Kate Crash

POETRY

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Kate has thousands of unpublished poems. There are no digital copies of her chapbooks. Here is a small, random, rotating selection of some of her poetry.

& THEN EVENTUALLY ANOTHER LIFE

in the slow water

i drift into memory

longing for things

i no longer have

or never even had

i catch the ripples

but then they go through me

everything leaves, even I will leave

stones beneath my feet, even I will leave

i gaze at the water

& it gazes at me

why can’t I love

all of the changing

fading away

my body

& reshaping again

in the sketch of a cloud

in a dawn yet to come

in the smoke set to the bones

once I am gone

once I am home

once I fall like a leaf

& smother myself into the ground

& feed the soil

& become a tree

& then eventually

another life,

a different me

always with an essence

always changing

BIRDS OF AFRICA

there's a blurry picture of a bird on my desk

some strange branches against a blue sky

my mom or dad took it on their trip to Africa

I never remembered their love

I was too young when it dissolved

into courtrooms, booze, & abuse

but when I was a baby, they left me for some months,

now that's not the good part of the story

I couldn't understand why they left me

& I would cry & cry  & cry

mop of blonde in my face

that hasn't been lifted from it since

my pink onesie sticky with honey

ants crawling up me all lonely

in a giant house

but that's not what I think of

when I look at this picture

I think of how they once loved

that there was a moment

in their lives where they believed in its

possibilities

of happiness & freedom

      where when 2 of the most self-destructive

& brilliant people found comfort in each other’s arms

while on safari

their love was so strong my mom got my

handicapped, permanently-broken-hipped,

broken-legged dad in a hot air balloon

tribesmen had to drag him in & out

& I think -- there was this bird,

& there was their love

which felt as forever as that sky --

& it's wings are flapping, outstretched,

& they are so excited

  you know, sometimes life can go your way

& that's what I think they felt

  at that time

& I wanna believe in that,

outstretch that moment between the stars,

forget & forgive for what was to come next

& know

            only of this

                        happiness.

FORGETTING MY NAME A PLACE WHERE NO ONE ANSWERS

one night I died

I forgot the shore

I curled myself

away from the surface

& began to sink

but could not find the bottom

as the earth had been stolen

& the deep silence of nowhere

felt like a broken clock

a place where no one answers

& I am not sought

a husk with withered feathers

I had hoped the end would have meant

flight

i remember in life

time weighed down on me

held me for ransom

took friends, prayers, love

until its hands sung the hymns

it was time for me to come

& be/ to be undone

i bit off its face

& i still I sank

into its faith

forgetting my name

(in the wait)

 until I can be reborn again

ONLY PASS YOU BY

Watch the planes take off into the clouds

They look like the shadows of birds

Sketched out of stone

There there

Then soon not there at all

There’s a glare over the back marsh

It’s the sun saying it’s here though we can’t see it

But we always feel it

The way I still feel people who have long since gone

They are tinges of colors over the landscapes in front of me, behind me, in the air

See- that hint of red on that wild flower shaking just above the water is my dad in his red cap always pushing me to try again, harder!  

And that bird swooping down has a silver crown which shines like that last boy who was my everything and that splash of orange as it goes in for the kill are the fires he set over my whole world

And my long lost grandma’s hand is the swirl of blue in the horizon, an echo of long ago times I won’t find again

Except on these early morning walks where I am

Finally alone

Except for those colors

Except for those voices

Of places that can’t be touched

Only felt

Only held

In an ache or a smile

Buried deep beneath

What everyone else sees

When they (only) pass you by

SUGAR THRILLS

I want thrills

the junior high thrills of sneaking out high on sugar and pills

climbing down my daddy's tree

running out into the world he couldn't keep from me

kissing boys and smoking in parks in the dark

unraveling the secrets of a girlhood lost

daring myself to die then running home to hide

from all the danger I let escape from deep inside

sweat on my skin

naked under my covers

reenacting those reckless adventures

and all those strangers

who touched my hair

and gave me a sip

and tried to get

inside

where I'd smile and laugh if they came too close

where I'd sometimes let them grope

at my neck or tug at my skirt

but the ones I really wanted

that never noticed

are the ones I'd think about most

under the covers

covered in flowers

my dad's bad taste picked out

and I'd fall into explosions

thinking about all the things I'd like to try

if I could just let myself fly

STUCK WITH MY THOUGHTS

when I'm alone I'm stuck with my thoughts

and all the people I should try not to become

and all the things that just may come

when I'm alone I'm stuck with my thoughts

when you're gone I do what I want

I'm not saying it's right it's probably not

I wish you'd never leave so I'd just stop

when you're gone I do what I want

when it's loud I get all shut up

or become too loud until I'm the only one

but every sound has it's up and come down

when it's loud I become too much

when things stop I start to run

I'm only good when I think it's fun

blurry feelings is better than none

when things stop I start to run

when you're close I itch for the door

and when you're too far I beg you for more

and I want to feel love but never let myself fall

when you're close I itch for the door

when I'm alone I'm stuck with my thoughts

and all the people I should try not to become

and all the things that just may come

when I'm alone I'm stuck with my thoughts

HE WAS

he was the water & I didn't know it

the moon hanging low over the mountain

the swervey road melting into the horizon

the smile before the day ends & night cracks you open

he was the dropped rock shooting ripples

the many first stars I had wished upon

the velvet feeling of a flower pedal

smothered into the hand    then dropped into the trash

he was the row of marigolds in mother's portrait

dusty & forgotten in a back hallway of the house

you don't want to think about

he was the first hand held

an impractical  spell

he's

the end of summer

the start of noon

& everything else

that came & went too soon