Pictures

These two poems were written in the Spring of '04, so they're kind of old...

A Collection of Photographs
It was a
wonderful time; the hay-day of the sketch-comedy Commander-in-Chiefs;
the happy days of acceleration and increased
Efficiency, life giving goddess—bow your head—
They didn’t just park tanks on each other’s border,
they had parties and signed wood-pulp paper documents,
Agreements…

So, this was the setting
of the first encounter
between me and Mr. Nero.
I thought he was a pompous bastard,
and he said that I was a drifter,
but too engulfed to recognize that I’m lost in the City lights
I told him I had my horn,
he smirked;
I told him I was in the mood to perform something “up-beat,”
he said he’s forgotten his fiddle,
or it was in the shop,
or maybe one of the luggage handlers
at the airport took it. “You know that was the one I played whe—”
“Yes sir, you’ve only told me that story every time it’s mentioned…”
“Well you know I didn’t really have those fi—”
“Absolutely, you’re innocent, framed…it’s a perversion of justice, I’d say.”
I finished the script with our ceremonial “next time…”
and gave him a buck fifty for bus fare;
I hate how he gets that look in his eyes…
“Give it a few years…” he’d always close, “Remember, they’re using a Time-bomb
as a stopwatch.”

But now-a-days, I just walk to nowhere, with Charlie.
(Mr.) Charlie,
who makes prophecies of oral corruptions, and preaches
when words fill his white-fluffed head—
Like Garvey, he’ll parade around Main Street,
inconspicuous, and reserved…but The Man has power,
and that man has style:
Always in his Sunday best (he dresses to impress); always his blacked-out glasses…
and always color-coordinated socks. He outlines the world
in frenetic rhythm, while the Blues fill in the rest.
He’ll speak of days, with Passion…
“But things change, and soles wear down—”
I could tell by the way he said it
that he leaves things undone; but what do you expect
from a man that doesn’t believe that God made
the world in six days, then sat back and drank beer?

“The Bicycle-man of Downtown”
was far more positive. He wore his backpack and windbreaker and glasses,
and the most familiar smile a “stranger” could possibly give you.
I see him sometimes, in the summer…just before twilight, most nights.
if you ever ask for him, people will just tell you, “He’s surely gone fishing.”
But that’s not the truth;
He sneaks into the Public Park after 8pm, and sits on the dock,
and stares far-out over the lake. I never saw the things he’d find,
since he sat facing the West; but I saw
the two setting suns, followed by two spectrums of nightfall,
followed by two moons,
to even out the tidal shift…
And his dog Randolph was the best behaved
stray I’ve ever met.

Have you heard the strangeness regarding Father Willem?
They say he’s lost his mind and
writes sermons with his left hand; but I don’t understand the problem.
They say some charlatan parishioner sent him seductive
undergarments; which I found absurd, yet amusing. They say the shock
sent him over-the-rainbow…
Now, he spends his nights in the Basement,
instead of the Confessional,
bleaching his whites mercilessly,
repeatedly,
in hopes that Transfiguration is just a spin-
cycle away…

Mr. Charlie made sure to warn me about perpetual “motion.”
“It’s the constant strain from
velocities, and the lack of sleep…you don’t have time for Health, you know?
That increases the chances of dying, age 42, of heart complications,
during an operation on
a bleeding ulcer…”

But sweet-talkin’ Susanne sounds optimistic,
because “Bob Vila restores old American homes.”
Meanwhile, Donnie promises everyone that
“everything’s going to be better…”
{though he’s hiding from rabbits and cruel realities}
and he’s right;
because we’re all super-heroes, regardless

Class Picture
A generation of diluting selves,
who rather fight the drug war
than the war on poverty
or the war against over-consumption…

But in all fairness,
how else should we deal with the fact that
our beloved flashing.....................we will be the 1^st generation, since
colors will inevitably.....................WWII with a lower standard
become a drab reality?................of living than their parents?

so why blame us;
or rely on us for the Great Task?

We’ve learned to be good
up
-standing followers:
we are willing
to sell ourselves
—short—
for the money to buy; and
we give shouts of thanksgiving,
as we pour our souls out
on lawns,
or kneel before the false ivory alter,
sterile with the germs of
a thousand other
confessions

[and only the real fuck-ups get help…shhh…]

Give it time. You’ll have
that pesky budget problem fixed:
with the coffee and aspirin we’ll be forced
to swallow
down, supplements for previous self-medications,
how will any one of us live past 42,
without dying of heart complications,
during an operation on a bleeding ulcer?

No, there isn’t any Hope for us,
since paradigm shifts rarely define a
generation…
but sweet talking Susanne sounds optimistic;
because, in her words, “Bob Vila restores Old American homes.”