So I am working late and wishing I weren’t. (Actually, that’s not true. It’s lovely in my office with the evening sun coming in and all. I am aglow. But not sweaty. Or smelly. I am beautimous. The whole damn scene is right nice. Plus, if I stay late enough I will be able to see a red full moon hanging above the mountains on my drive home. Is that not worth waiting for?)

Anyway, I had this big thought about nowish that went something like this: Wouldn’t it be great to be so ballsy self-assured that I could just be 100% honest with people?

Well I sooooo am that ballsy stoopid self-assured.

Tomorrow, a one-day event: Dana’s Be 100% Honest Day.*

Swing by. Ask questions. You are sure to get interesting answers. And don’t you think I am only doing this on the ’nets and such. I am so fuckin’ ballsy ridiculously stoopid self-assured that I will be doing this from waking until I turn in for the night, everywhere and with everyone.

Huzzah!

I am allowed three “no comments” during the course of the day, though.

*

*I whipped up badges if anyone is dumb enough to want to do this with me.** Let me know by e-mail (mygorgeoussomewhere at gmail dot com) and my domestically grown and assembled monkey servants will automatically can send you the code.

**Oh look: Some of you are dumb enough, and I’m making a list of you dummies brave souls in my sidebar so people can come take advantage of you by asking personal and uncomfortable questions be tame and good and nice and polite in their question-asking and whatnot. All in good fun, raiiight!!!

* * *

(P.S. Today, my father would have been 78 years old. Instead of celebrating the live dad in my life, I got nothin’. Not even incinerated bones in a sealed container. I barely have photos of him. I would have written something for him today, but I know I would have fucked the words all up. And that’s 100% honest.)

* A collaborative poem in process. Of course, I am writing it with Blythe. Check our her site for a stunning part one. This is part two:

Entry

Where did you stuff your women?
In bags, in lead coffins, in the farthest
recesses of your hilly land?
What Helen didn’t tell you
is that she saw you in a dream
where you slid the peplos
from her body and it glided
like water over her skin.
The night sky left only
her nipples and pubic hair
dark, made the rest of her
into a second moon
that orbited you
until you were dizzy,
until you said Yes my love,
whatever you want my love.
Then she took your sword
in her hands and drove it
straight up through her,
into her body’s bloodless cavities.

(It’s always so fun to talk with Neil in IM)

Neil: What are you doing?
Me: I am just dicking around.
Neil: Can a woman dick around?
Me: I have an invisible dick, so yes. I think about my invisible dick while I am fucking the ladies.
Neil: No u don’t.
Me: True, I don’t. I kinda do.
Neil: Are u attracted to women too?
Me: You clearly never read Sprigs. You are a skimmer.
Neil: Well, that was poetic.
Me: You were only there for the exposure. There weren’t poems on Sprigs. That came on Sublimation.
Neil: I mostly remember you playing with yourself in a nunnery.
Me: I always do.
Neil: And why did you stop Sprigs?
Me: I am dumb. Wish I’d kept it. Imagine the following I would have by now.
Neil: So put it back again. What do u need a following for? Are u a religious leader?
Me: Fuck you, following-getter. You are the quintessential following-getter.
Neil: Nah, not really.
Me: I beg to differ. Start a new blog, then, like Brandon. Do it anonymously. Don’t cultivate audience, and see how long you last.
Neil: So do u think it was cool of him to do that?
Me: I think everything Brandon does is cool. I would pour wax on him and worship him if I could. Masturbate on his altar.
Neil: Jeez, and what makes him cooler than me?
Me: Him.
Neil: His essence?
Me: His writing always cuts to the core of things. He licks words up like butterflies and opens his mouth to mine, setting them free inside me.
Neil: And I am just a court jester … is that what u are saying?
Me: I am saying you have totally different ways of approaching writing, equally valid. It’s like brands. Tylenol, Advil.
Neil: So if you had the choice of sleeping with one of us …
Me: You are Tylenol. He is Advil. I would sleep with neither of you.
Neil: Well, you have to. It would be Brandon … right?
Me: I am just saying: Advil lasts all day.
Neil: Even though realistically, I am separated and he is happily married. All because of his writing?
Me: Yes, and because he once offered to send me a book he thought I’d like, and he’d written in the margins.
Neil: I am much taller.
Me: Tylenol does relieve my migraines. You have a funny voice, though.
Neil: That is true.
Me: You would release moths into my mouth. I like moths, too. One flew into my eye once because it thought I was the sun.
Neil: No one likes moths.
Me: I do.

Just look at my naughty little cake-o-love go!

A Letter of Love

What can I say about the woman who has touched my life in so many ways? Writing poetry with Blythe has been a blessing ever since we first sat down at our computers and made those shy initial moves, laying ourselves bare one word, one phrase at a time.

It was slow going at first, and we both doubted ourselves. But we had an agreement at the outset that we’d never laugh at each other or expect perfection. We vowed that we could giggle when we faltered and rejoice when we succeeded. We set rules that would guide us but allowed each other the freedom to change those rules as needed.

And that’s what true love is, is it not? A place where rampant play and deep encouragement are prized. Where boundaries are established but aren’t so inflexible that they don’t take each other’s changing needs into account.

We’ve been writing together off and on since last October but have not shared most of what we’ve created. We are not in it for the look-at-us factor but because we both love language and rejoice at seeing words fold in on themselves then open back up like petals to reveal a strange small world, full of anthers, ovules, filaments, pollen and, of course, ants.

We never forget the ants. And if one of us does, the other is there to say, “Hey, look at the ants!”

So it is with love: seeing through one another’s eyes when needed, feeling the world through the other’s touch. I close my eyes and Blythe describes a world where airplanes love their passengers, where eels tighten on a groom’s chest as he stands at the altar. She gently reminds me that a wrench isn’t just something I use to repair my leaky pipes, it is also be a way emotion is squeezed and twisted out of me.

How many times when we’ve written together have we both gotten chills? To throw a word, a phrase or a line into the air to have it caught and returned metamorphosed, whizzing and popping with energy, is just cause for one’s hair to stand on end.

In short, with Blythe, I am a better writer. We navigate new worlds large and small, ordinary and extraordinary that, alone, we never would have considered or imagined.

In taking those careful steps toward one another last fall with letters clasped in our hands, we have created something new, and in so doing have engendered something new within ourselves.

We haven’t written much for the past few months because I was too ill to do so, and I just want to say that writing with Blythe again … well, it feels like coming home.

Now, as guests at our wedding, please feel free to respond to and/or critique the poem we wrote together to commemorate the big event. You can do it right down there in the comments section. But to leave a comment, you must also leave us a gift, since it’s a wedding after all. For your convenience, Blythe and I included our bridal registry in our posts. Please do stop in and leave a gift for each of us, since we like gifts. So give ’em to us.

Also, at the end of the poem there is a link to the comments section of the post where Blythe and I wrote the piece, so you can see our entire process laid bare as the poem unfolded. It’s pretty much entertaining, so check it out.

Bridal Registry Items

• 1 Anthony Bourdain
• 1 funnelcake stand (a no-brainer)
• 1 gryphon
• 1 helium machine (so we can talk in silly voices)
• 1 hot air balloon
• 1 ice cream maker
• 1 karaoke machine
• 1 lighthouse
• 1 margarita machine
• 1 mechanical bull
• 1 moonwalk
• 1 potbelly pig
• 1 spiritual healer
• 1 submarine (so we can see whales up close)
• 1 UFO (so we can get to our summer home in a galaxy far, far away)
• 1 walker (for Dana since she is older than Blythe)
• 2 body pillows
• 2 Britney Spears (clothing optional)
• 2 candy wedding rings (we really need these)
• 2 personal jet packs
• 2 rubber duckies
• 2 sets of fake fingernails (which we need to get on quick before the ceremony begins)
• 2 sets of stilts
• 2 Slinkies
• 2 sock monkeys
• 4 flying trapeses (in case we have friends over)
• 20 finger puppets
• 20 toe puppets
• a beer of the month subscription
• a lifetime supply of Wonderbras (34B and 34C, please)
• a magic school bus (Not the books or cartoons, but a real magic school bus. If you get us this you get an automatic invite to all our wild magic school bus parties.)
• a personal trainer/personal masseuse
• a plethora of feather boas
• all-we-can-drink Slurpies
• an 8-piece set of Pez dispensers
• BanangramsCanadian money (so we are poised to leave the country if needed)
• fake IDs that say we both just turned 18 (w00t! Barely Legal!)
• hair extensions
• jitterbug lessons
• lube (What? We need it.)
• matching monogrammed bowling balls
• nipple rings (obviously)
• porn (just kidding, kinda)
• waterless shampoo (for the days we feel like being hippies but still want our hair to look washed
• what the hell, some books of poetry (but only good ones)

What Happens at the Altar Stays at the Altar
By Blythe and Dana Funnelcake

I press the flesh of my palm
into your inexplicably chubby face
while the hiccupy rent-a-priest
folds at his midsection like a closing book

and crashes to the ground with a
papery thud. Of course, the rice thingies,
bagged and bowed in a frenzy last night,
will soon be swallowed by all the unsuspecting attendants,

who are half-mad with hunger and heat.
But I digress. Which brings me to your dress:
When I agreed to the chartreuse bride
spied in my mail-order catalog,

I assumed you came with the filmy white dress
worn by lucky Barbies ’round the world
(and even some confused Kens).
So when they shipped you in coveralls,

and musty ones at that, I felt the
slippery eel of panic slither ’round my chest.
And my balls (I must be honest) maneuvered
their way into a chamber deep within my body

whose existence I was, until that moment,
entirely unaware of. But after the requisite
ten-hour charge your instruction manual mentioned,
relief flooded through and engorged me — like Mom’s

Thanksgiving dinner filling and warming my alimentary canal —
when your eyes fluttered open, your lips parted, and you
began to emit a whoooooooo sound not unlike dank air
winding through a French horn’s valve tube.

We locked eyes, you smiled a bit, and said,
whoooooooo, whoooooooo, whoooooooo,
which of course I interpreted as I. Love. You.
And I, dear, whoooooooo, whoooooooo, whoooooooo, you too.

To see how this poem unfolded, go here.

To read other contributions for Read Write Poem this week, go to readwritepoem.org.

As an offering that symbolizes my love, I give you this:

Please say yes, and marry me when the sun goes down tomorrow. Until then, you will be in my thoughts and dreams, my sweet little silky Slim-Fast bar.

— for Jo

You make women sad and angry. Circus managers sew you into your tattered wedding gown, splatter fresh blood on you every sunrise before the first show. You weep. The world’s tallest man ambles by on stilts, nearly knocks you off your pedestal.

You hold your mouth open to catch stale crackers and call each one Jesus. Men line up for you, tickets in hand. Their besmirched high-waisted pants secured with suspenders; your bridal diadem held fast with diaper pins.

The men’s shirts were once starched board stiff but have been cast off so many nights they no longer glide over rounded torsos. The women know how easily they could become sideshow attractions, restricted to smaller spaces than their current lives. They giggle, shift inside their bloomers.

You are surprised when your aquarium is covered in dark felt panels, one on each side, like a fine piece of art that can’t be exposed to the sun. This makes you more mysterious. The line to see you swells as your supplicants multiply.

When did you lose your luster?

How many have rammed their hands into your cavities, looking for what was long ago excised?

Furries. This subculture has been much maligned, mocked, and misunderstood. The first image people seem to get are people going at it in animal costumes. While there are some furries that enjoy this, for the majority, it’s just a way of thinking. So … what is furry, then? Although there is a lot of disagreement about just what makes a furry, the most common thread is a love of anthropomorphic figures — animals with human features and characteristics.

— fashiontribes.com

Thanks to Dave Bonta, my tweets on the horrid Twitter interface are now being fed into the gorgeous Tumblr interface. It’s a thing of beauty.

I resisted Dave’s urging to get the whole Tumblr thing up and running, and that was a mistake. I am thrilled with it. Dave is always right, although I know of two instances lately where he has, in fact, been wrong. But still, he’s always right.

Oh, check out the thing of beauty of which I have been speaking: mygorgeoussomewhere.tumblr.com/