POETRY
Bare Bricks and the Soft Sell
Chinese glass
scalloped prisms
sound moves
across the hot pavement
heat waves
twist and turn
traffic noise
the river recedes
bare bricks and the soft sell
of another summer
tensions rise and dissipate
the typography of children
burnt by the sun
huddled in my memory
appointments mask mistakes
in conversation
with a squeaky book
by Kimberly Lindbergs
Shifting Sands
Camera phone footage
illuminates the present
cataclysms in history
political machinations
the fabric of American life
In stone age observatories
Snake oil salesmen brawl over the bones
of our history
weapons of mass destruction
adrift in the shifting sands
First-person stories of refugees
Corpses in flag-draped coffins
buried by Twitter threads and Facebook memes
Wars transformed
into Hollywood mythology
by Kimberly Lindbergs
Erotico
Have you seen Erotico
dancing, fragile
in a mad coil?
Take the step
but make no sound
Take the step
but never let your feet leave firm ground
I heard that he had gone to sleep
waiting for the answer
in a dream
Slip into the sheets
but do not touch
Slip into the sheets
and let your desire be enough
Cuff the hands that caress
Gag the mouth that calls your name.
Blind the eyes that stare at you
Kill the heart that falls in love with you
Erotic forgot long ago
how to care
Corpse to corpse
fucking in a storm of disease
It's time now to raise your glass
in toast to the worm
There is no return
from the dead
by Kimberly Lindbergs
Flashes
Tokyo 2001: Green rice fields disappear under clouds of gray. The city washes over me like so many buckets of acid rain. Memories of my mother come back to me in flashes.
Tokyo 1976: Sanrio has just arrived on American shores. Every little grrl I know is falling in love with Hello Kitty. I am in Tokyo. First trip overseas. First romance with another country. I will soon catch the disease that will plague me my entire life. Painful wanderlust.
Tokyo 2001: Tears come. I blow my nose. Black snot stains the crumpled tissue in my hand. Hello Kitty silently stares at me through hundreds of shop windows. Her toothless smile mocks me now. A continuous parade of boisterous street signs try to sell me serenity but I’m blinded by the flashing lights.
Tokyo 1976: Mother yells, “The train is coming!” But I can’t take my eyes off the magazine racks. Manga images pop off the pages of brightly colored comic books. Androgynous characters with huge eyes and small mouths beckon to me. I yell, “Please buy me a comic book!” Money exchanged. Her hand in mine. Comic book now held tightly under my arm. We rush towards the oncoming train.
Tokyo 2001: Deep in the bowels of Tokyo. Train ticket misplaced. Incorrect change. People pushing. People shoving. The magazine racks overstuffed with bright volumes of manga seem to mock me now. I reach for my mother’s hand, but it isn’t there.
Tokyo 1976: Mother whispers, “Quiet!” But the walls of the temple hear everything. Prayers are exchanged. Secrets shared. The golden Buddha smiles at us and we smile back.
Tokyo 2001: I search for temples lost among skyscrapers. The noise around me and inside me is deafening. I am here to pay my respects to ghosts, but they hide from me in flashes.
by Kimberly Lindbergs