Michael Mark

January 24, 2024

“Nicest” by Michael MarkPosted by

Michael Mark

NICEST

Mindy didn’t like me like me, I knew. 
Even when she put her hand on my thigh, 
slid it close to my dick, squeezed it in 
front of Brian—I forget his last name 
but not his face, some beard straggling 
his chin, sideburns already, diseased 
leather jacket, garbage truck voice, 
his 6 inches on me, his shoving me, 
and all his—then everyone’s—names 
for me. She liked him that way. I knew 
they’d been to second and were heading 
to third, his dirty fingers sliding under 
her jeans, her panties, her writhing, moaning, 
digging her nails into not me—she rubbed,
slung her arm around my shoulders when 
he called me that, like my father did, 
and my mother, though she’d say it worried, 
her voice like cried-in tissues, Are you …? 
You’re not? Mindy leaned her head to mine, 
her hair on my cheek, pushed them into me—
her woman breasts—voted best in 8th grade, 
including the teachers, according to me 
and my friends. We voted on everything 
from the cheap seats—smartest, dumbest, 
worst, most hated, nicest—pushed them 
into my side, chest, by my chin. They 
were strong and soft and it made Brian 
pull back from us like he’d been punched 
in his face. I knew she gave him a look: leave 
him alone or you aren’t touching kissing 
sucking on these, which made him want to 
kill me more, made him scream animal 
in the yard. I saw him push her against 
the fence. I did nothing—biggest pussy-
coward in the world award—watched her 
shove him back, flip her finger and pull 
her shirt up then down fast and laugh 
and they hugged and kissed long, hard 
and soft like in the movies and I thought 
he’s such a stupid loser who’ll wind up dead 
in the gutter after high school. I knew 
she liked him liked him. She couldn’t help it. 
 

—from Rattle #82, Winter 2023

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Michael Mark: “I get lost all the time. Poems are my compass. That’s not a metaphor, okay, but only half.” (web)

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February 12, 2023

“When 5,000 People Die in an Instant” by Michael MarkPosted by

Michael Mark

WHEN 5,000 PEOPLE DIE IN AN INSTANT

How much money do you send? How
long do you shake your head for? Or wait,
after you see the report uptick to 5,300, before
you wonder about lunch? Give some post
a like? Touch your face, reminding yourself
you are still here, that this is what it feels like
to be alive, the same alive those 5,700 people felt
minutes ago. You look up to count the bumps
on the popcorn ceiling—try to make it to 5,900
knowing the number will be higher by the time
you’re half done, is already higher, 6,200, 6,800
and it is too much to count. You close your eyes,
imagine it’s you—there—your family, friends. You
see each one of them, so close—the pores in their faces,
flecks in their eyes, and only move on to the next
when you can feel their breath as they breathe
their name. How long between misery and luck and
guilt and gratitude and terror and acceptance and hope—
how long between refreshes for updates—guessing
at the next number and putting the 7,300, the 7,600,
the 7,900 behind you, deciding to send more money
knowing that it will not be enough or writing something
knowing even if you’re a Nobel Laureate it won’t be
enough. So, you get on a plane. You don’t have
a ticket, you rush to the airport, wait on standby,
take the last middle seat. It doesn’t matter how many—
it could even be one person you pull from the rubble.
They don’t have to be a child. They could be anyone,
any age, any shape, any color. They don’t even have
to be alive—they could be one of the 8,000, 9,000,
10,000, 11,000. Now it’s 12,000. Now it’s 20,000.
You dig with your bare hands and reach down and pull
them out. It’s all you can do but you won’t, you don’t,
you can’t, you don’t. Now it’s 28,192.
 

—from Poets Respond
February 12, 2023

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Michael Mark: “The first report was 4,300 dead. We knew it was going to be higher. How can the human being deal with this beyond imaginable horror. We must imagine. We must do all we can do in the face of not enough.” (web)

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October 12, 2022

“Sparrow” by Michael MarkPosted by

Michael Mark

SPARROW

What did you eat today, Mom?
She says tuna.
 
The correct answer is crust from a lemon
pound cake she shredded with her chewed fingers
then puzzled together. 
 
Is it night or day, Mom?
 
The window shades are pulled. People look
in, she thinks. Sometimes she peeks
from a corner to tell me. Not today.
 
How old are you, Mom?
 
What’s this color?
 
I steady her on the bathroom scale.
What do you think you weigh, Mom?
Like a bird, she answers.
 
79 pounds.
 
I tuck her clothes but there’s nothing
to hold onto. She cries the belt is breaking her;
she sticks herself undoing the safety pins.
 
What’s smaller than extra small?
This question’s meant for me.
 
Like a bird, she answers.
 

—from Visiting Her in Queens Is More Enlightening than a Month in a Monastery in Tibet
2022 Rattle Chapbook Prize Winner

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Michael Mark: “I think of this collection as a family photo album. As my mother’s dementia progresses, each poem is at once a snapshot, a foreshadowing and a memory. And like memories, each is revealing, accurate, and blurry.​” (web)

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September 8, 2022

“My Mother’s Freezer” by Michael MarkPosted by

Michael Mark

MY MOTHER’S FREEZER

Again, he climbs the three-step
step stool, pauses to catch his breath,
then folds his five-foot-four
inches over
 
then over and scooches
against the bumpy ice. Stabbing
back some with a screwdriver,
 
he tucks his bluish knees
and brown-socked feet, closes
himself in.
 
A sonogram of the freezer
would reveal a foil-covered cube
of potato kugel, Hanukah 1973
 
written in her hand, a Polaroid
she magic-markered on the back, Catskills,
Summer 1957, two scarves
 
her mother knitted, mummy-wrapped
in foggy cellophane and my dad
curled into a fetal position, the cold
freezing his tears.
 
This last part’s not true.
 
Of course his tears don’t freeze
in her freezer—which she’d swore, “not only
keeps everything as it was, it makes
them even younger”—they roll up
 
into his eyes, glaucoma and cataract-free
again, the years, months, days, clicking backwards
as he talks with her, shivering—touched
where she touched.
 

—from Visiting Her in Queens Is More Enlightening than a Month in a Monastery in Tibet
2022 Rattle Chapbook Prize Winner

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Michael Mark: “I think of this collection as a family photo album. As my mother’s dementia progresses, each poem is at once a snapshot, a foreshadowing and a memory. And like memories, each is revealing, accurate, and blurry.​” (web)

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December 20, 2021

“First Date” by Michael MarkPosted by

Michael Mark

FIRST DATE

Two old, two very old cars
in the supermarket parking lot,
side by side in the handicap zone.
This is how I see them, my father
and his new girlfriend. The 1926 Ford,
him, dented fenders, hubcap missing,
bald tires overlapping the blue line,
bumper almost scraping the scratched-up
1930 Chevrolet, her. When he tells me
how they met I don’t hear—it’s already
in my head. Both cars backing out
of their spots at the same time. One
stopping short for the other to go. While
the other stops short for the other to go.
Then they both go, then stop, then go.
The screech of brakes. And he waits and
she waits until he hits his horn, Come on
already! And she gets nervous and moves
straight back into her spot to wait for him
to leave and he feels guilty and pulls up
beside her and waves for her to go first
but she just stares ahead, pretends
she doesn’t see, hands gripped at ten
and two. So he shuts his engine and gets out,
locks the door, tugs on the handle to test
that it’s locked so if he dies before he gets back
to it, no one should steal it, and walks around
and taps lightly, very lightly, on her window
though she pretends he’s not there, can’t hear
a thing, so he yells but tries not to make it an angry
yell, I’m sorry, my wife passed. I’m … He looks away.
This is where she rolls the window down close
to half, asks how many years they had together.
Sixty-five. Almost. Missed by seven days. This is where
she turns the key and shuts the engine. And how
many for you? This is where she feels her foot
ease off the brake.

—from Rattle #73, Fall 2021

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Michael Mark: “This poem came to me when my father told me his friends want him to find a girlfriend—Dad is 94 and his friends are older. They all (pre-Covid) go out, and Dad feels like a third wheel, he said. That sparked the poem.” (web)

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May 25, 2021

“A Daily Practice” by Michael MarkPosted by

Michael Mark

A DAILY PRACTICE

After I write Temporary on each sticky note
and press them onto socks, silverware, bills,
my hair, I put one on each maple tree in the yard,
and notice I don’t think of them as eternal
as much. All it takes is a single written word
on red, yellow, green tags to remind me
the car isn’t mine. The house isn’t mine. Snow,
money, flowers do that just being themselves
but I stick one on fear and another on hate,
pushing with all my weight so they stay. Dogs
are born with the knowledge, so no need. But
old people, even shrinking in hospice beds, yes.
Somehow they transform Temporary into Still Here.
Babies are so hard, I almost can’t. When the pad
is empty, I wait for the glue to lose its grip and fight
the urge to blow or peel them off. Sometimes a wind
comes. And I stumble around, trying to catch them.

—from Poets Respond
May 25, 2021

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Michael Mark: “The inventor of the Post-It passed away last week. This invention, that I rely on to this day, is based on a weak glue, so you can peel the note on and off without leaving a history, and a weak memory so we don’t have to remember, just jot it on the pad. What a strong combination of human insight and practicality. It’s darn spiritual.” (web)

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May 11, 2021

“Unfavorable Odds” by Michael MarkPosted by

Michael Mark

UNFAVORABLE ODDS

A leaky pot cannot hold the Dharma’s jewels,
my guru scolds. Almost all he has poured 

into me finds the floor, spots the carpet. 
I can’t remember the sacred sutras 

or absorb their meanings, I blank 
on the chants. Even the Diamond Sutra, 

an instant after our lesson, dims. 
Patch the pot! Guru stamps his doll-sized feet. 

Concentration! he growls in my ear 
so close it’s a kiss, and forces cup after cup 

of tea into me so I may continue. 
The chances of a blind tortoise 

swimming the vast oceans, he says, 
and surfacing its head—

my head, he means 

—through a life preserver are more 
favorable than the odds of finding 

enlightenment. And that’s a good pot!
Gurus get angry. It’s called wrath. 

Purposeful rage. Patience in disguise. 
I get it. My progress is his 

after all. His illumination 
hinges on mine. So I meditate 

on the pot, as he instructs, 
visualizing the leaks stopped. Tell me what 

you see. The pot, I say, dented, scoured 
past its shine. Good! Worn from use. 

Shiny is lazy. Where is the pot? 
On a windowsill. Her hands bring it to 

the sink’s spout. She has arrived! Auspicious! 
But the pot is leaking. No-no! The pot 

is solid. The pot is complete, whole. 
Water is running out. How can 

she boil tea, meat? She wants to feed 
the plants. Generous heart. But when she gets 

to her garden, the pot is near dry. 
Garden? She has a nice place! There are 

puddles around her feet. She dances 
in the puddles! No, she apologizes to 

the shrubs, trees, flowers. Ah, 
compassion. Bodhicitta. Drop by 

drop, back and forth, 
she tends to each. Joyful effort! 

I open my eyes. 
My guru is drenched. 

We are getting there, he says.

—from Rattle #71, Spring 2021
Tribute to Neurodiversity

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Michael Mark: “I have so many voices blathering inside me and then there’s the swarm outside, so I write to see what to believe. I’m not saying what I write is the truth; I’ve learned that’s a fool’s errand. It’s merely my attempt at cracking whatever’s in front of me, putting the flashlight between my teeth and looking around. This poem is about compassion. I’m trying to figure out the Buddhist tradition of Tonglen, in which practitioners dedicate themselves to others’ happiness, even trying to absorb their suffering—pretty challenging for humans.” (web)

 

Michael Mark is the guest on Rattlecast #92! Click here to join us live at 9pm EDT …

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