Author Archives: jeniferwills

Stuff

Piece by piece
it starts coming back
to you,
a winter coat here,
a printer there,
an alarm clock
someone didn’t need.
Pretty soon,
you may even have
your own place
to stay.

Does it all come
back someday?
And if it does
will it be
completely different
or frighteningly
the same?


Feeling Her Pain

It’s the tip
of hatred brushing my back,
fingernails dirty
with the film
of barroom floors,
(open mics
where no one cares
what you’re reading
if you have nice tits)
and the frantic loneliness
of masturbation.

It’s the frustrated whoosh
of a scream on my neck,
(her breath,
Reeser’s potato salad,
fried chicken
and cigarettes)
unheard, or barely
audible. The howl
of the dead to the living,
rustling a curtain
stirring a tree branch.

Outside, the sky
alternates, blue,
to grey, rain
to sun. The weather
undulates, pushing clouds,
lighting leaves
on fire. It’s cold
then warm, then cold
again.

He wraps his arm
around me, pulls his
massive coat across my
shoulders, and we
walk along
the river
beneath
the Hawthorne Bridge.


Fo’ Shizzle

self affirmations
are like scratching
your own back.


Jawbreaker

Orb of sweetness!
You are a plethora
of non flavors,
each overpowering
the next.
Slyly, you infiltrate
the barrier of my lips,
nestling yourself snugly
in my cheek.
You linger-
protruding from
and distorting
my features.
Bulbous blob of nectar!
Your name suggests
I should not bite.
Still, I try,
only to find my teeth
an unworthy opponent for
your legendary strength.
I desist-
fearing you might prove
your name true.
You persist, filling
my mouth with
your syrupy sweetness,
which rolls down my throat,
as the trail of a slug,
both attracting and
repelling my
baffled taste buds.
Upon removal from
my mouth, I find
-oh wow!-
you have changed your color!
then plop-
you are returned
to your aqueous tomb.
Jawbreaker-
Chameleon of candy!
Peddler of the sugar rush!
You are truly
an all day sucker.


Fall Term Pending

it’s interesting
how life
can be summarized
in bookmarks
deleted
from the computer.


‘give up life as a bad mistake’

and tomorrow
again
and the next day
again
and
again
and
again
and again
and
again
and again
and again and again
and again
and again
andagain
until i die.


How to Escape a Choke Hold

The strangest
things about self
destruction
are the necessary
awareness
and resolve.


He Did it Without Being Asked, or Asking if I Wanted Him To

It’s the sound of water running
that makes me turn my head.
He’s standing at the sink
rinsing the dishes
and putting them in the washer.
His hands have purpose, move
in the steady,
deliberate gesture
of a man washing up
for the night.


Summer, 1986

The pages of the old Playboy magazines
we had in stacks
in my father’s cluttered garage
were flat, muted moth wings
with wholesome milk ad faces
smiling up at me from their covers
before the days of rampant plastic
surgery; pointy nippled titties
small and high or supple
breasts attached to women arching
their backs, ringless fingers draped
across the delicate curves of their
untucked stomachs.

At age twelve,
I made my living
by selling them to boys
out my parents’
bathroom window;
an underage Playboy drive-
through of sorts.

There were other magazines:
Hustler, Cherry, some nameless
without covers stashed
beneath the bottom drawer
of the bathroom; battered publications
found by accident
when I pulled the drawer
out too far, smashing my toe
as it landed on the floor.
I remember in particular,
one with a brown haired girl
who traded a Tootsie Pop
for the cock
of an old, bald man;
her mouth and eyes
as lifeless
as the blow-up doll
she resembled.

Even at twelve, I knew
better than to sell
those ones
out the window.
But I got five bucks
a copy
for the Playboys.


We Must Have Been Very Entertaining

Driving past my childhood home,
everything seemed smaller.
The ‘big hill’
was not much more
than a slope,
the houses, miniatures
built with legos,
lawns of dry, brown grass.
I wondered if the people
who bought the Wilson’s
house knew of the murder
inside. The bullet
caught my best friend’s mom
as she was almost
out the door.

Our house was the same,
air conditioner hanging
out the exact window
in which my mom put it,
so cold indoors some days
we joked that you
could hang sides
of meat. Some days
I would step outside
just to thaw
for a while.
There was the porch
where I rollerskated
to songs on the radio,
the window my mom smashed
with her bare hand
in a rage, and the front yard
that seemed so large
when I was little.

Looking at it I understood
how the neighbors heard
all the screaming.

We were right there
the whole time,
hanging it all out
for the world to see,
reality television
before reality television.