Writing Life
But I accidentally listened to French House music
And kept listening
On purpose
So who am I to say?
What I can say is:
At least I’m not too good for
Sundowners discount ghetto cafeteria and
The bowl of chopped iceberg they serve
Drowning in ranch–mmmm…
Crunchy ranch…
Or the tiny white bread croutons either.
-M. Ashley
Oh my poet-y friend… how I have missed thee.
I have missed myself defacing your books with
Purple ink notes like, “Love it!” and “Scary.”
Remember that time I humiliated myself on a
Plane pompously overblowing poetry to a
Stranger who turned out to be a PhD in poetry
My nose in your book
My ass on my shoulders
Me talking out of it
But then you were there for me
For that—for my ass face too
And my starry eyes for you.
-M. Ashley
My poodle does downward dog
Ten times a day at least
Farts a slow fart
Presses her narrow chest back
Yawns with a long lolling tongue
Lord Shiva—First Yogi—Master
In a curly coat showing us all
How life and farts should be done
-M. Ashley
Dreamtime craving for alcohol
when you’re not a drunk
means Bacchus is having a crisis
of consciousness tossing
the nymphs and turning
the maenads out of his bed
thump
thump
thump
they hit the floor and
tap
tap
tap
he comes to your window
because you have your own bed
and won’t sleep with him in it
gravity isn’t a threat then
and he has the whole carpet to himself
because he enjoys thrusting
his head under your box
spring and tying your
mismatched and long-
forgotten shoelaces together.
Also, he thinks you’re fun to drink with
mostly because you don’t much,
don’t have the stuff for proper cocktails,
and while you’re craving his liquor
he’s craving the sexy way
you pour it into a diet root beer
shrug
and drink it all down.
-M. Ashley
I would love to swan around and
say dusty things about poetry and
have everyone give a damn and
have groupies who show me their boobs
and read at Carnegie Hall to 53,000
screaming teeny boppers in poodle skirts
and all that other shit
that real poets do
and don’t actually do
but always do
in my sweaty
jealous
glory hogging
little mind.
-M. Ashley
Sliced Turkey Stacker
Only the whitest turkey
With Best Foods mayo.
-M. Ashley
(Real menu item. It was ten years ago, so I have no idea what restaurant it was, but you have to love it when the poetry Universe delivers like this.)
I wonder if Jesus got
Saddle sores from the donkey
He rode into Jerusalem.
Lay down the palm fronds, people
And pass the thick healing balm.
This son of God is going
Bow-legged to the cross.
-M. Ashley
A raven would
Literally have to scream
Nevermore in my face for
Me to know the difference
Between him and the
Crow over whom he has
Elevated himself
Largely by having once
And famously screamed
Nevermore
In this other poet’s face.
-M. Ashley
I trace your ribs
In cerulean ink
Dewdrops of blue
On the skin
A connect-the-dots
That somehow
Resembles a unicorn
In calligraphy lines
A unicorn with the stripes
Of your bones
A child of myth
And the Serengeti
A mythical zebra with a horn
They must have had unicorns
In the Serengeti too
And your ribs
And my ink
Must have been
What their pelts looked like
On the walls of mythical hunters
If they had pottery
In the mythical Serengeti
And this cerulean ink
Would stick
I would trace your ribs
On the pottery too
While you are sleeping
The rise and fall of your abdomen
With your sacred breath
The reason the lines would be blurred
Not my tears, my love
Not my tears
-M. Ashley
Where we gassed and gabbed
we ground our cigarettes out
on the concrete window ledge
in front of the bustling store—
in front of our managers, what
kind of fuck did we give? Our
feet and backs were killing us and
somebody pissed in the fitting room
again. Someone left a dirty diaper
open in a shopping cart. Literal
shit. You customers deserved
every dirty thing we said.
-M. Ashley
M. N. Ashley 