Originally posted 3/6/2013.

A man who has never been rejected
is watching women on Highland Street

as if Highland Street were the ruins of a Mayan city
where these women are exhibits to be viewed

as if they were souvenirs
A man is shopping for a souvenir

among the women of Highland Street
imagining he is a prince of a lost realm

A lost realm he learned about in school
or perhaps in books from his father’s library

that displayed women as souvenirs
for the taking by princes of the realm

who may imagine themselves
against the backdrop of old roads

and palaces and even temples where men
are never rejected

because they never ask permission
when they take a woman for a souvenir of the realm

A man watches women
on Highland Street 

Imagines himself 
crafted in sharp obsidian

Ordained as prince and priest
Taker of live hearts

Imagines himself
hero of a bent myth

written by princes and priests
of the realm

Originally written in 1981 or 1982.  Never posted; not certain it has ever been performed.  Significantly revised here.

This is not a face I love
so I’ll gladly give it to you.  

Pull it from my head.
Put it on your own.  
I don’t need another, people would just 
recognize me then, don’t need that.  
Would rather look at them bare
and then scare them away
with my front skull.

Gradations are odious.  
My face is all gradation 
and subtlety and neither
is a thing I love.  
I surrender them
with this new wide smile.

The flesh we devote to expression 
is annoying and extraneous.  
I would gladly dispense with emotions
beyond the largest of them:
ecstasy, terror, rage, despair. 

In the new world
we won’t need subtlety.
In the new world
we’ll stick with ecstasy, terror,
rage, and despair.  These
will be our default settings.
Will guide our appetites.
Will drive our businesses.
Will admonish our gods.
Will break us in.

This is not a face I love.
I’ll gladly give it to you
but you should ask yourself
before you take it:
in this new world
why have a face at all?

Originally, this was three separate poems written over the years 1976-1980.  Never posted before, found in my ancient archives from that period.

I was a kid then, a teenager, and my reach was often far greater than my grasp.  I had an essay and a whole theory about what I was trying to do with poetry that when I read it now (of COURSE I kept it!) makes me giggle and blush.  But I was aiming at something, something larger than the individual Poem, even back then.  Didn’t have the life experience or the skill back then to make it work.  

Not sure I do now either, of course, but I am far more clear on my small abilities and my large ambitions than I once was, so…let’s say I think it’s worth a try.
Overheard from a dusk-dimmed driveway:

“Basketball’s simple —
you take the ball,
you dribble it, you move,
then you
shoot…”
Father, uncle or big brother speaking,
but who’s listening?  There is no second voice —
until after that, the good flat notes,
the rhythm of rubber on asphalt.

Two worn men on the sidewalk ahead of me.

One says,
“Every time I get my check
I try to hold on to the money.
They rob me at the bank
so I keep it all at home
but they rob me at home
but now I got them all fooled — 
I give all my money
to the man behind the counter
at the liquor store,” 
and his companion howls
and slaps him
on his age-sloped back.

On the bus

another old man, taller than I
by a head and a half,
muttering
again and again,
“…had a big
fat fat
fat fat
fat fat
wife, seven kids, forty years,
I know her face I think
but not her name…”

and now, by myself, in bed alone,
I say

may I never forget
that there are innumerable ways 
to get from one end of the court 
to the other
and may I never
scorn a journey
simply for where it ends.

Originally posted 9/29/2009.

In a world
wracked by anger and justifications
for anger

Glass Fist,

weirdest superhero of our time,

breaks his hands
on yet another villain’s face,
leaving the enemy shredded and wailing
and himself
crippled
yet again.

Back at 
the Fortress of Righteous Anger
his snickering friends watch

as he thrusts his hands 
into the Superkiln
and refashions them once again,
blowing shape back into each finger,
gloving them after they cool.

“What, exactly, is the advantage
of this particular superpower?”
they ask him. “You’re only good
for two shattering blows in any battle
and then we’ve got to save
your sorry ass.”

Glass Fist smiles and bows his head
in assent as they laugh — 

but later, when
he is alone in his lair,
Glass Fist pulls off
the gloves
and the mask.

Stares into his palms —
so clean,
no trace of blood.
His true and naked face
stares back from them
stained by tears,
soaked in doubt.

Originally posted 3/19/2012.

You look like a man 
in need of a punch
to the side of the head

or a piercing
in the side of the body

You’re looking for something that hurts
Something from the hand of a punk
or a Roman soldier

Something you can add to
your Martyrdom Book

Something as good
for starting a conversation
as any 
suicide attempt
colossal drunk striptease
bad haircut

Something to tell
the LADIES about
over a bottle of tears

You look like a man
in need of a narrative
to put it all into

A man in need
of a rabbit to tear apart for effect
as if the rabbit were an envelope
and the winner’s name was inside

A man in search
of a terrible weakling to be

A man
who knows his disease well enough
to call it up for a ride
when he needs
to get somewhere FAST

A man who’s not going to get
that much needed punch in the head
from this guy
because this guy
has no desire
to help you
win your victim badge 

Originally posted 4/27/2009.

Nothing against
palmistry and scrying crystals,
Tarot cards and Zodiac.
All serve the purpose.
It’s their modern monopoly
on divination
that’s troubling.

People act if they couldn’t
find peace and clarity
in the random jumble
of socks in a drawer
or the shadows of skyscrapers 
knifing across downtown streets 
if they tried
when every jammed closet
is a cathedral if you know 
how to pray in it. 

Whenever the ancients and their arts
are called upon
to tell us where we’re heading, 
they must ask themselves,

who are these frightened people
who do not understand how to make do
with what’s right under their noses, cobbling together
a peephole into time from whatever is close at hand?

All we did 
to meet our God 
was add a little attention 
to the mundane.  

Look into our own hands, pick a rock
from the ground and stare into it,
notice a truth when we gambled, 
ask the sky a question and listen.

All we did to meet God
was look for God,
trusting that
we wouldn’t have to look far.

Originally posted 3/14/2008.

the random blast
one block away
is just a backfire for once

and the neighbor’s reggaeton
ripping a hole in saturday afternoon
seems less loud

when there’s angel food cake
on the coffee table
for yolanda’s birthday

daddy’s home for once
instead of serving someone else’s chicken
to someone else’s guests

mama’s not looking as tired
as she usually does
after a week on the fast food register

the whole family’s here
bearing hot dishes and foil pans
full of what they’ve made for each other

someone drops some mac and cheese
in a corner
the dog gets to work on the pile

while everyone laughs and yolanda claps
her smile’s more delicious than usual
with that smidge of frosting on her chin

yolanda has a love for angels
and seven years worth of joy bubbles up today
for all these angels bearing heaping trays

of cookies and wings and old recipes
they just call “grandma’s favorite”
there’s white bread and stewed tomatoes

but yolanda’s got no business with that
when there’s sweet sugar frosting
clinging to the white crumbs on her plate

outside this room
there may be people addicted to devil’s food
and the darkness on their lips may be rich enough

but in here yolanda’s having a birthday
with her yellow dress sweetened by more
than the smear of angel food that her mother

rushes to clean away before that dog
starts licking it off her
(even though

yolanda
would probably
beat him to it if she let her)

when she’s done
she turns to her sister
and says

something sweet
and a little sad
but a little more full of hope

the words are lost
in the sound
of the beating of wings