thursdays

there is no such thing

2012-02-29T22:42:00.001-06:00

there is no such thing
as a kingdom within

many have preached a fact without knowing
even more have believed without evidence.

the sum of certainty has tainted the cow
and left the owl wildly unsatisfied.

one must be the jester to keep sane
when fire spewing dragons assert
a land within. nonsense joe boo!

obeah is for crazies, magic hokus pokus
for intelligence unvisited.

kingdom of heaven is a euphemism
for idiocy.

writing a poem whilst listening to a poem...

2012-02-18T23:59:00.001-06:00

the spit of ahjushis
frozen to the pavement
a permed halmuni kicks a plastic bag
up the one of millions of alley ways
this one being known to me
this one leading to a
hwajangsil...

the shape of their actions
heavy forming
in my mouth
she kicks the space
between tongue
and roof

i dont want to taste his spit
frozen in the pavements of
my mind

turning up my own street
my mind's legs
walk towards the hwajangsil
seeing the things we once
sharpied on the walls
(love notes
no longer valid
inside some illustrated red apple
now crossed out by keys)
(but im speaking of another
hwajangsil
thats further up the street...)

each day
i am making peace
with a past that i cannot
fully see
may never fully know

i am lines of blood
my own red string(s)
i am his spit
her kick
those silly notes of love
scrawled on bathroom walls
throughout this neighborhood

and in each act
of him
and her
and me
i am finding
the return
to
some body-known
beginnings.

born of this soil
born of this river
i am this place
this place
is me.

kim thompson. sun 19 feb. 2012. 15.00 seoul. s. korea

jarred thoughts (for the armerdings)

2012-02-17T03:33:00.000-06:00

*per katia's request... for malcom armerding and his mother and his family who loved him...

hand me your tears
drip them into my palms
and i'll dig a riverbed for you
with my feet

we'll burrow
beneath the earth
in the soil of
others regrets
staying warm till spring

youll whisper all your pain
i'll turn them into
poems
for you to float out
into the eastern seas

we'll meet somewhere
mid-pacific
speaking the
specific
walking on water
like we're our own saviours
- unsinkable.

i have this life ive lived
to speak to you
this life ive lived
to finalize in ink

but each day
when night begins
i empty words
out from their jars
spread them out on some
imaginary table
count them up
to see what i can cash

before heading out
to bury all our wishes
beneath
moonlight
to water with
your
tears.

this is how
trees
become
books
and how
words
become
the lives contained
inside these
forests
of the jars of
vocabulary
we collected in the
summer's heat.

i want to tell you
want you to know...

i will keep
your
salt water
safe
in this bottle of
soiled
rooting
verses

until you wake
and see the sun.

kim thompson. 18.33 on friday 17 feb 2012. seoul. s. korea

for you, little brother, that i always wanted

2012-02-15T03:21:00.002-06:00

walking through the park at night
looking for the back of your head

the life i may have lived
am living
in another world
(how many times each day
do we pass ourselves
never seeing?
only
wondering
"what if?")

hongik's gate
arching off the sky
"where i wouldve gone"
-- and are you beatboxin' in the park tonight?
-- did we just pass never knowing only both thinking
"umma" ?

are we the chubby cheeked
hand in hand
children running up the street?
(i coulda sworn those were our ghosts when smiling for false memory)

and does our dongsaeng know i went to paris first?
back when she was still dreaming of the day?
(and whose footsteps do i follow?
usually i just say "langston's")

how close are we every night
in the artist's park?
b-boys
round a boombox
how is it that we can be so
related?

here in this land of the ever great river of
"if-han"
i am building bridges to find you
will we ever intersect?
(i carry you in my pockets)
or maybe this bridge is for
my own return to
my own
need for knowing
"then"

... tell me little brother
how long
should i look for your (dreaded) head of hair
in the park of boomboxes and beats?
(we are so related)

and will our sisters
even care?

and will our mother weep?

tell me life
that i never got to live
how long
do i look for you
here in the land of
the great
"whatif"?

because so many days
i think i pass the answer
on the street
and smile
from the park
in between the shouts and beats
from near to where
this if
began to
fall apart
somewhere up the street from this
giant
arch.

kim thompson. wed 15 feb. 2012. seoul. s. korea. sometime in the late afternoon

poe-et-try

2012-02-08T21:39:00.000-06:00

youre this longing
in the center
of my
breath

youre the in and out
of every
hale.

winging out
wider than any
flutter
by.

where are you?
where did you go?
when will you emerge
from your
dormancy
of cocooning?

when will i see your brilliance?
when will i see your see through
flimsy paper
stained glass window
wings?

i used to live in a field of
moths
with rare monarchs
and blue bottomed things...

today this field
seems so
barren
cut off from language
(by my own doing)
(only 입양 and 시인
can understand the
emotional trauma of
language lost/sold out from
under them)

im standing here
arms wide spread open
like im about to take flight
just waiting
for some wind
to lift me

waiting for the volume of words
that rush across the tops of
field grasses
out of the seeming nowhere
all the way into the being of me
lifting me
even when not moving

i am waiting for that whisper
for your wings to brush against my cheek
waiting for you to tell me
in the cacophony that only you can create
that you are here
and we have symphonies to create.

my heart has been broken and duct taped
back together
more times than i can count
i am a walking cathedral window like
notre dame's divinity...
waiting for your light
to shine
through all my colors.

a person
i can live without

but you words
you poems
you well cadenced sentences

without you
i learn what "longing"
truly means

you are the reason that i came here
you are the reason i will leave
you are the reason why i now stay
waiting each and every day
for the if and when of your
appearance at my door

(you have always been
"the reason.")

lovers... they have been many
coming and going at any momentary whim
each one sacred for
the words left behind
to be reshaped into
stories
poems...

this urban concrete jungle
a field
in which words sneak up and out
from between the narrow alley ways...
from in between the steam pouring out
from the windows of 만두 sellers
from in between the heels clicking on the streets
from in between the shouts and spits of
아저씨's and 아줌마's
there is poetry and beauty in
each
and
every
thing...

but some days
this urban concrete jungle
can seem just purely
urban
and concrete
and
windless...

and
when other poets write
of love and desire for another's flesh
i am always certain what they really mean is
"i long for
poetry."

-- kim thompson. 12.40 9 feb 2012. seoul. s. korea

snow...

2012-01-31T04:39:00.001-06:00

you think me
open.

that i tell the world
all there is.

that every thing experienced
becomes
some form of
public
domain

... but i...

i am like this
snow

sharing being
the act of
evaporation
of whats already been
let go

and your lives
are just backdrops to mine
just as mine
is to yours

and the sacred
the few
...
there are so many
stories
i'll never tell
at best
at times
alluding
showing a drop
from the ocean
beneath
that most think rain...
but only if you were there
swimming beside
would you even know
the salt
of which i flavor
these pages with...

my life
it is like
tonight's short lived snow
collecting
being swept away
and melting

but my heart
it is like these streets
solid
open
well lined
spaces
which
absorb
the things
that flutter down from
the skies...

and
i go back now to the first days of
december
back again to the alps
and again to the fortresses of europe
and sit down on the wall perched above vilnius
meandering through forest paths
and still throwing chips to gulls off the isle of mull

and these things
like this snow
i show
to the world
but
all
other things
like all the sentences i never write
but sleep and wake to

those are mine.

thats why youll never hear me speak of those donkeys
or those nights in the cellar
or where the time capsule is stashed...

all things i hold dear
they are
like these stones on my shelf
more solid than snow
to others just stones
to me
they are streets
bars
friends
different days in the 20s
an engraved fish
and old dm's from covent g.

you think me open
saying all that i contain
never knowing
how little ive ever spoken

you think me a blizzard
not an inlet running under your feet
out into expanses so great...

you forget
that just as you do not think of me
each and every moment
i think of you in the same way.

our stories are like this snow
the things i speak aloud
already gone

i can count on one hand
the actual only
full oceans ive ever shown...

you see...
like this snow
that fell and is now
going to some other place...

i really am
no different
than
you...

so much of life
just
melts
on the
tips of
our tongues.

kim thompson. tues. 31 jan 2012 19.39 seoul. s. korea.

if...

2012-01-26T05:13:00.001-06:00

"if..." -- a poem i wrote last night (25 Jan 2012) and experimented with today on the computer... here is the youtube link to the poem (short piece)

http://youtu.be/unGeaPoZET4

kim thompson. 20.17 thurs. 26 jan. 2012. seoul. s. korea

the affair

2012-01-24T23:35:00.000-06:00

i grow weary of
blurry faces
forgotten names
and dates

my pockets heavy breaking
with stories of
random places
where we did
what we did

bored with my own
re-tellings
too tired from
all the running
and using
and accumulating of numbers

i awake now these days
to a warehouse of
forklifts moving cargo to the sides
the immensity of this space
being cleared
not to refill with many
but with
one
(or so my dreams seem
to be repeating)

keys in my hands
the exhaustion
of the past
receding
and eyes re-focusing
there are only doors to open.

i know this world
and what i can take from it
i know this world
because i have well lived in it
many beauties have been known
and
i know this world
because i have stolen cheated
deceived and misled
my way into moments
that meant so little
i know this world
and what it has to offer
because freely have i taken from it...

and now i know of this world
just how
beautiful
this thing i lied and said i didnt want
(but always did)
oh so truly
is.

kim thompson. wed. 27 jan. 2012 14.36 seoul. s. korea

language lessons...

2012-01-17T01:07:00.000-06:00

"so how do you?"
she asks
...
and upon hearing my
"uhhh i ...
i really
i...
dont know..."

she smiles and says
"ahh... (안다) its because you have
능력자"

explaining
the street slang value
and telling me
"thats a very good thing to have
i think.
because then you dont have to
do
anything.
youre very lucky"

... "ermm...
no...
not lucky
i mean
ermmm
its not like that..."
wishing i had a cigarette...
(which evidently
seems to be half the key to "my"
"능력자")
flustering...
"im not...
i mean
i dont go out
thinking like
... that...
im
not
that kind of person"

she smiles nods...

"its not good
because
then i dont know what
or how
to do
when i need to
like... with
this..."

she smiles and nods..

gesturing open palmed up
to the empty brown tweed cushion
to my right
that id just been previously mocking as a
way to explain
stieg larssen's style of tolstoy-esque writing...

"cuz ive never had to
and
so i dont know
how to now..."
(and 35s kind of old to
not know
what i guess everyone
else has for years)
-- carry on the unspoken thoughts

"but im learning now."
i tell her
... earnestly...
"im really trying."

explaining
how we have these fears
-- leaving out the "입양"
to explain that "we" ("우리")
leaving out the "very deep seeded" between the
"these"
and
"fears"--

making finger feet walking gestures
from a left closed hand
to an open handed
right
"we want to get from
here
to
here...
but dont know how to..."

... "but
i'm trying"
i confess

"i really am..."

... she nods

and repeats

"anyway...
you...
i think
have
능력자
and youre lucky."

and i
smile
and nod

with a reluctant acceptance
and wonder
who the teacher in this conversation
really
is

repeating to myself
"lucky."
"능력자."

lucky.

kim thompson. tuesday 17 jan 2012. seoul. s. korea. 16.08

thinking back to...

2012-01-16T04:23:00.001-06:00

the sex stained sheets
and the acrobatics
of listening

back when
things were once a seeming
eternity
the bed creaking
against the floorboards
threatening to bring down the curtains
and the blinds
a sort of
violence
in the sweetness of some kind of
otherworldly exchange
and the moon
peered in
not saying a word
and the scent of lilacs
filled the morning air
and there was no residue
only oxygen

and how we broke the frame
and we'd only met 3 hours before
maybe 4
and how the alpine sun shone through
the walls
and we pulled hay from our clothes
and
driving through the dolomites
we stopped to "ahh" at the stars
and milky way
above
with venice running through our minds...

and how i once loved you
to the point of
even vitmn water on the shelves of kowalskis
would break my heart to
recall
all the things i
never said
like
"love"

and that b&b
and how you kept disappearing
saying
"finished"
but would always reappear
and id say
"begin"
till you became this kind of
habit

and you had this sort of madness
in those 6 inch stilettos
and we'd wake entwined
blurry eyed
fuzzy brained
saying
"oh
ha
hi"

and i always knew you werent
right for me
but i could never stay away
cuz youd call
and i
was
bored
and
restless
and in need
of something
to tame

and we would spill our drinks
all over the floors
not caring
about everything that
got knocked off the tables

and when my path
would cause me to
pass your house
id let out some kind of sigh
even though id never loved you

and then id count the number of
houses
that id drive past in a matter of miles
sighing at
and
laugh to myself
and sigh again

and how you serenading was
the worst thing ever
and only vodka made it
tolerable
but that was when i was more
greedy

and i didnt even know your name
im still not sure

and i know we shouldnt have
but we did
and karma made sure to
pay me back for that one

and i didnt know you were
there with her
or i wouldnve brought you home
but i guess its ok
because i still guess at your name too...

and how i threw hardboiled eggs against the wall
and you bit my lip
and i felt like i was being returned to a place
that no longer wanted me
and you were
the most beautiful id ever seen
that i couldnt speak for two years
and we would
laugh about that
poem
that goddamn
stupid
silly
poem
and how everybody stared
and
i told you how i dislike mangoes
and you told me your disdain for oysters
and we didnt leave the rain for hours
and you would cry
in the middle of
it all
and id storm out to
smoke a cigarette
and you broke my heart
with all your lies
and i broke yours
with how
id go so silent...

and ive never yelled like
ive yelled at you
nor been as gentle as
with you

and i can only remember some
and half the time forget the rest
except there are
these scars
on my heart
that remind
and

even now
tonight
all memories merge into one
all yous are five minutes/ five hundred lifetimes ago
some kind of fast forward blur...

and the only thing i can recall
vividly
at this exact time
of
19.14

is

that one time

that one and only time

of over there
and how we did nothing
but
clink glasses
and walk on top of things
and eat
and drink coffee like it was
going to put us to sleep...

and its funny how
all that seeming nothing
can
later return as being
the most
distinct

not because there was
some kind of
poet's love
but because

in my heart of scarred hearts...

ive still always
valued "real"
over
sheets that are just offering
themselves up
to be

stained

(for the taking).

kim thompson. monday 14 jan 2012. 19.24 seoul. s. korea

lines

2012-01-14T00:31:00.001-06:00

i walk beneath
the lines
telephone
and
power
some heading
north south
others
east west
and all the rest
criss-crossed

over there someone is chattering
of something
their words
passing o'er my head
and i
seemingly
oblivious
to what these lines
are transmitting

over there someone is not saying
anything
the lines sagging
in anticipation
and
i
not hearing the
difference between
chatter
and
silence
only seeing
the lines
that seem to
hold the sky
in place

some of these lines
hang looped in heavy circles
dangling down the sides of
former trees
now
poles

and i
walk back
towards
you
knowing full well
the weight
of truth
and
the written
spoken
word
and how
even the unsaid
is an answer
and the lines
do not wait
for
me
or you
to speak

the lines
they just
streak
from
post to post
moving
from the wind
of communications
standing still
when people
have nothing else to
say

i live
beneath the lines
gazing upwards
waiting
for a sentence to drop down
and splash into my ears
snow
or rain
it does not matter
everything is still water-based

and i...
i have always been one to
swim
outside the lines of
in between
spokens
and
un-saids...

kim thompson. saturday. 14 jan 2012. seoul. s. korea

thoughts...

2012-01-13T04:41:00.000-06:00

there are nails
re-drawing lines
in my palms.
everything is
shift-ing.

and no
thing can
change
all the changing
moon tides.

sands collecting
falling
in a glass
without a sound
there are no cairns
to scatter on your shore lines.

i have stood
at the world's edge
3 times
watching gondolas
bob for water...

you are but another
in a story line
that keeps expanding.

but you are not
just
like all the others
(each grain of sand
its own
called by name
by the collector)

but yes...
you are
a single seed of sand
falling through
my open
hands
(for i have long ago
given up
mud clinging.)

and
we are running
along the canals
of venice
in the rain
beer
and pretzels in hand
we catch the train
(i was once 19)

and even now...
i let go
all the places
you will never know
that i will never
show
you...

still
building
memoric cairns
in the sands
of
my own
still
unfinished
pages.

kim thompson. 13 jan 2012 friday. 19.41. seoul. s.korea

for k & k

2012-01-05T21:30:00.001-06:00

how were we
to know that night
that some kind of
darkness
was already penetrating
your very calcium?

how were we to know
when hiding with a bottle of tequila
behind a bed
in that hotel room
that this was what was coming?

how were we to know
each time we shared a stage
that this day of
"wordless"
would arrive?

and i know
there are no guarantees
and i know
that life is not a thing of
"fair"

but this?
these things?
these days?

how were we to know
on your most joyous day
that connected to it
in an all too near
imminence
was
to be
your greatest
nightmare?

would we
have treated any moment
of joy
and laughter
differently?

and
all the things
we are too scared to say
too scared to risk
would we have just
said
and
risked
more
if we had known
that
these days
were part of
all that joy?

and there are
nothing
but
cliches
right now
nothing but
the same kind of
reactions
every single
human being
has
when things like this
take place.

and there is
no
escape.
no hiding behind a
hotel bed with
tequila
laughing.

no
keeping your perfect
most wing-ed moment
in some kind of
static
space.

but would we
have
loved each moment
any
more?

and its not
that i dont care
about my own
"situations"
but it is
that your
and
your
and
your
...
"situations"
these days
well...
they are teaching me
to love all of the uncertainties
and silences
and possibilities of
"yes"
or
"no"

because
we didn't know
that night
at the theater

we didnt know
that night eating
jjigae
and
platters of fish

we didnt know
that
these days
were coming...

and
right now
i dont know
what else there is

except that
there will be more grief
but there will also be
more
joy

and that none of it is known
even the things dreamed ahead of time
can only be
premonitions.

and so today
and these days
in betwixt this seeming
river
of
broken hearts
and
blackholes

i do the one thing i can:

i gaze at the rose bush
now sticks and thorns
watch the smoke push through
it's naked vulnerabilities

make time to see the moon at night

and i carry you
both of you
in my heart

and love
this moment
for all its pain
just that much more.

because...
these days we are reminded
how
we dont know
what kind of days are coming
we don't know what seeming darkness
is working its destruction against our
bodies

all we know is this:

that loving this life
is worth
every risk

and even darkness
always at one point...
must
give way
to

dawn.

kim thompson 12.30 6 jan 2012 friday. seoul. s. korea

Triple A

2011-12-29T09:48:00.002-06:00

Before posterity was secured
Empty wombs made unfulfilled
Houses temples of prayer
Or homes of natural science

But in the ruins of civil war
Carrotfuck had a dream

For the love of nation
And its pawns
Exportation of its own

A baby is born
Bought and sold
Cabbagehead of the east

Sanctioned in the name of christ
Abductees in the mist

Alterations and machinations
Erasure of identity

Adaptee in production

Traded in for capital
Extracted in plane sight

Posterity has been procured
Lives as a scanner darkly

this thing

2011-12-28T21:39:00.001-06:00

(*upon viewing Miwa Matreyek's work -- link to her work below)

this thing
birthing
in
and out

this thing
happening
in
and
out

this thing
nameless
groundless
space
inside of
outside of
all at once

windows open
life flies
in
and out
(can hear the beating of wings
rushing in and out
from this basement
room)

calling selves each day
out from
in
to

beckoning future
in the expansiveness of
now
for the fullness
of
later

heart pours out
from
within

and from with the out
it
fills
to
overflow

... beautiful
is
this
now

beautiful
is this
was

beautiful
is this
then

each and every
if of then and to be
... we are flying
towards
the beauty of
our
selves.

http://www.ted.com/talks/miwa_matreyek_s_glorious_visions.html

kim thompson. thurs 29 dec. 2011 @12.39 seoul. s. korea

she says...

2011-12-26T23:27:00.002-06:00

"we used to give gifts of poetry"
"tell your true mind
little
by
little"
"i wish i could understand your writings"
"poetry isn't easy to write..."
she says

as words swirl through the mind
like smoke churls out from this
cigarette
that is semi-permanently stuck to the lips...

"i want i want"
chants the mind
always william blake's ladder
stands ready...

"i'll wait i'll wait"
says the true mind
not needing anything to do with
ladders...

gifts of words
gifts of truth
"but sometimes there's such a thing as
too much honesty
sometimes its better to hide it"
she says

"네 언니~~~"
flopping head to table
grinning
"cuz... you know...
my blood is korean,
hence the propensity towards dramatic reactions"

"you speak like a 시인"
she says

"we speak in circled layers
so i know she understood
my...
'true mind'."
says korean blooded i
-- still table flopping
for her entertainment.

"i should be paying you"
we laugh

gifts of poetry
... gifts of circled layers
everything's a play on words
but everything is spoken oh so
blatantly...

"maybe ...
(after being reminded by the words of another)
its been this striving for some kind of
better self
thats been tripping me up"
stumbling down the street full tilt...

"maybe...
(after being reminded by the gift of words)
its just accepting
this is how I am...
and perfection
as spinning off
has not been pleasurable
and fact is
my contradictions walk alongside me
whispering
'no youre not'
'yes you are'"

maybe i just need to as the other she said
"invite them all to sit down for a cup o' tea"

"cuz i cant fix it
cant change it
let your reaction be what it will
im a master architect of making
mountains
from the hills of
moles...
today i retire those tools
every day i must retire
them
instead of trying to sink them to the bottom
of a sea that never swallows
only
floats."

gifts of poetry
thats gift of words

today is then like
some kind of
birth
day

the sun
outside
sweating in the cold

and me indoors
assembling all the presents
she said to me.

letting you exist

and if you return
the
gift i shall give to you
will be
a poem greater than this...

born of an imperfect heart
that commits confusing actions
seemingly contradicting my
"true mind"

but you know
as do i
we speak
in circled layers...

and your eyes
absorb
this
ocean of
too much
truth.

"want?"
says she.

kim thompson. 14.28 tuesday 27 dec 2011 seoul. s. korea

haikus on "is"/"if"/"then"

2011-12-25T20:38:00.003-06:00

is.
focusing only
on the wave, forgetting the
whole sea. we are foam.

if.
all things known in the
middle of some new start. there
is no "if" just "is."

then.
the future waves from some
oceanic grey. i know
then, the state of now.

kim thompson. 11.39 26 dec 2011 monday seoul. s. korea

yet another meditation on the rose bush no longer blossoming

2011-12-23T03:07:00.000-06:00

passing by you now
as if you are no longer there

(i) recall you from half way beneath the street
do not have to see you
to know
of all the roses that you contain
within your winter silent limbs

these days
we do not speak
do not look at one another
as we did
i have not gazed up you in weeks
but still
i
see you
without eyes...

you stand
quietly
in the courtyard of my heart
suffering the cold
of december
recalling your unexpected
autumnal appearance
when i just happened to glance out
when i did not want to go out...
when i had given up on seeing beauty...

i know
we do not speak as we did
but i do not feel
that you are any further
than you were
when you last let me
gaze upon you
in your
just before
unannounced retreat

even now
from this too chilled room
i recall you
as if you were some past
lover
still know the beauty
that now lurks within your frozen veins...

i think ahead to knowing
of what these months will bring
how it will seem as if
you will never return
and then
one day
youll wave to me with
your
tendril
kiss me with your
petals

and though we'll never say it
we'll both know
as i gaze upon your fullness

that

we were waiting
all along...

to be

seen.

kim thompson. friday. 23 dec 2011. seoul. s. korea. 18.07

yesterday/today

2011-12-22T03:09:00.001-06:00

catching up on the latest "gossip"
news
from back home
-- home being whatever that may mean
no indicator of the actual place grown up...

interlaced with a lot of
"oh my fuckin' god are you kidding me!"s
(a lot of gods got fucked in that conversation)

realizing maybe life here
isnt so bad
hearing the ridiculousness back there
-- my choices being just that
- mine -
and i got let go of just in time
-- salvation beginning in the first act of saying
"this has been let go of
now let go of me"
(not that heart stringed attachments are bad
but
knotted strings
only trip me up)

and im supposed to drop the "i"
to evolve
but what else can "i" speak of
with some form of actual
certain knowing
when in truth even knowing "i"
can be
perplexing to
my own
eye.

to try to unravel
my "i"
only winds my eyes
into a blur
-- better
i begin to think
-- to just let be.
--- followed by a string of cliches on
the key of b

... like how
im not waiting for you
but im not closing any doors
"i"m gonna let this space
fill itself"
and like how...
that seeming act of letting you in
was a door closing
as "i" filled the space
with
my own past repeated habit
-- im sorry that sounds so unkind
... this is how honesty can be.
(its nothing personal
its not "you"
its that theres this "you"
and that is the "you"
that my "i" is looking towards
all the while knowing
it could be that this is how
my eye[s] must look in
order to see
some
unknown
"you"?)

and they say half the key to cool
is not admitting anything
-- so lets say that for most of my life
ive been frozen
and now im done with cold
and prefer the heat of just saying
even though the lack of certainty
makes my eye sweat salt.
(but im still done with palm trees
and
palmettos
and the hurricanes of late summer)

and theres a cigarette stuck to my lips
and im supposed to be considering quitting
but
ive never been good at quitting what i love
so
one day when i cease to love
i will let the filter fall butt end to the floor
for good
and sweep away the ashes of this form of love
but for now
we remain synonyms...

and its still early in the day
but the sun has turned its winter
soul
and
we spin on its axis.

and all the darkness of yesterday
(did the sun even ever rise?)
my eyes sank deeply into
too dehydrated to shed tears
so eye just dribbled salt
from the side

and "i"
dont expect
a thing from any "you"
but that does not change
what the
eye
wants.

and all this news from that place
that once was home
where they misname a patch of lake sand
"beach"
not knowing of the tepid heat of the atlantic
as my "i" does...

how they still preen
too old
for not having let go of any "i"
or
"you"
they speak buddha out their ashen-ed butts
and cling cling cling
so tightly
to
something
that was never
theirs to
keep
because
thats not how
"you"
and
"i"
is meant to work

but then
who am "i"
to cast my eye(s) downward in their direction
when
"i"
prove to my own self
time and time again
how
caught up in proving nothing/something to my "me"
ruins all this unwinding
that is being done

fists opened
palm lines
shifting in new directions

just when "i" thought
"you"
were gone
you returned
with flowers

and so today
for the "you"
who has been with "me"
since the beginning
and the "you"
who let go when "i" needed
and the "you"
who does not want to be a "you"
(but then maybe "you" do)
and the "you"
who wants to be a "you"
(but then maybe "you" dont)
and the me
who wants an
"i"

... i think of over there
and right now here
pick up another smoke
let the words drop where they may
though it is now
the shortest day
it feels like
the beginning
of this
next
that ive been waiting looking for
and in the throwing up of surrendered
hands
in the utter loathing
of what "i" can do
(its not that it was that bad or wrong
its just that "i" know that "i" am better
than such doings
and my eye does not like cheap)
in looking towards "you"
i's
are
seeing

me.

kim thompson. thursday 22 dec 11 18.09 seoul. s. korea

language

2011-12-21T04:16:00.000-06:00

she reaches for something
flipping her wrists
jumping into the arms of he or she
she contorts to fit the others limbs

we pull our masks off each morning

she jerks in the embrace
fingers extended
to some other dream of life
her feet moving to the rhythm of her
own
heart

collapses without falling.

she takes a hand
between her own
elbow extended
her knees
buckling
under some
imaginary weight
of
being

we are not alone.

she drops her head
to a silent rise
as if proclaiming
all the words she will never write
whilst in this arms akimbo moment

we hide because we must.

she straightens her toes
touching floor
as if gliding on some kind of
table made from air
her abstract
so
intended

we yearn.

she jumps to the opening
of the others
extensions
and rides them until she
arrives in otherworlds

because there is no other way but this.

she is the pressing down
of each key
the arching back of
some form of
ecstasy
that can only be known
with two

we run from what we want.

she steps towards
because
today
she
cannot run

today we can only confess.

today
she crumples
mid reach
and
begins
again

as do

we.

kim thompson. wed 21 dec 2011 @ 19.16 seoul. s. korea.

re-working of an oft written piece

2011-12-17T04:32:00.000-06:00

as a child
feeling safest when alone

yesterday wondering
(as often)
how life became so
beautiful
after having only been
afraid

growing up
seemed this
distant thing
so far from reach.
belonging an
impossibility.

the darkness of no longer wishing to live
those days of succumbing to that wish
but still waking

(sometimes all of this
seems like a dream
from another version
of living)

daily wondering now
if it wasnt this now
and that then
keeping
breath from leaving
allowing time to age
and all this
now
beauty to be known.

and everything
that seemed like the heart
could never contain
the heart now overflows with
ready.
letting go the control
because there is no
thing
to
control
no future to
predict
just now.

yesterday
so much
joy.
so much perfection.
even the lazy exhaustion of
yesterday's pleasures
perfect in its own way.

and wondering
as often

how did
she
go from that
lonely child in the schoolyard
to this
she
living life
in the pivot point
of
exceeding
breathtaking
annunciated
joys?
-- where
no one walks away
only just comes towards
as she runs towards
and where

i...
need never
stand alone
even when in the silence of home
typing on a
screen...

its everywhere
this beauty
sliding backwards
beside that lonely child
whispering
"its going to be more than just ok
its going to be
better each and every day."

each day a mask falls
each day the playground
no longer
unfriendly
nor
friendless.

oh how great his
"imagine!"
speaks.

kim thompson. 19.33 sunday 17 dec '11 seoul. s. korea.

the russian

2011-12-15T08:30:00.003-06:00

the guy behind the counter is russian, unless he is lying, but he is tall and pale, looks like one, talks a bunch of shit. obviously the prick is a moron with his fucked up glasses and snow white skin. the dickhead is polite enough to avoid a drive-by, but he just won't shut his arse from which shit keeps pouring as if he in an instant went from a year of constipation to sudden diarrhea seeing an oriental for the second time in his life. aroused or repulsed? hopefully neither, but being a nincompoopeatingcocksucker his prescription of the oriental is complete:

"you asians all look so young it's disgusting"

MN oriental

2011-12-15T08:26:00.000-06:00

whitey is tall and weird, misplaced between two worlds.
he studies korean, for what? why not?
anything is better than pure snow.

the baldness of this country makes corn seem more yellow
and the craving for rice expensive and ridiculous.

this is a house of starvation, exploitation and subtle violence,
its universe hungry for pie and nobody questions its lack of colour.

there is a need for more amerasians and miscegenation
to sell over the counter, in this state

oriental with oriental equals authentic oriental
but oriental with white equals adoptee or bride.

contemplations on growing up ugly... an essay of sorts

2011-12-14T21:08:00.000-06:00

*based on recent conversations that keep coming up on how we grew up and where we grew up and who we grew up around and what we were taught to believe to be "beautiful"

---

our exceeding obvious
lack of
blonde hair
blue eyes
and white skin
being an all self perception shaper

"you could be a model for benetton" j.s. said ... this being at the time when benetton was going through a period of putting what we all considered to be highly unattractive people on their posters... this being after she had assigned vogue, gap, the banana republic, and 17 magazine to everyone else on her private my dad's a lawyer party bus for jr highers... magazines and stores that we all considered to be the creme de la creme of beauty... (we were afterall 13 or 14)

exceedingly clear to many of us
that
due to lack of dates in jr high and highschool
the only thing we were good for was
being the "asian friend" or some kind of forbidden exotic fruit

"you know you asian girls have really tight p*ssies" was c.s's idea of a compliment ... and as the student council president he "bequeathed" this statement as some kind of boon from his elevated status.

for many of us growing up where we did
as we did
we accepted "being ugly" at a very early age
without any sense of drama
it was like accepting
that the color of the sky is what it is.

"t.d. likes a chineeeessseeee... but you say she's just a friend but you say she's just a friend... oh baby you... you got what i need... t.d. likes a chineeesssseeee..." was the response that was sung at t.d.'s school upon his stating that he would be taking his best friend k.t. to his jr. sr. banquet. (christian schools dont do proms they do banquets... another story for another time)

exceedingly clear that if we were
just
blonde
blue eyed
white skinned with a tan
maybe we wouldn't actually be so ugly...
but never really needing anyone to tell us this was not the case
because well
we just knew it was.
suspecting that the only other option our ugly selves would have would be to become the school slut...
or to hedge our bets on others wearing beer goggles...
the highest compliment back then being the standard staple of
"so you know karate? you related to bruce lee?"

"i know karate. so if you dont leave my friends alone i will...... HI-YA!" 6 year old version of k.t. threatening a bully at church... it worked... k.t. was small and didn't even really know what karate was except that you said "hi-ya" a lot

many of us growing up in the kinds of towns, villages, or suburbs
where the homecoming court mainly consisted of
white girls
with good tans
we'd accepted we'd be voting from the sidelines from a very young age.

"like ohhh my gawddd you are like soooo popular and beautiful and nice of course you'll be queen" we squealed to the white girl with the really good tan and long line of boys queuing up to date her...

... exceedingly clear that our "ugliness" was not so much a defect
but a fact
and so we probably would one day end up marrying some white guy that we met in college
a white guy who had a thing for asian girls...
so we were free to worry about other things like
where we'd go to school
and what kind of job we wanted
as our looks were not going to be getting us anywhere
and some of us weren't inclined to being the school slut
and those who were never got a sense of being beautiful from it...

so
we have these conversations now from time to time...
adults... in our 30s
having had it only recently if at all begin to dawn on us that
maybe we aren't ugly
that maybe we never were ugly
but that we still see ugly or nothing in the mirror
and
like everything else about our stories
we cant go back and put ourselves back together
and tell our past selves
"ermm listen youre not actually ugly you know."

whether or not knowing this... would have changed anything for us
we speculate on...
some of us may have been a little less... "easy"
others of us may have been a little more... "easy"

the good side being (if there is one) is that none of us tend to fish for compliments when it comes to looks due to having accepted so long ago that there were no compliments to fish for.
so no matter the bravado we pretend
many of us still feeling
just like that duckling
startled to see a swan
staring back
and still living like ducklings.

but the fact that many of us
have finally begun to move into the idea that
beauty really isnt determined by
having
blonde hair
blue eyes
and white skin
with a good tan...
is a step in the swan's direction

and for today
that step
is
enough.

one day perhaps
we shall be able to
trumpet proudly as swans
but even if not
at least we're finally getting that
maybe
we
werent ugly all those years.

kim thompson. posted 15 dec '11 thurs 12.08 written 14 dec. wed. seoul. s. korea

3 years... ruminating pt 1 of many

2011-12-12T22:56:00.001-06:00

this feathered thing
re-tracing
the lines in (my) palms
(what is this new story
"i" am creating?)

in one sliding of a door
in one letting out of light
all lines re-drawn
a heart returned
from beneath the grapefruit tree it
had
been unearthed from
(florida a long ago
k-mart aged photograph
to recall)
(this here now
reality)

but this is not an
"ever after"
story
never forgetting the 98% still
digging
for what has always
been
rightfully
theirs

this feathering
giving wings
but also stripped/plucked
from the wings of others

when everything that is
coexists at once
and all the other of the everythings
knocking at the door.

id like to put the milk
back into its container
id like to put mother goose's wall fallen egg
back together again

instead i eat this rotted sulfur of a scramble
because there is restoration
in the fermenting of time

today
i stand
walk
full of wonder
with a heart so full
of 19.30 on a saturday

there are so many ghosts
spirits
here
they stand behind
and
beside
and my own self
just inches from the mid-space
between my forehead and my heart

they come out from the han
they rise up from the sea
they fly down the mountains
hanging overhead.

the moth became a guide
the guide she is a moth.
she leads (me) by the wrist...

there can be no
smooth connect in this...
the words
are too strewn by years

but there can be
joy
in amidst this ocean of milk
spilled out
all around

every 200
thousand
plus
of
us.

kim thompson. 13.53 tuesday 13 dec. 2012. seoul. s. korea.

Whorestaurant

2011-12-12T02:04:00.003-06:00

A meal is best served with clothes on.
Sometimes skin offends the eye,
Dragging appetite down to the docks.

Nausea comes dressed to the nines,
Bulging from inconvenient places
And mini skirts aren't for everyone.

Untimely nakedness of skin
Turns the stomach into a maelstrom,
Opposing that which should have been

A delikatesse.

after reading poetry posted

2011-12-11T07:13:00.000-06:00

we move so close
remain so far
like a gangly limbed blue muppet
racing to and from a screen
"nearrrrrr"
"farrrrr"
hit.
send.
repeat.

(it is not an ocean
it is not a land
it is...
a space unnamed)

having stood on the stones
that have been calling out for
26 years
built dynasties before becoming
(or maybe we too carved them
our reward to see them in a more luxurious life)
the past present and future all
collided in the blue
sending out
flashes of light
and a visage in the sky
all the way back and all the way forward
hitting right into the exact present
which is now
past
still happening.

time being a conundrum
time exceeding hands...
perhaps... it has already happened
this thing that has not.
perhaps... it too
just waits hanging in the blue of above...
appearing only in the after.
like a star that died long ago
but only now from the edges of this black hole
do we see it.

whether we race towards or from
whether we stand cocoon still -- not moving even (one) wing
still time flutters
still time moves
still time cannot be
stilled.

and the muppet running madly
near then far
far then near
repeating
hit.
send.
arms flailing
does it really matter?
does it change a thing?

and yet
and yet
as issa wrote

... and yet...

opening rumi's window after last night's moon

each eve
letting winter's light in.

hitting send.
repeat.

and the muppet sleeps
so
peacefully
upon stones smoothed by hard fought battles
whose losses and winnings
spun today into as it is.
relieved of
controlling hands.

kim thompson. seoul. s. korea. 22.10 on 11 dec 11 sunday

Land of 10,000 Lakes

2011-12-07T19:23:00.000-06:00

My Minnesota,
With fraternal but not identical cities,
With two determined senators,
With 1,000 languages when the wind stops,

My Minnesota,
Where I eat Lao coconut soup with a girl who’s tree traces back to Finland,
Further back to Mongolia and Russia.
The recipe, from a Korean adoptee,
from her Cambodian husband,
from his Lao ex –mother in law.

My Minnesota,
Where I learn to butcher a French-Arabic song,
From a man whose parents left Tehran,
Who sounds with a British accent,
Whose voice untangles 5 tongues.

My Minnesota,
Where I take Middle East literature from an East Asian woman
with a man marked as “half” African-American
A motherless German by passport,
Proficient in all things Deutsch and English,
He can only feel Kenya through his father.

My Minnesota,
With my tri-lingual Tibetan roommate,
A lover of Jerry Springer and Volkswagons,
Whose speakers outsung my Bollywood with Guns ‘n’ Roses,
Who always had Doritos in the cupboard.

My Minnesota,
Who gives me cuisine from every country,
And a sports bar for every lake and pond,
Sometimes the aroma of 99 cent sandwiches during lent,
Sometimes Hungarian goulash for Thanksgiving,
Always sweet corn and apples when the sun is shining.

My Minnesota,
With your Japanese restaurants,
Where the Pilipino cook snuck me sushi,
Where the Russian bar manager left to serve the country in Iraq,
Where the Spanish speaking chef crafted miso soup and gyoza.

My Minnesota,
With your Italian restaurants,
With the Czechoslovakian waitresses after class,
And hung-over stumbling I fed staggering Vikings fans,
Where I made white lies with Sangiovese and Merlot,
While the Gold Metal Flour sign blinked through the windows.

My Minnesota
How your mega mall lewers me every year
How I curse your Irish looking for parking in St. Paul
With your underpriced Aldi’s and overpriced Co-ops
Where I can’t distinguish from my bitterness for your redundant stop sign on
Ayn Mill road,
from my fondness for the locals who stop at it,
every time.

My Minnesota,
In exchange for multiplication and division packets,
You gave me an “A” for 9th algebra summer school,
But, you inspire the landscape with umpteen colleges and universities,
You reimburse with infinite museums and cultural centers,
Your theatres charm me back to optimism.

My Minnesota,
Rich with labor movement history,
Poor with being frank,
Where farmers and Citi folk carve niches along the Mississippi,
Where the churches and temples share the same sheet of concrete.
Where 30 below windshields send me into the arms of warm reggae tunes

My Minnesota,
With your Bi-polar seasons,
How each inhumane winter you jigsaw Lake Superior’s canal
and silence Minnehaha falls,
How each Spring I’ve never made enough income to hate you.
How each scorching summer I retreat until sunset.

Oh my dearest Minnesota,
How each enchanting Autumn haze,
I fall for you all over again.

poem of love for mpls

2011-11-21T23:48:00.000-06:00

we were at best
at first
at
odds
wanting nothing
if anything
to do with you
- pushing you away
and kicking your streets
telling you each and every moment
how you paled in comparison to the previous
drinking just so as not to see your face
even your air stung
even your club called c.c. brought ache -

as to when
it shifted
as to when
this kind of disdain
turned to some kind of
love
was somewhere in the middle streets
of uptown and lyndale

as to when the some kind of love
turned to
complete
balanced
dependence
give and take
equal reciprocation...
was somewhere between
35th and bloomington
and
14th and elliot...

you are no longer the one
there is another now
another whose river calls
another whose streets beg to be explored
another whose side alleys gesture alluringly
another whose air gasps to be breathed

but you will always be this one
of
6
or
7
years
giving and taking so much
you will always be this one
who opened a closed heart
who made beautiful a country
that had become a place to reject
after 8 years with others

and it is because of you
that now here
can be embraced
that now this seoul
can be known fully
by this soul

numerous
have been the places loved
numerous have been the
drunken one night explorations
in lands that can never really be described
whose scent still lingers
whose rivers still beckon

but yours
is a
river
a park
a lake
a clustering of
bodies
loved so
ardently
loved still
loved always

never fading in forgetting
always rising
up in dreams

never diminishing in time's ticking
always
always
always

whispering
"and how... we loved."

kim thompson 14.49 tuesday 21 nov 2011 seoul. s. korea

time... the sea... then... now

2011-11-20T10:04:00.005-06:00

images from the o.k.a.y. book 2009... (so much happens in 3 years)

-- and now... (an) epilogue of many 2 years 11 months 2.5 days later--

jesus didnt part it
moses didnt do one damn thing

wandering like a nation
in the deserts of the world
never knowing just how close you were
circling for stale manna
eaten rotten meat

you were never showing up in dreams
instead you sent the sea

you were not a cloud
not a holy fire

you were cross-legged on the floor
hand gesturing
that had been predicted 2 years before

speaking to you in that empty seat
speaking to you in that empty chair
speaking to you in that empty space

weeks away from what will be 3 years
29 to be exact in days

you were always absent
always omni-present
sacrificing on an altar
in place of harvest

that sea's been flooding land
for 30 plus
2 years
only to be calmed

not by their savior
but by

you.

kim thompson. 20-21 nov. 2011 (sun/mon) 12.50pm-1am seoul. s.korea.

movement: contemplations on dance(rs)

2011-11-15T21:54:00.000-06:00

*(an ode of sorts for friends who are movement artists)
----

they
move in between the sounds
hitting the beat unheard

landing like feathers
gliding across the stages of this world
paris
london
moscow
st petersburg
new york
chicago
seoul
and all the other
planks
in between (minneapolis)

hand wrist flip
hand wrist inward stock motion
animation

toes
ankles
bent just so
pointing us to
look anew

degas understood

they do the things that
poets
painters
cannot

they move the mysterious
from
invisible
to
visible

they make real
what is only felt inside
they make what is inside
real.

they make sharp
what is so often blurred to sight

they are the gods of details
making us all mortal
they are the ghosts we carry in our heart's hidden pockets

they are mortals who transcend all the
spaces
for a moment

blackholes projecting new dimensions
taking all this seeming empty void
and giving shape
to
moments that
escape
all words
written
spoken
put onto paper/cloth
canvas

... oh so
lithe
are
they.

kim thompson. wednesday 16 nov. 2011 @12.54 seoul. s. korea.

something new

2011-11-07T20:22:00.001-06:00

something new is birthing
something inside these clammy shells
something greater than a pearl
a diamond in the bottom of the sea
something new is growing wings
something new is outsmarting even the
intelligence of crows
impregnated in the darkness of the end of winter
formed in the unexpected moments of the spring
sweated through in the heat of summer
timing its emergence
in this late autumn month
the loss has been great
the floor pulled out from beneath
and with the loss of ground
came the gain of some kind of
albatross-like flight/soar
and something new is
waking
something new is
rumbling
"soon
soon"
it whispers
each and every morn...
announcing its own entrance
without fanfare
but in the space time fabric continuum of a
still
small
voice

something new is
being
rubbed into shape
between the grains of each day's dirt
something new
is
rolling endlessly into the
art of
becoming

dancing in between the beats
skipping in between our feet
when autumn feels like the birth of spring
and spring a distant gauzy memory

something new is --
knowing not what nor how
only knowing --
something new
is
becoming.
from out of the darkness
and into all this
lightness of
today.

kim thompson. 8 nov. 2011 tuesday. 11.23 seoul. s. korea

Thy Name Is Religion

2011-10-30T10:28:00.000-05:00

Evil has a name.

Deep, deep in the bosom
Of a burning cauldron
Laughs the lizard.

Ultra Catholic sunblock
Can’t save you from abduction,
Child trafficking by pope mobile.

Rage has flooded the nation.
Men in ties calmly sit
In fascist condescension,

While doctors, in freezers,
Babies keep.

Penguins can be evil.
Human theft part of prayer.
Money exchanging hands.

Franco isn’t dead.
The stolen generation lives.

Unbelievable

2011-10-24T10:55:00.000-05:00

Whenever I hear
예수님 믿으세요

I think: Fuck Off!
Verbal selfdefense justified

When I hear the question
교회 다니세요?

I want to reply: In Your Arse
You Fookin’ Cow!

When the word repent
Scratches my ear

I put on my shitkickers
And kick some shit

angels/demons

2011-10-23T23:13:00.004-05:00

im an angel full of dark
a demon full of light
one on my left
the other on my right
a bastard in the middle

angel's name is c.s. after lewis
demon's name is charles after bukowski
bastard's middle is named
kim.

theres an outer and an inner
a shade between the grey

the kindest sort of naughty
the raunchiest sort of reverent
the dreamiest cynic
the most jaded kind of resilient hoper

and every reason
(my grafted)
family tree
thinks me
damned to hell
is every reason why im
heaven bound
but every reason why you think me paradise headed
is every thing im trying to
reckon with my
night.

yes.
i AM a poet who weeps at falling leaves
and stares slack-jawed at the sky
but im also
the jackass who takes irreverence one/two/three step(s) too far
and the pervert who is tied to
devilish delights.

i don't worship any name-ed god
(even humanism smacks of some kind of
pre-prescribed practice)
(and anyways
im tainted from being gagged on
jesus and his goddamned fuckin' cross)
but still each day i take the time
to sit
and
breathe
the here
and
now
because it's balance that i seek
between my
outer
inner
in betweens
of
c.s.
charles
and
kim.

keep my lust in check -
let it dance dirty in the cage ive built for it
to keep it well behaved -
but sometimes
the demon charles whispers through the fermentation of a night
and it flies free
like some kind of
angel in heat
with an impish bastard's grin.

my halo is held intact by horns
my forked tail kept from lashing by my not going to tat em on my back-
wings.

i will weave you the most
lovely gown of
words
all true
all meant --
but in the next
i'll shred them off
to take you then and there

and for so long
there was always some kind of
holy battle waging 'tween these seeming
splits
one side always winning
and always getting / causing
pain

somewhere in the midst of
finding
has been this calming
of the seas

where the dark angel c.s.
and the sentient demon charles
now allow the
full truth bastard kim
to
float a line
of
calm
alarming
swayful
balance
in the breeze of their
windy incantations
of
lust
desire
poetry
inner peace
and all things
seeming
contradictory.

angel
demon
bastard
we are coming one.

(rothko moment from my airplane seat in the sky above the sea -- the sky as it was... the light and dark as it is)

- kim thompson. mon 24 oct @ 13.13 seoul. s. korea

Death to Barthes

2011-10-22T13:59:00.002-05:00

the young die hard and violently
to the song of the moose.

time is not what separates us
intellect is. smoke the last thing
seen before the moon opens her eye.

the mending of the chasm is left
to doctors who understand nothing
of the rising tide of misprision.

a heart stops beating because the author dies,
the sound of sirens faded into oblivion.

Lorelei doesn’t dance anymore,
the echo of waves against her breast
is the last trace of an obsolete sun.

further rose bush meditation

2011-10-17T22:36:00.002-05:00

do i dare
pluck the last of
two
remaining
red/pink magenta
petals
on the daily baring sticks
of what was once
full blossom
blooming?

do i reach out my hand
to touch the last
colors of a cycled life?

touch with my mind's fingertips
taste them on my tongue
they are velvet perfume bittersweet
they are wings
they are the last two months of this year

and the once vibrant green
is now
a stickman version of
a former fleshed out luscious being

and like always
i dare not to
reach out and grasp
the last signs of life
like always
i stand
stare
let the understood felt into taste of these last petal shaped drops roll around in my mouth
crush their svelteness between mind over matter fingertips
like always
i want to tell them
"please just stay"
"dont leave
i love you"
but like always
i just gaze
take them in
turn them into words
and let the memory of desire
fall upon the page.

trusting in the spring
they will return
brilliant
brand new
remade
after winter's
slumber.

-- kim thompson. tues. 18 oct. 12.36 seoul. s. korea

My Mind Is No Steel Trap so I'll Put This Here, For Safe-Keeping

2011-10-13T20:17:00.005-05:00

I pretend it’s for my benefit that Dad is repeating the story about how he and our neighbor, Sam, spent Labor Day weekend splitting logs in the backyard--

Like it’s his way of etching a simple, important moment into my memory. Something for me to find meaning in and pass on to my own son.

I pretend Dad is telling me again about how his older sister, Dot, suddenly remembered last month that their brother, Ray, had died--that she had been the first sibling his wife had called.

This has to be his way of underlining emotion--both for Ray’s death and Dot’s steady decline. He clenches his jaw.

“I already told you that, didn’t I?”

I pretend it will be for my benefit if I forget this some day.

Charlton Heston is alone again

2011-10-06T10:57:00.000-05:00

the streets are silent this afternoon,
almost deserted,
the city’s bosom laid bare.

today, madness is on hold,
men at work not rushing
into inevitable decay.

the day is red like a face
talking too much shit
the night before.

the hour is hung over,
a nation deep asleep
behind motel doors.

lazily the apes will rise
one by one, wondering where
the hero has gone.

The Shindorim Crowd

2011-10-01T13:16:00.000-05:00

a mixed bag of nuts
phalanxes of sheep
waiting for the cowboys
to bring 'm home alive

I don't believe in Djins and Daemons

2011-09-30T22:43:00.001-05:00

i wish i were a better poet
then i could write a golden sonnet,
prevent poor Romeo from dying.

but could i blame this withered flower
on empty air, when golden boughs
drop manna everywhere?

i can't keep count of all the notes aborted.

where is the palm that holds the tree,
the black feathered bird that speaks?
why are they silent, those ghostly walls?
there is no other ggod but me.

rose bush - an object of meditation

2011-09-28T00:16:00.004-05:00

in the silent throes of autumn
what seemed
dead
from spring
a violent burst of petaled red
- as if to remind
from the midst of naked thorns
and limbs -
that life
nor death
are never things
to be
assumed.

no start
no finish
always
unexpected.

what came to life in spring
then faded
only to appear today
as full formed
new found
cycle defying
blossoming -
against the
seeming
odds.

and i
i
am reminded
- as oft i am -
of words by another
of how life just carries on
no matter the
passing of one hope
to the next

beginnings
and
passings
anticipated.

but then there is always
that one
that one almost as if
"death defying"
act of nature
of living
to remind
that
nothing

no
thing

is ever truly gone

even when all dreams of
spring
seem seasons far gone

you walk up the stairs
out the door
doing as you always do

and then

and then

there
she
is

waiting silently
without announcement
face
arms
open
to the day
bowing only
to the
breezes.

kim thompson. wed 28 sept @ 13.29. seoul. s.korea

and in.

2011-09-26T00:39:00.001-05:00

and in the quiet

of the in between

of night

and dawn

when lights go dim

and only monitors illuminate

when the world is full of

original silencio

and thoughts rest

to leave space for the core of constant

(i) map a mental choreography

of invisible long stretched arching limbs

that extend past the realm of now

moved by a song

moved by the pauses in the song

- rhythm

drum beat

(my)

fingers hit keys in time with

the piano

weaving a dance of their own

a blank screen

(my) stage

a dim and glow

(my) stage light

... raise

arch

float in thought

(i) circle with

this song

like all others

directed by some kind of

inner

sense of

of-otherness

everything but me

is fleeting

and even i

am passing

with each tap down

on these lettered squares

one day

all that will be left (of me)

are these traces of thoughts

traces of moments

translated into a form of

typed out

language

its words that brought us here

it is words that will lead us out

i

we

each

the spoken reclamation

of a single act

of

another's

exhale

i

we

each

solitary

in communion

joined by inner

strings and strands

of

phosphor-essence

tonight

i yearn for nothing

wanting everything

in the

eternal

silencio

of

a temporary

now

though my body does not

my words

they dance

through space and time

weaving you into my

hear and jigum.

kim thompson. written on monday 2am or so 26 sept 2011 seoul. s. korea

beginnings (cont.)

2011-09-24T05:11:00.000-05:00

i want to

go back to a beginning that ive forgotten

to swim the chasm of the sea

to walk on water

fly on air

float through breezes

to grow my life from dust formed trees

and

to watch night dreams

grow into

day life.

i want to live

that space between

the words

the thoughts

want to

let go all the edges

watch words shoot forth free flight

from the center of my chest

we were all born of

silent explosions

born of

the connection of spaces

born of an act

born of a desire

born of a grief

born of a mystery

a void

a realm

born

of other.

i want to go back to that beginning

that i can no longer recall

go back to those first breaths

born of this very air

over by hongdae

next to hapjeong

i retrace the steps of my own carried feet

i want to return

to the place of their act

to whisper to self

the truth of the future

for those days when all would feel so

lost

to remember

what i have always known

i want to take the sea water

that swells in my chest

that drips down my cheeks

to the tips of my fingers

transforming to the smoke clouds of words

take all these words

all these half finished sentences

all these fragmented starts

and build bridges within my

galaxial self

i want to

live in the middle

right in the center

of everything now

and then fling it all

upwards

sky high

to watch it all be transformed

into

the art

the act

of

letting go

and rebirth.

i want to pick up the past

sling it over my shoulder

and release it dead weighted to

the bottom of some kind of

deep azure blue

so that the day you call

i can tell you

"ive let it all go

and found my center of being

way back in my beginning."

- kim thompson seoul. s. korea. sat. 24 sept @ 19.11

Once Removed

2011-09-22T10:17:00.000-05:00

Hello Thursdays! I am new to writing poetry and eager to learn and grow from being in community with each of you. I want to thank you for sharing your art and inviting me to be part of this project. I am sharing the piece that I started while living in MN, and continued to write as I begin learning Korean language while living in Korea. Thank you for giving me a space to share it. Peace and love~

기 화영
******

What good is half the story?

Told in tortured tongue, twisted and tamed.

Recoded Korean complete with English Talk function.

Even she daydreams of songs I sung and sounds undone.

My first language once removed.

Case K85-160.

Another non-native English speaker numbered and claimed.

In two-world paradigm of white-normative worthiness.

Let’s call her Lori Jane.

I wanna blow up this “East meets West” bullshit--

That never let me beg the question:

How do I claim the class privilege that cost me my mother?

How do I hug her when she hid her white guilt in my humanity?

Can any of us consent in this time of capitalism?

Each person made product, produced by imperialist consumer culture.

“Get your…bootless mail-order baby."

Easy addition to your four-person family equation.

I’m gonna pass on the long-winded rant about global white supremacy, dominant narratives of heteropatriarchy, and constructions of hegemonic masculinity...

But for now, let’s consider my desire:

To talk to her, my birthmother once removed.

Three decades.

Two continents.

One ocean.

I came all this way just to say “I love you,” to first mother once removed.

Is it anything but injustice that when I hold her hand,

I can’t tell her about my day.

The friends I made at school today.

The stories we shared over kimchi and rice, mystery meat, and baby fish soup.

To third mother now removed:

Even “I love you” fails us when my brown skin betrays your good intentions.

“I love you.” Three words held hostage by the histories of violence that I carry with me, each day, on this bruise called my back.

“I love you.” English language on lease as long as I don’t call you racist.

This is my orphan love story.

Crafted in American-made, Midwest English.

I am your bootless mail-order baby gone bad.

Gone evil.

Raging against the capitalist machine.

Waking up the rebel sleeper force of overseas Korean adoptees.

Calling all Yellow Devils!

To reject our constricted status: language-less Korean learners when living in our motherland.

I want to learn at school today--

The other half of my story.

Reclaiming Kee, Wha Yung!

Self-determined Asian American and deconstructed transnational adoption symptom.

Blue Eyes

2011-09-19T08:45:00.003-05:00

in this morning light bright,
the weather cock is silent.

not an atom moves or rubs its back
against this sea of matter black
and velvet air

one pearl in cosmic ellipse.

i doubt that angels exist.
what colour would be their eyes

i wonder

could i catch a silver trout,
pretend that i am Hugo?

those pearls, they are her eyes
and i fear not death by water.

Thursdays Blog Update!

2011-09-16T00:52:00.000-05:00

Hey y'all,

I'm glad to see us all writing and reading some, even if it's not every Thursday. I think it's a blessing for us to have a forum to share our work with each other, and props to those who keep up.

I wanted to do some quick announcements -

We have two new contributors! Mads Them Nielsen Lee and Laura Klunder - both adoptees currently living in Korea! I'm excited to read both of their work. Welcome Mads and Laura, thanks for joining us.

Reminder to contributors to add your name as a Label! This came as a suggestion so that folks can easily sort by name if people come to the blog looking for a particular poem, by a particular poet.

Peace. namee

(I missed you internet and Thursdays Blog!)

2011-09-09T08:06:00.000-05:00

An Ancestor's Daughter:

In some, time-
Without mirrors,
and moons,
I will ask my mother’s mother’s middle name.
I will also ask my other mother’s mother’s first name.
Will both my mother’s fathers still be at war?
And which of my lover’s father’s mother’s will they be slaying?

In that time,
will both my nameless father’s father’s still be drinking?
Sampling each other’s Soju and Whiskey?
Will their faceless father’s fine fingers be clenching Sake
or Moonshine?
And who will drink who-
under the table in heaven?

I will ask the winner, the difference between
Stoic silences passed from the scars of cannons,
intoxicated belts on boys, in between infertile corn fields,
Or the aftershocks passed from charred rice fields,
broken husband to breaking-
wife from Imperialist soldiers?

Because
even after the fire,
forever I am all my mothers’
and my all fathers’ unfinished
dreams,
When I step out of this skin and trade water for wind,
Will the nature of Buddhists, Confucius’s, and Shamans greet me first?
Or will the nurture of the Catholics, the Protestants, the amalgamated Native Americans claim me?

And is the culprit for my temper birthed from the stubborn Korean sun?
Or passed down from the hand of the sometimes Austrian but usually German valleys?
Is my passive aggressive nature a re-gift from the Norwegian and Finish?
Or is it residuals from Korean hierarchy and etiquettes that resisted Japanese cleansing?
Do I smoke following in the father’s footsteps of the French revolution?
Or is there cellular affinity to the Ajummas that hold both Korea’s on one back?

But my father’s fathers will still be fighting.
And my mother’s mothers still mending pieces of battlefields,
Collecting emotions the men couldn’t afford to carry

And then one by one
I will find all their father’s fathers
and their all mother’s mothers,
Tracing the Land of the Morning Calm,
digging up graves in
The Land of the Rising sun,
trying to unriddle the past peasants and prisoners
of the Land of the Free and the Home
of the Brave.
Until there are no more cloths to caress
no more dialects to decipher,
No new travesties to untangle,

And then I will find all my mama’s papa’s Gods,
and all my daddies mommies Deities.
And those Spirits will be sitting around a pool table
Together playing darts with stars,
Drinking their dreams,
and making a smoke storm out of their fears.

And I will ask them,
Peering through their telescopes
that spin like kaleidoscopes,
Which cloud? And which name?
in this time?
secret stories of my veins and vitality,
which crusade? And which fued?
in this time?
from all those lost centuries that lead to now.
without a reflected image in evening light,
to reveal rivalry and race-
tell me her first name, and tell me her middle name,

They will laugh at me, and say,
Everything was everywhere, always, all this time.

PROFILE

2011-09-06T00:17:00.000-05:00

I gotta get back on top of posting on Thursdays. I apologize.

In the meantime, here's the poem I did at the APIA Spoken Word Summit, and at the Woosh K August Slam. I feel like I've been working on this poem for a year, in different drafts, but it was never clear to me what I wanted to say, so it was never clear to anyone what it said. I think I've finally got it, or come close, for this poem at least. Love to my adoptees, and love to my birthmother.

PROFILE
8/4/11

I wish my birth mother
had Facebook.

If she had Facebook,
my newsfeed would repeat her name
and I could know how many carrots she cut for dinner.
How the sun kisses her and skins her and calls it summer.
Whether work is slow,
     or alive and steaming,
     when it’s not just a dark square on the street and we are in a taxi pointing,
     when she is counting the till at night
     and mixing sugar into the kimchi.

She could poke me. I could poke her back.

If my birth mother had Facebook
I could know her favorite quotations.
Is she a live life to the fullest, don’t look back kind of lady?
Is she stuck in song lyrics?
     Home
     Let me come home
     Home is wherever I’m with you.
Or is she obsessed with love like it’s a blessing worth repeating?
Maybe she left it blank, like I do, because there are too many words that lift us in this world and it’s hard to nail them down.

I would stalk her mobile uploads:
samgyetang on the first dog day of summer,
her son, stooped by a street vendor, buying onions and tea.
Cabbage and radishes stretching into her corner garden,
a couple, squished together on the subway,
her new shoes.
An entire album of little moments,
her moments,
the ones she has to save.
And the glow of my screen would catch my smile
as I got to know her.

Would we both
have a photo of the fog
soaking up the sun,
like the bright haze could lift our own shadows.
Is there only one sky,
showing up on both our profiles
over and over across the ocean?

If we were Facebook friends
she wouldn’t have to call me at 4am to tell me that she’s sorry.
We wouldn’t have to blubber in broken Korean about how wholesome we’re eating.
She wouldn’t have to let her tears out, I wouldn’t have to receive them,
she could just post on my wall that she loves me, and I could “like” it.

We could invite each other to events we can’t attend and Facebook could send us birthday reminders

would my mother curse the screen every august 13th like an annual birth pain?
would Facebook remind her to breathe?

If there was Facebook on the night I was born, my mother could have asked for more courage.
Her friends commenting that they hoped everything was okay,
sending light and love
and my naked mother holding me on her blood stained floor,
skin to skin,
my fist clenched around her finger,
us, weeping together
and still a secret.

Someone, somewhere, would say a prayer for her.

Maybe she would have 811 friends.
Maybe she would have ten.
Maybe she would have closed her account,
closed her doors,
closed her heart, her laughter, her words.

Maybe there isn’t really anything to say
when you’re dressing your baby for the last time.

But I want to know.
I want to be a mobile upload, too precious to forget.
I want to hear her quaint descriptions:
how long is the train ride to the city?
what is the woman next to her reading?
does she get lost in seoul?

I want to follow her check-ins:
to the payphone,
to the social worker’s apartment.
to the alley outside, where she threw up a piece of her.

I want more than an apology.
I want to know what I was wearing.
I want to know what I was doing, what my mother’s eyes looked like as she said goodbye.
What song was playing on the radio?
How many other mothers were in that black book,
sat on that sinking couch,
handed their children away
in return for their hope?

for how long did she sleep that night?
Has she woken up
yet.

Mother,
time-drenched broken mother,
let’s not wait another 21 years for a birthday party.
for you to teach me what it means to prepare your skin at night,
to scrub our bodies before bed,
to measure a red hanbok around my waist,
and feed me a lifetime of meals in one sitting.

Forgivable mother,
this is a friend request
from a stranger,

this is a friend request
from your daughter.

nostalgia.

2011-09-05T23:21:00.001-05:00

"zvegsdute
as nore namo"
she taught me...

our backs resting against weary rucksacks
somewhere in the middle of
poland's nowheres
of mafija crawling train stations
stars to guide us home
i was the size of a speck of light
our desires the size of galaxies
(ive always had this thing about
space
in all forms)

we slept
heads buried in our arms
so as not to be spotted by
invisible kidnappers
on the other side of that fence
my toque full of the stench of
"stinky cheese"
chanting
"ah zvegsdute...
as nore
namo"

so many years have passed
since that night

so many mornings have passed
since that sun
when laughing school children
appeared from beyond a fence
laughing
signaling
how close to home we were

so much of life in those days spent
catching one train to the next
empty
crowded
platforms...
steel girders...
i have clickity clacked across the world and back
outflown birds
and outdrunk the most seemingly decrepit

everything back then
was steamed
by desire
everything right now
is guided by
the taming of
once raging inner waters

when i think back to the spring
and the late winter just before
the heartache
that was like a violent jolt of
tectonic earth plate shiftings
and the smell of late blossoming lilacs
i think now
how
"that was then"
and
yes,
"now is
now"

and i am all the better for
all the lives ive lived in such a short span of
time

i still look to the skies
solitary murmuring
"ah zvegsdute
as nore namo"

i am still the young
20 something
looking down the tracks
head out the window
of the carriage
laughing into the wind
that swallows up my exhales
giving me my
ins...

i am still that
london twilight
somewhere off of brick lane
wandering
too broke to buy even a full pint

all of those things from then
are still with me

but i am not those things anymore
and yet
and yet
i am

every place of searching
is inked
every place of longing
is easily recalled

i have whispered to the skies
since before the desolation of
polish mafija train stations
and they
- the skies
- the oceans travailed
have answered
to my
longings of
"zvegsdute
as nore namo"

little star
i want to go home.

today,
i kiss
the sky
my face
aflame
with the holiness
of
now.

kim thompson. 13.21 seoul. s. korea. tuesday. 6 sept. '11

want in particle form

2011-09-02T03:19:00.001-05:00

*inspired by imagery etc from "nostalgia for the light."

i want to
gather my bones from this
eastern desert
fragments of stars
strewn in
black tarred pavement

i want to
"bring my sons from afar"
my collective self
dna
bones
marrow
flesh
hair
all of it
back to one place
- me.

i want to reclaim
the ocean floor
dig it up -- all cracked into
salt and broken clay
put it in my heart's pocket
sprinkle it with
tears
and the dust of my own
movement

i want to
call out to the bones
lying parched beneath the heat of time
and command them
to
"awaken"

i want the return to self
that one goes into the desert for
beneath some sky
of which i am born
to be fed by ravens
and brought back to health from
temptations

i want to write poems
from words that have been
collected from scattered sentences
strewn across this universe
i want to know this world
not from a book
but from my own
eyes
heart
flesh
being
bones
marrow
sinews
all of it
swallow it whole
until i am a canyon
of my own excavations

i want to unbury
the past that is strewn beneath my feet
in this galaxy of urban dust
i want to find the worlds
that sounds created
light years
before
all this.

i want
to want
what wanting wants

i want
to stare into space
and find the earth
my past
my ancestors
my star particled bones
put it all back together
and say
"yes, this
is why ive committed
to this
seeming desert
because only from here
can i see
the constellations
of the present just
seconds passed."

so today
like most
i take my words
carefully from my paint tattered pockets
and fling them sky high
like oracles
seeing where on heaven's abyss
and earth's unknowns
they land
forming
constellation maps
leading me
back

home.

kim thompson. friday 2 sept. seoul. s. korea in the morning and the afternoon

is.

2011-08-27T23:45:00.001-05:00

you take your soju soaked heart
and tell me
weepingly
"SEE."

but ive got salt in my eyes
and so i only see mine

i have no
control
over songs written
or hours passed...
(god id give anything to go back
to something
that i never really could
stop)
(and if i could
would i have?
knowing all that i know now?)

(but YOU could have) (or maybe not)
(but...
YOU
really
could/should
have)

and maybe
its not that "maybe not"
that so maybe
makes all this
oh so very
maybe not
ok

...

but you
you just
you...
lay that heart of yours
right down on the grill
and i just stare at the ignite switch
(off)
or
(on)
i cant
decide.

you didnt rob me
of my life
i see that
tonight...

what you robbed me of
was

you.

kim thompson. seoul. s.korea written 1 or 2am sun. 28 aug 11.

retrospective

2011-08-10T23:25:00.000-05:00

i stand
no...
sit
here
half submerged beneath the city streets
watching summer pass
watching the year flash by
like buses at the rotary
- writing drafts
not completed
but words down anyhow
wondering
what will be
but knowing just exactly
what is

and i think of leaves that have come and gone
like loves.
summers in the park
that i usually chose to ignore
due to heat
scowling at the algae filled lake
retreating to my artificial but
cooled
air
and wooden floors.
(ah how i miss
those wooden floors)

i rise from beneath these streets
to amble down the way
to purchase coffee
to smoke a cigarette
to buy juice
to go out and grill some fatted calf
(there was no father waiting with outstretched arms
so i cook my own beef
and cheers myself
for coming back to here)

summer
spring
last year's winter
soon to be autumn
soon to be winter
soon to be
another year

almost 8 months of a practice
and how things have slid into
new
grooves
(still i seek a teacher)
youd never think it
guess it
from how i carry on when in public
but there are things i practice
that are keeping me sane
this could all be much worse
if not for
breathing.

it is not
that i do not want
or
need you
it is that
i cannot see you
but you are not
out of (my) mind
i just see no need to want
what is not in front of me
and yet so badly do i want my life
that is not fully realized...
one day
one day
one day
yes
to all of this

so much happens in a year
so much happens in a day
even when not looking

dying is the struggle to stay above the surface
im resting at the bottom of the pool
watching the sun above the waters
watching the world from beneath the streets

and one day soon
with words anew
i shall fly above these streets
and part the waves
with one word

but for now
here below
is exactly where
i am.
the struggles been drowned out
and lungs are
free
to
carry on.

kim thompson seoul s.korea thursday 11 aug 11 @ 13.27

korea summer shorts

2011-07-07T01:28:00.003-05:00

I. 3-4 months

june was spent
repeating
"lets take advantage of tonight
before monsoons
and
august humid heat
hit."

july is spent
repeating
"i am sitting here
listening to
the
rain
fall down"

august will be spent
repeating
"i fuckin' hate this humidity
will it EVER
end?
where did winter go?"

september and how its spent
is anybody's guess.

II. on writing

this week
the sentences translated
trickle in
at leaky faucet pace
leaving me the time
to do my real
work

III. this morning

awaking to evidence of
lines criss-crossed
(perhaps tis my own fault
for allowing them to be so open
blurred)
but
we each have our own pen
with which to draw.
i ink mine in words

IV. the past

out of a need
not birthed
but resulted from
birthing --
of cords cut
(literal
and
real)
any line thrown
i have
bound to my
indent
grasping for
a knot
to remain
tied.
resulting in
damaged
webs
of spider's
silk.

-- and like a bug
i would get so
stuck. --

V. today

through the wires
that run overhead
satellite connected
we speak
in a technology
i thought for my
children's
children
never in (my)
lifetime.

it is the invisible which
connects us
the flutterings of
interwebs.

VI. friends

i am suspicious
of any --
no matter how good --
who do not surround
their lives
with
ones who
live
accountable
and whole
hearted
admitting
self insecurities
and
changing.
who know the value of
a
step
and the need for
love
lines.

VII. 일곱

as a child
i learned these numbers
at summer camp
and
tae kwon do
yelling each one out
happy to be 9
and looking forward to the age of
10
punching our fists straight out into the air
i broke a board with one
yalp
i cried like rain
when i failed in front of
family.
and in counting
found no
consolation.

VIII. nostalgia

20s waking in the alps
always brought me
back to earth
no matter where my lines
would spin
i long for odysseys like
that again
days gone past
what now to do with this
golden
fleece?

IX. present

like glasses that keep needing
to be topped off
i sense the shot
turned pint
turned
pitcher
turned
keg
i keep
refilling

one day i'll be a tanker

X. no longer

how i once did
i can no longer
do
punish you
for not being
what you could
never be
punish me
for not being
what i should not
never
be.

i cannot
go back
to past.
(nostalgic though i am)

i pull out my pen
in the repeating phrase
of july
draw my lines
upon this fleece thats golden
yell out sino count
while ink bleeds humid

and laugh with friends
whilst they down
martinis
and i smoke
cigarettes

all connected by the
spider's
interwebs
in which im no longer

stuck.

kim thompson seoul. s. korea thurs. afternoon. 7 july '11

push-n-pull

2011-07-03T01:35:00.001-05:00

push-n-pull
push-n-pull

july's sky
and streets
weep out
my soul

all the lives i could have been
all the pavement i have lost
all the language stripped

push-n-pull
push-n-pull

is it crying up
or is it sobbing down?
how then is it
my eyes remain so
dry?

how then is it
that i then still find small delight(s)?

push-n-pull
push-n-pull

the childhood i will never have
the family i will never know

if i date you
if i sleep with you
if our bodies become so enjoined with fluids
will i then be
returned to
this place
as yours?

or is this
just
one big
final
farewell
fuck
to the life
that
i cannot put back together?
for the life that
fell from the wall
and
that the king's horses
and king's men
have long gone away from?

push-n-pull
push-n-pull

words please wait
words please stay
until i make it to my home
until i finish walking up and down these streets
words rush in backwards
from all sides

this school boy that i could have been
this beautiful woman confident in heels that i might have been
this married ahjuma with children
this child tugging on its umma's hand

push-n-pull
push-n-pull

the rain hits
humid
doors are sliding
the river han
keeps calling
conjoined with
the mighty
mississippi
stream

i am water bound.
i am pulled
and
pushed
by your silence
by your stares
by your speech that runs garbled in my brain

i am yi sang's wild hair
i am some other poet's dream
i am my own dna
come back to haunt me
in my dreams
of bicycle aeroplanes
and a father that i cannot
scream at
for his
leaving

push-n-pull
push-n-pull

the closer i come to
some enlightened form
the greater i feel this
bursting from within
of pulling pushing
anger
of pushing pulling
seethe
of pulled pushed
fists that i never raise
to the sky that falls down
through my
9 dollar umbrella
of pushed pulled
strings and strands of filamental
loss

push-n-pull
push-n-pull
and then theres all the tugging

am i just making peace
with a thing that will never
can never
be?
i speak (of) the practice of forgiveness...
but for her
i have so little
and yet for her i am
without a limit

push-n-pull
push-n-pull

is this really going to make me
better off?
is this really going to be the road to
my own inner paradise?

if i capture as many
in my cage like heart
will i become by capturing
the thing that i can never
go back to
being?

if i master poetry in my mother's tongue
as im mastering in my other mother's tongue
will i finally have all the words i lack
for the immensity of this
push
pull repetitive
stress injury
heartline
fracture
that i dont know how to mend?

if i lean in far enough
will i walk on water
part the seas
or drown in heavy monsoon droughts of dry?

if i return to my ancestors' practices
will i ever look jaw dropping in a hanbok?
will i ever know how to tie that tie
and walk with such utter grace
in place of daily
swagger?

can the hanguk hetae
the horangi
this tiger shaped peninsula
ever give birth to any kind of
strawberries?
will the magpie return the song
that ive forgotten
but hear playing out
each day
in the push-n-pull of
city melodies
of my people
my
people
MY people
chattering in cafes
oblivious to
the 200,000 sent away?

she does not want to see me
she does not want to lose me
thunder rumbles loudly as i write these lines
and yet she does not speak

i am lost with and without
i am found without and with

i am the only one who looks as her
and yet for her i am the one most
foreign
my birthright traded
for a pot of western stew
my place as eldest
sold
for
for
for...

for what?

sold so that i could grow up the youngest?
sold so that this land of magpies and the hetae
could turn blind eye to how "oori"/"we" is only lived out
in grammar
sold so that i could be more exotic than my tattered self is truly?
(i am not good
i just contain)
(i am not bad
i just explain)
i am not pushed
i am just pulled
i am not pulled
i am just
pushed

i have taken beautiful and made her ugly
i have taken ugly and made her female deity
i have squandered and well spent my youth
i am paying off my sins of negligence for others
i am reveling in the reward for my love for others
i am still this kind of player whose benched myself from playing
i am still this johnny and june carter cash lifelong love analogizer...
i will make you the most beloved
i will make you the most despised
i am evil good
i am good evil
i am wild raging thats been calmed by time...
i stopped punching my knuckles through glass and walls
years ago
but i still carry all that raging molten lava
cooled by inner springs...
it bubbles to the surface when i let loose my
fettered feathers.

push-n-pull
push-n-pull

with here there is no peace
with here there is some land of morning calm
my own name speaks of this
my own names
are more than one
and when she calls me by my truest first
my heart returns to birth

with here there is no perfect resolution
with here there is only the unearthing
of a past that cannot be found
only tasted in the food
only recalled in all the most minute of moments
that my body knows but my mind cannot name.

the longer i am here
the more deeply i feel into knowing
the life it is i lost...
- the child (that) i never got to be
- the awkward adolescent (that) i never was
- the art student the kiosk worker the lady on the street
- the mother
- the lover
that was set to full erase
the day she sent my heart away from hers

there is no happy ending to this story
there can only ever be the middle

its all just
push-n-pull
pull-n-push

there are no words
for pain like this
pain that leaves me scrambling for words
and breath
and somehow still sensing life more lovely
but somewhere now
in all this sense of push-n-pull
i finally can untighten...
shower you
with my sponge squeezed self
with what this
summer storm torrential pour
is like.

push-n-pull
push-n-pull.

there is a certain sound in between the time
the water falls from sky to earth.
i am suspended somewhere in that
middle
of the push
and
pull
of
my mothers'
tears.

-- k. thompson. 15.35 seoul. s. korea. sunday. 3 july.

skipping stones

2011-06-27T01:12:00.001-05:00

i want to

take you like a pebble round smooth stone

from the shorelines of duluth

and skip you across lake

superior

watching you sink

my blessing

to some bottom

of a disappearing point

-- to stand where the jagged point of land

juts out into the water

(one single solitary tree)

say your name

and fling you

sky

high

water

deep

screaming silently

of burned out fire pits

and wood turned

blackened coal

like tar soaked

egrets wings --

(i took your photograph in fields

beside some bursting orange

of your flamed out

hair

making green look more

green

and the white border of the photograph

more

white)

i want you

jangling in my pockets

loose change

that i place on railroad track

an image only i recall

"i hear the train a-coming"

i want to

drain you bottomless

to the rounded curve of my finnish iitalla blue wine goblet

liver soaked

brain

i am not

love hurried

not love weighted

i dont believe in first sight

unless its in a movie

(and i dont believe in hollywood

but i wish their stories

were sometimes true)

i want

full release of

stone flinging

in the vio-lent lines of poetry

that occur between each word

like i did back then

off the edge of

where midwest

water

meets the

sentence

uttering what i needed to mutter

to god invisible

naming stone with yours

and freeing you

to be polished by

freshwater

lake like sea

i want to write your name

in whiteboard marker

on my hand

watch it washed off

running

in this late june

rain

call you

"stone lake skipper"

flinging my hands

sky high

rain puddle deep

in city without

egrets

only

tar paved streets.

i want for

past earth

to break off

clumping

jagged granite

smoothed by great lakes

and a only half decade of history

i stand here

solitary stoic solid tree

jutting looks across watery abyss

releasing rounded flats of rock

that my roots reveal

into

that disappearing point

of

skipped stone

meets

oceanic lake...

-- all blue roads still lead to

water swallowed by

the light of

letting go

pure hearts

release

somewhere up off the edges of

duluth

somewhere on the quiet paragraphs of

some lake

that we call

"superior"

kim thompson. this was written 26 june 2011 sunday. seoul. s. korea

chick-a-dees or maybe they are something else

2011-06-20T21:49:00.002-05:00

my friend
likes to say the word
"chicks"
A LOT

i dunno why
it makes me laugh
probably cuz when she says it
i think about
how probably some
white liberal in the tit cities
would find this
offensive
and it makes me laugh
because then i think of how
these same people
are really into
"eastern religions"
and
hang chinese prints around their house
never wondering if
my friend who says
"chicks" A LOT
and i
and others
find this to be so
reducing in its
blatant
objectification
of everything we've spent our lives
running from...
and are now falling apart at the seams
from trying to
reclaim

(how does one express in writing
GENUINE
amusement?)

and i think about all these things
this morning
as
chickadees
or whatever they are called
all swoop down
in a gang of
five
hopping about
looking for something i guess
cuz they look back at me
with this look of
"whatever you are
we dont really care
we're doing quite fine"
and hop up to the top of
an iron fence

reminding me of how
insignificant
MY
existence is for
them
they just like to
skip
jump
hop
and dont care if i call em
by the wrong name
cuz unlike ariel
i couldnt name a bird if i had to
unless its red
or blue
or speaks
or looks like it belongs on a silver dollar
then i know its name

and im watching how
they just
dont seem to care
about the traffic
the sun
the heat
the bongo trucks
the sun-brellas
the stench
the things i worry about
the things i think about
the things i label "good" or "bad" or
blah blah blah

chicks
chickadees
they remind me a lot of just how much
"blah blah blah blah
BLAH"
goes on in my head
how i doubt theyre very concerned about their own
"evolution of becoming"
making me wonder if im not just
adding to my own bullshit
maybe if i had a brain the size of
a chick
a chickadee
id be better at
hopping
flitting
jumping
hanging out on fences

but then i feel the cold
of the ice coffee in my hand
and how much im enjoying the taste
and i doubt that it registers with a
chick
chickadee how pleasant
enjoying
is
cuz... its not like they get to listen to
adele
or
even the pop music that i never admit to liking
and
they dont get to
read poetry
and have their hearts flipped inside out
and yes
though they dont know just how much a break up hurts
they also dont know just how beautiful
love
is
i doubt when they do what
birds and bees
are
want to do
that it leads to any form
of
deep rooted connection
i doubt they write songs
or long winded poems
as odes
to such moments
im guessing they just hop off
and though i
sometimes
envy
such ways
every time ive ever just
flown away
my amount of care
seeps through and tells me
"you know
there is
a
better way"

so...
today
watching them
come and go
thinking back on who and
what
and all
that is
over
across that great body
of water
that even the things
that at times sicken me
(like my recent
- legitimate -
rants on
the objectification
of my people
by those who claim to be so
equality for all)

think to myself how
im really quite fond of
"chicks"
and
chickadees

even if
im using the wrong
words
for
both.

kim thompson seoul, s. korea tues 21 june '11 11.49

Balancing Act (I'll come up with a better title later)

2011-06-17T21:03:00.000-05:00

I’m the cause that caught up with James Dean--

ended entitled white boy rebellion in twisted metal and legend that

regurgitates itself every few years in the suburbs

I’m where the parents were when their kids brought shooting games

to the schoolyard,

when boys are boys and girls get bought off, mouths shut, thighs wide--

I spread the panic when little white girls disappear

I am the Angel that taught Christians to paint targets on themselves

and the Westboro Baptists are like my side project.

I ghost-wrote the first argument for “reverse-racism” just

to see if anyone would buy it

I made Ed Hardy cool,

took away taste buds to make Miller High Life tasty

took away sight to make Sandra Oh pretty--

invented the word “exotic”

popped collars, bleached hair

that makes you a laughing stock,

created the guilt that makes you condone me.

My name is Balance and I’m here to fuck your shit up.

You can’t set dogs, fire hoses, smallpox blankets, or language tests on me

You can’t napalm, nuke, or legislate me away.

I’m here for your kids’ kids

to show them while they bleed that Justice is a diversion

arrived at only after a short period of Balance.

tomorrow this will be a poem and now it is "tomorrow" and now this time has passed...

2011-06-06T01:05:00.001-05:00

note to self: when you wake up in the morning do something with the following words "tonight's moon sliver" "the things" and "give-her"

-- and now it is tomorrow --

------

i love you

whole or

slivered

moon shape

imprinted in the never black

but deep ocean blue of evening sky

(you could be a white hotel fraction of a bed sheet

in the background of her beauty

you could be a fraction of her beauty

in the foreground of an entire mirror)

when you are giving light

or resting like the imprint of

a finger's very edge

up behind

the night

it is as if

everything thats happening on the streets

both here

and

over there

have zoomed up

and

back

from space

and galaxies collide on

tumbling city pavements

as patrons pour out from

sunday night revelries

and late night

fryings up of meat

the things

that you give

the things

that you take

-- the tides you create

-- the desire that you command...

... i cannot help but stare

and wonder on

this brevity

feeling fully how we are witnessing one another

in our waxing turned to

waning

i let go

to know this moment is a gift

i let go

to know everything of this is just a sliver be it whole

or splintered...

sliver of white light matter

comprised of particles

just as we...

nothing lasts near even somewhat close to

what we like to call

"forever"

and yet

words

matter

as they are comprised of such invisibilities of

the very universe

(that)

i carry on the inside of me

which holds me in this present

so that in the morning

when i wake

i remember you as fresh

and am reminded

of how

even moon

and sky

like love

in shining

are merely signs

of

mere short lived

mortality

and i inhale my world

and exhale my departing

with reverence for the sliver

of that moment

in between

which plants me here

on planet earth

inside

my spinning satellites

of

words become flesh

and

how nothing

even moon

can be found

outside

of

me.

*photo of another moon now passed from spring... back when it was almost full and not in last nights slivered state

last night i...

2011-05-27T20:23:00.001-05:00

i remember you

dark haired and lovely

as if through a window

and not a pixelated screen

i know the beauty of what i have been given

so much that this morning sun is blinding me

in my seeming cavern dwelling

i have filled myself with sustenance

and memories

love of you

is a love of

me

i know your transgressions

that you tried to hide in secret

but they do not erase

what once was good

because i also know

all the things youre pushing down

so even in a poem i can forgive

because of how even in life

so much i have been

forgiven

in (my) own days of

suppression

i know what this place does to the soul

yes,

it does rebuild

but,

it also does tear down

and you cannot look without being changed

han river is both contaminated and so seoul cleansing

i am here

so fully here

but i feel how my heart

it is

expanding

to outside of here

(this day is not the day for decisions

but one day will be)

but last night i loved this city

as if it were my own

as if we were friends separated by time

only to return to life as lovers

i loved it as i nursed my beer

and sat beneath some city planted trees

i loved it as i squelched my dunhill lights

into orange glass and tin shaped

ashtray 재떨이

i loved it as i

remembered you

dark long haired beautiful

as if vibrant

through time's window

pre sleep

pre our waking

and held

everything over there

and here

inside my ever waking

ever mounting

ever rising

ever growing

heart of truly ever green

kim thompson seoul. s.korea 28 may sat 10.23

dare...

2011-05-23T00:18:00.000-05:00

“I awoke and at times birds fled and migrated /that had been sleeping in your soul.” -- Neruda

i watched

as wind flew out from your center

a crash of wings

a crash of claw and beaks

(i have seen crows mourn their brethren)

(what this thing is now

i do not dare to

name it

i cast my eyes down to the earth

where my hand rests trembling)

half of my self

is still over on the other side

of all the unknown waves that sing out from the depths

where mermaids swoon

and the leviathan still roam

my body sits here planted

before a metal rectangle with plastic

and wires

for guts

my feet one footed on a metal bar

and the other resting 'hind it

legs crossed

i do not dare to call out into

what should not yet be

uncrossed

a black fly stealths its way in

taunting

"i know

i know

do you?"

and these birds are

gossiping about what it is

im

thinking

there is sunlight in the alley

and invisible utterances of

flutters through the

"interweb(s)"

"yes you must"

i mouth to j.alfred prufrock

but he just rolls his trousers

eats a peach

picks up his coffee spoons

and

flies

out the

room

kim thompson 23 may 2011 seoul s.korea 14.19

random thoughts on reunion

2011-05-21T20:59:00.000-05:00

* this is not a "poem" this is... words thoughts on life since finding her 2.5 years ago

"some things

cannot be

are not meant to be

reconciled"

those were her words

and i took them as mine

to sum up everything with

her and her and also with her

adoption and its disorders

which lead to relationships with disorders

adoptees are a form of oh so most "disorderly"

cannot attach

but always prone to cling

cannot let in

but always looking out

and those who can

i pray to meet

because some days being the ones to create the model

is too exhausting

she makes my heart a whirl

she makes my brain collapse

she takes the breath from my lungs

and slams it on the city pavements

and leaves me gasping

there is nothing simple about our love

she took my language

she took my understanding

she took my trust

she took the beat from my heart

and drowned it in the pacific

our love was birthed complex

everyone wants to know

how things are with her

these days all i can say is

"its so damn complicated"

you have this moment

where all the light shines in

when the moon is magical

and time stands still

and it moves

and youre back in real time

and the light begins to burn

and the moon looks bored

and time is poking you in the arm

our finding was beauty turned upheaving

and so then theres the drinking

and the over sexing

others find their other ways of coping

and youve just been spun in circles

and life's saying "hey walk straight"

and the ground waves up and down

and people say "whats wrong with you?"

as youre reeling from the booze and the goddamn so drunk sex

and you cant even pull the line back in

because how do you unravel and repiece a ball of yarn like this?

and some days you hate her

and other days you love her

and then at times you just choose to forget

and sometimes its the whole damn country

and sometimes its every woman whose ever done like her

and then theres this quiet calm

and other days theres grief deeper than any child who has a mother could ever know

and inbetween it all theres the knowing

and theres the guilt

cuz youre 2% of 200,000 who are without all you have

so the 1% that you know of the 2%

sit together huddled over dinner

saying things that only the two of you can understand

and what this new lonely feels like

there is no happy ending

you knew that

and yet you didnt

shes got a world of guilt to pay

shes got a lifetime of trying to forget her own flesh and blood

thats out there somewhere wandering...

so you drink

and you fuck

and you dont sleep

and you say crazy shit

because youre drunk

and screwing anything that shows up

and then sleep deprived from not being able to walk in a straight line

and then one day

youre with your friends

youre with a lover

youre with 1% of that 2%

and you realize

how youre no longer drinking to forget

how sex has regained its status and youve said no 9 out of 10 times

and youre sleeping

and even though youre not walking a straight line

at least its a slow "s" shape that youre treading and the floor's stopped moving everytime you lift your foot.

and everything that was beating up your heart and brain

is punching so much softer

and the 15,000 emotions that you were living with all at once

are now down to maybe 150 all at once and those 150 have been stabilized by

realizing you are living in her words

that

some things

cannot

are not

meant to be

reconciled.

kim thompson. seoul. s.korea sunday 22 may 2011 11.00

mpls

2011-05-20T00:03:00.001-05:00

and in that just before the dawn

when lilacs breathe through open windows

i finally know the song in full

when i mistake the moon for a street lamp

and utter a sound of awe...

all the shattered pieces meld together

and the broken becomes whole

to form a perfect window door that swings wide

open

(its always been how the light gets in...)

and the laughter inbetween our teary tasting drinks

revives each part that was

forgotten

put in boxes

put away on shelves

not for shame but for

... wishing for a better day

that never gets

any better...

and in the wishing

forgetting spilled over

and when we sat repeatedly

in front of the red and yellow bricks

staring into the park

through sweaty owled glasses

dogs digging earth

your son looking 15 frantic childhood times before crossing the street

the forgotten crossed back over and into

the again of "now"

and when you popped the flower between your fingers

i was for the first time

awakened by the memory of a scent

that we'd inhaled moments before

the opening of flowers

and when you slapped me on the back with a guffaw

and high fiving cuz that's just what we do when we're saying

"i love you"

breath re-entered to my desperate lungs

when i saw each face

heard each voice

consumed each bite of tenderloin

and breakfasts in the afternoon

all so present in the moment

every bit that i didnt know id lost

came back full fledged

in a newer brighter

yet

familiar way

leaning in

has allowed for

all the joys of

leaning out into open hearted ways of

light

and

of

love

and

of

ee cummings wings

and all (of) that returned me

back to

here

the place that being "i" first

began.

kim thompson seoul. s.korea friday 20 may 2011 14.03

Four Elements; Two Rivers

2011-05-09T17:01:00.004-05:00

Birth:
Fires, that the men ignite with kerosene and matches, it makes them feel alive.
Water, in the Han River drifting, mother’s pregnant tides, her protective lining, farewell tears.
Earth, enslaved while protected by gravity.
Air, currents wave from the Han River to the Mississippi River.

Childhood:
Fires, brother and father light by the streams, I tell muskrats and skunks to run. Fast.
Water, in the Mississippi flows, mother in the magical June yard, her constant absence of tears, she drowns the Iris’s daily.
Earth, I walk over sand pits, under the culverts echo, in search of amethyst lilacs.
Air, once winds carried blazing embers onto mother’s face.

Adolescence:
Fires, utilized daily, to go up or come down.
Water, they are separate tributaries, leading to adjoined oceans,
I find both mothers; both still drowning from the same single flame.
Earth, felt in each new touch to replace the previous.
Air, from each mouth, speaking ones, silent ones, imaginary ones.

Adulthood:
Fire, with lavas we waited for engulfing oceanic arms,
Water, I tasted salt from ancient cave ruins,
Earth, you built a pyre over a manmade stream,
Air, whispers to children pretending to be adults

Fire's burning wood into the water's air:
When we are still
just encircling,
just recycling,
the same wars,
and rivers,
the same territory,
words,
that always was,
reliving our sphere
again and again.

for (my) 엄마

2011-05-08T13:14:00.000-05:00

the past cannot be undone...

it is not a string that can be

unknotted ...

nor unwound

and yet (i) have stood before you

unraveling since the moment that

you let me

(halfway) in

and the half of me thats still outside

and the half of me thats been let inside

are divided into broken splinters

my heart a human form of flowering

but i love you

and have done so

since you carried me sight unseen

back when your flesh was my shield

back when we stirred each other into waking

i have loved you always

even in the midst of every righteous tantrum fit of anger/pain for all you did

and did not

do

and our past is the world's largest ball of seemingly unworkable yarn

but the train keeps speeding forward

and the solitary street lamps

are shining down on this

slowly knitted path

so today

just like back in the beginning

and all throughout the middle...

i love you with the heart

that you and he

made for me.

-- kim thompson. mpls, mn the states. sunday 8 may 2011. 13.15

about being here...

2011-05-06T13:35:00.000-05:00

shes outside sprinkling seeds on the corner of her block

and while shes crouching scattering life into

a corner patch of seeming dirt

i see the visual of whats been going on inside of me

and the purple blossoms reaching up from mossy greens

and suddenly i have something to write about

(cuz how do you write a poem 'bout eating

and drinking

and

eating more?)

but then she goes and sprinkles seeds into the ground

with the green hose resting obediently

like a long green dog

and i wish to "god" that id been born

"a dancer"

cuz they have these gestures for

seeds

and

joy

and

home

and planting things

and everything else it is

that ive been feeling these days

inbetween the

gorging

and there were rocket trails in the sky

and i dreamt with aerial zoom vision

only,

the world zooms out from me into the expansiveness of space

and i loved a dancer once

(i have loved too many for the count)

(i am guided by their choreography)

but my mouth could not move

(even though it knows the gestures for

desire)

and i awoke

my hands rotating to last night's

music

and

twisting feet

and i sat this afternoon

consuming food and buttered lemon sauce

my heart still gesturing long lines

with the seeds that

have been

sown

from these days and weeks of

being

here

knowing that

in (my) seoul

these things

will

blossom

beautifully

with

grace

-- kim thompson. mpls, mn, the states 13.36 friday 6 may

Lunch With Omma: (“Tell me everything!”)

2011-05-06T08:01:00.001-05:00

(My First Poem written almost a year ago in Summer '10!)Omma, I want you know-
In America the women come in all shades of beige and brown,
They REALLY are beautiful with long legs, big eyes
and yes
long lashes.
I want you to know the cars can drive REALLY slow in the left lane,
And Omma,
the condiments- they are always refrigerated
and there is a fetish for carpeting and neolium.
Omma-
in America I can drive through black neighborhoods with bodies hanging out my trunk,
And the cops,
they will never stop......me.
Omma in boy bands and girl bands, each member is cast a unique image.
And in American rush hour,
50 cars will stop to let one bike, one pedestrian pass.
Omma, here in America,
the individual can come before the group.
Omma,
no matter if the expense of some really benefits the whole to move forward or not.
Omma, the end result is always men drinking, while the women wipe their table clean

Omma, I want you to know I’ve met many biological families,
(Omma-)
sometimes it doesn’t look like I’m missing out on much.
Omma I want you know in America you only have to see your relatives on holidays.
And Omma,
in America, you only get to see your relatives on the holidays.

Omma I want you to know I am old enough to know that night after night a great hero will sleep,
as a villainess memory in someone else’s closet.
Omma I want you to know when you come of age in any culture,
Many good guys and bad guys are played by the same actor.
its difficult to acknowledge them all in one lifetime.
Omma, if you listen close, you see that envy can survive only from a distance.

Because Omma,
I want you to know in America too,
38th parallels exist to divide-
and the guard never sleeps.
Omma, here too in America,
a mother,
a father,
a daughter,
a son,
a sister,
a brother;
they wait.
They wait for recognition,
or for freedom to be elapsed.
Omma
I want you to know that even you
can’t tell me
how long
they will wait.

Ooommmaaa-
I want you to know all of this,
Because,
I,
will never tell it to you.

done

2011-04-28T12:42:00.001-05:00

so you want to provoke me

then i will choke thee

pipe to your broke knee

don't call it murder, call it mercy

i'm not at the edge i'm in the chasm

make you see phantasms

while i make your spine go into spasm

we at the point of no return

you should be concerned

you i will adjourn

you know this won't just burn

more painful than tax returns

no more option of peace

i will not cease until you're deceased

whittled down to the littlest piece

need to call a priest to release

from the beast of the far east

i feast on your fear

your lease on life's end is near

chug down your blood with a chaser of beer [gombae]

you thought the queer couldn't commandeer

let's get this clear

so you know i'm sincere

i won't stop until your lifeforce disappear

i make you bloody like a pap smear

flesh so disgusting even worms won't go near

no more birthdays this calendar year

blow out all the candles in your chandelier

your lights go dark

no question mark

i am a great white shark

my massacre about to embark

i'm a carnivore, a predator

i embrace you with c4

leave your body busted on the floor

add your head to my decor

you trying to start the third world war

go ahead, i got an arsenal for days

hand on the matches ready to set you ablaze

i'm not here to coddle + amaze

i'm here to make your brains go all kind of ways

here come the extinction

dinosaurs won't just have the distinction

you'll be wiped out like a giant wave

even if you change your behave

you waive the opportunity to be forgave

i'm razor sharp, no close shaves

time to dig you a shallow grave

you messin' with a goblin

this ain't no petty squablin'

your legs ain't the only thing that'll be wobblin'

a nose job is the least of your problems

thought your ugly face couldn't get worse

your plastic surgeon won't get reimbursed

shoved off the building headfirst

insides all dispersed

you'll wish you were cursed

and i'm not even at worst

shouldn't have stepped to me in the first

medical institutions goin' mental

tooth fairy can't identify your dental

your pain is not accidental or coincidental

i'm a force like elemental

the build up is incremental

until the payoff is monumental

brains stewed like lentils

how's that for oriental?

your weak shit is obsolete

it's alt control delete

i flip you to downbeat

wearing boots made of concrete

no parachute in your ejection seat

call an agent you about to be cast

slash your throat with glass

make you want the tear gas

i'll mummify your insignificant ass

fuck you with embalming fluid

draw + quarter you like a druid

splay your carcass on my shield

make you run track on my mine field

fingernails back + peeled

my lips aren't sealed

my words is rough

but my fists is tough

even when you've had enough

i still beat you into a bloody cream puff

see your blood run

anger hotter than the center of the sun

i got the formula to f1

regrets are none

torture is for fun

this is my entertainment with no refunds

the noose has already been spun

you're a stun gun, i'm a machine gun

i lay you out, done

WHAT I SHOULD'VE SAID

2011-04-25T02:50:00.002-05:00

One time I was sort of seeing this guy. After one kiss, he blessed me with a long speech about how he needed to know what I wanted because he didn't want to be a father. This totally pissed me off, which you should never do to a poet, because then they'll just write about you (a line I learned from Bao Phi). I dedicate this poem to all men who date single moms, because NEWSFLASH, we don't need you like you think we need you.

WHAT I SHOULD’VE SAID
for men that date single moms

Do you
think
I am the kind of woman
who lets love storm her judgment?
The kind of woman
who saves spaces in her sky for any
bird who kisses her?

Do you
think
I’m the kind of lover
who doesn’t respect men enough
to have favorites?
The kind of lover
who is so lonely
she’s forgetful?

What kind of mother do you think I am
that I would think
my son needs the kind of father
you think you are,
who considers this family a charity,
like we accept any donation?

A NaPoWriMo poem: I Believe In Harry Holt Too

2011-04-21T21:50:00.000-05:00

Unrevised with a visual aid.

Somewhere across the ocean,

a woman with my eyes looks at her ruined body every morning

and remembers me,

wonders what might have been

now that it is 2011 and the world is a different place than 1986.

Maybe her heart rips in half again

as she goes to work in a factory somewhere.

Somewhere across the ocean,

a man with my jawline frowns at his monthly wage

(less than I make in a week)

and remembers me,

wonders if I have his jawline

or what the woman with my eyes is doing now

before swallowing his failure like drunken sick

and clocking into a factory somewhere.

Yesterday, I bought a teddy bear for my friend’s kid

because the tag said “made in Korea”

and somehow, that made me feel like it could be less store-bought--

some connection to whoever was sewing it together

in a factory across the ocean.

I doubt he’ll remember who gave it to him.

Cell's Collect-ING

2011-04-15T10:34:00.009-05:00

These brown iris's are just a pair like 2 billion yellow others that rely
on rice seasoned with laughter to survive,
I am one of 1 billion women who fantasize
being taken
seriously,

In North America I am 1 of 529 million that dreams of mangoes at night and abides by daylight savings clocks,
My passport rests in the amalgamated monoculture
of tired soil with more than 300 million others,

My Korean birth certificate resembles 48 million in a morning calm,
who yearn for the 24 million north wind,
who also have hot
tempers and peppered tongues,

The path chosen for me in infancy was replicated by 200,000 displaced
lucky others
And like 15,000 of those lucky others,
my new life would be along the banks
of the 10,000 lakes
that charm the Mississippi River,
at the welding of well-behaved
Christians.

Having been born one culture by nature,
given another one
by nurture,
many more were sought to alleviate the dissolution.
The faded memories of different
cultures,
sub-cultures, counter-cultures
equalize their contradictions

Still Hungry,
I am just one in the rush of 7 billion pulses
Wondering how much longer
this
can be.

response to frank o'hara

2011-04-11T21:35:00.001-05:00

자전

프랭크 오 하라

한역 김 연복

어렸을 때에 난

학교 운동장 구석에서

혼자서만

놀았다.

인형도

게임도 시들했다

동물들은 나를 피했고

새들은 날아가 버렸다

누군가가 나를 찾으면

난 나무 뒤에 숨어서

" 난 고아다" 하고

소리쳤다

그러다, 보라, 오늘 !

난 모든 아름다움의 중심에 있다

이런 시들을 쓰면서...

상상이나 해보라.

Autobiographia Literaria

Frank O, Hara

When I was a child

I played by myself in a

corner of the schoolyard

all alone.

I hated dolls and I

hated games, animals were

not friendly and birds

flew away

If anyone was looking

for me I hid behind a

tree and cried out " I am

an orphan."

And here I am, the

center of all beauty !

writing these poems !

Imagine !

-------------

response to frank o'hara:

a little dude ranch

all alone

eating lunch

and for the first and only time

feeling peace

cuz the two boys whod mock were inside

(two boys whom i later learned to tame

through self deprecation ...

which became both my salvation and my jail cell)

i couldnt say the "r" in mark

i was (so) afraid to speak words like

"world"

"art"

"write"

"word"

and my very brother's name or who he was...

and yet all i wanted was to be

an "aw-tist" and a "ww-iter"

childhood was threatening

from an early age i mourned

how id never have sun bleached blonde hair

or eyes of blue

* such shortcomings were sure signs of ugliness

id never be...

maria von trapp in any school production

jesus and his dad were these nice but mean guys

who lived upstairs

always loving

but always threatening

with their thug named

"angel of death"

who usually liked to pass-over

just before easter

i had no choice but to

swear allegiance

if i wanted to make it to the 1st grade all intact

i'd lie on the wall to wall

carpeting

playing with words

drawing up blueprints for

a future house

and life

id tell her all the things id wonder about

HER

and she'd tell me

id see HER in heaven so not to worry

* this only made me worry more... as from what i knew of heaven... by the time i saw her there i wouldnt care id just be strolling streets of gold whilst stuck in a church service that was scheduled to run for an eternity...

id dream of london

and the world

id dream of women

and songs played out on the piano

id dream of tattoos and cigarettes

and sitting up in trees drawing it all out

id wake up thinking

how i never dreamed of HER

and yet... and yet...

when i was 9 and met poetry

thats when i suddenly knew that

all of it could come true...

so here i am

artist writer of words who has seen the world and who found HER (bringing my kind of heaven down to earth)

and so...

here i am...

this orphan turned woman

with jet black hair that gets more attention than a gangnam pampered poodle

here i am

this child who in hiding found respite

this tattood smoking kim hae kim

who has lived where maria von trapp once sang

this dreaming kid afraid of most but drawing up blueprints for the future

this who i was

and

who i am

this me

who no longer has to eat alone

no more afraid of things that involve the letter

"r"

... yes, frank o'hara this life i did

imagine!

-- kim thompson. tuesday 11.35 12 april 11. seoul. s. korea

my heart

2011-04-07T00:00:00.002-05:00

my heart is the flower that blossoms

pink and bright

outside the dry cleaners

i live downwind from their scent

my heart is

the smell of bread baking

from the bakers round the corner

i live upwind from its scent

my heart is

the sentences i write you

when time whispers "wait"

and the words say "soon"

my heart is

the rain that wakes me in the morning

collecting in my alley

in the space between two walls

my heart is

the joy of knowing trans oceanic flight

and the hearts that wait

for mine

my heart is

awake to knowing that

i will know when to

send

when to go

when to stay

and when to

meet.

my heart is

the painting above my door

arms up in the akimbo of

surrender

my heart is

that silver coin

oblong shape indented

piece of memento

my heart is

wings tucked in

wings unfurled

always ready for the soaring

my heart is

the morning coffee in my cup

and cigarette smoke in the air

and music from small laptop speakers

my heart is

yours for always

my heart is

mine from the beginning

my heart is

living upwind of baked bread

downwind of cherry blossoms

in between two walls swollen with rain

silver smoke wings singing

akimbo'd ready for flight

and well

caffeinated

my heart

it just

is.

-- kim thompson. thursday 7 april 2011. seoul. s.korea 14.00

Inside Out

2011-04-05T08:23:00.011-05:00

Our swords slayed the souls of locusts for autonomy,
Our secrets buried alive our own blood, for our betterment.

We yearned for the gushing of a lily pad waters in a concrete metropolis,
We ripped out street cars to put in a light rail,
We followed the song of a sparrow in the death of Decembers daze,

For the man who can speak the sly language of women,
For the sparkling novelty of a bronze-skinned vampire,
The adult articulations of a toddler in tutu,
And the grown-ups who giggle in times of grief.

We were seeking serenity in the home, we refuse to live alone in.
We run from the relatives that remind us of ourselves,
And scour kingdoms for the ones unknown,
We crave what we massacred,
We pry-d our way into the pumps of their hearts,
Until they caressed our pelvis, one time to many.

Once upon a time,
In a cock tailed field of creamy dreams and shroomy suns
Under constellations crusading Mecury's moon with my thumping pulse
I had an affair with freedom
And my bellied butterflies are spear-
hunting for his encompass,
A glorious ghost with a lingering spell,
The fugitive footsteps of his shadow never cease for me,
He is a constant sea-green of calm rebellion,

Sometimes, on a plum-coral eclipse after the meteor
showers, his echoed hush ripples
-through the caves of my porous sacrum.

2 days (of [eternal] perfection)

2011-04-01T00:00:00.001-05:00

"There Will Come Soft Rains"

by, Sara Teasdale

There will come soft rain and the smell of the ground,

And swallows circling with their shimmering sound;

And frogs in the pools singing at night,

And wild plum-trees in tremulous white;

Robins will wear their feathery fire

Whistling their whims on a low fence-wire;

And not one will know of the war, not one

Will care at last when it is done.

Not one would mind, neither bird nor tree

If mankind perished utterly;

And Spring herself, when she woke at dawn,

Would scarcely know that we were gone.

------

(she) speaks and writes to me of

sunflowers

and cherry blossoms blooming in the present

telling (me) how

the brilliance of sunflowers

is only for 2 days

"so short for so much beauty"

she explains

and how (oft) we forget reality

thinking things like such are somehow

bound to a

forever.

(how is it that i -love- you

without knowing

and without

quotations?)

(another)(she) writes to me of

the devastation and toxic water now around

but how

cherry blossoms have bloomed early in japan

... (recalling the lines of sara teasdale...

"there will come soft rains...")

and how (my) remaking of the words of how and when

spring itself shall slumber on...

sunflowers and how they stand

"like people"

she reminds me

-- so short

-- so brief

this beauty

-- so short

-- so brief

this life

-- so great

-- so immense

this beauty

-- so great

-- so immense

this life.

(how is it that when breathing

i see you

bodiless

and full?)

(her) words and images

play out with the steam that fills my tiled bathroom

thoughts collecting in rivulets that appear and then dissipate on the tiled walls and floor

sunflowers and seeds cascading down my flesh

cherry blossoms running down my hair

and into the drain

all being carried away by

by

by...

air and now

(i tell you of my day

and your ghost responds

with

"yes me too")

(i) want all the slices of my heart

to expand their shreds into

flapping wings

(i know this unfolding

i see it everyday/ noting "everyday" as "매일"

and drifting off into 내일

coming back to "오늘" "지금" the today of now...)

this morning when i awoke

ready to rip up the stalks of dead sunflowers

and curse their stems that knock me in the head

i found peace

in the blossoming of

cherry blossomed breaths...

and opened wide my

wing-ed (shredded) heart

and wrapped your words like

green as green so newborn green tendrils about

my neck and wrists.

so short

so brief

so unearthly

so sublime

so classically "magnificat"

all this

"2 day blossoming"

kind of

love and knowing.

for in the spring

we re-awake

even in the frost of

winter.

kim thompson. friday 1 april '11. seoul. s.korea 14.01

now

2011-03-23T21:37:00.000-05:00

and the hammer swings

and the sound passes through the air

whilst a pigeon cries outside my kitchen window...

a window,

that is half blocked off by kitchen shelves

- a sort of inbuilt window security system

(the shelves, not the pigeon...)

-- (then again this is korea so pigeons could keep many a female intruder away)

and theres the digging and drilling of the new airport subway line

filling my mind with the shape-sound of a well oiled drill bit

(sometimes when walking past all this noise i fear the snapping of chains

and objects plummeting from the sky

whilst the giant metal slabs covering the cavernous gorge in the earth

collapses and we tumble

samgyupsal, automobiles, ahjumas, ahjushis, students, and myself beneath)

all this whilst birds that i no longer want to shoot

are chirping about something

"you dig and toil whilst we sing"

is what i like to think theyre saying

happy with their own song

unbothered by the noise we make with machines

the whir of my now much beloved

air purifier

is a steady sort of hummmmm...

my pint sized refrigerator also joining in on the

white noise harmony going on inside my flat

-- sometimes i could swear that i can hear the smoke

drifting up and off my cigarette...

each day

with every passing moment

the sounds change

ceasing from memory

only to return with another passing breath

only to fade again

with the sound of my slippered feet slippering across my floors

to refill my mug that was made with love

with more

undesecrated morning coffee

this piece of writing

at times interrupted by the sounds of

editing

and spell checks

this piece of writing

comprised of the sounds

of my fingers speeding across the keyboard

(do you know how quickly a person can type with just three fingers?

and yet even with all ten i can barely play a tune on the piano)

a car

bongo truck

speeds by

as if pedestrians never walk these streets

im amazed at the lack of accidents that occur here

im amazed at and by a lot

why im here?

i dont always know

and sometimes this unknowing will break me down at night

and i fill the air with the ache of unknowing

but then the space fills me

with the joy of

becoming

... its no longer just

"the life ive lived"

it is rather now

"the life im living"

filled with daily sounds

filled with daily

"is's"

filled with daily

habits and routines

i am what is

and what is

i

am

brought into

being

(fully)

present

in all this symphony

of

"now"

kim thompson. 11.37 thurs 24 mar 11. seoul. s. korea

Car Crash Love Poem/No, Not Like Cronenberg

2011-03-17T09:23:00.002-05:00

Whiplash whips eyelashes back at

metal bending around metal,

whips memory back to

my arms bending around you.

This was all so avoidable--

road signs ignored, talking about milkshakes

instead of looking ahead.

No matter--no one was hurt;

this was just a minor accident,

between two people

and insurance will cover the damage

so we’ll sleep well tonight,

unaware of the refrain spoken

before work or a car crash--

let the last thing I ever say be I love you.

Thin Lines

2011-03-14T20:09:00.003-05:00

Maybe there is “a thin line between genius and insanity”
Then also,
Maybe there is a thin line between
What they are preaching polarized by what they are hiding.
Maybe charity is overcompensation in Halloween costume,
Maybe parenthood is camouflaged narcissism,
Maybe their desires mimic his “perversions”,
Maybe their stereotypes are derived by their own reflections.

Maybe there is a thin line between
The Catholic saints and the Hindu deities,
Between the Christian Crusades and the Radical Muslims,
Between Abaya traditions and teen magazines culture,
Between the death of the unborn fetus and the man who murders
a family’s integrity.

Maybe there is a thin line between
German run concentration camps and the American run
prison industrial complex.
Between the exile of the Tibetans and the extinction of the Native Americans,

Between the self-proclaimed moral and immoral incarcerated,
Between liquor stores and pot plants,
prescription drugs and psilocybin,
Between free trade and robbing a bank,
Between the leader's egos of left and the right,
Between white lies on taxes and skipping store lines.

Maybe forgiveness
bathes in apathy,
And niceness is the icing of manipulation’s cake

Maybe there is a thin line

between them and us;

between me
and you.
Between thin lines and open spaces-

Maybe also,

there is a thin line between
the love they didn’t give you
and the love you wouldn’t have been able to accept
even if they had.

... today

2011-03-14T03:46:00.000-05:00

lean into it

"lyrics to a song"

she tells me

lean into the wind

lean into the pain

lean into the waves that crash

lean into the disappointment

flip in the air like ravens play with thunderous drafts

i remember how we were

back then

drunk

tying each other up

choking for relief

my skin scarred for a month

i remember how we were

back then

too scared to admit the size of our

love

the size of our

fear(s)

how the ink was about

cover-ups for the past

how the bottles were about

cover-ups for the present

how we leaned away

not

into

tippling back and forth in the backseat of a taxi cab

shouting directions repeatedly

cuz even close to home

we could get so

lost

i think of your message today

in the light of the past

how we once were

and

now are

how my joy leans towards the

love that you have found

and how i now love without

attachment

i think of

a town of 10,000

disappeared

swept away

consumed by the earth in a flash

and the 10,000 times millions more who

find our lives exhumed

to lean towards

not away

from the pain of a world that can do little more than

let out one collective:

sigh

i think of

all that has transpired these days

compared to the past 2 months

and how i know all it is that you run from

and know how the plates of your life

will one day shift you into an upheaval

to bring you back to your

soul

to bring you back to

leaning towards

the winds

the waves

the pain of your past

i think of

who we were just winters ago

my first winter here

how mountains may crumble

and the earth may slip into the sea

but we stand here today

leaning forward

hands clasped

and joined

by a shared

time of

yesterdays

i think of

the letters i would like to

write to you

so that you understand that we have peace

but instead

for now

i trust the wind

to carry to you

in the form of ravens tumbling joyously in flight

the words that (i) compose to you each day in my head

of how one day

i will say

"i think of who we were back then"

and we will sing with the song that is still being written

that

the past is the past

and we stand here today

joined by what was once shared

and though the very planet itself

can swallow us whole in one violent shake

we have so much to live and

lean

in

to

-- kim thompson. mon 14 mar '11 seoul. s.korea

she...

2011-03-11T01:10:00.001-06:00

she

makes me wanna write so much

that i can't find a word to begin

so i just say

"she"

she

makes me wanna tear down my walls

to find the open fields

and run towards the

light

she

makes me wanna take my world

spin it upside down

shake it inside out

collect all the change

and buy her a

ring that completes itself on end

and say

"here is my beginning

here is our end"

she

makes me wanna breathe in

and

breathe out

not caring anymore if there's a ground and

say to her

"don't groundlessness just feel so flight?"

she

makes me wanna take all my woes

turn them into mustard seeds

plant them in the earth

and wait for spring to

take

full effect

and then take what's grown and tell her

"this is faith and this one's hope"

she

makes me wanna wrap my wrists in leather and cloth

put on my red hoodie

wear my striped black and white trousers

with my soviet era brass belt buckle

and tell her

"i say trousers

not

pants"

and then stand in front of a mic

and say all the things

that

she

makes me wanna

do

she

makes me wanna wait for perfection

that ive too long been sub-parring for

and then take that perfection

and label it

"her"

she

makes me wanna sit in my home

clean the dust off the floor of my

soul

do laundry

and

write

until the day that i can say

"ive prepared this for you"

and give her my soul

all cracked clean full of light

radiant like that moment that ive seen from the window of an airplane

just before the sun is seen by those below

but we see it up above the clouds

purple - orange - and pink

shooting out like we've all just seen the colors of

the

rapture

and i know

what a beautiful day we're gonna have when

my plane touches land

she

makes me wanna put down my ways

that weigh me

down

so that i can be

pure

poetry

for

this great immaculate

"she"

who is out there

waiting

for

me.

--- kim thompson. fri. 11 march 11. seoul. s. korea

heart shards

2011-03-09T03:02:00.000-06:00

i wonder what its like for you

on the opposite end of the same

(pain) line

as

(me)

the leaver

and the left

a place for where there is no "right"

only

somewhere

in between

used to think that

mine

was worse

than yours

but being here

knowing (you)

i think now maybe

(yours) is worse

than

(mine)

we (both) live with loss so deep

but (yours) is also mixed with guilt

and (mine) with only lack of comprehension

i used to think

(fear)

that only i was wondering

now,

knowing (you)

i realize how deep wondering can go

to the point of

burying

denying

and running

(mine "towards"

and yours "away from")

i was both

your

redemption

and your

reminder

(i often wondered how much it hurt you

to know

just how flat your excuses sounded

when bounced off of one like me

who is a reminder of

a name like mine that my own blood did not speak for years

but kept deep inside her heart)

we are together

broken shards of hearts

only

ive found out

just how large my heart is

and what i can make with all those broken pieces

"stained glass windows"

is my new cliche

"stained glass window"

is my new constructionist's belief

of what i'll build from

broken bits of heart

to make a window for letting in

and not a wall for keeping out

and i wonder

what its like for you at night

when you feel the loss of what your arms once held

(youve) helped me to understand that

i cannot

blame

or

understand

(her)

that like you

she too

was once

young

and

scared

and in that one last act of

oddly labeled time of courage

lost everything

today

as the wind blows into my windows

i think

of you

opposite side of me

as i gather up my shards

and rebuild

and you and she

slice your hearts to pieces

- kim thompson 9 mar '11 wed. 18.02 -- seoul. s.korea

But, seriously, have you heard Monster?

2011-03-08T19:46:00.003-06:00

I've been absent recently for primarily stupid reasons that should not have kept me from writing BUT I have recently begun work on a new project in conjunction with Trung. In short, it is going to be about superheroes and it will probably never move beyond being self-published.

2036 or The Day After The Tea Party is Defeated

There’ll be a day when we move beyond political statement--

in being, we’ll be less than a political statement.

We’ll wash the blood of a race war from our faces

just enough to see each other,

just enough to be embraced by being

nothing more than two

(or three--there’ll be a day for that)

and just our names will matter.

That day will be the day our names can swell,

take on the weight of history or personal baggage

but no one will think to ask if it means something exotic.

If my hands are shaking that day,

light my cigarette and smile as a gentle reminder

that it was us or them.

on love

2011-03-03T00:36:00.001-06:00

* thoughts after having seen "the illusionist" by sylvain chomet

i will buy you red shoes

for you to dance in

will buy you

white heels to match the coat

that you thought

i made

magically

appear

i will let you believe

that things appear from

behind your ears

and that with one wave

flick

of my wrist

all that you wish for will be granted

i will give you 3 of my 6

cobalt blue glasses

till the point that you have broken 2

and i am down by 4

later to return to 6

i will bury my letter to you

under the ducks and garden gnome

beneath (one of)

your favorite

backyard trees

i will drink champagne to your memory

and plant roses on ice

and sit on the edge of the deck

(sobbing) with my back to your now unmoving rocking chairs

and remember how you would pull slivers from my feet

i will be angry at you for 34.5 years

writing you words that no eyes should ever see

until finally the words appear

that can be sent

and we have

peace

i will raise the arms of my heart in surrender

letting you in

and one day almost one year to the day

letting you go

whispering with the note

"magicians do not exist"

-- kim thompson. posted on a thursday (3 march) but written on a tuesday and wednesday. seoul. s.korea

HOW A ZOMBIE MAKES A PROMISE

2011-02-25T00:52:00.002-06:00

Even as the buildings twisted,

his lips did not miss an inch,

his kisses like concrete,

slabbed against my skin,

his hands,

pulling through the wet cement

digging our initials in,

drawing a heart before I would harden.

I could hear the sirens,

the shrill sounds of last breaths,

a panicked serpent stabbing through the streets.

But he, he was a light of urgency,

a flash come my way,

like a gift in the blackout.

Of course

I was not blinded, I was blessed.

We were a mess of undone buttons,

zippers, jaws ripped open,

their teeth a bite softer than ours.

This is how a zombie makes a promise.

He whispers,

lets his tongue curl around you,

knots his limbs through yours,

grabs you eternal,

makes love like the world is ending.

When you remember to open your eyes,

you will see flames through the doorway.

When you remember to leave

to run

to be rescued

the humble floor will start to quiver.

He will sniff the pink in your flesh,

supposing how many tulips are left inside.

Your scream will be morning birds to him.

He may even hum along for a moment

as he buckles his belt at the rumbling dusk,

or he may scavenge for you, hungry,

depending on which side of the rubble he wakes up on.

Well, it’s been five hundred and forty seven days

and I have got to get out of this fuckin fortress.

This brick building made of mud, stone, and my

angry

terrified

perseverant

insatiable

joyful

spit.

Stocked with ramen and green beans and chips,

every door every crack

in my house is combination padlocked.

I have a child,

he has forgotten the word for stars.

Every now and then the zombie taps on my window with

a wink and a frothy smile.

He is running free.

He can smell the sweet cedar.

He can waste time in the moon.

He could break something, he could make something, the world is his

He has an ax in his shoulder, he doesn’t even notice.

I have a house full of ammo and more heart than I need to kill him,

but he isn’t afraid of me.

Those days,

those days

I can’t remember if I’m undead

or a survivor.

5 blue balloons and superman

2011-02-18T01:18:00.002-06:00

5 blue balloons

3 deflated

2 dilapidating

hanging on a telephone wire above some bar

i could not tell if they were sad or relieved

i didnt have the time to ask them

but i thought about them as i rode the bus

to and from my work

whilst listening to

how to manifest

and breathe

and say thank you for my heart's desires..

i went about the hour

chanting

"5 blue balloons

deflated"

inside my head

while chubby faced grace jumped and shrieked

and tony made some kind of orgasmic noise that 5 year olds know nothing of

and then i said

"sit down"

and kept repeating

"oh yes, good job"

"good job"

"yes ... yes... wow. good job"

all the while only thinking of the state of those 5 blue balloons

wondering

debating

between

"deflated"

"dilapidated"

"withered"

"resting"

and the like

and then i thought of superman

and the poem that i was going to write about him

and that day he went away

as a means of avoiding the word that i really wanted to write about 2 nights ago

or 3 years ago

when i was fuming from it

how superman wouldve been just "man" without the

"super"

how he woulda been the same as a deflated blue leotard and red cape hanging

from a

wire

how one time he gave up his "super"

to just be

"man"

and wound up drunk and deflated at a dive bar with stubble as his only friend

how he was something like

a

sad balloon without its air

knocking shots of whiskey back

how he gave up his "super"

to be "man"

for lois lane

till they both found out that

halfa why she loved him

and halfa why he'd loved himself

was because he had been such a

super

man.

but i got so

inflated today

by those 5

dilapidating

withering

balloons

up there on the wire

that all i could really think about was

that one word

thats been keeping me so high and full of hope

that one word being:

"rise"

- kim thompson. seoul. s. korea. thursday 17 feb 2011 sometime after 4pm and before 7pm

"You Need"

2011-02-15T11:13:00.006-06:00

YOU NEED…
Websters vest pocket dictionary

and food and water
and beds and couches
and chairs and tables
and blankets and mirrors
and jeans and shirts
and markers and pillows and mats
and bedboards and markets
and paper

and air and light
and pictures and cell phones
and cds and pills and house phones
and houses and makeup and purses
and football players
and hats and gloves

and color
and internet and computer
and handles
and wood and cement
radios and snowpants and boots
and snow and flowers
and fans
and dogs and cats
and fruit
and clouds and white and blue

and money signs
and poles and pools
and basketball hoops
and cars
and dirty snow
and stinky snow
and sweaty snow and booby papa and …
THE GREAT SHORTIES! d;P

And Eminem <3 And Lil Wayne.<3=>

on ashes and change and so much more

2011-02-12T23:21:00.001-06:00

so we stand there

and i can feel the ashes of this

sliding 'tween my fingers

hands open-winged at my side

but i dont say a-thing

i just say

"wait"

perhaps because ive never taken the time

to watch the full decomposition of a thing

perhaps because i hate knowing

before im ready to allow for what i know

so we sit

stand

letting the world make its slow slide into the sea

as if the crumbling will reveal something semi-precious

that we can still grab

but this is not a poem for sadness

not a poem for things lost

things betrayed

things sullied by deceit

this is a song for what can be rebuilt

after cities have settled to the bottom of the sea

this is a hymn for the fertility that springs from volcanic ash

a manifest for what we let go (of) and take in

i let go as the snow fell

i let go as the singer sang her words

and then took hold of what is waiting

knowing one day the words i'll say

that there you are

that i have traveled so far to come back to where i began

and we dreamed to find that we were no longer strangers

i came back to reclaim

all that has been laid out for me

to let the erosion make way for what my heart intends

i came back to rebirth again in the middle of my life

i am as she told me

that angel circling round my own head

telling me

what i have always known

that here

is where i will find

you

with my ashen outstretched hands

and well timed out heart

today the world itself is humming change

change that comes from hope

today the world rejoices

and tomorrow some day when it weeps

we will know what we have always felt

that we have built - destroyed - and rebuilt all this crumbling beauty

from our words

and with my sentences i can create you into being

and form that thing that has just been waiting for me to

surrender

and say

"ok. im finally ready"

today

ok

im

finally

ready.

gathering ashes to breathe new life into.

we were formed from dust and ribs.

selah.

kim thompson. yesterday sat 12 feb. seoul. s.korea

(i am)

2011-02-11T07:58:00.000-06:00

(i am)

drinking cold coffee left over from late morning's brewing

smoking dry cigarettes for how they hang from my lips

like they somehow make me look that much more the writer

(i am)

thinking how i want to do (with you) like neruda wrote of spring inhabiting cherry trees

remembering lines by frank o'hare

remembering the lines of the girl who exclaimed "each day i am something new" - forgetting the poet who penned her into being

(i am)

recalling every time when i thought i might never breathe again

which is exactly right now why i know i can exhale quite freely

knowing what i want

uncertain of how to get it

determined to not repeat past ways of running

(i am)

wondering how it is that most of the best lines are in songs

but how poems never work well when sung

and how saul williams has this crazy poem about love that makes me say "hell yeah"

and punch my fist in the air to show my belief

(i am)

wooled down in a blue cardigan that would make mr. rogers proud

and contemplating how much is too many when it comes to leather wrist bands

and how im certain i need more

but not with studs

(i am)

reminding myself i really must do something about eating

as its something i keep forgetting

reading my horoscope on every site possible

with hopes of finding one that tells me what i want to hear

even redrawing reshuffling till i read my ideal spread

and then mumble "yes yes so true. wow these things are so right!"

(i am)

here on a friday not wondering too much about saturday

twittering about nothing to no one

hoping that someone tweets back

for one second making today so exciting

(i am)

listening to what the air is saying

how the trees are changing

and what i think i know

is about to happen

all of this while

still holding cold coffee in my mouth.

- kim thompson. friday. afternoon sometime. seoul. s. korea 11 feb

love poem for the inanimate

2011-02-04T02:51:00.000-06:00

dear little blue couch

made for two

how i love you

so many times we have sat

reclined

resting

working

watching

and the poetically unmentionable

dear sanded wooden table

stained with booze and food

sometimes seating 4

with a 5th one standing

how i love you

and your white stained legs

absorbing my words into your grains

absorbing my highs and lows

listening when the world was deaf

dear big mauve washing machine

that clunkers and bunkles into the night

hopping cross my bathroom floor

like a mad rabbit come to life

how i love you

giving me a place to rest my head

when its tired from life's spin cycle

you bounce across the tiles reminding me that i am alive

dear photographs on my front door

frozen perfect moments of days printed onto sheets

half swaying like sentinels upon entering and exiting

how i love you

always whispering to me

"remember?

remember us?

remember when?

remember how you felt that day?

look at where you are right now"

remembering when i forget

dear knick knacks collected from a close to decade's worth of wandering

collecting dust

solid in your sentimental worth

how i love you

having carried you across continents and oceans

and back again

having packed unpacked repacked resettled you

each one of you a sort of talisman of a life well lived for an age so young

dear objects inanimate each and every one of you

paintings

drawings

works of art

notes written

moments taken

moments stolen

mugs smuggled

28 year old pair of pink argyle socks

bears whove been more places than most humans

dear objects inanimate

each time i wonder if or when or how

somehow one of you comes to life to say

"its real it happened

everything now will be ok"

objects inanimate

how i love you

-- kim thompson. seoul. s. korea. friday 4 feb 11 17.52

superhero

2011-01-27T12:48:00.001-06:00

you may not accept us

but you will respect us

put on our capes + soar

this world is ours

i got your AK style

repack your piece with a smile

lettin' my peace school you

don't let my cute face fool you

underneath it all

i got the beast of brawl

i may be a lover not a fighter

but don't test or out come the lighter

you may not accept us

but you will respect us

put on our capes + soar

this world is ours

scoop me like fat, man

fly like a bat, man

all your sins i will avenge

who the fuck want revenge

don't try to one up me like mario

when i can 7up you like pepsico

you can't see the "s" on my chest

prepare to be blessed by that which you detest

you may not accept us

but you will respect us

put on our capes + soar

this world is ours

i know you want to look over me in the casket

but my strength make you blow a gasket

can't fight my power source

adamantium unstoppable force

lethal weapons, laser beams

can destroy human beings

you can straight violence me

but you can never silence me

you may not accept us

but you will respect us

put on our capes + soar

this world is ours

you hunt us down like animals

punish us worse than criminals

no protection from sinister tasks

no wonder i wear multiple masks

the ignorance is scary

but i will use that fear to bury

thinking you're the master of this town

the universe can't hold me down

you may not accept us

but you will respect us

put on our capes + soar

this world is ours

lair accommodations for the meek

got that chic sleek freak

to prowl the street

bringing heat to the beat

you would never expect me to go hard

take it from this ibyang korean bard

even though it gets hard sometimes

there will always be power beaming from my rhymes

you may not accept us

but you will respect us

put on our capes + soar

this world is ours

after dreaming

2011-01-27T04:35:00.003-06:00

and after the dream fulfilled

"then what?"

waiting

ready

to begin

to want

again

after "wanting" so much

comes "having"

the "having" being harder than the 32 years of "wanting"

and then the greatest hardest newest challenge:

"to want - AGAIN"

where do dreams go after they are found?

where do birds fly after they have

well...

"flown" ?

dreams

true dreams

do not begin at night

but in the middle of the day

somewhere between the bed and the bus line...

theyre tearing down sultang

the night before my dream came true

that is the place that heard my fears over a bottle of beer and a lot of smoke

that is the place you found me at

before i found you the next

these days

i watch them tear down the ugly walls

men sitting on chairs around a fire

the sky exposed from the labor of their hands

the walls smeared in paint as if someone high on lsd or shrooms was having the trip of their life

only to discover the next day why painting when high is a regrettable thing

they are now ripped from the top as if a five year old decided to forgo scissors

and i hear the whisper again

- its time - let go - begin again - only here can you sense the sky

mpls my beloved but mpls my ceiling

seoul my tormented lover but seoul my endless sky

it is not the destruction of a dream

it is the rebuilding of a place that lasted years longer than it should have

that was stunted in its own lack of growth

-- i am so much taller than you know --

what do dreams become after they are gathered in the relief of letting go of 32 years of tears

what do dreams become after you have finally found your face?

where do dreams begin

after the only words to describe fall under the cliches of:

"magical"

"mysterious"

"miraculous"

and

"fairy tale come to life"

-- better than anything KBS could have scripted and filmed...

they tell (me)

"this only proves you can have it all"

"but i already do"

i say to (them)

... how do you dream again

after you did the impossible?

-- am i to turn water into wine?

-- walk on water?

-- turn fishes and loaves into one big surplus picnic?

-- rise from the dead?

i am not holy and i am not one third of some perplexing trinity...

so what is there left to want?

to see the world that ive already 3 to 4 continents explored?

to be what i already am no matter how it is my bills get paid?

to expand my heart when it's already burst?

what does life grow into after you no longer want but instead already have?

"dream the next impossible thing"

im told

to which i respond

"that seems... implausible"

... today ive passed sultang twice

now darkened inside

the trippy ripped up walls challenging the night to finish them off

i see in that corner that still exists but may be gone tomorrow or the next

us sitting shivering heating our hands over a candle

building dreams from fears

how for that moment you cracked

and i saw you for all that is you

and you saw me for all that is me

and for that night we had love that we took the wrong direction

i see us talking

maybe back then i saw the me from now passing by - perhaps that is why i shuddered at the thought of ghosts haunting us into reality

i see us then

in that corner

that each time i sat there after... i drank out of remembrance for the sacred-ness of how life is so ordinary the night before 32 years of an impossible dream is found sitting cross legged with right hand over heart that laurie had foretold me to know...

these days i pass by the bar

watching walls disappear and blue sky reveal itself

and i think the same thing

i hear the same thing

i carry the same thought

"that night is long over - your new day is rising - the sky is revealing -
kim child,
its time to start wanting again."

- kim thompson. seoul. s. korea - thursday 27 jan 2011 - 19.35

2011-01-26T20:46:00.003-06:00

I'm reposting this tonight because Fong Lee's murder case was extinguished today. There is no hyperlink for "Fong Lee's murder case" because I could not find him in the news. What I did see in the news (thanks to Kim) was the case of an ibyang facing deportation from my home state, yet another reminder that, no matter how long we have been here, no matter how good our English is, we are always going to be goo--er, "outsiders" to the entrenched and entitled.

Dear Fong,
I bet right now you're wishing you had been gay
and bullied
because maybe then
Fong Lee would be in the papers,
your tormentors might see justice,
and Mr. Sulu would have to remember which face he wears first.
I bet right now you're wishing you had a closet to hide in,
to protect you from the American Justice,
lock out Hatred with a badge and a gun.
But you can't take your face off
and bullseyes are often brown eyes.

There are no hotlines for kids who like to ride their bikes with friends
and your roommate didn't film it when who you really were
drained out of you from thirteen holes
onto North Minneapolis.

IN MY NEXT LIFE

2011-01-25T02:48:00.001-06:00

Me (procrastinating): in my next life i wont write haiku. i'll write five line poems. they are so much easier.
Rico: you can do that like next week, why wait for another life?

So then I wrote this, you know, as long as I was brainstorming stuff I might not get done next week.

IN MY NEXT LIFE

In my next life
I will drive to work on an elephant,
start my days from up high.
The ride will not be smooth.
I will give thanks to the ground.

In my next life
they will call me Chef Squid,
my ten arms will swing around the kitchen,
the average human eye will not keep up with the
tantalizing twist of my tentacles,
I will chop like a humming bell,
I will saute on high heat,
vegetables will cry for their mothers.

I will be a mother
with two spines.
The sky
will not be enough to scare me.

The continents will have moved together,
the land may have quivered at each other’s touch,
we may have lost lives in our unity.

So in my next one

I will catch every wedding bouquet,
fold their petals into cranes.
When I have one thousand
I will wish for a snowstorm.
I will hang my heart on an icicle
and wait for a wanderer to see it
flicker.
I will be safe by then.
I will be a shelter.

thoughts on pain and how everyone feels so (entitled) to it

2011-01-19T21:11:00.003-06:00

i think (that) of the many dangers slash pitfalls in life is the sense of being entitled to one's own pain and sense of loss and the idea that somehow whatever "i" have gone through is definitely WORSE than what YOU have gone through "you dont know pain like i know pain"

meanwhile we make shows and documentaries and like to sit around talking about the children who have no food or clean water in some far off land and how that's just really f'd up...

... loss... is. loss

pain is pain

rain is rain... unless of course youre talking about the singer... then that's a different story (shout out to the king of k-pop yo!)

and ive too often gotten attached to the idea that my loss is greater than anyone who doesn't share the same loss as me...

and then i go and make shows about it and people stand and clap thus adding to my attachment to this loss because it makes me money and causes people to pay attention to me...

while i am quite right in claiming that you can never understand the loss and pain that i feel in my life i really hate having to admit that i can never understand the loss and pain that you feel in yours...

it's pretty much like arguing over who enjoyed their amazing dinner of (insert food choices here) last night the most...

that said id like to point out that last night i enjoyed the most amazing meal of boiled pork, radish and cabbage kimchis, oysters, and soup... so i'm pretty certain that i had the best meal out of anyone who is reading this.

id also like to point out that not only is my art more meaningful due to the fact that my pain and loss are more real than anyone else's - every single break up i've ever gone through has definitely hurt more than anyone else who has ever gone through a break up because "you dont know break ups like i know break ups"

the in house fighting of communities is disgusting and abhorrent and though i scoff at the peacenik verbage that comes out of the mouth of tree hugging hippies i really do agree with the man whose horrible attack at the hands of police brutality said so simply "can't we all just. get. along. ?"

(we can discuss the mis and over use of the word "namaste" another day as right now im too fragile to make myself the victim of angry "namaste" sayers. cuz... "you don't know what it is to make yourself a victim like i know what it is to make myself a victim")

so far as i have discovered in my travels (and by the way "you also don't know what it is to travel the world like i know what it is to travel the world") is that ive yet to meet anyone who has never experienced pain and loss so deeply that it is pretty much miraculous that they have managed to love, heal, and trust again.

i confess that at times i become so involved in my own woes that i become so blind to the woes of those around me because "you dont know woes and you dont know oblivious like i know woes and oblivious"

... and when i realize what i have done i find myself to be as disgusting and as abhorrent as i find the communities that i roll my eyes at to be... because "you dont know eye rolling like i know eye rolling"

... to say that one of us is more marginalized or more maligned or is struggling more is probably pretty close to actually defining the word "blasphemy"

not that i am taking away from those who are truly marginalized, maligned, or struggling...

its just that i wonder what the good is in saying "more"

... and i am in no way implying that we must not strive for change in our communities or to not have as the politicians of late have been yammering on about -"truly robust discourse on the issues that concern us"

but it is pointless to point at ourselves as struggling more... in fact i find pointing to be such a waste of time all together as i figure why raise your hand to point when you can raise your hand to drink a beer ... or in my case - a shot (or 17) of soju. ... or in the case of the 5 and 6 year olds i teach - a glass of milk.

as much as i would like to believe that i hold the golden ticket when it comes to loss i must face the sad humbling reality that my loss is equal to yours... different but equal as we like to say

and that sometimes my being an artist and writer and all around self absorbed self reflecting over-thinking re-analyzer of analyzing really does not help things AT ALL.

i think instead it might be a "better world" if we attached the word "more" to the words of "love" "trust" "healing" "unity" "support" "faith" "creation" "creativity" "fun" "joy" "happiness" etc... all the words that have for some reason been labeled as "emo" slash "hippie" slash "disjointed from reality"

i would hope that we work "more" to "support" one another...

of course it doesn't mean pretending like there aren't issues to address or things to have different opinions on

but lets face it

at the end of the day
when all cliches are said and done
(which according to some should be around dec 2012)

"aint no one know pain and loss like i know pain and loss and ain't no one's opinion right but mine"

so let us in the meantime work "more" to create inspire engage love joy and all other good gut rottingly good sweet things in this life whilst keeping our eyes open to both our own loss and pain and the loss and pain of our friends and family and even the people that we find to be annoying - smelly - and obtuse.

p.s. if you can't understand where the "tongue in cheek" in this lies then let it be known that "you don't know where tongue in cheek lies like i know where tongue in cheek lies"

kim thompson. seoul, s. korea. 12.13 thursday 19 jan 11

i think

2011-01-15T07:45:00.002-06:00

back when

even just seeing

the bottles of vitamin water on the shelf

made me have to skip that aisle of kuwolskis

back when

just that green tinted incredibly hulk green

was like kryptonite

and id drive avoiding blue suv's

back when

i didnt know

but i knew

and so did everyone else

but i couldve sworn

- i really didnt know

i forget

how much is lived in less than

six

i forget

how short "six" really

is

that if it took

thousands for a heart to form

and thousands millions more

for this shape to house

that primordial sludge

then...

six

is just so

swift

... to have lived so many feelings

to have wondered so many things

to have questions answered by new questions

to have had too many to count on both hands and toes

six is not so much

for so much of this to have

been formed

sometimes i forget

how six is not

an

eternity

how six is just

one more than 5

and it wont be six

till

that

fabled resurrection day

when life re-borns itself

and somehow all the way from there

ive landed here

worried if i can make one year

when that's 1/6 of 6?

so these days are just hours

and these hours just minutes

and these minutes just seconds

and all combined still not enough for

the first

primordial sludge to have shaped into

a valve that beats

so i think

clearer than i have in 2

clearer than i have since the shaping of this 1

that

all of this?

will be like those shelves that now just make me smile to remember

how i can still recall that wonder of that tinted green photograph

how blue suv's now make me smirk

how i did not just get to dance with you i got to know your flaws that for 2 seemed impossible

how i dropped 15

and gained 15

and lost again

and now am somewhere inbetween

and still cannot count

all the valves of mine that have been broken

all the valves whose names i struggle to recall

and thats just in 6

so these seconds

are just so much less than 6

for waiting

- kim thompson. seoul. s. korea 22.45 sat 15 jan

homo-nym

2011-01-14T12:51:00.001-06:00

the wind sang on the leaves

just at the first peek of the sun

as night was stolen by thieves

to welcome the world's most beautiful son

his eyes the color of cherrywood

that would blossom during his first sight

parents flushed with joy understood

for the new part of their heart at that warm site

something was odd, not quite allowed

his body betrayed him completely

his parents didn't seem to care aloud

blinded to any difference discreetly

the isolation he felt wasn't just in the town

somehow his synapses always knew

that he was destined for love unbound

something utterly brand new

life hindered by limitations strong

helpless against the struggle he fell prey

but for a change to last his whole life long

his parents would constantly pray

his struggles went unseen

strangled by the burdens he wore

school, friends a new version of mean

who would want someone so young to have to go to war

teased tirelessly for his weakness

lined paper a lockbox for emotions he would pour

black eyes + bruised thighs were signs of the bleakness

how can he maintain with a heart so poor

mono images flashing hopefully

observing the lives of other guys

losing sight of his hopepulley

burying himself behind a deepening guise

digital chats + private phone calls yield hope

sweet dreams of a better life to savor

are quickly eliminated by a daunting tightrope

who will be his saver?

he can't hold on

in his hope he is lone

he can't be strong

his hope is on loan

despite the optimism he has read

he's confined to his mental electric chair

salty lava turns his cherrywood eyes red

he's confined to his metal electric chair

trapped / trapped / trapped

the wind sang on the leaves

just at the last peek of the sun

as night was returned by thieves

to reject the world's most beautiful son

his eyes the color of cherrywood

that would fall during his last sight

parents flushed with anger misunderstood

for the old part of their heart at that cold site

something was right, not quite allowed

his heart betrayed him completely

his parents seemed to care aloud

exposed to any difference indiscreetly

the isolation he felt wasn't just in the town

somehow his synapses never knew

that he was destined for hate unbound

something not at all new

life hindered by limitations strong

fearless against the struggle he fell prey

but for a change to last his whole life long

his parents would cease to pray

his struggles became seen

released from the burdens he wore

school, friends a familiar version of mean

who wouldn't want someone so young to have to go to war

praised tirelessly for his weakness

digital sites a lockbox for emotions he would pour

crooked smiles + tears of crocodiles were signs of the bleakness

how can he stop with a heart so poor

color images imprinting hopefully

becoming the lives of other guys

regaining sight of his hopepulley

freeing himself from a deepening guise

pill containers + deep-punted wine bottles yield hope

terrible nightmares of a worse life to savor

are quickly eliminated by a comforting jumprope

he will be his saver

he doesn't have to hold on

in his hope he is not lone

he can be strong

his hope is not on loan

despite the pessimism he has read

he's free from his electric chair

twisted fabric turns his cherrywood eyes red

he's free from his metal chair

escape / escape / escape

beasting

2011-01-06T12:39:00.002-06:00

don't push me cause i'm close to the edge

i'm trying not to lose my head

thinking it through like needle + thread

trying not to be a brain dead thoroughbred

but when the anger is widespread

coursing through the cells of red

make me put you in a dirt bed

you make me develop a complex complex

brush off those rosy colored specs

you see-thru like crystalline plex

i'll work you out like bowflex

running in a loop like cineplex

the unusual suspects

preparing to annex your objects

i rejects your fears of my sex

silencing me will only make me louder

i'll injest your hate like protein powder

i'm nietzsche with super powers

cower in your guarded tower

because it's you i'll devour

for happy rush hour

your grave lined with flowers

saran gift, it's a wrap

i got you running laps

clap back until you're ensnared in my trap

in the shower i got your cap

this is a lobotomy, a spinal tap

you made me snap

this isn't gangster rap, it's fagstar rap

go ahead and martyr me

you'll rupture an artery

no need to carly simon me

in my veins is no vanity

i'm a gorilla beating my chest to be the best

in this guerilla jestfest

i'm dressed to detest

causing you mental unrest

i'm that pest unimpressed with your quest

but my patience you do test

drop off the case pick up my suit

man up + steal your loot

cause a riot with my zoot

i'm an astute brute of ill repute

refusing to dilute

unable to compute

your petty dispute

refute your root square

remember this affair

when i chain you to the electric chair

it isn't fair that when i cause you despair

it helps fatten my derriere

come here to meet my khmer

you're unaware of the havoc i can share

make you beyond repair

no one else can compare

you're a teddy bear, i'm a grizzly bear

you're foursquare, i'm time square

you're solitaire, i'm a billionaire

so stay in your lane you're driving me to think

your mental capacity out of sync

dissolve your mind in my kitchen sink

on the brink of releasing the chink from the clink

soft like a drink

daniels got jacked

the handle was hacked

even if you got the ciroq on lock

i'll still popov and you i will subtract

you've cracked under the pressure of my abstract

you're in dry dock from your shell shock

scared of how my flow knock

like i'm a missionary on your block

my flow is ad hoc

my speed is mach

bow down before my jock

shrink like scrotum

worship my totem

your uptake slow as a modem

you stunned, son

you're just a rerun

and i'm a track star, cross country #1

i refund you, done

the whackness must cease

the creativity must de-cease

my creative release

trumps your life lease

of my problems, you're the least

you're drowning in the belly of my beast

priesting on this flow

got me feasting on the dough

riesling don't got me slow

beasting with the ledge of know

A "Reading"

2010-12-09T09:24:00.002-06:00

I will do more of these if I can figure out how to get a more Korean-looking "actor."

A REMINDER FOR FATHERS WHO HAVE FORGOTTEN THEY ARE FATHERS

2010-11-27T14:10:00.001-06:00

Sometimes I weep in his absence,
at dinner, when I call for our son upstairs and
he slides down our family backwards,
his young oak smile, wise in its open knot
as he runs to me, just a girl in the kitchen
that he mistakes for the ground.

This wood flute we made together,
I weep for him, his fleeting songs,
for this poem, undeserving of words,
for the headless horseback fathers,
stabbing into the dark with dull memories,
content with becoming ghosts.

Yet my child, son of the wind,
blows around the room a boundless toddler,
collector of questions,
and he asks none
of his mother’s love,
pausing only seconds
for these promising kisses,

for he is tear-free and peaceful,
and he has no sense of loss.

MADE

2010-11-20T02:23:00.003-06:00

My friend NaHaan was telling me one day how he thinks there should not be a difference between poetry we write and poetry we speak, so whenever we speak, it should still be poetry. So sometimes I throw poems into our fb conversations.