Love Is
Love is watching your friend get a tattoo, then going for ice cream from the gas station.
Love is “I’m going to kiss you,” right there on the street in front of the whole town.
Love is learning to make the Gen Alpha heart sign with your index and middle fingers.
Love is picking up pads from the store.
Love is sitting on the lawn because it’s been a tough day.
Love is El Comalito and a good book read aloud.
Love is unexpected and awe-inspiring and also tiny and subtle.
Love is your hype crew.
Love is the shoulders you cry on.
Love is a quartet, two duos, four solos.
Love is the beginning of this poem, and it’s ending.
/ / /
7 April 2024
Charlottesville VA
NaPoWriMo Day 7
Jason Crane Posts
Crook
Leaning in the front yard,
single foot jammed into soil,
arms unencumbered,
my purpose unsure.
Squirrels search at my base
but it’s too late,
they’ve carried off the bounty
they themselves freed.
Across the street a cousin,
metal-skirted,
holds aloft
the birds’ delight.
I long for my turn.
/ / /
6 April 2024
Charlottesville VA
NaPoWriMo Day 6
Catastrophe
buyer’s remorse
remorseless
you break it you
fire sale
fire
fire
fire
by her remorse
more or less
you break
you break
fire
/ / /
5 April 2024
Charlottesville VA
NaPoWriMo Day 5
Who’s Afraid Of The Apocalypse?
The world ending?
Bring it on.
Mine has ended several times:
When I discovered being a kid
wouldn’t protect me;
when I ended up on the street;
when the “I do” didn’t;
in a series of shitbox vans.
There were so many moments
when a meteor or The Rapture (TM)
would have been preferable.
But here I am, and here you are,
and the world is still turning,
and earlier today my friend
dropped their pandemic mask
and it fell to the sidewalk,
so we know gravity still works.
/ / /
4 April 2024
Charlottesville VA
NaPoWriMo Day 4
Kitty
Really I barely knew her.
She was the wife
of my great-uncle Bill,
and I barely knew him either.
Neither of my kids
would even recognize their names.
But she sat in a room once,
maybe with the sun coming in,
and painted a delicate pitcher
full of flowers.
Was it there in the room?
Did she use a photograph?
Had she always wanted to be a painter?
/ / /
3 April 2024
Charlottesville VA
NaPoWriMo Day 3
Winter Is For Big Bands
It’s when the sax soli starts that you know:
a more sure sign than the fire or the snow.
I miss him the most then, and the records
he’d play for me in front of the credenza
with the turntable hidden inside.
That’s where it started for me,
and that’s where I find refuge
during the winters of the world.
Glen Gray under his skies,
Artie Shaw as the cocoa cools
enough to drink.
/ / /
2 April 2024
Charlottesville VA
NaPoWriMo Day 2
The Memory Of Faith
I keep being told I love fiercely and well,
yet when the music stops I am left
without a chair,
watching the other lovers sit.
I no longer like this game.
Let the music continue —
I’ll hear the faint strains of song
as I walk to my fitted apartment,
back to the plants and the memory
of faith.
/ / /
1 April 2024
Charlottesville VA
NaPoWriMo 2024 Day 1
In the photo they are
monochrome
expression-less
pitchfork
morningcold
gothic
heartbound
destined
found.
/ / /
17 March 2023
Charlottesville VA
I Am The Queen Of All I Survey
Softly swelling minor chords.
A crumpled paper towel.
The slowly sagging hellebore.
A satchel, partly open.
/ / /
13 March 2024
Charlottesville VA
Thief
I’m supposed to be asleep.
You told me.
Hanna told me.
I’m awake, though, with
Australian indie rock
on the speakers
& daffodils on the table.
I fight the critic at night.
Tonight we ganged up on him
& he vanished like
Smeagol’s other half.
I’m supposed to be asleep.
The first iteration of that line
looks longer because of
the short line that follows.
It’s an illusion, though,
a story my eyes tell my brain,
which is a credulous creature
at the best of times.
Now there’s a queer nonbinary
songwriter playing
& I still haven’t gone to bed
because the night is
what I steal back from the day.
/ / /
12 March 2024
Charlottesville VA
Bonny Good Night
He cleans up from the unexpected visitor.
Throws the diced carrots in the bin.
Scrapes the dollop of peanut butter after them.
The bowl of water, untouched,
he pours down the sink.
The dishes done, he hangs his apron,
surveys the room, notices her absence.
Finds a single hair on the screen of his phone.
Then it’s off to bed, alone as normal,
missing the promise of warmth at his side.
/ / /
4 March 2024
Charlottesville VA
Such A Good Day
The thing is:
I had such a good day.
I saw a friend.
I ate tres leches.
I got complimented
on my outfit (twice).
I petted a dog.
I fist-bumped a kid.
I bought a record.
I bought a book.
I ate cold pizza.
I drank a diet soda.
(Pepsi, but you can’t
win ’em all.)
Anyway the point is this:
I had such a good day.
But when I came home,
you weren’t here.
That would have made it perfect.
/ / /
24 February 2024
Charlottesville VA
His Heart
He called them his heart,
not because he no longer had one,
but because she added to its capacity,
made it more expansive,
allowed him to love … well, more.
He called her his heart,
because they loved him, and that truth,
that essential knowledge,
was a solid place to stand
in a world that was constantly shifting.
He called them his heart,
because she reminded him it was there,
that it could be opened to the elements
without the fear that always followed.
She threw open the shade, let in the sun.
He called her his heart,
because they gave him the moss
and the lichens and the bees,
reminded him why the music mattered,
and sent him to sleep with a smile.
/ / /
21 February 2024
Charlottesville VA
half a mug
of cold chai —
all that’s left
/ / /
19 February 2024
Charlottesville VA
Humans have come up with many ways to make beautiful sounds over the past several thousand years, but we’ve never outdone the first one: the voice. Tonight, at the Jefferson Theatre in Charlottesville, three sisters showed once again how the power of the human voice is enough to strip away your preconceptions and build a beautiful alternate world in their place. Joseph traded leads throughout the show and harmonized in that way that only family can. Accompanied by just a guitar and a digital bass drum, the trio surveyed their entire musical output and treated us all to what at times felt more like a secular revival meeting than a concert. Joseph is unafraid to celebrate, to mourn, to indict, to examine, to uplift. They are transcendent and we were all lucky to be there. We can’t know where humanity will end up, but if it’s somewhere bright, voices like this will be there.
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