He said,
“God, I’m sick of
poets, of hanging with
poets — those cheesy
thieves, those fame-famished
greedheads, those little-loved
deluded souls
who think the world
owes them a little regard
just because
they can make music
out of talking.”
I mustered my courage,
gathered my strength,
and responded,
“Hey…
that was a great line.
You gonna use that?”
Who really cares about
sticks and stones?
Bandages and pain meds
handle those just fine;
but a name like that one?
It comes down
like a slab of whirlwind-flung
concrete.
It doesn’t matter
what the old proverb
insists upon. Names
carve and crush and
starve and slush you,
and then, there you are:
nothing but remains, and
no one knows
how to ask
after you,
no one knows how to reach
your next of kin.
to master the art of the one-off
do it once
and call it a day
a one-off show
a one-off album
a one-off lifetime
do it once
and never come back
leave everyone wanting
more
an artist of the one-off
bucks that tired reincarnation trend
of hogging time
of insisting on
do overs
continuing sagas
serial dramas
endless sequels
just because it seems
so hard to get it right
the first time through
the one-off artist
instead declares
that whatever happens is
because it happens
already
enough
I follow
a same-every-morning routine
of
blood drop,
breakfast,
coffee,
screen and keys
into
an unknown chaos called
the day,
much as I might follow
a constant called
North Star
into
darkness;
tugged along thus by hope
and discipline,
I can be certain
that even if clouds move in,
when they are gone
that star
will be there again.
CAT!
go eat the food I gave you
upon which money was spent
upon which I spent money
I could have used for something
more useful than feeding a cat
(like 400 guitar picks or a solid gold hat)
CAT!
why won’t you eat the food I gave you?
This morning you couldn’t get enough of it
And this plate’s been filled from the SAME CAN
But you turn your lovely whiskered snout away
as swiftly as a politician turns
from last week’s firm position
to its opposite
CAT!
I understand you need to be
a CAT
and therefore always
mysterious
always
the avatar of
Contradiction
CAT!
you are making me
nuts
you are making me
question
if I can ever understand
how to make you happy
CAT!
the whole time
you’re flinging things
to the floor
and screaming
for something
that is obviously
the food you aren’t getting
(whatever that may be)
you are purring
so loudly
in what is either
delight at my attentions
or gloating at my tension
CAT!
suddenly
you’re on my shoulder
rubbing my ear
still rumbling like a
tummy
and then you’re gone
and the crazy is over
for a few minutes until
you come back in
licking your chops
from the now-empty plate
CAT!
you
damnable
adorable
CAT!
it’s clear why
you were worshipped
once upon a time
you’re as unpredictable
as any
deity
ever
It’s time
to just be high
and let go
of one moment
of control.
I can’t feel much
in my little fingers
right now. My feet
burn whenever
I put weight on them.
Something’s
wrong with my body,
but nothing’s wrong with
that;
what’s happening
is what should happen
at this stage
of The Condition
and
while I’ll treat it
and fight it and
et cetera it,
it’s doing
what it is made to do and
the body’s reacting
as it was made to do
so
I’m going to get high
and take a moment to say
all is dead on for the horizon
and all is right with
my tingling, burning,
blood-shot world.
Went for a walk
and found a granite ledge
calling from where
it poked through
the frozen floor
of a clearing
I put my ear to it
The voice was
unlike that in a shell
that cradles
the womb-song of
ocean
Instead
a muffled
operatic baritone
declaimed other essentials
and broke now and then
into warm silence
I cannot recall a word I heard
although
inside me
the sacristy
where I hold
my best self
still rings
and echoes
and I have placed
a stone
in my pocket
to carry with me
always
Once or more a day I pull myself together
and face this art too many say
is not itself a proper subject for
art. They scold that writing a poem
about poetry is lazy, a mark of
having nothing to write about,
and then they sneer and slip away
to their cozy mutual masturbations
on topics of more import
such as comparing themselves
to superheroes
or more talk of how it feels
to fuck, to wanna fuck, to be
fucking, to be not fucking…
I turn back to how I am,
to the work of speaking of everything
under the sun — even to superheroes and
to fucking, if that even needs to be said;
but if there now and then comes a time
to sing
of how this often makes me feel
like a superhero,
of how I’m wrapped
in the arms of something greater
than myself when I am in this art,
of how I am humbled now and then
to see who I am through the stacking
and slashing and burning of words,
of how now and then I get to hold
the edge of the universe before
I slip back into daily life,
when a song comes that demands I sing of this
I will sing it,
even if you
turn away, your capes
fluttering, your asses
bouncing with your own joys;
I will sing it
and be well pleased
that I did not sing it
for you.
Not wasting a moment
more of my breath on him.
Not wasting time. Look at him,
a waste, a time suck.
To say the least,
he’s a shit. A turd
not worthy of a second wipe.
He’s a disaster,
to say the least,
to say the absolute least
in the least time
with the fewest and shortest words,
with no words, perhaps,
with a gesture
or one eyebrow,
one finger
raised, one elbow digging into
your target rib —
get a load
of that guy. Of him.
Need I say more than that —
if I do, if I need to explain myself,
you better pull up a chair
as there’s a lot to be said,
to say the least,
a lot to be said,
I guess
it’s kind of a
long story.
he came late
sat at my table
after some small talk
and some formalities
he began to speak
of why we were meeting
he had changed
he said
drank from a tall glass of whiskey
ran an unsteady hand over his head
front to back
he had changed
he said again
not the same man
had done some growing up
came to realize, etc.
working his steps
I looked hard at the glass
then at him
at his eyes
I said
put it together for me
make it make sense
oh
not for this he said
tilting the glass
to make his point
for the other
I said
what other
he said
water under the bridge
over the broken dam
does it matter
what other
trying to talk here
trying to make amends
ran hand over head
tilted the glass
I’ve changed he said
I’m sorry
I’m sorry
dammit
ingrate
wait
no
sorry
he tossed apologies
at the back of my head
as I stopped tilting
at windmills
and walked out
dime and penny
in my pocket.
eleven cents:
all I’ve got.
it may not seem worth
hanging on to
but I will hang on to it
for if I give you
a penny for your thoughts
I’ll feel I’ve overpaid
and then all I’ll have
is one thin dime
so how will I ever
make some time?
eleven cents
is nothing to build on.
you can’t buy anything
with it.
it’s not even enough
to make me feel more lost
if I lose it,
but I will hold
dime and penny
even though
they don’t clink
when they collide
in my pocket,
even though
they make more
of a grinding sound.
I believe
God has evolved
to an understanding
of how little
he in fact
controls — I see
God in Middle Age
relinquishing the historic need
to hold
each of us
too close — I see
chaos descending
for good or
for ill —
a huge Visage
smiles and
whistles
“Que Sera, Sera”
http://drunkinamidnightchoir.com/
The link above will take you to a relatively new online journal, “Drunk In A Midnight Choir,” which published three of my poems this week. I don’t submit to publications all that often, so I’m always pleased when pieces are accepted.
The work being published in this journal is excellent, and I highly recommend adding the publication to your reading.
My thanks to the editors for their kind attention.
–T
(the case for war)
because it feels
like I’ve learned how
to sing using
only blood
because I step
on my own tongue
chasing it
because between
the legs
is how I feel
rage
because I can buy
one boxcar full of lawyers
two boxcars full of editorials
and a whole train more of ginned-up rage
to ease the way
once it begins
because it can last a long time
it might lose its flavor
like old gum
but still stays firm
when it slides
up and down on the tooth
because having something sliding
up and down on my tooth
makes more joy than anything else
I can think of doing
because somehow
glamor and honor still congeal
around last charges
last stands
lost causes
and because they don’t give out
the good jewelry
for dying while asleep
A specialty of the fabled
electric sand-eel,
a creature extant only on
my mind’s favorite desert island,
is its ability to regulate its power
so that in one stroke it may bolt
across a room to kill or
perhaps light a fire
for worn travelers.
Among the creases in the folds
of the skin of the imaginary
pocket elephant
one may find
the algae, called by some “manna,”
which saved the Israelites
on their forty year stroll to
what they call home.
The solitary helicopter wing
of the bass wasp,
the blank face of
the spotted closet snake,
the fully functional heart
growing on the outside
of the Damson’s plum warbler:
can’t you hear that external heart
pulse as it’s calling you,
doesn’t the sting of the wasp
throb within you,
isn’t that
the tiny drumming
of the elephant’s feet?
Go ahead and admit how real they are,
how real you’d like them to be,
then make them more real to everyone else —
repeat these stories of their existence up and down,
praise the habitats they inhabit,
sing hymns for their well-being and
soon enough they will spring
into just as full a reality
as reverse racists,
welfare queens,
and the culture affirming smile
of Chief Wahoo.
Dark Matter 