day after

inside the liquor store
you buy a can of soda
and a can of tomato soup.
you come home to an empty
apartment.
you heat the stove and stir,
but only occasionally.
it's the day after Christmas
but there's nowhere
you need to be.

that's okay.

you empty the soup
into a bowl and
wait until it's cold.

walking in the sun

open the door,
walk outside.
feel the sun on your arms as you
light a cigarette.
walk with a weight in your step.
never shave, let it all grow.
see beautiful girls on the street-
pass them by
but never look.
exhale death, smoke
the color of
concrete jungle
as you
walk alone,
as flowers die
as yellow weeds grow.
you drop a cigarette,
but there is no one
to notice.
you've become invisible.
you're not like them.
the police officers
the homeless
the beggars or
the liquor store owners.
the sun sets
as the bars begin to fill.
in the restaurants there are people
sitting and eating
comfortably.
a waiter comes to a young couple
as I look through
a large glass
window.
these are the lucky ones,
I think,
who got it good
with the cupid's arrow.
something inside me dies for a moment.

but only for a moment.

Officer White

I wait for the day a

White

POLICE OFFICER

pulls me over for
being Hispanic
or for a broken
tail-light.

I will draw a gun and
shoot him
straight
into the head.

watch the blood soak
outside the skin
and into the
dirt.

the white officer,
officer
Jones or
officer Smith
or officer White.

no officer Garcia's or Mendez
or Lopez.

Officer White will
die with his head laying
flat
against
the pavement.

Officer White will
handcuff you,
put you in the back of his car
without an explanation,
draw a gun and
threaten you-

but not you,

you will kill officer White.

officer White can shoot you and
come home for
dinner
at the end of the day.

officer White can fuck his wife
and tell her
about all the niggers
and the spics
he arrested
that day
for not having the same
rights as
him.

Officer White will pepper spray
college students.

Officer White will tase
college students.

Officer White will pull down tents
from Occupy Wall-street
protesters
and Officer White will
prevent
Students
from entering School's
in Birmingham, Alabama
with hoses
from the Fire Department
in the 1960's.

Officer White will vote
Republican and the
Sheriff
will run for office.

Officer White will beat
Rodney King
on the side of the highway and
Officer White
will be on an episode of Cops
when arresting a drug-addict
Vietnam Vet.

Officer White was a Marine and
Officer White was in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Officer White is White and White is as
Black as night
as the bullet goes
through the head
and outside
the skull
to create the peace
that they so solemnly
swore
to protect.

murder

here I am 

again

fury in the heart

and 

in the brain 

blood

seething

through the veins

and into a new-found wisdom

through the chaos.

the fiery depths of hell 

have been well-traveled by those

deeply 

entombed

among

graves.

they are the hero's 

and the 

teachers 

and the

recipients of the Gods

but tonight-

there is a much greater

freedom

to be had

and I am here,

alone with 

whatever is killing me

and with

whatever is

killing you

and together we will

create

murder,

homicide,

or maybe

nothing at all.

it all started with m

and today while I was driving over 125 mph on the 52 I had made only two choices:
I was either going to hit the side of the mountain first or watch the carnival of red and blue in my rearview while I tried so very hard to think of nothing
and do nothing until it just finally happened.
and while the memories flashed and the music
played I could not help but remember the very
thing I was trying to forget.
but as the freeway merged
I was closer and closer to what has
had me concerned for the past two years.
not the men in blue, or the end of the lane,
but for the same reason I'm writing
this damned thing
in the first
place.

december 07'

I'm laying here watching the smoke drift from the ash tray
and it looks beautiful.
it's deadly and I never liked cigarettes
but I lay here mesmerized.
woman are as deadly
as they are beautiful too.
they give you a high,
but when it's gone you want more.
it's too bad they don't come
with warning labels.

trace your heart out

last time I saw her was
in a parking lot
at a
Jack In The Box
on
Main Street.
I got
inside her
Chevy F150
with the broken
right side of
the windshield
and
stared at
the cracks
as the
little pieces
of light reflected
like veins.
I looked
at her
and she still
had those
easy blue eyes
and platinum
blonde hair.
everything
about her
screamed
freedom
while
the
pit of
my stomach
ached
as I traced
and mapped
every
line like
a palm
reader.
it was
then
and there
that I
knew it was
all finally
over
and that
I would
never
see that
stupid
platinum
blonde
hair
again

different rooms

with this vegan roommate I have to worry
about eating meat in the house.

If I had a religious roommate,
It'd have to worry about
smoking pot.

one shot of whiskey.

written over 300 poems and

there may be hundreds more to go.

I know what you're thinking-

but I'm not always one

for the drink..

It's difficult to write here in normal heights.

the air is foggy and these hardwood floors smell

like another lone-boy Thanksgiving day.

the people walk around here in their scarves with their small dogs.

nearby is a yoga studio, a pet store, a grooming store,

a pawn shop, a vet clinic, and a vegan restaurant.

the artists come out at night.

I've written poems elsewhere,

in different situations and in

different places.

I wrote a poem once inside my car in a parking lot

as a security guard circled around

with his flashing yellow lights.

I looked up and saw a beautiful girl

walking alone to her car,

and watched as she began to walk faster.

Sorry sweetheart. but you're not cute enough

for me to throw in the back of my trunk.

there are many things that will hold a man tense
with his art.

the usual grievances like lust, love or no love.

the following loneliness
then wanting to be alone instead.

a man lets go of the past he can't control,
learns from it and finds a way to moves forward.

small grievances don't seem to affect me
anymore, but I've also learned to become more indifferent.

it's a strange thing when you no longer have feelings.

something could die in front of you like a small dog or a fly
and you wouldn't feel a thing.

tonight was a rainy night,
but when I went outside for a walk it was lightly sprinkling.

you hear an old man yelling at a couple of dykes
outside the kensington theater,
but you walk by as invisible to them as they are to you.

being invisible,
that's what I've become.

-

I walk across the kensington bridge
and I see a couple holding hands,
they're both wearing matching beanies.

the cars are all driving by slowly,
nobody seems to be in a hurry to go anywhere.

the world is frozen.

their is no grief about being lonely anymore.
there is nothing left for death to take away
so I live instead.

small flashes of light like thunder
bolts in my head.
there are my favorite writers and
sufferers alike who have experienced more.

turlock

presence of soft wind as you

walk across the sidewalk.

the police are out like wolves, ready

to hurt you more

then the thieves.

I finish my cigarette,

flick it into the window of a parked

police car.

you can't blame the police,

they have love, life,

and maybe something to come home to
at the end of the night.

they are the sober ones,

the rightfully right and

rightfully so.

I wanted to be one for so long,
but now I'm wild,
with the glass in my eyes and
unblinking.

the quiet ones,
these are the ones you have to worry about.

their is a recklessness when their is no fear,

when their is no love.

I'm out of cigarettes with no I.D. in

a strange town

2 hours east of San Francisco.

I find a liquor store,

walk inside and terrorize a small lady

for a pack of cigarettes.

I kick over a trash-can,
walk past the same police car and smile.

they will not remember me in a strange town

somewhere across the bay a sunflower grows

I am awake now,
and their is a smile on your face
as you look into the mirror.

I miss the music that we played together,
the records that we listened to,
I miss the the art books,
the poetry readings and
taking turns reading.

I miss your sunlight.

your brown eyes,
your anxieties,
your skin, your lightness, your light.

but you're far away now near
that golden bridge,
and all I can do is think of you-

and try to forget.

as a flower is beheaded by a child he is one too

all else is closing in now like the crush of the blue mountains.
when the faces are having it all, those friends
who are in love in their baskets of light.
it's then that you can drive into yourself, your own light
through the venetian blinds where the rose blooms, blossoms, and
dies.
I am here because I choose to be in my search for light,
but am often in darkness; draw blood in spite of wry madness,
or sit as still as the planets pissed at the sun.
you can scream but nobody can hear you.
the earthquakes have not killed enough, the meteors, the fires,
the murderers, and the plagues have failed too.
the stink of light is everywhere and
too much for the delicate thunder of words

because it should of been here about 2 months ago

when you leave for san francisco
you will leave me with
perks of a wallflower
new york sounds and this patti smith
singing "Birdland" into my radio.
I'm listening to her right now as I think
of you, thinking of how happy you will be in those
San Francisco streets you told me about.

everything is inept everywhere

everything is inept everywhere,
see torn butterflies
bad verse
no love,
no man is wise enough to stay
wise,
cool hollow of dim pities
where blood stank
is soft now
and not precious,
we are struck through
mixed with kittens and tigers
some life and
no life
at all;
no army lasts, no night, no day.
wallpaper flowers now
without sun-
they may last longer then even my
dimmest concern, and
properly so- yet
why am I so
sad?

like flies they come

come home,
under my thumb
on repeat
by the rolling stones,
heineken,
and the cigarettes are rolled,
and their are green leaves to be smoked.
the full moon's waiting.

some things are better not to be said, I think.
when you're looking at then moon
feeling no less awful then say-
half a million people
around the world,
you say fuck it,
it's better not to suffer
in silence

I'm going to
take another drink,
and when the nights are bad,
I'll do it again.

the nights are wild
like this,
but I somehow find
magic in small places,
and if you understood how good it felt
then maybe
you would try it too.

but they wonder if I'm
trying to write.
what they don't understand
is that this is an automatic thing,
like sitting upon the ivory
throne
and letting it all go.

what they don't understand
is that when I'm done with a poem,
I finish it and move on
to the next.
It's always the next.

I don't edit,
and sometimes
say nothing at all,
but drink and look into
the senseless moon
and wait.

I move into the night like a serpent,

I sink my teeth into the words like the body of christ,

but there are no cigarettes to smoke, those little slivers of death . . .

I am with Mendelssohn tonight, the melody is slow and easy,

something like the blood of kings on velvet robes

never empty

my beast comes in the afternoon
he gnaws at my gut
he paws my head
he growls
spits out part of me

my best comes in the afternoon
while other people are taking pictures
while other people are laughing
my beast comes in the afternoon
across a dirty kitchen floor
leering at me

while other people are employed at jobs
that stop their thinking
my beast allows me to think
about him,
about the graveyards and fear
and stale flowers and decay
and the stink of ruined thunder.

my beast will not let me be
he comes to me in the afternoon
and gnaws and claws
and I tell him
as I double over, hands gripping my gut,
jesus, how will I ever explain you to
them? they think I am a coward
but they are the cowards because they refuse to
feel, their bravery is the bravery of
snails.

my beast is not interested in my unhappy
theory- he rips, chews, spits out
another piece of
me.

I walk out the door and he follows me
down the street and
into my car.
we pass lovely laughing girls
on the streets
and the sun opens and closes like an oyster
swallowing my beast for a moment
as I cross at a green light
pretending that I have escaped,
pretending that I am far more meaningful
than the parted legs of their being
pretending that the beast is gone forever
and that the torn parts of me are
still there
under a black shirt and blue jeans
as all the faces become walls
and all the walls have become impossible.

goodnight words of the night

there have been many nights
in front of this
machine,
composing the
impossible words as
Brahms thundered through my walls

I have been alone,
with the music of the dead
but where
I belong

Van Gogh taught me of his struggle,
and how he never
found love,
but instead the sight
at the end of the barrel
of the gun.

and then there was
Miles Davis,
my father of music,
and of all that I know

but there have been many nights
alone,
giving you my soul
and all that I have left
to be forgotten,

in a world so
indifferent,

I write only for
myself,
and what's left
at the end
of the light

sometime long ago

these dark lonely nights,
I begin to feel like
the Chinese poet
Li Po:
drinking wine and writing
poems
writing poems and drinking
wine

all the while
aware of the strict limitations
that come with
being
human

then
accepting that

the wine and the poems
gently
intermixing:

yup, there is a peaceable place
to be found
in this unending
war
we call life

where
things
such as
light, shadow, sound
objects

become
gently
and meaningfully
fascinating.

Li Po,
that drunk mother fucker
on his wine,
knew very well that
just to know
one thing well
was
best.

in the morning

when the sun comes up in the morning
I awaken to
that lovely golden light
and
I'm usually alone
and sometimes (but not always) wonder why the most
beautiful woman in the world isn't sleeping there next to
me?
I deserve her, I think, I deserve
her.

then I get up,
go to the bathroom
splash water on my face

look into the
mirror

shudder a bit
in disbelief...

then

go sit down on
the ivory
throne

let it all
go

except for the
reality,

which

no amount
of
efficient
modern
plumbing
can

whirl
away.

I remember you Bud, as Bud walked in

It's fucking true,
Brahms, Stravinsky, Mendelssohn,
Coltrane, Miles, Dizzy,
Bud Powell,
and those officers
who beat you from your genius.

It's True:
pain and suffering
helps to create
what we call
Art.

given the choice
I'd never choose
this damned
pain
and suffering
for myself
but somehow it finds
me

i'm turning into a monster

you remember the burning fire.

nothing to smoke,
nothing to eat.

you scrape together dimes
for a meal or a smoke,
but tonight
it's a drink instead.

there is no love,
you can forget about that...

but what you can remember
is the burning fire,
and the dream of the hand-gun
in your hand as you eliminate all of those
who have rejected man after man
after man...

there will be no greater justice then this,
and when their lives are gone
their will be nothing else
for Death to take away,

no more panties under the bed,
hairpins,
hairspray,
no more eyeliner or lip gloss
or tampons,
no more text messages or
facebook updates,

but their dead bones
beneath the earth of those creatures
we once considered
"delicate"

I do this for you,
and for all the others who have suffered
like me or are suffering.

their is no misogyny,
but this is a man who once tried-

I want relief.

I live in my own world as you do your own,
so if you felt the way I did,
you would feel the same way too.

It's just too bad it has to be this way,
because I never dreamed
of taking anyone's life,

but now I have to.

and I will.

we spent many nights in hell together,
but the ones you spent alone
forever haunt me

how you were capable of such
endurance was not because of
money, love, or
woman

but because you had something
to fight for,

o.k.
so maybe the money helps,

but then,
what then if you have nothing to fight for?

need some sleep man

girl afraid rachel

reminds me so much of rachel-

her dancing
upon some
darkened
backround,

black and blue,
blonde everywhere
brown eyes everywhere

I tried to love her again
but her heart wasn't
mine

I tried to love her,
but her heart was cold

boy afraid,
she doesn't
even like me

because I know
she is
elsewhere

perhaps
not


here

interrupt

I am sad like a dead angel,
blue like a trumpeter-
I am the blue sand
in the blue night

I walk the desert of my world
in a smoky haze,
forgetting for a while
but I always remember,

the nights torn with madness and
the women who love
others.

- But I've always been here,
in front of this

if you knew how good it felt
then maybe you would do this too...

and now that the smoky haze has come
and finished,
so has the ending
of this
intermission
poem

brittany

another one of these poets who 

can't begin or continue,

who try to swim through the fire

of something they don't

yet

understand.

but I continue and I'm burning

and it's what's been 

chosen for me

as a way to 

divide the light from

the dark.

it's been pacing the floors,

2 bottles down with Stravinsky on high

or watching the spiders on the wall,

feeding only long enough

to survive

and then I wait,

think for a while and 

watch

as the words skitter across the page.

there is always something

not far

from behind that allows

me to continue,

and always a bottle waiting

for me to begin

momento

on a cold and
bitter
night
comes a
poet with the
fire
of a thousand
golden chariots
and he is the
writer,
the true writer
of the night
as the others
create
nothing.

"good luck in love" she said...

this bottle of wine is almost done
and now I can remember why I drink,
why I write

but this is where there is no love to be had,
no flower of chance,
no light,
no love

just the emptiness of
another bitter lonely
night.

I'm at the edge and
now my words have run as dry
as my spirit.

but there is nothing more to be said,
I've wasted my romantic
reverie on a woman who is taken
and I've have mused
beyond what is fair

I am sad like a dead angel.

I only wish for love in my
purest of intentions...

as for van gogh,
he cut of his ear and
painted for it.
then found love in his art.
(as for the other type of love,
it never arrived...)

but this bottle of wine, my only friend,
is now done
and now waits another.

but where there is no love,
no woman,
no chance,
there is a bottle
waiting
and another
after that.

who could want anything more then that.

DH lawrence

he lay on his bed and he was a great

novelist, poet and short story

writer.

visitors were often told that it was

his "rest period"

and were sent

away.

he was visited by a woman

who was a short story story writer and

a novelist.

the woman wrote about her visit

to him

in a short story.

she said that he treated her

unkindly,

seemed ungrateful for her

visit.

that maybe he was

not so great

after all.

in her story 

she wrote that

"he was a very bitter

man."

he later died and

the women's short story

was published.

he was D.H. Lawrence

and she has

rightfully

been long

forgotten.

vultures seldom are blessed with

immortality.

fuck it

I can't do it anymore, any of it, I'm turning in my

shit in at last, it's what THEY'VE

have been waiting for...

now they can dance in the street

with their sunflower blondes

and their envy can turn gentle:

"yeah, man, I gotta admit, he could write a

bit of good shit back in the day..."

it's been over a week and I haven't written a

decent line, and writing was never difficult

for me before.

I walk across the room, catch a look at

myself in the mirror:

how long did you think

you'd be able to play with words?

everything ends eventually so

stop your whining.

damn, I've never had a problem with writing before.

24 now. what will I do now?

become a paramedic?

who would of ever thought you'd last this long

anyway?

It's the first hot night of summer, one

bottle of wine is now gone as the laptop plays

gloomy blue's music from 1924.

I will say one thing, however, it's nice here now

even with everything else gone wrong, not to be

arguing with a woman tonight.

she's gone off somewhere

and this 

poem which never really got started

is now done and

the second bottle of wine is waiting

for me.

now, there's an art I can still

handle...

one last MEANINGLESS thought for Sarah.

where the poet can't sing he's not worth a shit.

just kill him. the hell hounds will make him a lovely meal.

living with Sarah,

I could never write a single poem,

nothing. I would just enter the space

between her legs and that kept me sane. the sunflower hair,

the eyes, (skin, smell, touch)

panties under the bed, hot showers and

then putting it inside

like a novelty.

she was out and about, always drunk,

but to be fair - I was drunk too, but alone,

alone with myself and the music but not being able

to write worth a shit.
 nothing. 

she'd come home drunk and it was sex.

it was easy,
long and winding through the sheets.

and then I would think of all the boys at the clubs, the bars,

anywhere but where I was drinking alone,

in my own bar, drunk with classical music and jazz,

while she was out with them...

and I can still hear her voice now,

more clearly then ever...

"Ivan!..."

"I missed you baby..."

monster

I would sever their heads off,

their arms, legs, ears, then

straight across from the neck.

watch the heads roll to the ground,

cut the arms carefully into four pieces

then place them into black garbage bags.

It's easier with the small ones,

the ones that are petite with light skin and

light blue eyes. their cries are

like the whimpers of their

small dogs.

but before this, 

I would strap one to a chair,

mouth duck-taped - hair thrashing violently and

then I would play Brahms or Mendelssohn,

anything meaningful 

but it was never supposed to be this way,

they could of brought chance, 

some sort of light, anything

other then their simple 

denial.

but all men must finally break.

what has been done and chosen will and

must be settled with God,

their lives and my own,

my selfishness and theirs,

for their is nothing to lose when

their is nothing gained,

no future, no chance,
no light and even God has
turned his face in disgust.

but the music will play on.

and as my hands close tightly around
their necks and their last breath of air is
taken, their will be a greater calm then that of the sea
and there will be no God to help them
like there was no God to help me.

new days in normal heights

I got a parking ticket today, and after the
movies I passed out in my car listening to NPR.
I was in fashion valley when
a security guard tapped on my shoulder,

"sir, are you alright?"

"yeh"

two fine blondes walk by,

"I'll be leaving soon . . ."

I pulled out of the parking lot,
two fine pairs of legs neither for you
or the security guard or the officer who wrote
you this ticket.
I light my cigarette,
feel inside my pant pockets but
no cash, only a ticket and the gas needle is
on low. the tires are low.

I make it anyway, It's a
miracle I make it to where I am going with
no police to run the plates
for an impound,
no chance.

I get home to the piano and
play Debussy,
but all I want to do is play the Blues, but
much practice and patience and profound proficiency
will make it all come true.

oh, but those two fine blondes... how I could
only wish for chance and light and
the goodness of their hair so warmly
flowing into mine,
eyes wild with youth and adventure
and I could play them Debussy!

so I play to the thought of them
but they will not appear,
I pound into the keys more desperately for the
sunflower hair and eyes of ocean blue
but they will not appear.

I light a cigarette and fill the deadness
of the white air,
sit in front of this machine
and wait.

and wait . . .

there will be nights like this with great fire
and you will be alone,
more alone then you have ever been
and you will be
entombed with the bodies of 1,000 dead soldiers
upon your shoulders

there will be nights knifing at the blackbirds
in the sky, love poems unfinished
but one too many

you will be alone with whatever is killing you
and your romantic reverie
will be that of your own

a family

they loved the finer things in life,
like cold beers and wrestlemania on sunday nights as
they watched the wrestlers go on stage
like glistening German sausages.

the father drank too much and he beat
the dog, his wife, and
sometimes,
the mother-in-law too

you'd hear the door slam shut and the mother
running out,
"I'm GONNA CALL THE GOD DAMN COPS
YOU DIRTY SON OF A BITCH"

and then the Cops would come and
take the report:

"Yes Ma'm, but please just go back inside
and take care of your husband now,
we've got better things to do"

other days you'd hear the father
working on the boxcar,
it was painted Blue with a white #6

but most of the time he was gone,
thankfully for the dog
thankfully for them

he was a trucker,
been sucked-off by over a hundred whores, he said.
fell in love with a hooker named Moonlight
who got him shot in the dark by a broad
in Blue Springs, Missouri.

the wife was built like a 20 brick-shit houses,
varicose legs shining in the limelight of her balcony
as she smoked cigarettes
(while he was working on #101 and so forth)..

but as they kept drinking,
the boys in blue kept coming
and then someone finally took the dog,
and then the trucker in handcuffs and then the wife.

the mother-in-law was there too,
arm's crossed looking quite justified..

all those late nights with Brahms,
all those nights with explosive arguing fit
quite well into my symphony,
while I was alone and staring at the decaying geraniums of hell,
while the women loved other's when I so
desperately
needed their hair flowing into mine,
they gave me chance, a fire to roast, a reason to exist
when even the walls seemed dull.

but as they're gone now, probably apart,
I remember them
and those white boys in tights as I watched
their TV through their window,
smoking a cigarette and feeling quite
uninteresting.

cat fight

the girls got drunk and they their battle,
their hands were in a sea of hair
pulling and tugging,
screeching and yelling as the
males stood about not understanding any of it

but then after a while, one stepped in
and then another.

I stood there watching as I
sipped my beer,
then looked up as one of
the boys said,
"Hey! We're all ADULTS here! can't
we all just get along?"

and then he too,
was in a sea of hair.

I finished my drink,
grabbed for another,
let them have it, I thought,
good decent violence.

I walked past them and looked
in the fridge, the 18 pack they brought was
almost gone. I drank 3 when they arrived,
the 3 that they offered, and the second one
was being worked on.

when the cops arrived,
everyone turned their attention to them.

and I can remember why I write

and I can remember why I write,
when all else is closing in like the crush of the blue mountains.
when the faces are having it all, those friends
who are in love in their baskets of light.
it's then that you can drive into yourself, into your light
through the venetian blinds where the rose blooms, blossoms, and dies
as a flower is then picked and beheaded by a child.
I am here because I chose to be in my search for light,
but am often in darkness; draw blood in spite of wry madness
write poetry in ryhme, or sit here as still as the planets.
you can scream but nobody can hear you.
the catholic bell's have been tolled, the wine has been spilled
on the graves of a thousand poets
but no one can hear you. the lion devoured the dragon,
the stars move north and there are no kings to follow,
the earthquakes have not killed enough, the meteors, the fires,
the murderers, and the black plague has failed too.
the stink of light is everywhere and the cupid's arrow
is stupid like thunder alike, and still, no one can hear you-
so you write, strike for minor chance, find a reason to be
when even death has failed to follow.

magen

changing throughout the years,
you now smoke cigarettes and sometimes, 
when you're out you light a stub, burn your nose, 
but even that will not make a difference and
then you sit here with whatever is killing you.
you think of the human faces with real nice lives, beautiful woman in
their arms with some elusive chance.
they have something you don't, and when you feel it, it becomes so
great that you become ill and you feel dead like them or dying.


yet several years ago there was once Magen. . .


in light of new love she has since forgotten,
changed throughout the years and I do not know her,
not out of chance but out of choice.
to see her brown eyes, her stature,
would be akin to a greater knife then suicide.


and I remember,
the many nights cuddled on a wicker rocking chair,
her hair falling into mine,
her smiling heart no less then pure
and my selfishness consumed by fear.


I needed to grow,
her mother said she needed to bloom like a rose. 


you were my first love and I will never forget you or your scent or your embrace
burned hot in my memory. I will remember the small things like Sugar Bay Ray
as he galloped in a field of pasture or the way we laid together in schools,
corridors and hallways. . .


but you are gone now and you sleep gently in my dreams,
never again knowing a love like yours as I awake,
take note of the indifference of the of the flower weeping
in the morning fog and at last,
all is as it should be.

my heart is swallowed in the san francisco bay

I think of you,
and the thought of you
leaving
makes me sad

you've made me happy
for as long as you've been here,

and I will always love you for
your mind and all that you are which
is an art like love,
one that can only be shared
between two people

but as I sit here
nursing
my thoughts of you like
delicate flowers,
I wont let the words
get in the way anymore of
what I've wanted to say,

so even if it's unrequited,
I've learned from you what it is to
love and accept gracefully and it feels good,
almsot peaceful
knowing I've never felt so pure.

miles

Miles Davis taught me how to listen

to music.

how a man can change and grow

through the century and.

keep on moving, keep on moving,

to achieve the impossible ART we must

change

grow through the centuries

and keep on moving.

Picasso changed,

and when you see a painting you

hear a pop song, the pop song is a cartoon.

for him, each woman was an era. 

but what I liked best was when he took that young girl at 18,

"My name is Pablo Picasso!

... and you and I, we will make great things together!"

He was 31.

Miles Davis only knew how to take a

woman into his room,

and there was always the H.

there was always the H...

moon

there have been moments of glory

moments of great discovery;

anvils dropped like mountains into

chasm's

slumped before this computer

attempting to compose the impossible

words

hell,

like an elephant reading a mag

in an abortion clinic.

struggling to open this bottle of belgium beer,

I have broken the bottle opener.

I see the moon in the sky,

seemingly ask it for help but instead

use a lighter.

it works.

moon moon,

moon in the sky,

how I wish to pull you towards

me with a lasso,

watch you for a while,

then deliver you onto the sky

how many more

boys with dark-narrowed eyes

will you take into the night?

of rachel

there is a pain sometimes and

I can't understand it.

and when I see something like a red truck

parked on a lawn,

I want to paint it knowing I can

when others have said I could not;

like the teachers of my past,

my own father,

myself.

and when I hear the birds sing,

I hear the sounds but nothing more and

then I think of her, Rachel, and

how I could never fall
for anything less

not anymore,

not now.

she brought me Peggy Lee

when I know of Jazz,

she told me she loved Fitzgerald,

when I know Armstrong is king,

and when she brought me Patti Smith, I

brought her Bukowski

when we shared a night of The Smiths

I brought her much and little,

when I know I could give her much more,

but when I see her eyes,

I see who she is and

maybe she knows,

and I know,

that she must be alone

and I am alone

alone together because we know

it's strength,

but as my heart aches

I know this is nothing new.

I feel it as I watch this red truck,

when I hear the birds sing, and sometimes,

when I'm by her side as the heavy waves come

she is the one that I love,
the one who is near and far,
like the tide that comes and goes,
a heart once opened
now closed

what should of been

listen, I now forgive all the woman who have
been with me and then left me
in order to find someone else to fuck,
to smoke with, to drink with or maybe just to
talk to.

I realize now that often I am dull
and that most of the time we simply weren't interested
in the same thing and/or things.

but I must tell you now that back then it was
difficult for me to forgive or under-
stand; I remember many nights of macho
hell
just looking at the walls
or an unmade bed
or a paper bag of Jack in the Box on the floor; the
minutes strangled inside my head;
and there was always female shit scattered about:
clothes on the bed, shoes on the floor, lipstick on
the dresser, a hairbrush in the bathroom ...

and then there was my precious ego, never being able
to understand how any of you could prefer
someone else to me.
there were many nights walking to and fro across
the room, refusing to accept, doubled over,
thinking: "shit, shit, shit..."

and trying to forget, going to parties,
looking, seldom finding, and when finding playing
a role I didn't really like, just hoping for
some kind of cheap vengeance
instead of accepting what should have been accepted
gracefully.

I understand that
I never would have met any of you
if you hadn't left someone else for me or been discarded
by someone else-
so here's to the good nights along with the bad:
at our best we experienced as much joy as any
one
and I thank all of you for giving me your
best;
you live in my heart and if there's a heaven
somewhere
someday you'll all be there
as
the great white shark continues to circle endlessly
in captivity
with stunned eyes, with dumb stunned
eyes.

euology

all is beautiful.

they killed the man who took
the lives of many on
September the 11th

I say a dead man
is better than a live one,
and so does Brahms as he sings to
me through the smoke
on this virginal night of May

but
today they killed the
killer and
Hitler,
who died only a day before
in 1945,
will join him in the ranks
of the infernal
underworld

let only the sharks be witness
to his sinking
corpse

light my fire

I believe in earning one's own way
but I also believe in the unexpected
gift
and it is a wondrous thing
when a woman who has read your writing
(or parts of it, anyway)
offers herself to you
out of nowhere
out of the blue
a total
stranger.

such an offer
must be taken
gracefully

the hands
the fingers
the hair
the smell
the light.

one would like to be strong enough
to turn them away

those butterflies.

I believe in earning one's own way
but I also believe in the unexpected gift.

I have no shame,

we deserve one
another

those butterflies
who flutter to my tiny
flame
and
me.

gentle song like red pinot

oh and I remember, "lets paint at the
jazz club," she said, where the wine is free and served
under age, "look, water!" in the corner,
no, no,
here,
lets drink this wine instead
"ok lets"
so here comes the man at the piano as the
drummer begins,
we drink our wine and the waitress smiles,
brings us another.
they begin to play a song,
as the people walk by looking through the large windows.

the love in a man's heart

is what's taken for

foolishness 

in the sea

of indifference;

like fools

we hold onto the

dream,

cry and stand

ablaze
when all should of been
taken
Gracefully.

and if I continue writing

like this,

I'll off myself first
in my last revolt

and if this was in a typewriter

I would tear it up,

rip it,
pull the gun from
the drawer and
fire

but not before this
poem is finished

I AM HERE

I sit.

think,
write,
drink

continue on for a while...

like most of us,
but not
like most of us.

they've got it all wrong,
baby,
you can be romantic
with yourself
in a fucked up
sort of way

and this includes the
brush, the bottle,
the needle inside your arm
or the
typewriter

this is another poem about 3 a.m. and how I'm still sitting

here listening to classical music and smoking a good 

cigar.

hell, I don't know, sometimes I feel just like Van Gogh or

    Fante or,

say, Stravinsky, as I sip wine and type

and smoke and there's no magic as gentle as this.

maybe I write the same shit,

sometimes I do and sometimes I don't, but when I do the

reason is that it feels so right, it's like making love and

if you knew how good it felt you would forgive me

because we both know how fickle happiness can be.

so I play the fool and say again that 

It's 3 a.m.

and that I am

Brahms

Vivaldi

Doestovevsky

embracing everything:

the sweep of cigar smoke,

another glass of wine,

the woman that love others,

the criminals and the killers,

the lonely mad,

this music,

I repeat it all again

and I'll repeat it all forever

until the magic that happens to me

happens to you

welcome back

this last drink was as
good as the first,
I now realize that the promises
I've made to myself
have been
kept.
that's plenty.
that last: about the promises:
what's not so good is that you've
now lost a friend.
as for woman, you didn't know enough
early enough
and you knew enough
too late.
and if more self-analysis is allowed: it's
nice that you turned out well-
honed,
that you arrived late
and remained generally
capable.
outside of that, not much to say
except you can leave without
regret.
until then, a bit more amusement,
a bit more endurance
leaning back
into this.

like the dog who got across
the busy street:
not all of it was good
lucky baby.

115

driving 115
DRUNK
on the highway
and
I wonder if the
Red and Blue's
will
find me
or if I will
be another
suicide drunk

(which
that matters
less than
nothing)

115
drunk and
alone with the world
and the radio and Vivalvi and
this poetic madness
-ARE YOU HAPPY NOW? lol

can you feel the crushed
birds
in my hands?

the sail boat
in the ocean?

the sail boat on fire?

can you feel the guts of the
universe
in your hands
of this
heart
I call my own?

now I UNDERSTAND
Vivaldi
now I UNDERSTAND
Bukowski
now I UNDERSTAND
Dostovevsky

the world is
NULL
and you brought forth
the gift
to beset us from
our unordinary lives and our
unordinary ills
as a way
of
ENDURING

I now
UNDERSTAND
that
death is not
the tragedy
but the gift,

that she will find a lover
like a flower,
and I that I will
wilt
like a rose
with it's
thorns

will I find a ledge
off this lane?

I will endure
simply to endure
because
there is nothing else
for me to do

I will forget and
unfold
this phone number in
my wallet from some
blonde 
named Sarah,

Fuck it.
Fuck Sarah.

I throw her number
out the window...

the San Diego Police Department
is another problem...

van gogh

vain vanilla ladies strutting

while van Gogh did it to

himself

girls pulling on silk

hose

while van Gogh did it to

himself

in the field man

unkissed, and

worse.

I pass him on the street:

“how’s it going, Van?”

“I dunno, man,” he says

and walks on.

there is a blast of color:

one more creature

dizzy with love.

he said,

then,

I want to leave.

and they look at his paintings

and love him

now.

for that kind of love

he did the right

thing

as for the other kind of love

it never arrived.

now I understand

Van Gogh cut off his ear
gave it to a
prostitute
who flung it away in
extreme
disgust.
Van, whores don't want
ears baby
they want
your soul.
I guess that's why you were
such a great
painter: you
didn't understand
much
else.

painter friend bobby

I was living in this gay hotel,
he told me.
it was getting to me man.
I began fucking those guys.
I even fell in love with a drag queen.
well, the other morning I found a
dildo in the trash can and it was still
coated with vaseline. I just hadda get
out of Frisco so I flew down to San Diego.
I'm in this bar and I meet this blonde,
we drink for awhile and she says
she'll suck my cock (she sucks
so she won't get pregnant)
we go to her place and I found out there
are 3 guys in the front room. I ask her
who they are. and she says, oh, they
are my lovers. and I say, wait,
you mean to tell me you suck those 3
cocks too? she says yes and I get out of
there.
I got to do a painting for a lawyer, she
promised me $300 and when I finished she
said, I'll give you $50.
what the hell, I said, that doesn't even
cover the costs of paints and canvas, let
alone my soul.

$50, she says.

I ripped up the painting and
walked out.
now I don't know what to do man.
maybe I'll go back to
L.A.
and try my chances at
finding a job

where do you think I ought
to go?

Portland, I said.

Portland! he said, furious. Don't
fuck with my head! where'd you get
that tattoo? I could draw you up
a new tattoo,
"Poet's Row"
like you always wanted. but where's that hot
blonde you were with? the brunette? and
what the hell man, how'ya been?

message from the past, syd

they have their gains

and

they're out there

having it all

in a place

higher then

themselves

but only if you let them.

and I remember my

brain

captivated by the

magic of those rare

delicate creatures

as they found

new ways to kiss

the lips

the ears

the neck

there were nights

firing

at this machine

in the well of

myself

as I sat here

musing

upon them like

toothpicks

"you have a way with words,"

they would say

"but why are you so

quiet all the time, what are you

thinking of?"

"what?!"

"why did you say that! what

the hell is wrong with you?"

"fix it!"

it is better now not

having

to think

about these things

because like them,

I too have choices

and that includes not

having to think

about them

or

their lips or their

eyes or their ears

but when Sydnie sent

me a message

it was like a

spiraling

into the script:

Caroline Kennedy

the other night
I saw Caroline Kennedy
reading poems with
Stephen Colbert on his show

god awful writing about
americans
the good in americans-
sunflowers
God
the presence of
sun or no sun-
men
woman
and the general
"goodness" of
life
and the sun
and the sunflowers

which is a lot say
considering she is a
published author/writer/poet
and I am
not.

but there is
one thing she said
that spoke of truth;
(like yellow sunflowers)

and that is to
say that poetry
is beautiful and
that woman
have a special
relationship
with poetry
(more so than men)
but when men
write poetry it's
usually about a
woman
and that,
according to her:
is beautiful.

so here is a poem
about a
beautiful
woman who;
surprisingly,
responded to my
e-mail
and my poem

bruckner

it was not a good day.
there was a jagged wretchedness inhabiting
my part of the world
and now I sit at this machine
tonight
hoping for some luck and some
light
but they refuse to
fire, things refuse to
fire.
wagner and brucker
on my
computer is
grand
but whatever was born in me
today
has been stamped
out, tossed
away.
I don't ask for your
sympathy
during this time.
I am just speaking to myself
and this is the medium through
which I speak.
still, if somebody reads
this
and your day and your
night
were
akin to mine,
then somehow we've touched,
stranger brother or
sister,
and we both understand that death is
not the
tragedy.
you are alone and I am
alone
and it's best that we aren't
alone
together
comparing our pitiful
sorrows
over the phone
or online
or in
writing

only let me sit before this
tired computer
strange friend,
and write this
final
dull
line:
thanking you
for reading
this far.

words of my dreams

tear at the relentless gods who
put us here
in our moiled carnage

our time could be spent
other than
wasted leaning
towards
this machine

to strike for a
minor chance,
unless sensibility overcomes first

like lovers we might need
and might be needed
so that the generous miracle might work

that finally,
words and words and words and words
might move forward toward
something.

to the last one: Sydnie

just like an elephant stepping
on an ant

that's the way you
helped love
vanish.

someone asked me, what would you do if you won the lottery?

I would buy a loft in
San Francisco
and
New York City.

I would go to College
and study English
and music history,
specializing in Jazz.

I would plan to travel
the United States
and then the world,
teaching seminars on the
importance of Jazz and education.

I would study music history,
and teach
with a meaningful
objective as to
apply the
knowledge in
correlation to life lessons.

but first,
I would buy a black
Porche Carerra convertible,
a typewriter,
a bottle of wine,
and I would drive
through the Arizona desert
listening to Led Zeppelin.

writer's locks
flowing in the wind,
I would gently stop at a
liquor store to buy another
bottle of wine.

I would probably then look for a
cheap hotel,
set the typewriter down
and start,
the best way I know how.

katelynn

it's funny,

but I was thinking about

a poet friend Katelynn today

I remember how we used to get drunk

and she would say,

"I need to write a poem right now,

I left a notebook in my car and I've

just got to rip one out!"

she did that about 2 or 3 times

then stopped.

now I'm sitting
here upon the ivory throne

thinking about that,

ripping one out.

in the sun

It's April
4/1/11 10:36 AM,

It's what the parking ticket says,
the officer even gave me his autograph.

I'm still with Rachel
but right now she's in the shower.

we went to the beach
and bought some Thai food from a
restaurant on El Cajon and 50th

two sandwiches,
one pork
one chicken

I guess what's really
on my mind is how good the sun
felt on my skin as we walked together
on the shore,
I've almost forgotten how good it felt 
to feel this happy

so if this is a bad poem for you,
please understand
that I want to briefly
capture this moment in the sun
before tomorrow,
before the sun sets and
cracks like an egg-yolk
and the sky goes
south
into the earth.

rachel kern

I love the way she moves
as she cleans
around the house.
I could get used to this,
I think
but you've had your chance and
she's humming now and
all you can think about
is how you'd like to hold her
and tell her everything-
everything
before it's too late.

"I'm not a very good writer," I say,
"oh shut up! she says,
stop fishing for compliments!"