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Discover our poem explanations - click here!Searching... Author: HICOK, BOB Matches Found: 276 Hicok, Bob Poet's Biography 254 poems available by this author 1935 First Line: He rode in the back with apples and wind Last Line: My grandfather lived. In the back with a pig 33 First Line: There's a joke about the inmates who know Last Line: Enough involves slightly different %though no less forsaken inflections 530 LAKEWOOD First Line: When last in this house Last Line: The teetering event of this life 85 First Line: I didn't expect this Last Line: Given how it might have turned out, %given that I expect the alternative %to be nothing at all A POLITICAL VISION Poem Text First Line: A cellist in every lobby by love and law Last Line: That would moan if bowed Subject(s): Political Conventions; Politics & Government ABSENCE Poem Text First Line: There are men and women huddled in rooms tonight Subject(s): Absence; Separation; Isolation ABSENCE First Line: There are men and women huddled in rooms tonight Last Line: By anything more comforting than space Subject(s): Absence AFTER HANGING OUT First Line: It was the conversation about why Last Line: Conceivable guise of the noose AFTER READING THAT A BIOLOGIST THINKS WE'RE THROUGH EVOLVING First Line: Maybe I'll lose my fear Last Line: Will be the first person whose breath %never breaks AFTER THE CONCERT First Line: Light can be coached to move faster Last Line: By saying anything else AFTER WORKING SIXTY HOURS AGAIN FOR WHAT REASON First Line: The best job I had was moving a stone Last Line: To do with the appearance of food %on an empty table AIDS First Line: I tried visiting home Last Line: And die the best you can ALICE WAKES AT TWO AND LOOKS OUT THE WINDOW First Line: A gate, she thinks Last Line: And lick you with wishes ALZHEIMER'S Poem Text First Line: Chairs move by themselves, and books Subject(s): Alzheimer's Disease; Memory ALZHEIMER'S First Line: Chairs move by themselves, and books Last Line: It's rumored no longer to exist Subject(s): Alzheimer's Disease; Memory ALZHEIMER'S BABY First Line: At 94 and with porcelain hips, raisined Last Line: The child and the day each died AMERICAN STUDIES First Line: Pamela anderson's breasts are examined by twenty-one Last Line: I don't know, I liked them, they bounced' AN INCIDENTAL REPORT ON MY GRANDMOTHER'S DIVINITY First Line: My grandmother had 14 children Subject(s): Death; Funerals; Grandparents; Dead, The; Burials; Grandmothers; Grandfathers; Great Grandfathers; Great Grandmothers ANOTHER AWKWARD STAGE OF CONVALESCENCE First Line: Drunk, I kissed the moon Last Line: Listened to the night's sole point of honesty ANY WRONG DIGIT OF INDIGNATION First Line: Are you a cheeseburger? I am or have been one Last Line: The value of breath to the next of kin APPETITES First Line: Even the clouds are leaving this place, run Last Line: Behind me in kitchen and living room Subject(s): Food And Eating APPLICANT First Line: The past's Last Line: We stood, shook hands. %I promised to be quick with an answer Subject(s): Labor And Laborers; Maturity ARCH OF SANCTIFICATION First Line: I could use a dove in my heart Last Line: It's to taunt, to beg them to speak Subject(s): Arches; Catholics; Churches; God; Religion; Spirituality AT THE TABLE FOR NO REASON First Line: The hummingbird is christmas, red throat Last Line: I leave to get on with coming back Subject(s): Family Life; Grief; Hummingbirds AUTOPSY First Line: I'm dead because I don't have a piano Last Line: And afraid this terrible joy %can happen only once BACKWARD POEM First Line: This poem ends in death so I'll walk it home Last Line: To the pilgrimage of bees, the sun %dead above hoarding the shadows for itself BAPTISMAL First Line: The waters rise to the level of sin. This Last Line: Fields open their mouths and swallow BARS POETICA First Line: This is the story I've tried to tell. Guy Last Line: Is all I've been trying to say BEAR THIS IN MIND First Line: We are the same Last Line: Of course this is a lie. %but so are love %and all other necessities BECOMING BIRD First Line: It began with a tatoo gun to his back Last Line: A real feather grows, useless but patient BEHIND BETHLEHEM STEEL First Line: The sky pinches my eyes and the dog is dead Last Line: Held low, a secret %in his hand BETWEEN ANN ARBOR AND CHICAGO A DECAPITATION First Line: The train's rude massage both lulls Last Line: The head, lean forward to engage his small necessities BIRTH OF A SAINT First Line: If there's a gun in her theory of heaven it's unloaded Last Line: And slip them neatly into the trash BOND First Line: He gets Last Line: And forth as if wounds are what we most %dearly love Subject(s): Love Affairs; Revenge BOTTOM OF THE OCEAN First Line: At least once you should live with someone Last Line: He'd poured twelve sugars into a coffee he never touched BUILDING A PAINTING A HOME Poem Text First Line: If I built a barn I'd build it right into the sky Subject(s): Buildings & Builders; Sky BUILDING A PAINTING A HOME First Line: If I built a barn I'd build it right into the sky Last Line: Until the steam is green and the sound is gold Subject(s): Buildings And Builders; Sky BY THE HOUR First Line: He's afraid of night Last Line: How fiercely his body dwells %in the ritual of unbecoming BYPASS First Line: You won't remember %disappearing, %the five hours your breath Last Line: Cracked open %into wings CALLING HIM BACK FROM LAYOFF First Line: I called a man today. After he said Last Line: Other people staring at their phones %hear? CAPITAL CRIME First Line: He'd intended a drive to moonlight bay. Bag Last Line: Insane wish is just to be flush CHOOSING MY CONCEPTION First Line: My mother at a party in a blue dress Last Line: Of a blue dress falling, and soon, %and randomly I will exist Subject(s): Babies; Birth; Conception; Creation CHRISTMAS MYTH First Line: The turkey carcass is chartres at the center Last Line: On the tree. They'll never die. Neither will we CIRCLING THE FLOWER: 5 First Line: Every mirror smashed, the windows Last Line: His family fed his ashes to the black %tongue of the charles Subject(s): Suicide CIRCLING THE FLOWERS First Line: So this must be a mouth Last Line: His family fed his ashes to the black %tongue of the charles CIRCLING THE FLOWERS: 1 First Line: So this must be a mouth Last Line: Impossible words, look %at me Subject(s): Healing; Hospitals; Physicians; Speech Disorders; Surgery CIRCLING THE FLOWERS: 2 First Line: He could spend an hour Last Line: Made of water, woke convinced %he'd never been who he was Subject(s): Language; Speech Disorders CIRCLING THE FLOWERS: 3 First Line: One day. For one day walls Last Line: After it's passed, the void behind sound %not even fear can inhabit Subject(s): Eye Patches; Military; Surgery CIRCLING THE FLOWERS: 4 First Line: They wouldn't let him touch the painting Last Line: Of the club palpable, reassuring %like a whisper giving shape to an invisible room Subject(s): Crime And Criminals; Prisoners Of War; Rape CLAUSEWITZ'S MAIL First Line: An aide found her is a shop in berlin Last Line: And touched %at night before darkness screamed Subject(s): Letters; Postal Service COMMISSION BY ATTRITION First Line: Who's to say gravity isn't love? The landing Last Line: My toothbrush in my useless %chest COMPLICATIONS AFTER BIRTH First Line: My mouth was a useless prayer Last Line: And that if I made the tiny coffins %I'd run away from my hands CONTRARY WOMAN First Line: She likes that Last Line: I want you so little, %how could I ever leave? CORONER'S REPRIEVE First Line: For the third time in a week he dreams Last Line: Or pride, ingenious with his lust, determined %enough to die Subject(s): Corpses; Death; Detective Stories CREW CUT DAYS First Line: Kiss my ass that's a boss is how I learned Last Line: By a trim the world wouldn't change CROSS TOWN First Line: She turns to see his thumb on ice Last Line: Cut through the wounded earth CURE FOR THE COMMON COLD First Line: I was having an affair with fever as winter Last Line: Of the sky like a monarch you made from scratch CUTTING EDGE First Line: I can't be in the avant-garde Last Line: Like everything else %I try hard not to say DAYS LIKE CHOCOLATE First Line: Being asked why so many poems are sad Last Line: Are love poems to the vanishing DEAD First Line: They'll never kiss your forehead at midnight Last Line: By the dream that's trying to kill you DEFENESTRATION First Line: Every plate I threw into the alley Last Line: Not to be a familiar whim DID I EVER TELL YOU ABOUT MY LOVE/HATE RELATIONSHIP WITH . . . First Line: Sometimes I leave my head in the other room Last Line: Of a vacuum on my penis and turned it %on. Honesty makes me feel so clean DIVORCE First Line: The complaints of the man on the phone Last Line: Better comfort than words DOCUMENTARY ART First Line: I watched richard nixon play piano for jack paar Last Line: If the other kids wouldn't let you be president DOGFISH MOTHER First Line: Dogfish mother has a hawk's nose and teeth Last Line: Stares until a blade slides across my throat DRINKING THE TALE First Line: A man on fire at one am's a knee slap Last Line: It's burdened with a smile DROPPING THE EUPHEMISM Poem Text First Line: He has five children, I'm papa Subject(s): Labor & Laborers; Work; Workers DUH Poem Text First Line: My father is silent and distant Last Line: From rolling over my head one day Subject(s): Family Life; Fathers; Memory; Relatives DUH First Line: My father is silent and distant Last Line: From rolling over my head one day Subject(s): Family Life; Fathers; Memory DUKE First Line: He was hit back of the head for a haul of $15 Last Line: That seemed eager to snow all day but didn't EARLY HISTORY First Line: I grew up with president johnson Last Line: Spoiled kid, I got my way ECHO Poem Text First Line: He or she let go of my wife and me Last Line: Blood disappears into water without blame Subject(s): Echoes; Miscarriage ECHO First Line: He or she let go of my wife and me Last Line: Blood dissolves in water without blame Subject(s): Echoes EDGE First Line: One day the kid showed up with a tattoo of a stapler Last Line: With blue cumulus cuffs and a girl %embarrassed by anything but the slowest dance EIGHT First Line: We expect the perp to be stubbled or shined Last Line: Today we will learn ELSEWHERE First Line: When we were pangaea, maps were smaller and vacations Last Line: I'm sure I was born but I don't know where END OF TYRANNY First Line: Being surrounded by extinctions, how do we notice Last Line: After which I can't say enough about the weather EXTREME MEASURES First Line: Blood was once thought a cure for epilepsy Last Line: Lean as fear with bright %and savage eyes FAIRY TALE WITH REPETITION First Line: Once upon a time a little boy %ate chocolate as he rode Last Line: Placed his own %fat hands FAITH IN SFAKIA First Line: Old women in furnaces of black muslin dresses Last Line: Or one second, one thousand years that weigh no more %than a leaf to the sky Subject(s): Faith; God; Prayer FALLEN First Line: As sometimes fish appear Last Line: How quickly my shadow %might pack its bags and leave FIELDWORK Poem Text First Line: There are two kinds of people and five hundred Last Line: The jealous eyes of god have seen? Subject(s): Amazons; Beetles; Insects; Jungles; Wilderness; Bugs FIELDWORK First Line: There are two kinds of people and five hundred Last Line: A fraction and flutter of life not even %the jealous eyes of god have seen? Subject(s): Amazons; Beetles; Insects; Jungles; Wilderness FIFTEEN FRAMES PER SECOND ON A SUN SPARC / 5 First Line: I watched a movie of my mother's heart. The two Last Line: Or that the movie of her heart %needs to end at all FINALLY I BUY X-RAY GLASSES First Line: At thirteen I questioned when it would stop, this Last Line: What making love should be like FINALLY OPENING THE ANTHOLOGY TO KUNITZ First Line: I found him in the bathroom. Straight off Last Line: That I stayed well beyond, having forgotten %my purpose FLOATING First Line: A man once asked Last Line: If different %is not so FLOOD First Line: She was pretty, standing there Last Line: Cause what's left then %but the fool things? FORECAST First Line: I fell asleep in the rain Last Line: Soon they'll be %what's left of me FREE-FLOATING ANXIETY SOUNDS LIKE A PRETTY BALLOON First Line: I need a soft day, soft hour, a minute Last Line: These bitter years swallowing us FROM THE WOODS First Line: For her they're not death, artifacts Last Line: Yet which is solely divisible by itself FRONT PORCH, LISTENING First Line: No longer reading of liege Last Line: The tone poem %of their last words GARDENER First Line: She holds a flower today, I can't Last Line: Wanting more than I'm prepared to understand and have nurtured %revenge into elegant survival Subject(s): Flowers; Gardens And Gardening GETTING BY First Line: Here it is just Last Line: Be provided, %and hating you when you tell him the truth. So you lie Subject(s): Revenge GO GREYHOUND First Line: A few hours after des moines Last Line: As everything I'd come so far %to give away GOOD NEIGHBOR POLICY First Line: The man who punches his son %tells a joke Last Line: Until I sweat %and it bleeds green GOODBYE IN THE SHAPE OF A KNOT First Line: I am stuck. Everything I want to say Last Line: A quest for the pure %improvisation of things GREED First Line: When I tell the truth about what I want Last Line: I have dug and dug without once %striking oil Subject(s): Soul; Spirituality GROWING AT THE SPEED OF FASHION First Line: It gets harder to find untroubled ways Last Line: She's nothing if not watched [or, which rises toward love if love is being watched] GUESTS First Line: At first the exact clatter of lust, headboard Last Line: For years but what comes back is silence, %articulate and unreconciled HA'ISH HU HA'ISH First Line: The man is ash in his hands. Eight miles out Last Line: The devil's ashes under the nails of his hands HARMS WAY First Line: Look. Look away %picture Last Line: On every page, and the shadows, the death shroud %of forgiveness HEADLINE: CLEAN-SWEEP CLEARS PARKS & GRATES First Line: She was a stench like dead leaves and sparrows clotted Last Line: The sky to take everything back HERO POEM #2 First Line: In in the heat %of the night %sidney poitier is cool Last Line: In a lake %that still has %no water HEROIN Poem Text First Line: Imagine spring's thaw, your brother said Last Line: To the strenuous work of vanishing Subject(s): Drugs & Drug Abuse; Hallucinations & Illusions; Needles; Narcotics; Opium; Cocaine; Crack; Heroin HEROIN First Line: Imagine spring's thaw, your brother said Last Line: To the strenuous work of vanishing Subject(s): Drugs And Drug Abuse; Hallucinations And Illusions; Needles HOW ORIGAMI WAS INVENTED Poem Text First Line: The last I went to confession was to whisper Last Line: To write a clear path to you Subject(s): Confessions HOW ORIGAMI WAS INVENTED First Line: The last I went to confession was to whisper Last Line: Everywhere on which I've tried %to write a clear path to you Subject(s): Confessions ICE STORM First Line: Ice cakes, shears by weight Last Line: Even the luminous air fell IDIOT-SAVANT First Line: A crude summary Last Line: Of the stone shoulder you'd tapped IN DEFENSE OF TOURISM First Line: The water's warm as sleep Last Line: A pair of shoes, %a shotgun IN HER HANDS First Line: Palming his on-again Last Line: By how still he is sleeping INCIDENTAL REPORT ON MY GRANDMOTHER'S DIVINITY First Line: My grandmother had 14 children Last Line: Since the first child emerged to screams %of holy insistence Subject(s): Death; Funerals; Grandparents INERTIA First Line: There he was with galileo, measuring the speed Last Line: He could let %such a wild, such a cruel thing happen Subject(s): Change INSIDE First Line: I've a matryoshka doll on my mantle Last Line: Cut no deeper for truth INSOMNIA DIARY First Line: At 5 a.M. Light %from their living room Last Line: The nearest thing %to itself INSOMNIAC VOYEUR First Line: There's another man on my block who can't sleep Last Line: Just before the rude kiss of the sun, %someone's alive but not me INSTINCT First Line: There was this one Last Line: You could die %by the time they figure %he's empty inside IT'S LONELY AT THE TOP OF THE FOOD CHAIN First Line: There's no bird like my neighbor Last Line: As saws trying to cut to the heart %of the matter IT'S NOT SO MUCH THE HEAT AS THE STUPIDITY First Line: Excuse me but I'd like to say something that should Last Line: Otherwise and I know it's rude to mention this %they'll die KILLING First Line: As a boy I killed to kill, clubbed frogs Last Line: Can I kill but will and want to LAID OFF, SLEEPING IN First Line: I turn over each hour to be evenly cooked Last Line: The one breath it's held %through winter LEARNING OF IT First Line: It was disgusting. In the basement Last Line: Where her body ended or words began LETTER HOME First Line: The election has left us stunned Last Line: We are just now forgetting, %just now settling %back to sleep LETTING GO First Line: If it were a contained explosion, yes, an orderly Last Line: That the voice is always there and strangely comforting Subject(s): Farewell; Freedom LETTUCE First Line: From 101 %was green boutonnieres Last Line: Of boys decapitating %the field LIFE First Line: The first time I watched he lifted his shirt Last Line: I'd forgotten, the high of living %with the faith you know precisely how you'll die Subject(s): Life LITTLE BLASPHEMY First Line: No one in ibsen kisses when they talk about death Last Line: Again, bewildered by mourning less carnally dressed LITTLE SCIENCE First Line: If we skin the trustees the university will not Last Line: Go home. Kiss spouse. Read paper. Pet dog LOUISE Poem Text First Line: She said I looked like jesus and it was true. I looked Last Line: From a cross and think of anything but revenge Subject(s): Household Employees; Old Age; Servants; Domestics; Maids LOUISE First Line: She said I looked like jesus and it was true. I looked Last Line: From a cross and think of anything but revenge Subject(s): Household Employees; Old Age LOVE WILL SEE YOU THROUGH First Line: An old problem: now that she doesn't drink Last Line: She wakes to the alarm of crows LUMBAR First Line: The pain in my back makes it impossible Last Line: To believe this will be kindness enough LYONS AVENUE First Line: Ramesh, ice-t dripping from headphones Last Line: In space, a time too brief %to believe by any measure but faith Subject(s): Neighbors; Streets MAGIC First Line: Mirrors, it's all done Last Line: Run out, and mirrors, they never love you %enough Subject(s): Magic MAN OF THE HOUSE First Line: It was a misunderstanding Last Line: Turns out I live next door MAPLE First Line: Is a system of posture for wood Last Line: Trying to lick them %back into place MEDITATION First Line: I've read of meditation %enough to be harmful at night Last Line: To admit but it's trying very hard %to come out MEETING BILL First Line: Bill liked revealing his nipple-ring %to new faces Last Line: Revealing %the darker secret of his modesty MEMENTO First Line: He'd been a thief he told me several hours after I killed Last Line: When I can't sleep and need the comfort of blindness MEMORIAL DAY First Line: Each year my parents flowered their dead: the dark-veined Last Line: Of hands, the carnal gift of bloom, %the beauty entrusted to graves a sensual payment of debt Subject(s): Holidays; Memorial Day; Sympathy; Veterans MEMORY First Line: I hated the road runner Last Line: That's easy, he said %everything METEOR SHOWER First Line: It's the one shower I take each year Last Line: Who can resist this hot music, %these ballroom lights? MONOGRAPH ON THE WALKERS First Line: Because they never talk I infer telepathy Last Line: By the indecency of words MORMON ISSUE First Line: Sister gardner said I am sister gardner, this Last Line: Questions: a considerate offer, an endless need MORNING, THREE YEARS INTO THE JOB First Line: Trees are buttered with sun, dew's a skin Last Line: To that breath & with something like the joy %of picking open a scab MORTAL SHOWER First Line: I met my butt in a pittsburgh Last Line: Dizzy, stunned %by reflection MY AFFAIR WITH A HAT First Line: Twenty years ago my hat left me for a man Last Line: A gentleman, and gentleman wear hats MY FAVORITE MORAL First Line: A fable begins with a horse. The horse eats oats Last Line: How the painting of the stars is hung MY JOB AS IT RELATES TO BRUEGEL'S First Line: I am today Last Line: By the militancy of this %shy boast MY LAST FACTORY JOB First Line: The job was pushing a rod. Steel rod Last Line: For me to realize I should have quit %after forty-three MY LIFE WITH A GARDENER First Line: The screen door firecrackers closed Last Line: That only open their mouths %to speak with the moon MY SEVENTH RANT AGAINST HABIT First Line: I believe change is good Last Line: And you were jumping through flames NEIGHBOR First Line: A man lives under the beakes bridge. I drive over him Last Line: Like music, which cuts its home through rock and is gone NEIGHBORS First Line: The dead man had headphones on and the house Last Line: The other a list of genuflections to appease %the tattle-tale trees NEITHER HERE NOR THERE First Line: Again with the gunfire, vague pops taht suggest Last Line: Chatter like the rivets are popping out NIGGER First Line: It was a new word and as words went then Last Line: After paying what was asked for what was wanted NIGHT AT MODERN PROTOTYPE First Line: Waleid drew a map of lebanon, x'ed where his village Last Line: Constant as a heart that does no more than it's asked to NONSTOP First Line: Did you notice the herding instinct of grief? Last Line: For solace, who wails for no one, whose flesh %is useless words Subject(s): Grief NOW AND THEN I AM DIRECT First Line: It's late and I've stayed up to miss you Last Line: At least the cloth, at least the wind %on which the sail feeds NURSE First Line: She thinks of him as a pancake Last Line: Before the many voices %of the fleeting rain OATH TO MY FORMER LIFE First Line: It used to be enough to be bigger Last Line: Life. How to say yes like a river %jumping off a cliff OHMY First Line: I do my part for ignorance Last Line: This is impossible OLD STORY First Line: It's hard being in love Last Line: All over town, when good %my lips glow ONE THING AND ANOTHER First Line: The crows are tagged to see how far they'll take Last Line: Before waking her to a face she made long ago %out of something irreparable as love Subject(s): Childhood Memories ONE THING CERTAIN First Line: He's read %memory's broken, that we hold color Last Line: By the testament of his shock Subject(s): Memory; Old Age OPTIMISTIC ONCOLOGY First Line: It's easy to have a positive attitude Last Line: To actually start before %screaming fire OTHER LIVES AND DIMENSIONS AND FINALLY A LOVE POEM Poem Text First Line: My left hand will live longer than my right. The rivers Subject(s): Absence; Hearts; Love; Poetry & Poets; Separation; Isolation OTHER LIVES AND DIMENSIONS AND FINALLY A LOVE POEM First Line: My left hand will live longer than my right. The rivers Last Line: In each place and forever Subject(s): Absence; Hearts; Love; Poetry And Poets OVER COFFEE Poem Text First Line: What you mean to say about the film is that Last Line: The first to address this exhilarating stranger Subject(s): Coffee; Conversation; Guests; Strangers; Visiting OVER COFFEE First Line: What you mean to say about the film is that Last Line: Of conviction, finally the stammers, the rush to be %the first to address this exhilarating stranger Subject(s): Coffee; Conversation; Guests; Strangers PALSY First Line: Ignoring the obvious is most of manners Last Line: Proof of a soul so happy %to still be around it shivers PARTS First Line: Now they make hips Last Line: Do no harm to dancing PARTY First Line: Bugs are chewed by the blue light into something Last Line: Taking an inventory of the bruised land PERPETUAL RESURRECTION First Line: Enough snow for tracks and blood, enough moon to imply Last Line: Even waitresses pretend they hold each moment dear PLACE First Line: A speedball at the old college above olmsted's Subject(s): College Sports PLACE First Line: A speedball at the old college above olmsted's Last Line: More sustaining than panic, bones %to cherish as if unearthing treasure Subject(s): College Sports PLUS SHIPPING Poem Text First Line: Certainly it was a premonition of a navajo warrior that men Subject(s): Loss; Moving & Movers; Refugees; United States - Immigration & Emigtration POET/ STALKER First Line: Thanks for your fan letter-I've built a shrine Last Line: I won't sleep until we meet. Yours. Truly POLITICAL VISION First Line: A cellist in every lobby by love and law Last Line: And that what we feel comes from a hollow %that would moan if bowed Subject(s): Political Conventions; Politics PROCESS OF ELIMINATION First Line: For 71 days I've tried to write about eichmann Last Line: He'd only apologize for the shit, %for the need and nothing else Subject(s): Books; Eichmann, Adolf (1906-1962) PRODIGAL First Line: You could drive out of this country Last Line: Aiming your eyes down the road PURRING ON First Line: The toads sounded like a xylophone of broken noses Last Line: Of how much she loved her daughter RADICAL NECK First Line: A match beaten by frail wind lights the cave Last Line: Burn him, make him ash: my revenge: his only wish RANDOM EVENTS First Line: Tom emery, according to the paper Last Line: When the cops kicked down the door %and came screaming inside RAPTURE First Line: In a bathroom lit by a 25-watt bulb the blue Last Line: You have no idea of what you are saying READY SET GO First Line: I circle april and hang the calendar %in front of the forsythia, just in case Last Line: Is at work, that any moment my soul %and forsythia will go off like a bomb REARVIEW MIRROR First Line: I saw her bounce on the passenger seat Last Line: Has placed in their path RED LICORICE First Line: Turns out the universe is an accordion Last Line: You feel nostalgic wait your turn RESTLESS First Line: I ask frankenstein for a cigarette Last Line: His blood to ask, what next? REUNION First Line: The story's that my great-aunt was killed by her mother Last Line: How hard we are to love, how desperate to stay together Subject(s): Reunions; Togetherness RIGHT STUFF First Line: If you break the sound barrier you fix it Last Line: You were part of the sky all along? RIVERA'S GOLDEN GATE MURAL First Line: She's too young to care Last Line: Art will be but one more intimacy %she pushes aside ROTHKO'S LAST MEDITATION Poem Text First Line: In the days leading to the miracle he did not Subject(s): Abandonment; Disappeared Persons; Meditation; Desertion; Missing Persons ROTHKO'S LAST MEDITATION First Line: In the days leading to the miracle he did not Last Line: Nothing, a miraculous calm he'd soon lose and chase %into his chosen death Subject(s): Abandonment; Disappeared Persons; Meditation ROUTINE First Line: I have this dream in which I sleep through the night Last Line: Reaching from the bush to touch the light %that has come so far to build a better day RUBE GOLDBERG MACHINE First Line: My dog chased a chipmunk Last Line: Ate the chipmunk %by eating the crow SELLING MAGRITTE'S HOUSE Poem Text First Line: The train in the fireplace Last Line: The owner? A very regular man Subject(s): Allen, Ethan (1738-1789); Houses; Investments; Landlords & Tenants; Soldiers; Stocks; Bonds SELLING MAGRITTE'S HOUSE First Line: The train in the fireplace Last Line: Granite wings %a joke played on the air Subject(s): Allen, Ethan (1738-1789); Houses; Investments; Landlords And Tenants; Soldiers SERVICE First Line: In the hospital he moans he was wrong, insists through delirium Last Line: Who'll mix the strychnine from which they'll sip, sewing up %the practical details of their faith Subject(s): Chandler, Raymond (1888-1959); Service; Suicide SEVENTEEN FIRES First Line: On ganymede looking back at the sun you would see Last Line: And report the keening of an impossible dream SHOPPING AT THE OCEAN First Line: Trying to save the bug she killed the bug Last Line: At emptiness because you know it's the animal %that will win SHRINE First Line: Twice a week I baby-sat six Last Line: Or a simple truth SKIN First Line: Is a trick. Sure without it Last Line: The hero she's just a word %in the parable of everything SMALL PURCHASE First Line: I drove my father for lettuce on the day his wife Last Line: Inside to make for one a simple green meal SORTING OF THE ENTANGLEMENTS Poem Text First Line: In my will the basement goes to the spiders Last Line: To the hyacinth. I leave body to the unfashionable earth Subject(s): Wills SPAM LEAVES AN AFTERTASTE First Line: What does the internet know that it sends me Last Line: Making the sounds once known %as conversation SPIRIT DITTY OF NO FAX-LINE DIAL TONE First Line: The telephone company calls and asks what the fuss is Last Line: Without fail everything clouds are trying to say to you STOP FOURTEEN First Line: Don't get too excited about the albino Last Line: Green thought the world has ever had Subject(s): Cowell, Henry (1897-1965); Parks; Trees SUBJHECTS' EXODUS First Line: We were children in the painting, ran Last Line: You never did cherish us SUDDEN MOVEMENTS First Line: My father's head has become a mystery to him Last Line: He's pawned on his children as love SUPERSTITION First Line: A broken yoke's three days' rain. Wisteria on the floor Last Line: Nailed to the wall: %like jesus, sacrificed by the meek; like us, dead after all Subject(s): Faith; Superstition SUR COAST DIARY First Line: I stood where the earth turned itself inside out Last Line: In the night and retune my breath to this black %lung SURGERY First Line: Masked, they cut you, peel back Last Line: A scar and the fact on any trivial day %you're still alive TEN YEARS DRY First Line: She misses the heft of rock and shot glass Last Line: Finally killed who she'd been after all along TEXTBOOK CASE First Line: A certain man fell ill. The year of coughing passed Last Line: Disposition if not a martyr's persistence, %if nothing else the good fortune to die Subject(s): Health; Medicine; Physicians THANKSGIVING First Line: Today I sided with the sleepwalkers. Today Last Line: Of wheat loomed as a story the farmers %cannot wait to tell Subject(s): Farm Life; Holidays; Pilgrims And Pilgrimages; Thanksgiving; Turkey THE BALD TRUTH Poem Text First Line: My hair went on a diet of its own accord Last Line: That I'm seen by love. Subject(s): Baldness THE SEMANTICS OF FLOWERS ON MEMORIAL DAY Poem Text First Line: Historians will tell you my uncle / wouldn't have called it world war ii Subject(s): Flowers; Holidays; Memorial Day THE WISH Poem Text First Line: On a tuesday I learned I'd never sit Last Line: This man was Subject(s): Fathers & Sons THOUGHT Poem Text First Line: Of job when her friend died and another Subject(s): Cancer (disease) THOUGHT First Line: Of job when her friend died and another Last Line: And with the other pushed me out Subject(s): Cancer (disease) THREE FLOORS First Line: At st. Michael's on tuesdays Last Line: You perceive in my work isn't art %but a pulse THREE FLOORS: ART First Line: Brushes alienate touch, the relation Last Line: You perceive in my work isn't art %but a pulse Subject(s): Art And Artists; Museums; Paintings And Painters; Portraits THREE FLOORS: GOD First Line: At st. Michael's on tuesdays Last Line: I wore knee pads, %eventually converted Subject(s): God; Prayer; Religion THREE FLOORS: SEX First Line: A back room in the basement, the floor Last Line: Each square repeating the word %again Subject(s): Love; Pleasure; Sex TO ERR IS HUMID First Line: Long ago we sat on a lake Last Line: Between the gun and his brain TO ROANOKE WITH JOHNNY CASH First Line: Mist became rain became fog was mist Last Line: That was the soul of the man TRAFFIC JAM First Line: I try to make eye contact with a pig Last Line: Filling mine with confidence at the end TRANSLATING SMALL TALK First Line: In calling my mother the first time after she's home Last Line: I mean to say she's not allowed to die TRANSLATOR'S NOTE First Line: There is a tradition in laparona that the first Last Line: The judas teeth of rocks TRUTH ABOUT LOVE First Line: I apologize for not being gandhi or tom Last Line: Into piles and whispering good night TUESDAY'S WALK First Line: This was before stars. A thin broth of clouds Last Line: With its alarm going off, we refused %from embrace to give ground TWINS First Line: Night and sea confuse me Last Line: Or both of these devotions VAGINA CANTICLE First Line: Healed by water %her hand unfolds, fingers uncurl to ancient Last Line: This spot %around which her broken fingers %turn green VISITING THE WALL First Line: The sweet gum %hover in the granite Last Line: A child so hopefully, %so violently born Subject(s): Landmarks; Memory; War; Washington, D.c. VOLADORES First Line: They fly, bodies suddenly light Last Line: Amid ours as predators among prey WAITING First Line: While waiting for the bus Last Line: That my response was to think %someone should do %something about that WAITING FOR UPS Poem Text First Line: Now I live inside the window. Now I think the sky Last Line: "she let me kiss each box Subject(s): Farewell; Letters; Love; Parents; Parting; Parenthood WAITING FOR UPS First Line: Now I live inside the window. Now I think the sky Last Line: Nearly as strange as my insistence %she let me kiss each box good-bye Subject(s): Farewell; Letters; Love; Parents WATCHING WELLES First Line: What he knows: hustling wine to the middle class Last Line: Of having nothing but famous last words to say WATCHING WELLES First Line: What he knows: hustling wine to the middle class Last Line: Decades gone and replaced by the bitterness %of having nothing but last words to say Subject(s): Actors And Actresses; Motion Pictures; Theater And Theaters WEATHER First Line: My grandmother's on the phone Last Line: And make love %wilder than any weather WEDDING First Line: I've no choice but to be taller than myself Last Line: I'd marry that sound %because it's exactly what I mean WHAT FINE KINDLING THE HOMELESS MAKE First Line: I know the importance of replication but intend no action Last Line: Of saying in the manner of a child, do it again Subject(s): Homeless WHAT WE SAY First Line: Another poem about a bunch of press. Another Last Line: That glow and disappear, and the words %we repeat, owning at least what we say Subject(s): Capitalism; Economics; Labor And Laborers WHEN MERCHANTS COME First Line: The witnesses wanted to know if I was happy Last Line: Wishing them well, not erasing them %from the horizon Subject(s): Merchants; Pain; Trucks And Trucking WHEN SWEARING AT THE CARPETING'S NOT ENOUGH First Line: All this whistling and target practice is me Last Line: After an hour of rest in the brutal migration WHITHER THOU GOEST First Line: Fish can have mad cow disease and I have a problem Last Line: And my promise to be there, conspicuously mad in my devotio n WISH LIST First Line: Love will do, or fortune Last Line: Either everything I ask for %or the beating I deserve YIELDING TO THE PROPOSITIONS ALL LOVE IS CANNIBALISTIC First Line: I'm placed atop an oak table cross- Last Line: Of my envy know I wonder %how many tasted better than this Subject(s): Dinners And Dining; Envy; Family Life YOUR DAUGHTER First Line: When she phones at two Last Line: You'll make room to avoid the slightest touch YOUR FATHER DEAD First Line: Your father dead and a field to mow Last Line: Is what he taught %but secretly hoped you'd outgrow Subject(s): Cemeteries; Death; Fathers; Graves ZOMBY LIFE First Line: Because I have insomnia and cable %my continuing education is a wondrous thing Last Line: On his face suggesting nothing human %is strange Hicok. Bob Poet's Biography 22 poems available by this author AFTER LOOKING UP INTO ONE TOO MANY CAMERAS Poem Text First Line: When the bones of my arm were emptied I began Last Line: Dangerous words are the ones we never hear Subject(s): Self; Bones; Secrets AFTER WORKING SIXTY HOURS AGAIN FOR WHAT REASON Poem Text First Line: The best job I had was moving a stone Last Line: On an empty table Subject(s): Labor & Laborers; Work; Workers BARS POETICA Poem Text Last Line: Is all I’ve been trying to say Subject(s): Love - Erotic CALLING HIM BACK FROM LAYOFF Poem Text Recitation by Author First Line: I called a man today. After he said Last Line: Other people staring at their phones / hear? Subject(s): Unemployment EPITHALAMIUM Poem Text First Line: A bee in the field. The house on the mountain Last Line: Of light: particle to wave. Do you take? I do Subject(s): Mountains; Hills; Downs (great Britain) FULL FLIGHT Poem Text First Line: I’m in a plane that will not be flown into a building Last Line: We’ve begun our descent, and then I sense the falling Subject(s): Aviation & Aviators; World Trade Center Tragedy (9/11/2001); Airplanes; Air Pilots; New York City - Terrorist Attack, 9/11 GO GREYHOUND Poem Text First Line: A few hours after des moines Last Line: Of the human condition, that the baby Subject(s): Music & Musicians HAVING INTENDED TO MERELY PICK ON AN OIL COMPANY, THE POEM GOES AWRY Poem Text Recitation by Author First Line: Never before have I so resembled british petroleum Last Line: Or notional, now that oceans are wheezing to a stop? Subject(s): Oil & Gas Companies; Environment; Poetry & Poets; Environmental Protection; Ecology; Conservation HER MY BODY Poem Text First Line: The dog licks my hand as I worry Last Line: By this thought you are welcome / to keep it Subject(s): Love - Erotic; Cancer (disease) HOW THE MIRROR LOOKS THIS MORNING Poem Text First Line: Probably the size of the six volt Last Line: As a happy person Subject(s): Cats; Death; Happiness IN MICHAEL ROBINS?ÇÖS CLASS MINUS ONE Poem Text First Line: At the desk where the boy sat, he sees the chicago river. Last Line: And the river promises to never surrender the boy’s shape to the ocean Subject(s): Schools; Nature; Students INTO THE BREACH Poem Text First Line: I want to tell them we can hear Last Line: Anywhere but inside their faces Subject(s): Relationships LEARNING TO SWIM Poem Text First Line: At forty-eight, to be given water, Last Line: Most of all, their dissolve Subject(s): Middle Age; Swimming & Swimmers LOVE SONG Poem Text First Line: I am misunderstanding a song Last Line: Of too many / nights alone Subject(s): Singing & Singers; Love; Songs MY WALK Poem Text First Line: I am misunderstanding a song Last Line: Draws a breath to speak Subject(s): Winter ODYSSEY Poem Text First Line: I sat in different places with different winds: Last Line: If it's ever considered being thrown Subject(s): Wit & Humor SELF RELIANCE Poem Text First Line: I have a picture of earth on my wall. Last Line: On our own Subject(s): Earth; World SHED AND DREAM Poem Text First Line: Rest with me under the linden tree. Last Line: O pie in the sky Subject(s): Trees; Time SO I KNOW Poem Text First Line: He put moisturizer the morning he shot Last Line: Of this word, / suddenly Subject(s): Language; Social Commentary; Words; Vocabulary STOP-LOSS Poem Text First Line: Absolutely, I agree. It’s what we all Last Line: Without ropes, in a pink dress, laughing Subject(s): War THE INVISIBLE MAN Poem Text First Line: He is my manta ray. The degas Last Line: Blue unless red until green Subject(s): Imagination THE ONGOING Poem Text First Line: Do you know bertolt brecht's the hammer throwers? Last Line: Or dreaming, yes you are Subject(s): Brecht, Bertolt (1898-1956) |
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