Brad Johnson
Spring 2008
On the Day Your Flight Was Delayed in Dallas
Overturned like hourglasses,
two trashcans metaphor in the driveway.
The garage door yawns open automatically.
No button got pushed.
The microwave clock hiccups 12:00. 12:00.
It’s been 12:00 since Wednesday.
The TV talks in the bored bedroom.
A question mark of hair curls on your pillow.
I curled it there.
The toilet sighs and sighs.
Its water trembles in circles.
In the hall, the ceiling fan exercises its blades.
The answering machine blinks your name.
I picture your silhouette in an airplane window
and toothpick my breakfast sausage.
A hot line of juice squirts from the sausage-skin.
Have you forgotten me?
I have.
A Sort of Prayer
This is not a reflection on my family.
This is not a reflection on my wife.
I have stopped drinking.
I know enough to know
what I don’t want.
I know disappointment
feels a lot like loss.
I know there are two beginnings.
I want to begin again.
Do not read into this.
I view myself objectively.
All acts have meaning
if one looks into them.
I clutch a mug like my father.
I scrunch my nose like my mother.
I share my grandmother’s gait,
my grandfather’s gambler joy.
This is not a reflection on my family.
History is where we come from,
not where we’re headed.
There are too many days.
Sleep does not satisfy the night.
My wife believes I’m better than this.
She loves me.
She’s humbled me into a man.
I would not be a man without her.
Her curves are like a rifle’s grip,
each dip an instruction on holding.
This is not a reflection on my wife.
Memory’s a helmet glued to the head.
It’s not heavy, but tight.
Even a fool’s head is full.
I have stopped drinking.
This is an act of confidence,
of giving up and accepting
I can contribute nothing
but exploding finches
in the twilight like shrapnel.
Itinerary
We wake around noon. You fill
the percolator. I microwave the leftover pizza. We drop
a rivulet of whiskey in the coffee and sip it,
hot, on the Florida porch.
We smoke our cigarettes as ducks drag
their Vs across the lake, unzipping it
as they go.
We lie naked on the couch, me fitting in
behind you like forks in a drawer.
I root for Detroit teams.
You cheer for teams from Cleveland.
You’ll support the Red Wings though,
since Cleveland has no hockey team
and the one in Columbus doesn’t count.
We fuck while the announcers deconstruct
red zone defenses, foul shot percentages and runners left
on base. We sweat just enough to need
a shower during halftime or a pitching change.
After showering, where I loofaed you
and you loofaed me, we drink our second cup
of coffee, with two rivulets of whiskey this time,
and smoke our cigarettes on the porch.
An arrowhead of air born ducks point
south, then turn east, following the compass arrow
they make of themselves.
Then a first tumbler of whiskey and the newspaper spread
out on the glass porch table.
You are Arts and Entertainment.
I am The Book Review.
We fuck in your rattan chair.
Newsprint tattoos almost-readable smudges
on the pale contours of your breasts.
I open the pickle jar in the kitchen. You grill
the cheese sandwiches. You sit
on my lap at the breakfast table. We almost stick
together. The cheese hangs down
our chests like melted taffy,
taffy you’d buy in a beach town on vacation.
Back on the porch for the second tumbler
of whiskey and you’re drunk now
and it’s not even four and we’ve wasted the day
—you’re my favorite distraction—
we can see the time sweep away
in half hour sighs
and you laugh like you haven’t heard the story
of the nurse botching my circumcision before
and you’re so cute
the way you pull your legs up
to your chest, your breasts smushed, trying to escape
on the sides, and your chin
on your knees making your whole nutcracker-head
move when you say
you love days like this,
all booze and sex,
and we haven’t been awake long
and you’re already tired and you want to lead me
back to bed but beds, to you,
are for sleep not the other,
and you’re not ready to surrender
another opportunity for an orgasm, especially
since the sun’s still out, the game’s still on
and the two cubes in your glass have yet to melt.
first appeared in Zygote in My Coffee
Brad Johnson is an associate professor at Palm Beach Community College, FL, and has two chapbooks, "Void Where Prohibited" and "The Happiness Theory," available at puddinghouse.com.
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