Simonds - Steal It Back

STEAL IT BACKSandra SimondsSaturnalia Books 2015 Sandra Simonds No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews. Please direct inquiries to: Saturnalia Books 105 Woodside Rd. Ardmore, PA 19003 ISBN: 978-0-9915454-9-0 Library of Congress Control Number: 2015945808 Book Design by Saturnalia Books Printing by Westcan Printing Group, Canada Cover Art: Saturnalia Books, Inc. Distributed by: University Press of New England 1 Court Street Lebanon, NH 03766 800-421-1561 Thanks to the editors of the American Poetry Review, Granta, Lana Turner: A Journal of Poetry and Opinion, Ploughshares, Columbia Poetry Review, The Awl, Colorado Review, Poets.org, Boston Review, Fence, OMG, Catch-up, and Pinwheel where these poems first appeared. I Grade Online Humanities Tests was in included in the Best American Poetry 2014 edited by Terrance Hayes and Similitude at Versailles was included in the Best American Poetry 2015 edited by Sherman Alexie. Some lines in The Lake Ella Variations are riffs on poems by Brian Ang and Carol Snow.

Much gratitude to them both. CONTENTS * * * * * * ALICE IN AMERICA Alice better drive her wet cunt faster than Western Union Oklahoma horse hooves Out into the nights capital-letters Alice better become a worse debtor Fail better? Never! Alice better fail worse Than the open letter Empire of letters One better for the American settler Last stop on the chain-letter This psychometric Republic Houses astronomic debtors With geometric heads and aches Get well Never get better Their optometrists Housed in glass malls Their glasses Concave Alice moves in convex debit card Transactions Alice holding wet contracts Is not convinced Alice with ripped contact lenses Her pupils ripe Her flesh always object Her asymmetric breasts toujours touched by men in charge Skinned-knee Alice in a desert Crosswind the woodwinds played on Alice as drowned doll eyes and antique boots When as a child she read the ship sunk She felt the joy of wind-leapt trees Burn everything Sink everything please All eyes on the thick-skinned Stockbrokers heaven a whirlwind Of electronic devices the plane In headwinds pressed on the continent Bloody-minded the way women Who are pressed into suburbs Collapse the white supremacist minds Of violent men who create Money and ideas and dominance Collision of passengers and jet fuel A field of vision no less Parisian Than communizing cell-division Alice looks up each catastrophe In her rhyming dictionary like a dying breed Of Dionysian woman Like a convulsing town Of complex strollers and baby cries and pesticides From here on out, Alice, you must take sides With your long-division Autumn in Allah or Guatemala In Golem Salem Gaza Quebec in Caracas Dallas In Oz In Hell there are fifteen synonyms for Sex but only one word for the police force Theres Alice climbing on top of a body To forget all these wars and bullets Theres Alice with Mutual Fund Waldorf salads and alcohol To ward off the inevitable toward Alice, My tome has come and yours will Drone my time bomb My dollface My mask Like a training drill or fire alarm or police baton My passenger jet drones on the Black Dahlias Severed head like a mirror that says This is all women Cut in half in Fourths in eights With the magicians wand Alice, bombshell, babe, take my language My genitalia and make your bombed out bake sale Break and rage glass poetry Palaces into tatterdemalion Oh Alice Hold your dura mater close to Your body of hot water Make water like a squatter Make gray water Make red water Make tonic water Make whatever is berserk better An iceberg or Gettysburg Make all your ideas Address me OCCUPYING They were building an askance Calvin They were asking They went on a hunt They were in the Netherlands They were wearing ice cubes They were a sphere of influence They were building a Catholic schoolgirl They were split like Germans They were split like dogs They were in a psalm They were in an amen sort of way They were easy They were not They were easy They were not easy They were at ease They were walking to the drugstore They had diarrhea They were uncomfortable They were building a Catholic schoolgirl They were aggravated They were not They were world weary aristocrats They were improvising They were a congregation They were distracted from the role of worship They were afraid of the West Nile virus They were us They were important and American You are incredible! They were simple songs They were antiphonal They were simple Catholic schoolchildren They were a choir They were testing the waters They were building a Catholic schoolgirl They were adverse They were trapping onions They were responsorial They were geniuses! They were following the leader They were split like dogs They were leaders themselves They were listening to one version of the hallelujah They knew about the soloist They were singing the next verse They knew about your church They were without a leader They were interesting kings They did not recognize the song They knew the old 100th They were a doxology They were reformed They were sitting They were theologically pumped They retracted their statements They were traditional They were not They were conventional They were not They were all pretty They knew this They were much more political They were divorced They were reading about Henry the 8th They were rude They were not They did not want to listen to the king They did They did not want to follow the leader They did They did not want to sing the songs They did They did not They did sometimes They did always They did often They did not They were the outgrowth of anthems Were too! Were not! Did too! Did not! They were building a Catholic schoolgirl They were cats They were cats on stilts They ate onions They ate clams They were trained musicians They were reading They were large and electronic They were like grandmothers cookies They were eating BBQ pork They were vegans They ate beef They were hypocrites They told us we must take sides They were men They were enormous They were not They were mindful They cleaned banks at night They reflected the structure of the world They were timed They blew the trumpet in the new moon They refused They collected trash They collected toys They collected land They accumulate land They landed They have cut the land with time They have cut the milk with beef They have cut the beef with horns They have cut the horns with gods They have cut the gods with toys They have cut the toys with Catholic schoolgirls They have cut the Catholic schoolgirls with trumpets They have cut the trumpets with the leader They have cut the leader with land They have cut the land with time Your poems are immature and buzzing Your poems are immaculate And lewd Your poems are buzzing Your poem is waspy Your poems are as immature as they are cunning They are bougie They are biting They are like pieces of cake They are extreme They are elemental They are losing They are too long They bore me to death They are losers They are winners They are round They are soft They are longing They are important They are accumulating They are wealthy They are satanic They are round They are going on and on about nothing Your poems are truly special They are kindergarteners They are rejects They are rejecting They are bears They are timetables They are huge They are soft They are rejects They remember being published They explain They are the ultimate They were created at work They were working They were on their own time They were timed They were confused They were misinformed They missed you They loved you but whatever They were the opposite of something They had no idea They were confused They were boring They went on and on They were derivative They were crafty They were simple They were announcements They were long They did not stop You are incredible! They are magnificent They do not stop They are marginal They are cunning They went on and on They were repetitive They cared about your feelings They were rejecting you They were cups They were plates They were at dinner They were diarrhea They were cunning They disagreed They did not stop They remembered They were historic They were calm They were annoying They were nice You are so nice I want to kiss you You are incredible! They had no ethics They were rewinding They were so boring They climbed a mountain They were losers They were incredible! They went on and on They were passing the time They existed They existed to pass the time They passed out Their lines were not long enough Their lines were too short Their lines were historic Their lines were liars They died They were derivative They were expanding They were expunged They didnt understand They were incredible! They understood They went on and on They were unknowing They tended to be philosophical They tended to be sexy They tended to one another They had a tendency They tended to lambs They tended to bears They tended to their own needs They put themselves first They put themselves above everyone else They were arrogant They were conceited They were deceived They were nice They were unethical They were nice They were building a factory They were bears They were people They were men and women They were bears They were nice They tended to gardens They tended to make love They tended to be sexless They tended to make love on Fridays They tended to be sexless They were criminally insane! They were incredible! They went on and on They were givers They were more givers than takers Sometimes you tend to give Sometimes you tend to be a giver Sometimes you make love on Fridays You say this is derivative You say this is exponential You say this is boring You say this is mathematical You say I am using the Fibonacci sequence You say I am right You say I am conservative You say I am a loner You say I am derivative You say you make love on Fridays You say you are sexless She was so nice that it was extremely annoying She was nice and needy and nice She made you a carrot cake because she was so nice She was so nice and careful I am nice Okay, I am not She was interested in being nice She was nice Alice, are you nice? Maybe not She was flavored nice She was nice We was nice We was flavored nicely We was nice she was Were she nice? Was she never ever nice? Nice she was? Was she nice? We was nice? Nice Nicer Nicer and nicer Nicer still Nice Nice Lice are not nice Lice are lice Lice are not nice Not nice! Not nice Not Nice Not France Supposedly not Supposedly opposed The opposite The opposed Supposedly the opposite You are spectacular! You are formal and spectacular! Go for her For her? Fourier? Dont splash the water, friend The truth is that this poem was written using the Fibonacci Sequence That is a fib That is a bib That is a lobster That is Maine That is a man That is noise That is not That is not happening Oh god this is not happening There is our toddler There is our town I am nice This poem was written using the Fibonacci Sequence In that sense it is confessional I have heard many noises today Because I am typing That is a fib You are a fat liar and I am hateful So there I want to make a long, happy poem cry I am poking a stick in the torso of my long happy poem It will not cry Oh you think that this is so terrible? Well you try to write a better one, friend Well, youre right On target Right on On the right there lived a family Its gone Question: Alice, how can you write poems so inconsequential? Answer: Because I am self-conscious and nervous And trembling I love you so much you make me nervous That is not true No one makes me nervous because I am not a child I am chilling out It is Sunday It is Monday and I am still chilling out frying up a steak because I am nice This is beer This is a candle This is cupid This is nice Occupy Wall Street I made you cupcakes I made you bread I made you pumpkin pie I made you pumps I made you already I made you soon I made you love It was manmade I made you limp I made you Christ I miss you Christ I miss your nice manmade pumps I made you a factory I made you a factory I made you a factory I made you math I factored that I factored in everything I made you love It was manmade I made you limp I made you cave I made you most I manmade you most I handmade you most I handmade you mostly You are the most You are mostly You are worth the most You are worth the most of the most You are worth more You are more Youre more and more fatiguing Youre more fatiguing than a manmade man You are manly, Mom This one was mostly mannish He had the worst manners He was not spectacular He wasnt more We were trying We were perceiving We knew it immediately We knew it instantly We were eating We were fatigued I want to make you something only a wife can perceive I want to make you at least half of a nipple I want to make you at least half of a terrorist Their skies were outsourced They were half mad They were criminally negligent They were unaware I want to make you something only husbands can subtract like bread pudding These were the worst of times They were the worst Thus she happened upon a criminal The movement was made by power sources It was manmade They were bored to death They were boring Im gift wrapping you half of a terrorist They used their sources I want to make you something only a wife can accumulate such as stocks Such as large bills Such as gold coins with mold on them Such as middle of the road poets with arrows who become extreme editors because they are in charge They delve deeply into sorting I want to make you something unreasonable that only a cousin can make Maybe a penis? They were accumulating sunsets They were going to die They knew not to know it They were men and that is why they remembered In this sense we are all Snow Vikings led by revolving pursuits They remembered They crossed it out I want to make you a laughing dog etc. They were asking for conventional poems I want to make you a conventional poem because I am so madly in love with you I would do anything Inside my conventional poem I will fall madly in love with my own whatever That is why I am reasonable and clear-headed like an ice sculpture Or Russian mobs eating large white steaks and telling secrets Your debt is my command The landlady owes me hundreds of dollars Ive been overpaying her for months What she doesnt know is Im building a house for her as a present Inside the house there will be a colorful tomb I will push her into this colorful tomb She doesnt know it yet I have so many tricks up my sleeve Its because Im passive aggressive Its because Im mean and violent Have you built a house with a colorful tomb at its center yet? You better get going, Sir I bet she is incredible! I bet she has been in the Rose Parade I bet she is incredible I bet she is learning I bet she has launched I bet she is clairvoyant I bet she is going on a long sea voyage I bet she is sea worthy I bet she is a vessel I bet she is a pirate I bet she is booty I bet she is a lot I bet she is on the telephone with you I bet she is a light brunette I bet she shaves her handprints off every night I bet she is incredible I bet she is going to be in the Rose Parade I bet she is a piece of gold I bet she is a treasure I bet she is incredible I bet she reads the New York Times silently I bet she is a lot of things I bet she is talking to you on the phone I bet she is brushing her hair I bet she is getting ready to go to yoga I bet she is incredible I bet she is a dancer I bet she is a lot of things I bet she is a reader I bet she is living with her elderly grandmother I bet she is a reader I bet she is a lot of things I bet she is incredible I bet she is an excellent typist I bet she is a lot of things I bet she has been to yoga today I bet she is noble I bet she speaks in hushed tones I bet she is a reader I bet she is a lot of things I bet she is incredible I bet she washes her hair a lot I bet she is holding a napkin I bet she is on the telephone I bet she is wearing pants I bet she is incredible I bet she is an incredible dancer I bet she is a lot of incredible things I bet she dances every night I bet she is a habitat I bet she polishes her nails sky blue I bet she is incredible I bet she speaks in riddles I bet she dances every night I bet she is incredible I bet she is in excellent condition I bet she is a dancer I bet she is a habitat I bet she owns a vehicle I bet she plays the flute I bet she dances every night I bet she has a good mechanic I bet she speaks in hushed tones I bet she is incredible I bet she makes muffins every night I bet she is incredible I bet she plays Monopoly The men were incompetent the women were dancers The men were incompetent The women were dancers I was freely espousing Doug The men were incompetent the women were dancers The men were incompetent the women were dancers I was freely espousing Dough The men were West of here the women were dancers The men were West of here the women were dancers I was freely espousing Doug The men were incompetent the women were dancers The men were incompetent the women were West of here I was freely espousing Dough