Category: Poems
here’s an age-old question: who among us can imagine our parents in passion entwined?
right! so, we must all be gods! eternal, deathless, our origins lost in the mists of time preceding time. certainly, we are none of us sprung from the clumsy thrustings of those wrinkling, aging, inept and flatulent poseurs who insist we are their offspring. and our own children? let them likewise believe that they are, in the face of the contradicting evidence (i.e., us), the inheritors of an ancient godhood. don’t ever let them know that they shall be as we are now: becoming broken-down, taking much too long to die.
(Copyright 2023 by Tetman Callis.)
we babies of the boom, now middle-aged, overweight, out of what were once our so-alluring shapes, now with spouses gone we wrinkle and sag. we sometimes flock together in the evenings, laughing over dinner and dry red wine. once we would have paired and been naked by midnight—three a.m. at the latest—now we take our leavings at ten, returning alone to our separate homes where we will later be illuminated by television’s flickering glow, watching a fantasy world in which we no longer see reflections of ourselves. we awaken early in the dark of our narrow beds, get up, it’s time to feed the animals, put out the trash.
(Copyright 2023 by Tetman Callis.)
what was once done with so little
thought given other than to the doing of it
now done (whenever possible)
fraught with consideration
with a strong desire to hold down by the wrists
to bite and to stab
to scream in rage against death
(Copyright 2023 by Tetman Callis.)
i’m given to understand freud said
we are all of us imprisoned by our dreams.
but i’m shut right now in a small room with no windows
(artificial light, overhead and flickering)
and have no way to verify whatever freud may
or may not have said, regarding dreams and prisons.
last night i was imprisoned with cream cheese cupcakes.
i’d never had them before and they were delicious.
i peeled their papers back, pressed my fingertips down onto
the crumbs that fell from them onto the table also imprisoned with me,
and licked my fingertips. the cream cheese was the color of butter.
the cupcakes were cupcake yellow.
some nights i find myself imprisoned with my best friend,
though he has been dead many years. last night he was still dead,
and i was trying to make sense of the mess he left behind.
he had not turned his calculators off, nor left any instructions.
this was before (prior to) the cream cheese cupcakes.
i complained to shadowy dream people imprisoned with me
about my best friend’s machines. the shadowy dream people later
shared with me the cream cheese cupcakes.
i like the sound of the phrase, cream cheese cupcakes,
though i didn’t particularly care to share any of them, and i’m not—
never mind. some nights i share my prison with a woman i had hoped
both to love forever and to have stopped loving some years back.
looks like forever is the winner, so far.
i’m imprisoned with forever, which gives me the entire universe
as my incarcerated companion. the man who has it all,
including the dream of a beautiful cellmate,
and a telephone in this small room with no windows
(overhead light, artificial and flickering). it may ring, this phone.
(Published in J Journal, Vol. 2, No. 2, Fall 2009; copyright 2009, 2023 by Tetman Callis.)
my son has a sister who is not his
mother’s daughter and another who is
not his father’s little girl. the first of
these two half-sisters has herself two half-
siblings in virginia, while the second
is closely related to several
persons in hawaii. we progenitors
(several inter-breeding mothers and
fathers) are, or may be, closely related
to people in colorado
texas
ohio
tennessee
scotland
france
germany
the netherlands
and possibly viet nam
now that we’re so many of us closer
cousins than we may suspect, sex seems not
quite so advisable, at least not for
procreation (pace his eminence
the holy father, with his children of
a different sort). the bunny-rub feels
so good, this is true, and there is nothing
to match a good orgasm (is there any
other kind?), but we could accidentally
generate to follow in our wayward
footsteps an even stupider gener-
ation than our own, unless we decide
to hell with the consequences, dub ourselves
royalty, and set to interbreeding
like the kings and queens whose offspring were
hemophiliacs and at least one world war
(Copyright 2023 by Tetman Callis.)
she drove up this evening, before sunset,
in her silver volkswagen beetle, one of the new kind.
it made a loud rackety clacking noise, as though
it really were powered by hamsters on a wheel.
many hamsters, on a large wheel.
i watched from the kitchen window. our son, hers and mine,
had gone out to meet her. the two of them
stood by the gate, talking in the evening’s
golden light. i could not see her face.
her hair was very chestnut in the light,
but i believe she colors it now.
i saw her figure in profile. she has a bit of a belly.
so do i. we age.
as i watched her i thought,
i used to fuck the daylights out of her,
then felt vaguely frightened and annoyed that such a thought
would run through my head, snatching words along its way.
i washed my hands at the kitchen sink. when she
drove away, her silver volkswagen beetle
was so quiet, i didn’t hear her leave.
(Copyright 2023 by Tetman Callis.)
home for the christmas holidays,
i snuck to the garage of my parents’ house to get high.
everyone else was in the house on the other side of the door that led
from dad’s green garage to mom’s red kitchen.
i laid my works out on dad’s workbench,
my papers and baggie on a magazine’s glossy cover photo,
some comely wench.
listening to the noises of voices coming muffled from the kitchen,
i tried to roll a cigarette but my fingertips were slick and dry,
the marijuana crumbly.
dad came to the door, opened it, said,
whatcha doin’, little buddy?
are ya makin’ any money yet?
no, no, i mumbled, wadding my works up in my hand, hiding what i could hide.
dad said, why’ncha come inside?
he was smiling,
we’re all making money in here.
he walked back into the warm-looking kitchen.
i heard mom’s laughter, and brother joey’s confident, even voice saying,
fuck your money, dad,
i want my daughters to learn about pornography.
i think they’re old enough now.
i can help, i called from where i stood,
i have some right here.
one of joey’s daughters, the youngest,
came out to see.
i pulled a glossy magazine from the rack on top of dad’s workbench.
take this and look at it, i said, and gave her the magazine.
practice, practice, practice, i told her.
i watched her walk back into the kitchen.
she’s beginning to get hips.
i still very much wanted to get high,
but dinner was about to be served.
(Copyright 2023 by Tetman Callis.)
i turned on the radio and folded my freshly-washed underwear
while watching out the window at schoolgirls walking by
the tingling and the pressure from my old workplace injury is always with me
i moved with care
clouds had been building up all afternoon
the schoolgirls walked down the street to the next block
i stacked my underwear neatly
the sound of a golden oldie came from the radio
the clouds were slowly billowing over the city
my bedsheets were still drying on the line
(Copyright 2023 by Tetman Callis.)
my father storms into the house when he gets home from work
bitching about obese paralegals
red-light runners
large cars badly parked
i’m watching television when he comes in
i try to avoid getting in front of his anger
after he takes off his tie
makes a martini and sits
he’s usually better
he sips
he says
why does my girlfriend keep calling me at seven in the morning to break up?
doesn’t she know she got it right the first time?
we watch television
i’m like
dad
i don’t know
he finishes his martini and goes outside
we forgive each other everything we can
(Copyright 2023 by Tetman Callis.)
you are still here
a root grown tight around a stone
a persistent dream of dark-eyed women
you are still here
in this chair you used to sit
in this plush and tattered chair where years after you were gone
i found a long strand of what could only have been your hair
i did not keep it
you are right here
you are here the way a parent is present in the face of a child
i hear my child’s footfall in the kitchen
he is pouring cereal into a bowl
(Copyright 2023 by Tetman Callis.)
writing by starlight
sloppily
has this page already been used?
orion and his dog overhead
satellites and red-eye liners passing seven sisters
chased as ever by the bull
this morning he has saturn on one horn
dawn breeze coming now
venus and a thin crescent rising
my girlfriend sleeps in our tent
last night we made love during a thunderstorm
rain pelted our tent while flashing lightning showed us ourselves
(Copyright 2023 by Tetman Callis.)
she lives in the kitchen paints her face
with paste she scrapes from cans sleeps on the floor in front of her stove
wakes up hungry stuffs her lovers into sausage skins
fries them up for breakfast they sizzle in her cast-iron pan
she turns up the heat her lovers pop and spatter spots on the walls
spots on the crystal she takes and shatters with her hands
fragments and blood with fragments drop into her mixing bowl
she makes her hands into fists grinds the glass
into a hash the color of what she’s hungry for
cooks everything until it’s done takes her meal hot
sopping up the drippings with gingerbread men
she breaks and blackens for toast
(Copyright 2023 by Tetman Callis.)
please don’t stand so close to me, boss
not only are you attractive in your own right
you remind me rather much of someone with whom i was once
and not sufficiently long enough ago
a little too much involved with for comfort
either mine or hers
or for that matter either of our spouses
and i see by your listing in the office directory, boss
you have what is these days referred to as a significant other
please, boss
you’re standing too close, and i am sitting down
my attraction to you is not what we would refer to as platonic
you have a way of leaning over a desk which i have noticed
(Copyright 2023 by Tetman Callis.)
hold me while i sleep and i shall know
that you are holding me as in my
dreams i see your face while you are
dreaming me i hear your sweet voice singing
me to sleep as i am holding you as
close to me as dreamers ever dream
to be as close as shadows close as walls
close as solitude will always be for
dreamers holding dreamers in their sleep
(Copyright 2023 by Tetman Callis.)
two pot pies were baking in the oven on a cookie sheet to catch
their bubbling over. i told my wife, the pots pies are almost done.
i took a hot pad in my hand and opened the oven door. see? i turned around,
my wife behind me in the kitchen. i’m not having pots pies tonight, she said.
she stood at the kitchen counter, preparing meat. she had all kinds of meat—
briskets and steaks and racks of ribs slathered with barbecue sauce.
but the pot pies are almost done, i said. i pointed into the opened oven.
the pot pies bubbled over, drippings sizzling on the cookie sheet.
my boyfriend’s coming over for dinner, she said. we’re not having pot pies.
she took the hot pad from my hand, pulled the cookie sheet with its pot pies
out of the oven, set it aside, and slid in a rack of ribs. maybe i’ll go eat
someplace else, i said. if you like, she said. she closed the oven door,
handed me the hot pad, took off her pants and climbed into the refrigerator.
she pushed her way in among the milk and juice, found a place on the crowded shelves
and sat, looking at me. you can still live here if you like, she said,
but we’re not married anymore. did you forget? you forgot, didn’t you?
she rested her feet on the condiment shelves. the pot pies were cooling
on the cookie sheet, ready for me to eat.
(Copyright 2023 by Tetman Callis.)
“Just as we cannot think of spatial objects at all apart from space, or temporal objects apart from time, so we cannot think of any object apart from the possibility of its connexion with other things.” – Ludwig Wittgenstein, “2.0121”, Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus (emphasis in original)
it’s when i have you impaled beneath me
your eyes the colors of the ocean
open and looking into mine
and i am in you
i know only what is important
and am freed from all the rest
(Published in Lyrotica, 2011; copyright 2011, 2023 by Tetman Callis.)
it was the middle of the day and the sunlight was bright. the house and the apple orchard
stood at the base of a ridge dotted with scrub oaks and pines. my wife and son and i
worked in the orchard. a jenny followed by a foal wended down the ridge.
a drift of swine, sharp-tusked, followed the jenny and foal. when the swine
saw the three of us in the orchard, they charged. we scrambled up the trunks
of the apple trees and onto the thick lower branches. the swine tore at the trunks
with their tusks and circled madly below us. the jenny and foal wandered off,
down the dirt road leading away from the orchard and the house and the ridge.
in the afternoon it seemed the swine were tiring. my rifle was in the kitchen,
leaning against the wall in one corner. my son distracted the swine, throwing apples
at them while i clambered down, ran to the house, and snatched my rifle and my clip
loaded with bullets. i hurried back to the orchard and back up a tree,
where i loaded the rifle. an angry pink swine with long and pointed tusks
tore at the trunk below me. i aimed and fired, reloaded, aimed and fired again,
and again. several of the swine lay below me in the orchard, dying or dead.
the others scampered off, frightened and squealing. the three of us climbed down
from the trees. my son gathered apples in the orchard. my wife would not look at me
and walked into the kitchen. i followed her, told her, i can call someone and have those
swine taken away. she still wouldn’t look at me. she said, i didn’t tell you to do that.
please take that thing you are carrying and go away from here. i turned and walked
out of the house and down the dirt road, my rifle cradled in my arms. the sun was hot,
there was no shade on the road. the jenny and her foal were nowhere in sight.
(Copyright 2023 by Tetman Callis.)
fetal lymphocytes can persist in the mother’s blood for twenty-seven years
or so i’ve been told
so part of me was still inside my mother
pumping through her heart
flowing through her fingertips
when my father taught me to ride a bike across a green field my seventh summer
still inside my mother when the freckled older boy
impressed upon me middle-school’s pecking order
still inside my mother when snaggle-toothed regina
held me close at the high-school dance
still inside my mother on college graduation night
black-robed and mortar-boarded
rolled diploma in my hand
still inside my mother on a cloudy late-summer morning in texas
while i stood outside a pharmacy’s door
regina standing beside me
her hand on the rough brick wall while she threw up on the sidewalk
an after-effect of the quick operation to remove from within herself
that which left her with fetal lymphocytes still persisting in her blood
(Copyright 2023 by Tetman Callis.)
my life blew up in my face
i never heard a sound
there was a flash and still
i can’t see
my eyes are burned
burning
shards that had been my life blew off
i grabbed at them buzzing by my head
trying to catch an explosion
eyes on fire
white blinded
me reaching
reaping the air
the fragments i catch are hot
jagged
molten steel life tearing through my hands
speeding away from me
(Copyright 2023 by Tetman Callis.)
my lover is a little slut but she’s a slut for me.
i stop by her house for coffee after work.
she wears her short black dress. we hug and kiss,
the way we always do when we see each other.
you’d think we were kids but the gray in our hair
and the lines in our faces—we’re not kids.
we hug and kiss the way we always do. she wears
her short black dress. no bra, i notice when i hug her
and run my hands down her back. i slip one hand
up under the hem of her short black dress, and into
her underwear. panties, but a real man has to be careful
about letting that word come out of his mouth.
so they’re not panties, they’re underwear.
my fingers are inside them.
you’re wet, i say
to my little slut lover. i think about her fingers
and where they may have been in the moments
before i arrived, before she set the coffee to brew.
it is brewing now, and my fingers
are feeling where she is wet.
take those off, i say
to my lover, my sweet little slut. i pull
at her pant— at her underwear, and step back.
she pulls them down her legs and off while
i kick off my shoes, strip off my tie, and take
off my pants as quickly as i can without my
seeming frantic. i take my sweet little slut
by her shoulders and guide her to her living room,
where i pull down my own underwear—
i’ve never worn panties in my life, not even as a joke—
and sit back on her couch. she straddles me.
my sweet little lover, my precious and
wet little slut, she straddles me and i push
myself slowly inside her. i use one hand to
guide and help support me, as i am growing older
and am not how i once was down there, how
i was when i was younger and ramrod straight.
i guide myself into my sweet little slut. she
rides me, her half-closed eyes rolling back in her
head, her mouth open in a grimace.
too soon my rock, it crumbles, or more accurately,
it melts away, becomes a little slug again.
before i’ve even attained the pleasure of
the explosive release we men so compulsively crave,
it melts away, wet now with the wetness from
my loving little slut. my little slug, gone back
to sleep before its work was done, now on point
for the reconnaissance into the sleep of death.
but never mind that. i lift my lover off of me,
lean her back into the cushions of her couch.
spread your legs, i tell her. she does. she
loves me. i could never find a way to tell her
how grateful i am that she loves me the way
she does, wet, her eyes rolling back in her head,
the grimace when i am inside her. i slip two fingers
into her, slowly, and slowly deeper, then
i squeeze her and squeeze her, the rhythm
of my hand matching the rhythm of her
rocking on me.
wider, i say to my
sweet rocking lover, let me in, and i slip
now three fingers inside her. i squeeze
her and pull her, kiss her with my tongue pushing
its way deep into her mouth, take my other hand
and squeeze her breasts, rocking her on me.
then i slowly let her go.
i cover her with myself. we hold each other.
her legs are up on either side of me. i feel
them trembling against my sides, and my
own legs trembling. my little slug, wet still
with the wetness of my sweet little slut,
sleeps between my legs. but as long as i have
my fingers, my darling precious lover, i’m sure,
will still be mine. and when we have coffee,
i’ll be able to hold my cup.
(Copyright 2023 by Tetman Callis.)
hi,
what a hot fuck you are
say, i’ve had more than one glass of wine tonight
but i just wanted you to know what a hot fuck you are
and that’s not the only reason i love you
i’ve been a little freaked-out lately over our getting married
don’t get me wqqrong
i mean
wrong
because i very much want for us to get married
to each other
but i have been a little freaked about it lately
you know i’ve been married before and in fact
this week is fifteen years since that ended
we should celebrate
really we should and i don’t mean anything mean to my ex about that
i’m sure she’s as happy as i am
enough of that
i’ve been a little freaked
so let’s go celebrate this coming saturday evening by going out to dinner
i almost wrote sinner
by going out to dinner together
you
such the hot fuck that you are
and me
who can occasionally still rise to the occasion
xo
(Copyright 2023 by Tetman Callis.)
so, my darling, you’ve shown me your lesions
and told me they mean you’re going to die
well you don’t get to feel so special
we’re all going to die
it’s just that maybe you have more precise information and belief
concerning your own demise
but that you’re going to die
(as if that makes you unique—as if!
that’s not what makes you unique)
is not enough to drive me away
you’re going to have to try harder than that
if you’re going to be rid of me
in the meantime
you’re for me and i’m for you
you are my lifeboat and i am yours
it’s a sort of magic
board me and i’ll carry you upon the ocean
riding over the crests of waves
though if i start to ship a little water
i will need you to bail
(Copyright 2023 by Tetman Callis.)
my son, who is still in his teens, has said
that when he gets into a serious relationship,
he wants it to be with a low-maintenance woman.
dad, i want a low-maintenance relationship,
he said to me at dinner at our favorite diner last week.
i said, son, there’s no such thing—you want that,
get a cat, or an inflatable doll.
my lover is sweet as honey, smooth as fine wine,
but she is filled with broken glass. she knows this
and so do i. we know the care we must take.
(Copyright 2023 by Tetman Callis.)
my love if you must scream
go out to the desert and scream at the stones
they will echo your cries and transform them into song
my love if you must bleed
take yourself down to the river
fill it with the force of your life flowing to the seas and oceans
become the waters of birth and rebirth
my love if you must burn
place your burning hands against my skin
wrap your fiery arms and legs tight around me
press your hot mouth to mine and burn me
burn me through and never let me go
(Published in Lyrotica, 2011; copyright 2011, 2023 by Tetman Callis.)
post-syphilis and pre-aids
long ago and far away, when there was nothing that couldn’t be cured
(gamma-globulin for the bed-bugs, hard liquor for the heartaches)
we would fuck at the drop of a drawer
those were the nights i slid my hard way
into runaround sue of the blue eyes and blonde hair
and the baby girl in the crib
and the cuckolded husband with lieutenant’s bars on his shoulders
cold warrior in a world frozen into the ice
of two great powers with atomic guns held to their heads
there was never a better time for fucking like there would be no tomorrow
now that tomorrow is here and we can see that it makes for no today
worth sliding between the legs of
into a sue so heavy in her middle age that she can scarcely move
her blue eyes crusted and bleared
blonde hair graying and cracked
her baby girl grown and gone, never to write home or even to call on holidays
the lieutenant promoted to captain, then on to colonel
silver eagles perched on his shoulders
before being cashiered when someone’s head had to roll
and his had always been convenient for sacrifice
but i slid my hard way into runaround sue
and i swear it happened on a golden morning, pre-aids and post-syphilis
when the world was ours ours ours and no war could take it from us
no war could distract us even for a moment, not even with the promise or the threat
of all our tomorrows flowing together without form or meaning in this our molten world
where our new diseases keep one step ahead of our latest cures
(Copyright 2023 by Tetman Callis.)
copulating on a bar in a nightclub after closing time
those little wet rings of condensation and spillage from drinks
are cold and sticky and stainy sometimes and often smell bad
the bar is hard on the knees and the butt and back
there’s no place to put your heels
no place to dig in your toes
no pillows to be found in the barroom
the bar is slick
narrow
falling bodies hit the barroom floor, sometimes breaking bones
(Copyright 2023 by Tetman Callis.)
she is sweet and vulnerable
sometimes she needs me
i feel strong when i hold her with my arms around her
she is sensitive and intelligent
aware of the world
an artist at heart
she is not overly superstitious
practices yoga and drinks herbal teas
caffeinated coffees, also
sometimes she says, for no apparent reason except that she wants to
i know someone who could use a blow job
then she unfastens my pants
she lets me put my hands all over her
my fingers squeezing inside her to bring her to climax
her breasts are small
they feel good cupped in my hands while she straddles me
she lets me fuck her and even lets me come inside
she says, you make me so wet
we fit together well, asleep and awake
sometimes she cries and says
i love you so much
also, she can cook, and drives an economy car
(Copyright 2023 by Tetman Callis.)
in the beginning was the word, and these are the words that came after.
these are the words that came to a man sitting in a chair.
these are the words that came while late summer rain gusted against a kitchen window.
these are the words that came to a woman in bed under a sheet
with two frayed hems and a hole.
these are the words that came from the sound of a pair of shoes being pulled back on.
these are the words that came after. these are the words that tell everything.
these are the words that explain nothing. these are they.
(Copyright 2023 by Tetman Callis.)
looking up the word inveterate to see if it might mean
what i thought it might mean
flipping dictionary pages to reach the word
my eyes alighted first on intumescence, then on invaginate
and i considered how lovely those two words are together
and how my love and i are ever turning to each other
inveterates that we are
(Copyright 2023 by Tetman Callis.)