new orleans drowns
new orleans drowns and i sit in a coffeeshop
new orleans drowns and i sit in a plastic wicker chair
at a dark green table on the patio of a coffeeshop in a city in new mexico
new orleans drowns and the cries go up for help
please help us god we are drowning
we are forsaken, stranded, dying of thirst
water everywhere but none to drink
we are awash in the poisoned sea
new orleans drowns
new orleans drowns and the faces and voices on the television news
are black if they are in new orleans
raising their voices and their hands to plead for help and deliver us into their rage
new orleans drowns and a black man sits at a table just to my right and reads the paper
and i am a white man and i am afraid to look at him
damn straight i am afraid
new orleans drowns
new orleans drowns and i have no boats
no emergency supplies
no heavy lift capacity
no politicians in my pocket all wound up and set to dance
set to make their crazy sounds, they smile, they look concerned
new orleans drowns
new orleans drowns and people sitting at a table just to my left talk about
the wine festival last weekend, it was fun
there was plenty of wine, lots of cheese
someone even got to be interviewed on television
new orleans drowns
(Copyright 2005, 2023 by Tetman Callis.)
“[T]he requisitioned civilians. This concerns a category of witnesses, often children or adolescents at the time, of whom one finds no trace in official reports or archives. Neither victims nor executioners, these people were often requisitioned at their homes on the morning of the execution by an armed man; sometimes they were requisitioned because they had a wagon, a shovel, cooking utensils, a bag, or a sewing needle. This invisible group, undoubtedly, make up one of our principal discoveries, all the more so as they appear nowhere in written documents. At most, they are referred to in the passive form: ‘The graves were dug,’ ‘the clothes of the Jews were taken off,’ and so on. But by whom and how? These requisitioned civilians were not hiding at their windows watching the columns of victims marching toward the graves. Neither were they perched on trees in the distance. They were at the place of the crime, very often well before the Jews were brought there. And this anonymous labor assisted the executions from start to finish, beside the victims and their murderers, sometimes sitting on the grass, only several meters from an open and screaming grave. A vital point is that these requisitions were not simply improvised. They were made an integral part of the implementation of the crimes. At times more than 150 children were used. Forced actors, these requisitioned locals shine a light on these dark events and allow us to gain an accurate understanding of what happened.” – Father Patrick Desbois, “The Witnesses of Ukraine or Evidence from the Ground: The Research of Yahad-In Unum” (collected in The Holocaust in Ukraine: New Sources and Perspectives, 2013) (emphases in original)
i bicycle through the city in the
pre-dawn faint blue light from the wakening
sky, in the blue, white, yellow and red light
from buildings, signs, lamps and cars. down streets and
along sidewalks i roll on my ten-speed.
a man gets into his pickup truck, turns
on the headlights and starts the engine, puts
the truck in gear and pulls away from
the curb right away. i pass and think that’s
no way to warm up an engine and i
hope he doesn’t run me down. he’s behind
me as i carefully run a stop sign
he has to stop at. he passes and he
doesn’t stop at the next stop sign, he runs
it carefully. i am a leader of
men this morning, setting the example
for others to follow. i bicycle
through downtown, along the red-brick sidewalks,
using the wheelchair ramps at the street
corners to smooth and speed my passage.
across the street, at the army recruiting
center, a woman soldier stands outside
in the yellow light from the building’s lamps.
she stands in her camouflage uniform
and smokes a cigarette, i think, or
maybe she doesn’t but she should and i
want her, in her uniform, with her
muscular butt and her short blonde hair
under her army fatigue cap. i
bicycle by fast, hoping she sees me
and longs for civilians and i am a
fool, but a happy fool am i.
ahead of me at the next corner a
man digs angrily through a garbage can.
he has long, dirty blonde hair and is bald
on top. he wears the scruffy clothes of
america’s lowest and most-lost class,
the inmates and homeless, interchangeable.
he’s throwing garbage around, looking like
he’s looking for something of some value,
maybe an empty can for recycling
or a full one for drinking from, and as
i pass him he looks up and throws a piece
of garbage at me—a small, wadded up
piece of what feels like a junk food package
when it hits my leg. part of me wants to
turn around, stop my bike, get off and get
in a fist-fight with him for his insult,
but i am forty-seven years old this
month and long past brawling in the streets so
i console myself with the thought that he
has probably not been long out of jail
and will probably be there soon again,
while i will not be if i behave
myself; if i am careful which stop signs
i run and who sees me run them; if i
am careful to commit my worst crimes in
the privacy of my own home, toward
which i pedal my bicycle, rolling
slowly uphill into my neighborhood.
(Copyright 2005, 2023 by Tetman Callis.)
landlord mowed the cats.
landlord mowed the welcome mat, grasses, bushes, seedling trees and twigs,
small rocks.
the small rocks.
cats batted small rocks. fresh-mown cats howled thin yowling cat-howls
after landlord mowed their water dish.
cats batted small rocks, pirouetted feline pirouettes with slender twigs.
slender twigs littered the cats’ back yard.
slender twigs littered the fresh-mown cats.
bushes of cats danced along the edges of the lawn.
small rocks rolled across the welcome mat.
small rocks rolled.
small rocks rolled between the cats’ paws, under the soles of landlord’s feet.
unmown hose was rolled, safely stowed upon the drive.
landlord rolled the fresh-mown cats across the welcome mat,
down the drive through splintered seedling trees to where the bushes dance,
where the twigs pirouette at night, under the vulpine moon.
(Published Pearl 43, Fall/Winter 2009. Copyright 2009, 2023 by Tetman Callis.)
“What was your reaction when you saw the blood? This simple question can stimulate the witness to describe the scene to us, adding new elements. In a general way, during all the interviews, it is a question of keeping the focus on what the person saw or heard. To that end, an inalterable rule: to remain fixed on the objects of everyday life, all the while respecting the viewpoint of the witness in such a way that does not bias the witness’s account. That, incidentally, is the irreplaceable contribution of oral history, which offers precisely the possibility of “looking” through previously unseen points of view.” – Father Patrick Desbois, “The Witnesses of Ukraine or Evidence from the Ground: The Research of Yahad-In Unum” (collected in The Holocaust in Ukraine: New Sources and Perspectives, 2013) (emphasis in original)
my boss is getting divorced
mid-life crisis time for him and his wife
childhood crisis time for their kids
what went wrong i don’t know
usual stuff i guess
little things big things
little things that become big things
like this thing he does at the office
he stuffs two or three pretzels in his mouth
then stands behind me where i sit at my desk
and talks to me with his mouth full
little pretzel pieces fall out and litter the carpet
i found one on my shoulder once, too
i wouldn’t want to be married to that
but most mornings i’m pretty flatulent
sometimes it’s pretty bad
i wouldn’t want to be married to that, either
and in fact
i’ve been divorced for years
farting away
the boss should be careful about standing behind me
eating pretzels or not
(Copyright 2023 by Tetman Callis.)
i know a place where the snow still sleeps
i know a place where the ice still creeps
up your spine
and to thine
ownself
be true
do
whacka-do whacka-do
oedipus, baby, you’re all heart
but your light bill
is due
you cast a pall on the palace
when your
hanged
bulbs
unscrew
do
look yourself in the eye
if you dare
do
if you dare
oedipoo
(Copyright 2023 by Tetman Callis.)
“What is time? It would be nice if we could find a good definition of time. Webster defines ‘a time’ as ‘a period,’ and the latter as ‘a time,’ which doesn’t seem to be very useful. Perhaps we should say: ‘Time is what happens when nothing else happens.’ Which also doesn’t get us very far. Maybe it is just as well if we face the fact that time is one of the things we probably cannot define (in the dictionary sense), and just say that it is what we already know it to be: it is how long we wait!” – Richard P. Feynman, The Feynman Lectures on Physics, Vol. I (emphasis in original)
when the sun shines
i can finish my cheese sandwich
step outside in my heavy coat
gather up fat brown sparrows
and pitch them across the street
throwing them hard at the neighbor’s spiny yucca
soft feathers ruffling as the sparrows zip through the air
i tally up the points
so many for bull’s-eyes
(Copyright 2023 by Tetman Callis.)
i’m reading about kosovo
its unmiks and kayfors
its pee-ohs and various constitutions
and i truly want to care about all this
—i am an educated, liberal man—
but i dreamed last night of a girl i had sex with
twenty-five years ago
(i will spare you the details i will not spare myself
or maybe i’m just being selfish)
then there was the girl i saw yesterday walking slowly away from me
she had a tattooed hip showing above the low waistband
of her pull-me-down pants
sex fractures my fragile concentration
leaving me just another of the world’s lost causes
(Copyright 2023 by Tetman Callis.)
“An object has energy from its sheer existence.” – Richard P. Feynman, The Feynman Lectures on Physics, Vol. I (emphasis in original)
coffee (with cream)
creamed corn (from the deli)
cherries (with cream)
fresh cherries fresh-washed
hot cherry pie
hot cherry pie with ice cream ice cream ice cream!
cream
cheese
cream cheese
cheddar cheese
chile verde
chips
cheddar cheese chips dipped in chile verde
chicken
chocolate (all types) cappuccino cannabis coitus
ice cream ice cream ice cream!
(Copyright 2023 by Tetman Callis.)
here is a rock
size of a small fist
a child’s fist
on the rock
size of a birthmark on a child’s hand
is a fossil
the fossil is of a sea creature
a shelled animal
it is exquisite
hold it up to your eye
you can peer into the small dark chambers of the fossil
time has been kind to the creature this once was
it looks pretty good for being two hundred million years old
give or take
i scratch these words on paper
seeking immortality
(Published in High Street: Lawyers, Guns & Money in a Stoner’s New Mexico (2012, Outpost 19); copyright 2023 by Tetman Callis.)
“A poet once said, ‘The whole universe is in a glass of wine.’ We will probably never know in what sense he meant that, for poets do not write to be understood. But it is true that if we look at a glass of wine closely enough we see the entire universe.” – Richard P. Feynman, The Feynman Lectures on Physics, Vol. I
the housefly is what you want.
gnats, they’re just morsels. starvation rations.
you can eat all the gnats you can catch,
and they’ll never be enough.
at night, you can go down and see if you
can catch yourself a baby roach or something.
there’s earwigs. but they don’t come around often,
and they’re a lot of trouble. those big pincers
on their tails. segmented armor so they can
swing their tails right over their heads
the way scorpions do—arachne save me from
scorpions—and if you ask me,
i don’t think they taste all that good.
no, give me housefly, succulent and fat.
(Copyright 2023 by Tetman Callis.)
i am not making a fresh cup of coffee to replace
this fresh cup of coffee just because some stupid fly
flew in to float parboiled on the steamy surface.
if the coffee is hot enough to kill that fly
(and it’s dead, see? stupid fly), it’s hot enough to kill whatever
was on that fly, and if it isn’t, then whatever was on that
fly is in the coffee and will have to take its chances
in my stomach’s hydrochloric acid; though i will take
a fork and remove the carcass, careful not to break anything off.
(Copyright 2023 by Tetman Callis.)
“I must confess that I do not understand why things are so arranged, that women should seize us by the nose as deftly as they do the handle of a teapot. Either their hands are so constructed or else our noses are good for nothing else.” Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol, “How the Two Ivans Quarreled,” Taras Bulba and Other Tales (trans. various)
i like the smell of earwax on my fingertips.
it has a musky, acrid smell.
whenever my ear itches inside, i rub around with my little finger,
with the tip, down inside the earhole,
which has a latin name that i forget.
the tip of my little finger comes out with a little smear of wax,
bright brown, sometimes almost orange,
glistening on the pad and nail.
i rub this little fingertip against the rest of my fingertips and my thumb.
if no one is looking, i casually pass my hand by my nose,
and smell the smell of my earwax. i’ve done this for as long as i can remember.
i bet other people do it, too. i watch them passing by me on the street.
i casually pass my hand by my nose, pretending i’m about to scratch,
or that i’m waving a shy hello. they scratch and wave back.
(Copyright 2023 by Tetman Callis.)
it pleases me to report there were no
murders in the neighborhood last year.
the map in yesterday’s paper was wrong—
those killings took place one block further south.
that’s a completely different neighborhood,
it has a different name and i tell
my son, don’t you ever cross that street
and go into that neighborhood, it’s
a completely different neighborhood.
and what’s more, i tell him, when you hear
gunfire, don’t look, just get down right away.
(Copyright 2023 by Tetman Callis.)
“There is nothing more irritable than departments, regiments, courts of justice, and, in a word, every branch of public service.” – Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol, “The Cloak,” Taras Bulba and Other Tales (trans. various)
how much more humble we would be if our flatulence were green.
we would trail tell-tale clouds, iridescent and glowing.
there would be no pretending as to who was responsible.
no way to lie or to prevaricate.
how much more truthful we would be if our noses quickly turned purple when we lied.
if not more truthful, then probably we at least would not say as much.
not so many lies about love and sex and death.
imagine if our lips flushed bright crimson whenever we had thoughts or feelings of lust.
no more pretending not to notice the luscious babe or hunky stud.
we would constantly be outing ourselves.
what if our fingernails flashed a blazing yellow when we were afraid?
no more stiff upper lips and steely glares to cow both friend and foe,
unless we wore thick gloves.
imagine a presidential press conference if we were wired in this fashion.
it would be a bio-neon hullabaloo.
the president would enter the room, his hands jammed into his pockets.
the fingernails of the rookie reporters, and of the press secretary,
would all be flashing chrome yellow.
the lips of more than one reporter would be a fully flushed crimson,
even if maybe the babes weren’t so luscious nor the studs so hunky.
every time the president went to say something, his nose would suddenly go purple.
in a little while we would see
that he had the chili cheese and bean burrito for breakfast again.
(Copyright 2023 by Tetman Callis.)
what a tiny pit!
i’ve never seen an avocado with such a tiny pit!
perhaps this avocado is a mutant strain,
mulish child of science and commerce copulating in sloppy abandon.
perhaps it’s just an accident, one of those acts of god.
such a tiny pit!
such a great amount of meat, thick and musky, the color of an old refrigerator.
i lay the avocado, split in halves, upon my plate,
take a spoon in hand and eat.
bless me, lord, i eat.
(Copyright 2023 by Tetman Callis.)
“There is no power stronger than faith. It is threatening and invincible like a rock, and rising amidst the stormy, ever-changing sea. From the very bottom of the sea it rears to heaven its jagged sides of firm, impenetrable stone. It is visible from everywhere, and looks the waves straight in the face as they roll past. And woe to the ship which is dashed against it! Its frame flies into splinters, everything in it is split and crushed, and the startled air re-echoes the piteous cries of the drowning.” – Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol, “Taras Bulba,” Taras Bulba and Other Tales (trans. various)
there is such a thing as a postmodern peach
it arrives at the wrong time of year
shipped over the ocean from a country on the other side of the world
it is fuzzy as a peach should be
its flesh gives enticingly beneath the touch
but inside it is hard and dry and will never be sweet
there is still such a thing as a modern peach
it arrives in high summer by truck from one state over
it is perfect
hold it in your hand and bite into it
its sticky juices run down your fingers onto your wrist and even sometimes
down to your elbow
it is as sweet as your favorite anything
there even is still such a thing as an enlightenment peach
no fooling, there is
it grows out back on the tree by the far wall
you pull it right off a branch in the late afternoon
it is ripe and warm from the sun
there are dozens more hanging on the tree
we can make a cobbler
(Copyright 2023 by Tetman Callis.)
auden said that if we men discovered what the women said
when none of us was there to hear the awful truths they would tell,
we would be shocked—
stunned, puckered, and withered we would cringe.
wystan, it turned out it wasn’t so bad,
the night charisse, lori, and sylvia invited me to join them at their backyard table
while they snacked on martinis and stories of their various lovers,
most of whom had glaring faults of which said lovers were only dimly,
if at all, aware. the talk was riotous and bawdy.
men can’t talk that way unless they’re gay.
the women cast a vodka spell that night upon their male companion,
to prevent him from ever quoting their words direct,
but among the stories recounted at that table, there was
the tale of one septuagenarian lover’s priapic skills,
report of which was enough to make any man of post-adolescent age
consider himself in comparison, and keep his mouth shut about it.
(Copyright 2023 by Tetman Callis.)
“The things with which we concern ourselves in science appear in myriad forms, and with a multitude of attributes. For example, if we stand on the shore and look at the sea, we see the water, the waves breaking, the foam, the sloshing motion of the water, the sound, the air, the winds and the clouds, the sun and the blue sky, and light; there is sand and there are rocks of various hardness and permanence, color and texture. There are animals and seaweed, hunger and disease, and the observer on the beach; there may be even happiness and thought. Any other spot in nature has a similar variety of things and influences. It is always as complicated as that, no matter where it is. Curiosity demands that we ask questions, that we try to put things together and try to understand this multitude of aspects as perhaps resulting from the action of a relatively small number of elemental things and forces acting in an infinite variety of combinations.” – Richard P. Feynman, The Feynman Lectures on Physics, Vol. 1
i haven’t been keeping up with the news
i’ve been traveling
been through a lot of airports
had to catch the news on the fly
i see there’s some sort of controversy going on in the capital
and somewhere someone has shot someone else
a plane crashed (hate to see that news in an airport)
a ferryboat sank
there was a train wreck, i saw the footage of that
there’s a war, maybe more than one
while a freak storm blew in from the ocean
and another new planet was discovered
orbiting a neighboring star
(Copyright 2023 by Tetman Callis.)
cherries remind me of zachary taylor
old rough and ready, who accidentally killed himself one july day
through eating too many cherries, ripe and sweet
some say the pickles and ice cream didn’t help
it was independence day, at a time when slavery was an issue
man eats
god laughs
king john, so they say
ate too many eels, his favorite food
and they pretty much swam straight through him
some say it wasn’t eels, it was ale
or plums or peaches
divine justice or so they say
for his having lost the crown jewels in the river thames
not to mention that business with robin hood and the sheriff
and the lovely maid marian
she was a virgin (that’s unconfirmed)
and last i heard, god was still laughing
(Copyright 2023 by Tetman Callis.)
“The future is unknown, and stands before a man like autumnal fogs rising from the swamps; birds fly foolishly up and down in it with flapping wings, never recognising each other, the dove seeing not the vulture, nor the vulture the dove, and no one knowing how far he may be flying from destruction.” – Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol, “Taras Bulba,” Taras Bulba and Other Tales (trans. various)
cats awaiting feeding crowd the yards
huddling in the leeward thresholds by the doors to kitchens
cats awaiting feeding sing their oriental songs
middle-eastern wailings, thin keening cries
sparrows hear
tremble above them in the bare-branch trees
(Copyright 2023 by Tetman Callis.)