Michael Rerick
segments from Hardtack
Hillscape stubble fade
a white wash
focus fleck
in grit flash
the evening edition
there’s my morning full every
manicured mansion
slum chump
blood up hot night
desert days
a pixel city fold
and stuffed in cellophane
glossed screen
excessive sun plump
along dust
[Testimony:]
a needle scalped cheek faces oven winds and pinks. sand thrown. bright stuccos hum cool
umber and sage swamp coolant, freon charged. a bicycle chain peddled uphill rusts
squeak. coors can catches sun rays a year to fade, blinks: a car’s yellow dim paint: pink
sand beds mica light. bed is a sweat. what hour the shade moves shadows need moving
in. monsoons fill washes for shade trees: thunder alive in palm fronds. pool water focus
to shoulder burns, hours of pink cheeks. ant haul scurry does not fade in the hottest part
of the day. dulled, a green sage throws air and hard reflections.
It pays
to trail glitz
paychecks
to picture the fall
they all fall trashed
invisible to be
suspicion hired
pictures print by picture or the client
investigates to hire but always
my face expresses sky.
my client says,
Rise
I rise
up clicking, listen
in the end: smoke: all fall fall equal to distance
and speed rises equal to distance
my client says,
Down
I follow the dead.
dead report
found:
hanged/gassed/drowned/ bullet to head/strangled/poisoned/walled
up/electrocuted/bludgeoned/buried alive
facedown
another RICH WHITE MAN suicide
another WIFE WEEPS OVER CEO with a poodle lap dog
boyfriend
click the camera in that position
boys
you boys
follow the rhinestones and low cut backs, hand over lipstick and mascara, get the blond
angle. the words, those black smears under the widow-pay check, fall any old way. it’s
the glint of flash off rhinestone, the mysterious wingtip tipped just before stepping into
frame
the rich dead art
off my beat. but with rags
the beat is never the facts
but freelance facts. facts like
smoke start before smoke clears and ash
burns the hand
old rowing hand
scars from the first
morning rag epic
in print, picture
this, boys, beat
the headline
boys, timeline
of daily reports
[Testimony:]
the boring present voting nation bore (p 3) picture
the new king myth (p 1) and god body hard
for sea spray gouging or predict future science
soft with levitation and replication (p 10) build me
an old legend of war epic grapples planetary struggle
bloody and inbred tragic and clever not this paper
currency correspondence neighborhood watch
group hidden behind blinds sketched in wrinkle
detail down to milk grade (insert) but what function
the sword the plasma rifle and how heavy the
crossing of mystery so deep only a kenning (2 down)
can name (across) houses of nature human nature
and daily horrors list a casual dead family haunting
behind the hardtack
soft bodies maw
gum or teeth their way
behind hard bodies
something soft
goes viscous turns hard
turns from a mass
its face away
and frames
an exterior face
a body is a face
and body
of course
she
of course a she was me:
she was she is she
a we were wed a
they and they were
she (she) he (he) she
he but a we was they
is a they were they:
whys and wheres or where were
but she is
a night architect
of light or was my
Confession:
fail the fail in light as lights down: we pretend along in a rain as rain: yellow: first time
the gray boxes of feet sing crack and mean crack as: brown there again all in the floor,
break the floor down into tonight blinds met on the green table: green? the table moves
slowly down to brown, cracks all black sunk in brown under green: little leaf bush in the
street—the innard peeker peeks out light the ionized moment of yellow: say: flail, say,
say: again the gravel hears against the tires of tired two in a car hovering over gravel
waiting to say: light! gone—meet the yellow slightly not under bush where things fall,
wallow, watch light from the blinds, mumble: say: say: brown this floor or cream this
mattress fell an arm to the floor: record the sound: say: oh: say: oh this box full of brown
fell on yellow, this blind slat open
light burns in buildings
I pass
passed on was
a was
gone
So click.
Roll point and click.
The tech drive
easy now, a button
and view. A button
and record.
a button to erase
Buttons button and words.
A home report.
Easy chumps.
a slow 2 a.m. apartment
mix tape over gin mixed with water
surfing the news the rags the vacation getaways
and an old rag source
(Id: Password:)
sends an inbox tip-off:
ceo widow loves more
than lap dog (look inside the extravagant boyfriend party)
this before the papers hit
I message my client
a shower and hit the street
88 Honda Civic classic
cover
stakeout shelter
for home surveillance
care to cover me
[Testimony:]
rag polished tools and beer on the primed
fender shaped off-fender molded special
for wind resistance buoyancy invisibility
the imagination travels in all possible
directions top secret bottle compartments
glass shaped in space the frame fused
build me a complete interstate escape
for a smooth escape down the interstate
mirage from the bright and oiled garage
a hide
in physical mesh
a me into wes
My client says,
Rise:
I stereoscopically lie,
to spy to spy,
telephone and lie, drive and lie,
a laugh and lie past security,
listen to lies and lie lie to me
(it’s all alright)
information lying around
a good lie to get it
see: CIA tactics see: plants see: covert see: a satellite
recording above
a history of bytes
passing along a history of biters
but lie covert
this that my job
like any other
history of any other
[Testimony:]
Boston Tea Party mother spy
mother of Food Not Bombs mole
dangle with a prune map infiltrate
parenthetical conversation mother
with pocket litter l-pill Food Not
Tea Bombs the Boston Party
parenthetical mother mapping prune
penetration of the other side lunches
mother encoded Bomb Bomb
conversation encoded prune
mother of maps infiltrates a dangle
pocket litter proof of mother of
Intelligence
savage, necessarily.
_____________________________________________________________
My surveillance
my widow stakeout
note,
architectural lack (above the roof,
in windows, through the porch) a loose
monster battering the brain to scramble
and leave the mess behind
space says
build, build me and the
CEO and widow wealth built this
oasis city
[Testimony:]
log on log steel and concrete spire
inspired curlicue fantasy home poured thick
and level house angle twisted round and
squared true but corners lay up out
of plane out of point build me the forest
said and the gravel pit like no other
marble stands the year to year pace
patient saw chisel contractor life long
vows said a dream to sleep in the journals
claimed when it’s finished the low
ceilinged coiling pipe halls and brick
shower cubby fingers loose over brackets
The palm, the terrace,
the window’s lit,
so the widow’s up
or just lit for the light.
the lawn
sprawls perfect
a water hunger
spread with
light patterns
delicate signs
in gaiety
[Testimony:]
brown grass solstice
for dandelion! salad leaf
tenders shooting
a burst of green snowflake
from gravel with yellow
bursts to float the pine bark,
pine needle soup (wild carrot
and garlic and leek
and Jerusalem artichoke);
cattail, strawberry sides
in a tart clover flower bed
a slow wait cigarette
smoke on my empty stomach
in a client confidentiality cloud
a light
wait
always awaiting
remember she was
was and is away
await staggered
after her her newly built
new life
construction of her light
staggering to the architect
after her is was
(overcast shifts
snow thuds then
light burrows in orange leaves
architectural light years built)
Confession:
cold grass waiting mold and dawn: buzzer again, window yell again: window lit: crisp
warm over the bridge: a winter over the frozen bridge slipping into a red Victorian
borrowing books and a canceled dinner: snow glare drift over Christmas lights: light
turn and chance reflect and penetrate the bus window: we caught car lights under the
busy street light: summer stabbed by bark dust under play equipment, separate our drunk
friends—we are drunk—singing in four-square boxes cross-legged, our earliest
shadowed part: no awareness of light, no light or building or space but space collapsing
in an arm raised motion: secreted away from all the light
the oasis city lit up
the down of night the
widow busy in her warm
I wait, awake
Wrinkle night and frump morning if wrinkle and frump copulate and spawn a generation
of wrinkle and frump I
My client says,
Rise.
am the last line in crumple
stuffed in the Honda finally
the widow blooms from her city
in grand canyon colors
a new silver BMW Z4 3.0i
noon ride
blond whipping
my smoke ball stomach
ripple jacket against ripple
skin cough off-ramp
tour downtown Saks bags worth
Macys: nothing
drink stop (Beefeater dirty martini)
binoculars say brie with apple and raspberry lunch
emergency Jack Daniel’s in the glove box
sun a rippling cheek bullet
building shade a chill snap
through the Honda window glare
the widow’s glittering handbag and skin
well fed
investment firm stop (disguised in acronyms)
I am not fed
tingly buzz of shapes
and wait
nod-off
dream relief
strange army
of relief
[Testimony:]
the red hot dog pallet signs a nice day
under a blue tarp the oyster sucker smiles
to the international federation of competitive eating
another and another yellow goblet of mayonnaise
goes down smooth, the hot dog, with water
spam’s a nice day of a gullet grinder
more cow brain pounds than record minutes
and salted butter stick by stick slick but cold
roaches, cockroaches hissing on a nice day
sticked, yellow butter must be conditioned
for another round of oysters for no ill effect
mayonnaise sweeps through the stomach
when asked why spam, answered I like it
roaches, it was a nice day under the blue tarp
another and another yellow goblet goes up
a last second smile not for cow brains
nod-on
car horns
hungry daze
blur
the widow floats out in
her cool car
atomized
minor characters
in our period dress
cross streets
talk phones
downtown live show
a bird a skirt a cart a messenger a tree a gesture a flyer a suit a delivery
a bum burps, watches, smiles, it all go by
the widow smooths by the federal
building courthouse interstates
exit by exit
into flat junk heaps and trailers
collapsible churches and Quick-Marts
(nervous teens out front)
away
my all night JD failing me
off the interstate
the neighborhood
I know no place
for a BMW Z4 3.0i
of boarded windows
cinderblock
walls cinderblock fences
faded unfinished asphalt
wind chime beer can clunk
the widow flows out bright
in the glint dusky sun glint
with keys swaying in a house
blurred inside a long time
outside the slow neighborhood
local snuff piece
local variety
magazine tone fills
an invisible boundary
warning
[Testimony:]
nazi low riders cruising hydrangeas
eh, eh, gage, ak, house finches flock up
do you want to ride in the lilacs? insane
gangster disciples cross the crabgrass
ak, cuete, do you want to ride? bangers
and sparrows, bangers and sparrows
collide in a demonstration, chiva and base
for the mourning dove low flyer, insane
in the palm fronds ak ak ak ak ak
bangers coiled in hydrangeas, cuete
pulled, sparrows pulled, want a ride?
chiva dusting the lilacs, eh, bangers
demonstrate gage, cuete in the crabgrass
the cats meow
the bushes tremble
the widow flaps
the screen door shuts
her face fortified
a thin screen of shut out
pink and cold
shut in her car
back through cross streets
we’re slow from slanted warehouses
with empty cranes
quick through urban mural mosaic renovations
past the college
in co-ops and coffee shops
the widow watches
while I watch
we watch
[Testimony:]
neon invites a weak drink, stool seats, gawking invisible bank statements: sandwich
board latte specials busy restrooms: the jewelry store they’re bright under a closet a
dresser she’s cloaked in: light strips spill from the ice cream shaped planter: all garbage
in the garbage cans, all garbage: he’s in uneven hair: two year old poor shirts sneak
sober laughs into vanilla cokes under muted Miles Davis: obligatory metered parking
twitters on and off car alarms, fingers on car alarm triggers: not so night market lights
spell QUALITY bright off steel, reflect inner counters steel, steel canned shelves, and
doors steel polished bright: walk-in and enter: block by block in and enter
we’re all life
off the clock
the widow engaged
in gear and slowly towards the foothills
Back to her city
the iron gates close and
I cruise for a burger and coffee. Rolaids.
It adds up. Not a drug
or sex condition. A relative,
maybe. The widow,
what does the widow visit?
I contact my client, say,
not much altogether,
not much of a killer
but trace a circle to it’s lowest point
and a point will surface.
Says,
OK.
_____________________________________________________________
segments from Hardtack
Hillscape stubble fade
a white wash
focus fleck
in grit flash
the evening edition
there’s my morning full every
manicured mansion
slum chump
blood up hot night
desert days
a pixel city fold
and stuffed in cellophane
glossed screen
excessive sun plump
along dust
[Testimony:]
a needle scalped cheek faces oven winds and pinks. sand thrown. bright stuccos hum cool
umber and sage swamp coolant, freon charged. a bicycle chain peddled uphill rusts
squeak. coors can catches sun rays a year to fade, blinks: a car’s yellow dim paint: pink
sand beds mica light. bed is a sweat. what hour the shade moves shadows need moving
in. monsoons fill washes for shade trees: thunder alive in palm fronds. pool water focus
to shoulder burns, hours of pink cheeks. ant haul scurry does not fade in the hottest part
of the day. dulled, a green sage throws air and hard reflections.
It pays
to trail glitz
paychecks
to picture the fall
they all fall trashed
invisible to be
suspicion hired
pictures print by picture or the client
investigates to hire but always
my face expresses sky.
my client says,
Rise
I rise
up clicking, listen
in the end: smoke: all fall fall equal to distance
and speed rises equal to distance
my client says,
Down
I follow the dead.
dead report
found:
hanged/gassed/drowned/ bullet to head/strangled/poisoned/walled
up/electrocuted/bludgeoned/buried alive
facedown
another RICH WHITE MAN suicide
another WIFE WEEPS OVER CEO with a poodle lap dog
boyfriend
click the camera in that position
boys
you boys
follow the rhinestones and low cut backs, hand over lipstick and mascara, get the blond
angle. the words, those black smears under the widow-pay check, fall any old way. it’s
the glint of flash off rhinestone, the mysterious wingtip tipped just before stepping into
frame
the rich dead art
off my beat. but with rags
the beat is never the facts
but freelance facts. facts like
smoke start before smoke clears and ash
burns the hand
old rowing hand
scars from the first
morning rag epic
in print, picture
this, boys, beat
the headline
boys, timeline
of daily reports
[Testimony:]
the boring present voting nation bore (p 3) picture
the new king myth (p 1) and god body hard
for sea spray gouging or predict future science
soft with levitation and replication (p 10) build me
an old legend of war epic grapples planetary struggle
bloody and inbred tragic and clever not this paper
currency correspondence neighborhood watch
group hidden behind blinds sketched in wrinkle
detail down to milk grade (insert) but what function
the sword the plasma rifle and how heavy the
crossing of mystery so deep only a kenning (2 down)
can name (across) houses of nature human nature
and daily horrors list a casual dead family haunting
behind the hardtack
soft bodies maw
gum or teeth their way
behind hard bodies
something soft
goes viscous turns hard
turns from a mass
its face away
and frames
an exterior face
a body is a face
and body
of course
she
of course a she was me:
she was she is she
a we were wed a
they and they were
she (she) he (he) she
he but a we was they
is a they were they:
whys and wheres or where were
but she is
a night architect
of light or was my
Confession:
fail the fail in light as lights down: we pretend along in a rain as rain: yellow: first time
the gray boxes of feet sing crack and mean crack as: brown there again all in the floor,
break the floor down into tonight blinds met on the green table: green? the table moves
slowly down to brown, cracks all black sunk in brown under green: little leaf bush in the
street—the innard peeker peeks out light the ionized moment of yellow: say: flail, say,
say: again the gravel hears against the tires of tired two in a car hovering over gravel
waiting to say: light! gone—meet the yellow slightly not under bush where things fall,
wallow, watch light from the blinds, mumble: say: say: brown this floor or cream this
mattress fell an arm to the floor: record the sound: say: oh: say: oh this box full of brown
fell on yellow, this blind slat open
light burns in buildings
I pass
passed on was
a was
gone
So click.
Roll point and click.
The tech drive
easy now, a button
and view. A button
and record.
a button to erase
Buttons button and words.
A home report.
Easy chumps.
a slow 2 a.m. apartment
mix tape over gin mixed with water
surfing the news the rags the vacation getaways
and an old rag source
(Id: Password:)
sends an inbox tip-off:
ceo widow loves more
than lap dog (look inside the extravagant boyfriend party)
this before the papers hit
I message my client
a shower and hit the street
88 Honda Civic classic
cover
stakeout shelter
for home surveillance
care to cover me
[Testimony:]
rag polished tools and beer on the primed
fender shaped off-fender molded special
for wind resistance buoyancy invisibility
the imagination travels in all possible
directions top secret bottle compartments
glass shaped in space the frame fused
build me a complete interstate escape
for a smooth escape down the interstate
mirage from the bright and oiled garage
a hide
in physical mesh
a me into wes
My client says,
Rise:
I stereoscopically lie,
to spy to spy,
telephone and lie, drive and lie,
a laugh and lie past security,
listen to lies and lie lie to me
(it’s all alright)
information lying around
a good lie to get it
see: CIA tactics see: plants see: covert see: a satellite
recording above
a history of bytes
passing along a history of biters
but lie covert
this that my job
like any other
history of any other
[Testimony:]
Boston Tea Party mother spy
mother of Food Not Bombs mole
dangle with a prune map infiltrate
parenthetical conversation mother
with pocket litter l-pill Food Not
Tea Bombs the Boston Party
parenthetical mother mapping prune
penetration of the other side lunches
mother encoded Bomb Bomb
conversation encoded prune
mother of maps infiltrates a dangle
pocket litter proof of mother of
Intelligence
savage, necessarily.
_____________________________________________________________
My surveillance
my widow stakeout
note,
architectural lack (above the roof,
in windows, through the porch) a loose
monster battering the brain to scramble
and leave the mess behind
space says
build, build me and the
CEO and widow wealth built this
oasis city
[Testimony:]
log on log steel and concrete spire
inspired curlicue fantasy home poured thick
and level house angle twisted round and
squared true but corners lay up out
of plane out of point build me the forest
said and the gravel pit like no other
marble stands the year to year pace
patient saw chisel contractor life long
vows said a dream to sleep in the journals
claimed when it’s finished the low
ceilinged coiling pipe halls and brick
shower cubby fingers loose over brackets
The palm, the terrace,
the window’s lit,
so the widow’s up
or just lit for the light.
the lawn
sprawls perfect
a water hunger
spread with
light patterns
delicate signs
in gaiety
[Testimony:]
brown grass solstice
for dandelion! salad leaf
tenders shooting
a burst of green snowflake
from gravel with yellow
bursts to float the pine bark,
pine needle soup (wild carrot
and garlic and leek
and Jerusalem artichoke);
cattail, strawberry sides
in a tart clover flower bed
a slow wait cigarette
smoke on my empty stomach
in a client confidentiality cloud
a light
wait
always awaiting
remember she was
was and is away
await staggered
after her her newly built
new life
construction of her light
staggering to the architect
after her is was
(overcast shifts
snow thuds then
light burrows in orange leaves
architectural light years built)
Confession:
cold grass waiting mold and dawn: buzzer again, window yell again: window lit: crisp
warm over the bridge: a winter over the frozen bridge slipping into a red Victorian
borrowing books and a canceled dinner: snow glare drift over Christmas lights: light
turn and chance reflect and penetrate the bus window: we caught car lights under the
busy street light: summer stabbed by bark dust under play equipment, separate our drunk
friends—we are drunk—singing in four-square boxes cross-legged, our earliest
shadowed part: no awareness of light, no light or building or space but space collapsing
in an arm raised motion: secreted away from all the light
the oasis city lit up
the down of night the
widow busy in her warm
I wait, awake
Wrinkle night and frump morning if wrinkle and frump copulate and spawn a generation
of wrinkle and frump I
My client says,
Rise.
am the last line in crumple
stuffed in the Honda finally
the widow blooms from her city
in grand canyon colors
a new silver BMW Z4 3.0i
noon ride
blond whipping
my smoke ball stomach
ripple jacket against ripple
skin cough off-ramp
tour downtown Saks bags worth
Macys: nothing
drink stop (Beefeater dirty martini)
binoculars say brie with apple and raspberry lunch
emergency Jack Daniel’s in the glove box
sun a rippling cheek bullet
building shade a chill snap
through the Honda window glare
the widow’s glittering handbag and skin
well fed
investment firm stop (disguised in acronyms)
I am not fed
tingly buzz of shapes
and wait
nod-off
dream relief
strange army
of relief
[Testimony:]
the red hot dog pallet signs a nice day
under a blue tarp the oyster sucker smiles
to the international federation of competitive eating
another and another yellow goblet of mayonnaise
goes down smooth, the hot dog, with water
spam’s a nice day of a gullet grinder
more cow brain pounds than record minutes
and salted butter stick by stick slick but cold
roaches, cockroaches hissing on a nice day
sticked, yellow butter must be conditioned
for another round of oysters for no ill effect
mayonnaise sweeps through the stomach
when asked why spam, answered I like it
roaches, it was a nice day under the blue tarp
another and another yellow goblet goes up
a last second smile not for cow brains
nod-on
car horns
hungry daze
blur
the widow floats out in
her cool car
atomized
minor characters
in our period dress
cross streets
talk phones
downtown live show
a bird a skirt a cart a messenger a tree a gesture a flyer a suit a delivery
a bum burps, watches, smiles, it all go by
the widow smooths by the federal
building courthouse interstates
exit by exit
into flat junk heaps and trailers
collapsible churches and Quick-Marts
(nervous teens out front)
away
my all night JD failing me
off the interstate
the neighborhood
I know no place
for a BMW Z4 3.0i
of boarded windows
cinderblock
walls cinderblock fences
faded unfinished asphalt
wind chime beer can clunk
the widow flows out bright
in the glint dusky sun glint
with keys swaying in a house
blurred inside a long time
outside the slow neighborhood
local snuff piece
local variety
magazine tone fills
an invisible boundary
warning
[Testimony:]
nazi low riders cruising hydrangeas
eh, eh, gage, ak, house finches flock up
do you want to ride in the lilacs? insane
gangster disciples cross the crabgrass
ak, cuete, do you want to ride? bangers
and sparrows, bangers and sparrows
collide in a demonstration, chiva and base
for the mourning dove low flyer, insane
in the palm fronds ak ak ak ak ak
bangers coiled in hydrangeas, cuete
pulled, sparrows pulled, want a ride?
chiva dusting the lilacs, eh, bangers
demonstrate gage, cuete in the crabgrass
the cats meow
the bushes tremble
the widow flaps
the screen door shuts
her face fortified
a thin screen of shut out
pink and cold
shut in her car
back through cross streets
we’re slow from slanted warehouses
with empty cranes
quick through urban mural mosaic renovations
past the college
in co-ops and coffee shops
the widow watches
while I watch
we watch
[Testimony:]
neon invites a weak drink, stool seats, gawking invisible bank statements: sandwich
board latte specials busy restrooms: the jewelry store they’re bright under a closet a
dresser she’s cloaked in: light strips spill from the ice cream shaped planter: all garbage
in the garbage cans, all garbage: he’s in uneven hair: two year old poor shirts sneak
sober laughs into vanilla cokes under muted Miles Davis: obligatory metered parking
twitters on and off car alarms, fingers on car alarm triggers: not so night market lights
spell QUALITY bright off steel, reflect inner counters steel, steel canned shelves, and
doors steel polished bright: walk-in and enter: block by block in and enter
we’re all life
off the clock
the widow engaged
in gear and slowly towards the foothills
Back to her city
the iron gates close and
I cruise for a burger and coffee. Rolaids.
It adds up. Not a drug
or sex condition. A relative,
maybe. The widow,
what does the widow visit?
I contact my client, say,
not much altogether,
not much of a killer
but trace a circle to it’s lowest point
and a point will surface.
Says,
OK.
_____________________________________________________________
