THE HOBBY

THE HOBBY


i lOv
PaiNt
ting ting
noW
cAwS I haVE no idea…
whAt
or wHo
or wHen
and this ! delicious drip
ping ping
is begin
ning ning
to infirm my poetics
as well

THE HERBIVORE

I duz luv
to git ma ass
high!

THE TWENTY DWARVES

THE 20 DWARVES


I’m in my lounger,
one hand on the dipstick
and the other poised to push REC.
Nudity was promised.
I was thinking full frontal of Neuwirth.

I got her last week
in a skimpy one-piece from an old Frazier,
so I was eager to take the next step.
It turns out all we see
is one of Bening’s shoulders

naked for a blink
and lots of Beatty as “Bugsy”
repeating “20 dwarves took turns
doing handstands on the carpet,”
trying to improve himself.

T. HERBERT CANNABIS (aka Homegrown) for the HOUSE

As a steamed member of the Marijuana party
I too am running at the mouth for congress
Sexual of course
I have served on the joint committee
For all these wobbly years
And am currently seeking support
I have a reputation for attending faithfully to my own extramarital affairs
Snapshots of my miss handlings are available for a small contribution
These are my six illegitimate daughters
I can assure you they know how to work the stump
I can speak for the lowest common man
No creep left behind
I have a record of convictions
I know from personal experience how a Patriot Acts when plastered
And I have a plan to match my opponent’s blueprint for disaster
To provide comprehensive health care Lettuce
encourage our youth to grow their own
My campaign slogan is: “A chick and some pot in every trailer!”
I pledge allegiance to the fag
And will completely free speech before the end of my fucking first term
But nubile females will have to register their breasts with the bureau of legal intoxicants
As your pro-life candidate I promise to demonstrate in front of recruitment offices
carrying a sign that says: Stop the partial birth abortions of our fetuses in Iraq!
I’ll also work untiringly to stem selling political power to the highest bidder
I feel that the meetings of the sexually active should be closely monitored…er…
Just to determine their viability as an alternative energy source of course
I think the budget for Defense has become offensive
I promise to open the first extermination…er…recycling camp for holiday music in my district
Free condoms and rolling papers will be available to the wild oats farmers
College students will be allowed only three abstinences before they are flunked
& in order to subvert what I feel is a toxic atmosphere of pomposity and hypocrisy in govt.
I will establish an open zipper policy in my office

LET GO

I’ve been let go
I’ve been farted out the back door
of a cramped office
Something rank and foul
at the center of my life
gassing me full of paychecks
and sugary self-esteem
has given way
A strong smell of shit is in the air
Can Spring be far behind

I'M STRANGE

no pine tree in my house
no electric camels and sheep on my front lawn
don’t sing love songs to frozen precip.
not sending pictures of elves

to everyone I know
haven’t a clue what an elf is
a completely elfless sonofabitch
who is liable to drink eggnog in July

that’s me
I followed a star once
her name was Brigitte Bardot
it wasn’t wise

in case any of you revelers give a shit
I’m standing under some cobwebs
waiting to be kissed on the skin flute
and I keep both my chest nuts away from open fires

ON CLOUD THREE

Ravel’s one-armed piano concerto
is tickling the ivories of my spine,
while I digest a breakfast of baby shrimp
and diabolically turn H2O into urine.

Then, left hand ringing false as usual,
Dottie Goldbarth, whose dots have yet
to be connected, stops by. Zipping down,
exposing my dangerous chest locks,

I quip, “Still marred with two children
and a wealthy insignificant other, I see!”
and, voila, it’s air on the g-string
followed by music for royal fireworks.

I TAKE CHANCES

I comb my hair forward
I lick envelopes
I drive to the store
I shop hungry
I eat the skin
I take communion
I use condoms
I answer the phone
I fart in the shower
I sit in the sun
I go to the dentist
I clip my own toenails
I listen to Glass
I read the paper
I invest
I send out poems
I listen to the scores
I go to the bathroom
I invite people over
I vote
I include “A well regulated Militia” when I read the Second Amendment
I watch Public Television
I married twice
I taught in an all-girls’ school for three years
I cracked a joke there
I rake leaves
I take pain killers
I go to the movies in the summer
I watch films rated G
I look in the mirror
I walk in the woods
I drink the water

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS


pissing in the wind was nearly taken by Prose Ax.

a limerick was rejected without comment by Poetry and APR.

the dirty little blind sister poem was raved about by Charles Harper Webb in a workshop at Vermont College on August 11, 2005.

a recess made little Debbie Bump spit Pepsi all over herself at an open mic last year.

anal clucking and the dumps were published in The Chiron Review (which then went out of business) and were referred to as “a perfect delight and perfect for Charles’ workshop” by Roger Weingarten when accompanied by my deposit check.

the bathroom poems were published in Naked Knuckle and Dead End: City Limits simultaneously (because somebody fucked up).

there’s something going around was published in Barrow Street which has since rejected me three times in a row.

anal clucking was not nominated for a Pulitzer Prize.

not one lowku was selected for the annual Best American Poetry collection.

pornku was a finalist in an “International Poetry Contest” along with 10,364 other entries, and we only had to pay $59.95 a piece for copies of the anthology that our work appeared in.

light bulbous girls was published in Knocked despite the fact that I had called the editor an asshole for rejecting my previous submission.

the script will be published in Paris Review over Simic’s dead body.

aging cracks me up was self-published on a mimeograph machine and distributed on the streets of Syracuse, NY.

manager to checkout 3 was enjoyed immensely by Tom Corrado, Dick Ross and Harry Maggio in a back room of the Last Call tavern.

the remainder of the poems in this ms. were simultaneously rejected by Fence, Rattle, Chelsea, the Colorado Review, Crazy Horse and Boulevard.

HONEY, I'M HAM

8 lanes fast forwarding
the large eggs have to be boiled
3 minutes and 22 seconds
whose turn is it at the bird feeder

you’re sorry
you’re always sorry
the point of the pencil keeps disappearing
who put that turd at the base of my tulip

you better salute that kernel, boy
the washing machine is not pursuing happiness
I tilted that painting on purpose
goddamn it

the battle of the bumper stickers
everyone is jammed
into a single middle finger – sir,
would you please try your card again

SOMETHING IS VIBRATING IN MY CHINOS

it’s Rebecca from Portsmouth
she’s not sleeping well lately
and she wants to talk
she’s great at multi-tasking

her boyfriend Bill is inside her
panting and moaning
I tell her to activate the loudspeaker
and quickly get as hard as a Gillette Foamy can

she’s talking about asparagus
she says she loves the furry tops of the vegetable
but the stem she can do without
I can hear the clicking of the connection

she’s dicing and spicing
what she lacks in enthusiasm
she makes up for in precision
and then Bill & I come together

TODAY'S PROGRAM DESCRIPTIONS

In this intense psychological drama by Roman Polanski, an architect shaves his mustache but no one notices.

Hollywood has-been torments famous sister in wheelchair.

Three people share their anxieties in an unnamed country, starring Mickey Rooney, Annette Funicello and Peter Lorre.

Beautiful women offer pleasing moments. ($9.95)

A Pakastani coffee vendor was once a janitor. (with Errol Flynn)

An impotent war veteran is reunited with his former love, and the sun is the only thing rising.

A man’s marriage crumbles during his quest for a candy bar.

A power struggle erupts between the queen and his lover. (Nature Special)

A singing Australian vampire, played by Red Buttons, finds his soul mate in Brooklyn.

A dentist lands in a lunar cavity with a lap dancer.

Privileged collegians wallow in British Literature and Diet Pepsi.

Mentally challenged sheriff goes into telemarketing.

In this wickedly entertaining Paid Advert for a stain remover, Norman Bates takes a shower after a long day of checking in with his customers.

Two Mexican women battle an emaciated mouse. (Fit TV)

TALKING TO MY HAIRDRESSER

Just trim around the ears.
Trust me they’re there.

The wax? I’m a cottage industry.
I make candles out of it.

My girlfriend? I don’t understand her tongue
until it’s in my mouth.

Honestly I’ve tried to go fuck myself,
but I can’t figure out how to do it.

I get all tangled up
and wind up fucking somebody else every time.

Could you turn your head when you cough please?
Thanks.

THE 20 DWARVES

I’m in my lounger,
one hand on the dipstick
and the other poised to push REC.
Nudity was promised.
I was thinking full frontal of Neuwirth.

I got her last week
in a skimpy one-piece from an old Frazier,
so I was eager to take the next step.
It turns out all we see
is one of Bening’s shoulders

naked for a blink
and lots of Beatty as “Bugsy”
repeating “20 dwarves took turns
doing handstands on the carpet,”
trying to improve himself.

JEOPARDY

contestant number one
does colonoscopies for a living

people fart in his face
while he saves their lives

he doesn’t enter
until the patient is positioned

ass and drugged up
moaning

we are told the money is good
we are led to believe that an annual

month-long cruise with a flat-assed mate
makes it all worthwhile

us with our moons gazing up
us with our sugar polyps

ACROSS A CROWDED ROOM

let’s say I’m malignant
but I spread so slowly
I am considered benign
part of the lumpen family

you’re mostly puritan
not in the habit of ravishing yourself everyday
so I stay under the radar
feeling you up

you keep your distance
the condition worsens
the drugs you need are illegal
hit and run is your story in a nutshell

I might be gay
the product of a single mother
kiss me through the face mask
hold me by my oxygen tank

if my name doesn’t appear on your television
how can I be anyone
not even worth the immature bark
of a fox kit

let’s say I’m buds
that only lead to a lot of naked trees
unable to provide enough cover
for a quick piss in the woods

knowing can’t cure the disease
but you are more beautifully sad now
I love you I say
and that’s the first symptom

THEMSELF

They chant the catalog of other people’s sins
Their eyeball on backwards

They say the rules are important everybody must follow
They whose tongues are the color of cat shit

They say it is so nice to meet you
Or was that the snake between their lips

It is essential to get the stains out they say
These spotless leopards

They say die for us and we will worship you
I say I wonder what you would taste like barbecued

They say right and wrong
I say two sides of the same rotting corpse

I’m looking at the ocean
They say it’s exactly thirteen after one

This is the road to take they say
Pointing to a shortcut of slime

They bring wars to their children wrapped in ribbons
Even their own intestines are against them

They move about in schools
But they can’t find anything smaller than themself to eat

TINY BIBLES

the meat loaf sticks
there is no sex without stomach cramps
and watching from lowdown my car risen up
tank nearly empty
gutters all full
I can’t even save one chipmunk
from the meow of death

yet dreaming out beyond god
where sin is illogical
Im gets an apostrophe
before being hooked up
with perfect enough
pawns can be queens
and Everlast holds up the boxers

WALKING AROUND WITHOUT A HEART (for Mal de Hyde)

All these years my penis has been faking it
If it rains I don’t lift a finger
I mate online I sleep
I have various organs removed
I eat chocolate covered cranberries
I watch basketball without hope
I put my clothes on the line
Nothing else
I have aches like anyone else
but they don’t lead to assaults
I have an extra room under my left nipple
I invite a slice of pizza in
Jazz makes me feel sound
Hairs I leave behind from the EKG
I like to see what’s inside the dead trees
The telephone is always a shock
like Plato walking in and asking for a peach
The computer is a trash compactor
I shop for general anesthesia
I only shave before surgery
I smell like dominion
I come up two lemons and a banana
Listen to the road noise
You can almost tell the mail from the garbage truck
The lungs sound like someone learning how to play the flute
There’s a recession I’m told
you should be writing happier poems
An erection is an erection I respond
In the land of the free
and the Black Buried young
Please visit me in the hospital cellar

AS IF THEY WERE DRACULAS

today I’ll paint
the rocks “partly cloudy”
or maybe “chance in hell”
with hunks of wildflowers

dipped in my puddle palette
breathe sporadically
share my mask
and count the clover

as if they were Draculas
because they say
it’s important to keep busy
otherwise you might go insane

STUPID SHEWS

Uh look at these here stupid shews
Never learns how to walk by theirselfs
No matter how many X we gits in n shows em

They’s like politicians
Loafers that keeps their laces lookin’ straight
So’s we don’t throws ‘em out

They’s like soldyas never can’t think fer themselfs
But sure always willin’ to stomp on holy ground
N anything called “the enemy”

They’s like Pee-Yewritans
Gets made in some dingy factory
Where nobody joys nothin’ they’s doin’

They’s like the creeples next door big mouths
Always puttin’ they feet in em
Never moves a hammatoe to help anyone lessen they has to

They’s like the hags we marry
Makes you feel gilty
If you don’t keep ‘em polished n well-heeled

They’s like the brats we have
Needen us to do everything’ fer ‘em
Cain’t even wipe the shit offa theirselfs

They’s like human bungs
Clings to the stink firm which they comes
Smells up the place somethin’ feerce

They’s like two-bit poets like me
Cain’t even walk in another’s shews
Without gettin wicked blisters

Now look at them there lame-ass hats
Hooks for brains
N…

Those limp-wristed gloves
One hand totally ignorant
A what the other un doin’

Aksessries one and all

MISTER 15TH STREET

I accidentally as much as I on purpose

sitting on the sidewalk with the shards

married to outer space


a night in shining laughter

religion in the nude

winter in the psychotropics


this goofy threadbare soiled and wrenching way

what you fumble is my food

I show my toenails & expect to be let in

IN LA LA LAND

The wind has been transcribed into a Concerto by Mozart. The garbage man is referred to as Your Honor. His truck smells like toy marriages and families. Children follow it down the street, salivating to the sound of its bells, their fists flowering with legal tender they find on the lawns.

The mosquitoes stay on their own side of the street. Infections surrender peacefully to the medicines. Death is confined to the Alfred Hitchcock Show reruns. The last pedophilic thought in the world was just sold to a museum of unnatural history for a bundle.

When the janitors emerge from their places of employment, huge crowds of teenagers start screaming and trying to touch them, hoping that some of that toilet bowl aroma will rub off on them.

Everyone has their fuck-you fingers removed at a baptismal font during the first three months of life. This practice was begun during the pontificate of George Bush IV who is also much loved for restoring the ancient Platonic custom of crucifying poets.

The ants knock before entering the house. One look from the master and the mud relinquishes the boot.

Calendar girls are no longer needed; men are satisfied with herbal tea and I-Can’t-Believe-It’s-Not-Buttered toast. The word sex has been eliminated from all application forms.

Oil is free and plentiful, homes are built in the middle of superhighways, and the air is squeaky clean.

Wombs are guaranteed to produce for at least 200 years. Skin color is not allowed. War is fun. Earthquakes and tsunamis are a blessing from the Almighty because they give us a chance to travel bearing gifts.

God is good. And so is the ATM.

THE CATERPILLAR POEM

THE CATERPILLAR POEM


I begin to see my life in terms of caterpillars.

For getting up in the morning, I deserve three caterpillars.

The bowel movement, or lack thereof, gets two caterpillars.

For starting another novel, the inner critic shoots me a finger, i.e. one lousy caterpillar.

For being faithful to my wife for three years: five caterpillars.

For sending poems to literary magazines: a dozen cocoons in the branches of a wild cherry tree.

For gazing at porn: an erection made out of 3,622 caterpillars.

For making it all the way to the end of this poem: the windows of my soul shall be covered by caterpillars.

For exchanging pleasantries with my neighbor, I award myself four baby caterpillars which I eat like potato chips before throwing up.

For the fucked-up song in my heart: three leeches disguised as caterpillars.

For all the useless stars in the virtually heavenless world: an asterisk.

For my contempt which art an appropriate blight on this universe of immature insects, there aren’t enough caterpillars in the world.

And for Ebony, my favorite whore, my entire collection of pennies.

THE NOBILITY OF MAN

daddy’s got eight legs
all different sizes
clinging to my bathroom wall

directly in front of me
as I pee
blowing so he’ll twitch

GUESS WORK

I looked up from cleaning
the Ladies room in a Hoboken Lerner shop
which experts say is a good sign

too busy making money
to support my children
to support my children

the comedienne spent an hour talking about pubic hair
there was an engine with a hacking cough
and the snoring of religion

maybe if I pull out of America
and re-enter from Mexico
I’ll finally have an orgasm

GARBAGE DAY

I often find fresh shit on my driveway
I look at it as new legislation
that I didn’t give my consent to

when the ink dries I take a shovel
and file it in the woods
without leaving a stain

AHA!

I didn’t know what I was doing
I didn’t like the little tire hiding behind a bush
so I lifted it and placed it up high around the branch of a tree
like a rock on the finger of a gorgeous blond

I didn’t feel like a minister or a genius
I just went on about my business
I sell sawdust for a living
Anyway

a friend said I don’t like it
the tire doesn’t go with the tree
and that’s when I realized
it was perfect

I CALL MY THOUGHTS "THE DOMINOS"

first of all Nero didn’t have no fucking fiddle

bird shit on my driveway –
white power

I have more pine cones
than anyone else in my village
and I produce the most gas

My fingers smell like a phone number

I’m taking as long as I can
to get to my death –
jogging, flossing, watching TV

I wish there were some other way
to do this 69

80 degrees and sunny
imagine how people are suffering
at the malls

it’s a given: the whore wants less than she is worth

my brain is a coiled-up poisonous snake
living off my flesh and
I love Jarlsberg cheese

Our public lands are not for sale!
so says the post card

before I may drool on myself
I have to card this girl

she’s pulling my leg
he’s jerking me around
they’re yanking my chain
guess what you can do with your bowl of cherries

life has no meaning -
not even this French toast
of cinnamon raison bread I made for you -
oh yeah sure that of course
but nothing else

I dreamt of Angelina Jolie last night
she was sitting on some mossed-up shingles
giving me the sign for a curve ball

I like living
a few ants always get in
my socks keep falling down
and I need servicing three X a year
but the calendars are great

as soon as I get up
my stomach starts right in:
jerk, it says, remember that woman
you saw coming out of the nursery yesterday,
you should have said what a beautiful ash you have!

she’s playing the harpsichord naked
it’s the only way I can stand it

rain makes the grass high
but it doesn’t work for me

George Crumb
this could be the start of something subatomic

with all the female chauvinist prigs around these days
it’s easy to become a sex offender

I’m on a voyage of self-deception
and my vehicle is the poem

I call my thoughts the dominos

MY OWN LITTLE SANDBOX

i can’t tell the sky apart from the ocean

anonymity is bliss

or perhaps twenty minutes of aerobics

how did that birch tree get there

I like the way she smells after exercising

imagine the word smeghlls

the cops are at the door

the rust is silence

and then a symphony of frogs

my sex life comes to me in the mail

soap opera clouds

wanna buy a leaf

songbirds guarding all the entrances

KLAVERSTYKKER

KLAVERSTYKKER


I am the kind of vegetation
that can water itself

if god exists
why does my ass always itch

I had my chance to pull her pants down
right there by the water cooler

your honors I swear
I am coming to the connection

insight emerging from the trite and the light
I deserve every splinter I get

Hello, Dali
my afterglow’s like a pile of wet rags

this is the stanza during which I get up
walk away from the poem and brush my teeth

I can put you under so
you won’t remember any of this tomorrow

simultaneity
two or more divinely inspired events

actus reus & mens rea
occurring at the same time

quantify pontificate
you’re delirious

golfball leaping like a gazelle across the highway
someone needs to be sedated

THE MOSS ON THE SHINGLES

I’m falling apart
and it’s nice I like it

the ordinary is too difficult
I’d rather play the lemon

the raccoon in the sky
hold onto your fat

shrill is such a beautiful word
naked/without its connotations

image results for Agnes Martin
bid on Agnes Martin now!

the #1 as opposed to the #1
a fair fight

dargnabulation
time is abstract

the plan is a coup d’etat
vs. confusion resulting in chaos

all suggestions will be used
after being melted down with the dimes

looks like I’ve finally clipped my commatoes
I should have written that last line in Spanish

in Educating Rita Frank asks her:
“have you come all this way for so very very little?”

when I took out my hankie
the squirrel thought it meant something

A THIRD OF JUNE

cloud to cloud?

was that thunder?

not unless you’re a Greek god?

clap?

the word leggy has an impact on my penis?

we are all androids?

many New Yorkers are sitting peacefully beside their kills?

like a housecat with its rubber mouse?

why wisdom teeth?

Pope Superego MMVI?

flash?

did I thunder again?

p-hew?

TIME

it is now time to dance

that's a strange sentence

is this time better than any other

yes of course it is

this time is the only time we have

dates plans lists down the toilet

after the heavy rains

a worm stretches out

like a drying isle of tar on the pavement

HEMORRHAGING

I have a Thursday morning coffee poem inside me
it runs into my sloth and sloshes around for awhile getting nowhere
icky issues of abortion and gay marriage blending in
as it scorches everything on its way to the bladder

and here I sit in my Joe Stalin cap eyes circling the globe
master of tin cans and irises
waiting for Joan Mitchell canvasses to come swirling out of my pen
will I bloom or vomit

it is best to sit close to a sink
sink along with me I’m on my way to a bar
my early days were filled with Perry Como and tennis balls
and I have yet to be transported by a limousine

oh Sid oh Imogene alas I knew ye well
as my precision cuckoo clock winds down
the bird hanging out of its house
like a lure for laughter

did king Camels kill my papa
I almost married a girl named LaSalle last night
I was plucked from that ocean by the alarm clock
and now it’s raining on all the scars

here comes Art selling his Cabernets
religion in its lingerie governmental glibness
bumble bees all swallowed up by the petals
just you wait till I finish fondling my capital X

EVERYTHING IS ART

I have to piss
(because I’m a man
I piss I don’t pee not me)

I’m desperate to drain the lizard
the nearest bathroom doesn’t have a lock on it
I rush in and unzip

a woman has followed me in
she wants to watch
we get into an argument

next I’m in my own room
with the door locked
and just as I’m about to whiz

two people who have keys to my room
enter and take seats around my urinal
they’re smiling and very professional

now I’m lying on my back
and looking through dozens of stalls
in a public restroom

everything is yellow christ and stinks
one crapper’s ripped off the wall
others are squirting or occupied or worse

awake with a useless hard-on
I think of what might have happened
had I gotten to take the dream leak

and buzz for my bedpan

THE PROPER WAY TO VERBALLY ABUSE A CHILD

when my niece returned from the bathroom
with her five-year-old she said
"it's a good thing we went; it was serious!"
and I looked at Roger and said
"I am glad; I don't want people
making frivolous trips to my bathroom!"

he hadn't a clue just like earlier
when he asked me why the tire was
hanging on the tree and I told him
because I was hoping that the tree
would teach itself to drive in case
it had a cousin on the other side of town
it wanted to visit

his mouth opened
and his thumb jerked out from his palm
as if dreaming of saliva

WHAT I HAVE, SO FAR

the novel begins with a hairy arm
it becomes reattached of course
but incorrectly
as a rib with a woman clinging to it
a gnosh here a gnash there
some rambling six cylinders engaged
this is what happens when you make people up out of loneliness
you get beautiful colors and faulty transmissions
blisteringly hot leather interiors
a scalpel poised above the point of incision
can we separate the woman from the rib
while eating an apple
lure her away with lengthy research projects perhaps
so that the hairy arm can have some semblance of its man back
two characters wanting to be three
an A and a B wanting to equal C
abstract romantic UFOs
there is too much drool on the pillow now
let’s turn it over
side B is not as popular but it can grow on you
it’s where the artist can feel free to experiment
now that he is wealthy
chapter two is real fun
sunshine resorts lots of lengthy sexual liaisons
the hairy arm wants to be a monk
the woman wants so much more than just a rib
it must be the wine
they’re finished repopulating so that’s not a motive
they like the way the gauze feels against the wounds
room service I need another print cartridge please
chapter three gets talked out in Room 208
mice roaches fleas and ticks all disguised as words
the hair is so thick
the rib makes her feel like a woman
museum marijuana chicken parmagiana
snake rib Elijah skirt made of pine cones who cares
first the pain killers and then the fecal impaction
later the controversy (British pronunciation)
of the intercalary chapter that begins
“Her cleavage makes him salivate.”
and goes on for dozens of pages
before it ends with the naked couple running for the exit of the garden

untitled

think of me as a stone
in your salivary gland

puritan you are not
in the habit of ravishing yourself

part of the lumpen family
I go undetected

you keep your distance
and the condition worsens

the drugs you need
are illegal

hit and run is your story
in a nutshell

kiss me thru the face mask
hold this old oxygen tank

I might be gay
or

the product of a single mother
in the wake of invention

I have a digital phone now
if your name doesn’t appear on my television

you are nobody not even worth
the immature bark of a fox kit

I am buds that eventually lead
to a lot of naked trees

can’t even provide enough cover
for a quick piss in the woods

knowing can’t cure the disease
but it can make you more beautifully sad

I love you I say
the first symptom

NEW HAMPSHIRE

in a Laundromat named Ron Padgett
I find this sock
“…free of the baggage of who I happen to be…”

I put it behind my right ear like a pencil
and wait for an idea
I decide to take it home and look for a match

I find “keep away from children”
and “close cover before striking”
but no match however

there is something without a mate in my home
me
so I decide to take many baths

until I am the same color
in the bathtub I begin wondering
if Gary Snyder lost many of his articles

while meditating in Japan
I figure yes he must have spent time in Laundromats
I also don’t know why my computer is always forcing me to capitalize Laundromat

it doesn’t seem proper to me
but that’s neither here nor there
I could hang myself on a line to dry

or I could just dye
I prefer living in a poem rather than the other way around
my feet don’t have to go together

JANGLE

JANGLE


can you dance
do you do full throttle

I don’t care about your ten grandchildren
they make no improvement in the species

have you got a quarter
moon hanging out of your ass

don’t give me that dachshund look
without an –itis you’re all ego my dear

BEAUTY

“Truth,” he said in 1819
“Nonsense candy, Schonberg!” I retorted in 2009
but I didn’t stop there
a sweater full of pills
Vermont suddenly declaring pot legal
the five-year-old’s flashing sneakers
her panties as I am pulling them off
etc.

when you turn the spell checker off
time dies and is reborn
I finally shut my mouth about beauty
sex depicted on a stained glass window
whether we win or lose
life encased in plastic
all the hours spent studying it from outside

how we whistle before our freight train derails
now you can moan like you mean it
now you can play the piano like a toddler
now you can come home meowing for milk after rolling in the dirt
now you can wish the murderer were never born
now you can understand why the word war is so much worse than fuck or pussy

philosophy is a beautiful armored tank
the geese are all tuned up
it’s good to wash the mirror once in awhile
after I finished filing away my important papers I closed the cabinet and the handle came off
if I hadn’t gotten saliadenitis I wouldn’t have met Gina
love is always wrong but beauty couldn’t care less

here comes opus 25
I was small and my father made me smaller
there will never be enough poems
the juncos decide to put their nest on my air conditioner
Sneaky Piet, the boogie woogie man
brown shoes don’t make it
allusive, cryptic, I comb my long dark hair

ITCHY HOMO

up the poplar
down five stars and to the right
there’s a peanut named payola
where a people live like wee
give them a seed
and they’ll sow it in the wrong place
any fault will do any desert
they gather on Brownie nights
to bemoan their stunted growths
the quake the drought a deity’s fault
prayer beads made of Honest Abe pennies
some paranoiac runt at the head of the flock
he who learnt his lines by rote
the phone calls are dialed by digital
the messes are dealt with by endoscopy
the moments are dismembered by plans
yawn burp sigh kneel and curse
would they shit you of course they would
and give the miracle a name
anti-death & anti-body
they are paid by the immaturish to dabble
the co-pay is all they are willing to add to the pot
they believe in unfunny cards
they will not let anything be wild
st. chemo smiles out of a flat screen spa
an Australian vintner is the shaman
language is a problem
3 and 4 letter words disable them
but jargon they like like a rattle
give them a sunset they can understand
and they will gleefully go for all the glue traps
say cheese I do and pledge allegiance
argue for obesity and pubescence
as long as it has the right genomes
raise herds of scapegoats and asses
they are the circus they just can’t find the road
give them Barnum Jesus Bailey Christ
give them their day the size of a millisecond
an ant lugging a bit of feather three times its size
that thinks it’s a chief

AWARD FOR EXCELLENCE IN TEACHING

ya know that old song
a raincoat makes
when the arms swing
back and forth against its side?

times fifty?

perhaps you were expecting
something more intangible
like a gold watch?

POP GOES THE MIRACLE

everybody back to work!

MOM'S THE WORD

organized religion
arrives at my privates

THE PYTHAGOREAN THEOREM

if i pray hard enough
I'll just know it
when the teacher calls on me

CAPTION

for a photo
of a demolished trailer park
possessions and body parts
scattered everywhere
I just wanted to lure a few nuthatches to my feeder

RAINY DAY

there is a drop
on a mission
to find me
to flower me

DRAGONFLY

I wind up parked
on a mountain of a belly
scratching my legs together
using my peripheral vision
on the human – one wrong move
and I’ll take back the whole universe again

LIFE HAS NO MEANING

around every corner
a woman has a project
she wants to play get in the way

I beg her pardon for bumping
I touch her hip excuse me
cartwheels handstands bobbing and weaving

if I can’t elude
I’ll have to go through her
anything to stay free radical and tangent

THE PRICK

I’m sitting on my bubble
exercising

inside the bubble
it is clear

I can see the billions
dead and dying

keeping the outer skin of the pudgy ball
supportive for me

though giving a little more
with each of my springs and landings

what a gay decay
is my luxury

PATTI

patti never calls
I have a very close relationship with my phone

patti doesn’t write
I am a prolific poet

patti doesn’t visit
my life is full of possibility

*

patti is my frog
my turtle and my fox

my pig says “Patti!”
every time I drop a penny in

if I patti my cat too much
she bites me

*

I drink patti like adrenalin

I patti back and forth on my bike

I pour patti on my pancakes

I climb patti to reach the peak

*

oh wicked wick in my wax

oh spark

oh black gems dropping
from the deer’s behind

oh crash trip
oh splat and bounce and roll and snuggle

*

I’m up to my flood stage in giraffes

worm that I am
I throw my line out for a patti

the heart of rotten wood all to myself
the dark cavity where I multiply

*

keep your pity for yourself
drop a patti in my cup

a thought is worth a thousand havings

she’s a maybe with all the extras

tartar sauce oozing out of a sandwich smile

22nd Century girl

*

TREATISE

the lung of philosophy
crawls across the floor
coughing

there is no other way
for a human being
to breathe

CLEANING MY GLASSES

sated with the crumbs of having

money love family work

what have you

muddle aged man

unbeautiful woman

lonely forever

in the monastery of consumerism

life is a marathon

even the teeth are sweating

if you are crawling about, press 1

every minute of want the fungus grows

THE NEXT PERSON WHO SAYS CELTIC TO ME WILL LOSE A FINGER

I am fourteen
a small bird that wants to die
selects my head

this occurs at an art institute
where lots of curvy young women
overemote about inconsequential matters

Gene Hackman and Peter Lorre are the resident villains
America is the leading manufacturer
of violent thunderstorms and applause signs

my expertise concerning the whimsical nature of smoke
has so far gone unreported there is a blog
to that effect which you will not find on Google

the odd half-naked Japanese girl
draped provocatively over downward flowing marble stairs
I do think moving but not enough to linger

the dogs the lightning the chatter
what else can I say
I don’t have anyone decapitated

the typewriter does it
that’s how antiquated we are
as far as I can tell I am not yet worshipped

there are moist wipes
and Dove beauty body wash squeeze bottles
displayed in offbeat places

thank you for reading this far by the way
the dream continues for approximately 47 years
I hope you’re not just another speed reader

masquerading as part of the intelligentsia
I can only take so much D-League showboating
thousands of franchises etc.

I use big words because size matters
I don’t waste time ogling the tropical fish
I order something in black bean sauce efficiently

I used to think females are different
the protuberances were blocking my vision –
they continue to shave in strange places though!

SCHONBERG

everyone is a pigeon
flying is always away from
Notre Dame means osteoporosis to me
where would I be without adultery
some days river like chocolate
she’s asleep while Paris forwards by
this is line #7 it’s doing its best
now we move to the transmission repair
the two left thumbs I bought for $2400
small is all
fifty degrees smiles the angular weather man
where the legs come together where the arms brush the ribs
deodorants are losing
quicksand is the name of my computer
I am not even a gulp

FLOORBOARD REVERIE

if I were wood I woodn’t
have to dance anymore
I could take it all lying down
beside myself
I’d able to relax with my knots
to remain silent
except for an occasional Zen squeak
to collect particles of dust
let the feet drag and pound against me
without recrimination
not answer the phone
not answer the call of the vagina
not always be filling up and emptying
no blood required
to hell with spelling and grammar
I could study the Klee calendar for decades
fuck the transmission guy
I’d keep it in the same gear permanently
and if some kid gets down on its knees
and starts blabbing at me
I might just snap in my warped way
KO the little bugger with one slap
and then sit back in my slot of oblivion
nobody the wiser

THE CARDINAL RULES

one may fly and eliminate at the same time

wearing red doesn’t mean you’re gay or a slut

just whistle if you want to get laid


love means eggs

if you are wanted, leave town

with “Three Pieces in the Shape of a Pear”

playing in your ears


blue jays are abortionists

sunsets are cheap imitations

Pollock is Art


we do not “borrow” books from the library

we have no need for a sheriff

all human beings are evil

HAIR AND FINGERS

my girl friend plays the hair on my chest
she has a talent I murmur
she whispers it’s just love
we are right

music is a combination of say
hard rigid strings and soft flexible fingers
we disappear into
become one with

we sleep peacefully
in a world being shelled and shattered
hair and fingers…hair and fingers…
later we will argue over the toast

THE FARMER DOCTOR MOORE

Celtic music was playing in the halls
The time machine was working

Stuff rarely happened on Sundays
So staff was minimal

Just Miriam a stacked nurse
and me the blissful intern at Intake

I should have been suspicious
as soon as he said his name

Gram without the ha! Iago
A loaded throwback

When I turned to get his file
he must have slipped a tab into my Earl Grey

Next shift reported Monday morning
to find me sprawled on the tiles

wearing nothing but a stark Miriam
and all the psychos sprung

My DNA was on everything
Even the upside down toilet seat was an eyewitness

CORRECT! YOU'VE WON A HALF-EATEN MOUSE!

I’m watching the collected poems of Ant’ny Soprano

I have my list of things to do

it doesn’t include someone who wants to do them

my days are numbered but they still don’t add up

I don’t know which exit to take and the toll keeps increasing

the pro-lifers won’t let me punctuate my own sentence

that’s right, double or nothing on that entendre

what’s behind it? the most treacherous philosophy:

two plus two equals four

followed by a showroom model infinity?

steam rising from a fresh dump

let’s face it

along with putting all the victims together in prison

we change the diapers every four years with our votes

the bottom line is a crack where the two cheeks separate

so we he-apes know where to aim our johnsons when the time comes

I was told to bring binoculars

but I’m afraid of getting too close to distant things

waiter, I have a tip for you: this life is overdone

I should have another bowl of oatmeal

yes that’ll perk me up!

REVISION

I GIVE A HEARTBEAT TO THE WEATHER


And, in return, it keeps me grounded, overlooking my smithereens. To be happy would require an Esmeralda under my umbrella. For this continuous being out of sorts there is nothing but Ocean Spray.

It wasn’t always like this. I had a tennis ball once. A greenness and a bounce. Everything was mythological. Dem Bums versus The Giants. In a broken down coliseum.

That’s why every mustard takes me back. Where the precip. ain’t schizophrenic. And the long range forecast is stalagmites. Show me what you can do with a paper clip.

We have but two choices here: Art or maggots. It all begins with cranberry juice. And the dreams disturb the sleep magnificently.

A clearance of throat, a glob of poetry.

#675

a small naked stone
along the shore
is being licked by an ocean

the discovery of fire is
a very personal matter

LONG ISLAND

the sound side
a woman
in a raincoat

the ocean side
a thong
with a woman billowing out of it

AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH IN OIL & VINEGAR

I’m sitting on top of a mile-high stack of books

a lot of gray up here

but the flies are few

I can say stuff like now is the whimper of my discontent

in a self-contradictory and dead language kind of way

like a gorgeous woman named Agatha

which sounds like you’ve got something stuck in your throat

Heimlich

the height of modernity and the depth of inanity coming together

like last week when my fishmonger and I

got involved in a heated discussion

about the derivation and usage of the term scrod

on cell phones

fortunately I had my suspenders on that day

A PEAR IS WAITING PATIENTLY

a pear is waiting

a picker snatches

a basket makes room

a truck is rumbling

a manager unloads and organizes

a price is set and paid

an elderly woman checks out

a bag tilts and partially relieves itself

a pear is waiting patiently

the snow begins

BETTIE PAGE IS DEAD!

tonight I have you
in The Garden
loving round ball like me

so close we can smell the sweat
you share your box with me because
I never ask you how you got it

we sing, “Rondo!”
no matter which Celtic scores
and we lead the league in technicals

baby, chests thumping, panting,
needing to be restrained, you know
we don’t leave before the final buzzer

and our police escort -
the whole fucking city of Boston
our locker room

THE SLOW LANE

The Malibu
ahead of me
has Jesus
inside a fish
on its bumper.
Ding! Ding!

ROADKILL

when I ran over the hat
the game changed

think of spinach all loose head
how a seed becomes many leafs

snip snip
and the growing continues

but bury it
under the crash and stink of cars

jobs families schools chores
suddenly the weeds do all the thinking

now we have a walk-behind police
and the choking grows

the greens can no longer get into us
the head is outside the body overgrown

the game becomes the same all over
and the hats smell flat

I GIVE A HEARTBEAT TO THE WEATHER

I GIVE A HEARTBEAT TO THE WEATHER


And, in return, it keeps me grounded, overlooking my smithereens. To be happy would require an Esmeralda under my umbrella. For this continuous being out of sorts there is nothing but Ocean Spray.

It wasn’t always like this. I had a tennis ball once. A greenness and a bounce. Everything was mythological. Dem Bums versus The Giants. In a broken down coliseum bordering Flatbush Ave.

That’s why every hot dog tastes frisky. Even when the precip. is schizophrenic. And the long range forecast is full of arthritis. Show me what you can do with a paper clip.

We have but two choices here: Art or maggots. Raping the statutes, grape juice stains on my shirt, is all I have left. The dreams disturb the sleep so magnificently.

A clearance of throat, a gob of poetry.

AT WORK

and now it's time for
good morning
i said good morning
dint you hear me
i said good morning
this is your final warning
ok boys
kill the bastard

MOMUS: The Greek god of censure and ridicule, who was banished from Olympus for his criticism of the gods.

Sound like anyone you know? Satan, for example.

OOH, I hear the big wind outside; guess I'm done for now!

“julie andrews”


if I were a bosom
and you were a carpenter ant
and he was a bowl of sugar
and she was a tenement
and they were wood chips
and we all had brand new sitars
and were collaborating on the invention of a new pronoun
one that could never be used in a sentence
because it didn’t refer to anything real
oh wouldn’t it just be Julie Andrews

FREE ZONE by Jacques Prevert

I put my cap in the cage
And I left with the bird on my head
So
we no longer salute
said the commanding officer
No
we no longer salute
replied the bird
Oh right
excuse me I believed that we saluted
said the commanding officer
You are entirely excused anybody can make a mistake
said the bird

translated by Harriet Zinnes


THEIR SEX LIFE by A.R. Ammons

One failure on
Top of another


NOT TONIGHT by Hal Sirowitz

She said that I couldn't go back
with her to her place, because
she had to study for a test. And
that I wouldn't be able to help her,
because I wasn't good at mathematics.
The only thing I was good at was
taking off her clothes, but
she already knew how to do that.


LOWKU by Larry

I wonder if my dentist
fantasizes about other patients
when he's inside me

A Recess

wendy farrell
leaves her girlfriends
to offer me a piece
of her cupcake

“sure,” I say
and invite her to sit
right next to Me
on the log

to which
I have recently attached
a big wad
of used bubble gum


A WAFER-THIN CHRIST


passing through the boulder
of my digestive system

I’m worshiping the back
of Angela O’Connor’s knees

all ten commandments
trickling out of my underarms


AFTER SCHOOL


a bunch of us rank amateurs
were sitting around watching
the pros fuck everything up
and one whacked-out eleven-year-
old broad her bra still
in spring training says to me
I’ll flip you a Jeter for your Sosa
and after we drained our cherry
cokes and drove the owner bonkers
sucking air bubbles out of the bottoms
with our flexible straws we went at it
right there on the flooring

OFF DUTY

there's my bus -
hey, hey!


THE #5

She’s in German.
The only word I know is Hitler,
but I’m up on perfume,
so I give her left buttock a squeeze
and then it’s my stop.


GISELA

it took me a few hours
to realize
I want that ocean


97% WATER


that’s me
sitting next to
my big brother the ocean

a salty bathing beauty
on the blankie next door

you better be nice to me girl
or I’ll sick my big bro' on you

he of the rapetide
he of the dangerous undertow


A DOG

with its head out the side
of a moving vehicle,
barking at everything it goes by –
now ain’t that the truth!