Is anyone
ever truly tempted
to Adopt A Highway?
Category: west coast poetry project
West Coast Poetry Project: Portland poem.
Stumptown Poem
You can see a bit
of every woman’s
back here in hot
summer Portland.
Mine, too. This dress
not stolen, stitched
on Saturdays, blue
buttons down front,
I sewed them on.
I could never buy
a cup of coffee
every morning,
can’t start my day
with paying for it.
I brew my own bad
habits, good stove
coffee, plans for beds
of flowers. Foxgloves
finished with their bells
drip the streets, black
-eyed Susans stare
and stare at sky. Too
hot to hate, names
of authors occur to me
too slowly, Larkin or
Levine, the faces
hidden from me
stay in hiding,
the thieves who took
our precious gems
are out there holding
books I chose
in San Francisco,
spending time
with photographs
of trees so tall
they split in two,
their faces painted
gaudy in my blush,
toes white with toothpaste
intended for my teeth.
*Our car was robbed in Portland, all our good stuff stolen.
Joy in Mendocino (photos).
Here are my Mendo-feetsoes
And here’s my Mendo-face-o
I look so glad ’cause I’m with Misha and the sea is silver dramatics and we’re headed to dinner.
Also: I wanna drink a cappuccino in Mendocino. ‘Cause that’s too good of an off rhyme to miss.
West Coast Poetry Project, Part 2: San Luis Obispo!
San Luis Obispo Poem
for Rachel, who said I had to go to SLO
“Let’s just take in this purple
for a moment” and we do
as the line for meats grows
longer and the street fills
up. We thought we’d just stop
to café but we chatted to a stone
man who told us that the market
would be starting soon and here
we are. We types can’t miss
a farmers’ market. We gotta
see the squash and beans
for sale, we buy more apples
and some avocadoes and a pint
of Golden Kiwi raspberries.
A man named Rick asks to take
our picture and we say yes.
We eat our good brown bread
with cheese and talk to Rick
and watch the kids around
eat corn. Kindergarten gymnasts
do their flips and men in camo
are the band. A kid can bounce
in one of three inflated castles
and I want to. The jacarandas
haven’t finished blooming here.
We catch the purple petals
that fall and strew the ground
like rice after a wedding.
We keep our purple vows.
panache, perhaps 