A man called Charlis Doyle

The man named Charlis Doyle came in
throwing me against the walls. 
Hurling me across the room.
Out of crumpled heaps, I'm
hauled in soaring somersaults to falls.
Bounced, grabbed up again and swung!
Sailing, crashing now, and now, and
NOW.  
Between 
each violent smash and upswept plunge,
I count one second's gap, not two. 
Big Charlis Doyle darts so fast across
the room! Two hands clamp - woooooo!
It's upsy daisy BOOM! for me. 

I was a touch surprised at first. 

Big Charlis Doyle. Big friendly guy! 
So I surmised, originally.
Until I noticed
sailing by
the picture window,
over couch and into bookcase: something
odd. Hey! It's me! Split-second later, Charlis
Doyle loomed in view then blurred spin-twist
flip impact CRACK! I slid
soft splat
to sigh on hardwood floor, 
then two-hand wham

and vwoop! once more! 

Damn odd! However, later it made 
sense. Apparently, that's just his 
way. Surprisingly intelligent! 

That Charlis Doyle. He's ok

the many uses of sourdough

Sourdough's density and malleability 
allow us to stuff thick-cut pieces of it 
into various crevices and gaps, to attract 
household ants

with their many uses. A large round 
of sourdough can often be drilled 
with inch-width holes to a hand's 
depth or so, lit on fire and thrown 
at a politician as an example to them 
of protected speech - provided it is 
first doused or soaked with a number 
of common accelerants. The internet 

will have details. For the romantic 
type, on-the-woo and desirous of 
meaningful copulation with that 
not-yet-proven special someone, 
sourdough is almost ideal 
to avoid

A curtain ten feet high and ten inches 
thick - composition: pure sourdough - 
might figure in a work of fiction in 
any key way you might devise, should 
this idea cue you to authorship. You 
may even let such a thing stand
in the background, unremarked, 
symbolizing the depths of depravity 
or similar. 

Many will tell you "sourdough" is 
an available breakfast toast option 
in this establishment. Take the hint. 
Look around at other tables. There's
only one reason a restaurant might 
put that out. The place is probably 

teeming with people who find
sourdough  
acceptable as toast! 

Or who at least 
are not repulsed 

to find others do. Do 
not judge the establishment 

for catering to culinary perverts 

and deviants. This is just a fair 

foul segment of the marketplace. 
To be in business at all you have
to serve 
them, too.

The sourdough
is probably an appeasement measure.
Decent places offer that
to avoid having to offer 
something worse. We 

who know the many uses of sourdough, 
though, do not begrudge its occasional
abuse or misuse as food unless forced
to endure it 
on a sandwich
we didn't order 
quite this way,
for instance. 

If the worst happens, 
don't acquiesce -
no matter how civil 
your deference typically
is. Forbearance here would
be no mercy upon others
standing meek and threatened
in the headlong forward path 
of the sourdough substitution maniac!

Send it back.
First, drill several
inch-width holes
into the sandwich
to about a hand's-depth, 
set it - DAMN IT! You

forgot to bring any number of common
accelerants, didn't you? Didn't you? EAT
that misbreaded sandwich then! Let each
bite bring penance and a lesson anew! You

were not prepared 

for such sandwiches. Were you? 

By the time you choke it all the way down
- next time, you

will 

be  

Outside kindness

We need to be kind to find out why
We so much want to be kind. Until
we find being in kindness’s ways,
Kindness is only a thing to amaze.
It’s plain why the kindness we get
is good. It’s plain why we want it,
we need it - we should. It’s so often
there in response to great need!

“Why everyone should display
kindness to me! Such kindness
is good - that’s plain for real!”
We haven’t quite cracked the

inside of the deal. 

sum party

I want to do better, 
live every moment of my life 
better next time, but there 
is no next time, so
I will have to settle 
for going forward 

better 

uncertainty sound.

When she doesn't sing, she conducts herself
like an orchestra of what music brings. You
can call it dance; it's an overture. Oh it's all
just dance? I don't know.

You sure?

the benefit

I don't expect to be 
believed! Support 
another's wariness. 

'Cause wariness keeps 
peeps more safe. We'd 
all see more and worry
less, be less deceived
and self-deceived if we
just took what others gave. 

Got our ideas thataway,
Instead of this prediction shit 
on intuition fancy play.  

Listen.

Listen. I know you've been 
wanting in on this project 
of mine for some time, and 
I'm honored. Frankly I don't 
know how you heard about 
it. I wasn't planning to come 
up with it for some time yet, 
and at this point you can probably 
tell me as much as I can. I'm 
not offended! Your interest 
is okay. I know you're bright. 

Like a light bulb of a size you 
could see coming from around 
the bend - looming over the skyline 
of average city. I know you go 
around with your ear to the ground,
steering by whatever you can 
get from one of these. 

Taps nose. I get it.

You're a girl. 

That means you have to work 
twice as hard as a woman just 
to not get noticed. When you 
do, people get offensive about 
your age and weight. I know 

exactly what that is. I can tell. 

So the answer's yes. Tell me 
your thoughts on my - our - 
project, and I'll see if it fits 
with anything I kick around
on the sly. It could fly, it could 
burrow in the earth, it could 
go swimmingly - I don't care
it's worth a try. I want you on 
our team. This-

Hey! 

Hey, you - were you there the 
whole time? Heard the whole
thing? I was just practicing my
speech! Yes, for you - who
else? So what do you think? 

I mean, you didn't leave,

right?  

The Content Channel

Welcome and hello to
the content channel. Home 
of the content you'll be proud
to judge on content!

And if you're not content
with the content you find, 
just stay tuned. More
content is on
the way!

At the content
channel, we pride our
viewership in offering more,
different and exact same content
you love than anyone else. No
so-called overarching purpose,
here!

Just content!

No purpose - and we're content
with no purpose. "Content With No
Purpose" was almost the name of the
channel, but the haters drove a wall 
between us, read it wrong. The content
channel presses on, totally against
the purpose. Other channels jam

some theme
on there,
typical generic
genre move. Cliché.
Controlling the content.
Excluding content you
may want. Not here.

We are perfectly content
with content you'll be proud
of tuning in when you love
content free from any guiding,
controlling, overarching purpose,
so you always get what you may
want. That content
you love?
Find it here,
and leap out of
your seat, cheering! Yelp it!

Tweet it!

Face it online to stand out
and show the world you know 
where the content is. Like it
or not, that's half the fun
when content is job #1. 

Which here it is.

The Content Channel. 
We bring the content. You?
Be content. Take pride 

in what you get. 

the climber

Be courteous
to those you pass,
climbing around and
over them

in rung
by rung reach,
grasp, pull, hitch,
haul. Since
from
where they
sit tight, the fall
is a bitch, and the view
is nice, once you're

out of it.

It wouldn't take much
with you clambering by
all limbs akimbo and
eyes on the sky, as
they sit clung
tight

on the rung
they're on

for them to do
something you
can't call wrong.

some control

A human who can 
control themselves 

Is one of nature's 
tiny marvels. See, 
somehow
they do 
what they
wouldn't, or
they don't do what 
they would. Now

to me, 
how the hell
would I know 
what I wouldn't?
I wouldn't 
do it!

And why would I do 
it? 

Conversely, what I would
do, I know that every time. 
However, I do it! 

I mean, aim is control. 
Control isn't all restraint, 
but self-control is a 

little marvel, when you see 
someone do it. It's just of a 
stop, step-back hitch, or a 
plow forward past. And 

you're like oh wow, how'd 
you do that? I thought you 
wouldn't, or - you'd do the 
other 
thing
good 
job 

scratch behind

I always scratch behind
my needs to find the wants 
so purposeful and driving 
to some use or ease, to be 
fulfilled, oh thank you 
please

For Jacob

I'm pretty sure that every
thing I wish
I hadn't said 

is long forgot
by every
one

I'd said it to. 

Instead,
it spikes anew 
in sour juice
and voltage 
in my mind, 

each time 
the whole damn scene 

comes back,
and 
deepening in time. 

And so we forge in life 
the chains they'll pry from 
our inert remains, 

or else they won't.

Since they can't see
what each
misstep
was meant 

to be.

flesh ghost

Sometimes I see you like a ghost 
of flesh and blood, upon
my rounds. I think it's you, but 
it is not. You disappear. Some 
one else here
is found, and this

makes perfect sense. 

I strive to treat them not like 
you, 
but in the end no difference. 

They 
do not know you 
like I do
.

don't fall

She spoke to me,
and look in her eyes:
her whole damn being
said 

There's no surprise 
and not much joy 
when heart's lost 
in your head 

You think that you want 
- you thought that you found, 
but it's gone hard and cold. 
It's long and it's round, 
and reliable, but it's not 
growing old
with you,
don't 

fall in love with a dildo! 
She said with dreamy empty 
ache, don't 
fall in love with a dildo! 
It's not the same as love
you make 

don't fall in love 
with a dildo 

she said. Held in each other's 
gaze. But I blinked first, 
and we fell out - laughs 
to gasps, and glad to ache

Well that's advice that 
I will take. don't 

fall in love with 
a dildo, mate 

It's an interesting model, renting.

"Oh, I'm in the real estate
purchase by proxy field.
Service industry, basically.
Property owners desirous
of actually owning their
properties - they contract
with me to live there while
buying it for them. It can

sometimes take a long while,

depending on how the mortgage
is structured - but since I can often
return double what they pay in, I'm

a real asset! I'm in high demand,
and soaring prices reflect it." 

meet thousands of lonely women

The sidebar ad 
is sad tragic fun. 
I am picturing this. 

I'm the only one 
heading out fresh, 
chipper and dressed 
all sly,
to 

"meet thousands of lonely women" 

Some guy!
I expect they've all rented
a hall. Some event! 

I mean
it says
"meet" 

(and "thousands")
- so this is no one-to-one
correspondence course.
The amount of time that
would have to be spent
on such homework binge!

It would take all month!
To a year or more! No,
let's
this once
just simplify:

let's meet.

And greet! Perchance to mix,
match, meld and mate, just 
- me?

And thousands of

lonely 
women? 

Why? 

I mean, why are they lonely?
I'm not.
Something doesn't fit
on my buffet plate, here
contemplating this hot
and cold, cool, warm potluck
smorgasbord of lonely women.
All
laid out
to "meet." Something
seamy, seemingly in
the layout. It's the

"lonely"

I think, that alarms
- if you must know.
If so many come 

together

to meet just one
someone - admittedly, 
a wildly great guy! Who 
wouldn't? - but having
united for such purpose, 

would they still be lonely? 

I wouldn't.
And women,
if you don't know,
can socialize like mad
together, effortlessly
when they find themselves
gathered together to meet me. 

Perhaps not "effortlessly." Still, 
thousands of women can sure 
make it look easy! 

Picture me as I step all lively
and bright into a rented hall, only
to find thousands of women - there
to meet, supposedly! But they've
already met! Each other, and 

they're not at all lonely. Don't
seem so. There's so much
lively and burbling well
-met dynamism surging
in jolt, current, juice all
through and about all
around the room,
my wonderbolt
of jaunty jut

don't even drop the bucket!

Women, damn. They've evolved
a cohesive social hierarchy while
waiting for me to show up! Now
it's closed 

so it seems.
No BIG gap for the man of the hour,
shown up late - thought that was the
fashion, treated like a fad! Bygone

and no style at all. Too soon to pose
retro, me coming in to this date late
just seems somehow cliché. No 

passé 

These women, making passé at me
(which is more an unmaking than 
a making) aren't "lonely!" False
advert! Thousands of women 

cannot be "lonely" except of course 
individually, in the aching pit and deep
well of being's each own subjective
alienation - we all get that. In which 

however we find social buzz, flit
and coursing is a pretty full, sweet
antidote! For the blues, for the dumps,  

for
a lot of people. Well damn, came late,
all these women met already. I should
of
clicked
fast first. Instead
I went wrote
a poem 

antisocial move 
there 

almost hostile, somebody 
might accuse. I mean, 

it could seem so  

I'm more a one-to-one 
guy
to be

honest. I feel that
to meet thousands 
of lonely women

would 
probably
be more fun for me

than all but maybe one 
of them. And then when
we'd clicked, hit it off
like rolling gold downhill
to pleasant meadows, she'd 

pull the plug! She'd be like
- suddenly considerate of 
all the others, conscious 
of the milieu and tableau
of such scenes, of obligations
such social moments always
imply, 
rather than come right out 
directly. It would be all going 
swimmingly, shooting the rapids 
towards everlasting falls, when - 

WHAM! She upbraids and berates
me 

me
for
focusing
on
her

and neglecting what I'm supposedly 
"here for" She's like
"GO AWAY. GO PAY 
attention to the thousands
of women 'here to meet you'!
That's why you came, isn't it?
You didn't come to meet ME,
you want thousands of women
lonely for you - welp! There
they are."

Taken aback, astonished, 
what the huh. Banished
with a huff and a sniff
when it was going so
well!

Well! 

Except every damn one of them
would be like that! You can't 
tell me they wouldn't! The 
setup is rigged for it. It's 

a trap! Women
are way too
considerate 
for a scheme
like this to fly,
I suspect 

and reckon   

but what do I know 
I'm just one guy 

slight

I noticed it
between
tiny

and minuscule,

and
it grew
to measly
as it shrank

from contempt.

Something not
even worth
complaining
about!

Which ultimately
is the insult, pent
by dignity's sighs,
in a matter so small.

I cannot
vent
without

compromise
of some principle
frankly, I do not
hold!
It's that

insignificant.

Just my size

trouble walking

I'm not having trouble
walking, exactly - in fact
that's the trouble. I find 

I'm walking exactly. I 

trot like a hobbit or 

trudge like a drudge, I
lever my way around
like a big sack of sludge 

on stilts,
with deliberate steps 

in placement I notice
in directions so chosen
and guessed. And

achieved!

I get there! 
It works!
But it's way
too conscious a step
by step, okay? It hurts
almost but not quite 
to recall (muscle memory 
held in light) my ease 
of grace, so immersive 
and cool you can't even 
notice it - just feel, you fool! 

I noticed it. Yeah, 'cause I feel 
it now. The comparison is that 
between why and how. It's like

I forgot 

how to godlike glide. 
Simply aiming my mind
where I almost am, and my
stride happens all by itself -
no hitch, no intent or design, 

just effortless drift like a bitch 
on the beach. Not awake or asleep, 
just there. Basking daydreams, empty 
of care and full of awareness, suspended 

and lit.
To be both

the breeze and the mote 

in it.  

To go by being, no try, no do,  

just be within gravity, magnetized 

through by the sensory stream carried
on along and aloft, alight, alive - it's a real 
good feel. Not soft. Hard clear intangible 
 

- gone off.

I identify the cause somewhere within
the last ten pounds I picked up, though
any single individual pound of them 
- could not possibly have blame or fault

to show! I mean look at me. I'm a big, 
lithe guy. Less svelte than I've been, 
but who cares? Not I. Yet

collectively, mass has crossed some
line. Impact's increase, infinitesimally 
fine, has shaded past battleship gray
to blue, with an ungainly ochre taupe
tinged hue. Just as subtle as a fly 
in gravity's well. It peeps above 
attention's threshold, breaks some 
spell of levitation and forward float.  

It's ever so slightly troublesome to
try and do - and succeed on my way!

So pedestrianly. When I know 
I'm a boat   

the coming crick

The crick 
in my neck 
is coming back 
It'll be here in full 
once I sleep on it. Come 
tomorrow morning, I'll wake 
with an ache and a stab, taking 
over my basic fit.
I'll 

accommodate it.
I have small repertoire
of things I do differently, 
subtle ways. Except it's damn 

hard to remember them all. 

I will!
I'll adjust 
let's not be amazed, 
'cause I got this 

crick. Or anyway, soon. 
And I've had it before, 
so I know the deal
and the doom. 

I love dim sum

I've only had dim sum
like 2-4 times. OK 5.
It's the best. It's like
a la carte taken to its
logical extreme

It's a fucking reverse buffet

Bring it 

I mean
some people probably
live near one of those joints.
A GOOD one. Or a selection!
And they love dim sum, so
they probably have had dim
sum more times than they can
fucking count, even stab at in
mind.

That must be like how they run it
in heaven, I bet. Fucken dim sum
privilege

Howcome people don't have casual
chic dim sum house parties where
everyone takes turns bringing that
shit around? Fuck 

I'd go 

Maybe that's why

"Who is this guy?" Oh, let him 
stay - he's the best waiter, just 
glides by, pause, lower the tray
- doesn't loom it at you 

No hard sell 

That's not what it's about, 
dim sum  

suits pressed best

In olden days 
a man would press 
his suit of woo 

and that was it. 

She'd yay or nay,
or play the coy
coquette, try on 
and suit to fit.

Or cast it off, 
and split!  

If she 
did not say
yes, her damn
support network
would bear in hard:
in pointing out that

she's unwed.

A most disgraceful 
term of art. 

Nowadays of course, 
the man who'd press 
his suit of woo on you 

must swear his affidavit 
out and file all his papers 
true - subpoena comes!
Soon you're dragged in 
to sit with hand on book 
and swear.

There stands the man.
To question you: 
"Be thou my wife!" 

You cock your head 
and wink: "For life! 
So there!" 

Or else, you know, you could
just toss that damn subpoena -
laugh sideways! A summons to 
the court of love has no real
power, nowadays. 

The man with the mustard stain

The man with a mustard stain goes out 
with a mustard stain. And everybody's 
like "you know that guy?" "The one 
with the mustard stain?" Oh yeah 

He's always on high in the place to be
with the UV lights, in the club  
he's got a mustard stain on the brain. 

He couldn't even see it
when he got dressed 
but out here it glows.
He's the main man with
the stain laid plain, so

everyone knows

Pretty soon, regionally, sales
of mustard have gone through
the roof - does he work 
for the company?

Were we all just manipulated? Now 
everybody's got a mustard stain as
proof, and we're working it out 
under UV lights by
body sweat
 and he says,

"Say, you know 
- I didn't want to say,

but 

you have a mustard stain." 

Yeah I know 
it's the best 

G'night story hitch, trip, giddyap

Sir Sandy the Gnight rode out
on his dreammare Knighthorse
to shove whole handsful of sand
from his dreamy dune-bag - which
he spends daytimes replenishing
from the beach at Sleepy Cove -

whoops

"...to shove whole handsful of sand
from his dreamy dune-bag right
in the fucking KIDS' FACE!" it
should be.

Wait.
Now Sir Sandy

is replenishing the kids' face.

Well, you get the idea. Where 
he's from, what he does and 
pretty much how 

He's Sir Sandy,
Gnight 

bring the picture

Some times I wish 
I could go anyplace 
I saw in mind. As
I concentrate - the 
beginning picture 
would start so clear,
just as I imagined it. 
Whole-cloth here, then
by fine detail it would 
uncoalesce, to slowly
converge upon some
there. Convergence upon 
reality: the closest real
place to whatever I'd 
made-up to find. 

So, not perfect fit. Just
whatever was real, what
I pictured would change 
to it in shift by degree 
and arc, in color and line,  
in shade and tone to clarity
fine 

I'd lose fantasy as reality
filled, defined, came in
by intent, aimed will.

Then once it hit snap-clarity
real, I could tell - and walk
through! And find 
how it feels.

I've perfected 
the basic technique
so far by picturing 
where I almost am, 
and find the direction 
in step by stride. 

As soon as I get there,
the picture's arrived.   

the metal pinch

The metal pinch 
on skin and flesh 
lands sudden hard 

to slam and bless 
with throbbing hot 
and jolting pain! 

Each time it does:
never again 

The problem is:
so many things 
seem made to lull 
me into them with 
fingers, limbs and 
tender parts. The 
metal pinch awaits 
in states of many 

arts. 

some fantasies are questionable

Some fantasies are - no
offense - pretty unmanly.
Why do men have these 
fantasies about women? Like 

You might get completely 
sucked up into her 
ravenous womb 
and devoured? She's 

really not that into you 
dude 

Or worse - the classic 
'vagina dentata' - NOM 
NOM NOM OW!! It's 

not a believable mutation
to just suddenly happen
all at once. That wouldn't
get you into the X-Men.
Nor is it an adaptive feature 
for anyone to build up in
incremental steppy-step
stages
down
many 
generations. Such
teeth placed there would
actively discourage reproductive 
success! - and be a potential 
danger to baby! As if mom 

doesn't have enough going 
on just then, wow. Teeth. 

There. 

Can you imagine having 
to brush and floss down 
there? Admittedly, dental 
hygiene companies could 
be salivating at this new 
market. "We'll make a mint!" 

Ob/gyns would probably 
have to side-specialize 
in dentistry (and even 
orthodontics) to offer 

a complete service. 

Well?
Is any of this shit
happening in reality?
Around you? Oh, you don't 

know?

The ol' "not a woman"
excuse? Grow up. 

You would know

slippery light

Slippery light, your intelligence. 
Deadly serious getting someplace 
in direct shine and reflect, absorb 

Laughing like bells at yourself 
at every disgraceful wrong turn, 
mistake and gaffe where you see 

you've arrived. You have to laugh 

Mine is huge boulders in slow, 
dense turns. Crushing by increment 
all things to a sparkly dust so cutting 
fine, which I whip up to shapes in
hard strobe light and weaponize 

it's ridiculous 

A sense of humor about one's mind 
can be done or found any number of ways, 
and it seems to be an essential thing 
if we're ever to keep or find our way 

in this maze. 

haters of the bold

People hate when I come in bold
like a boss-ass twerp with a stranglehold
on a style so loose and goosed it honks
as I sidle in crabwise glide, I bonk
like a hammer! Beep like a nose!
Bong like a thing gone bong,
and the next thing knows
people hate

when I come in bold.

I don't know really why,
but the act gets old. Though
it isn't an act! I'm about on
the cusp of a whole smooth
way instead of so rough, so
bold. Perhaps something more
blasé?

I bet people hate when I come in
that way

but,
that's okay.
People don't really
hate the other way. I'm

just trying to talk myself through
a transition here 

discovery of the atom

I had a dream that felicity's hips
were plunging and bounding
on my lap, but we didn't have 

any clothes on. She was wild,
and it seemed like she might
take a wrong bounce and fly

off - but cunningly, she'd taken 
advantage of my central prong
to sort of keep her in line! I was

stunned at first - just sitting there,
a big prong-lap statue with superfluous
extremities - 'til her face got a mean

look, like whose job is this? And I caught
on fast, making awkward (I thought) but
impeccably well-timed backwards

movements. No
Not "backwards" - reverse. No,
answering! Upwards. Lift and thrust
- I was half trampoline all of a sudden,
if people willingly half-impaled themselves 
on half-trampolines! Her eyes drifted closed,

her lips parted, smiling - I had to admit it felt 
great somehow from my side! Still,
what she was going through

had to be totally different
somehow,
right?

In the dream it all made sense, and
I didn't question it. 'Til suddenly I
came to myself (well, partly)
wondering and stunned to realize
it had been no dream! I'd just 

thought it must be, because 
the whole thing was so odd. 

How did she know to do this? 

What other tricks was she aware 
of, wisely holding in reserve? 

careful who you ask for dream advice

In dreams you come to me 

wearing that hat
and nothing
else,
and drift

right past! me
dreamily, and I'm
not sure you saw.

"Oh, I saw!" you 
call so breezily,
breezing on
and by, 
and I turn as if
caught by hook and line,
tugged spun round to watch
you look so fine as you go, now
going...going....I 

call "I'm not so sure 
you saw
who it was?" 

Oh, you saw
it was me, your
walk says back. 
With an extra swing 
in your hip or two - very
unlike you, that jazz sashay!
And you drop it like that 
as you walk away. 

Diminishing in distance,
growing in mind. Recurring
slight or flirtatious twist of
knife? What do you expect
me to do? Reach out and grab
you on the way through? So you
can wiggle and squeal and giggle
and throw your arms around my 
neck and coo? 

Well that's well and good, and fine
by me - if so. But how do I know 
for sure? Next time you come by
in this dream? 

I know. Next time I see you for 
real, I'll lay it out hypothetically. 
"Say, I need some advice."

"Shoot!" you'll say, all chirpy
and wise. "Some guy I know
says you keen walking right
by him, stark ass nude in
a dream he keeps having.
Same dream - oh! And
you're wearing that same

hat!" The one you have on. 
But...now you'd be dressed, 
I bet. 

You look nonplussed, but 
interested. Your eyebrows 
rise: "?"

"Well, what should I do?" 

You smile, arch and wry.
"You mean, what should he
do? You're 'friend'?"

"Naw, what should I do?
How do I get a dream 
like that?"

Smooth response. Wish
I was so smooth in dreams
as I am in real life!

dream mornings

A couple mornings back I woke
up from a dream and I was like
man.
That almost meant something, or
maybe something could be said
about it. And I idly tried

to frame it a couple ways, and then
it popped to mind yesterday, and I
kicked it around a bit,

and today I can't even remember
what it was about. 

Long walk through the valley

Yea, though I walk through the Valley
of honey and milk, where this wide sweet
river has cloven the hills, and the wild orchards
spill with ripe, red fruit, it is none of it mine
- and I don’t give a hoot.

Yea, though I walk through the Valley
in my undershorts, I pray that to passing cops,
these big, floppy boxers look enough like funky
cool shorts to pass - and they pass, and they pass,
and each time, I wilt.

Yea, though I walk through the Valley, I can’t
get used to the accent.

Yea, though I walk through the Valley,
I can’t seem to thumb a ride.

Yea, though I walk through the Valley
of the shadow coming towards me,
I lift up my eyes and behold, looks
like one hum-dinger of a storm coming on.

Yea, though I walk through the Valley it’s
stinking hot.

Yea, though I walk through the Valley,
I wonder about valleys in general.

Yea, though I walk through the Valley,
I feel pleasantly relieved about nothing
I can positively identify.

Yea, though I walk through the Valley
and I see some jagoff up ahead in a
black hoodie robe wearing a skull
mask and flailing around an antique
cropsmithery implement, I will kick
his damn ass for him if he keeps
heading this way and doesn’t calm
the hell down pronto.

Yea, though I walk through the Valley
getting hungry all day, the looks of this
roadside diner don’t inspire me with hope.

Yea, though I walk through the Valley
completing sentence after sentence, I
ponder the point of the exercise, if any.

Yea, though I walk through the Valley, there is none.

Guess I made it all the way through! Alright.

Now was that a river valley or what? All the way 
through I didn't see no 

mountains 

warded & armed

armed & warded, guarded 
by charms and guided by 
signs I looked to your 

eyes
and 
told you: 

"Whenever
approaching a car, I have
a precognitive sense that says
this is or it isn't

the car 
that is going
to kill me.

So I'm safe so far. And 
approaching a bird, or a
bear, or a bare stretch of ground
within falling distance of a great,
or reasonably great height - I tune

in 

- I have to tune in
for it to work, you see. It's not
sudden vivid flashes crashing
like they say, or in shows - 

and I find by the sense whether this 
is the bird, the bear, the killing

ground or not. Or the car. And I tell
by the signs whether the sense is right
or not. So far: every single time."

My voice and eyes grew serious
but not sad. Edged with hope, 
trailing trust.

"It only works
on cars, bears,
birds and broad
flat surfaces. 

Not on you. 

Which is why 
I had to tell you.
Ask you: can I
trust you like I do? 

Or...?" 

My voice trailed off
with her eyes. She
turned, and turned
back. Her eyes 
were like death.

Disappointed death. "So
have you ever found the bird,
car, ground that was going 
to kill you?" 

"Not so far, I grinned. Lucky!" 

"Have you ever even met a bear?" 

"Oh, I stay away
from bear areas. There's 
too much risk" 

"So - it hasn't actually worked
once? Has it?"

Her intent gaze, here 
seemed to hold

a message
of its own. 

I held her gaze.
My voice weighed a ton.
"Well, I hope you're as glad as
I am!" 

She sighed.

"Well, I was" 

the cool forks

as soon as we got the cool 
forks, we began fighting. 

everyone wanted to use 
the cool forks 

the old forks sat clean in 
their slot, in the drawer, 
while voices mounted 
heavenward: "there are 
NO FORKS" 

we meant no cool forks

the cool forks made every 
bite special

sometimes we felt we'd as 
soon starve as use the old 
ones 

finally we just threw them 
out. Went to the store for 
more cool forks 

they were gone. Sold out, 
every store

panicked, we raced
home

they were gone

the false canard

I am myself 
a false canard. 
So many people
point at me like
I'm the problem
in the world. As if
I am what's wrong 
with it

in fact 
I am the opposite.

the false canard Pt. 2

Well, anyway 'canard'

is not a kind of duck
found to be false. That's
my mistake. For what it
is, I'm still a false canard
though, boss! And I will
quack and flap my arms
a bit, just to be safe - and
walk my ducky talk,
proceed apace.  

'Cause that's the way 
I play it off.   

gladhand

I'm so glad I have hands 
I thank Heaven for them! 
Then in afterthought, idly 
scold Hell - that's the plan, 

by airy hand wave of the bird! 
Not enough! Double-barrel! 
Both hands! 

That is when 
I look up,
catch your eyes 

By mistake! 
By surprise! 
I just gave you both birds! 
I thrust both hands so deep 
in my pockets, it hurts. I wish 
right now my hands
could 
just fall through
two cracks in the earth.

Pockets. Close enough!

No, too 
close. Your face
is not appeased by my
policy of fulsome placation. 
Your inner Hitler rages (not literally
Hitler, I just mean you are by all signs
mad, and set on targeted atrocity
- unfair! What if I wasn't Jewish?
Do you prejudge me like a bigot
for a two-handed bird salute?!)

(signs say yes)

You thundercloud loom up 
within you and fume over like
bees with your thoughts in beeline, 
each patiently waiting to sting 
in good time. But before you 
can give me a fair piece 
of mind - 

- I say wait! Can the haste!
I'll explain anything! My idle hands
did devil's work by two birds. But
a bird in each hand beats a foot
in the mouth! As the saying goes,
don't burn your bushes, honeybee! 
Flies create a lot of buzz, but they 
catch so much shit! While honey 
is sweetest between us, wherever 
we bees. 

Her eyes flashed glare warning, but 
my explanations seemed soothing 
music to her. She was a beast of 
good-nature then, it seemed - apart 
from the odd eye flash,  
though.
And she'd had enough - just 
the right amount! - of explanation. 

So I stopped. Let it open edgewise. 

She charged. A sign of weakness, 
and she said: "OK buddy I'll let it 
go one time with a backhand bonus:
two birds, one free pass. But don't 

try to gladhand me." 

Fair enough. We shook on it, her 
with sustained yet well-spent wrath, 
me 
with a mighty quiver of relief. I kept 
my hands in my pockets after that,
for pretty much the rest of my life

and glad  

vehemence is cathartic

I feel like what's needed is
top-to-bottom systemic reform,
in incremental pinpoints driven
forward at generational rates by
a rambunctious public that gets
involved. Expressing its fucking

will and shit.

Voting people out after checking
their damn voting record. "YOU
SCUMBAG!" 

Some call me a dreamer. Others
a butt-hearted political canard with
an extremist bent too radical to fuck
with. I don't know what these people
are talking about, and fuck, people!

Can't we can the petty sniping and
put our shoulder to the public weal
for once? Great ideas!
Average events!
Small people

are where BOTH come from/effect.

Vehemence is cathartic I swear, but 
that's not why I do it though.  

random Instacomments #6

This masterfully composed, 
angled and lit shot captures 
perfectly a
culinary abomination.
How
could
food
too ugly to even eat make
a picture so gorgeous you
could masturbate at it if

only you could stop 
your stomach 
turning
 
oh, gross

gorgeous gross

Are you going to eat

that?

As many alibis

The night of the twelfth? Thanks,
I was at a fund raiser dinner dance
for cripples and the developmentally
disabled. I attended in fancy dress
- a masquerade! So my face wasn't
visible, but...they'll all vouch for it. 
Just ask them if goatee Batman can 
tango. 

Oh you said the twelfth? Sorry. I was 
at the ice skating rink, birdwatching. 
I was there with a couple of Spriver's
starlings, a hey-billed cockawhoop,
and a tallow-bellied thatchwing. 

They all saw me. 

Wait, you said 10pm? Sorry, that 
was all earlier. Can't watch birds 

for a damn at night - you miss all 
the black ones! By that time, I'd 
have been doing full-contact nude 
tai chi at the rec center. I've been 
organizing a class
to show my stuff. I believe 

my technique can help people 
relax! 

Since word got out, everybody says 
I'm in a class by myself. Check it 
if you want. There's another class 
Tuesday, three more on Sunday. 
All the same people will be there. 
Come by! Stay for the class. 

Hope that helps you with your 
questions, gentlemen. Now if 
you'll excuse me, it's murder 
out there. I need to go scare 
up 
some 
alibis 

a bad case

A pair of legs, 
one tilted one straight 
stick out of a barrel 
with one shoe on 

water spread all round. 

The detective arrives and
scents blood. He calls his
assistants, gives orders and
soon is seen everywhere, 
knocking on all doors. The 
assistants stand to the side:
holding up the wrinkled,
soaked
corpse, 
while their boss barks 
questions at who comes 
to door: 

Starting with
"Do you know who this is?"...
"Do you know who I am?"...often
ending with "Why did you do it!!" 

The case rip-roars about with many
a tearful, hysterical breakdown during
questioning, but those answering the door
are rather more bemused. Disdainful,
maybe. Finally, one grows

suspicious

at this
departing trio - or
quartet, if we count
the dead. Calls the 
police. 

Behind oak empaneled
doors at aitch cue: plans
are laid. Made and remade, 
relaid, and finalized, 
and refinalized. 

Now the detective strides 
imperious and arrogant, his 
assistants lagging, laboring
behind, now dragging their
feet, now the corpse - long 
since dried out.

He's sure as now, 
again:
the solution
to this mystery
lies behind this door. 

His job, challenge, meat & métier 
is how to spot, crack and break down 
those lies with proof! Find who did it
and why. He grins, not exactly evilly. 
Not exactly well, either. He is the best
in the world at this detective method. 

He invented it. 
He knocks. 
The door opens, 

oh shit it's the cops

"Officers," so smooth. 
"We think there's been 
a murder at the old barrel."
A look of disgust crosses
his face: "We found this."

 

haiku +1 syllable

I couldn't be a meat in
-spector. I really 
have no idea what's en

-tailed  

In the park

She sits with her legs out,
reading a book
spread wide in her lap
and the gap between 

Her downturned face, her eyes 
absorbed, you wonder what's
made her mind so keen  

You can't even see if she's
wearing a thing down there: 
just legs, 
just waist, 
with a book
to serve skirt, shorts 
or any such
purposes

so intense
and brief underneath
that book. So you look 
at her top - what! 

She's got another book up there! 
Held outward, pages facing 

you.
She looks up, sees 
you. Her eyes say 

come read 

Actually, 
you can't read. 
She's wearing sunglasses
shaped not like books, 
but daisies.

In fact, you're pretty sure
this is Elton John. Wait
no,

no  
maybe not

Consider dark storage

If you don't know what 

I'm talking about, if you're 
concerned that whatever you 
put online is currently being 
wanked at by strangers, if 
you mean to protect your 
flowcharts, powerpoints 
and holiday snaps from 
this disgusting prospect, 

consider dark storage 
on the afterweb. 

You can tell people it's a way 
of storing your most precious 
and sensitive data in a dark place 
located in the future of the internet. 

People hearing this will give up 
any idea of getting at your data 

since, 
come on. 

It's a way of tricking people 
actually. So they think you 
can't possibly have any good 
or worthwhile data 

anywhere they can get at it. 
They're not going to hack 
the future! Anyway it's 

too dark in there

BIG BOAT

In a much smaller place, 
I could be a BIG BOAT
in a place this size, I'm 
a bubble of soap! 

I could rise, fly shimmer 
and skip on a breeze! 
I don't expect notice 
for a drip like me. 

See a bubble's just a drip 
that's sticky enough to catch 
a breeze in itself, then wander 
off drunk (you know for liquids,
fresh air's an intoxicant). 

I'm at home as a mote, plus 
wherever I went! On the breeze, 
I'm at home, and I never did 
pop. 

I can always come down 
in the pressure drop, touch 
surface - the worst I can do 
is float! Theoretically, or 

drown. But so far, nope! 
I'm a boat.  

an honesty of wood

Come to honesty, I'm a cherry tree. 
I cannot lie with sincerity,
so I tell no lies -
'cause that's just me.

All I can do is blossom
and fruit and drink in sun
and carbon, breathe out
air and root, 
metaphorically.  

landlord problems

my landlord and I 
he cares for me
we get along fine, 
always running into each 
other, catching up. He 
runs a nice bungalow 
row, but he's always 

concerned. "You 
shouldn't be living 
like this. You're living 
way below your level 
you don't deserve to 
be in one of these 
shitholes." I'm like man, 
chill! These are excellent 
shitholes, plus love the 
location. He shakes his 

head, sad. I think he thinks 
if he could nudge me from 
the nest, convince me to move 

on, for my own good - I could 
take him with me 

He's projecting 

Hitched his wish to a star, he 
doesn't believe 
he deserves more

You show your worth in all you do.

You show your worth in all you do. 

I told someone that once, and they 
took it as if I meant good worth. 
They turned one-eighty in that sway, 
and backed and filled, and fawned, 
and swooned. And I felt like
an asshole, then. A gross
manipulator, sure. 

You show your worth in all 
you do. 

That was equivocal galore. 

And I'm the one 

who said that, then. 

wish well, and retract

I wish I could somehow
convey the sharp depth
and dull spike of life
your presence
in it
has cut me with,
But no,

that would be psychic
and unfair.
"Let it
happen

naturally,"
she said, 

I still breathe 
that air

Be prepared.

We could die
waiting for burning buildings 
for us to rush into, rescuing 
a trapped infant 

and yes

that would mean a lot -
a world at least, 

for us 
to die waiting 

small stakes

Small stakes sink deep 
in each of us. The simplest
act - the lightest touch. The 

thing 

there was no cause
to do. 

In this, 
worlds moved - 

as I knew you, 
so much. 

Ocean Of Women

An ocean of women! 
That's what I want to swim in, 
but I 

can't 

swim. 

I know it's pathetic 

Most boys, most men 
start in on swimming 
at the ripe age of ten 
and that's about when 
they get cute with the girls!
It seems I missed both 
of those boats, by then 

There's an ocean of women 
that I want to swim in, but 

I
can't 

swim 

eight cracks

My heart is broken by eight cracks 
like crazy crooked lightning bolts 
and never can the love forced in 
fall out of it. 

But you know that 
and you're the lightning bolt
that sticks 
You haven't
even broken, yet 

I hope and wish you never would 

That's all I need 
deserve 
and get 

momentum shift

A dog fouled 
on the pavement outside 

the butcher's. The

whistle pierced and silenced
the crowd,

the referee cried
out

"red flag!"
and threw his hat right on

the spot. The crowd
saw and roared. The
dog
barked furiously: 

"get off my shit!" it 
was
as if the dog 

knew the rules

real you

You have
inner personality
and charm. 

You wouldn't know, 
and nobody would - 
it doesn't show. 

But still, I know

no harm  

already ready all

Keys, check.

Coat, check.
Pants, check
- drawers? Check!
Shirt? Check.
Shoes -

- Check! 

Face, hair, teeth, 
arms, legs, hands, 
check, check. All
set. 
Ready?
Get.
Where
the heck
we going yet?

No Real Scotsman

In, in, endless curtain!

Death's but a lying light, an affluent spectator  

That slinks and swans her age beneath the house

And now is seen continually: it is a head

Untold by a genius, empty of sight and calm,

Understanding everything. 

charm attack

You blitzed with pealing bells 
untold in laughter rung like hearts, 
like rags, like dawn and sunset 
straw-spun gold in Rumpelstiltskin's
long-con gag to snag himself a first-born
child, by playing on a spinning wheel. 

Wait, where'd the fuck I go with this?
The point is you charmed me
for real, and knocked me
sprawled inside

big deal 

so now the world 
has twice the feel. 

the whore

The whore 
sells what she's got 
for sex.
She's got 
so much money 

but she won't give 
it up for free. If 

you want it 
and you do, 
you know 

what the deal 
is.
You

Yes, you! 
You have to sex up, sex 
out, sex in and sex
about the whore 
'til she gets so 
hot she pays. 

It's nasty the way 
that power imbalance 
plays.

You need her so much 
for the money, but she
must have her 
sex. Wait.

Are you
the whore
in this setup?

Have you checked?

Maybe the sudden flip 
of roles here makes you
understand how hurtful 
some words can be. 

Whore! 

For instance.  

ya face

You could teach
a class on how to have
a face. And how
to make faces 
with it. Your face
puts on a masterclass
and a clinic at once. It
is as if
your inner emotion,
sentiment, temperament,
feeling, attitude and charm, 
disposition, wiles and will 
run high-level tag team heart, 
mind and body slam ops
on 
whoever's
mind, behind their eyes 
gets a peep, glance or gaze
upon 
your mouth's quirk
or beam, the wink or twinkle
you shine, the nose. Is right there.
Eyebrows do their thing, cheeks
perfectly cheeky or innocent. When
you go about with your face, you 
lead the way

past whoever 
sees, 
and they wonder

who's she 

but 
they know who
is she. You 

could teach a class 
on how
to have a face.

Show them all, give
them the basics, the tricks,
the epiphanies, make every
face you have, and at the 
end, you'd wake up
screaming 
from the shock! 

Your whole class faced you 
with

one face  

your own. 

And you knew in that moment 
you couldn't face yourself 
much

transparent lead

You outnumber me by count
of one. Although I count one,
too, I'm done when you weigh
in. I can't count mine! When
yours turns gold in light divine,
and mine turns lead by alchemy. 

I only want your one, you see. 
Set next to mine, my one 
turns clear in everything 
you say, I hear. In every
thing you show I see. 
My one weighs tons, 
and feels like gold. 

It's only me.

slow pour for sure

The Canadian Club I got's 
got a nozzle on the bottle 
that impedes the whisky flow 
very evenly. I think it's for bars, 
so they can cheap out on the pour.
Hold the bottle high, give it a long 
stream - customer thinks, "You do 
me proud!" The ol' flow-rate fakeout, 
where the long pour is confused for 
a goodly amount. 
The upshot is, for me
it sucks 'cause
I get so pissed off waiting
for endless trickle to add up
to two glugs, I poured

myself twice as much
as I wanted! This 
is not even good

whisky! 

Don't mistake me, it's upper middle 
okay. No swill or rotgut. It gets 
better as it goes. 

That Canadian nozzle, though. 
Crazy. They must have all day 
up there to pour whisky in 
those long winters 

Cows in the sense

Cows in the sense of British 
bitches but with tones of stupid 
and maybe dowdy is a word 
I'd never use on women, no 
matter how English they 
act. It's a word I'd call 
offensive, but I allow 
its use on foreign cop
and detective shows, 
provided its either
"a fair cop," i.e. deserved, 
or the speaker is punished 
by being depicted as "low 
class" and not too bright. 

I know how much more 
that stings over there, so 
I figure justice served. OK
cow use - just this once. 
An exceptional use of cow

Does a logical approach?

A logical approach, 
done perfectly, takes 
too long and makes 
you miss your chance 
pretty easily. So easy 
to do with logic, and this 
is how it safeguards us 
from error, by removing 
opportunity from within 
reach. "Wait! Hold up" 
we'd become well-known 
for saying. "Logic dictates 
hold up. I'm doing logic, then 
we'll know what course lacks 
fallacies to the greatest degree."

Problem though. As we become 
known for avoiding all mishaps, 
missteps and successes by a stiff 
rigor of logic, people will seek 
us out. Ask us this and that. Give 
scenario and proposition to review. 

Then 
we 
have even less 
time for logic

Don't allow it. Rule them out. 
When they come by, just shout 
out fallacy names at them! "Straw
Slope! Ad nauseum! Slippery Man!

Haystack! Foul, foul - get out of here 
with that logic sample! No logical 
analysis!" People will stop viewing 
you as an easy exploitable resource 
for logic. They will nickname you 
"Fallacy" but actually no, you mis-
heard. 

Phallusy. 

They're calling you dickish. This 
is where overreliance 
on logic leads 

For time being

Tomorrow is forgiving,
but today can punish
- while yesterday reaps
its endless crop.

Whatever we possibly push
from today,
to land in the future -

our burdens will drop.

At least for time being,
we might be okay.

We're gathering strands
of whatever's to come,
and beating fish back
as they jump in the boat!

It's too nice a day
to get anything done

Danger is a virtue.

Danger is a virtue.
Danger is the risk
bravery takes without asking, or
danger
is the other part of valor.
Danger is what’s worth the risk.
In another world, you could have
stepped the wrong way, found 
danger that's what.
Danger. 

Ultimately, 
when you die
you know all the
danger was worth it. When
one must chance great dares
- only danger makes what 
bravery or cowardice

must do.
Danger 

makes bravery's worst fear
a very real risk - depending
on odds, really. Or danger
makes cowardice an easy 
call. 

That's how we know danger's 
on the case. Good God danger! 
What the hell do we have to 
do about it now? Just 
watch. Wary. Just 
wait prepared. 

Danger is coming 

soon 
or too late

"Meet loving, active women"

"Meet loving, active women" 
said the sidebar ad - and I 
immediately felt guilty, because 

the woman pictured was fat. 
I felt guilty for society. That 
means me too. Society, among 
others, is my own damn fault 
if I'm in it.

And oh I am. We gave that poor 
girl hell with unrealistic body 
nonsense, shame game, weaponized
self-image problem and all the rest.

A gender culture war with battles
doled out daily in a brutal schedule 
that only feels random because it 
always is. An unending reaming 
by impossible standards that no
one gets right. 

Impossible. They couldn't. Shit
that everybody's supposed to live 
up to can't be right. Can't be gotten 

right. 

The loving, active women you meet 
have been through a deep, vile slog 
of men and women you can't even 
imagine, unless you're one of them. 

And fuck you if you think you know 
what she's been through unless, 
you know, 

that's you. 

Explanatory note on tone (redacted)

I answered with a clean breast
here, because I wanted to find
out if anybody else was as
relatable as me on this one.

With the Big Stuff, some people
pose superior. Or feign a vast
distance. Or kow tow to the big
dog: consensus. I considered it,
but affected a gruff, bluff, hearty
and casual demeanor known only
in my heart. Others saw me as I am:
bold. Aloof from false, empty values
of culture and society. Vigilant. Fondly,
sometimes even vehemently attuned to
and rooting in true, full values, such as
society and culture also abound in.

Beside all that, my interest in hard facts
ascertainable to any who come look, come
check and decide for themselves, almost
overwhelmed me. I was left shaken. Rigid
with intellectual paralysis in an almost iced
fury of rationalism. My emotions were taken
aback, overawed by the sheer dispassion and
detachment that warred with me in my own
mind, and won.

That’s why I took the angle I did in the answer.
If for some reason you were intimidated or
appalled, please check your reaction against
what I reveal here. Is it fair? Reasonable? Or
has fat, raunchy bias slipped in somehow?

I hope that clears that sh!t up, if any. If not,
my apology is valid - and sincere. 

the goad

I'm just going
to coax, cajole
and goad you-all: DO IT
When it comes time.
When the thing to
do recurs to mind
and you know: DO IT
When you're sick
with the joy of
hope's anticipation
at an accomplishment
you won't be missin': DO IT
When the world says
you can't, or more likely
doesn't notice, or hasn't
noticed, okay DO IT

When people be like
DUH, WHY YOU
DOIN IT - DO IT!!!!!
When sometimes, all
you want in the whole
wide life is a hole to
poke your head into
and close your eyes DO IT
That's why I'm here. To sing
this

song

do 
it.

childlike world

The children built 
a nation strong
and wise 
from things that
they had known. So, 
understood as they best
can. 

Then they grew up with every plan 
to find reality had changed
from what they'd sketched
and laid in mind. So,
lacking other option, 
they just set to work 

as if it's fine. 
As if it's everything 
they thought. And acting out 
in subtle ways where chance

is found to make it so. 
By subtle breaks we mend

and go 

city hunter

The master hunter
grim and dour
ranged the city streets on track 
of quarry, prey 
and similar
he knew by scent and sight
and lack. 

About him, 
cars and walkers 
thronged in thoroughfares 
fared thoroughly. No sign 
of quarry - not one stone! 
Except well-laid, unhurriedly 
in pavement, wall and edifice. 
No sign of prey - the kind he
prized.

The master hunter screamed
dismay down city streets,
unsatisfied. 

The nomad cities

In the vastless deserts of O 
Shush, clouds without number 
(zero) dotted the sky not at all
and the nomad cities moved 
about crossing each others' 
weird tracks, occasionally 
bumping into each other. 

Then their towers and walls 
trembled, then. Then there 
was war! Or could have been
- but the people of one city 
(used to it) said excuse me 
to the people of the other, 
and each place awkwardly
adjusted its course around
and past the other - once
the direction could be found.

In all ageless time, no protocol
for this had developed. It was
just
then
that a

hero

came in
to this waste and expanse of sand
and wind. Well, not much wind. Not 
just then. It was Ak-Akoom! The self
-defender! Hundreds of years old already
by then in the full bloom and vigor of youth, 
a young man still! His span unnaturally drawn 
out but not attenuated at all by a curse. Driven
since then to be not killed or maimed, in a fit
of utter maniac cowardice he devoted himself
to one task: become the ultimate living instrument
of war! Which he had done long since.
He found
it pretty easy, given
time and application. So on he came,
searchlessly questing always for someone, anyone,
entire armies even not to kill him! Coming out 
upon the desert where this phase of our story 
is set, he set rapidly about finding not much,
and moved on uneasily. 

For so was his track ever laid, so his path led
ever onward, forward, upward and downward
to either side - unbending in his swerving way!

"If only," he thought, "There were moving cities
- then I could settle down. Nomad cities. I could
just hang out! Let the city do the moving."
Unfortunately
just then, these
cities were all
in another part 

of the desert,
which they were whenever anyone
tried to find them. All they'd find were
the weird citywide tracks, crossing,
converging, bumping into each 
other - edging around and 
past. The cities themselves 

were not even a legend. No one spoke 
of them. It hadn't occurred to any that 
such tracks were made by cities! 

People simply presumed the tracks
were some natural phenomenon,
a problem for the gods, tops. Nothing
we need to explain with fancy stories
of a preposterous kind. Meanwhile,
the sands of the desert beckoned 
in no very appealing way. They
stretched endfully in no directions, 
as numberless clouds 
failed to dot the sky  

self-correction

Courtesy's a strength, 
but propriety's skill. 
And I've had so many
teachers, but they're all
equal. Please pronounce
that eek-will, even though
it's eek-wul. Or the rhyme
doesn't work, and to me
that's bull. 

So I've had so many 
teachers, I could not 
be trained. I've just worn 
as many grooves and gears 
in my brain as I've had to deal
with all these different beans.
Being human myself, I have

found the means. 

huge diss but meant to help

Act your age 
- not your underwear! 
Don't stop your mind, 
when it's going nowhere 
Stop kidding yourself like,
some big inner child. You got
so much to grow up for!

It might take a while  

Fix your style for once! 
Start on that last week.
Take an inventory - throw it 
in the shit-can, freak!   
Learn all new techniques!
Get rid of all current-prior
best-acquired cope mode
thus far. It reeks!

Toss that old stuff back in the past.
It belongs! That's your way. And 
your way's the worst! So be strong.   

Stop making that face!
People saw it before.

Come up with just one (1) new face
for sure, and make it all night all day,
pronto galore! Make the scene with that
brand new face like a dream. Like
a human dream.

Look,
you know that it's true. Okay? 

Come clean. I'm trying to say this 
for you. 'Cause the way you keep acting's
like two butt cheeks! Got lost in a fetus! End up
at ten weeks, col' stuck in the head - as the brain,
in fact!

But your mind's so FAT
that your brain can't act
or act right! Then of course,

by the time
you're born,
your mama
said the butt cheeks bit was a metaphor,
and also she said that the metaphor's APT. 

So uh 

Yeah that's
just that, or
close to that.

Try to work on it stat. 

Up to lately?

Oh hell, nothing much. Keepin’
busy, workin’on the pond. I put
in some trees the other day. Sank.
Oh I was reading some sheet music!
Beethoven’s 7th. It’s freaking amazing
how much more you appreciate it from
the blots and staves and stuff. Curlicues.

Next I saw that movie in the theater, everyone’s
talking about? The one without superheroes?
Skip it, boring.
I should’ve waited for Netflix on that one, you
should of seen everyone file out so sheepish.

Nobody meeting each others’ eyes.

Every one of us waited to the end
of the credits, too! No bonus scene!
Now I don’t understand that. And

between that, I’ve been
driving around in the car.

I know it’s the environment
and all, but I make other
sacrifices. I need the road.
The road is my soul.

Yourself?

bad nap

I woke up wrecked
one arm
dead numb 
one leg on
fire
with nerves,
and some one jabbed
and pushed a twisted knot
of flesh into my back. 
My neck 

was drawn
and hot, pulled taut 
and hung at rakish angle, 
crazed and shot with funny
pains when last I tried 
not quite
to straighten and  

untie

I must have slept
on all
this wrong.    
 
This afternoon,
I thought I'd take 
a nice lie down. I'd
stretched luxuriously
within the stolen moment 
I had won, and laid me 
down flat out. Some fun.  

Ah, nah I lied. The nap 
went fine. It just

went way too long.

Four 
hours!
Whoops 

Felt guilty
when I woke,
so I
wrote a poem 

to give myself hell! A bit, 
then
my head got cut off and flew
into a cliff while my body
grew fire all over it, like thick
fur. And it burned to utter smoke,
and the stink of human flesh.
Burnt,
I mean. 

After that I was 
kind of tired

hero dilemma

It's hard to fight murder because 
you're out there on the streets 
trying to fight murder, but 
it's not murder unless they 
kill someone.

Then you totally lose. But 
if you win, all you did really 
was fight attempted murder. 

Which is kind of lame.
How 
do you know
they were really going

to do it? 

Were they trying to? 

Is it moral relativism 
or situation ethics

that's the real problem 

Weird gap

There's something weird 
about pets that disappear 
for over a year, and then 
just 
show up. 
Come back. 
What the crap, where you 
been all this time? But 
they settle back in 
like it's all 

just fine. 

a 2-way social jeez tweak

Shh don’t
tell anyone but I speculate
this question may have been asked
in part
as a 2-way social jeez tweak.

The jeez of the hyperscrupulous, who'll
fear overlooking and neglecting people,
and leap like kicked cats panicking to
overcorrect, and

...the jeez of the people who cannot be
wrong. And will not. And will react in
piqued defiance/rebuke. Maybe either
might spend 20 minutes searching,
searching

before realizing 

they got 
janked 

if that's the term. Yeah 
they got fucking JANKED. 

On the other hand it’s totally possible
none of that happened.
I’m pretty breezy about it. 

Anything could motive that! 
Possibilities are 1-of-many.

The person who walks in

The person who
walks into a
room

bearing
visible signs
and stains of sweat,
mucus, vomit, urine, blood
and feces

is

an uncomfortable reminder
to some of the people there.

“Ah yes. The true animal
nature of us all, revealed.
You know,

we’ve all
gotten so sophisticated
around here, it quite slipped
my mind.” Thankfully,

almost no one does this.

The track

And in the stands,
the fool felt best
and worst at once,
while hatred loved 
to dislike wants.
And meanwhile
likewise unwise tries
to tell the truth to otherwise.
So now the present's come
to stay. So then the future,
overcome and tackled from 
behind by past, has gone 
behind. The day is won.  

and never came next

A pleasure 
in the death of verse
spread webbed feet
upon the air and suckled
a sunbeam, and swung
and swung, and let go

flying above a pond 

plashless in air 

that never swum 

glad like

I’m glad like
trucks and ponds;
like buildings sprawling
endlessly toplessly upwards;
like recollections turned inward
and popping like good ol’ fireworks. I’m glad

like a fist
of pure Coca-Cola,
turning the icy tide of refreshment
in a do-or-die case of lunchtime.
I’m glad

like dueling snakes,
fish and waterfowl in some
kind of macabre free-for-all, touted
to the rafters selling tickets all week, but
the crowds turn up to roar, only
to see how
these innocent creatures
mind their own business
as usual!!

It’s hard to describe gladness
by comparison.
You end up
lodged
in all sorts
of too-specific,
out-of-the-way
places, and 

no less glad, maybe

but feels kind of stupid
for describing 

it all weird

the Blank

If I could have any superpower 
it would be instant familiarity 
memory blank deja-jamais vu
impact field. 

Basically anyone I aim it
(or
I can
just turn it
on blanket -
omnidirectional) instantly 
recognizes me. Or 
they know in an instant, 
they should. They should. 
I am someone they know 
for sure they should 
recognize. 

Now they're the one up 
to no good - for I sure seem 
to recognize them! (I made 
dossiers) (I can't just know 
strangers and names at 
a glance!)

They know, 
they know me
- I'm someone 
supposed to be
known. 

They should know.
Inexcusable lapse! They 
can tell - but what's riding 
on it? No idea! That's half 
of the whole dilemma 
I bring! 

Not...famous? Important?
No, no - someone
nearer. Some direct and
forceful influence king. 

Who is it? Anyway. I am
someone supposed to be here!
More than they! They embarrassedly
sense. Someone who it's shameful 
you can't recognize. The whole 
force of social expense/expectation 
is bent upon them to not be found 
out! 

Just what the hell my name is. Wrack,
wrack, wrack, your mind, flailing on the 
spot...or any spike or shard of context 
surely would drag the necessities 
in view. Who IS this guy?

"I KNOW I'm supposed to KNOW" 

me! It's just me, with my social 
dirty trick superpower on max! 

Post-encounter, they'd be like "whew!"
"Got out of it unscathed! They didn't
even realize I forgot their name" 

"...and everything else about 
who the hell was that? Anyway, 
gave 'em what they expected of 
me, got out of it. Tricked 'em
smooth." Smug. Triumphant. 
Relieved.  

Like that. 

Like a bandit. 

Of course I don't misuse it. 

While I'm in weaponized
social awkward memory 
blank cloak mode though, 
I'm not actually writing 

to waking memory then.

Dream memory writes
to a different tape that
erases itself if you don't
write it down, tell someone
or otherwise fix it in place, awake.
I
(the momentaneous experience of me)
write to that tape instead.

So post-encounter, I fade like a dream.
They can't remember specifically: face,
voice, height, race, gender or what I wore,
just size, shape (silhouette) and how I dressed.
An impression at best. Snazzy! 

Nope. Casual. Trust me. Why 
would the Aentity dress up 
for you nonentity slobs? Ha-ha

So I basically go anywhere, that way. 
The only thing I ever have to worry 
about is cameras. I make sure to go 
nondescript, just in case anyone 
compares later. Meanwhile, 
complete strangers are trying to 
placate me! Concealing their gaffe, 
their lack, their lapse 
"in memory," which 
is so unfair! They are not 
mind-controlled, just agreeable 
as a dodge and a trick to get, to dig 
all embarrassed, contrite - who the 
hell am I? Faulting their memory!

I was never there.

If I work it, I pretty much get why
I came. 

Later, they strive to fill the blank, 
and find out or recall why they care. 

up wants down needs

The sea poured rain into a meadow 
of flowers and grass which were all
equally weeds: casual and unofficial
wild growth in rank and riotous waves. 
Springy, hovering, twitch and sway
at the slap and spray of wet. Verdant
and fecund in shades of dark green,
deep green, straw, and millions of colors.

The sky drew off to far onshore, having 
slaked its reverse thirst, leaving the sun
all over. Far out to 

sea, 

another sky drank deep of invisible
steam swelling upwelling in blinding
white tumescence,

thirsty 

for some gaping meadow full 
of damp stank growing dry,
like a mouth 

thirsty 

my ideal reader

my ideal reader is far 
from ideal. Some
Frankenstein 
assemblage
of parts
whole souls 
who once were real
- but they can't be like
this! Some jumbled 
up heads hearts panties
in butts 

- it's casual dress 
and address, I craft. 

What fits
an assortment
of mixed nuts,
fore and aft bolts
struck from heavens
to the platform held
elevated in the nethers
of a storm called patiently
down 'til it's done, just to
bring it to life. This thing 

that I think, pull, push
to write some. Write 

to only one? 

Or a mockery of life.
Just a mockup of sorts!
A mental target I emplace
to write at, to, for, or 
towards, at least. Or
around.

Within.

An abstraction
far more
than idealization.  

My abstract reader 
- quite distractable, spun 
in always one of all available 
directions, I find. So I fling 
from the cuff, whiz bam crack 
boom! Some sticks, some clicks 
some splats, gross, icks, some 

swoon. 

So I write
for the abstract one. 

If the ideal one is in there, 
too? sure! You're
the one, boo.

wrong eulogy

Look I don't need to tell
you. She dazed, dazzled,
plummeted and uplifted
us all with just a look
or that touch
- do you know? That
touch? It was a human
unknowable, impossible
- unless you knew her,
and she touched you.

And I think as I look
'round - yes, I think
she touched us all.

Didn't she? Did she
miss anyone here? I doubt
she missed anyone, anywhere
she aimed, went, or went by.

She came in swinging
from the rafters! Pulling
all the stops out of left field
and rounding down the bases
to square roots for some
sum of all parties. They'll
be talking forever about
some of those, in
some parts.

She was like the mother
of celebration, like the aunt
of all hills and the bee of all
hives. To me,
she was like the sister
of incest - but only
in that sense.

Innocence, she was
yes and know. Her know
went cosmically beyond
encyclopedic, and she
gave it to you by the book
opened to page through
or slamming by the pound
through the air at you. In fact -

- oh wait. I'm sorry

this is about some one else,
isn't it? Not about my life

experience

even with someone who meant
more than worlds to this one
truly devastated man.

It
isn't about me. It can't
be about me now. It feels
like it is. I think all of us

took her so personally.
Because that's how she'd give.

This can't be about my relation
to her, or with her, or to be precise:

relations. Still, if any of you

have not been so touched

as I was, by her - too late.

Too late.

The whole world
from now on,
is too late.

If my slant or emphasis
seems wrong here, to any one
please

reflect: only lovers are mourned.

And we were all her lovers.

Burgers.

The quintessential American 
sandwich. Don't let the name 
confuse you, ass! They don't 
do it that way in Hamburg.

Do
you
know
what they
call a quarter pounder
with cheese in Hamburg,

Germany?

They call it a Russiaburger with
cheese, for all I care - probably. 
That's to piss us off, if so it's
deserved, plus they don't want
a thing to do with this delicious,
iconic cuisine abomination

- except to eat it by the ton! That's
one thing! Not to act like  "oh, oh yes,
we are the ones who put the Hamburg in
'hamburger' originally..." FALSE.

Germany
has real things
to be proud of. 

They don't need our slops and leavings.
Don't foist fake credit on a proud
German, buddy. They'll tell you
something in German that'll leave
you reeling psychologically, gasping
and groping for your travel dictionary
and phrasebook.    

Such cold, stony, quintessentially 
heartless German reaction to our 
jumped-up puppy-eager U.S. bullshit 
imposition of condescending foist
serves us right in the face! For our
cultural myopia! Our so-called

"exceptionalism" 

What even the hell does that mean 
in a world where everyone's
exceptional, generally?

WHY 
must we try to foist off our own
entirely, original creations such as
pizza, hamburger, off on other
countries? On full-on bull basis!

Look, the dish we call "pizza" has
about as much to do with the humble,
primitive and minimalist deliciousness
of what's put out round in Naples as
"Chicago-Style" "pizza" does here!

Bupkis!

Nil resemblance to real pizza, as 
it's done!

Take credit and own your own failure,
success - you name it! Name it YOUR
WAY. Screw palming it all off on European
"antecedents," unless that's just YOUR 
WAY. If it is, though - what the hell? 

Trying to rip off stolen cred and impress
the home crowd with faux exotic delicacies?
Serve it up right instead and name it what it is! 

Hamburger! 

We all know who did that. The whole 
WORLD
knows. 

It's US. 

Germany 
- don't kid yourself -
has exactly no use for nor interest in playing
tagalong shadow coattail rider to our bullshit
burrito eating cap-gun department store cowboy
hat clown crap, cuisine-wise. 

They've got their own. 

They very much tend to name it what it IS. 
Not "Oh, it is the dish of the town! How they 
do it there!" BULL. "There" they might
call it a Rundstück or Frikadelle or something. 

What kind of asshole thinks if some hot chef 
in Manhattan invented a novel dish that took 
the world by storm he'd be like "Call it a 
New Yorker!" THAT'S A MAGAZINE, 
FOOL! "Call it a Manhattan!" A COCKTAIL! 

What works for pretentious, unserious periodicals 
or mixed-up booze pours is beneath us to use 
for food, please. Although, bear in mind, around 
the world 
there may be
many exceptions. I think
I heard a "berliner" is "a jelly donut"
- even to the people of Berlin! But if so:

check the difference, please. 

Pastry sweets are frivolous. 

Nothing died to get in there.  

Go ask famous Northern English
Singer Morrissey if that's the same 
thing. He will probably tell you 

- no. Probably he'll just give you 
a look. That look of his, where 
you understand the import without 
anybody spelling it out. It says 

please fuck off 
and learn to die 
without troubling 
your betters.  

That uppity fucking 
scouser* is one of the few 
today capable of pulling off 
hauteur with the inner authority 
it takes to make even we the people 
go, oh, okay - he pulled it off. 

*close enough