Friday, December 08, 2006
0 Osmosis
Alexander slept
with the Iliad;
Senator Byrd
with the Constitution;
I between the white sheets
of blank pages.
Next: Poet/Writer
1 Poet/Writer
I am a poet slash writer.
This is not a memoir.
This is me breathing under
the weight of forty epic poems,
never written. The epics break
open and slash about in the tide
pool of slashed wrists. No, never
mine. This is a happy book. This
is the only time I say anything
dark like a child’s thunder. You
have my word. You have my
resumé. You have my soul.
Next: But
9 But
I don’t say anything macabre
but sometimes I do get depressed,
like when I can’t find a job.
Even the thought of a
jobs posting website
depresses me.
That and a cold cup of coffee.
Next: The Cynic's Assessment of the American Dream
22 The Cynic's Assessment of the American Dream
—How do you live forever?
—Tell people you wanna die when you grow up.
Next: Two Halves
21 Two Halves
My better half says, “It’s right there in front of you—why don’t you just change?”
I say, “Because I fucking can’t you fucking asshole. Don’t you get it?”
Next: Across the Wall
3 Across the Wall
The top drawer of the bureau is open.
In it, a watch aches with a ticking itch
to share time with the beautiful
woman rustling covers in a bed downtown.
Next: Maybe My Brain Can Turn A Profit
45 Maybe My Brain Can Turn A Profit
Who are the men
growing pot plants in my brain?
I’d like to see if maybe I could
buy some leaf off of them.
It’s good stuff, I’d bet.
“Home grown and totally organic!”
I’d call the brand New England Pot.
It would grow out of my ears
and I’d pull off a little bud
and sell it retail to some guy
on the street for $20/eighth or so.
I don’t know if it would
get me high, though. Could I
get high off of grass
that grew from my own synapses?
Sure as the killer bees come north
from Central America,
I can’t make my bed
while I’m on it.
Next: Thunderstorm Watch 295
15 Thunderstorm Watch 295
Turned down for another
job today, some public
interest outfit. Didn’t want
it anyway maybe they
were disappointed when I
said I was a fiscal conservative,
that this latest supplemental
is fulla pork. They can smell
it on me—th’aversion to lobbies,
the disdain for raising funds—blown
from key to key in this economic
archipelago.
I’ve had too much to eat and
too much to drink. Unfulfilled on a full
stomach means you’re not
makin good use of what you’ve got. How
many Tombstone pizzas, how many Schlitz?
How many years of schooling, how many
gallons of gas? Somethin ain’t right here, folks.
My power bill’s too high, I can’t wake
up early in the morning. I crave
thunderstorms, lightning, and hail.
Next: Potential
73 Potential
Why can’t you just talk to other people?
Why can’t you just be friends with your friends?
Why can’t you just be yourself?
Why can’t you just live up to your potential?
You have so much potential—
That’s what everyone says.
No, look—no, I’m not even going to...
Except, I don’t know what that means.
Next: Jobs Postings
2 Job Postings
• Send résumés to:
Northern State University, writer/editor (e-mail)*
AG Medical Publishing, managing editor (e-mail)
Poets of the World United (mail)
* Problem with attachment!
• NSU Phone Number
(314) 470-0862
• Or, apply in person:
3545 Almond, 13th Floor
St. Jackson, NO 63333
—Just ask for La Rev—
Next: What We Call Ourselves
16 What We Call Ourselves
Poets can’t even call
themselves poets anymore.
There always has to be something else,
some other business.
Lines can’t be straight anymore,
they must succumb to curve
like the snake’s back,
bending repeatedly
from one dune of
desert to another.
There is no almost straight.
Almost straight is the
embankment, marking
the cliff, over which
our poems run,
tumbling drunk
with the final drops of faith
Next: Interview
4 Interview
He arrived on time and helped himself to a half a cup of coffee from a pot that was staying warm near the receptionist’s desk. After ten minutes of sipping, a young woman came out from behind the receptionist’s desk and introduced herself. They exchanged “Nice to Meet You” and he followed her to her office.
“It’s good to be here,” he said, sitting down. “Thanks for having me down here and taking the time to interview me.”
“No problem, no problem,” she said. “That’s just part of my job.”
“Ah, just so I got this straight. I’m actually not sure I have your name right. It is Rev?”
“La Rev,” she said, looking him in the eyes. She had these gray blue eyes that sort of locked him in a dazy gaze. “People who know me call me Rev. But my whole name is La Rev.”
“So is La your first name?”
“I don’t really think of it that way. I don’t have a first name and last name like everyone else.”
“So it’s all one name like Madonna, or Homer?”
“You like Madonna?”
“I don’t know. She’s alright. Some of her stuff. I don’t keep up. I saw that she was trying to adopt a baby....”
“Oh, yeah, I heard about that....”
His throat was getting a little dry, kind of scratchy in one spot. He had only a little bit of coffee left in his mug. But it was cold and he didn’t want to drink it. He was swallowing but that wasn’t helping.
“Is there any more coffee, or some water or something?”
“Yeah,” she said, and left the room briefly, returning with a bottle of water. He couldn’t help but notice that she was wearing a skirt, no hose, and flip-flops. She had smooth, white legs. She handed him the bottle.
“Thanks,” he said.
She was smiling a bit.
“Is something funny?” he asked.
“Oh, no,” she said. “I just thought it was funny that we were talking about Madonna.”
“Yeah, I guess so,” he said. “I guess I wouldn’t think that that would be something I’d talk about at an interview.”
“You said you didn’t like her stuff that much, though?”
“Ah, well—can I ask: where is this interview going?” he said. “This doesn’t seem like the typical questions I would get at an interview. Is this normal?”
La Rev scratched with her pen against a notepad. It wasn’t clear whether she was actually writing something or just making a scribble. She looked up and he could see that she was biting part of her lip, the lower right side.
“I have a confession to make,” she said.
“OK....”
“You’re not going to get this job.”
“I’m not?”
“No.”
“Then why am I down here?”
“Well, I thought that since you applied I might as well go ahead and interview you.”
“But there is no job?”
“Right.”
“Well, why are you still interviewing people if you already have someone for the job?”
“You’re the last person I’m interviewing.”
“Then this is kind of a big waste of my time, isn’t it?”
“I’m sorry,” she said. “My boss just decided yesterday to hire from within. I had your resume in front of me yesterday and I was gonna call you and tell you not to come in, but something on your resume sort of caught my eye, and my boss isn’t in the office today, so I figured what they hey, I’d have you come in. Don’t take this the wrong way. You’re qualified enough.”
“Something on my resume?”
“Yeah. It said you were a poet?”
“Yeah, ahh, I’ve only gotten a couple of things published so far.”
“That’s more than me,” she said.
“You write?”
She nodded.
Next: Rev Likes the Cubs
60 Rev Likes the Cubs
There’s a girl dancing
in a Cubs shirt
in the tenth inning.
She’s not on anything.
No booze, no codeine, nothin.
She’s drunk on the night air.
Like I used to be sometimes.
Maybe she can refresh
my memory, relearn me the steps.
Next: Bottom of the 14th
10 Bottom of the 14th
People are chanting,
“Let’s go home! Let’s go home!”
I summoned my courage
and went down to where
she was sitting and asked her if
she wanted to go get a drink.
She said, “Yes, as soon as the game’s over.”
Next: Rev At a Bar
68 Rev At a Bar
She likes to sing a song,
and then she likes to sing along,
and then she’s daaaaancing....
Next: The Deck
25 The Deck
She had organic toothpaste, recycled toilet paper, a cache of gel pens, and an “I Voted” sticker on her computer (it helps with identifying your laptop at the airport). The place was pretty sparse.
“This place has a deck with an awesome view of the city,” she said.
To the deck we took mineral water, and that proved a good idea. I talked a bit about John Ashcroft—just to settle my curiosity—and it sounded like she was not ever interested in the subject, though her parents might have been.
What a view from up there! (But worth the price of admission?) The Knight Building loomed like the ultimate monolith, trumping the bright big buildings beneath it: the Cosmopolitan Tower, the Epoch, the Big Z, the Civil Courts Building. We looked for the building she works in. It had to have been the rectangular one with all the lights on, didn’t it? A spectacular night weatherwise, very clear and very quiet. Sitting out there over half an hour, we didn’t see another soul. But we did hear a bird chirping, I thought a robin. I told her I wasn’t too mad about going through the sham interview. Maybe I’ll run for office, I said. County judge or something.
“I’d make a good judge,” I said, something I had never considered before and was surprised to be saying.
“Why?”
“Because I am good at being objective.”
Back downstairs, sitting at the small corner table in her apartment, me with my shoes off, just beat. As the minutes receded, she recalled how I said I was objective.
“Then can I ask you something? … How do you view this situation … I mean, the fact that you’re here at 3:45 in the morning?”
But I didn’t answer objectively, did I?
She said, “Were you planning on staying here?”
And what difference did it make—for the night was done. I contemplated a wily answer, something that wouldn’t commit me either way, like: “Given the time, and how late it is, and the cost of a cab ride….”
But I said, “Yeah,” nodding my head slowly.
And I was heading out shortly thereafter, down to Broadway so I could get a cab. She walked me down, though I told her there wasn’t any need. I don’t remember anything about the cabbie, but we took the parkway. My window was open, and the crisp air took me home.
Next: Word Association
Wednesday, December 06, 2006
31 Word Association
La Rev—imagination
Ah, Rev—reality
La Rev—port
Ah, Rev—The Poetry of Love
Next: Morning After
36 Morning After
Water and coffee
help me through the morning
as I sketch last night.
I have her e-mail
but no other way to reach her,
other than at her work.
I’m wondering if we’re ever
gonna get together again.
Maybe we’ll go dancing.
How can I know.
In the meantime
we’ll be just two people,
in the meantime.
Next: Cool Love
18 Cool Love
I knew, like, what it was.
And, I knew, like, the symptoms.
My heart beat was off.
It was beating in another time zone.
I canceled all my magazine subscriptions.
The door was open.
I hacked my AC to pieces.
Can’t you feel the breeze?
Next: Dancing
54 Dancing
It was getting close to midnight, but it was Friday. I said I was up for anything. She suggested dancing. We didn’t really have dancing clothes on but I figured what the hell, I’m not gonna let that stop me. By cab, she took us to a place not far from downtown called Amsterdam. I had never been there before, only heard of it. There was a lot of red light inside. Some men there weren’t wearing any shirts. At the time, I didn’t realize that Amsterdam is technically a gay bar, but it didn’t matter. The music was hard, the strobes were flashing, and we had room enough to move. It had been a while since I’d danced like that. I told her I’d danced in Paris and she said, “I knew it had to come from somewhere.”
I had on a long-sleeved shirt, but took it off eventually. Dancing is a good way to work the alcohol through your system, to digest it & sweat it out. I wrapped the shirt around my waist, knotted at the belly. We ordered a couple drinks and somehow ended up with a Long Island iced tea and a vodka tonic. We took a few sips but soon put the drinks down and left them to drown in their own ice.
I like to think my dance moves were somewhat varied. Some hopping, a lot of arm movement, sometimes dancing with my arms above my head. She danced with a black purse in the crook of her elbow. There were close moments, where my hands were on her waist. It couldn’t feel bad to have your hands on someone’s waist, could it?
We left Amsterdam about an hour later, whether because it was hot, or late, or because we were worn out I don’t remember. I had no idea where we were going. We walked along the streets: Wall, Jefferson, Minnesota, Manitowoc. She seemed to think I minded that we were walking. It’s just a little further, she said. We went in a back door and up to her second floor apartment, for the second time in as many weeks.
Next: Statue
35 Statue
You stand in your slip
a statue of jade
I wish I had carved myself.
Next: Ledge
58 Ledge
I’m lying in bed with my legs open.
You perch your hand
inside my thigh.
Nothing sexual about it.
It’s just a good place to put your hand.
Next: Train Car
51 Train Car
My libido charges harder
than a train car
piled high with the
thick rich coal
of the Illinois hills.
When I get a whiff
of your perfume
I growl like a jackal.
When I see you
in a sports bra
I run a mile in four minutes.
Next: The Next Best Thing To Being On the Inside
12 The Next Best Thing To Being On the Inside
Love, like investing, is an art and not a science. What is a stop-loss order? What is a protective put? I ask, “How do you manage risk?” You say, “Take what the market is giving you.” I say, “But how do I do that.” You say, “Purchase what is selling below its real value and sell what is trading above its real value.”
“But how do I know value?” I say.
You say, “It is only charlatans who are certain. Doubt is not a very agreeable state, but certainty is a ridiculous one.”
I have learned and know only this. Never tell anyone what you are doing in the market because later it can force you to do things you might not want to do.
Next: Twenty
38 Twenty
You’re crisper than a twenty-dollar bill that’s never been folded, one that I just got fresh from the bank, totally clean and staring back at me with eyes full of potential. Where can you take me? Use me any way you want. God! I don’t even need to take showers anymore. I don’t even need to sleep. I can just look over at you, fast asleep, and I can lie there feeling ready for the next day. I move my tongue around in my mouth and my teeth feel cleaner than at the dentist’s hand. I don’t even chew my food anymore. My digestive track has switched careers and is concentrating on fermenting better versions of my love for you. Kiss me and try a sample.
Next: As A New Resident, Rev Makes A Request
63 As A New Resident, Rev Makes A Request
She’s spent just about
every night here for a month.
She can take the Metro
downtown to work.
She’s been buying us some groceries,
doin some cooking.
I’ve been on a real even keel.
Not smoking hardly any at all,
not messing with any kinds of pills.
Rev doesn’t like that stuff much.
She’s asked me to stop.
I told her no problem.
Next: Rev Is On Vacation
75 Rev Is On Vacation
I’m finding that I miss Rev quite a great deal. I hadn’t really permitted myself to think much about the time when she would be gone because we’ve only been dating for about a month. And that’s not really a long time. But it was a very comfortable month—we spent a lot of time together, ah, especially the past two weeks. And it was great. I mean, it was absolutely great. We, ah, enjoyed teasing one another, ah, got some inside jokes going, watches some movies, went to a movie, went out to eat, ah, at a couple of nice restaurants. We’ve done a lot of talking, really. I think that’s why I like her so much, you know, cause there aren’t really that many people that, you know, I have real conversations with. Even when I went out drinking with Larco and Jackson, I mean, I can’t say I had a real conversation with any of them. I had a good conversation with Jackson about taking German. So, I don’t know if it’s the booze or what, I need a fall guy. A fall girl, maybe. I’m sort of bored. I can read, I can get a job, I can go home for awhile, I could go for a fuckin walk. I could write, listen to music, play Nintendo. But damn, I mean, there’s nothing I really want to do. Ah! And I think if I have anything to drink I’m just gonna miss her more. Just ‘cause I have a tendency to acutinize. There is an acuteness about it, you know.
Next: La Rev
27 La Rev
Ah, Rev. La Rev. She allows me to be who I am and I don’t have to put on a false front for her. All other e-mail is irrelevant. She is my only username and password. When I drink her I don’t need ice. I don’t even need a glass. She’s a cloudless rain. She tans my skin. She’s a spotty leopard. We make love in the trees. Ah, Rev. La Rev. You are my dream, you are my scheme. Let’s conspire a new tree to climb.
Next: Hungry
72 Hungry
Really, though, I need to get a job.
And I will, it’s just a matter of time.
Rev’s got some headhunter
I’m supposed to call,
name Willie or Billy or something.
I don’t even wanna know.
I don’t know if I can take
many more days like today: 8a-4p in
front of the computer. All this searching, writing,
sending has to lead to something.
So now I’m sitting in my La-z-Boy recliner,
writing and drinking; the fan is blowing on me—
all I’ll read anymore is declared fiction; the
rest is just bullshit and subjective propaganda—
I’m in the denim-colored boxes that Rev
bought for me (though I reimbursed her) and
also I’m wearing sky blue sox from the Gap
and reading glasses and I’m a little warm and
I could use a shave and I’m g-d dehydrated—
after just one stiff drink / I’m pathetic about that—
so I’ll go out and see if I can’t scrounge up
some water /
Actually, truth be told,
I kind of feel like smoking...
But that would be dumb/
at least I’m not hungry.
Next: Self
74 Self
To my prevailing self: Let me Out!
Sometimes with drugs I touch it, feel it—
me—yes, there you are, slippery little bastard of brain.
You are buried so deep. How did you get so deep,
where no one else has been, not anyone else,
not even you? People think you’re going nuts
but dammit you just wanna be yourself and—
isn’t that what sanity is all about? Let me be!
Next: Weakness Shrine
29 Weakness Shrine
Come into my weakness shrine,
where I’m breaking rules all the time.
Have a drink of something cold,
ignore your body getting old.
Sit back in that lazy chair; have a smoke.
Think back to your innocence, as a joke.
Bring your camera, strike a pose.
The conscience is optional, as are clothes.
Next: Pots and Pans
46 Pots and Pans
I love
what is it she loves
a thing a wing
a cheese a shoe a tree
a me a me a me
a me reflected a can
opener a sideblind a hind
a rind a compost a hill
a two-dollar bill
a yard a bard a shared
archaeology requirement
a time a time a sign
Next: The Green Line
14 The Green Line
I thought I saw a green line
on my leg, just as I was
breaking into a yawn. When I
looked again, it was gone.
Next: I Messed Up
53 I Messed Up
I can’t do anything to help
except never do it again—
of which I am not capable
at this instant.
All I can do
is abstain during
this second
and this one
and this one,
on end.
Next: Iced Coffee, Part One
26 Iced Coffee, Part One
“You’re acting funny,” she said that day when she returned from vacation.
“No I’m not.”
“Are you stoned?”
“No.”
“Really?”
“Yes, really. I don’t even have any stuff. If I had some maybe I’d be smoking it. But since I don’t have any, scientifically speaking, I can’t be stoned.”
“OK. Then, why don’t you have any pants on?”
“These are pants.”
“White boxers?”
“Boxers are pants.”
“I still think you’re acting funny. You seem sort of edgy but, yet, you have this funny look in your eye.”
“Rev, everything is fine. It’s hot in here so I’m drinking iced coffee. I think that’s what’s throwing you off. You’ve never seen me drink coffee so late in the afternoon. I’m in a coffee mood is all. If it were six in the morning and not six at night nothing would be unusual.”
“Alright. If you say so.”
She leaned in to kiss him but stopped short after catching a whiff of something.
“Did you have a cigarette?” she asked.
J sometimes smoked, but he had not had a cigarette in several days.
“No,” he said, not lying.
He had not had a cigarette, at least not the traditional kind.
“I’m going back to my place,” she said. “It’s hot over here and things just got weird all of a sudden.”
“Rev—”
“Maybe next time I come over you’ll have some pants on.”
“Rev, I’ll change—I just did some laundry—”
It was true about the laundry. But she was halfway down the stairs and by the time he reached for his iced coffee it had become a tasteless morass of mushy ice and brown water.
Next: Willie
57 Willie
Rev calls later that night.
There’s a lot of commotion
and junk in the background.
Where are you calling from, I say.
I’m at a bar—a pub.
Oh yeah, I say.
Yeah, I’m here by myself.
Why don’t you come back then?
Not tonight, she says. Not tonight.
Alright.
If you don’t want to talk
because I’m at a bar, then forget it.
I didn’t say that. What bar?
The place near my work.
Oh, yeah.
I was calling to ask if you’d
spoken to Willie yet—I meant
to ask you earlier.
No not yet, I said.
I would I told her,
when she came back.
Next: Photons Having Coffee
39 Photons Having Coffee
Remember
when we were
just photons
this morning?
Before we
were loaded into
photon torpedoes
and blew up
the world?
Next: Harrar
59 Harrar
The next morning,
at a corner café, quality beans
sit quietly in clear plastic drawers,
aging in limited air and inking
the glass with foreign oils.
I asked the beat-down barista
for three pounds of unground,
single origin, fair trade, organic beans.
As he printed the source in permanent marker,
I imagined how sumptuous
the bursting brown package
would look when I
swung open the freezer to reveal it at home.
That night after dinner, the coffeepot
steamed and lurched
with the taste of another continent.
Over our second evening cup I asked,
“Would you prefer not to be hurt,
or would you accept being hurt
if I went way over the top in making it up to you?”
“Coffee is a complex substance,” she said.
“Not just chemically, but something
about the way it makes you feel.
You know?”
Then she asked to be alone
so she could finish the dishes.
I didn’t sleep that night.
Not just because of caffeine—
and not just because Rev
said she needed a breather—
but because of something else,
tucked away beneath all our bitterness.
Next: Staticky
40 Staticky
“Hello.”
...
“Yes.”
...
“Yeah, I’ll call him.”
...
“What’s that?”
...
“Whenever things settle down.”
...
“I know. I messed up.”
...
“Well, I never said I didn’t have some problems.”
...
“You’re breaking up.”
...
“I said, You’re breaking up.”
...
“What? No, of course not.”
...
“Can you hear me at all?”
...
“Listen: If you can hear me, I can’t hear you.”
...
“What’s that?”
...
“It would help if you came back, yes. Of course it would help.”
...
“I know I need to change some things. I know this. You know I know this.”
...
“Yeah.”
...
“Right.”
...
“What’s that?”
...
“I should take some risks?”
...
“Well, what the hell does that mean?”
...
“What’s that?”
...
“Fucking Willie is not gonna help me. Who the fuck is Willie anyway?”
...
“Why don’t you fuckin ask Willie for help if you’re such damn good friends.”
...
“Did you hear me? Hello?”
...
“Hello?”
Next: Her You Can
50 Her You Can
He was at the eye of the next
great depression;
he was out in the white-capped ocean
without any sense of land.
And so no one else knew
what he knew, no one
received a text portending the storm.
Even he, at its brooding heart, did
not realize what he was into—
a great howling turbine
of thought and lingering debris.
Part of him said, Odd,
but he folded this instinct
into the folds of the sea
thinking, This is how life is.
Palms bending ashore
and the cackle of estranged shingles
argued otherwise.
Next: She Said, "Take A Risk"
41 She Said, "Take A Risk"
Well I’ll take
a Fucking Risk
I’ll walk to Fucking
LA
Fuck Her!
Next: Fuck Water
20 Fuck Water
Water is death
I eat ten-thousand hot dogs
at a baseball game
I’d walk from here to LA
if it wouldn’t look so bad
Just when I’d come to the
surface of sanity they’d say,
“God—— he’s fucked up!”
Next: LA It Is
42 LA It Is
Really, though:
what the hell else is there to do?
Get a back pack,
a wallet with a credit card,
comfortable shoes?
Fuck maps.
I’d miss Rev but it’d
teach her!
I’d make the fucking news but
even then no one’d hire me. They’d say,
“That fucking guy’s really nuts!”
Next: You Ruined Our Wedding Day
30 You Ruined Our Wedding Day
Let me just tell you one thing you fucking nut you bastard you ain’t half as crazy as you think you are. I take drugs so give me more drugs. I take one to erase another. A lie for a lie an eye for an eye. I won’t chase you there, brother. I won’t do it. I call upon the power of my brain blockers you lazy fuck this ain’t no free mind ride call it off canal that shows the center of the Universe is the sun not you, dude. I feel it. I feel it, too, don’t think I don’t feel it—the tee-hee, the ha-ha, the ho-ho-ho. Life is easier if it’s all one big fucking circus clown joke with size 47 shoes. Ain’t that right, Jack? Are you just a little bit confused? Fuck Pink Floyd Fuck Acid fuck all that shit, dude you ain’t as crazy as you wanna be so you let it all slip through, the crack: goddam that’s a lot of noise, you know? You’re one smart motherfucker but a prognosis ain’t a goddam asshole license, motherfucker, it ain’t give you the right to deny people the respect we all deserve turn out the lights dude the party’s over strawberry fields no more the mushrooms ain’t growin anymore stop inhibiting selectively that serotonin uptake because goddamit the answer lies in you and not more chemicals ahem THC alcohol caffeine and trazodone fuck you for what you did to me you son of a bitch and straighten up for pete’s sake. You ruined our goddam wedding day. Love, Rev
Next: Hello Again
55 Hello Again
A thunderous applause in my head
as a hundred thousand minions
get what they want.
“Speech!” they say.
“Speech!”
But I don’t give speeches.
Next: Trick Candles
64 Trick Candles
Everything was shifting,
like an octagon on wheels…
The butt is where
my head is at,
rummaging for sleep
in that soft
caramel foam,
that sticky cantina
of brown tar
and pale-ale haze.
Sleep, sleep,
poor head, (I say,)
The cigarette
burned out long ago, No—
The nicotine still
waves its orange baton,
the smoke still rises,
its rings yet round,
resting like haloes
on the hurt of night.
Next: Love Song
49 Love Song
I’ll love you anyway
I’ll love you anyway
I’ll love you any way
that I want.
Ohh, that I want...
Next: No Windows
33 No Windows
No windows, man.
That’s what I love
about this room.
Next: My Head Is A House
34 My Head Is A House
The ants are everywhere,
in every crevace of my mind.
I forget one thing—leave it behind?—
and they circle it like a pack of synapsian wolves.
I don’t know where they come from.
Door, window, floor boards, ceiling?
I’ve shaved my head looking for them;
bleached my eyebrows;
bruised a thumb and broke a hammer.
They climb stairs, slip between
conscious and subconscious, permeate
my dreams and pitch me on their queen.
In time, they flood my skull, drowning
me out like tiny, black drops of water.
The ants are everywhere,
in every crevace of my mind.
Next: I Hate Myself
24 I Hate Myself
All of my boxers are from the same place.
The fuckin Gap.
Next: Be Aggressive
7 Be Aggressive
It’s like, I know how I wish I could be.
But I just can’t be that way.
I can’t be aggressive; speak up.
To myself I say what I want to say,
communicated in a complete
absence of body language.
It’s right there, so obvious,
the universe of me doing that—
speaking up, being myself, getting aggressive—
it exists somewhere. But not here and that’s when—
that’s when you start to think
that suicide might be a viable option.
Next: Runway Account
37 Runway Account
Sadly, desire is poor—
leaking tears
like money amongst friends;
paving the way
to half-broken, half-cooked dreams;
taking off
from the too-short runway;
never breaking
the silver-cloud bank.
Next: Cough
23 Cough
You have a bad cough but the only time you feel good is
when you are coughing really hard; you feel really bad
but the only time you feel good is when you are feeling
really bad.
Next: Note
Thursday, November 30, 2006
65 Note
“You made a mistake.”
“All I do is make mistakes.
That’s who I am.
Therefore, there are no mistakes,
and I am not.”
Next: Lovers' Wall
71 Lovers' Wall
We were on opposite sides
of a forgotten war.
But the wall remembered the war,
incorrectly.
You were on the other side
of my inconsistency,
waiting for me to settle down—
so we could get on with our lives.
But I could not scale it,
despite the footholds you had etched.
Next: Don't Worry
47 Don't Worry
There is always somewhere to go.
Get rid of breath.
Oxygen is only keeping us
from something better,
from finding health
in some other mixture.
When oxygen fills our muscles—
makes them red with the blood
it chaperones on a dance
from lung to extremity—
we go numb, though we do not know it.
When there is no oxygen,
we can feel our entire bodies:
big, aching cramps,
shriveled into balls,
tight as bullets,
heavy as novae,
shooting through
the hidden pane of glass
separating
this world and the next.
Next: Affinity
17 Affinity
Finished off the first affinity.
Dave Brubeck Quartet Plays “Take Five.”
I feel it working on me already.
It don’t take long.
Doesn’t seem like I got shit else to do—
think about Rev, wherever she is.
Ah, Rev, why did you leave me, me and your trees.
They’re still here, growing for you,
refusing to drink my water.
It’s full of alcohol, they say.
Next: Is The Magnitude?
19 Is The Magnitude?
I ask you. Is the magnitude of how good it’ll feel now commensurate with the magnitude of how bad it’ll feel later? We all have needs, Rev: this present self, that present self—
O, pride, to whom can I be fair?
It becomes a question of proximity, a time & place bias.
I realize it’ll feel bad later but what about the current me, huh?
What about him? When does he enjoy life?
When can he do something not because it’s lucrative but because
it’s a goddam human fucking impulse?
I want to tear magazines apart.
I want to smash tables;
to put my hands through mirrors;
to fuck it all goddamit!
But I won’t want it later, will I Rev?
I’ll want legible magazines;
and tables to have tea atop;
and mirrors to appreciate your beauty;
and faithfulness and loyalty and calm.
Next: Iced Coffee, Part Two
52 Iced Coffee, Part Two
La Rev, you loved coffee, didn’t you? Ah, Rev, I remember how you made us designate each Monday the coffee mug we’d use for the rest of the week. You would pick one out. You had first pick. I was fine with that; even curious to see which one you’d take first each week. Then I’d pick one.
I remember one Wednesday afternoon, actually a day when the words were flowing to me like a river of sumptuous chocolate I could shape any way I wanted. I heard you filling a mug with a handful of cubes from the freezer. I came into the kitchen to find you drinking iced coffee from a mug different than the one you’d picked that Monday.
“What are you doing?” I said. “That’s not your mug this week.”
“Iced coffee’s different,” you said.
At the time I was a little confused. But you know, I’m sitting here drinking some iced coffee, thinking about you, wondering where the hell you are, and it strikes me that you’re right. Iced coffee is different, different indeed.
Next: Reverie
13 Reverie
Who else but she
would cover my feet
once they’d scaped
from the neath
of my sleep sheet?
Next Chapter: That Person Looks Sorta Familiar
8 That Person Looks Sorta Familiar
Meet me someone outrageous
without them being dangerous someone
being underground with expert
knowledge of the bible but
believing none of it. Who’ll
say things I once thought of
but forgot and now, hearing
them again, will lead me to wonder
if it wasn’t in another life I thought
of those things, in another life where
I was this outrageous person
reminding me to be myself,
not dangerous but outrageous?
Next Chapter: La Rev's Creed
6 La Rev's Creed
Just write and
mother-fuckin
drink you
fuckin coward!!!
Death be damned
Love be damned
Life be damned
You didn’t ask for her
but you love her anyway———
Don’t look back
Don’t look ahead!
Next Chapter: Part of Me Has Gone Rotten
67 Part of Me Has Gone Rotten
Right now I’m trying to find out which part.
Somewhere lies a cankered sore,
as on the foot of a bum,
who’s been walking for days with no respite;
offered no help from my brain, my heart, my knees, or my eyes.
My stomach’s a landfill,
through which he rummages parts of last night’s meal,
worn down to bone by the thick, rich stink of unrequited bile.
Upon his surfeited burp, my white cells collapse inward with paranoia,
my lymph nodes hum ever so slightly.
I’m flesh-sick.
My eyes are last night’s cloud-covered moon;
my memory beset by dusty moths hungry for old clothes;
my heart bubbling up through my neck like a fountain of molten coins;
my knees speaking only to the weather, ignoring both nerve and vein.
Part of me has gone rotten.
I’m trying to carve out what’s dead without spilling the rest.
Next Chapter: Track Infinity
43 TRACK INFINITY
There is no CD,
no way to record it.
Either you’re here or you’re not.
Hear it?
That’s the sound of your life,
a song which has not yet ended.
Next Chapter: Tea For Whoever's Left
61 TEA FOR WHOEVER'S LEFT
Untouched cheeks
plague me like
gum in my stomach.
My heart is too aware of them:
it sends out chemical warriors
to cleanse body and mind
of thin-armed remembrances.
Like the tender turf of a battlefield
my spirit is impressed
with the sound of hoof-beats.
As I clean up afterward,
sorting shield and sword,
ghosts of the fallen beg me
to lessen desire, lessen desire.
Next Chapter: Backscratcher
28 BACKSCRATCHER
My head is bored
with cardboard boxes;
hammered with
tequila and bubblegum.
My jaw just went through
a title fight;
my neck is sore with shame
and unrestrained contemplation;
my instinct is aching in my stomach,
turning my innards like a rotisserie.
There’s a spot on my back
that I can’t quite reach.
It is sunburned
and itching
with wait
for you.
Next Chapter: Is This The Pineal Gland, Of Which I've Heard So Much?
56 Is This The Pineal Gland, Of Which I've Heard So Much?
I was here not long ago,
this rocky alcove of my mind:
watching memoirs made and lost
from within this frosty rind;
chasing anger through its hairy maze;
falling into tryst with lust and desire;
asking pride to sit back down,
remove its gaudy feather; and
catching again the scent of humility,
its precise purpose here unknown.
Next Chapter: You're The Reason
62 YOU’RE THE REASON
As long as I don’t
lose my reason,
I’ll change my thinking
any way you want.
I’ll parole
the worst killers,
Make loans
to the hopelessly insolvent.
Make sense to me and I’m yours.
Next Chapter: The Lamp
70 THE LAMP
For it burns like a fox in autumn
so you can see the way
to this, my love.
Next Chapter: There Is A Fire Somewhere
5 THERE IS A FIRE SOMEWHERE
And my love, like a fire engine
on a crowded street,
charges, honks, wastes hoses
on water that won’t even
mist, runs lights and
screams at shuttered cabs
to get, get out of the way.
Next Chapter: Baptism
11 BAPTISM
They put Galileo away for believing
Copernicus who believed in the Sun,
even more than the Sun.
They could put me away
for believing in you, La Rev.
Ah, Rev, you’re the church
with the highest steeples.
Your water is beyond holy.
You baptized all of me
when you kissed my forehead.
I felt my whole body go under.
I shocked the ocean and killed its fish.
But you brought them back.
You invented air conditioning
but I’m still hot.
Kiss my forehead again.
My love grows for you
like the inverse of a tumor.
I know no malady
that I know you.
I’ll follow you, La Rev,
in your celestial orbit,
in your quest for the rest of space.
Ah, Rev, you take me
beyond the Space Station,
you take me far beyond Jupiter,
you take me into the niches
of insane comets
and undetected planets.
Next Chapter: Screws
48 SCREWS
I could pitch myself
down these stairs
as a cry for help.
But what good would that do?
Which god would that appease,
but the grinning god of death?
Broken bones can heal
only themselves,—
not the rest of the body,
not the bones of other bodies
(nor bones already in the ground).
If this back is broken,
twisted with sin
and my own damn fault,
I’m gonna have to have
you rub it,
before I hit the floor.
Because below the floor
is dust and screws,
thousands of screws,
like rusty rocks in my shoes.
No one knows what they go to,
and I don’t want to find out.
They can just sit there,
planes strangling
the life out of levers.
All the screws in the world,
and everything forgotten.
Arguments that should’ve
held together;
notes that never
reached the addressee.
Things I shouldn’t have done,
this bed of screws,
jumping like a static shock
when I reach for you,
chirping like crickets,
untouched by the wind,
and running for dark
when you set your light upon them.
Next Chapter: How Do Things Happen?
32 HOW DO THINGS HAPPEN?
“You’re like a molting robin,” she said the other day. “Your breast should be warm red. Instead, it’s a dingy brown and white. There’s rings around your eyes and you’re going to need some time.”
Maybe there are rings around my eyes. I don’t know how things got this way. La Rev, what about the trees? Ah, Rev, an alder would be nice right now. A place to make our nest, a new nest? The old one, made of mud and sticks and parts of plastic bags, let’s get rid of that. I’m spreading my wings for you, Rev. Come home. There’s room for you on this branch that shakes with pleasure whenever you are near it.
Next Chapter: 66 Airplane
66 AIRPLANE
You worried about me, didn’t you? You didn’t want the worry. You didn’t like the thought of me coming off of you, the tremors I would have. You tried to take your worry to the bank, but they wouldn’t cash it. They are smart those moneychangers, you said in exasperation.
But you brought me back, didn’t you, Rev? You strapped me to the hood of your car. You made me aerodynamic. Like an arrow, like a rocket. Like an airplane composed of skin and bone. I flew, Rev. And you were right there with me.
The end.
Monday, July 17, 2006
27 Marathon
I take your love as though I'm running last in a marathon and it's a cup of water.
26 Rev Calls
"Where are you calling from?" I say.
"I'm at a bar," she says. "A pub."
"A bar?"
"Yeah, a bar. I'm here by myself. My buddy's late & I thought I'd give you a call. If you don't want to talk to me because I'm at a bar, then forget it—I'll call someone else."
"What bar?"
"The Knot, near the Airport."
"Don't know that one," I say.
Then she is silent for awhile. I can hear jukebox music in the background. She is about to ask me for something, I can tell.
"Hey, did you get back over to Tubb's place yet? See Willie?"
Willie again.
24 The Next Best Thing To Being on The Inside
Love, like investing, is an art and not a science. What is a stop-loss order? What is a protective put? I ask, "How do you manage risk?" You say, "Take what the market is giving you." I say, "But how do I do that." You say, "Purchase what is selling below its real value and sell what is trading above its real value."
"But how do I know value?" I say.
You say, "It is only charlatans who are certain. Doubt is not a very agreeable state, but certainly is a ridiculous one."
Never tell anyone what you are doing in the market because later it can force you to do things you might not want to do.
23 The News
Really, though: what the hell else is there to do? Get a back pack, a wallet with a credit card, comfortable shoes. Fuck maps. I'd miss La Rev but it'd teach her! I'd make the fuckin news but even then no one'd hire me. They'd say, "Man, that fucking guy's really nuts!"
22 Where?
She is here and then
she is gone. I want to
dial her number but
where is it?
21 Job Posting
Send résumés to:
NLU Law School, writer/editor (e-mail)*
AG Medical Publishing, managing editor (e-mail)
Graphic World Companies (mail)
* Problem with attachment!
•AZU Phone Number
(314) 470-0862
•Or, apply in person:
3545 Lafayette, 3rd Floor
St. Vincent, MO 63333
Just ask for La Rev.
19 Is the magnitude?
I ask you. Is the magnitude of how good it'll feel now commensurate with the magnitude of how bad it'll feel later? We all have needs, La Rev: this present self, that present self—
O, pride, to whom can I be fair?
It becomes a question of proximity, a time & place bias.
I realize it'll feel bad later but what about the current me, huh?
What about him? When does he enjoy life?
When can he do something not because it's lucrative but because
it's a goddam human fucking impulse?
I want to tear magazines apart
I want to smash tables;
to put my hands through mirrors;
to fuck it all goddamit!
I won't want it later, La Rev.
Ah, Rev, I want legible magazines;
and tables to have tea atop;
and mirrors to gaze upon your beauty;
and faithfulness and loyalty and calm.
18 La Rev's Creed
Just write and
mother-fuckin
drink you
fuckin coward!!!
Death be damned
Love be damned
Life be damned
You didn't ask for her
but you love her anyway———
Don't look back
Don't look ahead!
17 Affinity
Finished off the first affinity.
Dave Brubeck Quartet Plays "Take Five."
I feel it working on me already.
It don't take long.
Doesn't seem like I got shit else to do,
'cept think about La Rev, wherever she is.
Ah, Rev, why did you leave me, me and your trees.
They're still here, growing for you,
refusing to drink my water.
It's full of alcohol, they say.
16 Hungry
Really, though, I need to get a job.
And I will, it's just a matter of time.
More days like today: 8a-4p in
front of the computer. Searching, writing,
sending will have to yield something. So now
I'm sitting in my La-z-Boy recliner,
writing and drinking, the fan is blowing on me—
all I'll read anymore is declared fiction; the
rest is just bullshit and subjective propaganda—
and I'm in my denim-colored boxes that La Rev
bought for me though I reimbursed her and
also I'm wearing sky blue sox from the Gap
and reading glasses and I'm a little warm and
I could use a shave and I'm g-d dehydrated—
after just one stiff drink I'm pathetic about that—
so I'll go out and see if I can't scrounge up
some water at least I'm not hungry.
15 Muse
Well, I still want to be a writer but, God, I'm not actually going to say that to anyone, anymore. What kind of fool do you think I am? We'll just keep it between you and me, La Rev. Ah, Rev, you're my favorite muse.
14 Cough
You have a bad cough but the only time you feel good is
when you are coughing really hard; you feel really bad
but the only time you feel good is when you are feeling
really bad
13 The Cynic's Assessment of the American Dream
A Joke
—How do you live forever?
—Tell people you want to die when you grow up.
11 Self
To my prevailing self: Let me Out!
Sometimes with drugs you touch it, feel it—
me—yes, there you are, slippery little bastard of brain.
You are buried so deep. How did you get so deep,
where no one else has been, not anyone else,
not even you. People think you're going nuts
but dammit you just want to be yourself and—
isn't that what sanity is all about. Let me be!
10 Depression
depression—knowing what's wrong but feeling like you can't do anything to fix it
He says, "It's there in front of you—why don't you just change?"
I say, "Because I fucking can't you fucking asshole. Don't you get it?"
9 Be Aggressive
It's like, I know how I wish I could be. But I just can't be that way. I can't be aggressive; speak up. To myself I say what I want to say, communicated in a complete absence of body language. It's right there, so obvious,
the universe of me doing that—speaking up, being myself, getting aggressive—
it exists somewhere. But not here and that's when—that's when you start to think that suicide might be a very viable option.
8 Baptism
They put Galileo away for believing Copernicus who believed in the Sun, even more than the Sun. They could put me away for believing in you, La Rev. Ah, Rev, you're a church with the highest steeples. Your water is beyond holy. You baptized all of me when you kissed my forehead. I felt my whole body go under. I shocked the ocean and killed all its fish.
But you brought them back. You invented air conditioning but I'm still hot. Kiss my forehead again. My love grows for you like the inverse of a tumor. I know no malady that I know you. I'll follow you, La Rev, in your celestial orbit, in your quest for the rest of space. Ah, Rev, you take me beyond the Space Station, you take me far beyond Jupiter, you take me where only comets will go. To Jupiter and beyond.
7 Airplane
You worried about me, didn't you? You didn't want the worry. You didn't like imagining me having to undergo a heart attack. You tried to take your worry to the bank, but they wouldn't cash it. They are smart those moneychangers, you said in exasperation.
But you brought me back, didn't you, La Rev? You strapped me to the hood of your car. You made me aerodynamic. Like an arrow, like a rocket. Like an airplane composed of skin and bone. I flew, La Rev. Ah, Rev, put on that skirt I like so much. I heard about this new tree, growing up on the bluffs. Up where the eagle screams, where the grass grows tall and almost touches the sun.
6 Cool Love
I knew, like, what it was. And, I knew, like, the symptoms. My heart beat is off. It's beating in another time zone. I've canceled all my magazine subscriptions. I'm living now, baby. The door is open. I hacked my AC to pieces. Feel the breeze?
