To the Tralfamadorians

"Consider
The increasingly large man
Of increasingly large appetites.

In his narrow youth,
to tell the truth,
Was chaste and plain and mild.
Middling tastes for middling child.
Then came of age
To little change,
Some milk-sopping milquetoast
Facsimile of A.D.'s ghost.

But timid youth, you see,
Shall only set the stage
For tastes that bolden quite unchecked
As yeast beset by rage.
A new man, undercover(s),
Goes abroad, courts danger(s),
Leaves his wife to be with other(s),
Late nights drinking, spent with stranger(s).

Years, stories, sins and waistline
Expand in unison, and how.
What life once took from him in youth,
It puts back in him now.
In some times, such a man as this,
This loser, would be in.
Ask a Tralfamadorian.
It's all the same to him.

Don't dawdle, rush, or choke.
Some people can't tell a joke."
Timing is everything:
Thus the old man spoke.

For You

I wish I'd never met you.
That's terrible to say.
But though we're friends,
'Twould suit my ends
If you'd just go away.

Your smile fairly twinkles.
Your features, they allure.
You never hide
Your warped insides,
But think you are a bore.

You need to be reminded:
Those geeky things you do
Give some a start;
They've won some hearts;
We'd kill to be with you.

You date below your numbers,
Give guys like me ideas.
To be my muse,
You don't refuse.
It's really quite obscene.

In words you can
understand:

Fry found his Leela;
Candide had his Cunegonde,
And Shippers their Millenium.
If they'd all hit snooze,
Or taken a cruise,
No doubt they'd be better off.

In words more my style:
Get out of my head,
Or I'll have a fantasy
And we'll all end up dead.

One Word

One word:

She said to me,
Confusingly.
Inspired me.
The intensity
Of writing free...
Something "me"
Could come to be.

One word:

Danced out of reach.

My writer's plea:
That words should be
Here for me.
(Oh, irony!)

Communication

Introduction...


(Intervention of Time)

Recognition
Presentation,
Hesitation.

Conversation,
Inquisition,
Familiarization,
Implication?
Flirtation?

Confusion?

Communication,
WEDDING INVITATION?!?

Contemplation: (Confustion? Devastation?)
Resignation.
Affirmation.


(Intervention of Time)

Continuation...

'Tis Just the Season

Awake with a start
In my heart.
I know this was part
of Growing-Up Christmas,
But I'm grown, knees groan now.
What is this?
I don't need to know,
But I want to!
Old part generosity,
Young part curiosity.
'Tis just the season
For sly investigation!

Mind races, time flies,
Toward Grandmother's visits,
Her pretextual pies,
Whipped-cream White Christmases
Of myriad types.
Cars slide, and roadblocks
Make candy-cane stripes.
Don't care when I realize
This blissful ignorance, incongruous
In somebody my size.
Family giving, family living, brings cheer:
Season's feelings, after all these years.

The One

Petite, peculiar, passionate person
Whose pain I can't take pleasure in:
Where did you go?  What do you do?
Do you know where to find another like you?

You were never the one.
You were always the one,
I could count on to help when I thought I was done;
Could count on when doomsaying gave way to fun.

This friendship, it died and expedient death.
I moved on, you moved on, it drew its last breath,
and Having moved on, we can never go back,
But looking over our shoulders, let's smile and laugh.

After

You seem to like me.  You admit that it's true,
Smile like the sun.
But you've never heard about the evil shit I do,
and I'm not done.
Life with me is sticky, so severe, stifles laughter,
Turns smile to frown.
I like you too much to live with myself after
I bring you down.

He Who Hesitates

She, I, we had our moment.
I didn't know to think it meant.
A change in her eyes
Brought truth to her lies.
These things, written in subtext,
I read too slow to know what's next.
And then our moment,
It came and went.

I hestated.
I do that a lot.

Who is This For?

Who is all of this for?
What is the reason?
The poems have
No reason.  They
Are Poetry.
Poetry is unreason.

And the emotions?
They are less real
Than the poetry.
They cannot last;
They've already passed.
I wouldn't give anyone that.

Muse News

I can't believe
She sat next to me,
But can't figure out
Why I should doubt
Those tiny, big questions,
Sly little mentions.
They mean nothing,
Or everything.
Opening flirtation
Or tame situation?

Smiling little sprite!
T'was a good night.

I bid adieu
To the old muse.
I'm into
Someone new.

What Happens to a Dream Deserved?

What have I done
to deserve this dream?
This amazingly beautiful,
Unapproachable geek:
She's not just too pretty.
She's too smart for me.
I'm always amazed
How seeing her smile
Could make me shut up
and just listen a while.
Those classes, just a peek:
The highlight of my week.

What have I done
to deserve this dream?
With friends like you,
Who needs enemies?
I don't know how long
Telling me things
I didn't know about her,
Enchanting little details
I don't need to hear.
I may have to start a religion,
and then start believing.

What have I done
to deserve this dream?
She's always right
In front of me, and
Never within reach.
I have a muse
Who doesn't know I exist.
Nothing can come of this.
I'm no Dante, and she
Exceeds Beatrice.
At least the poetry
Won't be missed.

The Truth

Meaningless, unrhymed
Dialog (Diatribe?)
So contrived,
Like that black coat
I wear all the time.

A role, and act. There's
Noplace so low, so dank
As where we hide what's
Good about us.  The truth:
The only reason for an
Attention-craving poet
To keep so quiet.

The Lie

This is why we climb up
Like we do, every morning.
Who we are, dreamlife,
Our unsuspected innocence
Is just a burden on our backs.
Our wings that will never fly.
A coat of ink over it to face
The world. The world.  Those people,
Those beautiful terrorists.
Show 'em your game face.
Become who you are.

Is the lie in the ink
Or what's under it?

I Don't Believe You

It's not because of that one time, with that one girl,
Or those other months, so far from home.
In spite of those, it's not that simple.
I can make myself that simple, but I couldn't do it to you.

I want to believe you.  I think I want to.
Though I'm not sure about that last part.
I'm sick of saying stupid things to smart, pretty
People.  Guys this ugly don't get that lucky.

I could be wrong.  I'm sorry about that.

I'm used to apologizing for the way I think.
My only other choice is believing in a romance
That may not exist outside my head.

I Hope Love Isn't Like The Movies

Ah, to be a young lover
Of film.  The newest movie
You see is the best,
Until you see another.

Until I was thirteen.
Ten years gone, Empire
and The Princess Bride
Are still the best I've seen.

It worries me.

Is ten years into dating
The best it ever gets?
Emotion is too fleeting to
Record onto cassettes.

The Antidote

Prose, verse, scenery,
Children's toys and bad movies.
In the car, we hear a song.
In your seat, you dance along.

Your simple joy is
Anything but simple.
You're an example
To the rest of the world.

Being with you is the
Antidote to Existentialism:
Creating our own
Meanings together.

Why I Write, Part x+4: Writer's Plea

Grant me, oh muse, my writer's plea:
A voice to describe the world I see.
Hear me this once, and I'll make of me

Any cliche you'd prefer I be–

The brooding artist, my moods so dark
Inundate me as I wait for my Ark.
Add to this darkness a neurotic twist:
Self-hating alcoholic existentialist.

If I'm not so neurotic, I'll live to be vain,
Get DTs when I go without critical praise.
Or would you prefer me insane and obsessed?
Until I can write, I won't eat, sleep or dress.

And feel free, dear muse, to make me a gimp,
Mama's lame wordsmith, with a pen and a limp.
I'll be all the above, dreaded "misery guy."
My aspect and leanings make me a pariah.

But I doubt that a muse would grant my appeal,
and agree to the terms of this one-sided deal:
The payment, the word of a faithless man
To strive to become what I already am.

In Front of You

I wrote some verse
In front of you:
A disrespectful
Thing to do.
I could have chose
To sing or speak,
But chose to write,
Perverse and meek.
I thrust a pen
Into my heart;
Did not invite you
to take part.
That sort of thing
Will make a mess:
Hid at the time,
But now confessed.
I had a reason
to conceal:
A mess may bother
if revealed.
So please forgive me,
Dames and Gents,
For insult given,
But not meant.

Remember

So you tell me this goes away?
That I'll just get over it?
You can't get over it;
You can never get over it.
Even when I want to forget,
I need to remember.

That's the point, I guess.
So I pinned this note onto my
Man-skin sleeve forever,
With an artist's needles.
I chose this.  Nature demands that
I keep it.  I earned it.

You want to blame the victim?
You want to call her a coward?
You say it's easier to talk
to Someone?  It isn't.  Talking
Can be the hardest thing to do.
I know better.  I knew better.

I knew I should say something,
and I said nothing.
I have to wonder what
That makes me, because
What does that make me
If I stop wondering?

Sense and Wordplay

There are no such thing as deep thoughts.
Only different kinds of shallow.
Only sense and wordplay.
I am not here to use words on you.

That which cannot be said, cannot be.

All I have to say is this:
I always want to spend time with you.
I think you feel the same way too.
See you at six?

Wasteland

How I long to walk
Those lonely lanes of memory.
Ashen snow falls from
Ashen skies.  Silent Streets,

Rusty cars, peeling houses,
No streetlights, low clouds.
The hidden moon hangs heavy.
I stride - as the snow falls - light.

My world is beautiful in monochrome:
Resplendent, reassuring desolation.
Dormant senses clear my mind
As I walk alone.

As the world ends for a breathless
Moment, I wrap myself in hope.
The cool air of an unexpected winder
Apocalypse tastes like a new beginning.

Sometimes I remember; I miss that moment.
Its transcendent isolation
Always robs me of my power,
Only to renew it.

----

Last night, I set out for that wasteland memory,
but It was not the same.  Nor was I.  You see,
We cannot be surprised by that which we embrace.
I have become the wasteland, and moved away.
But now I turn a corner, see a ghost:
A shadow of the moment, which can open what was closed.

The Fool

Sit back to watch a one-man clown show: me.
Watch and listen for a while,
Until you think you really know me.

Tell me you can predict me:
Nothing I would ever do
Could really contradict me.

You know just how to brush me off,
Know just what I don't want.
I act like I'm above that kind of stuff.

You say you're smart enough to reduce me,
Know everything that might induce me,
Just the tickling breath beats to seduce me,

Well that's all cool,
'til I play the banker,
and make you the fool.

J'accuse! (I Feel Stared At)

I fell into some inspiration:

Big grey-green blue seas
Of thought and pain and poetry.
Revealing surfaces, unfathomably deep,
I love them, sometimes, it frightens me.

J'accuse!
Can't sue a muse
but



-I feel stared at-
Big brown-black soul pits
Like you: intense, but full of shit.
I'm not your friend; not yours; now quit!
Don't try to push me into it.

Health and Beauty

Though health and beauty
Are codes for youth,
And all the rage,
Half the wholesome beauty
Of a silken, starry sky
Is its measureless age.

Whine

Under the engine's whine,
She looks so beautiful when
She forgets the world's watching.
She'll never be mine.

Lost in the engine's whine,
I realize half the girls I know hate Florida,
And the other half want to live there.
That first part suits me just fine.

Feeling the engine's whine,
I contemplate, remember,
Our ride through December,
Rushing to take our time.

Rocking the engine's whine!
This ride through the night
Will die in the light.
It's a crime.

Over the engine's whine,
the Things I want to tell...hell,
I'll bitch to someone else,
Some other time.

Get Along, Go Along, Don't Belong

Lovers and strangers
New-ish places,
Same old new faces,
Getting along.

Turbulance
Tosses the baggage.
Keep rolling, disengage,
Go along.

An assault on my mind.
Bad actor faced bad asses,
Genius only, no free passes.
I don't belong.

Learn to lose, learn to smile.
I curse, I clown, I play my roll.
Who cares who's in control?
All I know: I sing my song.

It's mine.  I can't be wrong.

Why I Write, Part x+3: Because I'm As Crazy As They Say I Am

There's a little beast inside,
Who gnaws at me,
Whose breath is weak,
but Eats the strength from mine.

I searched for means to its end.
I searched low and wide,
Sports, film, suicide,
Before I found this revenge:

Now, I torture the words on this page.
I tear at their limbs,
Those sad-laughter hymns
Their blood will quench my rage.

Banish the vermin
From within?
I'm as crazy as they say I am.

Why I Write, Part x+2: Inspiration, Perspiration, Social Frustration

Here's a sample, just a part
Of my simple, honest, from-the-heart
Expression of what one can gain
From exposure to the arts:

The printed verse
That pleased me first
Was as a gentle breeze,
When for so long,
the Gift of song
Had rocked & rolled to me.

The novel takes us on its
Many-paged journey, back
To where we were, but not the same.
And let's not forget that
Hand-made toys bring joy
To lucky girls and boys.

Most importantly of all,
the Painting makes
a Layered statement
Just hanging in the hall.

But should you find no audience who reads or sings?
The mystery of creation's still better than
That awkward, existential dance
Called "fitting in."

Unrequiters

I don't walk down that hallway
Anymore.
He's always there, and I know
the Score.
Charity, to impress me, his concern
For the Poor,
Last week it was art, tomorrow music
Or politics, or

You know why they don't write poems
For the unrequiters?
To start, it's as boring as hell, and
We haven't done anything to deserve it.

Right There

I don't know what you were thinking,
I don't know what you were doing,
I know you had us going there, but,
I don't know why you're so proud of it.

Coming from the guy who
Was never good at anything,
Was never there for anyone,
Was never much of a man,

That was pretty fucked up, right there.

Manning the Line

The stale steam rises,
From twenty-two smokestacks.
Factory football,
Manninig the line.

Crouching colossus,
I face
A hormone-fueled,
Muscular ball of hate.
He springs from his stance,
I retreat, mirror his advance.

My arms, springs coiled;
His first ploy already foiled,
He cuts back, repositions,
for a new angle of attack.
Shuffling leviathan of nimble feet,
Tearing up turf as we violently meet.

He reaches out to
Tear me to the ground,
knock me down,
then run around.

Coiled springs fire
ONE
TWO
THREE
Blows jar me from neck to gut,
The last one sends my foe to his butt.

Averting the crisis:
The taste of triumph.
Factory football.
Back to the line.

Steam rises...

Margins

I took 3 from column A,
and a Few from column B,
Then scribbled in the margins.
And Look how that's gone...

I Don't

I do not know you...
I don't like you...
I don't hate you...
I do not miss you...
...but I want to.

Mistake

Half-Baked
Give and take:
I'm not a mistake
You want to make.

Throw you over
Or share the covers?
Will I hover
Or take lovers?

There's always time
For pleasures divine,
But soon comes the time
Life puts chips on the line.

Roses aren't blood.
They're cowardly-tough.
We'll have to give up.
We won't be enough.


Not the Same

Turn the Heat Up.
Deadlines, Lovers,
Running, Roiling,
Boiling Over.


Then pull me off -
I'm not the same.
All or nothing,
That's the game.

I Now Pronounce You Sisyphus and Martha Stewart

This should never have happened.
You and I had nothing in common.
Maybe something.  Nothing real.
You and I were together,
At cross-purposes,
With the world, and each other.

You pitied.  I imagined.  We saw a movie.
That was a good movie, I'll admit.
I healed.  You imagined something else to pity.
You healed, enough to imagine intimacy.
You fed me, because you loved me, you said.
I know that's why I said I bought you things.

I dismissed you.  You ignored me.
You suggested.  I deflected.
I suggested.  You protested.
I taught you that excuse, you know,
and You went and used it on me.
I suppose you make me weak.

That man at the Courthouse, he
Prounounced us Sisyphus and
Martha Stewart.  It never did
Make any sense.  I guess I imagined
It.  Did I get less pitiful with age?
A miracle.

You can keep the ring.
I want the liquor cabinet:
Goodbye in ten words or less.
I always said too much.

Why I Write, Part x+1

I once wrote a poem.
I put my heart into it, some.

It was passionate, and
Appreciative, Altruistic,
Broad, Brazen, Bombastic,
Bipolar: Balancing Baggage.
Trustworthy, Loyal, Helpful
Friendly, Courteous, Kind,
Obedient, Cheerful, Thrifty,
Brave, Clean and Reverent.

And all that Bullshit.

I believe I closed with the words:
All of You out there,
Who are reading this (or not):
Thank You.
You
Are Why I Write.

Well, guess what:
So am I.

Why I Write, Part x: A Message

A message for Mom and Dad:
thank you.
some of those times you didn't tell me
to shut up,
I learned that I don't always have to,
even if sometimes I should have.

A message for my Brother: thank you.
We spent so much time,
Over so many years,
just Talking.
Because you listened, I have a voice.

A message for Rusty
with the Red Hair and the Stories: thank you.
You taught me that I like to write.
I think that might have been important.
We'll see.

A message for all those who
Put up with my writerly
Eccentricities.
If I were as patient as you,
My writing might ring more true.

A message for those older (or younger)
and Wiser, who treated me like
I have something worthwhile to say: thank you.
You were probably wrong,
But that's beside
the Point.  It was sweet of you.

A message for a Particular Pair of Professors: thank you.
It's your fault I think poetry is relevant to me.
You got me into this medium,
and I'm enjoying trying to climb back out of it.

A message for Emily Dickinson: thank you.
You taught me to write,
A little bit.
I'm not done learning.
You're certainly not done teaching, but
It's been real.  See you on the other side.

A message for my Friends,
my enemies, my Family,
For random fucking people I see in random fucking places: thank you.
You give me something to write about,
And someone to practice on,
Even if the last thing you were thinking about
Was giving me something.
A special thank you to the particular random people
In particular, random places
Whom I loved from a distance.
I wrote you a poem.  Now go read it.

A message for my past lovers: thank you.
I have no idea what I am writing about.
Somehow, each of you,
Have helped me a little bit closer,
To knowing that.  To knowing Life.
After all, you have to write what you know.

A message for Modern Culture: thank you.
For the most part, I live in a state of
Constant, passionate inability to stand you,
But you did give me something to be passionate about.

A message for Ford, Henry and Alexakis, Art: thank you.
There's just something about being able to tear down the road at 90MPH, windows down,
SCREAMING
"THEY CANNOT HURT YOU UNLESS YOU LET THEM!"
at the top of my lungs.
It's really very empowering, trust me.

A message for beyond the grave:
I'm sorry
I wasn't there.  I should have been.
I've stopped blaming myself,
a little, but
That part is my fault.

A message for the Grave Itself:
You can take me,
and my Family,
and possibly even some of my Friends before I go.
But you can't take this.
Writing doesn't die.  It only goes into hiding.

A message for the intrepid,
Trepidatious Writers:
your Writing can always go into hiding,
if You want it to.
Maybe sometimes, though,
You should put It into the world,
and let It decide on Its own.
Maybe hiding is not where It belongs.

A message for everyone,
All of You out there,
Who are reading this (or not):
Thank You.
You
Are Why I Write.

Fiery

as She dances like that, in front of me,
she doesn't know what she's doing, so perfectly,
Fiery.  She sears my eyes.
She stirs the hot, delicious hell-stew in my mind.
She's dangerous, and taken, in fact,
so that's the end of that...

I Saw You

It's been so many years since I saw you, my friend.
Yet I need just one moment to see you again.
I need only to close my eyes, to pretend,
to get back to those wonderful places we've been.

Take me back to that place where nothing is wrong,
to that place where you sang me that Everclear song.
Let's go now dear, because I know before too long,
I'll return to my conscious mind, where I belong.

I know you so well by your eyes, smiling free.
I know you and love you, impersonally.
For we met as two drivers, passing at speed,
and our love was so beautiful, never to be.

Typecast

As I drift through the day,
there are roles that I play.
Do I play them by nature,
or directed, on stage?

Always reticent, shy,
except when in class,
today, wake to find
I've been typecast.

I ask myself, all shift,
would it help--
to know who wrote the script,
the world?  Or myself?

People and Things

People and things live apart in my mind.
Each have their place and appropriate time.
Those places and times, they always arrive,
but rarely accompanied as I desire.

When I'm reading or writing, the phone always rings.
Work pulls me from friends and pretextual games.
It seems, in the act of tracing a day,
I and the world move the opposite way.

Alone, I get lost learning little-known facts.
Oh! To know the euphoria-guilt of this act!
Our world has little use for a man
Who feels the canyon between "talk" and "chat".

Yet as I gaze up at the well-marbled sky,
I re-learn that God likes me...I don't know why.
So I wait for the quiet.  Then, I can find
the lyric release for this ill-fitting mind.

Branches

Arms spread like branches,
Under shadow of branches.
Cool grass on my back
While the sun heats the rest
of the world up.
The only part of summer
That doesn't suck.

Holding

I've put so many little things in life on hold
until I figure out how to do the rest like I'm told.
But doesn't everyone?
And does anyone?

Life is Where

Is life a great journey; is each day a stride?
Is life a great mystery, to be solved by keen eyes?
Is life some deep spectacle, experience uncontrolled?
Is life a beach, or someplace cold?
Life is just something that passes through water.

It moves.

Where is life lived? Is it all in our minds?
Or is life lived in our bodies' feelings and doings?
Is life in the spaces between us,
an ocean of people ebbing and flowing?

Life is where everything happens.
It's the place to be.
Everyone ends up here sooner or later.

Make yourself at home.

End or A Retrospective on More Than One

I don't miss the things poets say that I should:
my heart's feeling like sunsets, or our walks through the wood.
I don't really miss the kisses we shared,
one arm 'round your waist, hands gliding through hair.

Our entanglement: a convenient discharge of needs.
Did it mean much? I don't know; emotionally,
could a "we" have ever been said to exist?
Can lithe, waving reeds marry unfeeling fists?
We were foolish; we needed a pretext to feel
the things seen on TV or on Hollywood reels.

But I do miss the time spent, in more ways than one —
you so pleasantly kept me from writing and fun.
Better yet, you kept me from irritants, strife,
the erosive, drab nature of everyday life.
The things that I truly miss now, in the end,
are the same I'd have kept with my other close friends.

I suppose, looking back, I deserve to hurt more.
In the end, I'm the jerk, if you're still keeping score,
for I suspected, deep down, our relationship's use:
as most, a long-standing, all-purpose excuse.

Why?

Why...?
...Mommy?
...is the sky blue?
...can't I grow up?
...do the good die young?
...did she leave me for another?
...can't she just love me?
...do I have to work so hard for this?
...can't anyone take the time to understand me?
...should I want anything more than her, the children, and the rest of my life?
...have she and the children made such a mess of my life?
...doesn't he realize that he doesn't know everything yet?
...can't I go to work for you anymore?
...does she still love me?
...did she leave me alone?
...have all the others gone?
...treat me like a child?
...am I so blue?
I know...
...why.

Was Forced

Was Forced to work in poetry
but now – it felt a little free.
Though stilted in its filler-verse
a cub-idea begins to nurse.
And from my cranial loins may come
a sister-cub to join the son.

How I Won for Losing

We were found in fall's shade morning,
under sky of clouded light.
Our loss – begun that moment –
ends now – a winter's night.

I saw our fate that moment;
I knew our losing had begun.
As youth reduces fear of death,
So you went blithely on.

Sometimes I would ignore my fate
but still would talk of times
when I had lost some other things
that lingered in my mind.

Those mishaps made me question;
wounded pride and mourning hurt.
I did not save a treasured friend;
I was let go from work.

But this? Twas not so bitter,
though it did leave me flat.
The only joy is triumph, and
you never gave me that.

I've lost the range of rummage
but this one thing I've found:
I'd rather be alone – but right –
than the other way around.