He slowly sips
before the tap drips
again.
He just had it fixed
they had to pad it with grips
for the bartender’s big, meaty hands.
The noise level rises
as he quietly sighs and
walks out to the cold, rainy street.
He zips up his coat
as he steps over the moat
gurgling around his feet.
He looks up in the rain
as he waits for the train
listening for a sound on the track.
His mind keeps on stalling
as memories come calling
and his eyes shut to hold them all back.
The rain falls around him
and he wonders if it’ll drown him,
slowly shuffling his feet.
There’s a kid in the crowd
with his boombox up loud
nodding his head to the beat.
The man hears the whistle
he thinks maybe this’ll
be his last lonely ride on the rails.
He hears the thing cry
a small part of him dies
and he sobs as the iron beast wails.
Its rough heartbeat grows
and he certainly knows
surrender will be his release.
The sound of the bell
and the engineer’s yell
as he vainly hopes for surcease.
A large puff of smoke
as the beast gives a croak
and his body and mind seek some rest.
The past to the rear
and the track ahead clear
as the man and the train headed west.
The smoke like small clouds
and the clattering loud
of the track as it met with the wheels,
interrupted the sheep
which he counted for sleep
just to keep his mind off of the details.
It moves from self to self
bringing the moment along for the ride
with certain purpose.
There is no chance.
The thread is thin
to invisibility
yet stronger than any diamond
and more painful in its brilliance.
It can twine itself around us
and squeeze complete strangers together.
It can
perhaps more easily
drive through us
with fatal accuracy
more completely than the strongest arrow
flown from the tightest bowstring.
It never changes
but forever changes those it touches.
Woven by fate
from purest ether
into an endless length of
minutes and seconds.
Time uses us
until we break or rust.
It is the carpenter
and we are the hammers
we are the nails
pounded with indifference
into rough wooden planks
the harsh sound echoing its laughter
overlapping yesterdays.
Martha Stewart
insists on soft focus.
She screams incoherently at the cameraman
for more Vaseline on the lens.
People say she speaks in tongues
which I always thought was an ironic phrase.
Most folks
most folks
mo
moist Legos
that speak in tongues sound more like they’re speaking
without tongues.
The frenzy of spiritual enlightenment
has a numbing effect on the zealot’s mouth
mumbling affectations through a zealous mouse.
An ex-producer once gave Ms. Stewart a spiny wedge of cactus
after one of her foam-inspiring tirades
on the lack of oil-based lubricant.
Without looking
she bit into it like a cookie
never winced
and no one has ever seen her bleed.
A checker piece black
deck of cards in a magician’s act
guillotine whack
Maybelline eye-shadow
with no reflection
but drools with attraction
and rules of cause and effect
pause to relax
clause in long-winded
soliloquy
from Hamlet’s mouth
to Macbeth’s mouse
nibbling on the blade of a rusty axe
while Leo reads of atrocious acts
leafing through the well-worn book
and leaving before the play is done.
He never saw that Detroit won
scraped raw, the four became one
as he changed the price on the sign out front
his friend throwing rice to a squeaky runt
yelling for Gibson to bunt
so we can get a run
and settle the game
before the pain
of my shoe on his head
registers the sales tax
receipt says I was over-charged
so you’ll never see me
in those shorts
at least not before
the start of the war
of the rich and the poor.
The poor wanted more
they were sore
so they started the war
killing two and then four
until they had more
and the poor
were no longer sore
which just made those rich folks
sore in return.
They called Major Burns
but there was nothing he could do
the rich were too few.
Frank didn’t like war anyway
so he gasped
whew!
and thought nothing more about it.
He bought his girl
a new ring
with a pretty swirl
around an off-white pearl
and she started to sing.
She was better than Jim or Burl
but still worse than you might think
it drove poor Frank to drink.
That’s what made him lose his girl
and the ring with the pearly swirl
so he poured the liquor down the sink
as it twirl’
‘round the drain
it gave him a wink
that stuck in his brain.
It made him pause in the field of grain
and think of the train
she had left on.
That’s when the bullets fell like rain
all about the major pain
and he tried to run but his poor little brain
couldn’t shake the pain
of his girl on the train
and the young Major Burns would never again
take a stroll down the quiet lane
or drive down the Street of Main.
The train
rode on in the rain
and the whistle cried out
playing over the forest green
no one had seen
the Major fall
and his girl didn’t look back at all.
She bought a house in the fall
or was it the spring
in sixty-four
when the center fielder caught the ball
and helped to bring
the trophy back to Baltimore.
The team had all
begun to sing
until they couldn’t sing any more
they gave one last victorious call
and their throats did sting
they were happy, but sore.
The bird saw it all
as it took to the wing
and began to soar
high over the wall
the same moment that Bing
stopped making movies about the war.
Billy decided he was just too tall
to carry on about such things
so he sold the store
wiped clean the stall
made a list of things to bring
and moved in with the girl next door.
Frank Sinatra croons an old forelorn song
about a woman who will never love him
a familiar story.
I have known love.
I have served up slices of myself to those I thought I loved
and they have each taken these portions with them.
Milder than scars
yet still holding the same power of memory.
The human brain is too much like a computer
waiting for a trigger to launch another program
of long-stirred memories
complete with emotions
traps for all of the senses
filling out the flashback like paint to a line drawing
with all of Picasso’s gusto
and just as overwhelming.
The brush of memory scoops up a glob of yellow oil
and ravages the canvas
almost vicious in its intensity
but warm, never harsh.
Heavy streaks of yellowish, shiny
raw energy
become sunflowers in a field,
which becomes a field from a picnic,
which becomes the fragrant cork
from the bottle of wine.
Am I the medium for these memories?
Do these recalled moments move through me,
or is it the other way around?
Perhaps I am nothing more than an
eternal screen
backdrop
for the recollections to flicker upon.
I cannot see them
but I can feel the phantoms
moving around me.
The air swirls in cool currents.
As subtle as the moon to the oceans
they create eddies
that tingle my skin.
Sometimes
on the special days
their voices flow past my ear
on the waves.
The strange words
crawl inside me
and stir up my own dust of thoughts.
If there are too many
my thoughts become mixed up with
their utterances
and the sediment will not settle.
Goodbye
she said
over her shoulder
as though she didn’t care
lobbing the farewell in an easy, high arc
but not waiting for the return.
She would have made a lousy tennis player
with such indifference
but she was fun at parties
ironically
for exactly the same reason.
She went through people fast
discarding them into the bin next to
“TRASH”
labelled
“WHATEVER”.
She could never soil her hands
with anything as messy as
resolution.
Her script apparantly read
“EXIT STAGE RIGHT, DRAW CURTAIN”
at the middle of each act.
She would have done Sho Kosugi proud
diverting attention
then vanishing in a thick
plume of magic ninja smoke
leaving anger and frustration behind her
like spent throwing stars.
She could flip a knife
right into your pupil
when she wore that green dress.
She was a master
(or should that be “mistress”?)
at avoiding and blocking
all pathetic attempts
at guilt, fury, or indignation
and turn them back against you.
Verbal judo expert
lethally adept at sparring,
taunts, jeers, and humiliation
her best weapons.
She could hone an insult to a razor’s edge
and sink it neatly between your ribs.
Sure, it hurt like hell
but some guys like that.
I allow the thoughts to pass through my mind
closed my eyes as imagination wanders
I
i
imagine
and it draws me like sunflowers with oils
vigorous and passionate
unstoppable
my forehead glistens with a thin sheen of
anticipation
desire
tremble enters my hands with the nearness of the moment
quickness of breath
thirst
craving
my eyes unfocus and
dart around the room
watching the faces in the massed crowd
expectant
laughing
watching
surges through my veins
burning on its way beneath my skin
I nervously step up
the addiction urges
compels
forces me
lights and eyes, attention
igniting the searing
euphoric
need
flame
the driver stamps on the gas
words and energy pour from my skin
with every
explosive
syllable
drawn slowly, splinterlike, and given out
as it dwindles
the meter slowly drops
polite and appreciative static noise
I step down
sated the addiction
curbed the intolerable need
until I see the next person
take the stage
It was a vacation from work
an exhausting schedule
finally forgotten for a fortnight
I spoke enough of the language to get by
until I met her
and all I could do was gesture
She spoke no English
but we found it didn’t matter
It was dark
her room was small
we spoke by touch
there was no clock
and we were alone
an island of dark in the sea of space
we fell asleep clinging to each other
I awoke with the first light of morning
drifting in the window
falling across a dark shape draped on a chair
Curious, I quietly slid from bed
and touched the soft material of a man’s sweater
property of her other lover
I inhaled
to her scent, faintly left on the clean surface
gently washed by hand and hung to dry
I slipped it on
and found a perfect fit
the sleeves just long enough
over my wrists
a fit with a little give
quality stitching
making an attractive yet unpretentious pattern
not bulky
nor too thin
holding in the warmth of my skin
softer than richest cashmere
or finest silk
and affordably priced under two hundred dollars
I pulled on my jeans
she, under the covers, slightly stirred
a glance in the mirror revealed
a slightly rumpled
yet sexy
figure
and the sweater welcomed the jeans
I kissed her gently
draped my button-up black shirt
with mandarin collar
on the chair
and quietly left
wearing my new sweater
(available in black, ivory, or olive)
Drew Barrymore calls me
on Tuesdays
Usually her bowling night
except when she needs to hear my voice
a flat and
occasionally
nasal
ramble
of small
yet swelling
ideals
bountiful
and curly
like Drew’s hair
after a shower
and disarming smile
slowly
floats
to hold
attention
I can’t look away
and I can think of little else
she is the Cybill Shepard to my Travis Bickle,
but without most of the creepy
tendencies.
I wouldn’t
use
the word “obsession”
but there is a
psychic
certainty
I look over my shoulder
I can’t see her
but I know if I whisper
she will hear
A breath is drawn
throat contracts in swallow
eyelids slide closed
to reveal a vast dark expanse of stars
smallest of bubbles hanging motionless in syrup
and I am suspended sideways somewhere off-center
circles and ellipses, ghosts in flight through the ether
trailing colored streamers
ribbons hanging from balloons
stuck on deep blue bulletin board
perspective changes with a ringing in my ear
down below the valley floor and layers of sediment
to become one with the soil
to bury myself below the populations of extinct cities
and I will know the secrets of primordial swamps
as I open my eyes and sight lights on a changed landscape
nerves in my brain firing messages back and forth
to reveal the truths kept buried within
beyond the magma that seeps from my eyes
and slowly cools to a thick vapor that hangs on this
timeless land heavier than the ghosts and stars themselves
opaque and bright, seething brightness
static swell over tidal sense wave
to fill space with coded thick burlap fabric tear through pinhole planet points
growing to consume the clinging miasma gusting tornado drain in sky tugging at
frontal lobes unclear wavering flickering pounding hurl my physical mortal
shell through earth’s crust to fall back on rumpled sheets
My love is a soft word
my love is a white shirt on a still summer day
my love the warm hum of dialtone
with the
phone
held two
inches from my ear
my love is dark blue
arterial
blood
my love is catalogued by name and date
my love is order
my love is the breeze that ripples her gown
my love is cool mist
fog hanging
between grassy hills
my love whispers
my love is a jazz chord on piano
my love ignores
my love is hair tossed as head turns
my love is fluttered eyelid closed
my love is ice on pond
my love darkens
my love is a broken E-string
my love is bitter, lemon, sour, sweet
Water melts from my love
color drips from my love
through scars that line the surface of my skin
bare skin is my love
foreign accent and painted words, have my love
tightly wound and ticking is my love
collar turned up has my love
stroking random keys, codes my love
illegible messages to be washed away before me
stirring silt, uncovering, beneath :
my love