Sunday, October 31, 2010

1163. THE RIVER LETHE

THE RIVER LETHE
-(part a.)-
I am riding this bark along
the river of forgetfulness; trying
not to sleep, yet failing at that.
Above me, a lethal form of sky
is hovering low; caves and flowing
water assuage the doubts, as I
duck and timber the flow.
-
My brain this time is purely the
loser. Attempting its own deceit,
so sure of the reality before it, it
pauses at nothing at all - but goes on,
and on, relegating a propensity for
reflection to only the water alone.
And even that reflection is but
the faint glimmer of moving illusion.
-
-(part b.)-
What is it I've carried this far,
and strapped to my back, no less?
What is it drags me through water like
leaden weight, sinking and falling? The
onus of this magnificence? Oh, surely
not that! The plaque-worn, granite-load
of memory carried, ever onward and more?
Perhaps. Singing like sirens, I hear a
feminine sound - voice, songstress, singer.
And, oh though, would it be, she were mine!
-
-(part c.)-
This foul nomenclature; I bury the
name 'neath the waters. Why try the climb
and the flow? I am sinking as I sing. Both
regard each other equally, these words -
past me strange landscapes pass.
I am entering Heaven,
or I am leaving a Hell.

1162. A FEW MEN

A FEW MEN
A few men making mischief can ruin a
world already gone high to Hell; can take
a tree and bend it 'til it breaks, can re-route
the rivers and streams until Scylla and
Charybdis look serene. I wouldn't pass
their way, for even a dollar or less.
I may have been to the hills. I may have
been past the gorge. I saw the arrival
of new Fall and all its colors and noise.
The toll house was filled but with skeletons
as I passed - and, to be truthful, it was
not any longer Halloween.
-
I get sick of the costumes and pretension.
A few men like this, feigning magic and skill,
can alter my world and enter at will. But I
will not let them in. The high heats of August,
all of them as one, will still linger in my memory
and keep their cold faces out.

1161. I'M GOING TO TAKE THE BET

I'M GOING TO TAKE THE BET
That the light on your face is better than
any light of God's or glory, that the sun in
your hair can make miracles. I already know
that the miles within are always greater
than those outside. This is the story
to which I subscribe.
-
Mandolin meadows, scrumptious saliva,
and the deeds of every common man.
I am going to take the bet, that within
this world, we are each doing all that we can.

Saturday, October 30, 2010

1160. ONCE PASSING THE ZUIDER ZEE

ONCE PASSING THE
ZUIDER ZEE
Kindling wood. An oasis of little men. A
pile of flowers cast away. Don't tell me
anything I never knew before - these
are catcalls I hear; the frown of the loser,
the arched eyebrow of a distant King.
-
To all those men who play cards, I say,
'play on! Eat your cigars and finger those
cards. Leave nothing behind but ash for
the mice. This is a miserable Paradise,
yet a Paradise nonetheless - and you
never get a second chance at that.
Malingerers always remain idle.
At heart, anyway. Look up, once,
as I pass. Just say something,
and I'll keep moving on.'

1159. TOO LATE FOR THE PARTY

TOO LATE FOR THE PARTY
I'd come too late for the party : the tables were down,
the cups had already been taken away. A few dead-drunk
people were set around like puppets props from the
Living Theater : twisted limbs, frost on their faces,
and all that shouldered harmony of the dense. The
pretty waitress from the kitchen sauntered by. Picking
up scraps, she sparred with the busboy; as if throwing
darts and flirting with results. Only the lighting saved
the day. I'd asked if I needed a reservation. 'Now?',
she said, 'we're going away.' Hallelujah to that.
-
Along the stairway, the crescent moon had bent strips
of yellow light; they rolled across the steps lending
a color to the night; not much, but a color nonetheless.
Had I been a smoker, this would have been the place.
Instead, I took my rest - leaning on the wall I watched
the three men from the Carson Warehouse load their
crates : marked from China, big, strapped wood,
probably filled with marbles or nothing really good.
Cheap wares and Chinese flares - all that stuff of
dollar stores and emporium fairs. Junk, probably
like the boat they also named.
-
I realized I was late for the party. I realized what
I'd thought, as well. If I had a Chinese junk, I'd
sail the harbor solo, never setting foot on land
again. Impractical as that would be, from all this
patter I'd be free. It took a moment more to sink
in - nothing mattered anymore, and I was
drowning anyway. Too late for the party,
and too late for the festive tray.

Friday, October 29, 2010

1158. EPHEMERA OF THE SCATOLOGICAL

EPHEMERA OF THE SCATOLOGICAL
I knew it wasn't going to work from the moment
she walked in. She took her dress off. A moment
too long, it seemed. Nothing underneath; oh good
God, a pussy like a fist. My sunglasses, as I recall,
came off in an instant. With her one hand, she
flicked some sort of radio on to a songbook of
her making - a shifting yet frolicsome jazz
I'd never gotten to like. We sat down for a
spell, just learning to breath. She said her
name was 'Emee'. I couldn't quite grab
the pronunciation.
-
I'd never done this before : 'too many years
in school and not that much to show,' I'd said
to her long before, when her mother was
still around. Back then it was a difficult
choice, the 'her or her' - now that she
was alone, it was much more simple.
-
I jacked up her car with the only
lift I had. The car stayed up
a very long time while we
worked on the engine parts
parts below. Things
running, and
things not.

Thursday, October 28, 2010

1157. AVERROES

AVERROES
I found Averroes with his abacus
slopping up the floor - using his
perpetual rags to clean up his mess.
It was so very simple : migrant
headaches and Iberian disputations.
People nodded as we passed. He'd just
put everything back, saying he had
reason for this and reason for that.
None of which I believed at all. Like
anyone else on this ripped-torn planet,
he was wandering without guide
and lying to boot. I laid my head
down and cried.

Wednesday, October 27, 2010

1156. SICK UNTO...

SICK UNTO...
Death. And the old Rambler,
parked at curbside - half a century
old already, limping, leaking, leaving.
Puddles of oil where once the sweet
Byrds sang. Fifth Avenue Presbyterian
Church. Gaucho Corral and all those
gay boys, choir-singing themselves
to Death. Again. Mention at your
own peril. When Cult becomes
Culture - isn't it true - we're
all in trouble. Double. Trouble.
-
Weltschmerz. Gotterdamerung.
Wiener Schnitzel. Oberamaggau.
-
The hand on the light bar is
controlling the stage. Things go dark,
go light, go dark again. We don't know him.
Don't know who even let him in. Mention
at your own peril. Or mine. Death...
and the old Rambler, sinking at the curb.

1155. BRING THE POPE TO ME BY TUESDAY

BRING THE POPE
TO ME BY TUESDAY
It isn't an egregious harm, this web-craft lounging
that we do; inexperience, amidst those whom I admired.
Wantonness, together, brought us both to this sepulchre
- where now the geese fly by, along, and high overhead.
Atop the clouds, the sky. Atop the sky, the Monday moon.
-
I'd always wanted such meritorious service; alike to
myself and those around me. We swilled the beer in
the open field, wrote stories of each other in
darkened classrooms, and practiced at the target
with our lethal bows and arrows. Yet, somehow,
still alive, we stand to thrive. Will not leave.
Demand an impression, a visit, a blessing.
-
Let Him come then; nothing like that matters.
Bless the baloney sandwiches, and bless again
the sacred water. The Red Sea parts at noon.

Tuesday, October 26, 2010

1154. NEW HOUSE

NEW HOUSE
(suiting myself very well)
I lifted the new house sideways until
its cover came off the door, but by then
I was already startled with wonder. There
was, as well, a new tenancy - beneath
floorboards and cellar doors, precious
moments now, of a newer calling. I was
dwelling in a box of my own creating,
and suiting myself now very well. The
wild lilt of the cardboard edges, right
there, where once all the boxes had stood,
left forms of ghost image, like memory,
in the space where a closet should be.
I came away with nothing, but felt all
the more secure. In my new house, I
so sure, I would want to stay forever.

1153. TITLE

TITLE
Let us call this something nice : the juggler, who
loses a hand in an accident, the singer, whose
vocal chords fade, the soldier coming home
with one leg. Or - as I've heard before -
the ballerina who can dance to nothing at all.
Everything jumbles together in that shop on
the corner. In a window, the fortune-teller's
globe and a wand. A plastic pyramid pretends
at ancient Egypt. The lone red light beckons.
I wouldn't know anything if I knew nothing at all.
-
In the rich man's atrium, I noticed, he
displayed his collection of medieval armor.
What appeared to be knights in full regalia,
chain-mail and weapons strange. Studded
balls and quaint devices with which to kill.
Things I've forgotten the names of already.
I wanted to laugh, but just scoffed instead.
Yes! This is how we built our world, and
who else but this rich fellow should know.

Sunday, October 24, 2010

1152. DEEP FOCUS

DEEP FOCUS
If one goes to deep focus, a penetrating leap,
the edges blur from the distance and colors
seem enhanced. Lines and angles thereby change.
Like the swiftest, sleek ship skittering swift
across an ocean smooth, there are seeming blurs
where things should be. Wild maritime breezes
blow things crooked, as bent-by-time-itself worlds
change and collide. We live a far too comfortable
life when we don't know things such as these.
The threat of comfort looms, the slow demise
of any integrity and daring snaps us shut. The
very midnight sky trickles down upon us into
a dark and bloodless ooze. If one goes to deep
focus too soon, on the other hand, there
is only one mistake to be made - the scent
a track dog takes for granted : that this flat
life will last forever, or should; that reason
and logic make everything right, or could;
that we are most alone when we are
working with ourselves. Beats me
what any of that means, but
there it all is nonetheless.

1151. 44 CARNATIONS

44 CARNATIONS
I counted 44 carnations on 24th Street along
the front of someone's store. The light was all
brand new and the day hadn't even really
started yet : tall buildings massed in the looming
distance, as if trying to overhear a word. Lights
changed and taxis dove for cover. Something
like the Flower District was limping along; all
those sagging storefronts still old and decrepit.
No one had yet fixed up a thing, as if the
rest of the city - all that new glass and steel -
didn't really exist at all. A man was on the sidewalk,
his prayer rug on the ground, and he was actually
bending to the east, as some form of sun came up.
The solar-powered worship of carnations and men,
it was, that made me realize right then - and stop
dead in my tracks - that I was living in a moment
of time unprepared for by me. I never thought this
would be. I still live in a court of milkmen and
breadmen and doctors who came to one's house.
Maybe a simpler time, but one still there for me.
Too bad then - all this super-speed and overlap,
people playing notions off the ground. A million
ancient things beneath the sun, still leaking in
to color a day that's just begun. For me, I
shrugged and moved along, still
watching shadows on the wall.

Saturday, October 23, 2010

1150. RANDOM THOUGHTS

RANDOM THOUGHTS
I want to bless my readers, anyone who does,
and especially those who comment. I really
love them all - invisible matter I can think
about to no recourse, having nowhere to go
nor image to see. Unlike the sky before me,
or that orange-fat moon stuck low and full
on a Halloween horizon, I get nothing back
tangible from them except the wizard-like
feeling of knowing they are there. Trick or
treat this, I say. They are the razor in my apple,
and I am only too happy to bite. What that says
about me, I leave to you to decide. But please
don't write me about that. Please just say you
love me back. I'm really that miserable a person.
A cat, meowling in sickness in my own sour milk.

1149. DEAR UNCLE NEFARIOUS

DEAR UNCLE NEFARIOUS
(before I hit the ground)
I am writing to say this to you :
I want to take my own life. Very
slowly, mind you, but take it
nonetheless. I want to go double-time
slow on the breaths I take, taking
only one in the space where two are
usually needed. Will this then redden
my face? I wonder. I want to drink my
poison by the drop, in droppers I think
I can get from Joey's chemistry set. I think.
If I poke my skin with a sharp knife-point,
just a poke, day by day, will it eventually
add up to a jab? What can you tell me?
Perhaps, as I am changing a tire, let's say,
can I get the car to only slowly crush me?
Can I outlast the hurt? Why no, of course not,
if I could outlast the hurt I wouldn't be
planning to do all this. Asking these stupid
questions. If I jump off a bridge or building,
remember too, I only want to come down
ever so slowly, floating this way and that
like a feather, for a very long time,
before I hit the ground.

1148. IN MY TIME OF DYING TOO

IN MY TIME OF DYING TOO
There will be nothing like the haste of passage when
the passage makes haste to come : enter at will for
there is no turning back. That bevy of shoes and socks
in the doorway, remember, they were all for you :
left by the millions, forgotten by all, never needed
in any case. Cavemen and acolytes, millionaires
and troglodytes, the mixed sortie of ten-thousand
atomic bombs - all going off in your face, at once.
Lights the brilliance of flame, clouds as silver as gold.

Thursday, October 21, 2010

1147. SPURIOUS & FURIOUS

SPURIOUS & FURIOUS
What will you do for me, Mr. McMosty?
The genuflection we never see, the rip in the sky,
the poise that makes a skater shy?
I can never be what you are now, but at
least I can sit down and alter the place
I sit; finding better places for that.
I open to you now both of my hands,
yet you will see they are full of ink -
ink and paint, the mainstays of my
existence. Yours, on the other hand,
a spurious form of money made vague
by speed and froth. You say so much of
nothing, I blanch at the cantilevered fabric
of your fulsome cloak. You anger me, you do.
But that fact makes no difference.
Together, we are a team from Hell, both
reading different signals from the
selfsame signal giver.

Wednesday, October 20, 2010

1146. WALKING ON THE EDGE MARLENE

WALKING ON THE EDGE MARLENE
My God, I really don't know you :
I am walking on the edge, Marlene, here
where the early-morning street-sweeper
crawls along the curbs and corners, splashing
water out beneath its scratchy brushes. Like
the cat's low meowling, I am heard to utter
sounds - long and short, no matter, all
my sounds nonetheless. I walk past all
the empty doorways and the broken lights.
I really don't know you at all.
-
Turning inward is an infelicitous thing -
inscribing thoughts in private notebooks,
writing small ideas in bigger places then they
deserve. The sin is wanderlust, some seer says.
I laugh back at him, and say 'I've been walking
since I was ten, you fool.' I really don't know you,
Marlene, but probably wouldn't even if I could.
-
Paradox and conundrum. Two paired ideas
of nothing, going nowhere. The frog shouts at
the pond, and the pond shouts back - yet only
they, in Nature's way, can understand each other.
I find that seems a lot like us. I really don't know
you, Marlene, but probably wouldn't if I could.

Monday, October 18, 2010

1145. TURTLE DOVE OASIS

TURTLE DOVE OASIS
Camarague, mistral and the sands
of distant Morocco and such - I want to
land upon my feet, you see, where I can.
Tortmeister, hammelsinger, Wednesday's
King of Prague. How those ancient names
remember. Let the torch flame singe the palms.
-
Native lallygagging layabouts
listening to sweet squiggling musics.
While their fair girls dance all
the way to France, I envy
all their aplomb.

Saturday, October 16, 2010

1144. KILLER

KILLER
Wanted dead or alive, keeping company
with bedposts and bar-girls, spinning
a six-gun under his covers. Let us find
ways to reach him. Writing in cities
to people in the country, while sending
letters too from the country to the town.
He's a voracious sidewinder of subterfuge
and disguise. And though I'd know him
anywhere, I'd have to see his eyes -
the eyes that have killed, those eyes
which look past the pinpoint aims at the
end of the barrel. The Rook at the head
of a chessboard sweep - really nothing
so valuable, and nothing we'd keep. String
him up, in your imagination of course, for
he only gets down again and can ruin -
certainly - any day you may have.
Free is nothing. The task is simply
in staying alive.

1143. OF A MADRIGAL AND LACE

‎OF A MADRIGAL AND LACE
Madrigal and lace - a gloved suggestion for your heart
to be reached for by others. Lights of the great world
around us. Inspired by the Heavens, all the arts are
at your feet, and I thereby beseech you for your
Winter ice and Summer heat, all those things
which make us vanquished. In the inner harbor
of the greater mind where we all unknowingly
live, there are things amassed we feel but never
recognize : a heartfelt face, a wiry heart, the
pound and pace of all Life brings us.
-
The grab-bag stories of Gods and grace, we
memorize the lines and speak them, in haste,
only then pretending to understand. In front
of us, some mental marshall with a cloak and
scabbard pretends to force us to want to go
on living. That ship has left for outer seas.
We are standing by the seaside posts,
awaiting the salvage ship of Time itself
to bring us rescue, rescue and
solace, and rest.

Friday, October 15, 2010

1142. SYNOPSIS

SYNOPSIS
Into my nature there entered something dark :
spinning a shadowy maelstrom right into my
heart. Doubt equalled spin, and I questioned
within. The rising and falling of breath bespoke
my goal - a sparkling Freedom, from both
ascension and the falling down. Like the
airs of a distant star spinning afar, the
darkness kept moving about me. I looked
out, shrouded in flesh, and found - for
the nonce - that I couldn't move myself.
A certain heaviness depleted my strength.
I knew too soon how much was over.
My dark soul resonated with its
black depth. Suddenly, I felt
ready to move on.

1141. KAISER AND FALKENROY

KAISER AND FALKENROY
"I can't shouldn't have done anything looking back
the measly way it ended still makes me sick excuse
me I'm sorry not then but now." So, bedraggled, I stayed
to watch : fifteen sickening more clowns and that frantic
reporter from the Post, the dead, raggedy body being
drawn from the water, the car horn somehow playing
itself, an alarm gone bad or something. This was how
it seemed things should never have been like this.
"I'm glad anyway you came it's good to have you
here. Yes, he was my brother, but you probably
knew him far better than me. To me, he was
just always a creepy outsider. So sorry now
so sad." He turned away and walked to
his car. Same old black Buick I'd
seen him in last time. The other
people too started breaking
away. I took a breath and
walked off, leaving
nothing behind.

Tuesday, October 12, 2010

1140. HIGHWAYS & BYWAYS OF A NEVER-ENDING GRACE

HIGHWAYS & BYWAYS OF
A NEVER-ENDING GRACE
(nyc, 1969)
I walked the jester every night.
I never felt about 5th Avenue this
way before. Not at all. 'Shining light,
good night, Applewhite' was really all
I could remember of living back then.
If I'd ever attained anything, it was
no attainment at all. And then there
was you. You were just a heart by the
riverside - probably why I loved you best.
Kept as chatter, released as lust, held like
so much else. That small house on the riverbank
bluff - late night yellow illumination by lights
beyond. A side-apple romance, and you sure
knew how to bake. I've got my own story and
I don't need yours. Simplicity kills, and baby I
ain't got the breath to go it alone. How is it that
when we touched we touched on two sides? My
belly to your belly, it always seemed, out on
that highway of a never-ending grace.

1139. OF STAN LEE AND PEPPER WALTER

OF STAN LEE AND
PEPPER WALTER
They were carrying their wallpaper home like
gendarmes on parade - comic book characters
frozen in time. Nettlesome voyagers, glue-paper
fiends, superheroes now stuck outside of time and
thus powerless now forever. Past doorways and
garage sheds, past all those tank tops, all those tits,
along the city's streets and alleys in this Summer heat,
past windows of dawn and afternoon and evening too.
It was a gracious pronouncement by a humorous God :
a Being of salvage, a Maker of many things. Stan Lee
and Pepper Walter, forever together, walking by.

1138. LONG NORTH AMERICAN FORCE

LONG
NORTH AMERICAN
FORCE
Well, well, what should it be! A voice
like this, talking to me. All along the
deep horizon, that Mohawk warrior
slipping through some Glimmerglass
woods. That upright and peering soldier,
staring straight ahead. What he would see
if he only had eyes : His complete future
of nothing is made for our ruination. He
killed this Mohawk for tar and retribution,
a never-met occlusion made for today's hate.
All ass-backwards too. Would such a stupid
soldier see, over the Mohawk's corpse, parking
lot buildings of glass, abandoned downtowns
and Nature walks, mad, frenzied shoppers
beating each other off? And off? And, of course,
that dollar sign that chokes every newborn
baby's cry. For these sickening nascent social
forces, soldier boy, go home and let us die alone.

1137. THE MOMENT, THE NORM

THE MOMENT, THE NORM
You should then have to witness everything -
passing vignettes of solace and harm, the
complacent, dull homage of a million separate
lives. In that window grange, the two people
in their kitchen, eating one guesses a breakfast,
by the hour of day. The light thrown onto the
courtyard like glass from where they sit. A
dull, yellow kitchen glow somehow brought
brightly to life. A red sweater on a woman's
body, like a tea cozy on some ceramic pot.
A pottery bowl showing shape and form.
All the same, everywhere,
the moment, the norm.

Sunday, October 10, 2010

1136. THIS MIGHT BE DIFFICULT

THIS MIGHT BE DIFFICULT
A man I once knew as alive is dead - not the first,
mind you, but another in a line. I barely outrun the
bunch of them. Suicide, bullet to the head, cancer,
motorcycle death, diabetes, stroke, aneurysm...
I'm naming but a few for those inclined to know.
Not a one of them did I truly 'know' in that sense of
a science or a chemistry of knowledge or psychology.
In fact, the whole entire lot of them baffled me always -
left me stranded, bereft, without too much emotion.
Misunderstanding all I saw, so to say. But I was never
too much concerned. I'd listen and nod - whom they'd
just fucked, where she was now, how it went with
Lola or Cindy or Jane, career crap, exploits, every
outrageous claim. The idiot with his made-up shit, stories
of expensive clothes and imported denims and leathers,
three-thousand dollar sunglasses, whose ass he'd just kissed.
I was supposed to be impressed - by such fucking lies do
you know them. Reality being, he was probably a psychotic
freak still locked in a cage. But one alone. There were the
others, more sensible, more gentle, sweet and kind. The
writer friend, living alone like a snipe in a garrett, unsure of
everything but his isolation and distance. Much like me -
I had to say 'yes!' to that. The academics, the union guys,
the ones with the money and big jobs. Everyone a circus unto
himself, my guys, one by one passing dead for death and
gone for forever. It's so fucking over everyday.
No more, no never.

1135. STILL LIFE IN BLUE AND WHITE

STILL LIFE IN
BLUE AND WHITE
For at least the time being I am living without
reference, without you, and without direction.
Now, to my left, are the heights of Morningside -
as they are called - and, farther off, the jumble of
the Jumel Mansion. So many things are different,
while so much is yet the same. I see little women
with petticoats and bonnets scurrying around.
They hold trays in their tiny, small hands.
Tea and coasters, things to eat. Odd it all
is to see this now, years and years on.
-
If people say I am a seer, it is because I see, but,
yea, only backwards - through a mist of time,
through blue China dyes and porcelain tiles
and Delft. All those things of those very odd
words and very old days. In essence, whatever
I am and see, I want to be left alone. This is
all ruined by crowds, dissembled by noise.
-
I am jarred anew by the sound of a truck or a bus,
one or the other, breaking through space. Two modern
men, loud and annoying, are bolting past me walking
fast and - seemingly - now shouting towards each
other as if they actually have something to
say. What a wasted day. This is leftover time,
poorly spent, a civilization of laggards and dopes.
Others are eating from paper wraps, spitting as
they talk and chew. Gentility falls to the ground
around them, their still life in white and blue.

Saturday, October 9, 2010

1134. EVIDENCES

EVIDENCES
Abound. Everywhere.
Small towns made of sutures
and stories, monuments to the
war dead of decades old dread.
Persipolicitic nurses still handling
judgement bandages and kindling wood.
Ideas, campfires, hospital wings and
graveyards where the teachers wait.
Tell stories. Review the past. Engorge the
new reviewer : we are what we are not now
and never have been what it is we set out to
be. Wars and revolutions may be dandy,
but they accomplish so very little.

Friday, October 8, 2010

1133. ROOTING THE END TIME

ROOTING THE END TIME
I was finding things out : dirt turns to mud turns
to dirt once more. Light turns to dark turns
to light again. What essence each has is
far beyond my comprehension. An
American atom bomb project called
Trinity? Three Gods in one hat?
-
I drank coffee at the Livermore Lounge.
She came over, to sit with me. Her
name was Alice, and she'd said
already that her mother was
a communist but long ago
dead. Named her other
sister Enola, after the
Enola Gay.
-
Beats me, all this does. Broke my mind
and broke up my day. I really wanted
somewhere to hide. All I had was
a drink with someone who lied.
No chance of anything
more than that.

1132. GARGANTUA

GARGANTUA
Embroiled are the lights of Sydney,
massive are the flames of Koche. The
frogmen sit around, talking of Melbourne
Harbor, or the swift currents along the
Adelaide Breach. Of a sudden, behind
them, rises up the great monster, roaring
like a fountain full-flowing, tearing down
all beaches and walls. Ancient foundations
crumbling, structures of 600 years fall
away. Like Galileo, Newton, Einstein and
Godel, it has effected a great certain
change in the sky. 'Let us cancel all
knowledge now,' says the lanky fireman,
'for this has now altered all things.'

Wednesday, October 6, 2010

1131. PODCOAT

PODCOAT
This world won't be mine, this world won't
be yours. We are probably as good as dead
already. Things change and time passes.
The variegated coatings of the round
pills we digest are the colors of a life well
lived. Nothing escapes fancy : watch those
tree-leaves turn their ways, listen to
the black walnut pod fall; it hits the
ground with its own sweet thud.
We can ignore or we can absorb,
but I bet we can't forget - all that
which we know - from those
long tribal pasts in the forests
and woods, when sense and
reaction was all that we had.
Say what you want, but
life gets no better. Of
that, you should
be glad.

Tuesday, October 5, 2010

1130. INSENSATE

INSENSATE
(bulgaria/cold entry)
I have seen every valve turned the wrong way once -
gas flowing, water flooding, gates closed
and long doors locked. No one could escape.
The mind-rending shatter of glass and bulb,
blowing out everywhere. 'We know our men by
what they leave behind them.' It is so bad, in fact,
that carnage of this sort has its own encyclopedia entry.
-
Wipe the countertops down after spraying.
Burn all the cloths. Separate the cuttings from
the regular trash. We are done with our work.

1129. MY OWN ANDY WARHOL MOMENT

MY OWN
ANDY WARHOL
MOMENT

So upon coming my saint white-eyed
over-present dominator of one's only
ragged dreams; you opened eyes
commingling but faintly with things
upon this Earth. I'd seen your kind
before. The trailers of all my stairway
trash - where the man so inspecting
the new table stays in place as he
crosses nonetheless a doorway. Paradox
is like that everywhere we go. A repetition.
The random rateables and the oh-so-constant
precisions too. This is, after all (you said)
'what makes art art.'
-
Kiss Brillo Box Empire State Blow Job
Sleep Kiss repeat Kiss Brillo Box
Empire State Blow Job Sleep Kiss.

1128. ONLY SO MANY SHADES OF RED

ONLY SO MANY
SHADES OF RED

There are only so many shades of red.
No? New? Old only? Say what can you
say see do you paint me? Red? Homosexual
tablet you say you were watching Spartacus
again 'for probably my twentieth time.' I
honestly turned and said what I thought,
'but I do not know what that is.'
-
'A movie,' you said, 'just a movie.'
I replied, 'but they're like billboards,
they're everywhere but you don't have
to see them if you don't want. They can
be ignored.' You laughed back, and said,
'only so many shades of red make
this red world red.'

Monday, October 4, 2010

1127. LIFE DRAWING

LIFE DRAWING
To be just sitting around, drawing
the lines from the life before you -
drawing like talking and drawing like
draw. Either way, what I say : the
modular forms of the things placed
before you, like icicles or vases within
the orange or pear. I know as I go I
cannot see what's there. My own
achievement is this smudgy line,
drawn from where I cannot say.
Lifted from a memory, or a
fantasy of flame.
-
As I watched, distant enough,
but still alive, the entire world changed.
'Don't write that letter, rather keep
your opinions to yourself.'

1126. SCIENCE GENE FLOW

SCIENCE GENE FLOW
I awoke as if from another land,
one better suited to my ways and needs.
A needle into a spike - I'd goaded these
changing illusions on. I had not wanted
words, but got them anyway. Used
and unused both, they received their
comings no matter.

1125. THE BLESSING OF THE DOGS ON FERRY STREET

THE BLESSING OF THE DOGS
ON FERRY STREET

I stumbled here by quite the accident
- dog yawp yowl, unleashed and how.
They stretched the rope and gathered
on the grass. All those leaders and their
dogs to follow. The parade was a graceful
canine bite - more like a suckle than
one of fright.

1124. SANCTIONED AND OVERDRAWN

SANCTIONED AND OVERDRAWN
There was no taking back what already had
passed. I'd known that anyway. The lumbering
light had broken our brows as we spoke; patterned
reflections of leaves and trees splashing oddly,
I noticed, on your forehead and hair. That newly
installed black iron fence, so perfect behind your
form. The passing of a season, just like this,
would be a pleasure to behold.
-
'Come over to the this corner, watch my heels
in play.' I didn't understand your words and, gaping,
my own jellyfish mouth wondered what to say in return.
Or I wondered, I guess, what to make it say. Life
is a funny process like that - a part of me commands,
and another part follows. The mind is in control,
but everything else wallows, not knowing what to do.
-
Perhaps in itself that is why time passes.
We're lost without a referential edge, so -
as the sun passes overhead - we fill our times
and days with sleep and patter. Tongues wag.
-
Just out of reach, to my left, lines of people
kept passing. Art gallery denizens, weasels of
taste and fashion, high-line skippers running
a dirge of their own making. The city out
before me broadly stretched, buildings cloaked
in form and color and light of their own reflected
glory. I'd read the book, yet I forgot the story.

Friday, October 1, 2010

1123. MAKING THE GRADE

MAKING THE GRADE
Making the grade means handling a heart,
breaking an arm, forecasting displeasure,
causing alarm. See no idle postehaste here.
The wily wren I just saw catching sunlight,
scooting away at a sound or a hint of trouble,
how unlike anything I know is that bird.
Reading air, understanding space, flying
through time. I envy the unexcelled marvel.
-
Down at the river, athwart the canal, the old
steam-man was seen sleeping in the sun :
on the bench built along the toll-house wall.
I noticed he threw no shadow at all - it was either
noon or, better, his image was but a chimera,
teasing me back from some hundred years ago.
(Either way, I'd never know).