JAMIE SUE AUSTIN

because in my last days,
when people gather to say
last words,
or make last amends, 
bring cake and pie,
or don’t visit at all
because my grievances
were too great…
I want everyone 
to reflect on the most
simple fact of my life.
I hated bugs.
So, don’t bury me in the
ground, if you remember
me at all.
Unless you hated me,
then I implore you
to remember that 
cremating
my corpse is
cheaper and caskets
are expensive revenge. 

Online Yale course in Contemporary Poetry.

 http://oyc.yale.edu/english/modern-poetry

Someone shared it on tumblr today, but I can’t find the post now.

Awesomesauce.

Come over here
and sell me a bottle
of your best miracle-hope-for-a-cure,
that makes me
peppy in the morning
pretty like Donna Reed  
all my hairs in place
none on my legs
blush painted perfectly
to match my lips
healthy and happy
smiling Crest white
not a pain in the hip or a
wring in the hand,
not a chore un done
or a worry on the brow,
just one bottle of perfect-all-day,
fresh mint flavor please
I’ve got cash. 

I’m back,
as if they ever left
the microbes crushed
under their feet
their sweat evaporated
and mingling with
the atmosphere
the carbon in their
bones
still leaching into
the water table…
No, we never really
leave. 
I never ever left. 

I lit a ciggarette,
from a candle
in haste
and was
immediately struck
by an Appalachian fear—
a piece of Lithuanian past
reached up to save
a sailor
from death—
and formed my hands
in imitation
of a priest,
but a bit more
Orleans Voodoo, —
to cross
the candle
three times…  and
save sailor my
disrespect
We have become—
all of us—
so many people
in this place. 

Let’s talk BRAND IDENTITY here,
I mean everydayjoe and his coffeecup
BOTH knowing your name.
Let’s talk scailablility, can you take
this persona to the next level? 
Is Jamie Sue Austin going to be the
next Jamie Sue Austin to do what ever
it is that she does best?
You know, that stuff you do, that
people like and remember you for,
what ever it is…
Those are the kind of things you
gotta ask yourself, chica, before
you come here to play with big boys.
Are you a sheep or are you a shark? 

I know you birthed me 
in the blue clay of Kentucky
hoping I’d take stubborn
root and grow
hard for future winters,
but I’m not a cedar
or a pine, or a pluck
of white burley—
but a little white
clay sipping butterfly
flitting off to bright
colors in foreign
gardens looking
for cool drinks
of blue clay 
elsewhere
in the world. 

and it was too grand for me?
Or if it didn’t suit my fancy,
being suited for a particular task
and having no interest.
What if my purpose commanded
humility to such a degree
I could not bend the reed 
to yield to it.  
No, I don’t think
I’ll let omnipresent powers
choose my purpose.
I have been built fine and
flexible, vain and brilliant,
I should choose
my own purpose.
Not to fill the universal wish
list, but to bring
the unexpected gift. 

like the gangly arms
of teenaged boys
would be grown out
thick and straight
a line to walk down,
a path already picked,
but my voice is round
and my breasts low,
the awkwardness
always the same…

and in new ways I
think “how can I endure
the irritation that
is the act of loving others?”
to cause no harm,
but to be set free
to chrysalize
and emerge winged,
to triumph self
 discovery

and find that, just like
before and always,
the dance between self
and family, 
is so entangled
that palm to palm
we struggle
to keep the
intricate steps
leaving no room
for the graceless—
or the self
serving
artist. 

Dear Jamie Sue, 

Thank you for submitting to (redacted). We appreciate your continued support and patronage. Unfortunately we were unable to find a place for your work in this issue. Sometimes this happens. It means nothing. So pull the shadows around you like a puff and get back to work. More opportunities scramble forth, trailing their long elegant heels of hot air with alice blue eyes, crinkled as if at the most exquisite moment of a very long opera. 

Tally ho! 

Much love, 
the editorial staff

I’ve never been told to piss off so eloquently!

in the same way
that some personalities
freeze in hostage situations
the clutter constitutes
too much visual input
and I have lost my
data processing capabilities
as if the house
has folded on top of me
black and thick
a mat of confusion
with dusting
repairing
cleaning
cooking
holding
healing
teaching 
loving 
and merry making
my primary seasonal duties

going unperformed
as I sit banded and blinded
I can no longer see
a section of my brain relays
a repeated message
—External connections
to critical data inputs
severed—Back up systems
fail restore—reboot
system and clear cache
If there was more cash
and time for processing
I could overcome
my own objections 
at this point
I have blue screened. 

on a thick leather bag
filled with TUMS
Excedrin
red lipstick from Macy’s
and Valium

is all you need
to determine a woman’s age.

you know she is old
enough to value
a dependable thing,
for heartbreak,
headaches,
bright red lips,
and more stress than
is generally called for 

I can tell you 
my age by saying
I carry the same things,
in a cloth bag (for washing),
except I use lip gloss
and keep a number
in my lipstick case

for emergencies. 

I have said my peace
and counted to three
and now you walk
so carefully
to avoid the cuts
of eggshells

I did not spend
my weeping words
to build a floor
of anything else
but bamboo,
or else I would
have scattered
the ground
myself,
with curses 

Jackie had a special place for her thoughts.  Each one belonged to its own distinctly unique file box, cross referenced with images, sounds, and emotions, against all same-similar or like experience.  They were locked tight and she could trace each one from its birth till its death.  

It didn’t stop the thoughts from escaping.  Sometimes they’d snap from her rolodex and present themselves like giant index billboards through her eyes before careening into a dark fold to hide.  The “wouldbeen” thoughts, she liked to call them. The thoughts she didn’t think on purpose so she could never get rid of them.

She imagined something far away which was so familiar it made her heart ache at the distance. The imagining, the missing of a certain indescribable feeling that she had once before, triggered explosions in file cabinets.

Photos flung up, letters too, a blue rhinestone necklace, her favorite songs, an X-men comic, a hair crimp and it was all so perfect, so perfectly doomed because it was small, it was hard to see the first time.  If she had another chance…

Then the coordinated thoughts, logistical concerns, self conscious examination of her waistline, the status of her bank account…

The wouldbeen thoughts raced, skitter-scattered into the folds, and hid.

Then they waited for a chance to come back, again.