no song is fast enough. no opinion makes sense. no patience, no censor, no holding. no moment of calm in stomach full, tongue wet, heart even, slow chest rising and sinking.

no time for people beyond the necessary few who stay because they stay. no time to spend love except close by.

no peaceful drift to long sleep at regular hours. no way to disguise the footsteps in the kitchen late at night in search of whatever isn’t visible in the bedroom.

no way to disguise the end of things.

no imagining a gouging job, a telekinetic girlfriend, a Harlem Passion, a tall figure leaning back onto a lowrider.

no desire to abide when time is the only, the all there is. no starting, finishing without need of future.

no. no. no. no.

keep an eye open.
keep both.
let a thing catch one.
see it.
view a thing properly.
view a thing improperly.
do either and follow one with the other.
lean back from a thing once seen.
see it again another way.

find a word that describes a thing.
find two words.
find more than a few more words for describing a thing.
describe a thing.
describe it another way.
describe it as if a thing were another thing.
explain a thing.
get that wrong.
explain it again.
explain a thing again.

see a different thing.
see a first thing in a different thing.

listen to what things you said about a thing.
say those things again.
shift a word to make a music of what you said.
make up new words to make a music for a thing.
make an old word sing a thing anew.
sing old songs to a new thing.
sing for sake of singing.
sing for anything.

see a thing and think it is your own.
write a thing and see it is a different thing.
write about a thing that will not ever be your thing.
write about the same thing.
write about the same thing.
write about the same thing.
fall asleep with your head resting on that same thing.

wake up.

rub your eyes.
see everything that looks the same as the other thing.
see nothing that looks like another thing.

assemble your words into things.
print your things on pieces of paper.
give them names.
sign them.

Some of my oddity should be revealed here…

in order on shuffle:

It’s My Job — Jimmy Buffett
Gouge Away — Pixies
Fall Like Rain — Eric Clapton
Across 110th Street — Bobby Womack
By Myself — Tony Bennett
Immigrant Song — Led Zeppelin
Bathwater — No Doubt
Lean Back — Terror Squad f. Fat Joe
Grey Ghost — Mike Doughty
Wish You Well — Bernard Fanning
Boys Don’t Cry — The Cure
If I Was Your Girlfriend — Prince

I think I’m going to be inspired to a poem by those titles — I won’t end up putting them word for word in a poem, but I’ll use them as associative jumping off points for a piece I’ll post in a day or so.

Billie just came on singing “Lady Sings The Blues.” A good time to close my eyes, I think.