i kissed a girl because

I kissed a girl because
she was lonely and lovely
and needed kissin'. This
is the story of how
it all came about. She
came to me, and sat upon
a wall I myself had
been leaning upon all
afternoon. She said "upon
is one of my favorite words.
Please kiss me sir, for I am
lonely and need kissin.'" I said,
"lonely and lovely and need kissin',
I'd say." But at this

she sniffed, and turned her head.
"Fie upon your poetic corrections,
messire." My injured dignity shot back:
"go fie yourself! Fuck you
and your forced archaisms, bitch!" This
was perhaps an overreaction.
Then we kissed.

Tyrant: the Prequel

kindergarten's tough, and if
you are the second-fattest kid in class
according to miss bitch with pigtails
who can draw better than you,
and is so pleased with herself
she knows letters already (but
not what to do with them), you
shouldn't put too much stock in
what she says. Some people think
they can get so far ahead at the start
that it's going to matter later. Me,
I bide my time 'til recess comes.
Just past the clanging doors,
out from the inside dark,
moving now in a swarm of
kids running,
blinded

the sun suddenly stuns white hot
a flash of a world too-well lit, burned
to the backs of our eyes -
some squint, run, tumbling forward
all the faster -
I stop cold, and master
the situation.
I squeeze my eyes shut cool,
head craned back, looking up right
into the sun through red lids,
until the bright levels out.
Equilibrium.

I'm headed for the monkey bars! Over
by the baskets, there is a game of bats
vs. ghosts. The white lines on black asphalt
define the maze. It looks like the bats
have this one. I can see most of it -
I could see everything all around, but
most of it, I let pass without notice.
I'm not paying attention to the scurrying,
so far beneath me.

Sitting up here, at the top of this
cheerful half-dome of holes and red,
yellow, blue painted hollow iron bars,
I can - quite easily! - stomp
any encroaching fingers. Later
for cookie, triumphant swings of milk
and naps. Later

for pretending to learn to read. Later
for letting the world catch up, and pass by

if any of them cares to try.

again, with compassion

She walks like the stick up her ass
has become a source of pride. Hobbled
by heels that look like thick wicker stilts,
she's become comfortable at that height
I guess? But she looks so far from it!
Like a flightless bird,
ready to topple
as her shoulders begin to draw inward,
as if pulling in wings.
There's no wind.
She makes her way leaning forward,
her feet scuttling to catch up.
I gaze after her, and wish there could be some way
I could let her know
I could tell her that
despite this whole patronizing,
belittling series of observations
about her body
and walk,
I would totally, totally
do her

truth from this angle

Mirrors don't help us. Not
when we have to look with our own eyes,
which have seen it all, after all - and mostly
the bad part. From where you sit, it is hard
to see the best thing in the room. In your life. And
the people who love you, do
- and as much as you love them,
it's so easy to believe they're just
being nice.

Which is one thing I can't understand:
"We believe what we wish
to believe" - so we do! So why
do we wish to believe
the worst?

lose confidence

Oh don't be fooled! I lose confidence
all the time. Leave it strewn
and scattered in my path,
for others to pick up and find!
If I only I could turn back,
I'd find the confidence I lost.
But at what cost? Friends, at what cost?

neatly done, with practiced strokes

when I was small, I thought a soul had bones
your bones
it's anchored on
and when you die, here comes the knife
to cut through soul, and slice
along each white, long bone
slides blade. It pares
away the ligaments
and shears
connective webs.
Your soul is freed
and flayed
and laid
to weep and bleed
on tray, with sheets
- translucent, white -
of dry wax paper. Pray,

goodnight

.

Well

There is no real rush
with poetry! No crisis,
no urgency - it's not a limited
opportunity, the available words
are not going to change.
There are not better words now
than will be there later.
You are not creating
new
and special words,
in this magic moment,
that you must seize - or else
whatever you mean
will forever be irrecoverable.
No.
Those words are there. Waiting.
They will exist
later, because it's their
fucking job to.

Yours
is to pick and choose. Choose right? Perfect!
But there is no real rush. Choose wrong - choose
the not so perfect word? So what!
So what. The perfect word, if there is one,
will be there,
later,
to come back for. Later on,
When
/If
that perfect word occurs
to your notice - kill! That poem
you thought was done. Insert,
with surgery,
the perfect one.

Like Edgar Allan Fucking Poe. Do you know
how many times he wrote "The Bells"?
One.

So take your time. Why not?
Choose well.

a stirring breakfast metaphor

Life's a bitter bowl of grits, but
it's hot at least. And if you put
a little honey in - it tastes
pretty sweet! Or if you prefer salt,
you can salt to suit your taste. Grits
are flexible like that. Unlike, say,
Corn Flakes.

no hard feelings?

you want my life
to work out right
it's not your call
we're letting go
you know, you know
you just don't want to be the one
I look back on and say,
"That jerk's the turning point -
my whole path turned upon,
went wrong!"

You want to be the one
I want to think and look back fondly on

and say "She was a positive experience!
She built me up. Despite
how all things end, and all
I'm so glad
we began.
Yup, yup"

Yeah, that's the kind
of thing you'd like to think
I'd think of you someday,
when looking back.

Let's hope for that!
Meanwhile, just get out
of my way.

follow soon

follow soon,
as soon as you can -
I'll keep the sheets as straight as slices
warm as loaves

you do your best.
And do your work
and know I am
ahead of you
yes, just ahead
I've gone ahead
to make things soft
and square - our bed

as best I can
to lie in it

until you're there.

prayer

God,

just keep me from cancer,
and heart disease,
and help other people, God
please

God,

please

baby, don't

Well you're helpless inside your head
and wherever it aches
you can push all your needles in it
acupuncture with hate
but if all of the poison comes out
you'll be pouring more in
until all you can cling to is doubt
it's a sin,
it's a sin of pride. You
think you can take
someone so great as you
and break her down, and cave her in, babe it's true
babe it's true, don't do it
baby, don't
don't
don't

baby don't
don't
don't

baby, don't
don't
don't

baby don't
don't
don't

Well, you'll follow inside your head
to wherever it leads
it seems lately the stair's winding down
irreversibly
you count all of the bad advice, twice
but you turn a deaf ear
to all the people who say things so nice - are they blind?
or just insincere
you
ask yourself. Because you know better, hell
you've been around
your whole damn life
to beat you down, baby
Don't!
don't
don't

baby, don't
don't
don't

baby don't
don't
don't

baby, don't
don't
don't

It's not the mirror, the mirror tries
to show you beauty. It's your eyes
when did they stop seeing truly?
Did you ever see you truly?
Have you ever seen your beauty?

Because you're helpless inside your head,
and wherever it aches you can push all your needles in it.
Acupuncture, with hate. You count all of the bad advice twice,
but you turn a deaf ear
all the people
so desperately
say things so nice

Are they blind? or just insincere.

choreography

the sweetest high I ever had
to take your good and turn it bad
that sweet and pure persistent bliss
from innocence turned cynicist
and now you give me such a smirk
as we join in, to evil plans
turn in, in turn - corrupt the world
step in, in step - encircle, dance

bewitch bystanding innocents
the beauty of the dance we make
the fascinating web we weave
our bodies, lines, and souls at stake
and you do more than half the work
you've taken up the lead from me
this dance I planned is in good hands
you stole my choreography

me, too

you turn into crazy - when you drink,
and you think what you think is so true
and so deep
when we wake, you would pay
all the price of that pain
to remember one thing
that looks good to you
sane.

chronology

the calendar's a map of states
all perfect squares, with borders drawn
in all one color, day to day
the interstate runs through
one-way

and time and space cooperate
to move conflicting dates around
to blank, adjacent squares, and clear
the way to this engagement
now

but there's no way to stop the car
we're moving on, we can't delay
I'd love to get out, build a house
and settle down on this
one day

Sadly, we're just passing through
the interstate runs through
one-way. At least we're where
we want to be
right now!
enjoy

the
scenery

bitch, please

I try to be polite and stuff
your ignorance back in your face
your medicine - my compliments!
you're welcome, bitch.

How does it taste?

failed exorcism

I picked up this place
for a song. The cost
was suspiciously
far below market value.
But I knew about that.
And I'd fallen far,
from loved to lost
- the real estate agent
was perfectly honest:
she laid it all down.

So the deal was inked.
Three years ago, I moved
into this house, because
I had heard it was haunted. And how
I would love to be haunted! - by anything
else but the absence of you,
and the presence of what
you have left me without.

But your spirit moved
in, too.

Despite the fact
you're alive and well! Oh, all too
alive, all too well, I know.
And this whole house of ghosts
has gone quiet as souls:
the memory of you
permits no other holds.

Galactic South

The stars all hang differently
where you hang your hat
and your eyes must be full
of that light - but that's
not remotely enough
to explain how you see
all the world
how you hang it all up
in a breeze -
like magic lanterns,
strung on the ways

you catch it at play
and say, "Hey, look there!"
Well if God made all time
and space -

still: you have made this,
and so many more
of my days.

to go sushi

soy sauce
squirts like ink from its torn, ruined pouch
onto a fluffy green wad of bile-hot wasabi
strength dissolved by weakness
for the sake of the absorbent rice

pluck
each plump clump of precision sliced
organic geometry,

convey to sauce
and thence to mouth
in rapid assembly line

I wield these sticks
like an intermediate-level
expert, still conscious of my skill
not yet one with this extension of my hand

people say raw fish is disgusting, well
they should have seen the first draft of this poem

raisinets

raisinets
are the perfect illustration
of why the world needs pleasures
on a different scale to sex

performance

if you could put yourself in words,
could you read yourself aloud?
stand up straight, gesticulate
shake the crowd
and make them take
each syllable, so self-controlled
your meter, measured for effect
as words hit home, their meaning held
a pause
until released, into each listening brain
a spell -

a flower whose bloom would unfold like a bomb

and toll like a bell?

or would you
- with false aplomb -
hold forth with bombast,
whispers, with more show
than tell

explaining with your eyes, your voice,
your posture, how everyone should feel
about hearing your words?

and when you end,
run out
of the worst thing you could think to say

they all congratulate you on how brave
you are, and how powerful
it was

"Really?" you ask
because you are really not sure!

"Would you like one more?"

mercy

Sad suspense. We're done

our lives

A deep breath, and words plunge

like
knives

happy ending?

sometimes I find myself reading a book
that could go on forever,
to judge by the cover
and somehow I can't skip ahead to the end
'cause that would be cheating
I can't cheat, my friend
but the story keeps going
just keeps disappointing
I want to believe
that it's going to get better
if only I could peek ahead
one quick look!
and I'd know, then:
keep going
or
just
close the book.

"The Sweet One"

Sometimes you're such a bitch
but I'm not allowed to say that word
I'm not entitled to a simple curse
I think I'm going to be kept late at work
I bet I'm going to have to hear about it
do I exist compared to what you are?
I'm lucky if I ever got this far
I didn't mean to imply that it's hard
forget it all, forget it all, forget it

you're the sweet one in this
relationship
you're the bright one in this
relationship
you're the good one in this
relationship
it makes me sick, you know

it's just a pain, my heart has gone out to someone
so perfect and so deserving of one
so where were you when they were handing out them?
I guess you just must have seen me coming!
you know you'll never see me go away
you know I'm hopelessly yours for always
you know your better than the best I could get
you seem to know a lot of total bullshit,

you're the sweet one in this
relationship
you're the bright one in this
relationship
you're the good one in this
relationship
it makes me sick, you know

you've got a way with words and away with murder
I'll go so far, but you go one further
the wherewithal to make me feel worthless
you said to me that I'm your only weakness
I may be weak but at least I've got you
to point out all of the things I can't do
and all the habits I ought to run from
I look at you
I think you might have missed one

you're the sweet one in this
relationship
you're the bright one in this
relationship
you're the good one in this
relationship
it makes me sick,
you make me sick
you're the strong one in this
relationship
you're the calm one in this
relationship
I'm the wrong one in this relationship
it makes me sick, it makes me sick

you're the fine one in this
relationship
the kind one in this
relationship
you're the blind one in this
relationship
you make me sick, you know

summer's overpowering smell

the world is perfumed
it's wearing too much!
and summer comes on like a slut
like a lush
like the girl with her head cocked
at angle obscene
with a smile in synch
with her hips
as the flowers you pass
in their thickets
make promises thick
the summer comes on
like a lick of the lips
it's putting it on
thick and sweet, like a scent
summer walks in, perfumed
with intent
it's wearing
too much
it's almost
indecent

valor

I'm walking down the broad sidewalk
a little drunk
(beer festival)

I'm sure that I could launch myself
into the air
a somersault!
(with running start)

perform a stunt
tuck head right under
land, and roll
back up, to

feet!

in perfect form

but I would rather be

discreet.

forked tongue

the tip of my tongue
is of two minds
and I'm dying
and trying to spit this out,

but the tip of my tongue is torn
between

what I know I should say, so clear
and clean - and the benefit
of what seems to be
in doubt

I can do

I can do better than that. There isn't much I
can't do better than. Put it in a hat
at random, I

will draw forth the winning ticket, and
read off a completely different number
and that will be what fact stands on. I

can't help but determine for myself
the course the fates of others take -
a game to me, but not one I play

eyes closed

book open

finger on page

Man.

Man. To read some of my poetry? Wow.

You'd think I was pretty fucked up.

I mean, don't get me wrong! I love those poems.

I'm always fucked where poetry goes, because so many people

put poetry forward one way only: into a dark teak
cushioned box with kneelers, and a miniature
pew: a confessional. But fuck that!

I was born Catholic.

Why do I need?


Poem-wise,


I'd be a novelist.

and of course that means
it's all true.

Straight from the Marketing Department.

deadbolt

there's an extra step I have to take
to keep you out
forever
fate

the key slips in to do the job
I didn't even lock the knob

summer notice

only a week removed from solstice
these days darken slowly
the sun takes its leave
like a surly tenant

the night, grim landlord
has long since given notice
but still this bright-faced bum
drags his slow heels down the sky
to horizon's front door, under twilight's
watchful
eye

wish wish wish

I'm wishing for you for no reason
I wish we could talk -
I've got nothing to say!

Except all the things
that will spring to my mind
in the moment your voice
leads my focus astray

as you lead me to look
up to cosmic designs
'til the future decides
to give in to today
as you lead me to look
down to where our paths wind
branching tangents
from way, on
to way

on our way

will you please

Everything you ever gave to me
is ready to be sent back.
Packed, boxed and bagged,
it's in the driveway by the curb
of my heart's garage. Kind of a
dumb move on my part. I've
blocked in my car.

My heart's car, I mean. My heart's
car is sweet - one sweet ride,
a classic! A "muscle car" -
that American classic style.
They don't make them like
that anymore. You should hear
this baby purr. It's all revved up,
fueled up and ready to go!

Will you please come get your shit.

like ants

towering clouds
look down on us like ants

like enormous ants

like gigantic, fluffy white ants
trooping in huge, loose,
disorganized formation
towards some unimaginable anthill

burrowed

deep into moist
blue depths

divinations

things break, and birds
carry off strands and pieces
in beaks, to build nests with
each shiny thread
woven into an interpretable pattern
decorated with shards

clouds burst
they are not crying
that's jism

eww

unfortunate metaphors
are run with

the earth is doused
with heaven's rich seed
as the grasses sprout
and the fruits grow
wild, and beasts feed -
fattening
the world's continual harvest
some pagan excuse for a carnival in the making

hey,

let's you and I lay back
and make our own excuses to the stars
why our destinies are not
lining up with, living up to
the signs laid out

this fate is ours

new horizons

Suddenly the world
has expanded its horizons, no
not "its" - "mine." My eyes
have been widened. The world
has not changed its shape, has not
stretched farther than yesterday, than what
was already there - I just didn't see it.
Too short, or maybe
my eyes were not looking far enough
up? Or the visibility changed. Crystal blue
clarity, for a million miles of sunlit
distance.

When I shrink,
or when the humid haze returns -
will I still know the world's true shape?

An Appeal to The Reader,

To the Reader,

Poem,
poem,
poem!
Poem!

Somebody said: make a poem, make it rhyme
I was like: "I can do that one time!"
then I lost interest.

I mean, it seemed a little bit juvenile, the way
the poem in question was progressing. Too sing-
song, too chant, too children's tv program host
sucka emcee, or

something.

I guess I got suddenly stuck-up.
Pretentious
I said:

try it this way! "Free"

unmetered,

and with the consequent heft of significance.

But who was I kidding? Not the reader!

The reader is inured to such tricks. The reader
has turned green from being jaded, has seen
free verse poems vomited forth like so many
rushing rapids, falling and crashing like so many
niagras, plummeting floods of unstructured words
into so many metaphorical buckets, and

Well,

once the process of composition is complete,
once the urge
to create poetry has been purged
in the act of its creation - does anyone imagine
the reader who really wants to revisit the product
of that process?

What is the thing that would draw them there?
Is there beauty there? - meaning, there? Or just
so much revolt against a norm?

a "norm"
that's fallen so far off the norm,
you barely even
see it anymore.

A norm that in itself
is so laughably remote, so obsolete
- so beaten and weak,
and bled - is there any envelope there
left to push at this point? Poetry.

All I see
is rips of paper, striped in places
with old, dried licks
of glue.

Nothing there that needs to be confronted, or opposed
at this late date,
surely?

Poetry
is for suckers.
You people reading this?
Suckers! The form doesn't exist.
It's been refined by being defiled, defined
right out of the dictionary. And we poets,

Well,

we can't really say
how we feel about poetry anymore, can we?
We don't
want to step on each other's toes
do we? And be called out! Forced to justify
our own - that's the last thing we want!
To say what's what, to have to make a case for Great,
in a world where Who Can Even Say What's "good"?
is the definitive mantra of the age; the challenge,
the dogma, the battle cry of
artistic integrity. An art critical theory
of who are you to criticize? The cat got your tongue? My
tongue. Our tongue. Lapping at it, like

a bunch of pussies.

all of us

the broken note

your song
goes

off

slid
skipped
a slipped,
horrific instant -
one second of squall, in
an aria of smooth, hard glissando
like a swooping modern sculpture
of blown glass -

- crack'd,

and
fall.

hard like the world

what you said was hard
like the world
but dead accurate, and
honest. True

I know you are my friend
first. You will give me straight
truth, straight. If truth is hard,
you won't put a glove on it.

And the world is hard. I just wish
there were ways for you and me
together

to create a softer place

whassup, wretches!

the word "wretched"
seems weird, to modern ears -
we do not see ourselves so.
"wretched"
no,
we don't look around
ourselves, raise our eyes to see:
the streets thronged with wretches,
wretching their wretched ways
through the wretched maze
of their wretched days.

oh amazing grace,
that saved a wretch like me

it used to be
that pretty much everybody was a wretch
or at least,

admitted to being wretched

we once have lost our wretchedness
but we need a new word
for what we've found