a quart of gin.

a false regret
over all the things that can never happen
because time is set.

Time, one thing
that has happened at once, from start to end,
and is constantly done.

So there is no use
to regret, dear one. Don't fret, there is
only one way, and it

goes on

"Check!"

I like a woman with a young ass;
a grown-up mind;
an adult sensibility -
in all that that entails;
ancient, wise eyes,
and shining behind them,
a soul that was bought
brand new, driven off the lot
at some point (instantly losing
half its book value, they say, but
what they know is a lot) plenty of
miles now and some bad, but all
one owner, all good, running smooth,
sweet and humming, all original parts
combining in some sum whole
you could just about fit
your whole life into,

or at least you would want so much
to have fun trying, and die
while you're at it.

dangers of multiple choice

One time,
I was offered three things
and I opted
to take first the one,
second the other,
and then,
later when the person was like, hey,
what about the third?
I was like,
I'll just have another of the second!
- if it's all the same to you,

But it wasn't

alarm

what woke me was
a slowly-dawning
sense of foreboding, growing
into an increasingly-specific uneasiness
over a far-fetched but threatening presentiment.

balance

I have half
the necessary time involved, and double the
don't gives a shit.

brand loyalty

Reality's the biggest gift
you can give somebody. Even if
it's coming from your perspective!
They may not like it.
It's not the right brand,
and the taste is funny.
But I tell you! Watch out,
because it's very dangerously
seductive, maybe even addictive
if you distill it pure from the prime,
good stuff.

Which I'm sure you do. Even
if yours tastes funny to me, I feel like
I could learn to love it, too.

Ambitions

I would love to learn
how to juggle kittens. Like
if you could do it infallibly,
with so gentle and confident
a touch and motion that the kittens LOVED IT
- and loved you? And with such talent
and assurance that there was never even
a slight chance of dropping one?

I'd be elected Prime Minister

journaling

When I fall asleep each
night, I dream of waking
in bed, and picking up my dream journal
from the bedside table. I then write
in it everything I can remember
about what happened that day.

Before it fades.

By the next morning it's gone.

wrong prank

A...

A...

A play,
an interactive
stunt, a racquet
-bop badminton without
a net,

where a random and
variable number of players
come in on either side and
the birdies are all variants
of a trouser.
A tourney,
where the back-and-forth arc
each volley describes could be visualized
in terms that leave one breathless,
gaping at the sheer
mental athleticism of all the participants here
who, in seeming effortless, blow minds
and bat around trou after zer
for hours and instants until the audience
whips its collective frenzied mind
into a blur, into stiff peaks
of sweet yet tart meringue

and must admit
oh goodness - this won't fit
I never understood the rules
except by breaking them. Ah,

Shit.

Then suddenly a clapboard claps
to mark the start of this next scene, and everyone
in clapping distance dawns in horror, sprawled upon
their mind's first realization that...

...their trousers are missing.

And in-between,

the neighbors next to next door's house, left
their oven running out,
left their oven gaping wide they fled the scene,
they ran outside into the street,
to keep it real. Call the police
to seal the deal anonymously,
shush! It's not me, it's just

- the neighbors you can't trust
have called it in. Reporting screams.

Well, someone? Tell them what
it means.

better than too good to be

The words to describe this
are all wrong. Fantastic.
Fabulous.

Even Wonderful -
all deal with things
not real, jarringly out-of-place
here; things that yaw in from out of a world
of fantasy, these words
speak, breathless,
of the concoctions
of fabulists,
brewing
and weaving
the unreal into
an object of Wonder,
upon which reason
can get no grasp, find

no purchase.

Not what you have actually achieved.
This,
which you have made,
is as concrete
as legal tender. The texture
prickles under one's fingers, and lingers
in mind and body, the way only sense memory can. What
you have done here

is credible.

Against Purpose #2

Purpose helps how?
Purpose is what - the illusion
of control. We act and expect
as if intended result
will follow like thunder
from what we done.

From what we done, to bring it on.
It won't!
We know it won't, we can't
- control.

I do the thing

bright like lightning and with just as little regard
for what happens to the air afterward,
in my scorched ozone wake.

Lightning is not proud of thunder. Thunder
is the hanger-on, the bandwagon, the press
of the masses of sycophants, radiating out
to spread the word, their own reaction, proclaiming
the gospel of what the lightning meant.

The lightning didn't mean that. The lightning
meant nothing but the act. Purposeless, senseless, this
is reasonable enough. It was a bright act.

I don't say it needed to be done;
I felt it could be done,
and I did it.

There is,
building up in the clouds
an energy and a charge called free will,
and who is in charge

of it?

against purpose

Purpose
is a false god. Too many lives
punctured and immolated upon that altar, too many
acts, uselessly dedicated
to that. That
incontrovertibly empty,
and therefore ineluctably corrupt,

religion.
The worship of purpose,
founded on the dogma that things
should be done for a reason.

Well.

Ladies,
and gentlemen.
I don't need to tell you
where I stand on that. I don't
stand on that.

I stand as far away from
that as possible. But at need,
under attack
from it,
I give you

my vow now:

I shall not shirk to stand against it.

Come, shelter in
behind me.

I have a very odd
combination ready, to befuddle the beast's defense, then
we trip it, shoot past,
break North,
crack a forty and laugh.

Purpose is useless to us.

Purpose is useless, to us. Whose purpose?
If it wasn't ours? A thing should be done
for no reason, or not at all

I trust. Let us stand together, for
nothing. No reason at all. For ourselves,

we shall be invincible.

Why not? If we're not
doing anything else
at the moment,

me might just as well
be just who we are,
doing things with just cause,

just 'cause we can.

There's nothing so just
or responsible. Let's choose
noble means, and defy

to the end.

the horror beyond the end of it all

At the very end stage of the universe
...just after that, long after all
has been said and in the moment
after all is done,

in the breathless interval
that extends permanently
after the last thing
to ever happen
has happened

...somewhere, out in all of the vast
expanse of distance through which
the thinning, dimmed vestiges
of matter and energy have
finally worked themselves through

the final throes of thermodynamic entropy, I hope

somebody comes along
and hangs up a sign.

a sign that says, "out of order."

brightening dawn

Whatever the day may bring
I know that I've always been
through worse.

And I have lost more
than anything I have left.

As blessings go
- as blessings let go - I see
no call to curse.

With each darkening dawn,
I am brightening. Not ready

for bad to worse, perhaps to worst,
or better to best, just ready

to see what's next.

It can't be as bad as the last.
Unless
it turns out to be, I guess.

got slick

I got slick and slipped

on

a hardwood floor
of my own polishing. So I
checked my

hip,

rolled over and moaned
took off my socks, squared shoulders
pushed off, got up off,
straightened out

it

and went for more.

all in one smooth motion,
conscious of how cool
it no doubt didn't

look

where me been

I'm scarce,
and when I'm to be found
I'm sparse.
Not much of me to go around,
and what there is
is harsh, not sweet
and not kind.

I'm not the man you knew,
but then I guess

that isn't someone you would miss,
or mind.

And you call yourself a scientist.

You find yourself saying over and over
"I am going to prove something
the rest of the world
is entirely incapable
of proving!" saying to me,
about different things you have
proved, over and over again:
that no one else on earth
has ever proved this

and

you call yourself a scientist.

Well.
This is my result, these
are my methods and here
is what they prove.

Could you prove this too?

Does it work also for you?

bad things in threes

the things that are expected of you
the way that she looked when you saw her last
the memories of previous deaths repressed

bad things like these, they come in threes

the word you just found out you're using wrong
the fact that you're wrong, after all this time
was everyone laughing? or are they just dumb?

bad things like these, they come in threes

the slip that leaves you exposed as you fall
the crack of your skull, breaking nobody's heart
the schemes you believed guided you, fallen apart

bad things like these, they come in threes

the things that are expected of you
the way that she looked when you saw her last,

and you knew.

write-off

people are kind
of ready to write me off,
but nothing's decided it finally, yet.
They're still waiting to weigh what they'll get to deduct
versus all the expense
and the current projections of what they expect
- of all I could get them,
and what they could get.

It's a roll of the dice, these things
- not exact. And whatever the choices
are made, it's an act
that can never be taken back.
It's an art.

However the choices are made,
I won't blame. It isn't a game,
but I know what part
I have played.

These decisions
are made for a reason
each time, and

it's never the same

St. George and the Dragon

I want to destroy
whatever
is available
- and destructible,
of course!
I don't want to waste
time,
effort, or
resource on what can't
be broken now,
brought low
by force - but that still
leaves quite a bit, through which
to plot one's course.

I don't want
to be the hero
or the antihero, no
just an implacable place
for you to place your blame
- a force of nature, or fate
or whatever you've got
whatever you name
to keep the demons at bay
whatever you've got
that keeps you okay
with all
that this
world's not.

That's what I'm here to slay. 'Cause
I wanna be anarchy, let's go hey ho
hey,
I wanna be
but I'm not. I'm me.
Oh, say - can you see, by the
rocket's red glare, bombs bursting in air?

Well, I can't. See, there was
never a sight in my entire life
that I needed so badly

to see by such light

A Pocketful of Poesy.

Truth is never a princess.

It's always going to have you reaching
for the top star, just out of the box
and ready to light up.

The only way for you to get there
is to jump.

Don't lose your balance! Keep jumping
Looks funny, but it's the only way.

If you've ever known what you wanted,
more than anything else in the world,
don't tell anybody

- just wish for it all the harder. Out loud,

Because how can you see what smart is
if you don't know the shadow? How can you tell
what evil is if you don't know what it is to be
lucky?

And how can you know the light, if you
have never seen the dumb? It's easy

to start out, to keep going, but hard
When what lies behind you can't guide you now.
When you know in your heart why.
When one foot in front of the other just proves
you have no idea which direction you

came from.

The fool takes wisdom

The fool sucks wisdom's
dick all life long, only to
- when the moment comes
turn head, and spit

But the wise man takes
wisdom's cock up the ass
hard, all night every night -
teeth gritted, sweat slipping
from the corded tendons of his neck,
saying to himself "holy fuck thank god
this is only a metaphor!"

breaking over

Breaking over is just one of the things
that happen when you try to break through.
You just have to keep going, right
yourself somehow. When you break over,
there's a few things you can do.

Straighten up, see who's around:
did anyone see you? Play it off,
if so. We all break over sometimes.

They get it.

They've been there. If no one saw,
just keep going like nothing happened, like you
never broke over at all. There's no shame

in nothing having happened.

a warning

There can be no through,
not if your truth stops halfway.

Can you get to the other side
and leave your self behind?

Who will you be, when you get there then?
Hold yourself hard! Let go burdens

if you must. Drop grudges, certainly!
Lose even your way, but hold to you

- so that when you have finally
climbed out onto wide places,
with paths wending for miles before you
in all directions, you will find yourself,
there: ready.

A clear head,
with which to choose a path.
Sure feet,
with which to walk it, and when
you reach some home, a heart to offer
in love, and to hope
and hopefully - to rest in contentment.

But if you have left your self
and your truth behind half-way,
broken into shards to cut some foe,
beaten flat in the hammering of some point
you had to prove, or buried - buried deep, hidden,
to be safe!...if you have lost your truth
and your self, along the way

- whose home can you ever hope to find?
Though you enter into it, it will not be yours,

and neither will you.

to encouragement #3

In a time when,
it is not confusion that pulls you
through it.

You must wake up your eyes
to see what colors there are! Dreams
aren't big enough

to contain what you can do.

If only you're testing, pushing, poking and then
it comes true - the thing you expect at least! Or
some other thing, but seize it

with every hand you have in you.

to encouragement!!

Dear with a hard way! Please
stop and love where you are.
When a new beginnings - pain is true
and for all! Nobody works - each and
everybody, a fear and a sudden come!
So take eyes for the road ahead it
is not GO. The time is yet. It is not
now, so don't ask it! Yourself can see,

there things are, waiting and blocking - not with your eyes
can you push through.

Put your mouth up please.
For with heart is true, your plan
comes up with itself! Sky will tear
holes through clouds. With deep thrust
of lungs, believe in a waiting moment.

Trust the time it is.
Don't seek with magic answers,
the promise from mister easy
- always there is a promise behind every
devil! But when time sings you will
join out shouting, because the tune you know
its heart!

It counts beats to five, your dancing boots
abound.

It is the promise. BELIEVE THE CHANCE until
it presents!! PLEASE

Start not crying!

buck up

Hey.

I know
sometimes you feel like it's all
going to be worth it. Arguable
things, questionable things
and who's to say? Maybe you're right, but I can see
that look in your eye from a mile away
and if you tell me this isn't a crisis of faith,
then I don't know what to believe in anymore. Look.

The soul's dark night has grown darkest again, I know.
I can't look inside you, I can't read your mind to tell
you what you're thinking, these are all just great
guesses. Hit after hit hits too close to home and you're like,
"who is this guy? How's he so acquainted with my demons,
and is you going to give me some advice or what?" Sorry.

Your demons and mine
are the same damn bunch of guys, that's all.
And they sure do talk about you when they drink.

But I can't give you advice. Advice is meaningless,
in a world where one person more or less
just doesn't seem to make any difference
to the weight of the world. And certainly
not to lifting it.

But it's not hopeless, OK? It isn't hopeless.
You don't have to life the weight of the world.
You're only responsible to lift your piece. Which
is only

the size of you,
at least.

faking narcolepsy

oh, she falls over
yes she falls over, no
nobody knows why
she's out like a switch
like a finger snap
like a ginger snap
she's going to break her head some day
she's going to crack
her skull one time,
except somehow
she always finds her way
she guides her way as she falls, center stage
whether no one's around or not,
she's down

and out like a light,
sleeping sound with a smile
on her face and dreaming. Ten, twenty
minutes or an hour or more

later,
she will wake up,
sit up, arch back, and stretch -
as if refreshed, then get up from the grass,
or the path,
or the parking lot,
or the sidewalk,
the street,
or the floor,

wherever she was when she happened to fall,
and she takes a deep breath,
and she starts walking fast

the Messenger

the angel of the Lord came
bearing bad news, as usual
and said "don't shoot the
messenger!" - which was
pretty cruel, considering

angels are bulletproof

feel like dreaming

I don't feel like dreaming
I feel like being awake,
and looking across the room,
or turning over
and looking at the near wall. I feel
like reading another book,
again. I've read them all
and my left pinky finger
has gone numb, I think, from
the way that I prop myself up.
It's hard to read in bed on your back,
especially the heavy ones. I've read them all,
but I'm still somehow not sure
how some of them end.

I won't skip a page on the way there.

If I remember early, well, I'll either
stop or keep going. There aren't really any
other options for me. I don't feel like eating,
because the dishes need cleaning and I don't feel
like shopping for food. Anyway,

I don't feel like dreaming.
But maybe I'm only avoiding you

what criticism

Jackson Pollock was in many ways,
the Beat poet
of quintessentially
-American Modernism. Like Kerouac,

he
moved through the world
bipedally, guided by a binocular
superimposition of imagery
fed to his brain via optic nerve input
from his left and right eyes. Like Bukowski,

he had an almost rude appreciation
for the charged sexual value he saw as
inherent in the female buttocks - and
the vagina, nestled just forward of between
them. Like Ginsberg,

his imagery
defied
attempts
at rational decoding. And like Burroughs,

he was - let's face it - a bit of an asshole. Yet
in at least one critical
aspect,

Pollock

stands apart from all
these iconic figures: he was

a
famous painter.

"People Ride In Vans"

Drink and music makes things good
but sometimes I am so alert
I'll tell you what is going on
you shoot me down
you shoot me down
it doesn't hurt. I point it out
so later, I can tell you that
I pointed it - and you, too cool
for skeptical, just sit and sip

and you say

People ride in vans. That happens! It happens.
People ride in vans. They're not European.
People ride in vans. That happens! It happens.
People ride in vans. They're not in the band.

I swear those guys are someone, though!
just look how skinny are their clothes
how they get out and mill around
like it's this close to going down
there's something, they are centers of
and though you scoff, and sip and sit
they have equipment in that van!
That guy's sweater is legit
There's something they are Here To Do
they have a plan! I'm telling you

Just look and see! and with the look
upon your face, you say to me:

People ride in vans. That happens! It happens.
People ride in vans. They're not European.
People ride in vans. That happens! It happens.
People ride in vans. They're not in the band.