I colluded
with the wood in my walls
to remain invisible
but sturdy today
despite the gnawing
in my skull
and the ache
in my gut
I got things done
quietly
without fanfare
holding the place together
I’m as proud
as a support beam
that I have managed
to be productive
even though
to the outside world
it may appear
that I did nothing
the wood and I both know
that what is done in secret
often makes all the difference
for tomorrow
I grew up in Massachusetts, south of Worcester on the Rhode Island line, in a town called Uxbridge, named for a town in England; we called our region the Blackstone River Valley.
Never thought of this before: why that name? The stones in this valley are mostly whitish gray and pink flecked granite; at least the dry ones are.
Once they’re wet, of course, it’s a different story.
Everything’s blacker under water; the stones, the bodies of Nipmucs, the remnants of mills, the memories of millworkers.
I romanticize, of course: I’ve learned today the river was named after a white man named Blaxton, AKA Blackstone, who magically moved from the coast to build his house along these banks in 1635.
The dead Nipmucs called it the Kittacuck, meaning “the great Tidal River.” It once was full of salmon and lamprey.
No one remembers any of that now; most of the Nipmucs and all of the fish are gone.
After white guys had been here a while, some of them built mills that filled with Scottish and Irish and French Canadians and Polish and Italians.
That’s half the story of how I got here.
I don’t often mention it. I romanticize, of course: I tend to focus instead on my descent from New Mexico, where in 1635 white people were already killing and being killed, as were the natives I call my own.
In that high desert lava and obsidian are plentiful; black stones are everywhere.
Think of it now: how parallel the stories, how unlike the geologies — think of all that killing, thousands of miles apart: dead Indians, dead fish; some dreams slaughtered in spirit if not in the flesh.
Others had their dreams came true in these valleys of black stones. Big houses in both places testify to success, even a I stare at the land and try to hear the cries of those who lived and died there.
I romanticize, of course: mostly, I hear nothing now in either place.
I drive through highway cuts that gleam black under the intermittent streams that flow after intermittent storms. I go to work or play tourist and don’t think much about changing names,
or about unchanging black rock filled with old light that was sucked into the ground and held fast in basalt or volcanic stone, light that leaks like radon and keeps on killing as it always has.
I’m dying here, people — eh.
Perhaps I romanticize.
You’re so pretty,
she said,
touching my cheek.
Because I knew it was
the last time we’d see each other
I did not try to correct her
by saying I was a man
and so could not be pretty —
I laid that bullshit aside
and let the sentiment
burn away the culture for once,
and damned if I didn’t feel pretty.
I run my life by parachute
to confuse the howler monkey
in my chest. From below
it only looks like I’m drifting down:
it’s in fact a directed
crash that keeps the beast
docile. What will happen
when I run into the ground
is best left unknown. I know
what I fear, but perhaps the animal
will fall asleep rocking in the thermals;
a man can hope. Sometimes
all he can do is hope. Having heard
the screams inside,
it’s in fact all I ever do.
We say
things like
my tree fell down in the storm
or
I have a growth on my finger
we settle into moan
if we change the words
some say we change the world
so
that tree honored the storm
by raising its roots to the sky
or
there is a fresh bud
on my finger
still
the tree browns and dries
until it is removed
and
the finger stiffens
the bud is cut and tested
and the story of a garden rampant within
lousy with blooms
is told
keep talking
as the world does what it should
nothing is wrong
Death to that thing! Life to our thing!
We’re the Mafia for our causes.
We like to keep it in the family
and don’t mind a little blood.
We don’t like to talk much.
Someone’s always listening.
Or maybe they aren’t but it’s best
to be safe. They might be.
We claim legitimacy.
We have cover stories,
fronts, deniability — but still,
Death to their things, Life to ours!
We are the worst sort of people
except for all the others.
They say it too, we know,
but they’re wrong to say it.
Death, death, death! Love
the sound of it — how soft
it ends. It’s like saying life, life, life —
it’s exactly like it. Can’t have them separated
by much. One means the other,
at least in our thing, and death
to the things not ours, life
to ours! This is how
we got here, saying that, being that —
bones in the dirt, blood on the sand,
eyes leaking or picked by the crows —
death is that thing that is also life,
death to their things is life to ours.
So call it brightly family, call it strong.
Call for some to die that others may live
as sensationally well as they possibly can —
death to some things, life to the other ones,
that’s our thing. It’s everyone’s thing.
We live making the others die for their things
so that ours may live, yes, the ultimate yes
made stronger by the ulitmate no.
puzzle at my closet door for hours
agree with the mirror
wear GQ clothing
take arms against my issues
eat up the latest trends
gear up for a new season
be true to my word
be fitter, happier, better, longer
spirit away the stress
snake past the guards
divide the adversaries
game Satan to distraction
lie in wait
storm the walls of your prison
sing for the release of your hair
kiss you
rock your world
fuck you up
tell you a bedtime story
believe what I’m saying
tuck you in
say goodnight now
stay up for hours
push it and push it
promise myself a better tomorrow
get up early
do the dishes
get some work done
forget you exist
be a motif
be a recurrent dream
live cliche
open myself to critique
smile at the argument
cover my ass
keep on keeping on
All my young friends
All my young peers
All those young fascists say
age is just a number
because they are stupid
in the ways of aging
God, please protect them
as I lose myself
to my snickering, flickering body
because more and more
I want to stab them a little bit
for their blithe dismissal
I don’t want them
to be this oblivious to me
wincing forward
with hands that won’t close
around what I want
and
every sharp pain
under my left arm
that spins me
between exhilaration
at the thought of the Great Divide
and terror
at the approach of the Great Divide
and
the first whispers of decay
behind my forehead
but I suppose, God, that you should
bless the young
for this dumb they carry
as a birthright rocket
to infinity and beyond
(or
as people used to say
ad astra per aspera)
That ignorance was mine once too
I’d like it back
but will settle for a night or two
of uninterrupted sleep
and someone to hear me
blurt out upon waking
“I’m ok with dying right now
If this is how the rest of life begins
I have seen enough”
so far so good
along the path.
brambles and
broken glass.
enough sting
to the stroll.
enough blood
on my ankles.
no view yet
of another end.
still, so far
so narrow.
wrong steps
are part of this.
falling
is de rigeur.
crawling’s
fashionable.
drunk on nettles
and crowns,
I move along
now close to blind
from thorns
at my eyes.
still, so far.
good has little
to do with passage now.
it’s stubbornness.
I want to see
what destination’s
worth this.
worth scrabbling this long
and this far. what good
comes of it. what’s good
about it.
what it is.
not this year
no
I will let go
I will face planes and towers falling
say
yes to friends lost there
and no to
being told
ordered
compelled to recall
every damn detail
in service to
overwrought agendas
how many houses
in how many countries have fallen
and no one remembers them
how many terrors are there
to tame
how many names unspoken
on bitter tongues
no exceptions
mourn the dead long enough
you mourn yourself into the holes
left behind
it’s a long climb out
I am climbing
damn the demand for excruciating recall
I want to forget everything
except how my friends smiled
and that all over the world
for far longer than ten years
everyone else has always known
death makes no exceptions
for the flags people die under
The livestock
and pets
won’t rest,
and I can’t sleep myself.
Got no mail again today —
it’s like there’s no one left
who cares to write
or even to try and sell me stuff.
It’s a beautiful world, but it feels
like it’s ready to drown —
something in the sky
wants to come down.
I can’t help but think about
what Lucifer must have looked like when he fell —
from the right, ruined and hideous;
from the left, resembled an angel still.
What’s so obvious to look at now?
I don’t trust my eyes.
Two sides to every story: good side,
bad side, and both are becoming lies.
There’s a body
in this lovely spiritual book,
pressed flat between
pages 138 and
139.
From the clothing
it’s old news.
From the color
of the face,
it’s no one worthy of
investigation.
An old murder, then,
long forgotten. The author
must have needed
credibility and then
abandoned the deceased.
It’s likely
no one
was meant to discover it.
Instead, it was likely
a source to be
concealed. Stupidly,
an assumption was made
that the text itself
would render it invisible.
After all, reading the book
reveals that whatever
the dead told the author
was changed
for marketing purposes
and stripped of
context.
If you pick up
enough books on
our histories and
cultures, you’ll find
a lot of these corpses.
Par for the course,
business as usual,
the way of the world —
kill ’em all,
let the consumers
sort them out,
hope they don’t notice
the stink
and the stained pages.
Any mourning
is left to us —
the ones
who learned how to live
less obviously. Who just
live. Who aren’t compressed
and dried and mere
bookmarks in dishonest
funeral guestbooks. Who still breathe
rage and spit memory of
how many of us
ended up
like this, and how few readers
will pause
between pages 138 and 139
to notice
the body
when its shadow
crosses their minds.
No narrative
makes a difference
when you are repairing an engine
and reach the One Nut
that will not budge. No wrench,
no socket, no logic or physical law
makes sense then —
here is the need
for the Sublime in your life
condensed to sweat and
bloody knuckles.
What you need to happen
is obvious, no known tool
will make it happen,
and all you can do is sit
and supplicate
for holy intervention.
Is it funny?
Is it tragic? Does it require
beer and momentary
abandonment of your good sense
to face it? Nothing’s
off limits
now
that what is supposed to happen
doesn’t. Thank
something for the chance
and sit back down in front of the engine
until some wizardry arrives.
Willingly un-inspired
by the morning, I’m
not above sleeping it out
entirely,
hoping for a damn fine
afternoon once the day’s
early fumblings have resovled
into something more defined;
who needs the worms
those efficient birds work for,
anyway? I’ve seen worms
at all hours of the day
and night, and the competition
falls off dramatically
later on, once all the obvious ones
are taken.
The full round of the day
is too often neglected.
I prize it all, and do my best work
when there are not millions
with whom to contend. So I sleep in,
sometimes alone, sometimes not,
and seem to do perfectly well.
If I am missing something,
it is nothing I feel I am missing.
An artist was asked,
if your next work
was guaranteed
to save the world
but would also mean
that you could produce
no more,
would you stop?
The reply:
Let it go
to hell.
They’ll need me
more
in the aftermath.
Dark Matter 