from / THE VENTS /
by Craig Blais
on the school bus to avon old farms the coach comes down the aisle and mouths
“what are you listening to?” i pause on my diskman and say “nine inch nails”
he repeats “dire straits?” and i don/t correct him “we/re starting you on defense
tonight” he says i skipped tryouts and am on jv because a sport is required
there are players on both sides who are new to the sport you can spot them
by their shaky legs and postures awkward as newborn deer all game i hang back
and let them come to me w/ their heads down i skate backwards slowly and time
the pounce that will drop them like bags of rattling plastic and pads onto the ice
as the puck glides slowly into the corner when i used to play football w/ gerry/s
friends in the park i liked getting the wind knocked out of me someone bigger
would drive me into the ground and suddenly the simple gift of breath was gone
you look around through the aquarium glass at life going on normal all around you
laughing smiling talking you can/t quite hear then suddenly gasp yr alive again
/ / / /
my dad stood on the boards to get his head above the plexiglass to yell at gerry
during his hockey games it was the price he paid for being a goalie a static target
in a game of constant movement he wasn/t like that w/ me but i was always
afraid of what he/d do i knew he teased me to connect threatening to sign
my permission slips top gun until i was pleading w/ him “don/t don/t don/t”
walking past a teammate/s sister on the way out of the hockey rink he/d say
loud enough for anyone to hear “check her out huh?” and knock me on the arm
i wanted him to disappear forever you can imagine the guilt i felt when he did
/ / / /
it/s dark on campus when the bus pulls into the parking lot after everyone
disperses i/m waiting w/ my bag and sticks in front of a medieval-looking window
w/ some latin words in a gold crest mary comes outside smiling to quiz me
“i think this one says no parking violators towed at owner/s expense?” “bingo
i didn/t know you know latin but i should have guessed w/ a name like mal”
“it means bad in latin” “malfunction malpractice malaria” the moon/s teeth
flash white through the trees mary loves fugazi she/s fourteen and she/s from dc
her parents can/t tell her what they do the night sky is top secret when my mom
pulls up in her gold astrovan w/ the red spray paint and popsicle stick glued
to the side i say this is me “i know” mary says “the girls call it the pudding mobile”
/ / / /
a faces of death video my dad and uncle bob watched w/ me and gerry told me
everything i knew about rich people and international places the scene started
w/ four tourists at a round table accompanied by eastern music and the clinking
chimes of belly dancers a man stuck a bill in a dancer/s waistband like a stripper
while his wife in a string of pearls threw her head back in maniacal laughter a waiter
clapped twice and a man walked down the hall holding a monkey by the shoulders
it squealed and flailed its head like a child throwing a tantrum locked in a stockade
table it screamed until knocked unconscious by a wooden mallet and the top of its
head was sawed off the camera panned to each person at the table as they placed
a morsel of brains delicately into their mouths swallowed and flashed their perfect teeth
/ / / /
i read three hubert selby books and another by jean genet called a thief/s journal
before my english teacher suggests i branch out and lends me midwinter day
by bernadette mayer it has notes in the margin that make me feel i/m being
let into a conversation when legible it/s one long poem covering a single day
in the life of the poet as she goes about her business running errands writing
and caring for her children in lenox mass next to the outlets where i go w/ my mom
mayer shifts into her children/s point of view to anticipate their wants all the wanting
put on her the whole way through mayer/s day i think of my mom and my teacher
and why he recommended it to me i think about who pays for this who pays
for the indulgent pain the domestic epiphanies the feats of creative endurance
and genius that results i think of a quote by genet “being a thief is banal
but writing about it is magnificent” this to me seems true for bernadette mayer
finally on page 106 she reveals “we publish books and a magazine united artists
we sell our letters we apply for grants lewis/s parents send us a hundred fifty dollars
every month” someone has to pay it would seem dishonest to harvest yr daily
life so thoroughly but leave that out as for me my mémère is paying for my school
she works all day as an electrical parts assembler then she takes home piecework
in the evenings i never hear her through the vents but i know she/s up there
in her amber-hued apartment soldering circuit boards at the kitchen table and breathing
toxic smoke through the evening so i can read secondhand books and meet girls
from far away mémère believes in a potential my mom sold her on that i can never
live up to because none of us know how to define it if you think her sacrifice
makes me work harder yr wrong the weight of what she tries to give me will
cause me to crumble like someone who doesn/t really want to play who is pushed
onto the ice and immediately run over by someone who doesn/t want to play either