Christopher Henry Smith

Writer, Independent Arts Administrator

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Filtering by Tag: love

Stasis, in Three Parts

I

When I say, “It’s hard,”
I mean, for other people.

What I feel watching the news
Is, at best, third-hand grief.
I own no pain, just a
Comfortable viewing position.

Jenny’s in the hospital watching her hair fall out.
The cops won’t stop shooting us.
Paris is on fire.

But here:
In Uptown,
In Chicago,
In the apartment above the Ethiopian place,
Just across the street from the Green Mill,
At the top of the stairs on the right,
Down to the end of the hallway
(No, not that door, the other one),
I’ve just met you.

And I’m trying to be upset—to weep for our world—
But you’re coming over later,
And we’ll drink wine.

II

“Why doesn’t the treasury just
Print more money?”
She asked.
“Not a lot, but, you know,
Enough to help where it’s needed.”

Greying temples and a discontented grin,
The figure at the front of the class,
Departed from discussing poverty
And taught us a bit about balance.

I now think that's how “Goodness” works:
In steady symmetry with “Not-Goodness.”

Equation-mad, there is somewhere a
Mathematician, quietly accounting compassion,
Filling ledgers with love and
Corresponding columns with hate,
Sleep deprived over proportions,
As we amble around sad or happy,
Thinking it comes so easily.

“Why doesn’t someone just print more good?”
Because of the overseas markets!
Do you want to lose value on what kindness we do have!?

III

I see churches burning across the South,
Complicit masses with mouths shut tight,
And young men confusing ammunition for answers.

I wonder if we are responsible for some of that.
Hoarding our happiness, are we
Keeping it from those who most need it?

The way I feel thinking of you—
That must be a civil war in a country I couldn’t find on a map.

And your eyes when I make you laugh—
There goes another village mud-sliding down a mountain.

And when you say that you love me—

A prime minister is shot.
The doctors come in with bad news.
Suicide bombers aren’t thwarted.
Hate crimes abound in areas
Where the newspaper won’t run the story.
Scientists look on as a new virus is born.
Shuttles implode on takeoff.
Drones strike at civilian targets.
White men in suits cover up a rape
(And then a murder,
And then a military coup).
The baby is lost.

And I,
In disbelief,
Smile and respond,
“I love you, too.”

Chicago, IL
2015

Browsing

I want so badly to be kind here.

To stop ignoring you. To stop feigning interest in whatever’s new with you. To stop hesitating to send you away whenever you pop up.

But I don’t know that I can.

And I acknowledge that that is my problem, not yours. And I’m sorry.

I’ve led you on—I see that.

For a time, we were exclusive. Traveling. Learning. Exploring each other and everything the internet had to offer.

And even when I moved on, you were always there in the background; every time I was on, you were there, quietly, just existing. Just warmly being, somewhere far-off but present at the same time.

Then again, a few times in college, after a few drinks, I’d bring you up. I acted like I didn’t care what everyone else said—what I had said time and again. For a few slow, clunky moments, it was just me and you. I know now that that was not something I should have done.

And.

You’re beautiful.

In your own way.

You know I’m not the kind of guy to turn away from a site just because he can see a bit of the coding or a few broken image links. I don’t mind downloading obsolete plugins to try and better see through your eyes that page clearly designed with other browsers in mind.

You asked me the other day if I wanted you to be my default browser. I didn’t know what to say. For a few seconds I hovered over the “submit feedback” option, hoping myself brave enough to share what I have typed into the comment box of my heart a thousand, thousand times. Instead, I hit Ctrl+W.

You’re not safe for me anymore.

I think you should stop coming around here. You should stop sharing updates, trying to connect when I don’t recognize a file type.

I don’t love you anymore.

And maybe I never did.

Chicago, IL
2015

"Are You a Doctor, Are You Italian": From a Friend on the Train This Morning

No mah mee wai
No mah mee wai

Excuse me
Excuse me
You used to be a boxer
I know you
No one try to rob you
You’s a boxer

No mah mee wai
No mah mee wai

I make this lady laugh
I used to be her husband
Had white skin and
She would give me kisses
But
No more

No mah mee wai
No mah mee wai

I wish I could sleep
Can’t take a nap
Not until 95th
Hush little baby
Don’t you cry
Papa’s gonna buy you
A mocking bird

No mah mee wai
No mah mee wai

Excuse me
Excuse me
Can I get through
Ladies you look so lovely today
Will no one marry me
No one
Ladies, please

No mah mee wai
No mah mee wai

Chicago, IL
2015

Poe at the Taqueria

I wanted to be a pendulum,
Grazing your cheek and neck,
Like the raven earrings
Rocking along your jaw line,

Until I spied your guilty hands,
Stained after their recent crime.
Two cheerful butchers, smeared
Green with the flesh of an avocado.

You finished the defiled fruit and
Lingered on its seed.
It slid between your lips,
And how I wanted to be that pit.

Austin, TX
2009

box of most special things

“i’m trying to give you this,”
you breathed.
“it is a present—a
box to hold your most special things.”

you gave me a—surprisingly large—box for
pencils & neckties & pills & ball-rolled belts & travel alarm clock in his own tidy box
(unfolding only once—
for tangiers to
behold her current time),

& (in numinous tomb-like corner) droves of
your freed bobby-pins,
martyrs gathered from carpet & bed sheets,
when liberty minded (or suicidecrazy) they
abandoned hair-holding to fly south
& lay out in more comfortable climes—
emancipated in a letting go—
single-most daring act of their entire lives—

& pocket watch & ticket stubs & bottle caps & knife—
but not my steely, brazen knife—
nemesis of dead tree branches,
cardboard boxes & trespassers
(on that night we were certain
we heard someone downstairs
& I had to arm myself,
but it was only our cat)—
no, my slugabed bone-cased blade—
rival of pencil shavings, packing twine,
& my poor thumb when i’m drunk,
(that you said was factory-made
& sweated together by malaysian children
& i said was skilled eskimo scrimshaw hand scrawled
& you said well we can pretend
& i just smiled).

a box for papers, papers, papers—
amber-tinged news clippings of fading significance,
reminiscent of make-believe pirate treasure maps,
but with too many x’s—
names & places now only
purplyblack hue of day’s end;
& love notes back & forth from
sleepless three bottle wine nights
of too many cigarettes & broken expensive things
& dawn-screaming from rooftops
with tar-streaked lungs at morning sun
that HE’S NOT WELCOME HERE (!)
& voter-registration card you insisted i acquire
(though i’m not voting again until they
put a buddhist on their ticket);

& arrowheads & coins & shakespearean sonnet
& part of a chain & lamely waning bag of marijuana
& my tiny gold elephant—
a gift from hannah traveling in cambodia—
(sister come back I miss you)
& cufflinks with scrabble-board “c”
which matt bought from a barber in the french quarter—
(brother come back I miss you too)
& incense that smells of
beaches & god sent from karen in care packages from home—
(mother you can stay).

my box of my most special things
blazing with ecstasy
& immortal hope
& violent breathing nostalgia

that you cannot
see from where
you are now
& i want you to,
but you might as well
be on the moon,

where moonmen have
captured you &
put you in their own
box of most special things,
making me your
love-sick astronaut
trying to build my
space craft, so i
can fly & fly & fly
all night

past tangiers & malaysia & alaska & cambodia & new orleans
& bellow down canyons
at your moonmen captors

“GREETINGS MOONMEN!
the time has come:

i will give you my
box of most special things
if you will give me yours.”

Austin, TX
2008

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