THE BEST DAMN THAT COULD BE GIVEN AT THIS PARTICULAR MOMENT

Your swagger
I’d say something nice
about it
but I’d be lying

frankly I don’t think
you pull it off
very well
not everyone can

some people
are unaware of such
the ones who
find themselves

hysterical

COMPETITION WITH YOUR OWN SPLIT LIP AMOUNTS TO NOTHING

I want to dig your swagger
much more than I actually do
but the plain fact is
you just haven't got it

The blazer, the cheap shoes
THE SHOES FER CHRISSAKES
for the shoes alone
you should be shot

Sell off the corporate jet
complain how you hate losing
you will turn things around
through sheer force of ill

Passing through like driftwood
only less knotty
washed ashore and dried out
like a ruined promise

What's worse
the ruin
or the promise?

UNFORGETTABLEVILLE

I could've just
pulled something
if I was the kind of person
who pulled things

Every fifteen minutes or so
I get the urge
to call my old phone numbers
and ask for me

In the vague hope that
one of these
mes' lives
has really worked out

Fabulous wealth
a complete lack of worry
the respect of my (his) peers
and a nice complexion

I call the numbers
in sequence from the first
I can remember
to the most recent

Obviously I would feel
most relieved if
the earliest iterations
worked out the best

That would mean
they have enjoyed
happiness the longest
and isn't that the point?

But I've been
trying to give
that up for
a long time now

Shiftlessness
lack of conscience
deformed morality
uncivil behavior

Inappropriate appetites

The world hardly
prepares one for anything
wholesome and throws shit
in our faces

With two hands
to make sure we get it
which we do even when
we think we don't

Said the mute
to the deaf man:
I'm blind
not smell-dead

I AM HERE

I've given up on the white beaches
and blue waters of the Mediterranean

I'm resigned to never seeing Amsterdam's
red light district again

I will never travel by train through Canada
to the place they once called Fitzhugh

Denmark, Norway, even Berlin are all
completely out of reach by now

When I point to a map with my finger
I see a skeletal digit's shadow fall

When I turn a globe I feel my open eyes
with each and every spin

When I think about a passport
I see blank yellowed pages of life erased

I am here
and here I shall remain

SHORT TRIP HOME

Through the gates
past the iron lion
up the slight grade
feeling the gravel
crunch beneath you
the yearly sojourn
every early July
because tradition calls

the sun unforgiving
the welcome less so
time has healed much
be grateful for that
and so many other
things you've forgotten

SONG OF HATE

I cannot bear to reread
the instructions
and find out
what I've done wrong

It seemed fairly simple
I looked at them
with great care
or so I thought

Now I question everything
my baseline standard
and why not
nothing ever changes

FULL MOON, EMPTY HEART

There was no sunshine
no breeze
only the suggestion
of bells sounding
from far off

When dusk hit
the shadows made
circus freaks
of us all
taller wider ruined

A full moon risen
lights my way
the giant lantern
seeking truth
mocking my heart

CHECKLIST: HOW WE FALL OUT OF LOVE

1. Quickly
2. Surprisingly
3. Sadly
4. With regret
5. With relief
6. At a moment's notice
7. On airplanes
8. In other countries
9. With haste
10. With waste
11. With no net
12. With bitterness
13. With anger
14. Stupidly
15. Soberly
16. In a fugue state
17. Forever
18. For never
19. For God's sake
20. Because this shit has got to stop
21. With surety

CHECKLIST: HOW WE FALL IN LOVE

1. Madly
2. Badly
3. Poorly
4. With benefits
5. With people we hate
6. At first sight
7. At first fuck
8. One glance on the street
9. With movie stars
10. With rock stars
11. With drugs
12. With dogs
13. With toys
14. Dumbly
15. Drunkenly
16. In a blackout
17. Forever
18. For never
19. For old times' sake
20. Because no one else will have us but us
21. With surety

HISTORY OF ART BY H.W. JANSON

There is great beauty in the world
we all know this to be true
there is great love in the world
sometimes we're not so sure about this

Love at first sight exists and don't let
anyone tell you otherwise for they are wrong
perhaps jealous because they have not
yet experienced it for themselves

How could I know that seeing her
right ear - her ear! - would prove to me
that love at first sight was for real
and forever unfading undaunted unmatched

She was one seat in from the aisle
and to this day I wonder where did I get
the nerve to ask her: "Is this one free?"
and sat down right next to my destiny

In love for the rest of my life
though I wouldn't get the chance
to demonstrate that love for twenty years
you read that right: twenty years

She had skin like milk and small features
her face contained more beauty than I had
ever before beheld in one visage
the way she took notes slew me

The lecturer held great promise
for a life-changing class of all the world's art
shown in full-color slides from fertility idols
to the geniuses of the present day

But the real life change came for me
two days later when class met again
and she was sitting in the same seat
and I sat next to her beautiful ear again

I'M MORE THAN ONE SUNSET BEHIND

Because that's the way
God planned it.

He looked, he evaluated,
he threw the mother into drive
and this is where we ended up:

You looking your way, me looking mine.

There are still so many pipe dreams
available, which makes for a cozy
two minutes on the set list of
your life.

Me, I'm taking a gander at a
pitiless past and an even
more pitiless future.

Can't you see me waiting tables,
pulling double shifts
—with my back!—
stacking quarters like a levee
against the rent
of some shabby
rooming house like in
The Abbott & Costello Show?

I can't hardly not afford to not wait.

In the meantime the sun is setting
somewhere and it's a beautiful
pink orange gold one
magical and provoking those
who witness it to grow insane
at the joy of existence.

I missed it.
I was here, next to you.

Nowhere I'd rather be.

MY INNER VENTRILOQUIST DOLL IS A MAJOR BUZZKILL

Wood not plastic
solid stuffing helps
but I like
a big hole
in the body
not that goddamn
string you pull

I couldn't get
so lucky as to
have my inner
ventriloquist doll
insult waitresses
flight attendants
madams at bordellos

And have them all
find it charming
giggling behind
their hands
exchanging glances
and seeing me
in a new light

He is pure id
says what he means
means what he says
doesn't say what
should stay unspoken
and has a mouth
like a sailor

Matter of fact
he just told me
while I was
drinking a nice
twelve ounce glass
of seltzer water
"Why'ncha go fuck yuhself?"

THE FUN NEVER BEGINS

You bastards stole
my G.I. Joe
with Kung Fu Grip

But Xed me out
for the C word
in an email

I admit that's
just plain rude
but you're thieves

and theft is a crime—
is cursing?

I'm uncouth
but you're criminals

Stealing my soul
was the least
of it

THE ADEQUATE SPARROW

I challenge you:
possibly the most
familiar of all
wild birds.

Though you are
lacking in color
and your song
is unremarkable—

your smooth feathers,
your adaptability,
your familiarity
frequently paints you

as a representative
of the common,
the vulgar, the lewd—
or divine providence.

I challenge you:
fly, fly away.
Be a sparrow;
an adequate sparrow.

THERE REALLY WAS A PRECIOUS

And she was Latino with very large very white
teeth and she bit my cock hard when I came
because I only had $14 and not the $15 she had
asked for.

There was an older French woman who looked
passable in the black light of the anteroom where
you pick your "girl" but once we were in private
she peeled

off a body stocking and her entire form changed
into something of a blob. But she was very nice
and took charge in a way that was comforting,
thank God:

"First, I'm gonna suck…." And she did but after
the revelation of her physiognomy I wasn't
quite present. She had other ideas, though,
parting her

labia proudly: "I'm very clean here," but after
a few long minutes of that she could sense I
was elsewhere. She resorted to lotion and her
hands - generally

a fool-proof combo, but when you are lost, you
are lost. Who else? The young black woman
who took me to a freezing room in a 42nd St.
hotel (the

OLD 42nd St.) late on a Thanksgiving evening.
Though I tipped her generously she didn't like
the idea of giving me any change. But eventually
she relented,

pulling a few folded and blood soaked bills from
the front of her underwear. She smiled a half-
lidded smirk and said "Here it is, baby, your
blood money."

A NOTHING MORNING IS BREAKING

The ship is empty at daybreak
even the captain is gone
though he was nice enough
to leave his forwarding
address

I see the scar on your knee
and though you've told me
I can't help wondering
where and when that got
engraved

There's a battle raging for
our souls and the odds are
worsening with each passing day
though there is no clearcut
evil

There's no good either
but we all knew that already
just an academic exercise or
an experiment without Pyrex
beakers

The results are only going
to be shredded anyway
which serves to make it
seem fixed like professional
wrestling

RETURNING TO THE SCENE OF THE CRIME

But this time with sharper
eyes thanks to my Cavalli
glasses worn for the express
purpose of looking more
intelligent and hirable.

What am I looking for
exactly and why can't I
see whatever it is through
this new prescription?
Why am I still so blind?

KNEE DEEP IN HEAVYWEIGHT BLUES

I strongly suspect I have arthritic knees. The rain says so.
They always hurt walking up stairs, now they're starting to hurt
walking down the stairs.

There was a time, though brief, when I took Jesus up on his
"my yoke is easy and my burden is light" routine;
in today's parlance he was my spotter.

I admire the old bluesmen's dedication to their music and
its legacy of suffering, but they kept it alive for idiots with
few complaints. That's not right.

You'd be shocked to know that I once pumped iron, bulked up
on supplements, ran a pretty fair 40 before I took to sucking
on bongs and guzzling 40s.

Sometimes I felt clearer about it all as a result: an understanding
I had never before experienced that led back to God
(not Jesus this time, but close enough).

I hit my knees morning and night. Maybe that's how I
ruined them: by praying for redemption and climbing stairs
to sit at God's right hand.

HER WINDOW FACES THE STREET

She doesn't collect hearts
she steals them

Her hands touch you and
you feel healed

When she sings in the shower
she sounds happy

Even though all the songs
are about regret

She doesn't forget a thing
even small details

Her garden is a Monet
and smells like heaven

SEVEN SIGNS YOU'RE GOING TO HATE A JOB

1. You get the job.
2. You get the job.
3. You get the job.
4. You get the job.
5. You get the job.
6. You get the job.
7. Everyone on your team loves Thai food.