Poetry By Holly Day

Holly Day has taught writing classes at the Loft Literary Center in Minnesota, since 2000. Her published books include Music Theory for Dummies, Music Composition for Dummies, Guitar All-in-One for Dummies, Piano All-in-One for Dummies, Walking Twin Cities, Insider’s Guide to the Twin Cities, Nordeast Minneapolis: A History, and The Book Of, while her poetry has recently appeared in New Ohio Review, SLAB, and Gargoyle. Her newest poetry book, Ugly Girl, just came out from Shoe Music Press.             

             The Beast At Your Side

There was a time when I treasured being alone
vaguely dreamed of giving birth in a den to children
that would someday also leave me blissfully alone.
I could have stayed hidden in that den forever
living off of rotting carrion and cold ramen.

I treasured my own scent before I met you
I treasured my space and the few things that were mine
had my own dreams that seemed very bright and important
thought I was strong.

Before I met you, I was pure beast, a sleeked-furred creature
hiding in the dark, teeth sharp and bared
a completely different creature than what lies in your bed
waiting for you to lumber in at night
to claim me as yours.



            What There Is to Lose

I pretend to be content with our conversations
because I still like having sex with him
and I am afraid that, even after all these years
that if I don’t keep him talking
don’t act interested in what he’s saying
he might decide to leave. Even after sleeping beside him
for more than a decade
I’m afraid that if I don’t hang on every word he says
nod approvingly at all the right moments
in his ramblings about cars and work
and the driving conditions to and from work
that he’ll decide I’m also not very interesting
wonder why he’s sitting next to me at all.

Some days, I’m afraid to even let him go outside
in case he runs into the woman he’s supposed to be with
the one who finds all these musings on
back spasms and diarrhea attacks,
his problems with his mother
his problems with my mother
all the ways you can use Chinese pepper salt to enhance your cooking
completely fascinating and absorbing and yes
I know she is somewhere out there

waiting in the mismatched groves of birch and pine outside our home
hungering for what I will never let her have.


  
            My Cat

In my cat’s dreams
the world is safer, softer, quieter.
no garbage trucks rumble by at 5 a.m.,
no mailman rattles the front door at noon.
I know this because

when I sleep with my cat
his paw pressed up against my cheek
I dream only of quiet things:
small birds by the feeder, their footprints leaving
jagged hieroglyphics in the snow
tiny rabbits chirping in the undergrowth

warm sunshine
filtered through green summer leaves.

  

            An Act Never Actually Committed

I remember my father’s
neatly-typed suicide notes
left in conspicuous places
around the house for us to find
when we came home from school

practicing for the day he would
go through with his threats, a fire drill
for something truly awful.
I watch my son sleep and wonder
if his dreams are filled with the worry
mine once were.

  
            Spoilsport

avoiding the stares of the other visitors, he pushes his way down the aisle
to her room and close to the edge
of the hospital bed. last week, the beautiful woman was
hurtling through the air on the back of a horse
and now she would never walk again.

her breathing is so quiet he can barely hear it over the sound
of the equipment in the hospital room. a noisy machine breathes for her
but underneath it all is her own breath, soft,
a rattle of lungs inflating, deflating
a tiny whisper of life. he is here

because he knows from his own experience
her friends will all eventually abandon her, humbled
at the loss of her mobility, frightened
by her sudden dependence on them. he is here
to let her know

that no matter how beautiful she is, how beautiful she still is
she will always be alone.

Poetry By Holly Day

Holly Day has taught writing classes at the Loft Literary Center in Minneapolis, Minnesota, since 2000. Her poetry has recently appeared in Oyez Review, SLAB, and Gargoyle, while her recently published books include Music Theory for Dummies (3rd edition), Piano All-in-One for Dummies, The Book Of, and Nordeast Minneapolis: A History.  

Sustenance

the irony is not lost on me: checking
strips of treated paper every Monday, every Friday
praying and praying and failing to see
a “plus” sign appear in
the second window of the pregnancy test.

the irony is not lost on me: five years before
seeing this same sign made me
think briefly of suicide, led me to a life
I never would have lived, left me with a child
I would now die to have more of
if they could only be just like him.

the irony is not lost on me: two years, a single mother dating
squeaking by safely, using various forms
of uncomfortable contraception, and now
Husband #2 and I
can’t conceive. it’s ironic to think
that after the absolute hell #1 put me through
abuse, divorce, and complete financial abandonment
I owe him something
for giving me my son.






            Take It

folded wolf
soft flesh beside me, I
am so hot, unfurls into something I know

baby bird above me, wolf
clutched in its beak, I
touch the white skeleton man, push it up, I know

what you want, man-child, wolf
creature, put it in my head, through my head, I
dream in kaleidoscopes, know

love for fractions of seconds, wrap me in sick sweat, wolf
spit, take this burning I
am almost burning--rip me up, make me know.






            Open Plains Cut By Highways

Caterpillars and bridges
rise and fall like waves, there is
always another

road that starts at the point that
the bottom step ends, where
your tiny bare feet stumble on

the gravel path, determined
to run away from me even
now.  The wind lifts the hem

of my cotton dress, hold
it down at the edge here
and here, with one tiny

hand that will someday too near turn
into an adult hand,
in these moments when tomorrow

and yesterday and nothing
all matter equally,
so long as there are bridges

and roads that run forever.





            Vermin

I’m sorry
I think to the cockroaches that squish under my boots
as I walk home along the roaring breakers of ocean surf
on a thin strip of sidewalk crumbling slowly to sand. In the darker shadows
cat-sized rats scurry over concrete pilings, carrying greasy chip bags
hamburger wrappers and bits of rotting fruit in their mouths
claiming the fetid remains of the day for a midnight feast.
Years before, these rats and roaches would have been in hiding
in the ramshackle brick houses and empty warehouse spaces that used
to line this part of town, but now that all those old buildings are gone
and the new buildings, mostly condos, are too brightly lit for vermin
the rats and the roaches have all come down to the beach. The new condo owners
might have chased away the junkies and the whores
and the homeless drunks with their overflowing shopping carts
but the rats and the roaches are here to stay.





            Revelations in the Dark

I’ve heard
sometimes prisoners in solitary
grow so lonely they tame
spiders, lure them to their cells by
plucking single
hairs from their heads and playing them like
guitar strings
mimicking

the sound of a mother
spider calling out
to her children
by tapping on her web

if the memory
of some
warm
comforting mother-spider figure could
make a spider like that one
staring at me
from the dark corner of my room
come running like a tardy child
expecting dinner

how awful and terrifying can it really be?

Five Poems By Holly Day

Holly Day was born in Hereford, Texas, “The Town Without a Toothache.” She and her family currently live in Minneapolis, Minnesota, where she teaches writing classes at the Loft Literary Center. Her published books include the nonfiction books Music Theory for Dummies, Music Composition for Dummies, and Guitar All-in-One for Dummies, and the poetry books “Late-Night Reading for Hardworking Construction Men” (The Moon Publishing) and “The Smell of Snow” (ELJ Publications).



A Story About God

When my father was ten, his mother died
and he went outside into the street after her funeral and screamed
at God. He said, “Take me,
you fucker!” to God, and his younger brother, my
uncle, was so scared he ran
into the room they both shared and hid. Later, when
my father came back, my uncle asked him what Hell was like
why God had let him come back, if he had seen
their mother, what she was wearing. 




            The Vampire

The vampire comes in through my window and sees I have written more poems about him. He thumbs through the stacks of loose-leaf paper, leaves bloody fingerprints on the crumpled edges. I watch him from my bed, eyes half-closed, pretending to be asleep, watch him as he shakes his head, snorts derisively, scribbles something nasty in the corner of one sheet, crosses out all the words I’ve used improperly with a bright red pen.





            The Beautiful Things

I read through my son’s emails
wonder at the beautiful things he’s
written to girls, wonder at the sincere
man emerging through these words. My son
the poet, I think, savoring the
unbidden phrase. My son, the
writer. I should have known
he would grow up to be this man. I shut down
his machine, think about
the conversations we
should have been having about writing, and art,
and music, wonder how I can broach
the subject of his poetry
without revealing I’ve been reading through
his emails, without letting him know  I know
all the wonderful things he’s been
saying to other girls.





The Elephant

when an elephant is young, he
is tied to a pole
too heavy for his little body
to move it its own.

he spends his first years
tied to this pole, is encouraged
to pull hard against it
to test his limits
taught
to give up.

for the rest of his life
he will believe
he’s not strong enough to break free
from his chains, will simply accept his bondage
to the same limitations
he was strapped to
as a child.





            They Will Discharge Me Soon

white walls, soft
floor, white goes all
up and down the
ceiling to the floor
bright eyes watching me
through the small square
window—you won’t

get in my
head tonight  sharp
metal objects in doctors’
pockets keep me up
all night long—how
can being scared all
all the time make me
better, make me well
enough to go back home?