Sunday, July 31, 2022

14,474. GARDENING AGAIN

GARDENING AGAIN
Oh dear! I bloomed all my
blossoms until the petals fell
away, and only now am I left
with bare stalks. To say they are
bare quite begs the question of
'What were they, when?' Another
meaningful episode of the portions
of life that we never see.

14,473. JUST LET ME STAY

JUST LET ME STAY
It's party time in this heart
of gold; but I cannot move 
out from this dismal clime.
Mine breaks; heart drips and
clotted loves and glories.
I only want, again, another
day. I will freshen the freshet
with a new, clear-sprung spray.
(Just let me stay).

14,472. RAPT ALLEGIANCE

RAPT ALLEGIANCE
To what exactly goes the heart,
and how does it adhere to here;
this world, but a mere glimmer.
This world. Grant me leave enough 
to think aloud  :  The storefront 
snickers with its candied crowd. 
Posted windows, with flyers for 
things long over, a month back, 
away in time. Blues Fest, Balloon 
Festival, Motorcycle Rally. We 
benefit ourselves as much as
others; and the winners of the
sack-race will report to the
main tent, please all!

Saturday, July 30, 2022

14,471. RUDIMENTS, pt. 1,287

RUDIMENTS, pt. 1,287
(Big Foot)
Yeah, so I was sitting in a
bar this one day  -  same day
as that old story I told here
once, about Rarleighbourne
Fischbein, Negotiator For
Extra-Terrestrials' and one
more of those crazy types
comes in and starts talking. 
The aroma, in the air there,
was of cooked meat (poorly
vented) and stale beer. I
liked it better than the cheap 
perfumes you often smell,
but, mostly at least they 
held out better promise. 
He's this Indian guy, native
American, not South Asian, and
I'd seen him around enough.
It wasn't that often, in NYC
that an American Indian was
out and about. This guy, huge,
was called Big Foot. I'd seen
him around, here and there.
Size fifteen and a half shoe, 
he said. I wasn't even really
sure if they made shoes that
big, but I guess they did. Still,
I wanted, right off, to ask him,
when he told me his name, if
that was one of those Indian
names given at birth, like when
whatever your father sees first
becomes your name: White
Cloud, Sitting Buffalo, Flying
Eagle, and all that. But - really -
'Big Foot,' at birth? 'Hoka-hey 
ko la' was all he ever said to me,
and I only later learned that it
meant 'Today is a good day to 
die,' in his Lakota tongue.
-
Over the years I've met a few
outrageously wealthy people.
I've ridden motorcycles with
Malcolm Forbes, who was 
way up there in the richness 
department. I've met a few
artists, and some rock stars
too, who, by hook or by crook,
had amassed large sums. In the
case of the artists and their work
and reputations and lectures and
books and such, I figured it to be
valid. The 'music' stars, on the
other hand, were all a bunch of 
crap. Yet, for the most part, they
were as much like you or me as
could be. Rich people aren't that 
big a deal. It's easy to think of 
wealth as a barrier that protects
the wealthy from the normal
occurrences of life  -  things
ranging from headaches being
cranky to worries and problems.
Actually, though, all it ever seems
to do is take the ordinary and
mundane problems of everyday
and notch them up into another
realm, but having to do with being
a more-expensive and annoying
realm. You think having a 75
foot yacht and a Lear-Jet is an
easy task? When someone like
Bob Dylan sings a goofy lyric
like 'Don't fall apart on me
tonight, I don't think that I
could handle it...' it ends up
not being so surprising after 
all.
-
The few times I did see Big
Foot, it was usually while he
was, silently and by himself,
striding heavily along St. Marks
or Second Ave; I guess those
were his area marks. I never did
know much about him but always
wondered. by how stand-out he
looked, even in those days, what
interest his story must have had.
To myself and others. I read
later somewhere that there was
a 'surprisingly large' number of
Native Americans living within
NYC, though he was really the
only one I ever saw.
-
When I worked at one of my
pit-jobs along that avenue, I
worked with a large, fearsome
Mexican guy much in the same
physical frame as Big Foot. His
personal claim to fame  -  which
of course kept me in abject fear
and terror of him, was to being
'on the lam' from Colorado, where
he had (supposedly) pushed his
wife out of a speeding car while
rounding a deadly curve and
precipice on some Colorado
roadway. I assumed he somehow
'knew' she was dead and it had
been a fatal push. All the rest,
better left unsaid. The entire
story made little sense.
-
The difference between the rich
and the not-so (the poor) is,
firstly, the quality of their stories.
Perhaps? A 'Reginald Falkenberg III'
wouldn't exactly be the sort of chap
who would fit into any of these
stories. His tale would be deeper,
and would be held within the more
serious confines of the University
Club along Fifth Ave. rather than 
in the combined hell-hole and
sewer of the Tan-Belly Tavern
here, and with the likes of Big
Foot, and me, slapping backs.
Back in those days, that was a
private confab of below-the-radar
people out doing what they did 
best. It was a low-level, secret,
group of passing strangers, each
spreading more of their own
bizarre tales  -  the sort of tales
that only filter DOWN, never up
to any higher or societal realms.
-
Actually, I can think of two: There
was a killer-criminal taken up in the
80's by Norman Mailer. The name
was Jack Henry Abbott, as I recall,
and he was a released inmate with a
story to tell, and Mailer bit. All sorts
of accolades than began, by the
usual 'Society' sorts, and Mailer kept
writing about him and in his favor...
and then the guy, in some kitchen
restaurant job, kills a co-worker and
the entire story fell downward once 
again. And the other one was Gary
Gilmore; same drivel, and he was
executed and the story again just
dwindled downward back to where
it belonged. A movie came out of
that one, as I recall.
-
I did a little more snooping, after
that bar-room meeting with
'Big Foot'  -  since he never much
answered any questions I'd ever
posed. It just got more and
more bizarre (but that was what
my life was like). His real name,
it turned out, was (get this),
'Merrith Stops At Pretty Places'
and he was (then) a 43-year old
Crow Indian from the Wyola
Reservation in Montana. With
a given name like that, I can 
only imagine what the rest of
his life must have really been.

-




14,470. APRIL

APRIL
I might have watched the trains roll
by, I can't remember. It was one of
those evenings of a very late day.
The Smothers kid had just been
injured, and taken away. There
were a few pigeons on the overpass, 
and some kids with a radio on 
Suydam Road, where the ice-cream 
store still then stood.
-
My friend worked in the photo store;
they restored old pictures that were
shabby and cracked. Her name was
April. Lots of people, she said, brought
in old family snapshots and heritage
stuff. She enjoyed seeing all that once
had been  -  the barns and schoolhouses,
great-grandparents and their homes.
-
Not a smidge of any of that was left.
Maybe she liked it more for that, she
said, 'the way today was so much less.'

14,469. NOTHING TO SHOW

NOTHING TO SHOW
Outside the fence is just another
paragraph -where the local tavern
is have its annual Chicken Barbecue.
A few cars I see rolling in  -  far off,
but I get the gist of only a few miles
on the hard-top road. The girls might
seem charming, but they're vortexes
too. Those men who stop for a moment,
with their chisels and beers and tobacco,
they wander lamely across an open field.
-
Every year, time tells, there's music in
the air, for one day. The next day, always,
driving by you can see a few cars left.
They went home with someone else? Or
forgot everything they ever knew about
the simple responsibility of parking? it
has two parts : the arrival, and the
departure too.

14,468. AND THE DRUMLIN WAVE WAS OUT-OF-KILTER

AND THE DRUMLIN WAVE 
WAS OUT-OF-KILTER 
Enchanted forest my ass! This was the
worst of the worst and the people were
all engulfed. When the roof caved in,
the fire began to spread: All over the
Iowa lands and the Illinois prairies and
the swamps in the lowlands and the hot
plains of Texas. Jersey oil and New
England's toil. 'Lynn, Lynn, City of Sin.'
-
I'd seen that before on an Angel's tee shirt,
and I'd seen lots more : California jackasses
twirling knives and surfboards too. If I didn't
know better I'd have had to decide. Circus?
Or Zoo? And the Drumlin wave was out
of kilter too!

14,467. KEEPING TIME

KEEPING TIME
Even the out-of-step Maestro
gets it wrong. I wish him no
ill, but he's on the wrong song.
I suppose he's just Biding his
time until the next page is
turned; taking a rest now from 
what his work has earned. Which
isn't that much when you figure 
it out: A trip up the gangplank,
a rumor, a shout  -  all those 
who line up and clamor. I just
realized : they no nothing either.

Friday, July 29, 2022

14,466. CBGB'S, 1978

 CBGB'S, 1978
The crud was so thick my
spit wouldn't stick. The rest-
room was swarming with 
floods and disasters. The
dinner trap was set : no
one got in edgewise. 
-
Sound was a mere percussive
wave, and wasn't that Patti
Smith I saw with Lenny Kaye?
Or was that Debbie Harry with
Nick Cave?
-
It was slave night; slob night;
and the Hell's Angels were there
too. A few. They just hung around.
Watching me, watching you?
We got up and went to Phebe's
instead.

14,465. TO CIRCUMNAVIGATE THE GLOBE

TO CIRCUMNAVIGATE THE GLOBE
It's all a matter of distance, and, really,
just getting started. A straight line of
travel will do it, and that is all. Flat 
Earthers notwithstanding.
-
So, sit back a bit, and think: Is that
what you'd really wish to do? Take
a space capsule instead. Beat the
time with half the energy! In the
review of chance, opportunities
always abound.

14,464. HIT ME WITH LARKSPUR

HIT ME WITH LARKSPUR 
Days are dark and nights are
glum; these problems oppress
my very soul : I am taking
back nothing, but retrieving
all. Everything I've ever done 
has been mistaken?
-
I need something large : A
Deity again to enfold me,
another Jesus to take me in.
Please, please, I call out
names.

14,463. HOW TO MAKE A HANDLE WHERE THERE'S NOTHING TO GRASP

HOW TO MAKE A HANDLE 
WHERE THERE'S NOTHING 
TO GRASP
I too am underfunded; just like
the Seattle Police, or those in
Newark or Philadelphia too! My
angry citizens swarm about. The
storefronts and streetsides are
smashed  -  people running with
what they've taken, and I will
do nothing back. Looters and
hooters, running the streets.
-
'Send them to Ukraine' one
old-timer utters; he seems to 
hate now the distant world he
views...and I can understand.
Twas once you lost the keys
to your car, and that was it 
until you found them. Now, 
by contrast, you lose an entire
system, and everything stops.
(Hey! Let's blame the cops!)

Thursday, July 28, 2022

14,462. SOMETIMES I GET GENERALLY MAD

SOMETIMES I GET 
GENERALLY MAD
What passes for poetry today baffles me:
Not saying anything about my own, but
I admit to have tendencies that do not fit.
For instance, tell me what sense you make
of this: "Black Frasier Crane  -  As lonely/ 
in her overthinking/and as forgiven/Black
Frasier Crane/is a woman in a multi/-
generational/household with more than
enough/square feet"...
-
That's only the first of five sections. When
my belly stops hurting I'll type up another
section. I'd have to say there nothing really
to grab onto when reading it. It's fairly
trendy, all the right buttons : Black,
female, and the rest.
-
"Black Frasier has/a small staff/but she
treats them/'like family';/she has a soothing/
radio voice and reserved/parking at both
her condo/and the office"  -  I have to ask,
isn't all this so good?
-
"Black Frasier complains/about little everythings/
because what is more/important than the fine/
dusting of cinnamon/on the perfect ratio/of foam
to espresso/except the knowing/that you and/
only you/have the sense to complain"
-
I don't begrudge  -  don't get me wrong  -
Rio Cortez for getting this published, and
in a national publication too, but I have to
ask, simply, why? What standards were
in play?
-
"And who else/could understand/ but a
sister/two Black Cranes/in custom Italian
suits/joking about Freud:/Isn't this the hardest
work?/To be happy"
-
I guess I'll break in one last time to say,
before I leave you with the conclusion
of this monstrous predilection to random
pretension: Aren't we all what we say?
So why should this crap be any different?
-
"when you already/have everything/to have
so much/you give some up/ not away/but to
the beast in you/that just takes/and takes until/
there are no more/brulees and no more/canapes
just the mind's/endless narration"
-
Now that we've rhymed brulees and canapes,
I'll leave.

14,461. FUNDED FOR MADAGASCAR

FUNDED FOR MADAGASCAR
We went too far in that little car,
and I knew I should have jumped
out before. Jumped out the door?
-
Possibilities always abound, I 
suppose, and everything can be
endless  -  or called so. Gypsy
Moths, in caravans, denuding
Water Gap hillsides. Folks
funded for Madagascar who
then only reach Berlin?
-
All my life it's been: A mishmash
of timetables and missed links
to transportation. Throwing
Chick Peas to the pigeons and
gulls off the back if the Staten
Island Ferry. Eating a hot dog
at their bastardized grill.

14,460. OIL SLICK

OIL SLICK
I dropped my motorcycle just to see
you? A slob-fest of oil dropped on
the roadway? It was that or death, 
I figured. Short-term anyway; so
I let it down  -  spinning slowly
around, rear wheel still turning.
I guess we all live by what we regret.

14,459. WHY INTERFERE

WHY INTERFERE
The fox got the hedgehog and
I got the burr. Nothing special
about that. I prefer standing atop
this box anyway, just staring out
at the Summertime lake. Things
have a way of changing quickly.
-
Just a little off (in distance, I'm
meaning), I sense some deer out
picking grasses. Let them be, it
seems to me : Why interfere?
-
There's an oddly gracious cloud
a'forming in the eastern sky; it's
slowly rolling in, blimp-like, or
maybe giving a try to resemble a
floating castle? Without a moat?
What good is that?

Wednesday, July 27, 2022

14,458. YOU MAY HAVE THE ROUNDABOUT...

YOU MAY HAVE 
THE ROUNDABOUT
But you've lost the roundelay. Yes, and
I must say I saw your shadow kissing
itself down by the lake. It was on the
charming bridge, near where the three
ducks are always crossing. I watched
intently. I never seen it done before.
-
A pleasant Summer's afternoon should
not be wasted shouldering burdens or
being incessantly sad. You break your
back, you break your back. Can it really
be so bad? I saw your shadow kissing
another. More than I'd ever had.

14,457. THE TANK AT FENSLAVEN

THE TANK AT FENSLAVEN
They like to memorialize war like
a birthday or some party; whether
religious or anarchic, I do not know.
Yet, in spite of exaggerated memory,
each man holds forth his own role
in the truth : the matters of that which
was, with whom, and how and when.
That's the easy part.
-
Now the young boys, I watch, are
clamoring over the tank. For fun,
and as a residue of a war they never
knew, or saw. Perhaps they heard.
Read stories, or some Grandpa told
the tale: The citadel bell at Remagen,
how it had to be re-taken three times,
as it traded back and forth.
-
The old dusty path to Remy and
Faison. A clock tower and two
churches  -  how the people cried
and waved their rags as we entered
town. They were grateful to live,
and grateful for us.

14,456. I STILL HEAR ALL THAT

I STILL HEAR ALL THAT
With the pangs of a broken heart
and the sad sorrow of less life to
live, I walk outside into the dark.
Hoping to find something; anything
that will do  -  to ease the pain and
the hurt and the tease of the curt
moments I face. The moon has no
sadder face than do I. I maybe
finally have met my match.

14,455. IT'S NOT LOUD, IT JUST IS

IT'S NOT LOUD, IT JUST IS
Interesting situations do leave
interesting stories. My recumbent
bicycle doesn't fold. My book 
jacket was lined in fleece. The
author photo was a mere cartoon.
-
Had it been a drawing of a horse,
could it too have been a mare
cartoon? I'd never known the
difference. We were stealing the
coal that fell off the trains on the
B&O tracks as they passed.
-
They were slow freights, and if
the coal had simply 'fallen' we
were never even sure if it actually
was 'stealing.' But we liked the
idea nonetheless. At the stove
shop we stole pallets to burn.
-
At the fish-store we stole whatever
smoked sturgeon we could get.
Ever have smoked sturgeon?
Best there is.

Tuesday, July 26, 2022

14,454. INTERESTING GRUB NOTE

INTERESTING GRUB NOTE 
It's kind of strange, living up
here, how everything changes.
In the usual cacophony of New
Jersey noise - Woodbridge, highways,
traffic, turnpike, parkway, trains,
people, trucks, etc., very little of
it all is actually 'noticed.' The
attention is always elsewhere. 
To the contrary here, the silence 
allows every little noise to take 
precedence. Simple things, like 
the wind, the creak of the trees 
in that wind, the sound of water
or any sound of an approaching
vehicle, its tires with their rasp 
along unyielding surface. I can't
say it's 'maddening,' but it makes
me take note.
-
I guess I'm just an old crud, 
now again showing my mettle 
by carping on something  -  if it 
isn't this it's that. But it makes a
lot of other things clear too  -  how
mostly it's bothersome men who
do this. I never see a woman at
a task of some scraping, pawing,
cutting, or rasping the land or the
soil, chopping, cutting, building
still more crap; grinding, sawing,
smoothing, and then taking a
diverse and beery pleasure in
going over their work and plans,
reviewing, as it were, the future  -
or a future  -  of their next task of
devastation, change or alteration.
-
Who says there's no difference 
between the sexes? Just once I'd 
like to get one  of those Tony Guidos 
in an apron and put him in front of 
a sink or a washer, just to gauge the 
reaction of his awful tendencies.

Monday, July 25, 2022

14,453. UNDER PRESSURE, EVERYTHING SPRAYS

 UNDER PRESSURE, 
EVERYTHING SPRAYS
When the gutturals start to talk
you know I won't be listening: 
Those outside lights are too shiny
for me. Up here I just look down at
 the water and realize I'm treetops
to it. Funny feeling; a thousand
feet off and a hundred feet high.
-
Some grimy motorcycle enters
the scene and I can hear it a half
mile away : The fools with the radios
are the worst. It emanates, like that
skunk right now sending forth its
rough perfume. Where is that, and
how's it go?
-
Under pressure, everything sprays.
Even the lips, twisting around the
gutturals, manage to leave their
sprays behind. I can't tell you what
I mean, until I really mean it.

14,452. CLASSES WILL BE HELD

CLASSES WILL BE HELD
We will observe the specimen in the
lab. There can be no speaking while
the class is in session. Listen to the
Moderator as she speaks.
-
Like the rat and the pigeon in
the city, the mature Procyon
lotor (raccoon) does well among
human beings in the suburbs. It
measures more than three feet long
and weighs up to forty pounds.
-
It can chew through gutters, peel
shingles from a roof, and eat through
wire fencing. In the wild, raccoons
nest in hollow logs and burrows, but
in the suburbs a chimney or attic or
storm drain will do.
-
Their teeth are serrated on both sides,
and they will eat most any organic
matter, including house pets, and
may carry diseases too.

14,451. RUDIMENTS, pt. 1,286

RUDIMENTS, pt. 1,286
(same world, different day)
I used to think that it was
so weird how the ruins and
debris of the Twin Towers,
including some human remains
or bits unretrieved, were taken
to Staten Island, to a re-opened,
for that purpose, landfill called
'Fresh Kills.' That was an old
name, and it referred to the flush
and body of the ancient harbor
waters around that part of the
Island, abutting NJ. Be that as
it may, the way names and 
things were usually so quickly
altered to better fit contemporary
needs, I always wondered. Was
not anyone watching? Were they
all numb enough not to notice?
-
Nothing be done about that,
no, and I knew it. The everyday
occurrences of what was around
me had their own way of taking
over the everyday. In 1967, it was
Vietnam; everyone somehow just
seemed to amble up the gangplank
and get ready to do their part. Their
part? People actually thought they
had a part in what was an otherwise
civic nightmare in not just this
country, but in Laos, Cambodia,
Thailand, and Vietnam  -  I leave
out Australia, which kind of also
went willingly. In all that time I
never met anyone who could
sensibly delineate the whys and
wherefores of what was for the 
most part American terrorism.
Defoliation, slaughter, chemical
and flame warfare, and massive
B-52 attacks over on-end and
over some more. Truly, it was
a school for scandal.
-
Making things worse, at the
approach of June, 1967, while
still rotting away in Woodbridge
High School, awaiting the last
magical days of getting out of 
that creep-trap, Israel and Egypt 
went at it in what was termed then 
the 'Six Days War.' It began on
June 5, as I recall. I was in Mr.
Brown's history class, a normal
enough occurrence; from which
the daily NYTimes was dispensed
freely to whomever wanted it
(schools used to get free copies
for distribution). The run-up to
that war had been going since
April; all the same usual crap
but with a sort of Jewish-sympathy
spin, which often made a connected
reference to the Holocaust and all 
that. To be expected, no one was
able to oppose the news or the 
words. It all came down, somehow,
to Jewish entitlement for which
we were somehow supposed to
rally and cheer. Myself? I saw it
as a cheerleading-reflective image
of the Vietnam War, just with yet
another tribal and faux-national
designation. No one ever mentioned
Palestinians or the real Semites. 
(Until maybe the next year, when
Sirhan Sirhan had his say). I was
a patient guy, just wanting out, as
I said, of that damned and dank
school. The problem was that I
was in the midst of a small coterie
of Jewish kids (Gutman, Klein,
Goldfarb, et al.) to whom this
little bit of warfare was a grand
and happy sport. Each day they
cheered as their own spirits soared.
I wanted none of it, but was trapped
for like 22 more days! Having been
taught of the Thirty Years War, and the
Hundred Years War, through those
history classes, when this quickly
became just the 'Six Day War' I
was suitably stunned.
-
War should never be given that privilege.
-
Ah, well, so much for all that. I tried
and tried, really, to view this all through
their eyes  -  as perhaps survivors, or
kids from families who'd lost family
members, young or old. I found that I
could not, and I took umbrage at their
stupid, modern-day, gloating. Speaking
of stupid, the school and its 'curriculum'
did nothing on this matter either. They
too gleefully enlisted their male students
and all graduates into military service.
Period. I found schools, the school
boards, and the teachers and staff, all
to be in service to United Jewry. I
was never so happy to get out of
school.
-
If there were differences to be found,
differences say between Arab and Jew,
or Vietnamese and American, I never
found them. Humanity is one coarse
ledger, written pretty much the same
everywhere, and worse as it ascends 
to the higher reaches of power. 30
some years later, it was all worked
out. First down went one, and then
the other, Tower. Same world.
Different day.

14,450. OLD NAMES ALWAYS TANTALIZE

OLD NAMES ALWAYS TANTALIZE
Old names always tantalize me:
Menelek, Orestes, Menelaus. The
profound rotunda of those old
Greek names  -  running the gamut
of ancient time. Hecuba, Electra,
and Oedipus too. Never knowing
what it all quite meant, I read and
forged along. Summarizing even
the plots of plays now would be to
no avail, for no understands the
ancients now.
-
Today's odd mix of baseball names 
and sport-God guys goes nowhere 
special except for mispronunciation:
lightning bars on Hispanic daggers;
a strange triple play of life and
place and logic  -  not near as wise.
Those old names always tantalize.

14,449. MANNERISM

MANNERISM
It was like that at nine o'clock -
the pointillists were out - rive gauche
and Georges Seurat. Having to do, perhaps,
with the French Navy, my impression of 
the Impressionists was that they should be
impressed. I went looking for bathing suit 
beauties and industrial chimneys. I bought 
a flower from the flower girl - she said her 
name was Marna, and that it rhymed with 
Hedgewick. I said I didn't understand. 
And then she said, 'Language is always a
barrier,' putting a red rose behind her ear.

14,448. HOW WE JUMP, AND WHY

HOW WE JUMP, AND WHY
(I only seek forgiveness)
Those rocks in the road, 
damn them, have wrecked 
my tires again: I'm stuck
in the same forlorn ditch. 
Best thing to say, in situations 
such as this? My  turn-signal 
works, but I'm not turning 
anywhere. Which way is up, 
my little darlin'?
-
I've heaved all the ballast that
one man can heave; junk's piled
everywhere pants-cuff to sleeve.
I'm wondering deadly with my
flashlight off. The darkness gets
worrisome, so I better not scoff.
-
'Just take yourself down to those
all-redeeming waters,' Padre Henson
says. He wants me to lie down in
green pastures  -  I think that's what
he says. I'm aging too well, far past
any purification; only seeking love
now, and affection  -  not altercation.
-
Take me to the river. Drop me in the water.

Sunday, July 24, 2022

14,447. THE WAR ON ECONOMICS

THE WAR ON ECONOMICS
There's a screechy sound in the
cereal aisle, as some kid runs by
with a toy. If he's got a mother
about, I don't see her. Lady!
Come get your boy!
-
Whenever I get to these places,
I go flooey  -  like crazy in an
igloo kind of way. The ratty
papers at the check-outs, and
each aisle ending with things
piled as high as can be : corn
cans, pancake mixes, soft drinks
in plastic containers. Eskimos
sent out to die, on ice floes, even
they have it better than me.
-
I get to some cole-slaw deli display,
hawking 'Grandma's' brand salads
and some sort of sauce. It stops me
cold, just trying to think. Was this
Grandma ever even real? A brainiac
headline by the lottery spinner then
catches my eye : 'The Social Costs
of Carbon Use.' Try telling that to a
food-mart with 16 acres of parking,
depending on those vans and SUV's to
ferry the minions in. I still remember
when 'Consumption' was a disease

14,446. I ADMIT

I ADMIT
I admit now to everything
being wrong: I have voices in
my head, and I'm probably mad.
A diffusion has hit, between the
crazed and the broke. The voice
wants to say everything will work
out, at one moment, and then the
other side speaks: You're broke,
you've lost it all, you're headed
for time's disaster. This I know,
but where else does one go?
-
I have nothing to go by any longer:
piles of words and pictures and
stories. One million worth nothing
and piled in glories; dead glories,
and of my own vain beseeching.
Everything around me has fled. I
only have voices deep in my head.

14,445. JUNIPER BERRIES IN A FUNNY LAND

JUNIPER BERRIES IN 
A FUNNY LAND
Sometimes I get stuck, in another land
where people talk on  -  endless words
about most anything  -  their recipes
and foods and trips and vacations and
children. By them, next to them, I am
the local pauper who's not gone anywhere
myself. If that's called living vicariously,
it's not that at all. I don't want that life.
-
A crumble-pick full of some Disneyworld
creeps would send me into paroxysms of 
a newer despair  -  false gimmickry, flat
earth, sour emotions and dead feelings
too.  Even dreams should be more true. 
What is this, a zombie zoo?
-
I laugh back. They show me pictures of
their Google-book trip  -  kids and ice-cream
and Mickie. Some vampy princess meant
to stick. Their minds are really filled with
this? For the sake of a child they let the
world run amiss. It shouldn't be like that
at all.