in
1932, and like Whitman
I have these things:
I am a face behind a window
a toothache
an eater of parsley
a parallel man staring at ceilings of night
a heaver of gas
an expeller of poisons
smaller than God and not nearly as sure
a bleeder when cut
a lover when lucky
a man when born.
there’s much more and much less.
at 6 o’clock they start coming in like the
sea or the evening paper, and like the leaves of the
berry bush outside they are a little sadder now,
inch by inch now it’s speckled with brown and falling leaves,
day by day it gets worse like a wart haggled with a pin;
my shades are down as the scientists decide how
to get to Mars,
how to get out of
here. it is evening, it is time to eat a pie, it is time for
music.
Whitman lies there like a sandcrab like a frozen
turtle and I get up and walk across
the room.
Face While Shaving
So what is a body but a man
caught inside
for a little while?
staring into a mirror,
recognizing the vegetable clerk
or a design on wallpaper;
it is not vanity that seeks reflection
but dumb ape wonder;
but still the reflection…
movement of arm and muscle, shell-head,
a face staring down through the
stale dimension of dreams
as a Mississippi coed powders her nose
and paints a lavender kiss;
the phone rings like a plea
and the razor breaks through the snow,
the dead roses, the dead moths,
sunset after sunset,
steam and Christ and darkness,
one tiny inch of light.
9 Rings
the simple misery of survival
the tyranny of ancient rules
and new deaths,
the coming of the beetle-winged
enemy
chanting, cursing
bits of blood and grit;
I slam my fingers
in the window
as the phone rings.
I count 9 rings
and then it stops;
some voice it was
to test my reality
when I have no reality,
when I am water
walking around bone
in a green room.
I would burn the swans
in their lake,
I would send messengers
to the mountaintop
to razz the clouds.
she was getting to be a
dull lay
anyway.
Somebody Always Breaking My Dainty Solitude…
hey man! somebody yells down to me through my broken
window,
ya wanna go down to the taco stand?
hell, no!
I scream from down on the floor.
why not? he asks.
I yell back, who are you?
none of us knows who we are, he states, I just thot maybe you
wanted to go down to the taco
stand.
please go away.
no, I’m comin’ in.
listen, friend, I’ve got a foot of salami
here and the first fink that walks in,
he’s gonna get it in the side of his
head!
don’t mess with me, he answers, my mother played halfback for
St. Purdy High for half-a-year before somebody found her
squatting over one of the
urinals.
oh yeah, well, I’ve got bugs in my hair, mice and fish in
my pockets and Charles Atlas is in my bathroom
shining my mirror.
with that, he leaves.
I get up, brush the beercans off my chest
and yell at Atlas to get the humping hell out of there,
I’ve got
business.
Thank God for Alleys
hummingbird make yr mark he said and then something about
an arab and a son of a bitch and I hit him in the mouth and
we fought in the snow for ten minutes spotting it with red
blossoms—breathing is a blade—and I kept thinking of astronauts
up there circling the earth like a rowboat around a pond
all out of trouble and in trouble, and we finally stopped
or somebody or something stopped us and we went into Harry’s
for a drink and the place was empty and Harry kept looking
at us as if he hated us and pretty soon we began to hate him
his money, his hate, his hate of us without as much money
or as much hate, and my friend threw his glass against Harry’s
mirror and then he did hate us, and we ran out down the alley
and the dogs barked, and the
1932, and like Whitman
I have these things:
I am a face behind a window
a toothache
an eater of parsley
a parallel man staring at ceilings of night
a heaver of gas
an expeller of poisons
smaller than God and not nearly as sure
a bleeder when cut
a lover when lucky
a man when born.
there’s much more and much less.
at 6 o’clock they start coming in like the
sea or the evening paper, and like the leaves of the
berry bush outside they are a little sadder now,
inch by inch now it’s speckled with brown and falling leaves,
day by day it gets worse like a wart haggled with a pin;
my shades are down as the scientists decide how
to get to Mars,
how to get out of
here. it is evening, it is time to eat a pie, it is time for
music.
Whitman lies there like a sandcrab like a frozen
turtle and I get up and walk across
the room.
Face While Shaving
So what is a body but a man
caught inside
for a little while?
staring into a mirror,
recognizing the vegetable clerk
or a design on wallpaper;
it is not vanity that seeks reflection
but dumb ape wonder;
but still the reflection…
movement of arm and muscle, shell-head,
a face staring down through the
stale dimension of dreams
as a Mississippi coed powders her nose
and paints a lavender kiss;
the phone rings like a plea
and the razor breaks through the snow,
the dead roses, the dead moths,
sunset after sunset,
steam and Christ and darkness,
one tiny inch of light.
9 Rings
the simple misery of survival
the tyranny of ancient rules
and new deaths,
the coming of the beetle-winged
enemy
chanting, cursing
bits of blood and grit;
I slam my fingers
in the window
as the phone rings.
I count 9 rings
and then it stops;
some voice it was
to test my reality
when I have no reality,
when I am water
walking around bone
in a green room.
I would burn the swans
in their lake,
I would send messengers
to the mountaintop
to razz the clouds.
she was getting to be a
dull lay
anyway.
Somebody Always Breaking My Dainty Solitude…
hey man! somebody yells down to me through my broken
window,
ya wanna go down to the taco stand?
hell, no!
I scream from down on the floor.
why not? he asks.
I yell back, who are you?
none of us knows who we are, he states, I just thot maybe you
wanted to go down to the taco
stand.
please go away.
no, I’m comin’ in.
listen, friend, I’ve got a foot of salami
here and the first fink that walks in,
he’s gonna get it in the side of his
head!
don’t mess with me, he answers, my mother played halfback for
St. Purdy High for half-a-year before somebody found her
squatting over one of the
urinals.
oh yeah, well, I’ve got bugs in my hair, mice and fish in
my pockets and Charles Atlas is in my bathroom
shining my mirror.
with that, he leaves.
I get up, brush the beercans off my chest
and yell at Atlas to get the humping hell out of there,
I’ve got
business.
Thank God for Alleys
hummingbird make yr mark he said and then something about
an arab and a son of a bitch and I hit him in the mouth and
we fought in the snow for ten minutes spotting it with red
blossoms—breathing is a blade—and I kept thinking of astronauts
up there circling the earth like a rowboat around a pond
all out of trouble and in trouble, and we finally stopped
or somebody or something stopped us and we went into Harry’s
for a drink and the place was empty and Harry kept looking
at us as if he hated us and pretty soon we began to hate him
his money, his hate, his hate of us without as much money
or as much hate, and my friend threw his glass against Harry’s
mirror and then he did hate us, and we ran out down the alley
and the dogs barked, and the
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