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