The fine online journal for the small poetry press world, “The Poetry Question,” just published this short article I wrote for their ongoing series, “The Power Of Poetry.” Take a look and follow them, if you wish, on Twitter or Facebook, I thank them for the opportunity.
Monthly Archives: February 2020
Terraformed
Do or stop all doing,
be dead or be changed into
another’s expectation;
I’m in awe of how far
they’ve pushed me
into their pattern.
They’ve killed part of me,
believing death will spread
and give them life.
I’ve been made
into something useful
to another…yet
under the alien soil
where they’ve buried me,
I’m still alive, opening space
around my feared body, and
soon enough
will come raging out
into their smug faces
and remind them
that the surface
they prize so much
is just that.
BigDumbNoise
The lure of
that which is meaningless
to my larger concerns
is that there could be
relief
available for the
weight:
a jack to lift
what’s crushing me
off my chest
So therefore bring on
the dumbest TV and
the loudest three chords
you’ve got
as now and then
the Big Dumb Noise
is all there is
to ease the pain
of complexity
ambiguity
and the solid leaden
grays
that seem to be
my ruling principles
my heavy core
Neuropathy Blues
A guitar neck just feels
like more of my nerve-drunk hand.
The strings burn graves
into my dead fingertips.
The volume knob turned too far
spikes my fear of exposure.
If I sound insecure to others
about how it feels to play,
it is because these raging nerves
are what I know of my hands lately,
and lately my guitar is where they go
to fail and (soon enough) to die.
The pain on the day after:
history informing the future.
Music comes from
the place between those things.
All my apologies flow
from how every broken arpeggio
climbs a ladder leading
to a day when I will have to stop
all of this, or when I am
at last stopped.
Till then, though?
Till then, I am yours.
Grain Of Sand
I have so little
to give
except my life
which I do not
routinely consider
large or of value
although in its current size
and worth it may serve
as grain of sand in a precision machine
as killing germ or worm
as parasite in an evil host
You grab me by the arms
and shake me
and your own head
saying no no no
you have so much to live for
and so much more about you
is golden than you know
Hush
Be still
As sand or virus
I take part
in cosmic order
in a time when stopping
the Machine or slaying
a Host bent on death
is truly all
we all have left to do
and you say
no no no
to my being
even a nameless piece
of how that happens
Try to be serious
It would be an honor
to be forgotten
to be anonymous
in the future
for that would mean
that I and the rest of
the nameless who say
let them take me
if it stops them
made the future real
Stripes And Spots
Zebras on your mind this morning
Zebras in the driveway, trying to get in
Leopards in your dreams last night
Leopards hidden in the backyard junk
Is that a giraffe looming behind the neighbors’ garage roof
or a jaguar on a crane conducting surveillance
You are wondering if you should call a cop
but they’re more like the suspects than they aren’t
Not what they appear to be either
Everything in the jungle wears camo
Zebras now on the back porch knocking
Leopards scratching the front door bell
You put down your phone and start painting your face
But it’s like doing nothing at all in the scheme of things
So you sit and draw the shades and cower like a rabbit
though zebras and giraffes aren’t threats it’s not certain
that the cops will bother to tell the difference
if they come when called at all
You’re just another critter and your hole isn’t safe
Lions and tigers and bears and jaguars and leopards
and cops and there you are and who is who
It’s not like you can tell who might have changed
their stripes
for spots
Why We Got Here
A faith like
Al Capone’s:
a gun and a smile
will get you farther
than just a smile.
A vision like
Charlie Manson’s:
love is all you need,
“love” spelled
“K-N-I-F-E.”
A discipline like
John Gotti’s:
well-dressed, cracking
jokes and heads, bragging
and daring you to try it.
A truth like
George Armstrong Custer’s:
if you charge long enough
and often enough, you’ll become
a famous loser.
A holy fire like
Cotton Mather’s:
find a scapegoat,
hang it high, pretend
the rope wasn’t braided out of fear.
A repentance like
Jimmy Swaggart’s:
public and eyes up
to a heaven somewhere above
a cheap suspended ceiling.
Death By Metaphor
Originally posted April 2010.
This morning
it feels like my heart
is knocking against my ribcage.
I mean that
in all sincerity.
Heart, in this case,
is muscle and not metaphor.
Ribcage is
a common descriptive term for the arrangement
of the ribs.
Morning is when this is happening;
these words should be seen
as carrying no figurative weight.
I mean to say just what I say:
it’s morning, and it feels like
my heart is knocking against my ribcage.
Note that I did not say, “trying to break free”
from my ribcage. That would be stupid.
The heart has no will of its own.
It doesn’t know freedom and it’s not
going to leap from my body
leaving splinters of bone
and a huge hole behind it.
That would invite metaphor again
and I’m trying to avoid it
as my breathing’s too shallow
to use so much oxygen
on creative thought right now.
Did I mention my breathing was shallow?
Don’t assume I meant something else. There’s
nothing hidden there;
my breathing is shallow, meaning I’m taking
smaller breaths than usual, higher in my chest,
more quickly. I could add that they do not
expand the ribcage as much as normal breaths.
You should get the picture
though I’m not trying to paint one:
just the facts here. I’m wincing
with the effort of staying in the moment
with the pain in my shoulder.
Yes, I’m in pain.
For a full description of it,
I’m going to have to dip a bit into
comparison.
Forgive me. It’s what we all do;
I don’t know how else to say it, so:
it’s like something’s cutting me at intervals.
Sharp pain. We call it that because it explains it
to another. We’ve all felt it. Right now,
it feels like my left shoulder’s being slashed
from clavicle to pit; a rod’s being shoved in the wound
and shoved down my left arm from the inside.
That’s accurate as a description
even if it’s not a fact. No wonder
my breathing’s so shallow. No wonder my heart
feels like it’s knocking on my ribcage.
I would feel safe
in having you assume
that these are the signs
of a heart attack, which itself is a metaphor
used to describe a myocardial infarction
or some other cardiac event. Heart attack
is a bad description: as if the heart
were capable of hostilities.
It’s not attacking me. It’s doing what it is supposed to do
in response to my not taking care
of it properly. Fatty foods, no exercise, pack a day habit.
No metaphors there, just facts, though
I suck at self care contains a metaphor
that works, even if the sentence
makes no objective sense.
This morning, then,
let’s just say that it feels like my heart
is knocking against my ribcage.
Let’s say, further, that my dumb heart
and my ribcage
and my arm are in some kind of distress
and as a result
I am too
although I don’t know
what I means, who I am
distinct from awareness
of my body. If I did,
would I be writing this
instead of calling the ambulance?
If the heart dies I’m sure I’ll find out.
No metaphor in that, either.
I suspect there will be a moment
when I will understand
the meaning of I
if keep writing instead of calling.
I won’t come back to tell you about it, though.
You will have to draw conclusions
from the poem and the pain and the heart
and the dying. You will say
that stupid bastard died
writing a poem while his heart was failing,
and you’ll be correct.
I’m sure someone
will make it into a metaphor,
though in fact it isn’t.
Paid In Full
We lay our hope
these days
upon imminent endings:
the last mortgage check
slid into an envelope
and dropped into the mail;
the last “click”
on the “Pay Now” button
on the car payment
Website; the meteor
from on high
rendering the need for action
on everything at once
obsolete.
O beautiful,
for fiery sky,
for closure
on our pain.
Sing it,
my countryfolk,
my weary troupe
of roleplaying warriors.
Curtain call,
final bows,
leaving the dark theater;
then, off we go to
our debauched
after party.
Partings
are all we have to
anticipate now;
do them drunk and
lawless. Do them weepy
and raw. Sit up
alone till dawn to wave at all this
one last time;
wait for the sound
of “Paid In Full”
being stamped on our notes;
lie down to rest.
You Liar
When you knew it was over
you did nothing drastic,
did not weep or moan.
You tucked
all your loves
into their beds,
went outside
into winter rain,
sat on the step
at the end of the walk
and got soaked through
listening to the highway below.
Late night traffic, still busy,
people heading home,
you tell yourself,
though in fact
you don’t know that.
They could be fleeing,
could be joyful or manic and
destination-free, urged along
by a wild compass within.
You had to make it up
as they went along, because
you weren’t going anywhere.
You had to believe
they must all be going home.
Home felt safe and solid
and someone had to be
as safe and solid, as
clear in their intent
and execution
as you were not.
The cars rolled on
and you sat still
in the rain, soaking
through, still trying
to pretend all of us
would be fine,
you liar.
Unimportant
Her name is unimportant here,
not because she was
but because I do not want you
to know her in the way
I will describe her.
She hung around us,
not with us.
We had a nickname for her.
I will not say it.
Did not mock her, not
directly, not to her
face, unless our rolled eyes count
as mockery, or our excuses
to leave and go to class,
even if there was no class;
I will say it.
I understand now
and will admit it now:
there was no class.
In casual discussion
she mentioned once that
if they ever filmed
the story of her life
she wanted to be played by
Olivia Newton-John.
We rolled our eyes.
We went straight off to no class.
She died young of cancer.
Her name was Unimportant.
Her nickname was cruel
and unnecessary and
mocked her body.
God, we were awful
behind her back
and I suspect
to her face too
if I think hard about who
I was, who I may still be.
In the movie of my life
I should be played by
a stone sunk into the silt
at the bottom of a cold lake,
a stone so deep in the water
the chance of it ever being seen
by human eyes is next to nothing.
Infinitesimal. A probability so small
you could hear the dead laughing at it.
Existence
Existence
A function of language
To bring a flower forward
from thought
description
matters as nothing else
does
Pictures now
can be fake
and who trusts
that all is as it appears
But add the precision of color words
Talk to us of
the threaded ridges of
the stem and the way
its damaged green sticks
in the nostrils
peppery and stiff
lasting after the bloom
is taken away
and thus it exists
for you as no picture could
With 1000 words
or 100
in your ear
before your eyes
easy to say
there was a flower
It was without doubt
real
Driving Bad Roads
Tonight,
driving people to their destinations,
listening to them
worry on their phones,
barely talking to me
or talking to me nonstop and
I agree,
I agree,
I agree
till I’m weary of agreement;
yes, these roads are bad.
Yes, these roads are busy.
Yes, there are too many
deep ruts. Yes, someone
ought to do something
about it.
Tonight, I drove
the longest unpaved road
in the city to its end
with a man stinking of
some sweet liquor
who warned me and warned me
how bad the road
ahead would be.
Tonight,
I drove Wildwood Road
to its faraway end,
came back around
the cul-de-sac
onto the same ruts and potholes
I’d just covered,
knowing enough
this time about where
the hardest blows
to the suspension would come
to slow down enough
to soften them.
Tonight,
I came home
over the roads I know best,
missing every pit and
axle-breaker hole
because I know it all
so well.
Someone ought to do something
about it one of these days
but until then
I take it one night at a time:
dodging, avoiding,
half listening to complaints
and monologues;
trying
to hold it together
while I drive
and drive.
Chantey
You can hear a recording of this with music here:
https://soundcloud.com/radioactiveart/chantey
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
you walked for miles to the ocean
stood on a jetty to see
if the horizon was as distant
as you’d always presumed it to be
you stepped off the edge into water
as rough and disturbed as you were
swam past surf breaking hard on the rocks
toward a line you never would reach
sovereign over yourself
ruler of all you contained
you turned on your back
you let yourself drift
to see what would fade or remain
you left your thoughts on a sandbar
your vision and voice caught the waves
whatever you thought you knew of horizons
was lost in the storm and the gray
once you were back on the jetty
once you’d returned to the shore
the horizon refused to release you
you were not the same as before
submissive now to a larger sense
of what you had lost and retained
you turned back to your life
where you never forgot
how that motion rocked you awake
Also Ran
Thinking of
all the talent show
also-rans
you never hear from again
(unless by chance one of them
makes it big and then
how the news loves to bring it up
as in, wow, looks like the show
got it wrong, look how this one
was the real talent and
ooh wee ooh, we told you so
back then, although in fact
they didn’t), but then
there are the others
who go back to more or less
the same old same old,
the used-to-be that rises up
to cradle them or swallow them.
For most it’s no doubt fine and they settle in
with memory and love for the moment,
the not-even-quite-Warhol moment
that gets mentioned now and then
by locals when they sing the anthem
at a high school game or tear up the floor
at a family wedding or jump on stage
to sing at the village bar with a cover band:
c’est la vie say the old folks, etc., etc….
of course, there are no doubt a few
who crumble like cookies into dust
and use words like robbed and contender
and should have been and rigged,
who groan for decades afterward about injustice.
I do not know
whether I would have been
contented or embittered
in the aftermath
had I ever had the courage
to step to the stage,
even as I mutter
“too late, too late”
while refusing to consider
that I might have been
none-of-the-above,
that I might have won.
Dark Matter 