6764. OVERDUE SOMEWHERE

OVERDUE SOMEWHERE

'O Smiley, have you heard?' Damned elevator

talk just makes me grumble, and these people 

with their holiday plans already  -  Memorial Day

and those bug-out cook-out types.

-

I want to live in that cave that has no bottom, the

one I fell into that last time I crashed. No superficial

waxen plans within for me. I treasure the surplus

of possibility.

-

Like the limit of flowers as they grow along the fence.

They can only grow so far; and they can only grow so far.

6763. THIS GRAND POMADE

THIS GRAND POMADE

This grand pomade is landlocking me. I cannot

walk with such heavy feet.  Every distance I see

is an illusion, as all space is but a confining corner.

My pet bird has sanctuary in the sky  -  a place I

do not have. Yet, (be still, my wings), I hear the

sound of that dominant hawk, a sound I recognize.

In this smallest of containers I keep my heart and

soul; should some great raptor of the sky take even

me away, I would surely note the difference of

detection, me seeing nothing versus me seeing all.   

6762. MISERLY MISBEGOTTONS

MISERLY MISBEGOTTENS

On a cold Winter's night when the snow was wailing

and piling high along the driveway ledge, I sat me down

to think. I awoke hours later, in some form of a tropical

heat. Not knowing where I was, I called out : 'Hello! Does

anyone know I'm here...and if so, where is here?' The

only answer I got was the sound of the roiling wind,

tearing into things and destroying the world I knew.

6761. I FLOUNCE THE LATEST CAT

I FLOUNCE THE 

LATEST CAT

I do not live here anymore, understand : the

third-tier walk-up on Montgomery Street was

enough to be me in. I carried too many heavy

things upstairs. My bottle is no longer full.

-

Retrograde emotions can bring back memories:

like some Proustian smell, that wicked Madeleine

within the pocket or the closet. Grandma's baked 

goods, or even that store on the corner. Look up;

the sky is high, or at least as high as it gets to soar.

-

We've soaked up all out medicines together now : 

you the Jiminy Cricket and me the tantric bells.

When you wish upon a star, your dreams come true?

6760. ISLAMIC STATE IS WINNING IN IRAQ

'ISLAMIC STATE IS 

WINNING IN IRAQ'

So sorry we have to be going : leave your

head at the door while Allah is doing the dishes.

I have a casserole here that we can eat. The

few tents left will be distributed across the

dumb desert, while elderly camels are waiting

by the tanks. This diminishes the afterlife

not by one whit, and I believe we shall still

yet get to Heaven. We can kill the infidels later

The scent is so sweet, and God is so good.

-

Words escape me in this dusty heat : the oasis, 

is it, which forms to the right will be faded away

by dusk  -  yet you say I'll still be here with a weapon

and a breast in my hand? How strange. All those

beautiful maidens and you can only bring me this?

The scent is so sweet, and God is so good.

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

[*Do you note the title, with 'The' (NYTimes, lead-line, 5.20.15).
One cannot say 'The Islamic State is winning in Iraq', because to date
there is NO Islamic State. That is simply what they call themselves.
Islamic State, with no 'The' at all.]  gary

6759. YES AND THEN WHEN

YES AND THEN WHEN

All of this wants to sound so real, it

has the bouncing energy of a child : 

my life is this witness to everything 

I've done. The card-carrying Communist

is eating communal bread at a long, brown

table while a few listless types sit around

complaining about something. The new-born

socialsit comes stepping in  -  he's black now  -

and starts going on about his ideas of helping

the community. Parks and water fountains and

playgrounds. I look up and want to say to him :

'your playgrounds are festering and they breed

but drugs and sex crimes, your people are

useless cogs in an enemy machine. Screw your

head on straight you stupid ass.' But I don't.

Instead I take out my gun and shoot him in 

the chest. No, not really. Neither do I shoot

myself, though that same thought had entered

here my mind. I thought I heard the padre say

'forgive me father for I have skimmed.' Oh my

God, I did! Everything is confusing me now.

-

Were I a dog would I need to learn how to howl,

or does that just come naturally? Anywhere and 

anytime would be OK with me. The ladies from the

carnival are walking over : it's Fireman's Week in

this deadly town, and everybody gets slobbering

drunk to celebrate what they hope will never happen -

a five-alarmer when every fire company for three 

towns around is dead drunk on its feet. 'Harry, man, 

where'd you put the water?'

-

So, I'm watching them, those wives, in my own alarm  -  

they're kind of pretty actually, all and each in their own 

sweet way. I feel like Leopold Bloom again, wondering 

what those statues have on under their gowns, and vowing

someday to bow down and look up to see. Take a peek,

then take a pee. That's just how Leopold likes to be.

6758. SOMETIMES

SOMETIMES

Sometimes  -  and even in the largest cities  -

it seems like village life is at the fore : the family

lines, the connected people, everyone knowing

everyone. You want ice cream on St. Luke's Place?

We can get it from Jerry. You want felafel on St. Mark's?

Hey, that too is somehow Jerry. Here's the cigarette man

again, walking around with his singles. 

I think his name is also Jerry.

-

I helped build a shack here, yeah, right here, in 1969. It

stood half a year; we'd painted it dark green and hired

some Chinese flunkie to try and sell baked waffles for us.

Made a few bucks before he torched the place. He got away,

and we were left with a few bucks and no more worries.

-

Sometimes I think fondly back to times of yore;

and sometimes I get mesmerized by memory and

something more : I remember you, that little face,

your prepping ways, your enthusiastic way of 

calling out the temper of the days.

6757. WASHED UP WASTREL

WASHED UP WASTREL

Picking through a ton of stuff the picking 

isn't really rough; just homeless things that

keep appearing break my mind in two. I

remember that, and I remember you.

6756. THOSE MEN

THOSE MEN

Those men are working like ants now, crawling

in harness over the skeletal remains of the General

Dynamics building  -  white-powdered concrete and

the dust of cemented loins. A powered-crane lifts down

the slabs, things crash as I-beams clash. Every window

that was here once had a view to something there. How

different things are now : flattened and wide open; piles 

of diminished rubble with park-kids' voices still stuck to

the rungs. I can hear the fun and laughter yet resounding, 

as well as I can hear those dads flourished cars arriving 

for another shift. Life in this wheelhouse was never fun.

Now only the tower stands, ivy-covered and derelict too.

6755. MALADIES

MALADIES

Things which come and go we hope : otherwise being

'wired up' defensively in a hospital bed can diminish

the life we've led. I want to break bread with something

new, or different. Tired of dereliction, all these forms

and papers have no sense. Look around, what's to see.

-

Mandible and maxilla, bones to go. I brush my face

with teeth of a different flavor : tears are what you get

from overflowing with emotion. Those things, I've said, 

which come and go, we hope, are angels. 'Hope is a

thing with feathers'  -  that hoary and overused Emily

Dickinson image seems tired and well-worn now

on this dizzy doorstep to God's own Hell.

6754. MARK TWAIN JUNCTION

MARK TWAIN JUNCTION

This wayward trail has been walked before,

slaves and workers trailing in their Nigger hats

and Dago fruitpicker apple-packs. Everywhere

one turns, the harbor ghosts of tired enemies

are still fighting over very old words : subordination,

ownership, miscegenation, flaggelation. Let's let it

all go on. I hear the whip and I hear the slave ship.

They both sound alike to me : intimidation.

-

All the way up to Albany, indentured Italians picked

apples and slaved in the orchards, over-reaching both

ladders and hearts. Far to the south, fifty years before,

the fierce-ending whistle of bondage broke stolen Africans

thrown down in this new land : auction blocs and whipping

posts, the fast-talking slime of the slave trader's grime.

-

Between Washington and Jefferson and Jackson and

Buchanan, there was nothing to be won and nothing to

be lost  -  the entire world was a darkened canvas for some

black/white artist of a Franz Kline ilk. I do believe the

only reason so many were silent was because their tongues

had been cut, and the silence enforced. Yes, their 

tongues had been cut, and their silence enforced.

6753. FAULTLESS HEROICS

FAULTLESS HEROICS

This new grime is between my teeth, like the finest dust

it seems to seep  -  in everywhere, gagging and the choke.

Such a sensation, to be labored over, like an old judge's

sentence of 'slow death', not just death, but slow death.

Odd, how in prison terms, that would be life.

6752. I TAKE EXCHANGES

I TAKE EXCHANGES

I have stars on my toes and I can fly like some wizard

Mercury messenger Greek God, fleet-footed warrior too.

Buy some gloves if you're going to touch me. I have

heard too much : Elliot Smith and Leonard Cohen

coalesced into that cozy tired pancake rant one

cannot stop listening to. I throw my textbooks

in the river of blood and watch them drown,

gurgling down as they sink in a scream.

-

If not, bring it back on Wednesday  -  I'll consider

hearing you then, having to watch your oily, talking

face in one place with the highway streaming behind

you and some pecker-head running his lawnmower

double-speed down the grassy slope. See? Those

alone are the nasty things I understand.

-

God of? God of what? War? Woden. Mercury.

Mix-up. Everything  -  polyglot contentious

system of dreadnought fighting men all

going down for the count. I take

exchanges, see.

-

(A couple of things to learn: don't

worship the past. It never did

anything for you).

6751. AS AN ARTIST

AS AN ARTIST

As an artist I am tight-fisted, but may I buy

you a can of emptiness? They're running a

special today at Nasco's General, and I think

I may just have enough. We can share.

This space we inhabit is a fulcrum, with so

many things balancing  -  the respite might

be welcomed when we're done. Leverage

and pivot, that swivel of precision at the

point : each of those things make me now

worry where I may go off-track.

I can write, I can paint, I can

play music, I can draw. But

what I cannot do is find

an audience to even

look or talk 

of more.

6750. STAYING WAY PAST

STAYING WAY PAST

The dark blue doors are closed at the warehouse,

where the Spanish guy has hidden his lamps for

tomorrow and gone home. Another day of hours is

over for him. By the ramp, a few cars still await 

their drivers. I am incapacitated by nothing.

-

In this dark book where comments are kept, someone

has scrolled what looks like a pelican, or a flamingo  -  

I can never distinguish those two in my mind  -  and

written 'late again, fuck', where a delivery comment

should be. I have no idea what that means : but...

-

I am here now for the late-night shift and so I have

to sit and reason. Not with much to do, so I'll

try and think what he could have meant. It won't

be until about 4am that my own delivery-trucks

begin arriving. This dead shift will come alive.

-

Then, of course, it will be my turn to write my notes

in that same ledger book  -  delivery times and comments,

notes about freight and the handling. I don't know yet what

I'll be writing, but I'm pretty fair-damned sure it won't

be 'late again, fuck,' for that really tells no one

anything at all. But, then again, why defeat the

 purpose of an otherwise useless book?

6749. TIRED

TIRED 

My fag-ends are all tired, my genuflections are

gone, my knees are like plywood that's split.

Everything hurts and I cannot walk another

God-damned half-mile. Just tonight, the girl

from Carteret with the barest English accent 

left came up to me and said how broken-hearted

she was that I wasn't free and unencumbered.

'Because I really like you,' she said. I smiled

and said, 'that's okay, Tanya (she'd told me 

her name); you'll find it all again someday. 

Stay sunny  -  in fact, that's what I'm going to 

call you next time we meet. Sunny.' I do think

she misunderstood though, because she said back

to me, 'you think I'll be somebody someday?'

Oh dear. At a loss. What could I say?

6748. MY LANGUAGE ALONE

MY LANGUAGE ALONE

If these words can tease you they will : I can see

through your shirt, your loose-leaf is showing, your

hand's an enigma. All these things are set here openly

to baffle you and confuse. I do not want your mind 

to go lax, or fade away, or drift. It is my language

alone you will heed and listen to.

-

Young men already tired of details and duty : they

will read poetry under duress and not understand a

thing. Not knowing magic, all they can see are words

which lead them to others. Instruction manuals.

Detective novels. Sleaze. I have none of that.

My words are not infirm.

-

Down-Neck Newark, and the working girls of the Port

in Elizabethtown. I knew them all as places and

beings. They've torn it all down and walked away.

I have words, here with me, left to say.

They girls are all gone now and

the great ports are dead.

My language alone

bears repeating.

6747. MIAMI DOLOMITE

MIAMI DOLOMITE

Cant' have, couldn't be, and although everyone

goes there now, there's nothing really there. The

devil takes the swampland, and the hindmost

quarter is free. Florida? Alligator Alley?

What's any of that mean to me?

-

Let me have a whispering campaign instead for

points asunder : the ruins of Catalfalque, the old

broken soil of Chichen Itza, or Troy  -  worlds 

apart but filled with joy, and drama, and death.

-

Deep things work out simply when you're alive 

and well  -  and walking a tunnel to get to a

river can sometimes cause you a death

by drowning. Settle in, little guy,

settle in. Mr. Dooley has your

number, and he's coming

to talley up.

6746. WHITTLE ME DOWN SOME

WHTTLE ME DOWN SOME

I am drawing new breath from just being alive : the

man on the old wooden chair, whittling a stick, making

a form. The knife, in good stead always, follows each

command. Sharp as it as, as sharp as good wit.

-

Here, where the windows now are opened, some fair

breeze barely makes it in. As in some old military

barracks, stifled and gagging for air, the atmosphere

around seems too tense and close  -  yet this fellow is

miles away, and happy, and intent on his work.

-

Splay me an opening, let me in too.

We should all be so gay, (in the 

poetic sense, not like today).

6745. I WAS NOT A BEATLE, THOUGH I COULD HAVE BEEN THE BOY NEXT DOOR

I WAS NOT A BEATLE, 

THOUGH I COULD

HAVE BEEN THE BOY 

NEXT DOOR

What would I have chased to be so serviceable? good

words at a nice, round table? A family sitting around

in love  -  like some enjambed TV grouping, the kind

that buys soap and wax paper? I just don't know.

-

Some people are born with a silver spoon in their mouth,

others have places setting jammed down their throat. Do

you know what I mean? Or get, at least, my tendency?

For I am so tired of highways and traffic and all thotir

horrid stop-lights. No one abides by any rules, 

and no one listens to what I say. Any way.

-

Anyway, I just don't know.

You say goodbye.

I say hello.

6744. IN ONE HUNDRED OTHER WAYS

IN ONE HUNDRED 

OTHER WAYS

My tongue has fallen out of my mouth, and I am

speechless though I am not. I talk yet. Gibberish

works. I can remember being a stupid eight year 

old  -  the big joke around town was holding onto

one's tongue while speaking 'My father works in 

a ship factory, making ships all day long.' Of

course, it came out, 'my father works in a shit

factory, making shit all day long.' Or so we

claimed. Laughable, crazy risibility then.

-

It's now so different now : one can tour the

Andes on a group archaeological vacation. Being

watched all the time, I guess, that you take nothing

away. There's a thrill. In 1967, my boss Jim Rattigan,

basically a bowling-league drunk working a print-shop

as boss, went on vacation to South America and was

killed on some beach in Peru  -  by a poison-dart an

inland native had shot at him. His family came home,

minus the boss, who shipped in later. Laughable, crazy

risibility then, but true. How things happen? Unknown too.

-

I think I'll go to Cambodia, touring. Battambang, Siem

Riap, Phnom Banan, Udong, and Phnom Penh. Pol Pot

long gone, I bet I can get there for a song.

6743. TO GO BETWEEN

TO GO BETWEEN

Heaven has a line which cannot be crossed,

on the other side of which is Hell. So they say

and so they tell. Here, I think it's different : the

day is square and sunny and I am sitting by a

river passing time. Cantilevered days and time

of rhyme. Somewhere up ahead, there's a contorted,

dying Jesus high up upon a cross. My friends call

it 'the gay Jesus.' Because of the look, and the New

Hope location too. It makes sense, Why writhe, when

you can ride for free? This Jesus guy  -  how much do

you think he really knew? Part of the father, and all

that, I guess he knew everything but had to play it

coy : that map of the east-coast USA in his head?

Yeah, but he couldn't mention a thing. He knew

it all before it even started, and before it ever

happened. Cool to be the go-between,

to go between the now and then.

6742. THREE NATIONS IN A BREAD BAG

THREE NATIONS 

IN A BREAD BAG

My eyes are bloody; seeing red. The hand that

lifts the anvil just lifted me. If there was a

federation of the wounded, now I'd be at 

the top, management officer for sure.

God how I hate bar fights, and

for no silly reason at all.

-

(I hope here come the cops,

before rigor mortis sets in).

6741. HEAVEN HELP THE RENTIER

HEAVEN HELP THE RENTIER

(bank street, 1974)

I have no selections to show you you're not going

to believe this it just rented it was a beautiful place, 

yes. But now there's nothing in this book any longer,

the snowballs are off the porch and the tulips I'd

planted have already blossomed and died.

Sally forth, Sally. Ray on, Ray.

Ballad of John and Yoko

this ain't, today.

6740. RECIPROCAL VAGARIES

RECIPROCAL VAGARIES

How do you charm a clouded sky? By seeding

luck with love or nothing doing, and the bicycle

is the only animal I know. In this hand, there's a

cloak, in the other a microscope; and I am all men

at all times, everyman. Succor me with my frugal

means. Subsistence farming, and  -  yes  -  the rest

of everything calls. I took the turnpike to the 

parkway to the thruway home.

6739. SO HEAVILY BURDENED

SO HEAVILY BURDENED

--(oh, I don't know; something to do with Hemingway)--
Well then, I'm supposed to feel sorry for you? It's 2am

and I'm still strapped to this back-breaker machine and

it's set to the highest speed and pressure. Let me off some

maybe? Thom Paine? These are times that try men's souls?

Summer soldiers, Winter patriots? Any of those code words

still matter? I just don't know and I just don't reason.

-

You're reading Poor Richard? An almanac while you sit

by a Franklin Stove? How cute, how quaint is all this now?

Vermont, like a memory, makes me hinder my chance for

chances. My lust for life is gone, and I've got two good ears.

I'd try to shoot myself, but I know I'd miss.

-

OK then  -  for now let's make it short and sweet, like a

Hemingway sentence, declarative and right to the point. 

No decoration : damn the bullfighter, I want to say, damn

Robert Jordan, damn Jake's damaged penis, wounded as

he is in the 'worst-place-of-all-places'. I mumble : 'so

what makes you think your death matters, with

so many more deaths to follow.'

6738. OLD BAD MUSICS, JUST LIKE NEW

OLD BAD MUSICS, 

JUST LIKE NEW

Who were those guys? Hall and Oates; 'You 

Mak-a My Dreams Come True.'? How in the 

world did I listen? Where was the warbler 

then, the meadowlark, the mockingbird, the

robin? What grounded bird feared flight?

I think we listened because we were forced

and 'Society' you know had its radio norms.

Back then. Riding the skyway in a Volkswagen

squareback, cranking the windows by hand,

re-jetting the carburetor at will. Well, maybe

all those things back then were my dreams.

Wish I was there now again with you.

6737. FUSTO MAGNIFICENCE

FUSTO MAGNIFICENCE

If I could sit around reading Hart Crane all

day, maybe I would  -  but it goes too fast and

I've read it all already. His fawning letters home 

too. Mama send me money.

-

The trend is to the trending, the opulence of a

crowd on an open-faced bridge, done with 

cathedral highlights that take the heart away.

New York City hasn't seen a barn like that in

centuries; and I'd bet I could explain it all.

-

Too many little poeple now, ice-skating and

roller-blading. I can't take the steam and I won't

take the heat. On these library steps I sit, facing

two lions, both off to the side. I wait for nothing,

and I want less. If I was a smoker, good time 

for a smoke. Instead, I just sit and mope.

6736. WORDS

WORDS

Generally, now, she leaves the kids out

of her writing; memoir, story, whatever.

Though not her husband, a lawyer and 

a blacksmith. Yes, I wanted to question

that myself, but didn't : a lawyer, and a

blacksmith? "I really tried not to talk about

the kids now, other than where they work

and what they do." Emmett owns a landscaping

business; Jessie, a painter, is studying neurological

rehabilitation; Virginia, the youngest, is a corporate

lawyer in Manhattan. "People say, 'Well, how do

they feel now?' and I say: 'Why don't you call them

up and ask them? It's not my job.'"

6735. HIRAM ON THE LAWN

HIRAM ON THE LAWN

Oh Weegee, it's that time  -  people sitting out on

lawns, watering things, and staying out late to watch

the warm-eve sky. I guess they never know what's

going to occur. Me? No, I'm pretty bored with all 

of that, generally. I've had my share of those who 

squander  -  women, and their souls to the Divine, 

Mother of Sky, King of All Godly Things. I say

let it go  -  the river won't stop once you stop

looking. People writing Japanese poetry and

counting notes and syllables. As if they too

were Japanese. Suits me Suzi Sushi.

6734. HIGH SCHOOL, '67

HIGH SCHOOL, '67

Bravo and here. I have been sent home again,

for something, I can't even remember which :

too long hair, unkempt manner, sandals not

allowed, unacceptable clothing. Pulled out of the

hallway, by the art teacher, no less. Frank Gubernat.

OK, let's be Frank  -  Up yours and you're a dick.

Like my friend George told me : 'If they can't take

a joke, then fuck dem up dem ass.' He had a way

of putting it. Frank Gubernat. Unbelievable to me

too  -  art has a way of taking you past this crap, 

enlightening  and lifting the mind. Not for this fool :

'I teach the Art, yeah, but there's still the rules and

the right ways of doing things  -  you've got to learn

to follow and produce.' What marine sergeant crap

I hear. 'I'll tell you what, I'll go home and I won't

come back. How's that creative solution 

plump your cap?'

6733. GALEN

GALEN

Like the cathedral arches of the brain's blood vessels, 

the great vein of Galen is seen dark blue and glittering.

Why I ever wished to be a neuro-surgeon is now

beyond me. I do not remember a thing, yet

here I am, stalking internal cerebral veins.

-

My own, very private, view of the brain stays with

me always, and I take it home each day : a very private

view, clearer, sharper, and more brilliant than the

world outside. Others will never understand that -

and it is made all the more intense and mysterious

by my own anxiety. Do you know?

-

Do you know? Does anyone know? Can they?

6732. ALL THE HANDS OF LITTLE CLEVELAND

ALL THE HANDS 

OF LITTLE CLEVELAND

It's been fifty years since I heard of anyone named

Cleveland  -  I used to know two different black kids,

each named Cleveland. And some writer, back through 

the 50's and 60's, named Cleveland Amory. Now that

was a nice name  -  yet you just don't hear it these days.

-

Things get all jumbled, stuff instead like Rashid and

Amalque. That's Ok, I don't know them anyway.

6731. JEFFEREY THESE ARE

JEFFEREY THESE ARE

Every little thing should not concern you : that

guy at the pastry counter, he's probably just

counting pastries. Don't you see that? The older

I got, the more I understood  -  one doesn't need

an opinion on everything  -  it only makes you

smaller, like some dweeby, nasal neurotic whose

voice cuts in on everything. The prudent college

scholar eating his cauliflower.

6730. ALL UNDER UNCLE WIGGLY

ALL UNDER 

UNCLE WIGGLY

The guy at the ice machine was having trouble, the

ice was overflowing his container, cubes of clear,

everywhere. Apparently the thing just would not 

shut off  - 'Take it for what it's giving!' I told him,

'Frozen water's really a temporary thing  -  supposed

to make it easier to handle too.'

-

He had, what, poison ivy or psoriasis all over his

arms. I wondered which  -  didn't ask, didn't care.

If it burns, ice it, if it stings, cool it down. I'm a mental

case doctor, prescribing for free. Now listen to me :

'As far as you've come, there's always more of the

path to follow. You've earned it, so never decline

the turn. This life is just a vest you wear  - fill the

little pockets with something, and then move on.'

6729. THAT PARTIAL SMILE

THAT PARTIAL SMILE

The bookended moments are caught with a

glimmer  -  a camera light beckons for a flash

to go off. It's all that mark of your own sweet

face  -  that half-smile which motions and calls.

Something tells me to sit and stay.

-

Incredible notebooks, those Moleskine things

you carry  -  flip-open travel journals and the

small jot pads of writers. No one's sure how to

say, the pronunciation varies, I've heard, but every

bookstore buzzard learns to sell them quickly.

Now I can see why too  -  your wide eyes summon.

-

A report on something is due. A journal

entry, all about you.

6728. MIASMATRONIC GOPHER HOLE

MIASMATRONIC 

GOPHER HOLE

I fell in, long ago. I surfaced just recently.

Cough, cough, gag, gag. Now take the

blindfold off, I'm freed!

6727. THE USE OF THE CRADLE (endlessly rocking)

THE USE OF THE CRADLE

(endlessly rocking)

How many times have my own hands beheld the holdings:

rock, paper, scissors, of sorts, a twine and a dream. My

mother's fear, with her children, was always 'cradle cap.'

Something about being too long on the pillow, or

perhaps a sort of 'bedsores for the cranial mind.'

-

I am the man, Walt Whitman again, endlessly rocking:

I have fever sores and Blistex held aside for you.

I have lain now far too long in this callow bed.

-

'Arise, then, and follow me; there are no excuses

in the land of the dead -   new dead, new land, one

without bounds and edges, no fencelines for endings.'

Yep, Ok, Sir! I can see my Mother out there now,

carefully scraping to examine the child's head.

There is nothing more sweet than despair in

this supposed land of the living, not dead.

-

I am the man, Walt Whitman again, endlessly rocking:

I have fever sores and Blistex held aside for you.

I have lain now far too long in this sallow bed.

6726. THE GREAT DISGRUNTLEMENT

THE GREAT 

DISGRUNTLEMENT

This dog is in the yard and this fence will keep

him in  -  neither one is mine, dog nor fence.

Just all something else, and a bark and a bite.

-

The girl comes over with her own dog; off-leash, 

and five dogs in all are playing. What dogs do

when dogs do that  -  humans at the time just

talk on. I've got the know-it-all about Porsches.

-

I'd rather this girl brought herself forward, but 

she remains aloof while this guy, a war vet to boot,

goes on and on about stability bars and transmission.

Oh Jeez, not me, oh Jeez, not me.

6725. I WANT TO WISH THIS AWAY

I WANT TO WISH THIS AWAY

My own open-heart surgery of a dream involves 

you, and I've heard you exclaim for me to hang 

on and not leave you now. But what can I do? 

I don't want any of this, but yet here it all is.

6724. CONTEMPT AT FORGER'S FIELD

CONTEMPT AT 

FORGER'S FIELD

They call it that because that's what it was  -

the field where Kannarty's farm once was:

but it was more than that  -  a cellar full of

printing and engraving presses, counterfeiting

money everywhere. His specialty was hundred

dollar bills which  -  at the time  -  were also being

specialized in by the Russians, who flooded the

country with so many fake hundreds that they've

had to change the Hundred Dollar bill twice in

twenty years. Unheard of ever before. Kennarty

got in on that, in his much more small-scale way;

and it worked for a while, but his kids gave him

away  -  flaunting their happenstance at one too

many a high school dance. Sucks to be him, I 

suppose. They came and took him away, everything 

was closed and the family moved away, and even

the farm was burned  -  house and sheds and

trailers and the rest. I never heard any more.

6723. I GO TO SPIRAL

I GO TO SPIRAL

It's already too late at night to survive; some

secret hour hidden between three and four, one

no one knows of and which never comes out  -  

except in that spiral of twisted time that exists for

personal moments and then disappears. The minute

between the magician's hands, the time it takes for

a coin to re-appear behind your ear. The space 

between a cat's meowing and its purr.

-

'Roll me over, I'm done'  -  something like that, 

when you're just too tired to stand but too alive to 

just fall down. I can smile and I can wince  -  in 

between, in between, there, that's my spiral moment.