BURNING HOUSE PRESS

J. EDGAR (Dir. Clint Eastwood, 2011)

 

I.

 

i don’t

 

i don’t

 

i don’t         like to

 

i don’t like to        dance,     mother,

 

i don’t like to–

 

EDGAR GO LOOK IN THE 

MIRROR TALK THE WAY THE DOCTOR

TAUGHT YOU TO BE MY LITTLE SPEEDY

 

((i can spit my         words out with    ((with 

((i can spit my words         out with 

 

mother,     mother 

 

i don’t like to dance

i don’t like to dance with     anyone 

((but mostly 

i don’t like to dance with     women

 

–ODD BEHAVIOR

–DO YOU KNOW WHY –ITS SHORT FOR

DAFFODIL HE SHOT HIMSELF–

SIX WEEKS AFTER

–I’D RATHER HAVE A DEAD SON THAN 

A DAFFODIL […] SON

 

II.

 

EDGAR:    you know i care so very much for you […]

CLYDE:     IS EVERYTHING OKAY–

EDGAR:     yes i’m fine–

CLYDE:    DON’T YOU MAKE A FOOL OF ME […]

CLYDE:    HAVE YOU BECOME PHYSICAL–

EDGAR    yes we have–

EDGAR:     do you want me to be half a person–

CLYDE:    IS THAT WHAT I AM TO YOU– INCOMPLETION–

CLYDE:     YOU’RE A SCARED HEARTLESS HORRIBLE LITTLE MAN–

EDGAR:    you’re acting like a fool–

 

[…]

 

EDGAR:    don’t you ever do that again–

 

[…]

 

EDGAR:    Clyde     ((where are you going

EDGAR:    Clyde     ((i’m sorry

EDGAR:    Clyde     ((please don’t leave me

EDGAR:    Clyde     ((i’m begging you

 

 

 

THE LIGHT, RIGHT BEFORE (IT GOES OUT)

 

we are eating our separate smoke in 

your living room: you prop your broken

 

window open with a weapon-part when 

the hot air coaxing us into a fine sweat 

 

[triggers] 

 

my body back into the last jail cell: for weeks

afterwards i wake up dragged out of my car 

 

& my hands cuff-numb again in both our 

beds: i’ve decided love is the awkward way 

 

we dance around the word itself: so in the 

interest of being transparent i am admitting 

 

i am an expert at pretending to be asleep: 

i have done it while another partner fucked 

 

someone else in my bed next to me & 

i have done it to stay home from grade 

 

school & i have done it in jail to placebo 

myself into stillness:  i promise i am not 

 

lying even when i say the same things as 

i’ve said into similarly uncertain mouths: 

 

love is me telling you how to devastate me 

& you choosing not to: love is you wanting 

 

me to believe all the awful things you assume 

would make someone tell you to leave: or, it 

 

is knowing we are pretending not to watch 

each other move / liquid-like / right before 

the light / goes out. 

 

 

THE NEW JERSEY DEVIL STOPS BEING A PACIFIST AFTER WATCHING COPS BEAT ITS FRIENDS INTO THE PAVEMENT 

 

The New Jersey Devil is being followed by an unmarked car (again) (today). The New Jersey Devil sits across from the jail-warden and looks at its own mugshot upside-down. The New Jersey Devil watches the camera watching it eat naked shit naked sleep naked sob naked glare back at it naked. The New Jersey Devil finds the only not-Bible book during the one un-solitary hour and it is Hamlet so thus reads each sentence twice then recites it back to itself like it is the Ghost and the voice-crack and the Accident and the scene-change all at once. The New Jersey Devil is told it is unsafe but the jail-warden is not telling the New Jersey Devil how it feels he is telling it how it is classified. The New Jersey Devil does not know how long it prayed to a sliver of sky before realizing it was just a brick wall’s painted taunt. The New Jersey Devil has handcuff scars for months after. Later, the New Jersey Devil learns a prayer exists in a lover’s language that begs the skulls of their enemies cracked open on rocks like brunch eggs. Later, the New Jersey Devil practices the script of its emergency contact number so often it recitals in its sleep. Now, the New Jersey Devil does not have it memorized (yet) (again). Now, the New Jersey Devil gets one phone call and it rings and rings and rings and rings and rings and rings and rings and rings and rings and rings and rings and rings and rings and rings and rings and rings and rings and rings and rings and rings and rings and rings and rings and rings and rings and rings and rings and rings and rings and rings and rings and rings and rings and rings and rings and rings and rings and rings and rings and rings and rings and rings and rings and rings and rings and rings and rings and rings and rings and rings and rings and

 

 

L. Reeman is an interdisciplinary archivist and poet haunting highway rest-stops. They are the author of INVENTION OF THE MOUTH (Dream Pop Press, 2019), and BAITED MEMORY (Ghost City Press, 2019), as well as other chapbooks, and they have work in the 2017 Bettering American Poetry anthology. They want to hear about your favorite bridge.