Twin rivers of sweat
trickling from my armpits,
tickling down my sides
and a quaver in my voice,
dying for a cigarette,
a script, a wish, or that
I’d rehearsed more.
Archive for November, 1993
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For Dawn
Posted: November 24, 1993 in PoetryTags: Bed, Blanket, Blue, Dawn, Eye, Kiss, Love, Shoes, Sky, Smile
I know I could live
without you here,
but it wouldn’t be something
I’d choose.
My bed is empty;
I’m tired and lonely,
my blankets worn
like the soles of shoes.
I miss you madly,
your cotton kisses,
your blushing smile,
and sea-blue eyes.
Only when you
return to love me
will I enjoy these blue skies.
Spare Tires and Empty Alleys
Posted: November 17, 1993 in PoetryTags: Angel, Blood, Car, God, Life, Point Loma, Smoke, Snake, Sword, Time, Trash
I used to roll spare tires
down alleys in Point Loma
to see how many streets they’d cross
before stopping:
against a trash can or a moving car,
a cinderblock wall or a pile of dirt.
Stupid things is what I thought.
Why’d they stop there; it could have kept going
after that.
Steering.
I’m rolling and I steer myself short all of the time
and it’s coming; I can feel it singing and surging to life
in a tide, a god, an angel looking for a sharp sword
in his tongue,
fiery-eyed and furious,
smoking and snake-bitten.
But I can’t be touched by the fire I create –
burning myself won’t work anymore
– there is nothing left to burn but everything else
and it is to be smelted into my sword,
my pen, my tongue, my eyes,
my breath, my words,
my blood, my thoughts.
The Cataclysm of the Mirror
Posted: November 17, 1993 in PoetryTags: Angel, Anger, Beast, Believe, Bird, Blood, Cigarette, Fire, Fly, Glasses, Godzilla, Hope, Lightning, Magic, Mirror, Vomit
I’m looking at myself
in the mirror and wondering
who the fuck I am –
wire-rim glasses, two day old growth of beard;
cigarette dangling from my lower lip.
FUCKING POETRY – I’ve been gone so long,
writing to myself, watching
my pen bleed from word to word
across the page,
tasting every letter,
thinking every penstroke: the speed of poetry.
And fuck it if it’s not – it’s mine:
my thoughts, my wisdom, my reminders, and my beliefs.
Soon, the anger manifests in obscenity
and thinking of destruction and Godzilla,
not caring, not feeling anything but
pinpricks in my feet from stepping on rooftop antennae.
Flying like a bird, a beast, a leap
from a cliff, to die, to live, to believe
in myself and my vomit, my eyes,
my power to change myself, thus the world.
My wildfire magick of angels and cataclysm,
comedy, tragedy, hope, lightning flying
from fingertips and pen nibs.
It’s all the beauty of the plumbing behind the sink.
A Private Poem for Me
Posted: November 17, 1993 in PoetryTags: Beautiful, D&D, Eye, Fears, Froggacuda, Imagination, lilypad, Lovecraft, Memory, Soul, Swamp, Tears, Teeth, Trees
Sometimes it’s hard to find myself,
camouflaged and hunting fears by
hiding underneath the lilypads.
Like fear is going to to assassinate the Froggacuda?
But the memory is that if that is what it is:
a feeling lost and sunk in the swamp it was born in;
a beautiful first and last of its kind,
bred from books and desires and pirate gold,
from lost helium balloons and forts under acacia trees.
The Froggacuda is nothing without
one poet of keen eyes and quick hands,
a child catching frogs in the bog alone near dark
with a flashlight and an overactive imagination
full of Dungeons and Dragons books and Lovecraft stories.
Nothing is the Froggacuda without the puppeteer
who makes the teeth snap shut
and the eyes roll,
the ears perk up and the lungs breathe.
But nothing is the puppet-master without
those teeth, eyes, ears, and lungs
beating, breathing
in his self-esteem, his soul.
Alone on a rock
at the sunset’s death,
I sit with a paper airplane,
waiting to throw it away;
an edge of a cliff,
folded paper and a hope,
both wishes for things to last;
a long flight or
a short plummeting fall;
either we go on
or we don’t
and I’m waiting for the sun
to go on
or I won’t.
Playing Hardball
Posted: November 14, 1993 in PoetryTags: Cry, Eye, Rain, Salt, Shoes, Sound, Tears
The tears come hard and fast
mimicking the sound
of the sheets of rain
blowing over the cab of my truck.
They pool in my lap
and get cold running down
my legs, in my shoes,
cheeks caked with salt
from the crying,
wind chasing tears
from the corners of my
eyesockets.
And all I can do
is keep my head in my hands
and ask: why?
why?
why?
Patience is a Hard Virtue to Come By These Days
Posted: November 14, 1993 in PoetryTags: Drug, Eye, Happy, Patience, Tears
Patience is a hard
virtue to come by these days;
in many ways I thought
I had it down,
downtown, thinking I’m the clown
that, no tears in my eyes,
I’d surprise somebody
with the everything that I am,
a quick little flim-flam
and she’d be happy and high as a kite,
for everyone advertises
as the right guy (nice try)
but I am the drug that only I can supply,
and I love to treat
you like you ought to be treated,
in my eyes
and it’s not that difficult
in this day and age of phone-fuck romance
some people should take the chance.
Santa Claus
Posted: November 10, 1993 in PoetryTags: Alcohol, Child, Devil, Dreams, Imagination, Knife, Magic, Night, Promise, Road, Santa Claus, Sleep, Song, Wine, Women
Between the Devil and the deep blue sea
there is me and a bottle of Smirnoff™ Vodka
destined to drown me in Davy Jones’ Locker.
The pursuit of happiness, wine, women, and song
goes on like the road that never ends, so long
that it sends itself laughing away ‘till you’re lost
lonely and livid at the stupid kid
that let himself grow up into this;
I learned to eat, sleep, work hard, and miss
being young, strong, and full of inspiration,
dreams, songs, and wise magickal imaginations.
My thoughts were real, my dreams weren’t fantastic.
They were attainable goals – feats of magick.
People had done it and I was going to do it,
going under, ‘round, over, or right through it.
Twenty-two and going under in a different way;
the ocean is grey and the Devil is calling –
bastard chased me through nightmares
every night of my life and the knives
that I cut with shine bright like a promise
that I have chosen unwisely; I’m falling.
Surprising? Dreams don’t come true
and you can trace the cause back to
when you stopped believing in Santa Claus.
Untitled Poem #173
Posted: November 9, 1993 in PoetryTags: Dark, Fear, God, Heart, Scorpion, Untitled
sometimes I finger the scars on my heart
in the dark, all alone,
rough ribbons of hardened tissue;
they are braille lines of poetry;
railroad tracks to remind me of my innermost fears.
They feel almost skeletal,
and read like the scriptures of God,
and sting like the scorpions of God.
Meatgrinder (Version 1)
Posted: November 9, 1993 in PoetryTags: MC Honky, Pus, Song, Tempest, Zero Boy
I get wicked like the wickedest man alive.
I stick your head in my window, roll it up and I drive
your ass around your own block so y’all know:
I’ll stick your face to the wall like a gecko, huh.
You always try to come off like your hard, son,
but every rhyme that you write’s like your first one.
I never want to upset you, but I know that I do,
because I can’t help but point out what I know is true:
you can’t rhyme, can’t wrestle and it’s nonsense;
you think you’re hitting hard? You’re not making dents.
What the fuck is that? That’s your fucking track?
I’ll put it in my pocket as the definition of wack.
You’re so high, G – you’re played out, see –
I never fret backstabbers like you, ain’t that right, B.
You think that you would look as good as I do? Huh.
I think a Doberman or two would suit you and your crew
of sell-out suckers who are lying through their teeth, not rappin’.
You say you’re from Compton but you grew up in Cleveland.
Listen to Cube and chikkity-check yourself
because my foot in your ass ain’t good for your health.
And I’m just waiting to hear you say that talk is cheap,
‘cause then I feel good about cappin’ your ass, creep.
You don’t want to feel humiliated? Get the fuck out,
because I’m the fucker that your parents warned you about, huh.
I’ll cut off your motherfucking hands if you touch me.
I can’t stand the man who’s gangbanging to fuck me
like I was ever looking to be taken.
Move over bacon, ‘cause you ain’t moneymaking.
You’re not honest with the shit that you talk about.
You walk around in the streets, thinking you got clout,
but you lie, and we all know motherfucker
you call your girlfriend a ho, ignoring her at a show.
I don’t say I’m from the ghetto ‘cause I’m not from there.
You’re formatted for pop and it’s sad that you don’t care.
As long as you’re a gangster, a hustler, a pimp
mack daddy loc biscuit-eating knucklehead shrimp.
I know my boy Brian, and he’s honest as fuck;
you should be on a game show ‘cause you’re pressing your luck.
You should be doing time – there’s no soul in your beats,
you should go into politics because you lie through your teeth.
Now I’m a scandal vandal man with my hands – they’re slamming
and your rinkity-dinkity jam falls short ‘cause you’re shamming.
I might wobble like a weeble with my sleeves full of tricks,
but your track couldn’t hack it even with a remix.
I’m carefree like an angel, not a package of gum, see,
and you can chew on this because I know that you’ll bite me.
It can be tough to get respect from turkeys like you,
but you trudge me, begrudge me because you know I’m true.
One more poem
before I drown into sleep,
filled like a shopping cart
full of food to cook
and eat and explore
with dreams of
department stores.
A Poem on a Note on the Fridge
Posted: November 6, 1993 in PoetryTags: Beach, Cat, Child, Joy, Love, Sand
I forget the joy of writing
then reading what I’ve written,
curling like a kitten play-fighting
with the same gentle hands
that stroke poems from the sand
of the beaches that I walk on
when I haven’t forgotten
that I love to be alone sometimes
with my simple childish rhymes.
This inexplicable heaviness of my heart
comes when it understands
and the remainder of me doesn’t;
yet it holds the responsibility,
and everything else must follow.
For Galstephus the Mage
Posted: November 6, 1993 in PoetryTags: Alex Kohrt, Dream, Eye, King, Lord, Mind, Music, Power, Wind, World
You dream like a king
on a throne;
you are not like the serfs
and servants of this existence.
This world doesn’t want kings and heroes;
rather, normalcy is enshrined
and page homage to with certificates of merit.
You are a nobleman
and your heritage is not acknowledged –
there is no room for the likes of you
among the jaded and the complacent;
these powers wear blinders purposefully
to destroy the talents
that could change their status quo,
that could threaten their idols of stability.
These same closed eyes cannot envision
the wondrous sights you see;
they cannot hear what runs through your mind,
the musical scales of rivers and windstorms;
they cannot feel anything anymore,
walled into courtyards, shut out from the street,
unmoving –
they cannot even dream on their thrones
where you, my lord,
belong.
Wading Through the Cattails
Posted: November 6, 1993 in PoetryTags: Car, Cat, Child, Dark, Dream, Frog, Girl, Gold, Happy, Imagination, lilypad, Love, Memories, Money, Moon, Night, Platinum, Sex, White, Wife
I went to find my childhood
buried in the morass of my memory;
discarded in a moment of adolescence
trying to be an adult
before I knew what that was about.
So me and a shovel and a dream
go wading through the cattails and the frogs,
looking under lilypads and scouring the undersides of logs;
hopes waxing and waning with the flux of a dark moon
laying with my arms behind my head
in a dark room.
There was a little gold-gilded crown
once made of paper. . .
I thought I had drowned my youth
in a premature effort to be a man,
coated with cars, money, girls, sex, and truth,
white picket fences and two and one half kids,
a loving wife and instant happiness.
Ah, but so many can’t and so many others won’t
dig up the countryside grave of their little one,
content to weep and dream with a withered imagination,
or they chase ghosts of happiness in platinum nightdresses
taped to the part of the elephant they can still feel.
Four Hours, Thirty-six Chances
Posted: November 6, 1993 in PoetryTags: CCS, Courage, Fears, Orange, Stars, Tears, UCSB, Wink
I spent four hours
reading and rereading
these private journals
of people who I do know,
I don’t know;
and then, done,
I wept,
looking up at my orange lit ceiling
(I still can’t stand white light)
and my room smiled at my tears –
refracting them into stars and faces
– wiping them out into galaxies
and creating fantastic places
without my normal, everyday fears
where I felt wise and understanding;
understood, undemanding;
freely given, thirty-six chances
to let them know they are my stars
and they are all shining
for living and not dying;
the wink while I waver,
and when they waver,
I am so proud that I
have the courage
to wink.
[for my Zen colloquium Fall 1993, CCS, UCSB]
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