Prayers

please forgive this prayer,
I've made many oaths, and
I'm just so lost; out there;

but it goes like this,
the air conditioner hums,
I can't tell what's going 
on outside,

it could all be over, just as
easily over as still going,

I didn't look up at the clouds today,
often I forget they're there,

if I died right now
what would I remember?

nothing--

Bless those faces I've seen,
they carry with them the sadness
inherent in existence, and

I was made to write it down.

Ben's Next

today on the train
Jack was conjuring
the Dragon boat
in lost journals written
1956-57,

at U Street the civil
war was raging still,
tho in bronze cold form
and running before the
Gettysburg Address,

we stopped at
Ben's next door,
there was this guy in there
who couldn't sit,
didn't want to, he was up
following the waitresses,
ordering some Stella Artois,
"Daaaaaamn, this Stella is
goooo-ood!" he let the bartender know
as she attempted to slink away,
he was full of fucking energy,
walking table to table and inbetween,
taking in the scene in which
he was the spectacle,

I felt bad for his kids,
huddled up together
eating their wings,
ignoring their dad trying to
fuck, showing off, dancing
by himself,

when he slowed down
they paid for the food,
got up silently and left,
I watched them pass
Sportscenter and tried not to look.

Can't understand

when in the drowsy hours
you speak to me in tongues
I can't understand,
is when I realize we must
be doing this for a reason,
to get to some end, or
to prove something lost,
and you wait patiently for me to answer
in huffy silence until you recall that I can't
speak a bit of mandarin
and you laugh, a sweet,
funny kinda laugh before
you fall asleep and forget.

Peasant Bread

Fresh bread, whole
house smells like the
hearth and what's missing
most of the time.

I made sure I was
wearing Lenin's shirt
when I poured my coffee,
when i tore off the first
piece, the steam burnt
my finger tips in the
air like the steppe,

I blessed it
and prayed over it,
saw a vision in its
austerity, it was pure
and smiling,

I chewed and
swallowed with my eyes
closed, washed it down
with bitter blackness,
unsweetened,

I knelt down too,
in the kitchen that
was like a hall that was
in many buildings anywhere
to finish this song

Put up the signs

Got up at 7:30 to
hit some estate sale
in the 99 degree hell
that was outside waiting
for us, all the power
out at Medical Center
so no fucking street lights
on Rockville Pike
and for that matter no
sidewalks either,
we had to check both
ways and book it,
our destination was on foot
and a half hour away,

the cars were confused
the trees were down
the glass was broken
the lights were dark
the storm was past,
the TV's were out,

I squinted into the sweat and emptiness of
wherever it was we were in
the homogenized suburbia of
Maryland
only to find that it wasn't an
estate sale at all, just a yard sale
with fantastic marketing.

Bathroom Break

Everyday the same fuckers in
the bathroom, washing their hands,
brushing their fucking teeth, afraid
to catch eye contact in the mirror
because then they might have to
admit that there's other men out there
that piss and freshen up, remembering
to flush when they fart (out of
embarrassment), waiting for you
to leave before they shit, (embarrassment too)
ignoring the cleaning guy cause he's just
some poor Mexican and they fuck
enough poor Mexicans in the ass
long distance that they're dried out by the
time they see one in person,
everyday I watch these assholes and I glare
into the mirrors waiting to catch them
so I can give them a half smile, the kind
that says "I know you,"
the kind that says, "I know you and
I hate you."

Just before dreaming

You gotta cut that underwear
so it fits, or like, at least slash at
the seams holding tightly
onto those legs where we
all get to watch,
and
in that vision purity is
a pool above the mind dripping
deep cool water from out the night,

a car backs up,
no, a truck,
I hear the beep-eep-eep--
It's far away

what matters?--
too often it's nothing,

If you're still struggling
baby,
I'd suggest you just take them off

None of the Dharma

Everybody walks on water,
is messiah, is god,
is endless endless nothing
reaching backward through time,
everybody is falling apart
falling down, getting back up
splitting their head in worry,
in frustration, pounding the wall,
the wall is almost nothing,
is a sentimental thing, is a lie
perceived into existence,
everybody is prescient on the stand,
above the stars, at one with the chaos
tearing the universe into tiny little
shreds, of paper, of harmony,
tossing them into the
air, waiting to catch the remnants
that are drops of blind divinity,
that flow like the water
we all walk to in the end.

Old Joe, new nights death and jumping

"What if I just dove off this balcony?"
He said,
"You'd be dead, " I answered.

He was standing in the doorway
drowsily, old Joe drunk, sorrowful,
lamenting, that layer of phony happiness
and smiles torn away by scotch and
beer, we were bare-chested, bastards, fuck-ups
in the summer's heat, the party in shadows behind us,

"I'd rather jump off the Whitman,"
I told him, and truthfully told him,
"Yeah," He mulled it over sloppily,
"The Franklin seems too popular,
everybody is jumping off there, you can't
just walk up on the Whitman, that's determination,
if you did it you'd have to stop traffic, even swerve
your car into both lanes and jump out,
run over the hoods of cars,
climb up to the edge and just go,
and when you're floating between the
bridge and the water, with your arms
outstretched like this, forcing all those
idiots to confront the end, mothers
holding their hands over their children's eyes,
that's when you're truly, finally free, that
moment is it, the only time it's
possible to escape this...this shit.
I'd like to walk the Appalachian Trail,"
He finished.

"And when we do finish," I figured,
"We fucking jump off the Brooklyn Bridge."

"Yeah! And we keep detailed notes, and
take our poetry with us, send it all, send
everything out the day we jump, to
publishers, media, everybody."

"Man, if we did that," I said musing
over my empty beer, watching his
dulled eyes, "We'd
be read man."

"We'd be dead," He was reeling
in this thought, the possibility.

"Yeah, but we'd be read," I repeated
and we smiled at each other through
the years and the trust and the pact,
through the meaningless nights and sounds.

Alone at the Beach, I prayed it was enough

In the journal of my soul there are cliffs and girls, and other such things that bring us down, to earth or stars, or some other place. I prefer to write it out in staggered lines known only to me. I was alone on the beach, sun coming up and then up, watching over. I took my hat off and sighed. Placed it on my towel, the only one I owned, now down beside me in the sand. I was the only person, I was the only living thing in sight. My glasses began to tint in the new born light. I removed them too, placed beside the rest. I took one great big breath of God and jumped into the morning waves. Salt and force shoved back at me. I launched myself without fear or embarrassment. I tasted the sky, alive about me, the ocean, churning beneath, the day, brave and innocent. I let out a single chilled bellow, it was all the love I had to give to the Earth.

Two Punks

Two Mexican punks
at the corner of Baltimore
& the Best Western Travelers Center
walk off into the past
without phones or music or time;
Irrelevant musings at the 
fire hydrant and spiked vests
blur silent conversations as
the bus they escaped lumbers
by, forcing them into heaven
or oblivion, unto heaven
and oblivion, maybe? Or shit,
maybe they huddled close
experiencing that copy scene,
that cyclical memory,
those black, white, silver shining
unnecessary spectres 
of Philadelphia
of New York
of gray east coasts
of Nowhere 

and the world as a frayed stem
continues to hang, shit, fuck, piss, spit, yawn
ball and turn
without misery

Go Go Go

New Jersey lies

foggy and mysterious

across the blue mighty

Delaware this afternoon,

like some foreign land

of Avalon beyond the shore--

trees are greener today, lush

with warm breezes,

water as clear as the 

sky and tumbling out of heaven,

my bus is nearly empty 

and the great road groans,

crashes, moans, and gapes

south,

I follow it along

going going going

non-stop

Southern metro cookin'

They had us in a fish fry
like sardines sweating those
remaining hours away before
a hand grabs and pulls them
toward God, like the can with
the curled up top that looks like
some satanic soda pop,
and the girls were grinding their
teeth all smiles, a group sang happy
birthday outside Arlington cemetary
which I found kinda funny
in way, I guessed for all the oil lost
and we boiled crispy and golden
until we hit the end of the line
which was just two slices
of white bread and a side of slaw
away from the Pentagon.

Angles

Tonight I read a poem aloud
on the balcony alone, without
pens or papers or pencils or whatever,
I spoke it out loud once without repeating
to make sure I wouldn't remember it
when I got back inside,

When I got back inside it was dark,
I watched the cum slide like beads
into the toilet drain, congealed into
balls and rolling toward the abyss,  
I was up on one knee like the coach tells you
to stay when you huddle up in pee-wee
football until I flushed it all away,

I thought about metaphors
and Superman right then, thought maybe I would
call Will back, he'd rung while I was outside,
instead I took a sip of milk and played with
the brightness display on the monitor,
I tried to find a metaphor in that
and when I found one I liked
I went to bed.

The Statue

My beard grew grey and bitter
Waiting for you to get going
but you just sat there
immovable like a stern Buddha
saying nothing at all.

I stared really hard in every direction
tho you were directionless,
offering you a sign,

The wind whipped around
and you'd raise your head and give
me one great laugh, blinking
triumphantly into the void.
No kidding. I was there. Think about it.

I loved those Saturday mornings
and the kids playing baseball and the
red salamanders losing their tails,
and the statue of you they built
at the center on the grounds where
you sat smirking, smirking at the passersby
and the goings-on, smirking like
a real son of a bitch,

I knew it all back then, that you'd
never get outta there, and
that's why when somebody
goes, "Yeah he's still there,
believe me," I believe them, and
I smirk and laugh too,
as hard as I can, and say,
in my most stern voice,
"Well fuck you too, you son of a
bitch."

The Balm

Fuck, I'm dying from the taste of
banana/berry,
anybody can talk about Bukowski
talk about truth,
talk about fucking,
but banana/berry?

go ahead and say Hem
was your biggest influence
who gives a shit
he should be, really
think about it,
unlike banana/berry,
which doesn't think or
feel, just exists to torment--

I can't get this viscous,
vicious balm out of my
mouth or my thoughts,
even as your sleeping body
breathes in rhythm with the
tires crunching pavement outside;
I'm helpless--

and the world goes home to lonely
darkened halls and paranoid fears;
anybody can vomit some words
onto a page, for their own
self-serving needs, read
Blake swinging empty bottles at shy stars,
screaming of visions, moaning
into the face of it, groaning,
blithering, swallowing
banana/berry
but it talks an idiot to want to write about it

Days too, always go by without saying

So we dance again today,
eh?
On casual fridays in the
brown lights of the underground
no less,
You've found your book
I see, better reading than yesterday?
No? Well,
the tin foil you crumble
should block out the soundwave-airwave-
smart phone-imbalance, Watch!
Or it'll crawl off the table!
Watch! As we loose our lunch to the
compost machine blabbing-always-
blabbing-effortlessly blabbing-
blabbing-mockingly blabbing-
Wait!
What idiot tome do you suffer
over?
What fools do you read?
What jeans are honestly blue?
Oh.

Open up

you should turn
and face me so I can
glimpse up that skirt
instead of at its profile,
honey, it's useless to
play on that phone
way down here,
and there ain't time
enough to read,
'else
I tear the page out
to laminate it for ya,
it's just...you know?
it's just you
and the lunch room lights, so
Open up. See? Open up.
we can't all be poets
ruminating on old hearts
& fresh scratches,
throwing our fabrics to the wind
some of us gotta
suck it up an'
make a buck to live.

This is the first line of a novel

I've told so many lies in
my life, I'm not sure how this
should go,

I remember Hoffman park
with its old green
bridge that seemed taller
than anything I could think of,
it was worlds away and I never
dreamed anyone could reach
its tracks or know where in
some magically dark world it
traveled,

There were those large cement tunnel
pieces outside the picnic gazebo
strewn about and like Franklin's snake
scattered but whole,

There was something of another
time about them, something old, like the gods of
our forgotten imaginings dropped them there
to wait for us and I could stand inside
without touching my head,
they were so incredibly big! I remember my
Father would chase me, how he could
block each end no matter which
I tried and he would grab me
and yank me out,
I could never get away

until I found out where the tracks led
and I rode them everyday to
gray, worrisome destinations
and guess what, they painted those
pipes green now,
they're so small and sad
sitting solemnly amid the cigarette butts
and broken glass of 20 years,

I looked the park up on
a map yesterday, it was a green square
and there were no pipes and
no children,

tho I still think of it sometimes
in the loneliness of night
and I wonder if maybe my father does too

untitled

O! fall from brick-fired sky
and soak the earth,

I've waited with sleeves rolled
all day for relief, and
tonight barefoot, I watched pure
earth and darkness in
lingering humid solidity,

I felt it bite at my arms and rest there,
a heavy contraption plummeting steadily,
as one form, as an image obscured by metal and concrete,

from above,
the rain
and below,
the rain--

O! Drowned America,
wandering unaware,
virtuous, plain, penitential, Ah--

I watched the world flushed
away before the night,

I followed it swiftly.

IN dreams i'm MAD, have VISIONS

Once I wrote it all out, tho
you won't believe me,
it was splattered on my floor
in rich, vibrant colors and non-colors,
non-existent breaths and streaks of sky,
I stepped around the letters
each morning when I awoke
from heavy sleeps with hair
tangled about my sweaty face,
everything was there, all we wished to say,
it was perfect, beautiful, a world unto itself,
the etching, the care, each curve and straight line
of it a truth much like death unavoidable, each fucking
lettered space unbelievably serene, I'll tell you
I kept each thought in pristine condition,
never dropped a sandwich crumb,
and it was hard, and it weighed on me
until I forgot
and I scuffed it, until I hated those old gashes and
lovely curls, that truth I'd seen enough of,
I spit on it this morning, in the cool
light with the toilet running,
I wrote your name on the walls.

There's too much paper left

three months since I finished
the last draft of that novel, that
first novel, and I can't really get
anything else going at all,
long, tremulous hours of writing
and deleting--
all I've managed...

a few measly pages
a few hundred words

I fear I may not have
enough blood left inside me
to stain a page

Whit haiku to carry in your pockets

Sleeping cat
open your eyes
see the gray rugged morning

Where were you kitten?
six years ago lost
when mother left you alone

There's no food
you check anyway
licking the empty bowl

my finger struck your nails
blood rose to surface
you were afraid but smiled

without a clock
you mewed for morning
until I rolled from bed

on the table sprawled
we watch the streets
with different memories

Scar down your nose
a white furry schism
between sad orange eyes

rumble of cars on street
an old obstacle ignored
your upturned sleeping belly

in your thick coat
I see the sad alleyways
rainy nights of the past

Notes

A photograph of me throwing a couch cushion.

Jamie on the floor, a rolling, uneasiness in his eyes. He smirks, hesitates, glances at the floor, smirks again, drunkenly teetering.

Tommy is an elemental, a conjurer of this whole deal. A giant tossing glory like it was a thing you could grab and crush or vomit out of you at will. He is a breaker of walls.

Steve is in his glory digging it all, engrossed, grinning, gunning for the girl, or her clothes. He looks at me with wide eyes bearing his teeth, his soul. I love it.

I'm a ghoul exiting that plastic image carrying a stick torn from an alley and a tree.

Vitaly is everywhere, nowhere, appearing, disappearing, nodding. He gently rests his thoughts on the hardwood floors. He has a god out there. He dodges it.

Eternity dodges too.

Joe's on the couch, somber, assuming this is how it's all supposed to go, trying to disapprove. He can't though. He's had a beer. His arm is around the girl covering her face. Forget about her.

There is time. I've counted it and kicked it off the curbs,

I've squandered it on that Hurricane.

I dare you to

Try to act somewhat
surprised or happy even
when you escape that building
with its fucking marble water fountains
and labyrinthine hallways that
lead you in circles for an hour
around the same 10 rooms
that remind you of your old "new"
high school, the one that'd make
Bentham jealous and Foucault shit.

Try to make it out of
there with your soul
intact.

I swear.

A song of leaves and crying

Whit:

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p[;'['

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These are the things my cat types to me while I'm away

Promise Bop

That guitar would be
meaningless without
her voice,

I write that down
checking behind my back,
see, I prefer to write in secret

and I'll hide
that note in my pockets
forever, or

until it crumples into obscurity
on the next laundry day

because it isn't supposed to rain
for the next few weeks

Limp

The ladies in the cafeteria
jabber on in Japanese eating with
chopsticks and the hallways are filled
with languages I can't even discern
there's so many speakers and voices
and all of them are helping to rape
some country that they're probably from
or maybe they've reserved their witless wrath
for some peasant or pilgrim or refugee
they'll never glimpse but to pity them
on National Geographic pornography
and they're all uncle toms
or hypocrites or bleeders and probably
accountants too
fucking everything up.

Adoption

his blood, bright red and new,
dripped onto the soft
lambs wool bed leaving
stains like miniature brush strokes,

from his trembling eye,
I saw the wound, a sad gash
on the pupil unnoticed,
he lay still, unmovable, stoic,
content in that silent pain,

I called a women walking by,
told her about the injury, the blood,
the urgency, she thanked me
and ran to help,

I watched her for
as long as I could, then headed
for the exit
to buy cat food and litter.

Celebrate

Under the crystal blue sky
with a chair back
as loin cloth I take my
leap off the curb and into
rush hour traffic, the
cops are gone, tired of
wasting their fleeting hours
sitting at the corner
of Broad and Ritner,
I'm running to the opposite
side with a hockey stick in
hand, I'm conjuring the ghosts
of the past, the little time I've got left.