I read this at the Doolittle Reading a couple of weeks ago. It started as a story, not as a poem. And I think it's going to go back to being a story. A slightly longer story. With the kind of arc you've grown accustomed to in my stories. I think I like it better that way. But I figured I'd post it in this form, along with the video of me reading it. Scroll to the bottom if you're interested in seeing my first attempt at reading in over 10 years. And watch the lights dance on my shiny, bald head.

A Camera Kind of Love

I went to the city
to take pictures
with a girl
who could see through me
with her camera.

She told me I was
well-grounded.
I suspected a loose screw
seeing as I was the
least grounded guy I knew
But I liked her
imagination--
how it saw something
in me I didn't.
And so I let her hold on
to the delusion.

We were in high school
then. Two friends. Sitting
in my not cool car, killing
time in a Chili's parking lot.
Can't remember why we were
just sitting there.
Maybe we were waiting for somebody.
Maybe we were waiting for each other.
Whatever.
Sitting in cars
is just something people
do in high school.



We were photographers that day.
On a mission of truth.
Copping our cold cameras
like talismans in front our
frightened faces, hiding them
from each other. From ourselves.
Shielding us
from the things we
weren't sure we wanted
to find. We used downtown
Houston as our
our canvas. The steamy streets.
The molten concrete. We stood among
art installations
and tall, modern buildings of
glass and stone.
We looked up and over and through.
Trying to see the things we weren't
shown. We looked anywhere
but at each other. Swimming with
the business-suited masses. Grinning at
our flat freedom, which
was an illness
we didn't know
we didn't have.
Yes.
We used our cameras like shields.
Protecting us from the words
we might have spoken.
Protecting us from the touches
we might have made.



I took one shot of her,
her face framed by a sculpture--
a Dubuffet. Her eyes
grinning. Her smile
slaying. And because I was
young. And because I thought
such things were possible,
I told myself I had
captured her "essence."
I told myself this thing
I had done was
the most noble thing
a person could do.
And I was proud of myself for
seeing it.
And I was proud of myself for
knowing when to press
the shutter.

And I know that's all bullshit now.
I know I
knew nothing.
I know I
saw nothing.
I know damn well I
did nothing.

We were practicing
a camera kind of love.
Capturing things at
a safe distance.
Filtering feelings through
the shallow lens of
our flawed, untried perception.

We sat there in my
brown Oldsmobile.
And for want
of knowing
what to say,
I leaned forward and
smiled at her. And
I hoped the smile might
lead to a kiss.

But it didn't.

She lifted her camera to her
face. "Don't look at me like that,"
she said at my smile.
And she could see
through me.
And she could see
through it.

So I backed off.
Because I didn't yet know that
girls who could see through me
would be the best catastrophes
of my life.



My friend died
sophomore year of college. She died
when a car ran a stop sign
and drove into the side
of her light-bodied Ford
pick-up. She died
and left me with
the pictures we'd taken
and the letters we'd
written, and the words we'd
almost spoken.

It was the stuff that
made up everything.
It was the stuff that
felt like nothing.

***

Her mom gave all her CDs to
her friends. And I took
Doolittle.
I took it
not because I liked
The Pixies. Rather, because I
thought I should.
I didn't play it
for years. I
just carried it to the places
I lived. And
imagined how she'd
listened to it and
imagined how she'd
loved it.



I saw the Pixies with her at
the Houston Summit.
The sharp scent of weed,
like the good sexy musk of a
lover's underarm,
and our collective
breath and bob,
and the pulse of the
hard noise, those
cannon-thunder, bass-
drum booms, strong
and persistent, the
dull thud of it against us.
Like fists, and sharp hips
boring down.
The sweaty brows and carnal sounds.
Erotic smells and
the wet Houston heat
that always found its way into
every inside place.
The way it covered us, and blocked
out everything else,
and put us squarely
in that moment that
felt dark, and illicit, and good.

And Black Francis singing:
The Devil is Six.
The Devil is Six.
The Devil is Six.

There is nothing like a rock show
to put you in the
mood to fuck.
But we didn't



fuck. That night
or ever. I still
think of her, though, whenever I
hear the Pixies.
And that's something:

to be dead
twenty years
and somebody still
remembers you

from hearing a song,
or seeing
a sculpture,
or just sitting in
a parking lot in
front of Chili's.

That's everything.

And dammit, one day,
I'm going to leave
that Pixies CD
behind too.





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