His mashup 
core’s two songs
run together a love song
and a death song and
how those beats collide
collude and now he is
one then another and
the mashup reminds him
of all the songs he is not 
so what the memory does
is originates and
a new bit of beat and
big tears is made from 
mashup a mix a pastiche
of what is heard over
a year or ten and now
until so many bits and beats
smash into born again and
again the yet incomplete 
core of him tells a mistake 
story and a moral is not
anything more than imposition
of a unity among elements
never meant to be found
in the same place and all this
before he gets out the door
first thing on his way to
the singular nature of
his job. On the way to work
he plays the radio because
he likes to take a risk and perhaps
add a little season to the stew
the mash the hash within and
they won’t know him maybe this time
and he’ll go through the dirty glass
of the lobby into the cubicles 
not looking like
the same guy and he’ll be 
tossed out for not matching
his ID pic and so get to go
home and this time
no radio as he has chosen not to
have ears anymore
in a bid for healing an end to 
the mashup he carries
at his core and stop
in a field and let the noise
settle long enough
as he lies there on the grass
trying to remember his name if
nothing else not caring how it is
pronounced as it can be
pronounced anyway
he wants if he can’t hear either that or
how another responds
and right now this stone
of silence sounds
pretty good.

On TV
Annie Clark of St.
Vincent
playing and explaining
jazz voicings with a
vintage junk chic
Harmony electric
guitar

The host 
a fine player
is attempting to
play what she is playing
on a vintage not junk
Dan Armstrong
Lucite electric 
guitar but

can’t quite follow what
she’s doing to make
that slab ring and
sting such odd
angles in the air

She patiently explains
and demonstrates
for him again
and when he at last
gets it she
riffs against what he 
is playing

Guitars and
guitarists wincing
with glad effort 
Expecting nothing of music
but to be there as
music expects
something 
of oneself
to be paid before
offering any greatness
in any increment
no matter how
small

A bounty from each according to 
first ability and then 
need