good size girl

I understand
they like their models thin
like hangin' from a clothes-rack, drape it to advantage
but when
it's time to change out the drapes
you're dealing with a curtain-rod, not too much to manage
oh man
that isn't meant as a slight
to all you slight lithe lissome slips of a girl
but damn
you get enough praise, right?
I'd rather spend my praise right there -
I like a good size girl

I like a good size girl

It's not a case
of fetish, preference or taste
it isn't "what I'm into" it's not about a type,
it's just you
without a curve out of place
you're something to hold onto, I double-extra want you
it's not
a case of "what's inside that counts"
appearance is important, I'd love to paint your portrait
your face
your body
your beauty astounds
good god I got to capture your bounce
I like a good size girl

I like a good size girl
and you look great in those jeans, since you ask
but since you asked me, I have to say:
take 'em off.
Can't understand
the way you make me so wild
so softly, deeply, truly you sure look healthy to me
your love
abundant, in substance and style
your confidence connects me it's double-extra sexy
it's not
a case of overcoming jack shit
you're everything I want, and I want every bit
so don't you tell me
that this isn't clear:
I don't need no sweet nothings my dear,
I like a good size girl

campfire

Sexy to me is a crooked burnt stick held
by two people's hands, with a fat, crisp,
slide-y marshmallow balanced
and transfixed
at the tip of it, and grins,
and eye contact,

and intent suspense,

and what happens next.

And it is building, because

I wrote 0.7 of 3 separate songs last week, and
one of them was yours, it has become
inevitable.

It's rolling uphill, and
gathering speed, sisyphus
ain't got shit on me

I came
from straight physics
but I'm liberal arts

theology's for pricks
philosophy's for farts
I can't pretend, never again
I can't fail

I raise a glass to toast
it's BOONT! AMBER ALE

apologize if

i apologize if I
have been strident,
careless, insensitive,
incoherent, credible,
infuriating, irrefutable,
and wrong.

I had an excuse.

It is gone.

so scared

I'm so scared, I need to go
to sleep, where nightmares come
and comfort me, reality's too real
for words, I need a terror most absurd
to wake me with perspective, scream! At least
life can't do that! It seems

such sweet relief, until you rise
to get a drink of water, hit the lights:

life can do worse.

human boom-

a human boom~
the project shunned
from six months back
rung in the year
ruing the day,
for last year's goals
it will explode
cut red, cut green
cut blue

all clear

be a man, man

I decided to take a piss
standing up, like a man
I did fine - quite astoundingly
well, I don't know why I'd be surprised!
I always do

quite astoundingly well. Well,
I confess: sometimes, I admit,
sometimes,

I do pee sitting down.

If I feel
there's a good chance of also taking
a shit, well

I'll demur to stand, and finally
be seated. I will acquiesce, yieldingly,
wantingly, to the possibility of an urge
fulfilled, a need emptied. I must do at least this:
be open to the chance of what's to come. In this life,
hey. You gotta. You at least: gotta. And yielding to
this plain, good sense - for some reason I don't know,
it makes me feel quite ladylike. Practical!
An unselfconscious multitasker. I'm on the job.
Yet if some fucking dude
comes in, before I've finished
the first part of my business, I yell: "HEY!
GET THE FUCK OUT OF HERE!

I'M TRYING TO TAKE A PISS
SITTING DOWN!"

This serves only
to underscore my manliness.

All we men are sensitive about that shit.

little help

I sure could use a miracle
shaded clever to blend in
any kind of help at all is fine

infinitely kind of you
any help at all would do - that is, if you
don't infinitely mind

coronation

legs
hoisted
spread,
BREATHE
wide
crowning!
push
BREATHE
arms
gripped
frantic father:
"push!
BREATHE"
mother: SHUT THE FUCK!
UP!
We
are
HERE. comes the king -
our ruler, now
to thee we sing
poppa
SCARED
weak
proud
mama
MAD
with pain
with joy

our heads we bow:
a throne of arms
we cross you in
you rest in us,
our baby boy

plural genius

there is no stopping us
because the two of us together
are not genius - we are that
times two. In latin, the plural

of genius
is genii:

that is us. We
can grant wishes
(and not only three:
as many as we please.
that resentful limitation
we can choose not to apply)
we can wish and grant
and wish and grant
all we want.

all we have to do
is both take our hands
caress this lamp

- and let the crash
of brimstone lightning

fill the sky

proof

I just got this data, and
there's nothing wrong with it
far as I can see. It looks good.
It looks like data. And they're asking me
is it right? Well, who are we to say
what's right? And what's wrong? Particularly
with data. Does data operate on our scale? Don't
anthropomorphize.

This doesn't fly. Is it right.

What am I supposed to do? Eat it? The whole
thing? Poop it out? "Yes. It was fine.
Nutritious." It would kill me, to do that
is that what you want? This data
it looks good to me. I see
nothing wrong with it. I'll try that.
Coy evasion. Confident smile. Looking from
face to face: "It looks good."

I say.

Empty eyes. Disappointment. Wise to it.

"Is it right?"

I sigh.

We used to have systems, for this. Before the dark
times. Before the changeover.

"What percentage of lines is an acceptable spot-check
for you guys?"

neck

my neck was stretched
on a noose of behoove
I impressed myself with the sudden thought
that I never did much
to deserve a shot
but a paper cut
from the pages of my favorite novel, left
bookmarked in blood,
just a trace,
p. 98

right where the devil steps offstage
and lets his clowns do all the dirty
work. Play

it again Sam, if she
can take it I can
but she's not going to take it
any more, no, no

so let it all go
as we swing to black,
I can still breathe fine, but
my neck

it snapped

stolen letter

I know this is probably a bit late -
you're probably halfway to wherever
you're headed by now, but if not,
if you haven't left yet - well hell

get to it! Do it, do it all - not necessarily
all in one shoot the works binge, you can stretch
it out in bits and snatches over a life lived
to the full in-between,
and savor

the feeling
of always being halfway to wherever you're headed,
making plenty of stops along the way.

Except one thing though: I'd advise against
the flirting with the cowboys in front of their girlfriends
part, just from a shallow knee-jerk compassion standpoint.

I mean,

just picture if you were a cowboy's girlfriend,
and along comes a small-talkin', back-seat-sleepin',
carefree, so-hard-tryin', ocean-driven skinny-dippin' girl

with no clear plan

in a car full of good music and cheap cigarrettes,
and she jumps out and starts flirting with your cowboy
boyfriend right in front of your face?

I suspect at that point, it would "be on."

But what the hell
am I saying, trying
to check your resolve
with my cold counsel?

Don't pay attention to me.

Pay attention to the other half
the woman you know you could be.

She's talking, clear now

and calm,

and definite.

kind of commitment

I guess
the wrong kind of commitment
is the kind I've got: I tattooed
your phone number on my back. Now
that's not dedication, so much
as it's impractical. I find
I can't really dial it
backwards, in the mirror
I should have instructed the guy to transpose it
when he put it on. Shit!
I shouldn't have had to!
The man's a professional, he
couldn't figure that out? Or
at least suggest?

What a fucking idiot.

all the way down

are we down? We down. Are we all
down? We all down. Is life down,
is the world down?

We down.

Is chaos down, entropy inevitable
down? We down. Is the spreading out
of all things until the moist hot
center of the universe spins and calls
it all back like a taut spring down?

Is the rebound down - the principle that says
the power of attraction rules, and will pull all
of all back in, down? Is the opposite principle
- the one that says the center can not hold, the one
that says we have too much force and too much unfold,
too much outward explosion for any backward-attraction
to ever catch us, to ever drag back in, to ever make
us come back down from how high and how far and how out
we are going, down?

We down.

Chaos is down. In infinite and unpredictable flavors.
Inevitability is down. Predestination is down. Whatever
will be

is down.

Is order down.

Is the thing, the funk,
the system that replicates itself, always allowing for variation,
always letting slip in the mutation
that could overthrow the overwhelm of all that surrounds,
down? That's all part of the system. Order
encompasses unrestrained division, relies
on small errors. Is that down? We down. Is
the one that divides to two, that divides
to four and so on to fingers and eyes,
to vertebrae and a tail that subsides,
to a slick body that glides
out the hole at the entrance to the universe, down?

Oh, yes.

We down.

Is free will down?

girl

- we don't even need to ask that.

"caught up"

it shouldn't be so hard. I can see you,
and you don't appear
to even be moving. Let alone fast, but you dance
standing still as a building

as I sprint,
shin-splints
- pavement pounding up at my feet
my lungs pump -
I am trying to close all the distance
in the world

between a moment
and time
between a boy
and a girl
between skin and clothes

and I can't seem to catch
you, as close as I get
I am sure I'm getting closer
you are growing to fill
all the vision that my eyes
can hold

all the wisdom that my brain can
unfold
all the mission that my will
can embrace,
take on

- and the moment
I am sure
I could close the gap at last,
at least,
catch you up
with one desperate effort more
with a leap! with a lunge -
and I do!

and you're
gone.

"release"

release and breathe
we pushed down pain, tamped further down
the juice and grist and matted clot
of what remained
apart from what we knew we ought
to save for later - cut and paste
to put upon a higher shelf
exhibited,
Exhibit "A":
debase yourself,

and push down pain.
Tamp all the meat and love
and juice and blood and heat
of all you felt, into the funnel
of this cool and dully-gleaming mill
then turn the crank, and push down
from above
you've earned your fill
of love
and hell. Just push down pain,
and see what comes
of it
of this.

one wish,
unwell

the fault

but this is not the fault
of the universe,
things at least
must fall to peace: people just
increase, they must.

Love has but
a point to make: flesh and blood
to pierce and rake, heart and mind
to slice, divide.
Crust and rock
to push, slide, shock and shatter,
buildings, mountains,
matter,
energy
will shake
to peace.

This at least
we say for sure: love
has no disease,
nor cure -
but this is not the fault
of the universe: the fault in me
pressure builds it up, to point
where rupture, buckle, juncture, joint
must soon or now become a crack
actualize into explode,
catastrophe -

this is we.
and wrenched, revealed,

some motherlode

there are no poems.

There are none. No such things! - as a
poem
I mean,
I don't concede
the existence of the definition. "A literature
of exceptions," she said. Fuck, you
might as well kiss and make up
with that asshole boyfriend who used to
expound upon moral relativism! as if

he just thought of it himself, and

couldn't wait to explain it to you. Just

so. No such definition: it is worthless, and you

the torturer

please,
don't - torture yourself about me
there is nothing in love
but a dream, but a
stone

made of through-and-through, solid
from grain to core:

it's as simple as that.
You will need nothing more as it flies,
flung

through element air - to the fire of your skin,
of your skull

it has struck

such spark -
that the world of your eyes has gone black

consequence. Hung upon
- what a streak!

of
bad luck
that

I never did mean

to be done.

March

March
the war
is just ahead
we'll get there dead
or not at all
our hearts pump blood
what else? our lungs
pull air, expel
our feet stamp soul
against the earth
our bodies tramp
the war is just ahead, we'll fall -
enrich the soil, we'll get there dead
or not at all, or not

at all

surface Pt.3

I am a surface
of infinite shallowness
there is nothing beneath,
no depths unguessed.
I can only conceive
of the gleams and beams
that refract out at all angles
of skew and bent
as reflections of
all the world's
argument. But
it doesn't seem
that some ever
went in yet.

myself

I hate myself for everything I never couldn't say
to you. Because I said it all, and it made all
the sense that it could do - but never
any consequence, no nothing

followed on from it.

I must have said it

all,

as best

I could

so wrong, I must have said

it.

concentric

I am thinking in angles that skip off of surfaces
just like a pond that's constructed from stone
as the swells and the ripples fan out, in immobilized waves
the stone skips, ricochets but can never sink


home

not unusual

not unusual
I am not unique
I'm not special, no
(though I am a freak)
no outsider, me -
and I do fit in
(any place I please)
(anywhere or when)

I am what you'd call:
perfectly,
(you'd say)
unexceptional
except
one small way -
in one small detail,
you cannot quite know

but you get a sense:

I'm nonstandard, though.

"What We Can"

We all do what we can, but
we should do what we would:
- if we were in our own right mind, and
- if our will was good,
- if our hearts were less destroyed
illusions, less decayed
if our reactions were less hard:

if we were less betrayed.

Instead we gather up our scars,
our lessons all mapped out
we've learned our eye, our stance, our guard
the limits of our doubt
within which we will execute
a well-intentioned plan: we will
get all

- what we deserve.

We all do what we can.

"Dream Kitchen"

You live in a dream house, it's all in my head
and every night you appear in my bed
it's all you can do to convince me you're real
I'm going to wake up soon, I know how it feels

and I will go down on my knees,
in this house of my dreams -
pray you would always be
where you belong - by my side
barefoot in my

dream

kitchen

I built you a dream house, if only you knew
and every night there's a vigil for you
it starts with a candle, you answer the call
but dawn will come up soon - and darkness will fall

and I will go down on my knees
in this house of my dreams
to pray you would always be
where you belong - by my side
barefoot in my

dream

kitchen

You're my only cellmate, to my only soul
and since you've been gone I've burned out of control
it starts with a candle - it's climbing the walls
the air will be gone soon, and that will be all

but I will go down on my knees
in this house of my dreams
to pray to you: always be
where you belong - by my side
barefoot in my

dream

kitchen

too kind

Have you ever gotten a thing off your chest that actually
lightened the load on your back? Some seem to say it helps, but
I don't see that, not in my life. The long,
bad stories that I occasionally tell
aren't building up within me.
Pressure to kill
if no life-giving vent
appears to sunder the veil of tears,
tears with a gaping rent
to let in the light of consolation, sympathy

I don't mind consolation, sympathy.
I'm fine with pity, actually
I do not spurn charity, or consider it an insult
have mercy, on me
please. I beg you, even:
mercy.
These stories
long, boring, horrible, that you want to hear
do not particularly lighten the light of today's day
for me. Or ease my heart, or help my mind
from the putting of them
in order, for your ears.

There is no order
they can be put in. These kinds of stories
(by me, at least) can not be made to make sense, and
they smell bad, when released
into the air, their cloud blots
light out as well
it doesn't feel good coming out
there is no lightening,
no lightning,
just the deafening dumb numbness
of counting for thunder that never comes
- when is my relief going to hit? One-one
thousand, two-one thousand, never
one thousand. Never
release, never relief,
not to me at least.
I guess sometimes,

it helps to hear

to be trusted in, tears
can be very therapeutic to a certain kind of shoulder
but dear,
mine are shed freely
all day anyway, and never held in.
They do not collect, there's no rim
to the gutter that guards my roof,
and the water that rains down
runs down and off. I have
neither water nor works to spare for at the moment,
I will spare you because I must.
but I will be certain to take your trust,
dampen your broad and tender shoulder
at the earliest possible time that I can prove your love
and usefulness, in the way you'd suggest

will help me.

drive stick

When I get in a car I'm like KEY turn
CLUTCH and the stick forward up, as the engine catches
CAUGHT and the stick comes
all the way back, right, back
as reverse goes the roll, and the wheels to the side
like in one smooth glide,
then forward slip CATCH
clutch stick wheels grab POUNCE
pavement thrown back, and the driveway
only has about a second left, as I see
all the way up both directions YES
there's a GAP
and I stick
clutch
shift
THRUST
GO!!!!
In my bad sweet ride, my toy
yo toy yo ta, yo

"Corporate"

How many left to go?
It's all been a blur you know
And hey, it's nice to be important!
- but where are we at? How many left to go?

So many people depend on me
they got kids to pay,
they got bills to feed
they got dreams to wake into doubts and fears
so I will sign my name
for the next ten years - I'm corporate
corporate! pay me and I'll spend it I am corporate,
corporate! break me and I'll bend it I am corporate,
corporate! said it like I meant it 'cause I'm corporate,
corporate!
inter-independent, baby.

Hasn't it all been done?
The many have pulled as one
We've yielded up to the collective,
and made it all great. Hasn't it all been fun?

Now my corporation can kick your's ass
we got the market share,
we got the business class
we got the satisfaction to guarantee
and what you start with them
is gonna end with me, 'cause I'm corporate
corporate! pay me and I'll spend it I am corporate,
corporate! break me and I'll bend it I am corporate,
corporate! said it like I meant it 'cause I'm corporate,
corporate!
inter-independent, baby.

I finally begin to see:
It's all been explained to me
A vision I see eye-to-eye with
a mission I choose to accept, I choose to be

where I find myself making perfect sense
it's like everyone's on one big wavelength
and we're all possessed with the will to win -
well how long have I waited to fit right in? I'm corporate
corporate! pay me and I'll spend it I am corporate,
corporate! break me and I'll bend it I am corporate,
corporate! said it like I meant it 'cause I'm corporate,
corporate!
You're too independent, baby.

So many people depend on me:
they got kids to pay, they got bills to feed
they got dreams to wake into doubts and fears
so I will sign my name for the next ten years