as long as it looks nice

there
are
times
when
all that
matters
is the
shape
and
look
and
feel
of a
poem,
Ill
jus
t stare
at it
ignor
ing
the
words,
bastard
doesnt
have to
say
shit
about
shit
anything
at all
and
its
fine
with
me
as
long
as
it
looks
nice

Finger Prints

I left the prints
somewhere in gusty winds
New Mexico
they're a hand me down
alright
regardless of how I
care to look at it,
they weren't my original
thought--I
     wouldn't have had a
notebook big enough
     to fit all that
THOUGHT
                   in it--
without running
low on lines
electrolyte pages
universal spiritual
economy
isn't doing well enough
to fight the alcohol/gasoline
cartel/horde,
     all my m$n$y & miles
surely the want ads
     will be enough
I paid by the AI ink blot
     I followed the
technological stratagem,
     stocked my head full
on them rules (I can recite'em)
     they're in the mail
right now, queued to my
address--directed to my brain
     injected into my healthily
diseased veins.

Behind the Counter

Corrode the middleman
corresponding to the cool
railroad ties of the present
indigestion, Same has his boys
waiting on the game, it's so loud,
thinking is harder than usual
impossible like usual,
sparkling hydroplane realities
continue as per the cost
per hour $25/to retire,
up to the equation
on the following line
Oh, my heart skips a beat
the radio rewinds
tortuously back-to-back
back to office report in
failure is on the horizon,
sandwiched between opposing
universes, and the grand stand
gold glowing speaker speakering
speaker cells for the fools to mount
the culling stead
TRAVEL ON THE BRAIN WAVES
FUCKING dark CORNERS
unbelievable -- irreversible 
climbing backwards on only 
GOLDEN tether
Last map of last purity
milky way galaxy galazy
we've knot yet scorched
wantonly,
a finger taps a table
with a mouth got
something to say
unheard over the mulling
rolling mouths of untalk
unthought pulsing earless
wurlds--through the galactic
windzzz--
She can't listen, tho,
kno, Sam can't hear,
it's a set up, get up,
get out now,
ANY WAY YA KEN,
I'm straight-jacketed,
won't return, can't remain
an almost familiar lost sound
on forgotten wind--

Stay for Dinner

the rain came down
on our pink umbrella
meaningusehelp-less
your sandals acting like
shovels, my shoes like
buckets, runoff flood-like
snake-like rivers and no
time for us to maneuver
just splash right through,
dark heavy coalblue sky
and your laughter and
my arm around your waist,
storm lasted the walk,
elevator ride, our kiss
goodnight and let up
shortly after I walked into
my room with one last
flash of goldwhitechrome
across the heavens.

Complications

I perceive my brain
like a broken stick in
the games caught on the
man-made pipes that
ruin the view, breaking rapids,
bundle leaves, tall grass,
growth in shallows, on the
unnecessarily blacktopped
edges of dirt seeking roads,

I am a closet phantom in
my own, only reality,
watching strangers pass,
writing their stories in my
fixed mind/meld  molten idea factory
bereft with excuses,
why & how & when &

does it even matter?

in the cosmos ending conspiracy
window, from soaring wooden
complex space station, I'm
drowning in applewood
smoke--sifting through
the membrane notions--
     waiting on the aftereffect
trip, the endless storyboard
of forgotten iconography;
     listen little lost one,
music grates like potatoes
on the slicing block fast food
assembly line falling in my
greased pan--
     boiled first I perceive reality
coming on, inventing itself.

Currently Broadcasting

consumerist American

pop culture surveillance

entitlement shootout 

plane crash damnation spectacle 

airing on the tired bright

tubes of the television set

fantasy--drowned out by

the griddle & eggs hatching--

at my table on 23rd,

no coffee, see I'm 

dying of some cyber-ailment

and can't handle the

caffeine, luckily my mind

still beats a slow average

pace or I'd be one with

the clean-up crew--paying 

attention, tallying the score--

getting outraged--sure, we

could be better, sure, we're 

progressive Trayvon

Martin's throwing skittles 

at the system,

Cops would'a gunned the

kid down anyways, 

I couldn't have cared either

way--both brainwashed

         zombies--melodramatic

         walking dead--he

         said, he said 7:17

         on the crucifix 

it's all shit, see,

it's all getting laid,

it's all what can I get,

it's all an inescapable hive

to protest,

and you can even

purchase that,

if you care enough to,

and if you feed into 

that void

you should shut your mouth 

& take it.

there's no right of complaint

in the BDSM knowledge-law-

fate-consumption-machine,

     you're a controlled thought 

     response robot

         so

         do

       what

      you're

fucking 

        told

         &

fucking

      believe.

Searching

You were sifting through
stones and sand and sea shells
as the sun set, rosy-hued and
baby blue, over the Chesapeake
bay, you told me the water looked
like velvet, and it did in a way,
there was a tree that had tumbled
from the cliff-side, had been worn
white and smooth by gentle waves,
stationary driftwood,
green algae goo hanging
from outstretched arms,
I stood on it's aged side,
tried to see what was beyond the
orange cliffs,
you found your fossils,
four of them, a gift for
your father, brother and me,
one for yourself,
I dropped them into my
shirt pocket for safe-keeping
and you held
onto my arm as we walked
back to the house (it was
getting too dark to see), pulling
on my sleeve,
thinking about sleep.

Last Para.

A car I recognized
pulled up
to a house I recognized
on a street I
knew from long ago.

I opened the door,
tossed my
bag on the passenger side
floor and got in.

I closed the door behind me.

Yellowed

Everything is coated
in a film
yellow dust,
some areas more
than others,
desk by the window
most of all,
I feel it on my
clothes, bed,
towels, on my
skin, in my mouth,
eyes, under my finger
nails, toenails, in
each fiber of the carpet,
chairs, sprinkled in
the cup of water by my bed,
I cannot escape it,
last night I lay in bed,
wool sock over mouth
trying not to breathe,
I feel it in my lungs,
sifting, sifting, sifting,
further down, is it
killing me I wonder,
will it kill me?
I don't even know what
it is, how it is,
why it is, I used a napkin
to wipe the layers
off my typewriter case,
it seems like dirt, is it
dirt? I'm afriad to tell
anyone about it, afraid to
ask, afraid it's not really
there, I want to by sanitary
wipes, but they'll run out,
I don't have any
towels, rags, shirts, pants,
to waste, I only have
a few more days, I am
buried in it, I am
yellow, sulfur is yellow,
death is yellow, suffocation.

Raining

watched the line of
piss fall from the balcony,
thinking even with the
rain falling hard, the
stream held together
exceptionally well, if
anyone was looking
out their window it wouldn't be hard
to tell what was going
on, then a car drove underneath,
five storeys down, I pissed
on its front bumper, its hood,
its front windshield, roof, back
window, trunk, rear bumper,
people inside probably didn't even
notice what had just happened,
and pulling out onto the street, they
disappearing behind planted
trees, brick walls, and
it kept on raining, and I kept on pissing
watching to see if the car would reappear
going  north on route 1,
but it never did, so I just went on
pissing five storeys down, waiting
for another car or an umbrella,
I really really had to go.

A Tunnel of Steel Reserve

Empty Steel Reserves,
individually bagged,
lay in a slim, brick-walled
tunnel under US route 1,
along with a few cans of
Coors and a beer you wouldn't
recognize side of tall boy
reading -IDE, offering
some kind of story of
night, from the night,
before, it's raining now,
cold, hard, January rain,
last night rained even harder,
imagine those hands seeking
respite from freezing wetness
of closing hours, darkened streets,
lonely highway passages,
imagined drunkenness, sadness,
un-watched aching eyes
peering into the fluorescent
bitterness of tunnels lights,
strange, english muffin looking
dripping ceiling scratched lengthwise
bladed hand of some horrible
nightmare beast,
imagine fumes of beer,
a story to fill last hopeless hours
of the day, day gone now, fading
into memory, imagine leaning
hearts, folded, buried, wishful
of old places, better days,
imagine a story lost
to time and ignorance,
speaking sorrowfully, gladly,
maybe regretfully to me as
I avoid the rain,as I
drink in the mornings
stories.

Count the Green

Ever see a Gulf gas pump

with scrolling dials in the 

living room of an apartment?

Place smells like weed

weed weed & PBS

running un-watched

un-listened to,

white walls chipped and mildewed 

and old famous old DC punk

stories, get this one:

Guy comes home late from a party/bar/party drunk off his ass, banging on his apartment door, can't find his keys see, but this door, as it happens, isn't his door & old lady inside isn't his old lady, so she calls the cops,terrified (someone is shouting, cursing, trying to bust her door down & they show up, find him passed out on the floor, check his wallet, see he lives in same building but floor above, so they help him up and take him from say 4A to 5, rifle through his pockets for find his keys & open the door, find inside on coffee table:

Weed - 2 lbs

Money (in American $) - 15,000

Tomorrow he wakes up in stupor on couch, money gone, weed gone, and only hangover, robbery infamy.

There's a robot jellyfish painting on 

the wall above his couch now,

it's no longer 1994--

Those years are gone,

he's chilling now with 

medicaid,

healthcare, &

fucking hell, help a bum out,

why don't'cha?

I'm not at liberty to say--

He lives in an old beat highrise,

coffin elevators, maroon brick walls

everywhere, follow me?

We sit facing each other,

Jon and I--

He counts the money,

makes sure,

counts again,

deals out the green.

Pure Water

Realize the impermanence
of society--the lies of this
evolution--all this medication--
science--exists to cloud your
brain--from truth, simple truth
insanity of truth--
life is fading nothingness
within the great void--
         you are a figment of
a fevered mind--
     machinations of robot will--
school doctors books laws
governments currency work
luxuries products rent debts
      exist to tether your soul
to mundane lies--
     know truth is emptiness
     as only fools do, unafraid
to admit all your pursuits
are without meaning
     cast-off the ego & seek
     essential truth/mind
Remember beginning-less time
     cry of seagull
     crashing waves
sad memories of karma building,
          You've built lies
          on
          Karma!
Facts              Facts            Facts
          Facts             Facts
listing, classifying, separating (I am guilty too)
          there are jesters in the
                  folds of space/time
                          ignorant thoughts
                                 the clock is a
                                       Great Demi-God
                                                 tool of subjugation
Heed this lesson, check into sanitarium, find solitude
in ageless, ageforgotten, aging insanity

I carve my poems on
cave walls,
what has man succeeded in?

Killing Earth's oldest trees?
Its oldest living thing?
Freezing saintly clams?

Progress is a bitter untruth
life is an ever bitter lie,

vanity is sanity,
pour another cup on pure tanned thighs

How can I escape sight? taste? sensation? noise?

I am hypocrite, I am just like
you.

Dream Tonight #1

1920s street car &
street reminds me of
San Francisco that
was dead before I got there
and I wonder do
dreams continue on after
I've woken up & forgotten
them?

Joe was waiting for
me when I stepped off &
we head to apartment
porch reminds me of some
porch from my childhood
with screens and wood facade
& two chairs, table, patio;

rest is void, dream doesn't fill
inside, I leave to find streetcar again
deciding it's time to go home--
been dream hours but
only seconds maybe,
but there's no time
that isn't perceived however I
want it to within confines
of selective reality--thinking,
"Joe, we haven't talked
in a while."

Take them dogs to school

even the lab can
smell the
collar round your neck,
won't take orders from
submissive tool of
consumer replication,
bends each day at sunrise
at sunset at waist to take the
cold dick of the blessed bourgeois state,
still asks for obedience from
"lesser" beasts, from what little
can be controlled,

do they have to teach
dogs artificial communication too?
Should stray cats have hidden
agendas? Looking to move up
in the business world, the only
world? Young professional?--

Broadcasting--

cookie-cutter
universal
understanding

Broadcasting--

money
it's money
money money
or
nothing.

Shit

I knew one
more cup would
do it, that and a
short walk, I paid my
tab and took off (2 cups
in, thin film and residue
of grounds left) and walked
out, peeled plastic of toothpick
and stuck it in my mouth,
crossed the street against
the light and stopped at a coffee
shop connected to a hotel,
ordered a cup (not having enough
cash, paid with credit card, put
a line across space for tip,
signed my name) took the cup
and sipped on it heading north
(there was a toy in the street,
a blue truck from movie Cars, picked
it up, examined it (tires were roughed
up, melted a bit)) I sipped and
walked, sipped and walked, joggers
passed me (always jogging in CC)
I walked into my building took the
elevator up to my floor, put key
to lock, walked in (taking off
my shoes) changed my clothes
quickly, put down Ulysses (I'd been
carrying this whole time) picked up
a book of poems (Chinaski)
I was right,
all I needed was one more cup.

Current State

Ingest the aspartame
toilet cakes one gulp at
a time,
     Your fractured skull
needs tv to think to see,
     do you see?
I doubt it, where only
news has eyes
& the eyes think
for you,
     easier that way say the
vicar of Canada former
vicar of Pater vicar of icy
shore,
     Christ! It's a simple
algorithm for control
food is poison
information is poison
air is poison
eat, learn, breathe.

A Rain drop landed in my pocket

A
Rain drop landed
In my
Pocket

                    I glanced at the damp spot,
                    "Trying to tell me something?"
                                                   I asked,

Another
Landed on my
Rolled-up
Sleeve,

                    I rubbed the water out,
                    "What do you want?"
                                     I wondered,

stream echoed back, laughing
                 
                    haw haw haw
 "Nothing, nothing, NOthing"
                    haw haw haw


The rain goes,
                    pat pat pat
"Look up the sky is gray,
                                     and night is almost here."

Ghost

I felt the obscurity
granted by the fog
overtake me
and I was a ghost
gone from the world,
forlorn wanderer
outside life's infinite wonder,
          I crossed the bridge at
Shavers Fork(old WV-33) in eerie
silence, gurgle of Cheat River,
God's one and only sound,
I sat by the banks and prayed,
the day disappearing, night,
night, night, a car from the mist,
demon car of civilization! ushered
me back along with the grayed banks &
strange summer chills,
I was no longer able to hold on,

Later on, in my room
I listened for recognizable footsteps,
I watched the rain fall.

Running Bear Loved Little White Dove

     Funny there's no inroad
for excrement spewing
native-indo-fucking-racist-
sexist-voyeuristic-Lakota-
nation- sick shit, consumerist
porn machine intake-sex-
video-fix, right?
     Where's our next avenue
of existence exploitation
or was the submissive snuff
fantasy enuff to get us
off eternally throughout
our familial timeline
greatgreatgreatgrandfather jerk-off
into handkerchief & toss it
@thenearestvacantindianlot
#trailo'tearsmotherfucker
& finish on greatgreatgrandma's
tits one off & done?
     shit, who's up next on this
fuck machine, go?

We'll be angels on the ocean

Discontented, disjointed
hurling thoughts into
never-was-being-like-human-
waves-on-the-spiral-lines-
of-collective-understanding
a mirage o' menagerie
of mind-image-fog,
sever my wings above
Pacific clouds, I'll float
down, I'll float, we are the
roads starving below,
disillusioned, ragged

List (so far)

two pairs of pants
red flannel shirt
ten pairs of underwear
equal amount of socks
plus one pair wool socks
hiking boots
two notebooks
a pen
pocket knife
utility tool
messkit
coffee can

what else?

2 backpacks (one small, one large)

my hands
my mind
my thoughts
myself

and...

we'll
see
what else
can
fit.

Halfmoon DC

She was struggling up
the sidewalk, sun sinking
temperature still
over 90 degrees, arms
waving as she walked
out like she was balancing
herself, legs wobbling too,
overweight, overwrought,
rushing, almost frantic,
surely late,
I could hear her heavy
breaths in my head from a block
away,
           "Get outta here!" she said,
"Halfmoon Bay!"

pointing at my shirt,
                                  "That's
where I'm from! I just flew
in!"

we passed each other, I
turned around,
                        "What're you
doing here?!" I asked,

She laughed, wheezing, smiled,
sweating,
                continued on.

Painting on my floor

I wish this could be a
picture,

in many ways
it is,

in the most important ones,
it isn't,

I am left with words and
nothing else,

stinging meaningless
flat words,

no subtext, no gentle strokes,
no shaded marks,

just lines and letters lined up
one after the other,

a string of thoughts, at best,
a rough outline,

causing pain and misunderstanding,
and you know,

just looking plain awful for the
most part,

times new roman lettering, lazy,
I just hit the keys,

I just type whatever the hell
I want,

because I tell myself this is me,
what I am thinking,

this isn't planned, I don't have an
artist's table,

I don't have an artist's
touch,

I have a desk, it's dusty and sits
by the window,

sometimes it sits there, alone,
all day,

I don't even look at it
sitting there,

I just go on dying and it goes on
waiting,

covering itself up in dust, looking all sad,
eventhough it's not alive,

it's like atlas, shouldering
my typewriter,

then when I have something to say, some ugly,
useless thing,

I type it out, and we both wait
for me to fail,

which happens from time to
time,

there are more crumpled papers,
than clean ones.

Rancid; Error while posting

I'm saying
too
much,

in mad gulps
hoping
you'd
understand
just a bit
of it

but I guess that just doesn't matter
maybe it only matters to me,

I get it,
I'm blue

but that's not what we're getting at,
I feel like my thoughts
used to be so clear,
like I had the words
for it, could articulate it,
now I'm
a
mess,

I can't hold it together,
can't string a thought along
together,

can't bring you along,

I've got too many inside jokes
I only make sense
when I'm
talking to
myself

So this happened.

She asked her
friend not to tell, "Please
don't tell anyone," she said,
watching a group throw frisbees
out on the lawn, on the freshly
mowed lawn, in the freshly
bright sun, she whispered,
"come on," and "I'll be right
back," she ran out onto the grass,
jumped up, caught one of the
spiraling disks, tossed it back,
there was another group of girls
I couldn't hear what they were
saying to each other, they were
too far away. While she was gone
her friend sat quietly eating her
lunch, blond hair braided in
pigtails, she looked up every
now and then, until she walked
back over, when she sat back down
they didn't really talk, for maybe
five minutes they didn't say a word,
"see," her friend said, "yeah," she said,
then they decided to meet before
finals started, sometime next week,
"I'll text you," she said and then, "did
you see that thing I posted?" as she walked
away, "no," her friend said, then
resumed eating her lunch.

luckily they aren't payin' me by the hour

luckily they aren't payin' me
by the hour, I don't accept
money anyway, I want
to write a poem that'll last
one thousand years,
maybe more, I'd take more,
not trying to be greedy, but--

I'd like to add a little more
allusion to my poetry, I will
if I can find the time, maybe
I'll stop writing about I and
me and what is, find something deeper,
less sad, who knows?

                                   If don't
who'll fucking know, nobody reads
me anyway (it's how I know I'll make
it) I've already got the rejection down,
the anonymity, the failure,
it's only up from here, it'll only take
a few years, I'll be 50 washed out,
dying and

                 famous before you know it.

To the man on the 7-11 roof

Saw you on that roof
over there looks like you
were talking on the phone,
I wonder what is going on,
what secret thoughts, what
secret plans are hatching,
who or what are you gunning
for, do you know I can see
you? I'll blow the lid off this whole
god damned thing, I'll find
out what's really going on,
about why you needed so much
secrecy up there, about who
you were talking to, about what they
wanted, or what you wanted,
you don't even realize I'm here
watching your every move,
you're good I know that, but
I'm better, I'll stay hidden
until the time is right, until you
think you're safe, that's when I'll
strike and foil whatever evil
outcome you seek, I'm watching you,
I'll remember you, I'm here,
you can't escape me.

Building up to this

clouds moving in
cars in line
just rolling now
not yet rush hour,
bus stop bench and
canopy on south going
side of street two figures
sitting metro paper in
hand, gray sky now
sun gone, chilly, spring
chilly may the 5th
slight wind, not enough to
blow the paper pages
enough to rustle the trees,
all you see in the distance,
trees and sky, snake like
tunnel leads underground
tunnel across street unseen,
red top taxis count'em, go
from arlington/alexandria to
Dc not the other way around,
red circular buses monday-
friday schedule break
between stops and fwush
of air click-slide of door,
afternoon after lunch silence
woman dressed in black
slow walking slow crosses
one-way street
hands in pockets.

A Tale of Four Girls

So she walked right into it
three girls saving spots
on the rail, but sitting down,
saving those spots as well
I guess, and you know
if this wasn't DC I wouldn't
have believed it, but
it was 9:30 club folk show
and there was/n't enough
room in this self-starved
world because manners
and etiquette means not
imposing on my wants/needs/
personal space, we can't accomm
-odate each other and make room,
that's not how society works,
it's all for me you know, that's how
it goes you back down to
whoever is there first--you're ruining
my good time so relax and get
lost--I'll just stand aside and watch this
girl force her elbows wide playing
like war and encroaching until
the absurdity of the space is obvious
you might not wanna back down--
since you wanted it that way--it's
what you learned in college in those
education courses, rationally
reasoned selfishness--let's act this out
like Larry's watching, that'll work--
that'll drive it home--let's keep it
going all night, why don't we?

The Unpublished Poems

I worry about them,
scratched in pencil,
sitting still, marks fading,
written in short hand,
edit lines, circles,
little notes aging,
meanings lost to time,

what was I trying to say
two years ago, where
was I when I was walking
Passyunk as the sun set,
where have I gone since then?

I'm afraid they've lost their meaning,
that I've traveled too far
to go back to them, that they've
been wasted on nothing,
left to die anonymously,
left to die ignored,
on my book shelf,
alone.

Radio

*Sfffxxxzzzkkkyaa~Goooooooooo-oood
moooornin' DC
the sun is shining
the weather is beeaaa-U-ti-ful
and if you're worth anything on
this fine fine fiiiiiiiiiiiine day
you'll be on your way to in to work
so enjoy that spring air while you can
my little darlings 'cause the world never
stops turning and~grrrrkkkkvvvvvsstktk~lll
of me
          why not take 
                               all of me~hrrrrrppp~
to you from sunny
southwe~we got~
you're not going to believe what's
on tap f~
               today~left me with
                                              eyes~
so I hope you're out there
looking for that green~gkkk~ats
Dodgers last night in elev~cry~
forget to tune in that dial
I'll be here all~

day~