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For Mingus the Cat

We were united in our mutual weirdness

co-conspirators
writing partners

If you were a person
you’d be an installation artist
who wore nothing but Hawaiian shirts
and drank Night Train
out of a bowler cap

You saw the street
You saw the good life

You cared nothing for either
and took it to your death rattle

I would’ve traded a city block for you

but that’s not how life works

so
I do the next best thing
and leave the door to the attic open
when I write

like Jews
leave the front door open
for Elijah

in the hopes that you’ll wander up
and perch your dirty asshole on the railing
like old times

and watch me chug black coffee

and write through dirty glasses

swearing at stanza after stanza

missing you

I know it’s weird
I know it makes no sense

but humans never do

like the street
like the good life

like an empty attic
and some silly lines

© 2016 Lee Kitzis

Everything Smells Like Breast Milk (A Poem on Fatherhood)

My wife’s kisses smell like breast milk

The baby’s head smells like breast milk

The plants smell like breast milk

The cats smell like breast milk

The mailman smells like breast milk

The sidewalk and the stoplights and the streets and the birds

The reverend and the rabbi and the bums and the stoners
and the fresh air at the beach

Titty milk
Titty milk
Titty milk

My receipt for creamer smells like breast milk

The cop writing a ticket smells like breast milk

The cage fighter smells like breast milk

My typewriter smells like breast milk

This poem smells like breast milk

Titty milk
Titty milk
Titty milk

12 AM
2 AM
5 AM

I’ll shout it from the top of a mountain

down below to the U.P.

Where the woman I love pumps away

and waits for me

© 2016 Lee Kitzis

Cecilia

You came into this world
screaming
with the back hair
of a 50-year-old Greek man

The greatest day of my life
punctuating the worst 4 days of my life

exhausted
in love
I held you to my chest
I kissed your head
you ate some of my chest hair

and that was it
I was hooked

I would console your screams

I would wipe your ass

I would chase away the boys
or the girls

I would find your lost scrunchy

I would buy you all the pretty things

withdrawing cash
and not charging it to the card

a technique daddy learned
to conceal his junk food and
lottery ticket purchases
from mommy

and we’d stick
that silly pretty thing
way down deep
in the daddy/daughter secret vault

and catch a Cubs game

and you’d have your favorite players

and mine would be dead or managers

and it will be ours

the whole thing

and nobody else’s

© 2016 Lee Kitzis

Since I've Moved to the UP

Since I’ve moved to the UP
my beard has gotten bigger

I’ve had an oven explode in my face
and I drink beer in the attic for next to no reason

I’ve calmed down
and learned to be friendly

When I walk I smell spruce and backyard barbecues

The meth-heads are less violent than the crackheads
but far weirder

There are no gangs because the bears control everything

The food culture is a vegan craving a steak
and the buildings are old and beautiful
and all the transients look like trappers
and the beer is good and a bum can live
like a king on cans and I’m in love
with the big red lighthouse and the fog horns
that carry me into slightly restless dreams

© 2016 Lee Kitzis

The Day an Oven Exploded in My Face or Sunday Funday

I was nearing the end of my shift
and just had to get the fluffed garlic potatoes
out as an accompaniment
to the whole roasted chicken

I took a look in the bottom oven
and before I could assess my potato situation
there was a BANG! that crumpled me
hat and glasses flying singed hair
blood gushing from my head

I thought of my wife and my unborn kid
and what’s that burning smell oh it’s me
that’s not good lemmee just go ahead
and feel the top of my head oh fuck me
no bueno it’s hospital time
don’t let this be my obit
barely published poet dies
after oven explodes in his face

but it wasn’t my time
and the doctor was nice and quick with the stitches
and flirted with me a little and my wife
held back the tears and then calmed down and said
“maybe now I can beat you at Scrabble”

and I know what matters now
I know

I love my wife
and I love my kid

and those potatoes
those potatoes

those potatoes needed 3 more minutes

© 2016 Lee Kitzis

Poem for a Songbird I Knew for a Few Hours

We found you
outside the public library
busted wing and all
afraid
a big black dog
in an SUV
staring at you
licking its chops

My wife
her heart as huge
as the Upper Peninsula
cupped you in her hands
and we took you home
and spoke to you
and gave you a cage
and a clean towel
and a water dish
and seed

and my wife
could not name you
it would just hurt
too much
so I did

Kingston
and it hurt to do it
but I did

and I talked
into your inquisitive black eyes
I told you that I loved you
and would be right back
and we would talk some more

and then I left
and went to a birthing class
and watched videos
of the bloody sloppy
miracle of life
and we grimaced
my wife and I
and we talked
about babies
and we talked
about birds

I would put you
in the attic
and we would sit in silence
and watch the big black dogs
pass us by

Me with my Old Crow
and you with your seed

but that would never happen

I guess it wasn’t supposed to

Kingston
I’d like to think
you were happy
not getting stepped on
or eaten by a hawk

Just curling up next to a water dish
and letting go

Many people don’t let go

They mean nothing to me

but you

you meant it all

© 2016 Lee Kitzis