anchor. spacing out,
not even looking at the stars.


'wolves'

wolves of europe return one cold night in winter.
they land on a rooftop in hamburg germany.

with a winking, the helicopter returns to 'stealth mode'
and they descend the elevator shaft,
bringing medieval europe to the damp streets,
glistening with reflected light.

they bare their teeth and prepare for a feast
of modern European sensibility.
'it has been too long,' they snarl.


'pale bedsheets'

across pale bedsheets of my old room in seattle
i can see the backyard still looking aimlessly green.
the window is open and the sound of fall comes in.
dry-sounding snaps and rubbing noises seem realistic
and probably come from the trees and plants.
gray clouds deepen my sense of seasonal foreboding and
remembered suburban depression.

in this room, the dark wood panels
dull the ache of california and i consider what
it might be like to someday to return to this 'wasteland'
of wet shadows and distant feelings.
probably could happen.