month or so

squeaky transcendance


is all i get. why is nostalgia
easier to take than anticipation?
things i think of have to do with
a calliope and a test signal
mittens winter skies and spring breeze.
there's no looking forward
from the tasks at hand to their completion,
whether your favorite building
will still be there next year,
when your best friends will turn up lost lost,
or pass away, whether you'll ever get it.
ah, but backwards or forwards either
and the dance goes on, i'm wobbling
from americana to nirvana,
grabbing onto all these words
to fill my pipes.


~


4 9 06





Big Business



Anyone can talk themselves into success,
or maybe I should say: everyone does,
no matter aptitude, talent, perseverence -
any of the incidental graces we say we are
blessed with. Talk is the pipeline,
the cargo carrier tough enough to do the job,
if the specs are right. I know I did.

What comes from a pitch, an equation,
a list of rules? I'm not sure. But speech,
yes, speech can bring you face to face
with a monkey, bring you to birdspit soup,
an expense account, a free lunch. Sure,
there is such a thing as a free lunch,
only sometimes it's on the other side
of our world. But forget about all of that,

I know I did. Tired of talking opposing language,
tired of watching people dance steps that rock
from harpsichords to harmonicas, Bach to blues;
this is not talk, this is not success. Success comes

when we finally shut up, stop flying, just breathe,
only look into green eyes, strain for the whisper
which makes us foreign, yet for that straining, and
for the listening, remembered perhaps, sold without
a sale, dare I say loved.


~


4 20 06





I Want to See You Naked


And it's this imagination that's interesting --
even more so at this moment
when I haven't yet seen you naked --
more so than what you look like
at this moment, possibly naked.

But I'm not seeing you, right now,
even if you're naked. And I want
to see you naked, and I have to be there,

no imagination. Though now I imagine
what it's like, seeing you naked:
you stand, you sit, and oh yes
you turn slowly.

My whole imagination is in slow motion:
your hand moves slowly to me,
you press your body to mine,
I smell you as we kiss and your scent
comes to me in bright wisps,
foreign, slowly overtaking.

Even if you tripped out of your undies
and lost your balance and steadied yourself
in front of me, quick quick quick --

I want that more than imagination, I want to see
you fall upon me naked, my body wants to see.


~


4 28 06





Sky


I'm the grey smudge band
between green treetops
and sky, something doomed
to always be, something
of my own making, sky-drunk,
life-bloomed. A hand reaches
up past life, into nothingness,
tells me Enjoy. Some
whispers: Unbutton her
here, under my tree, in my air.
Dip your grey tongue in my dirt,
kiss her everywhere I tell you,

make her disappear,
disappear each other.

I'm hearing my voice
it's me speaking now
to myself cultivate
irrigate sun-touch
us,
sky.


~


4 28 06





quiet bedroom


contrapuntal
folds of curtains

sheets gliss
tickle the hot ivories mama

everywhere
breeze touches
on fire

moments
we are absent:

trills in melody

tongue the final chord


~


4 28 06






to myself, at 52


there are times when you tell yourself
you're not old, you still struggle to prove this
but somewhere a voice mimics your own
and the sounds it makes hope for a speedy end,
hope that it all ends soon - the struggles, you mean,
all you meant were the struggles. there are times
you look in the mirror and, except for the wrinkles
and sag and missing hair, you can still see the guy
ready to rock downtown, surprise a girl, drink all night.
but don't pull out the old pictures, that really was
another guy. not too long at that mirror, either,
by yourself, in your bathroom. there is no one else,
and so no passion or conflicts or joy. dangerous ground, this
longing come by unexpectedly. age is one thing, look around,
it's everywhere this decline of light but this is the opposite,
isn't it, this true image, this reflection you can't make sense of
for it's always changing, and never for good. too long here
and you'll be nothing which is sometimes what you want,
isn't it? 52 means nothing, you mean nothing.
you mean this nothing to no one, not even as one nothing
might comfort another, your pleas for senselessness
echo and disappear. instead you get numb, don't you,
when what you want is to disappear within another,
at least, if not disappear into the clouds over the water
near the trees. disappear anywhere, then, anywhere
but into yourself. you don't know cold, you don't know green,
yet you can move as though there were a destination,
warm soft arms around you, haunted by a body's fragrance,
numbed by the wait for the next joy, the next conflict,
numbed when you get there too. you don't have a hard time
convincing yourself it's all temporary, do you, except when
in dim light dreams of flesh turn any way you want them to
and you usually want them to turn to embraces,
and you still won't disappear, will you, you'll keep
your eyes open against her skin and detail will disappear
all the frustration and fear and bits of nothingness
taken away by an impulsive lick of a shoulder
thought circling tomorrow's specifics
mirrors at 52 a woman can
give you the world see?
it's over there.


~


5 1 06






What is Music


Examine ice crystals. No, don't. They won't be there, their symmetries brought down, like what grime on the windshield does to sense of purpose. They're now dead words, these patterns. They might be meditations if you're lucky. But mostly not what they are, by the time you're true with them. Only if you're apt to see angels who scare you or a moon hiding behind a moon will you survive to understand the patterns and how every circle is different, how they're spinning wheels chattering with basball cards, rolling away. Windless harmonicas settle for second best, no choice in the matter. Blow your harmonica, son.

I've written my first symphony, alone by an icy window. I'll admit there are some rough measures and questionable melodies. I hardly disturbed the ice crystals though, hardly aware of spiky echoes and their godly roundnesses. I think I'll get rid of the second movement, I think that's where I touched the glass. Across the street a little boy in a red cowboy shirt stuffs his hands in his pockets. It's cold and he has no jacket. He's saying something. I'm hearing What you think are questions are not questions over and over. Mother arrives, singing showtunes. Why is tombstone a word, what are we saying? Is song brought down to this? I love the ambivalence that fuels my art. I get it from half-looking at ice. Sometimes being sneaky is appropriate. Beethoven loved big fat notes, big stupid chords, and look how many of us went along with it. This windowglass, frosted with trill upon trill mathematical, white prison of soul heat, melts when I touch. It's the just the way it gets sometimes, here in this trad kazoo, limegreen scherzo, icy conundrum.


~


5 2 06






Critique, like love, is constructed of apparent contradictions


I read some of his stuff, this poet.
I enjoyed him before I knew who he was.
I'd tear it all apart now, even having to check
some books on poetics for new ways to prove
how he has failed in his work. Once perhaps he
failed you, even if this has somehow
brought you to me. One type of critic or poet
would use irony to turn and unlock
this situation. Another tears through the work
like fangs through the dark,
don't see blood, but you bleed.
I have the silly grin.

O those poets, I'd smirk,
or jovially concur, or slip someone
a tickle, some sharp abstraction everyone
knows they should turn away from,
look for postmodern glittering rainbows,
some drug hallucination    they know
they're being tampered with
and so on. But, you know,
I have the silly grin.
See you Saturday?
Though we don't dance, well,
you know.


~


5 3 06







What I Want To Be When I Grow Up

Look me up, Loch Ness, spotted a yeti
New as I am to the world of the chuckle
Things get you through, like rice and spaghetti
If they ask what I do, I swashbuckle

I don't have the nuts to be a Svengali
My lurid romance steams one hot tamale
Want two, or three, and to be obscure
Zen moments bloom from each nonsequitur

My need, my need, is to have a spoon feed
In red-bubbled hot soup de jour
A rollicking bald tumbleweed

~


5 4 06






quick poem


i
was
thinking
about you

when the sky
went dark
but lit by
moon

how
angels sing!
another
matter

lit by spring
i nearly didn't
notice until
some po
et wrote
some t
hing

that triggered me i read it
on an internet poetry board
actually this whole thing is a lie

the
fancy
dancing
softly
soft

inside i'm
roaring i'm
thinking
of you

~


5 5 06






then there's this


time in my life when nothing works
and it lasts for years all those years
i find without looking    people passing
stores where the signs are all crooked
churches locked and fenced    i have no
notion to carry me further along in these
discoveries    who sent me and where do i go
schools have different names and my fingers
not properly calloused to play the guitar
in those years when nothing works i can't
sing    i like to walk at night all night
this time in my life when there are no incidents
only weeks or more at a time    this sort of time
imbeds itself in every moment now
not days or hours
but moments    a little piece of a missed funeral
all of this time


~


5 5 06






Of minds that would be entranced


We're in the middle of it,
and pretend it's over there.
We can see it over there,
but I can't see it in you
nor you in me, except for
its action which we see
over there. We buy supplies
at Walmart. Nothing so
Americana to me than black
lung and rolling hills with
that smoke and fog that
really does shroud. Even though
life was tough before wouldn't
you like to stroll down a gaslight street
garter on your arm, suspenders,
gal gettin' saucy and that new
perfume. Even the drugstore
was poetry, written not for poets
but for the fun of coming thirsty
to its fountain, downing new elixirs,
taking home notions. Did this all happen,
the parades and barbershop quartets,
talkies, ads folks really listened to
no matter if they're myths? I buy
supplies at Walmart, which we
see over there, not in here.


~


5 7 06






one moon's


phases pull
me to you

and when
you're not
around i

dance inside
and under
not even
moving

moonlight
in your eyes
a few miles
away

your colors
are perfect
pastel against
the real

the chill is
in the air

all is metaphor
spanish
in the park
cold coffee
and cream

embrace me
once more
by share of night
i touch you
soft fingertips
bright


~


5 8 06








dare i sign off with love


there's a grey-green balloon that popped
and all the monkeys that came out
weren't monkeys yet, they were still
children, blonde-haired, green-eyed,
chipped tooth and such. destined for monkeydom
these childbeasts boarded a train
and from its windows they saw golden light
curve in on itself, shapes left their feelings
behind, abstracted themselves, sent themselves off
to some other Smithsonian, an American symptom,
this growth towards monkeydom. at some point however
nearly every childbeast has a spot of recognition
as to who they were, what they were becoming and
how to stop it. and this spot is usually over their shoulder
and to the right, maybe not, who cares. because
this is like a book of monkeys already, full of the feelings
left behind. now who's going to clean up all this balloon mess?


~


5 12 06




The Legend of Starbucks


Twice or more upon a city
An apparition appears
We partook of its potions
White cocolate and strawberries
Forsooth! The dragon
Singes us with scrutiny
CDs at the counter
Drags its tail into the night
Ever after winds blow hot
Shrill with the change we hold
The fool's hymn just a ditty
Muffled in the crowd's noise
Of this second's century
Respite on the way
Busy and chatty

~


5 12 06








for a while


there's a spot under the moon
god misses small fishes still
in its light otherwise in a splash
heat drips from echoes
now how does it do that?
drips to sear my skin
and my eyes and every
word i will write


~


5 13 06







empty basket through frozen foods


you can keep
the movie, i'll mail you the book
after i finish it, is that okay?
or i'll bring it to you somewhere,
meet for lunch maybe,
or a long walk through the dark,
maybe catch a movie,
maybe talk.


~


5 14 06






Lost My Footing for a Moment



Last night at the winery I had to listen to the guys talk
about guns, cars and racists. I couldn't tell you anything
about gauges, rims and why the government is in a rush
to work the southern border, and not say jackshit
about the north. Pussy and reverse discrimination don't usually
engage me in themselves. But I'm thankful
a woman comes along once in a while whom I can adore,
and if all that black/white/brown stuff is for real
at least I can ignore it, and sometimes it even makes it easier
to see more of what some people really are,

just like pussy will teach you things you won't learn
anywhere else. I can overlay this with all sorts of curliques
and Viagra and what all else, but let's touch its beating heart:
before and within skin there is love, always. Take it as a given,
love for friends, family, love for beloved, all sorts of love.
How could you not feel it?

There's routine begatting other routines, and the routine of
falling into a routine begats another you. Word association is a cruelty too,
and suddenly we realize it's going on deep in our muscles,
even our eyes blink consistant with where we might be
who we might be with, and our larger shadows are even easier to spot.
Spics and porch monkeys, ragheads, fags, wetbacks, whiteboys and Gramps too.
How an arm goes up if there's too much disagreement,
decibels displace grace. Put a newspaper in front of my face

and try to remember her scent, buoyancy in her eyes
right down to her belly, remember, then it's gone,
and a high level alarm starts to ring, break is over,
fucking only an adjective, all the compressors are running
still there's silence upon silence, scent and its memory have no sound.
We all submerge again, swim in what we don't even know we love,
or what we love and cannot have, silence and the work gets done.


~


5 17 06