It's not that I don't have the time

It's 2:15 am on sixth street

somewhere,

with pedi-cabs slowly, slowly

disappearing,

vanishing with their tips;

content to flounder and folly,

tussling through tracked vomit

musking their hair.

It's 2:15 am on sixth street

somewhere,

with mahouts steeped in sweat

& parasites.

Imperial hats & swords & guns

march on through the circular

tracks of the elephants -

diseased, drenched,

creating the stench on the road.

It's 2:15 am on sixth street, somewhere.

No matter the era to pith, delay, and

eventually, wear.

-[m]

-----------------------------

This is part of an ongoing birthday gift from my sister.

Each day I will write a poem inspired by a series of notes she sent me.

Poetry Is Braver Than Anyone

GODZILLA IN MEXICO

Listen carefully, my son: bombs were falling
over Mexico City
but no one even noticed.
The air carried poison through
the streets and open windows.
You'd just finished eating and were watching
cartoons on TV.
I was reading in the bedroom next door
when I realized we were going to die.
Despite the dizziness and nausea I dragged myself
to the kitchen and found you on the floor.
We hugged. You asked what was happening
and I didn’t tell you we were on death’s program
but instead that we were going on a journey,
one more, together, and that you shouldn’t be afraid.
When it left, death didn’t even
close our eyes.
What are we? you asked a week or year later,
ants, bees, wrong numbers
in the big rotten soup of chance?
We’re human beings, my son, almost birds,
public heroes and secrets.

-Roberto Bolano

---

(k)

A Note to Claire About America

Claire, (able to climb the stairs)

A note to sustain you

through the long evenings

stretched nowhere you haven't been.

Claire, (bliss-filled, unaware)

A note to forgive you,

tar pits have their logic,

even those wrapped with whirlpools.

Claire, (up the apples & pears)

A note of admonishment.

But don't let it happen again -

falcon claws caught in leather.

--

Things haven't always been

different. Sandpaper sidewalks:

Discordant laughter::

--

Claire, (guerilla warfare, guerre nucleaire)

Sometimes things stay

the same. Traveling for miles

on the tarmac, resting

at the gate.

But even stasis has its place,

jiggling softly among us.

-[m]

Generation Spill

Science and fact

Plural solution

Intellectual

Pollution

Fighting

face to face

Timely

destructions

Accurate

negative results

Missing

instructions

Hopeful waste

Like a big fucking purple laser

Dices goliath yellow clouds

Our voice

Fuzzy:

Cicadas in the sea

-

{q}

Floating, the pangs of

Clouds curdle

across the sky,

and rightly so.

You can't have just

anyone claiming such

colors as their own.

Power belongs maintained

- in windowless buildings,

collapsed in attaché  cases

and ironed after dry-cleaning.

Not given out,

willy-nilly --

left in the hands

of parties with-

out hands.

Bumbling, mumbling, directionless

to the whims of the wind

-[m]

Graduating Speeches

It's a war out there, in the rain.  Streaking bleach in the sky,

while bundled in trinkets, hoping the car windows are up.

We've traveled far enough to learn a thing or two about it,

but little else, now that you mention it.

When Katie brags there's nothing to do around here without

getting your hands dirty, I can't help but question her motives.

The seams within her are splitting like hairs, and I cannot stress

enough the importance of stature in a place like this.

When you've got less windows than doors, it's tough to see

where you're going, and where that hard rain's coming from.

But that doesn't mean buses have it made, of course.

Don't take adages so seriously.

And while you're at it, don't look anything in the mouth --

it'll come back to haunt you if you believe in that sort.

It's a war out there, one leg at a time.  And it'll sweep you

off your feet, in a place like this.

-[m]

When We Were Hungry

When the water had run out

we turned to the tea kettle

a miracle!

it was still full

from when we drank tea

and rolled cigarettes 

on the porch the other morning

we boiled the water again

waited for the blue bird

perched on the spout 

to whistle

and when it did

we poured the water into cups

and poured the water from the cups

into each others hands

and from our hands

the water washed our faces

and there was even a full cup left

to pour over our toothbrushes

then we went for a walk

it was still sunny

we smiled at each other

we held hands

maybe one of us whistled 

because we were so lucky

luckier than most 

even when we were hungry.

...

(k)

Vomit-Colored Clouds

I stopped loving thunder storms

when I ran out of roofs and awnings.

It's amazing how little

we consider gutters

a means of protection.

All that water channeling,

funneling, trading places,

I can lose sight

of the sewer drains

that allow me to

not smell my

own shit,

and the shit of others.

-[m]

At The Crack Of A Whip

I am not a workhorse, I say.

When people ask what I am,

I never say "horse."

But I beg for attention, applause, that wreath!

I admit:

I want to feel what it's like,

the weight of the garland, the scent.

It's not like me to want it,

It is too human, too stupid. 

Even I know!

A hoof can't hold a goddamn thing.

It just scratches and scrapes

at the surface of the shape.

Still,

I point my big head to the sky and say,

"I'll do it again, and again, and again!"

I only have one name. 

...

(k)

Bumblefoot

Slap On the Stamp

Branded: Weathered.

Cattle Clothes and,

Blackened Blows and,

Abracadabra --

You're Healed!

Torpid Little Girl.

You'll Never

Understand How

the World Works

Wearing Those.

an Ode to Synapses Firing Doggedly

oh, my sweet synecdoche!

is the beauty of

a one plus a two

=3?

-[m]

Technical Armor

This is what it's about then,

isn't it?  The leftover, mesmeric

scraps of mash-ups & counter-culture?

tossed in with bones & bouillon?

This is what it's come to then?

The spatial collapse of now and

almost-now? -- piled neatly into

nasal cavities? waiting to sneeze?

This must be the right time,

right?  To lay down our spartan

defenses, hiding in the attic

all these years?  Handle with Care.

Burnish it

Brandish it

        Wield it Brilliantly;

                          Carry it Top-Heavy

                          Spilling Digits.

This is our unfurnished

destiny?  To speak of the rot laid

before us?  in continually uninteresting

ways? blown to the ground by warm breath?

We've bellied ourselves

in backyard composting bins, in

the physical doors to nowhere in

homemade marmalades & pestos.

We've nuzzled each other

with the commodifications, counter-

clockwise stagnations & stases.

Crystalline shards on our elbows.

We're the leather-bound mole-

skin impersonating vinyl or ceramic

or anything else conveniently dis-

covered in black & blue scrapheaps.

Stare at Me, Austin.

Stare at Me, Jealousy.

         Stare at Me, Unmoving

                                Callous Kettle

                                Calling Itself.

We're the wind I've swept

beneath my feet?  We're the

tragic stoicism?  The mythic

throw rug? on the fast-track

to the spare room?

-[m]

Grab the Reins

Accounting can come

from anywhere,

staring anemic towards

a wall; shriveling

Blank inspirations of

numbers & actuary 

tables, even abaci - 

if they still use them.

Take it where you

can get it, I say;

don't starve yourself

for artistry's sake

It certainly wouldn't

do the same for you.

-[m]

FOXNEWSDOTCOMFOUNDPOEMZ

We found the skeleton

up in the tree

with the pistol

hanging on a rope

next to it

Sense of Humor

The sun is shining 

and the snow is falling.

It is Kafkaesque.

It is grotesque and Roman.

It is a surrealist painting.

It is every painting combined. 

It is Goddard and Revelations.

It is past and present and sex. 

The two boys across the street 

playing catch yell, "the sky is falling!"

They continue playing,

constantly missing, 

OK with all of it. 

They never notice my gaze, my presence,

as I sit on the porch smoking cigarettes

contemplating the absurdity 

of weather and planning. 

We always think of ourselves

as invincible. 

...

(k)

New Yorkfdh*

Walking beside the street

(LOOMING DEPRESSION)

Smiling, to no-one

(LOOMING DEPRESSION)

Headphoneless even

(LOOMING DEPRESSION)

Help a tourist

(LOOMING DEPRESSION)

Destination?

(LOOMING DEPRESSION)

No sir, you are too close to capture the entire thing, try 40th street

(LOOMING DEPRESSION)

Hotdogs taste very good in 50 degree weather

(LOOMING DEPRESSION)

Made 16 cents on a cigarette

(LOOMING DEPRESSION)

I did the math.

--

{q}

Mr. Mentat

Consumer Drug.

To augment, stretch, tear and PerFect

Future~Branches

Glass and hollow,

Run alongside the trunk (technocracy)

Separate, save certain perspectives.

"Falling into the Wrong hands!" They said.

"Bringing our fears to life!" They said.

"The only thing we have to fear is fear ITself!" - Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1932.

Mr Mentat they call me. Volunteer No. 00001 they call me.

Great Sense of Purpose.

"They put it inside him!" They say.

"He doesn't need!" They say.

"Needless!" Needles.

M. Mentat feels happy. Feels a paranoid life. Suspects anything. Knows nothing.

Lighter payload, heavier engine.

Memories like dollars.

"IT will save us!" They'll say.

"Kill IT!" They'll say.

"IT killed IS and saved us all." They'll say, eventually.

--

{q}

Bolaño

Are you the poet

who chose his path at sixteen

and let the blue

lines lie across his canvas

for spiders to nest?

I can always say

with certainty: Yes, I am

with skink skitters

littered in crumpled clumps,

of unlit corners

in my studio apartment.

This path didn't

choose me, no art ever does.

And don't trust

a liar, pedaling himself

In theatrical form.

-[m]

On the Smoothness of Skulls

It's a barren wilderness;

guarding fossils for patents

& harboring names for dates.

You always end up with

one another, don't you?

asking of the other what

you only ask yourself?

Why are the teeth the

indicators?  The red flag

of prosperity?  Do our

eating habits, & dietary

concerns always catalogue,

& cladogram so easily?

Is it true, what they've said

once: You were what we ate?

-[m]

Legs & Blue Skirts

Legs and Blue Skirts,

shimmering effortless.

No one around to stop them.

-[m]

Rocky-Mountain Freshness

Two peaks with a line,

done with a line,

symbolizes our freedom.

Two squiggles for snow

caps, two dashes flair,

and we're off, staggering

swagger at its feet.

It's tough to catch a

trademark

buried so solemnly grave;

But hidden within

the stitches and trim,

the object that

even mountains crave.

An amassing.  A garnishment.

A sprinkling of calloustude.

So gallantly conceived,

an ego swelled to etude.

-[m]

Richard Burton, 1967

I can't play with girls;

I'm not a Romantic actor,

in that sense.

Gibbering across the stage,

Galavanting as one would,

in such a situation.

No, I'm a epithet for

Equality.  But not one I live by.

In the strictest way.

I might be found mumbling,

perfectly at ease with

my surroundings;

And for that, I can find

contentment without them.

-[m]

Worry Is Faith Spelled Backwards.*

How unfortunate

that it only takes one beer

for me to forget 

what a terrible person I am.

By the time I've opened a third,

I've almost nearly burned a church.

I promise

I'm re-learning how to 

bite my tongue,

How to be seen and not heard.

Oh, what a time that was when I could!

What a precious year

of seeming deaf and dumb

and so beautifully harmless!

...

(k)

*Taken from a church sign on Route 60.  

death wish

i am so, so fucking sorry. 

Arrhythmia

my love expired
the same day as my Metrocard
it's like they were wired
to make life doubly hard

the fare will soon increase
but what can you do
soon i will cease
pulling answers from you

--

ka(te)

stars and gods

I say I admit it

I have no idea what a star is.

We are on the porch

because my mother doesn't let us smoke inside.

I am looking at the stars with my father.

He points to the sky with his cigar

and asks do you think that one is dead already?

I say I have no way of knowing.

The cigar could be pointing at anything.

He says I think that star has been dead

for thousands of years

and we aren't looking at anything really.

I say if we could wait long enough

then we would know for sure

that we'd been staring at nothing this whole time

and then laugh like gods. 

...

(k)

The Proverbial Big One

This morning I woke up and thought I'd died.

Dreams of deaths by strangulation, by suffocation.

It took longer than usual.

I checked the mirror.

I looked alive, 

but my irises were floating in an eye of blood.

"Think of it like a bruise," my brother told me,

because bruise doesn't mean broken,

just like blood doesn't mean blind--

but it is true 

that what blooms on the surface

is a warning of what's looming underneath--

I kept thinking of my own death.

It's one of those things

that if you think about too long

you'll throw up. 

You'll make yourself sick over it,

like thinking of what infinity means,

or the parts that make up the parts of atoms.

How many times have you escaped death?

How many times have you woken up alive

only to remember that the night before

you were strangling yourself 

between flushes

in a bathroom stall in a crowded nightclub

willing to do anything

to get rid of your hiccups?

...

(k)

Record

Where are you,

I asked

At the breaking point,

he said

What are you doing today,

I asked

Beg, I guess,

he said

Beg, 

I guess he said. 

...

(k)

14 hour poem, columbia national airport

The clouds of mountains of Bogota are yellow today

-

{q}

March 3, 2009. INSPIRATION day

"Ridiculous

How the space between three violins

Can threaten all of our poetry.

We bunch together like Cub

Scouts at a picnic. There is a high scream.

Rain threatens. That moment of terror.

Strange how all our beliefs

Disappear."

-Jack Spicer

Ceilings Are Just Floors

The thing about plane crashes is

that they level the playing field.

Humans are alive.

Corpses are dead humans.

Empty skulls make beaks look 

like cathedrals. 

Words are controlled sounds.

Sounds come from flies hovering 

above a fresh wreckage,

a hot, flat mess.

Let's see more of the world together,

before it all looks like Kansas. 

...

(k)

Movement, Years too Late

Headlines will read of

the betrayal to ones

and zeroes, continually

toasting our generation's

                    unwitting triumphs.

"Baked Capital Friendships of

Mixed Blessings, Heritage"

Stylized, with design flaws

fixed in v2.05.

                    bugs list, calculated.

Shoulders made of crystalline 

shards, an acrid fashion barge, 

ironically; organized; 

sentiments;

                    all flawlessly executed.

Arrogance mirrored only in post-.

In post-hymns we find,

it's in falsehoods we pine,

                    with lost regard

                    to alignment.

Cogency Prevails in Most Goods

,Capital.

Errors listed in tomorrow's

inevitable, typed, phrases.

Only this time, it'll be paper

exclaiming in the future tense:

          No one will read the news.

Poison-Induced

I never know what to do with right now;

scorpion stingers, marching slowly backward.

-[m]

SLS - 2-28-09 (Historical Moral #1)

Rats had a ball with the plague. 

...

(k)

Burn All My Poems

It's not the repetition

--recognition, misuse, misreadings--

I'm afraid of,

the carriage, the death, the waiting,

and to you...  my poems,

Destroy them, etc.

Feel their weight and

breathe

deeply;

inhale the rising carnage

toxic and suspended and, etc.

colloid, like Jell-O,

like horses heads

pointed towards eternity.

-[m]

(for q)

Dear Nietzsche, Convincing Is Exhausting

I don't have much

of a concept of how often 

is too often. Often

to me isn't often

enough. I suppose it's that ol'

empty husk chestnut 

that slippery slope 

of definition, that recognition

of the fatality of words, and how often 

they fall short of actual. 

I admit that it's strange how often

I profess that I love 

them, and that I want

so much of myself

in their existence, and that

I spend so much time convincing

myself that words are truthful, but never 

quite believing it. I don't sleep

well sober. 

...

(k)

SLS - 2-21-09. (Foresight)

I want to paint all the good people left red so I can pick them out from far away.

...

(k)

SLS 2.21.09

My blood is not a condiment.

...
[y]

Backlash

The Pages Are Filling Up

With Numbers. Nothing 

Against Them, Of Course.

Ruled Lines Match Them Well.

-[m]

Admission

I have wool socks

and a full tank of gas.

I'll go anywhere you want me to.

...

(k)

Not Even I Know Why I Feel Anxious Right Now

Not every night can be the best night ever.

That was a fact.

I wrote it, so it's true

I have to go outside to smoke a cigarette.

I bring wine with me because it is past five o'clock.

There are snowflakes in my Pinot Noir.

I didn't think I would have to wear this sweater.

I hear sounds of someone breaking into a house,

or hammering up a painting.

I think it is not a painting,

because a girl walks past the sound

and the sound stops.

Earlier today it was sunny.

We were walking over bricked sidewalks and sloping gutters.

I'm almost out of cigarettes and it is just past five o' clock.

It's a ten minute walk to the nearest bodega,

although no one calls it that.

I think I need some music.

I think I need a job.

I think that if I were in solitary confinement

I would not do well.

I would eat my hands. 

Today I read,

"Do you realize that all great literatures are

all about what a bummer it is to be a human being?"*

I'm scared again.

It's always true that the way out is by moving,

so I tell myself in times like this

to be like the shark

or the cement truck

because some people have no idea,

no concept,

of the shit they are walking past. 

...

(k)

*Kurt Vonnegut

Confession

The plant that you gave me is not doing well,

but that doesn't mean I don't love you.

...

(k)

Working Class Frustration

Take that monocle out of your eye socket
It's making my son and his friends upset.

We're having his birthday party today
At this Ground Round™--

It's a pity that we can't afford to rent a hall for ourselves
But my husband and I are just not making a lot of money right now.

You seem insane but I'm glad you're easily approachable.
Can't you take a minute to notice the other people

Here today just enjoying some burgers and chicken fingers on the cheap?
The children were having an excellent time before you came.

They were having so much fun that I thought my son
Had pretty much forgotten about how we promised him

We would have his party at the laser tag place
But he didn't forget--no.

He mentioned it just a moment ago
When he confessed how upset your monocle was making him.

...
[y]

Wife Trophy

All of the ugly women wrapped around
The lamppost across the street from my house.
Rubbernecking is what they do for fun.
All of their tiny feet on tip toe
Springing up and down--elastic bodies.

There are car accidents all the time on my street.

...
[y]

Single Line Saturday (Sunday). Like the Fuzz You Can Feel But Never Grasp

An errant hair is flirting with my eyeball.

...
(k)

Single Sat. 02.14.09 - Posthumous Reproducers

Like a tumbleweed, traveling dead.

-[m]

Comic Primer

the gutter is a rest,

don't make it bridge--

allow it to divide you, as

one dancing on the graves

of strangers.

-[m]

24 Productive Hours

...
[y]

Magik People

...

{q}

Farm Prison

On the map
I gesture to my take
Like I'm fanning out
An invisible deck of cards.

"I'll ride
My horse
Down this
Mile-wide path"

It stretches
From Nova Scotia
Down
To someplace
In Florida.

"All I mean to do is ride my horse."

...
[y]

Key to the City

I hereby award you

A key to the city.

For excellence

For keeping your cool

For not wigging out under pressure

For not killing an entire airplane of human

For landing your airplane of human instead of crashing it into a tall building

("Too soon" you may have thought)

You are excellent.

You excellently landed the human plane in the crashing waters

You kept your cool

You coulda wigged or buckled

Heroes don't buckle, wigg, they got the still hand

They bleed excellence

They land the plane (humans) in the water (crashing)

No sweat. 

Or did you? Did you sweat a little? You'd still be a hero.

You are so fucking excellent.

You get the key, man

For being a bloody hero.

For doing your job.

You saved the bleeding, sweaty human plane of buckling assholes

You saved us all

People at the newspaper company (they thank you)

Me, Mayor Fuckin Bloomberg (God do I thank you this makes me look awesome)

Your job is to fly planes and not crash them

You are a New York hero:

...

{q}

Viscosity

Motif Fledgling - an 

accessory to the murals,

the portraits, & the

backgrounds of culture.

Flightless, Pitiless, still

chained to the ground,

its movement patterns that

of a serpent; guileless; guided.

Our own growing pains

mark writhing & pleading,

mark entrance & exits;

a flower shaking for the sky.

But never discount 

the voracity of youth -

viscous as phlegm,

sticking to the throats of animals.

-[m]

Warped Reflection (Point 1)

How time distorts things.

Soon all you'll be thinking of is:

sex 

and 

"where can I get it?"

...

(s) + (k)

My Conversation with Émile Boirac (his) Clone

My clone visits my grave
I am dead.
But there is something very powerful
About his visits.
I think that maybe when he comes
He is experiencing déjà vu.
Experiencing déjà vu.

...
[y]

Single-Line Saturday 02.07.09 - Colloid

Like an underwater flower, exposed, soaking in the sun.

-[m]

A General Westward

This isn’t the type of place where the birds hum like bees.
An elegance floats in these airs. an elegance with a firm line.

So tear me up and call me “trenchant,” or maybe just “trenched;”
we’re all stuck, but a mudpit can only go so far before hitting crust.

Black-Eyed Susans make the lawn, marking dawn,
and it's rare to find a whole city just a futuristic graveyard.

But darting skyward what else is there but palms and sun?
Neither indigenous to methodical wastelands, no matter the season.

Grafting limbs and lawns, hymns and haws,
spectacular craftsmanship by people who remember dreams,

but can’t recollect past lives. They may only visit
solemn things to-be, and avenues not yet constructed.

These are the visionaries we’ve envisioned ourselves—
black as markets,
calm as stockades,
brittle and foreboding 
as time’s myriad passageways.

Enjoyment hallows our halls, and scars our shallows,
blankets our yards in thick, red and white checkers,

breezy and alone – skittering cloth beneath our shoes.
It’s high noon for everything but us.

A balanced framework hides us and guides us,
but it’s petals that mark our progress. Ringing outward

in yearly, cyclic, patterns. Draped thoroughly around
everything. And that’s just what we always need.

Believing is only the last step, but mark my words,
This place is due for its beliefs.

-[m]

my expectations died

and now i am free

Maybe I havent done enough
I might be ashamed of that.
For not doing enough
For not giving enough
For not being more perceptive, not being aware enough
For not understanding
For... being stupid

(Charles Manson)

What Little I Know

Why write? Why the medium of pen and ink and hand? It is certainly not for my penmanship, or my carefulness; indeed, most of what I write is not legible to others, and most of that has been ruined by a spilled drink or a small pocket. So, why then writing? I think it is a love of words, and, more particularly, the love of seeing thought crystalize on the page. Or, maybe it is because everyone can write, because nearly everyone can hold a pen, but only few can write something that is affective to the body, something that is just beyond the surface of reality, but still wrenchingly honest. There are many ways to write a story or a poem--I write mine with a cigarette in my hand--but it is difficult to write something that you care about, and that others will care about, despite what you are holding in your non-writing hand. For what little I know, I know that good writing is honest--and this is not to say that good writing falls under the category of memoir or nonfiction, for writing honestly in a memoir is even harder to do--but to write fiction and poetry well, you have to be as honest as possible. You have to be sure that you are writing from a perspective lacking both ego and id, which means that what you are writing you are writing hurriedly, as if necessary to your breathing, and that what you are writing, as you are writing it, has killed any thought about how it could be perceived. 

...

(k)

REMEMBER

"If you're going to try, go all the way. Otherwise, don't even start. This could mean losing girlfriends, wives, relatives, and maybe even your mind. It could mean not eating for three or four days. It could mean freezing on a park bench. It could mean jail. It could mean derision. It could mean mockery--isolation. Isolation is the gift. All the others are a test of your endurance, of how much you really want to do it. And, you'll do it, despite rejection and the worst odds. And it will be better than anything else you can imagine. If you're going to try, go all the way. There is no other feeling like that. You will be alone with the gods, and nights will flame like fire. You will ride life straight to perfect laughter. It is the only good fight there is."

-Charles Bukowski (Factotum) 

critical essay

research the fates.

research revelations.

if nothing else,

try and do at least one thing well.

using evidence from the text

is your best option.

stay informative.

stay out of it.

always remember,

they don't want to hear about you.

they want to hear about it.

it is what will keep them going. 

be convincing,

which is to say,

be confident.

even if you are kidding yourself,

pretend that you are a king

making just, yet clinical, observations.

don't care if you are right,

care that you are vehement.

don't back down,

sit with your back straight.

try to pretend that you are wearing

a heavier hat.

put on a hat. 

indulge in pomposity.

don't let your eyes

stray from the subject,

even if there is a mosquito

sucking at your armpit-

ignore it 

it is not important.

let it suck at you

for you know that you are doing something better.

be proud, 

and whatever you do

keep your eyes focused,

because victory is straight ahead of you,

if only you can bear it. 

...

(k)

Computer Lab Musings

Hello?

I heard your bird
Say a word
It said turd.

Your bird has a filthy beak.

I cannot force myself to appreciate
The fact that you have gone behind
God's back to make your bird
Cuss so.

...
[y]

Hockey's Always Good (overheard in the corridor between Stetson and Curry)

It's the same dream as usual:
I'm being trampled by horses;
And cowboys and indians
Are riding them.
And they're cursing.
Not at me but at each other.

Someone says (in Japanese):
Don't complicate this.
Don't trip all over your shadow.
And
Who's in charge of the money?
And
Who is it!

It's an efficient production.
I'm startled.
I trip over my shadow.
But just as free will is being strangled by fate,
I tell a lie.

...
[y]

most important

...

{q}

Scooter Vacation

Dreeeeaaaaaamin

(scooter vacation)

Steeeeaaaaaamin

(a real sensation)

Gleeeeaaaaaamin

(its just inflation)

Creeeeeaaaaamin

(in the gas station)

---

{q}

Flashbulb

He looked over his shoulder
At the sound of some rummaging through boxes.

Claudia come down stairs and cheer up--

His chair creaked in that old familiar way

--Won't you?

But only sounds of displacing
Bric-a-brac from upstairs
Kept on--no reply.
Come on, now, old girl.
So he lurched forward
To put his hands down on
The arms of his chair,
Get his balance and
Advance toward
The foyer.

Hey!

He fastened his hand to the banister and made his way, slowly, up the stairs.

Please don't come in, papa--for i can't begin
To explain my business in these boxes!

Ok. Ok. Ok.
But you'll have to come down sooner or later for supper.

Fine, then.

You know, Claudia, I shouldn't mind refreshing my memory
Of some of her old things either.

Refreshing, but what for. The greater part of your life was spent with her.

Sure. Sure. The memories, though, Claudia, they change around
Relocate.
They need to be tuned sometimes, too.
Just like the old piano in the living room.
And. You can vouch for me that that old thing hasn't had a tune in years.
But then again. Then again it still plays marvelously.
It can carry a tune that is.
One we might not recognize at all if it were properly tuned.

These old things though--

--Yes?

[y]

Taken from Kristina 2.3.09

When I was rolling over to face the alarm
I picked up a spool of thread
It was a deep reddish color--
The thread.
I almost completely forgot
That
I
Was
Rolling over
For a reason.

My sheets drew a shadow
Across my face
And, strangely, I was colder;
There was a rattling sound
Coming from the radiator
When, suddenly,
My alarm
Started ringing
Ringing and
Ringing again.

I pressed the button on top
And resumed laying still.
I smelled something delicious
Frying in the kitchen
And I heard the sink water running--
That recognizable hissing that's always accompanied by gargling.

I closed my eyes a little longer
But felt compelled
Finally
To get out of bed and
Start my day.

...
[y]

Poem Project: Use Something Of Mine As Yours (a phrase, a word, a piece, a sentence, etc)

When All Is Present, But Nothing Is Given

I wake up with strange words, or sometimes phrases, on my tongue.

Usually, they are in languages that I don't know.

I research how I think these strange things should be spelled. 

It is a disarming exercise.

Mea culpa,

joie de vivre,

pied-a-terre.

Sometimes they are in my language, but I still have to look them up anyways because I am not certain that they mean what I think they should. 

Conscription,

insouciance,

cryptogenic.

Sometimes I know the words exactly, and know what they mean, but when I look them up anyways, I am surprised that what I knew was wrong, or at least, not fully correct.

Glamour,

travel. 

Sometimes I become angry at this, angry at myself for not knowing simple things that I should.

How could I have not known that there were so many definitions for

heart

and how silly was I to think I knew what the word meant without knowing the other parts of it.

Sometimes I wonder if there is more meaning to all of it, these early literatures, or if it is just a simple matter of waking up with words in my mouth, like pieces of a dream that I kept hidden under my tongue like a pill or a communion cracker, just a piece of a dream sentence that got stuck when I was rolling over to face the alarm again, waiting for when I am ready to cough it out into consciousness.

Maybe it is as simple as that. 

...

(k)

Near Moosehead Lake

Around the river's bend and towards home:
My brother, myself, a boatswain and dog.
The edge of Sugar Island was lined with white foam;
The reluctant noon sun was slowly swallowed by fog

A sound from the east in the crag of a scree
Startled the dog; his head cocked in that direction.
The boatswain whispered softly, "dog what do you see?"
My brother saw the plumage of the Peregrine Falcon

The boatswain used a branch to trace a line in the sky;
My brother secured a good photo to take.
The dog flared his nostrils and let out a cry;
The falcon's reflection flickered over the lake.

Neighboring falcons resigned to their flock
As we knotted the line and lassoed our dock.

...
[y]

Sunday Sonnets, 2-1-09

Watermarked

How quickly things can get away,

how often thoughts just disappear,

despite the ink or time one takes

to liter'lize what's between the ears

it all goes swiftly from our clutch,

our brains move faster than our hands,

and we all want to say so much,

but brains can't make hands understand.

But when brains can manipulate

the fingers over pen and page

the words that come rely on fate,

and pray that beer will not upstage,

for nothing is as humbling

as writing that has been drowning. 

...

(k)

Sonnet Sundays

Murphy's Song

A rhyme but wouldn't dare have come to die

If only his was this, a right to air

The fearful trade many for just one eye

And justice knows just this: the word of "fair"

But heroes come from Gallus blood to fight

A man of generations looped and sewn

Be armor clad with semi-automatic might

Electric eyes and will parts steel and bone

Ride on to splash their blood upon the soil

The green of earth is mother's perfect sword

And Boddickers, all on knees of selfish toil

Regain the truth of the imperfect word

The herds of pushing thoughtless always run

While heavy knights walk on 'till hides the sun

---

{q}

Single Line Saturdays 1.31.09

What color light will the sun throw today?

...
[y]

Single Line Saturdays, 1-31-09

He died upon impact, which is to say, he was lucky. 

...

[k]

Single Line Saturdays 1-31-09

I'll smoke your whole fuckin planet.

---

{q}

Working for a Hand

At my local grocer
At the end of aisle 9
Is the first time I saw her
On the checkout line

2 lemons to pay for
A stick of Old Spice
Olives to savor
And traps for my mice

Beep beep
Price price
Beep beep
Price price

The girl at the register
Was missing a hand
The customers after me
Won't understand
I think I'll make a scene to take the attention
Because you seem like a nice girl working for a hand

...
[y]

All I Ever Wanted

His father said to him,

and he said to me,

if you're gonna steal,

steal big. 

Steal

a car,

rob 

a bank,

hold up

a liquor store,

kidnap

a child

for a delicious ransom.

But

whatever you do, don't

steal

a wallet,

or a pack

of cigarettes.

Don't bother

with a watch,

or a TV,

or copper wire 

hanging off

an old apartment like

old spaghetti,

because

regret 

doesn't care

if it's a bagel

or a diamond.

It'll settle 

into you

in the same 

sinking way,

stinking like greed, 

and it won't love you. 

...

(k) 

Don't Pay for White Teeth

Kind of fingering the edge of the page
and pressing my lips against the window
before the train stopped
reminded me of one time in Magnolia.

I was a little boy. A very a little boy
and it was time for a cleaning.
I hate the dentist.

The waiting area, in my memory, was somehow smokey.
My
Heart beat fast.
A receptionist gestured to my mother;
My mother sent me on my way

I stared back at her; she was fingering the pages of a magazine.

"Before long" is an absolutely incorrect thing to say.
Time grows old in a dentist's chair.
After the hygienist finished her probing and prodding
The real dentist came inside.

He was a stupidly old man.
His beard dragged on the floor behind him down the narrow hall.
He entered the room and shut the door behind him.
He started talking like a fool.
"Dribbly-Bwibbly-Gibbly-Mimbly"
And some more of this and that
Singy songy old man banter.

I started shaking in the seat as he went for his tools
With his geriatric hand.
He was shaking too--
Like a rotten apple lost in a tree top.

...
[y]

Steam Dream (meme)

I had a dream

I was walking

under and between

loud legs, long for speed, steal for stamina

and you whistled and slumped

back in your saddle

and one of your silky dreadlocks drifted past your hairline,

parting your goggled puss,

like a skinny brown beak.

I told you I loved you

as your mount hissed and squealed

I can hardly imagine you hearing

me correctly.

---

{q}

Old Hat vs. New Hat

I've got a dumb lip-

a limping half of a mouth

like a stuck fish

succumbing to the hook stuck in it. 

It's useless-

It can barely hold a cigarette!

At the dentist's, 

I sat in a long chair

like a reclining stone covered in plastic.

A bib was strapped around my neck-

Bib is what he said-

I'm not kidding. 

He pulled rubber gloves over his hands

and pushed his fingers down

into the space between the fingers. 

He did it on both sides.

For some reason, 

I couldn't help but picture

blood dripping from the ceiling,

until the dentist made a joke, 

came at me with a syringe,

and told me to open up,

just like an old boyfriend once whispered to me

when I was still new to all of this.

Now, I am an old hat

with half a smile,

living the dream.

Sent via Blackberry by AT&T

---

(k)