The poem below is about an (un) family–one that appears to be something that it’s not–a family where things seem to be order–but are, in fact, far, far from ordinary.  It’s about family dysfuntion on a massively deceptive scale. 

We wear nice clothes.  We drive nice cars.  We go to church, to school.

But–we are, in fact, none of those things. 

We are the inversion of family.

(un)poem

everything begins and ends

     with appetite

                                the edge

 

of the photograph

     where the girl’s

     arm ends

                                and the tablecloth

 

begins again its

     grammar of red

                and white

                                diagramming

 

father / mother

     sister

     sister

                                plates

 

in their places

     knives to the right

     spoons

     roast chicken

                                relics of

 

10,000 family dinners

                                that swim

 

     white cat

     cadmium yellow

 

to the windowsill

     on the east side

               of the house

                                where we

 

have set blue mason jars

     absorbing particles

                of spring

                                the early

     face of april growing

                in the yard

 

seeming untime

                unspace

 

work room

wood floor

 

tangle of limbs

     jungled

     wet

 

always never

     arriving