On Departures

it’s so easy to “forget” to say goodbye,
that is to say, it’s easier to pretend that’s not happening
other times, thinking what if, what if, what if they’re gone?

(remembering that one, only two, after I left for the first time
watched my heart break, as he covered his eyes, because my arrival after absence was so shocking
he could not believe his eyes,
in the real sense,
covering his eyes with his hands
because my returned presence was too real for him

that’s what happens when you forget to say goodbye, I guess)

not in a tear-my-hair-out kind of way,
but to remember now what I have, instead of forgetting
it’s so easy to forget what’s there, in front of us, right this second
i mean, are there rampaging ducks? or maybe some small cavalcade of tormenters? say rather, some donuts rolling by, delectably delicious?
No, none of that. Just silence layered on top with sounds, sights, smells, etc. Or, say rather, distractions. Simply distractions.

the fact they’re gone, now, is only light and fluffy because i “know” they will return
where “knowing” is an assumption in a world with no nothing nowhere certain to endure for sure
bite that apple now, because it will be gone, eaten by worms and torn apart by whirlwinds of flies, time lapsed of course

laugh and gather your rose puppies right away, is what I’m saying

On Light-Stained Wretches

Forget the ink, these days we’re all stained with light
Pixels so small as to be meaningless, branch out in millions of colors to stain our skins
Fifty-seven zombies huddled around cool fires
Brainiacs in head cases grew these things in vats, I suspect, far away from daisies and green cheeses
Is it any wonder that our tools inspire so much unbridled anger when not bridled carefully?
whoa horsy, I mean it!

Well then, sir, how do you wash this light away?
Well, sir, simply turn it off, sir.
Easier easier said than done, sir.

On Ink-Stained Wretches

if this were yesterday, my fingertips and shirtsleeves would be dribbled with red and black ink
probably I’d even have ink on my shoes
my eyesight would be even worse than it is now, because my glasses would be decades older than they are now
perhaps scribbling, from time to time, in the margins
foolishly trying to leave some stamp on the leaves of time, as they turn turn turn down the years

Sherlock Holmes would know in an instant what I did all day, without resorting to calluses or blood samples
even Watson would have no trouble at all

perhaps I’d have twelve books to my name, saving all my extra funds for number thirteen
but what books would I buy with such a small pittance? would I stalk the halls of history or pounce upon the starving poets, gnaw upon their bones?
Or would I rather wait, breathing hard, for the last Dickens or Eliot serial to arrive by steamer boat?

feel that breathlessness as some new thing comes rolling off the presses in scores of numbers
are they seditious pamphlets bent on undermining those prone to lording?
are they playbills for the scintillating actors ballooning across the stages of the town?
are they posters promoting the latest mail-by craze?
just be glad there are others who slop the glue

On Public Transit

packed in, slowed down, stopped
a side trip to the zoo
this bus is going anywhere!
weapons-grade pleasantness deployed to hack the whole system
no one once to be the first to nastiness

everyone just wants to get where they’re going, but do they really want to get there?
or are they just going through the motion?

all the time, there’s some talking ’bout occult nonsense, these conspiracies aren’t even interesting any more, just steeped as they are in reasonableness and “studies”
Hey mans, let’s talk about something real, like gravity. It’s so much more rewarding, bros. Or why the moon is chasing us on its long long legs, keeping pace, no one “knows” why.
it’s only occult, nowadays, cuz no one cares much
it’s all there, pretty much, out in the open, crinkling in the sun
no more gnomic utterances dribbled out in foot thickly dusty booky shops

so many knees and elbows, so many barely awake, a sleeping man followed me the whole way, patron saint of the foggy-bound
unleashed to the street corner, we all breathed a sigh of relief as the dragon rushed away, bound for some queer destination out west
there be dragons there, or something

falling asleep to the sound of someone talking, falling asleep to the sound of train wheels clacking, or maybe the silent breathing, or maybe the alarm clock not going off

On Feeling Like I Need a Cup of Joe

Just can’t shake the groggy feeling. and so feel stuck just just stuck just stuck just stuck

what. can’t jog it loose.

when the thing gets stuck like a worn out leg.
ouch. can’t
that thing be so miserly
or yes. in other words, chances are good

creating one problem by solving another, this is how the road to hell is paved with..
in other words, contrariwise.

getting all the cruft and nonsense out of my brain. so I can focus on the good stuff

but what is the good stuff?

just nonsense?

or is there any way to think that isn’t broken into a million pieces. with all the scattered
brains flashing away in the distance, or rather like a semaphore in the hands of a master
with no one to see with understanding

this is how the writing in sand goes, just ape that typing as it monkeys about. and then type some more and type and type.

oh my, where’s all that typing coming from, those hollows of the mind where dread frogs grow?

or some bedeviled cake in a saucepan full of bellows gallows or something like that

hiding out in the corncrake won’t solve it, nor will figuring at sums.

flashes of insight. grown up all the way and still can’t shake that she hyena loose.
the impostor perches on the kern, chuckling and eating snap crackle, whatever that is
some damn thing, munching away, with crumbs spilling all over the front

don’t eat so much popcorn if you’re going to wear black like an undertaker.
undertakers don’t snack, or so i have read.
especially not when they’re wheeling out their metaphorical or literal coffin for the end

juggling terms in the head, or wracking them round the stew pipe,
these days no one has any sense or maybe
it’s just meee.

the monkey hanging from the tree, the god tree, the sephiroth or the clambake or
whatever those old ones call it
don’t shake that tree too hard.
you’ll never know what coconuts come raining down, because one will surely have bonked
you on the head.

On Parenting

clamber out the cold controls
undertake no new corrals come morning
already some strange clarions keep calling out for contests
thor-heavy, we cry in the morning
collapsed on our couches, comfy, still

you see, we want what’s best for every except ourselves, where the comfort comes
soon the pale face grows paler than normal, aghast
or maybe just sick at heart

other times, everyone’s jolly.

this cat’s got some lowdown
he’s spillin’ the beans about all the secret ways, the occult texts, and growling penumbras of mystery
beard-scratchin’, yowlin’, there’s some real there
here man, have some soap, wash that mystery right out ya hair
creak creak roll the bones, old chicken bones, divinin’ shit right there in front ya face

caterwaul, that’s all, just caterwaulin’ like a cold craver, jiddering about on a hot lid
all the old fellows trapped behind glass, but O, I want
grace has an odd shape when it’s shaped like a hug, not quite an O, but more like an ooval.

but really. when the old one draws a picture that claws tears from my heart, sketched out in a moment
how does this one respond? how can one respond? what possible response could would should have?
is there only cool regard? does some hot gushing of feeling have a place?

‘my dear old one,’ i might say, ‘wherefore all this pain and sorrow when time has only flavored you for O not so long a time, even within the deepness of your time?’

but what would he say to me, except an unerring silent gaze, seeing only the trappings of my place, the bells, the whistles, the tags, and patches
Or maybe he would say, ‘be still your cool anger, only watch. and listen.’

and still I sit, clawing not-quite words from out my brain, a lost searcher, figures scratched in dust.

Parched

The grey bubble of a mind in slow decay

shiny slick with rainbow patterns but doomed

convexing them into looming geometries

no one has a nose that big, nor eyebrows!

Quick: apply the sushi flavored band-aid

Once full of words that brimmed out

dictionary + scissors + rage = tatters

matchless before the timesweeping tide

out, broom! we’ll need your services no more, today

Words unspoken clamor about the candleflame.

Grinning now, the teeth have eaten

though food now puddles on the floor

incandescence blazing in the closet

lighting lonely coats and scarves

Have you reset the icebox?

Stomach growls, hungry for novelty

the gut disagrees, bellowing

(the gut of the mind that is)

“no more gumdrops, dewlips, crab cakes!”

If you don’t have enough for everyone, don’t bother

What if machine consciousness already existed?

Suppose the internet had achieved a kind of sentience…

…how would you know that the email you just received was from an actual human being?

…how would you know that the weblog you were reading was written by an actual human being?

…how would you know that the last wiki edit wasn’t some artificial construct?

If distributed, artificial intelligence existed this is how it would affect the world–through manipulation of the physical beings on this world, via misdirection, persuasion and trickery…

Loki’s imprisonment

You can hear Max in the background of this one. Sarah said it was “one of your more disturbing ones”. I’m inclined to agree. I think I wrote this one when I was reading a lot of Norse mythology. Loki kills Baldr–a guy everyone likes–so he gets hunted down and imprisoned with his son’s entrails. (Nice!) They put a snake over his head so the poison drips down. Combined with my admittedly messed-up headspace at the time, it seemed like the perfect time to write this poem:

Memory IV

“Too true, too true,”

she whispers in her cold way,

her boiling old way, her true-blue and sold way.

“Too true…”

And I, I am like a quivering daisy chain,

full of green and yellow anticipation.

I strew, or no, link my self’s mind together;

Dixie Blues are clinking on an old player piano.

Seeing her slow eyes again, I rinse myself with spices—

for the blood-boil—

and put this old scrumptious dalliance on the slow burner,

thick potatoes and carrots swirling in the brew.

“But this between us will lead us only to more

and deeper dripping poison and despair.”

“Too true, too true,” she whispers.

I hold up my arms

and let myself be tied with snakes to the bedpost,

paying penance to the old gods.

As she holds the cup to keep the venom from dripping on my face,

all that remains is my trickster’s voice,

words spilling out over my silent body:

“Listen to me:

“Hear and understand

“these cold words of mine

“that will glitter and sparkle off the end of my tongue

“when my foes unchain the wolf, the dragon, the hungry maid:

“the children of my soul’s revenge.

“But they haven’t yet let loose—have patience!

“I keep waiting and sighing and spying and clicking and spinning and wilting and weeping:

“now there is nothing but my silence,

“my wicked silence that hurts you so…”

Too true, too true and her eyes are leaking tears,

my body burns and aches at her touch

but I feel pity only for myself.

“Wicked? No not wicked, that goes too far, too

“too far. Far beyond the reasonable, far beyond intuition and of grief.

“Far beyond the boiling hams and bouncing tree fairies.”

I wonder if I actually said that, for she hums in a pleasing way,

and places her tight lips upon my face. “Too true,

too true.”

“Replace wicked with frightened and old. Or tricky:

“that’s the silence you have.

“I have. Me. A frightened old silence.

“A tricky frightened silence.

“It’s time you listened and heard my silence truly.

“Truly, for what it is.”

She seems to be hearing me,

her tongue is dripping slow circles along my chest.

I can feel her cold fingers drag shivers down my side.

She stops. Looks long into my eyes:

“Too true, too true,”

and cuts my tongue between her teeth.

“Ahh. You’ve lived too long in a short space,

“I think your ends want to outgrow the short space of time,

“but they shrivel instead. It’s time you…

“it’s really time you…

“it’s got to be time you…

“thought it’s not too late you…

“Ahhh… it’s past time you danced your new self back into being

“so that those dear ones, those frizzled and delightful

“loves may hold you close once more

“spiral you around with glee, laughing in the sun.”

“Too true, too true.”

I feel this bodybody thrumming from head to foot

as her breath rushes slowly in my ear

and she finds the all-center of my desire.

Sharp pain lances through my wrist,

up my thin and withered arm

unto the throbbing hollow in my chest.

“Look… ahhh…

“You gaze too long into this tiring, soul-gutting

“mind-splintering gulf. Please.

“No. Please. Wait.”

This is too… I can’t… I didn’t think…

No…

I am gone.

She is gone.

Silence.

Venom splashes on my face.

The snakes wrap tighter about my throbbing arms.

Revisiting past things…

It’s funny to me: revisiting these old things really dredges up the memories. I can’t remember why, but I had a vivid memory of lying in bed while my right foot’s big toe’s toenail throbbed beneath the bedclothes. Was it raining? I don’t recall, but I do remember it being cold and the weight of blankets heavy on my feet….

I like the tortoise shells and the land of spice and dreams made reel. I can do without the rest of it, I think, and the “dainty” there is a bit superfluous…

Memory II

Tortoise shells were raining from my forehead today.

I almost caught it: nose bleeding, head thrumming.

The bedclothes were all twisted up

my toes’ thick nails were pounding beneath the skin;

there was a mess of daisies and lilies and snapdragons.

“What?” I said to you. “What!”

but there was no reply:

Rising, deciding to dance:

placing those pink buffalo slippers upon my dainty feet.

It was there you made your mistake:

underestimating my resolve.

“This ring: take-it, take-it.

“I beg you: take it

“for I wish to blow away in the wind.

“My black umbrella catches

“and I float away from you forever

“among lands of spice and dreams-made-reel.”