If you can no longer bear life's clenched fist, it's random smashing of all your hope, dreams, desires, and passion,
be drunk.

Be drunk on wine, music, poetry by the pages, or, on the agelessness of the silky moss covered pond or the fog thick meadows.

If you would not feel time's ticking brutality, be drunk.
If all memory does is remind you of the losses, the deaths, the divorces, the regrets, the remorse over your high ideals and standards, and your much lower behavior, choices, and antics; when life seems anti-climactic, be drunk.

As loneliness becomes like a rotten tooth, hot flashing pain, and the stain on your heart and hands won't come out, be drunk.

Whether it be *****, poetry, nature or music, be full, filled, consumed.

Until the glare of this cruel world becomes a soft gentle blur, be drunk and entombed.

It was a four horse race at
Santa Anita.
I was with my old man and
little brother.
I put everything I had on
the number 3 horse to show.
His name was Dusty's Diaper.
Shoemaker was aboard;
the shoe for God's sake.
It was a sure thing.
All he had to do, was not
come in fourth place.

I learned that day,
in a horse race,
anything can happen.
I was 12 years old.
And like horse racing,
In life, anything can
happen.

Amidst the California evening,
On our way to the car,
I thought my Dad
Would live forever.

I saw the dawn
**** lonely
orphans,
while bats ate
butterflies,
cats killed sparrows
and hope flew
south for
the winter.

On my way
downtown,
I've seen the
dead through
windows at the
drycleaners, eating
hamburgers with
starched faces

The librarians,
dry and dusty,
pray for rain,
as hippos weep,
hyenas sigh,
and hope
flies south for
the winter.

I've seen the strange
hand of
circumstance
wear the jester's
hat.
I've seen destiny
angry turn her
back, while potential
is wasted on
the railroad tracks.
Yeah, hope flew
south for the
winter.

Hook him up to the machine.
Shock his brain into
mediocrity.
Death stalks him;
he is aware.
There is too much
flash in his eyes.
His brain needs a reboot;
he needs to forget,
like a goldfish, like
a monkey in the zoo.
Hook him up to the machine.
He is too sentimental.
Salmon swim in his blood;
he has a paisley heart,
and a tie-dye soul.
He can smell colors.
Hook him up to the machine.
He has Van Gogh eyes, and
a Bukowski gut; he walks
like he's lost in a maze;
hunchback sadness,
butcher knife nerves,
Hook him up to the machine.
He believes in love,
and has too much trust.
His vivid green memory
is a curse, we need to
crash it, **** the eternal spring.
Hook him up to
the machine.

I used to crush
lightning bugs on
my face. I thought
I would glow in
the dark.
I don't, although,
my liver has given me
a nice jaundice cast.
Almost Miami tan.
The other night
she
punched me, then called
the cops- blood everywhere.
She went to jail for
five days.
She acted like it was
an eternity.
We ****** last night until
we were raw.
Today, she's a stranger;
self centered and
self absorbed.
I've been drinking Cooking Sherry
to keep from having seizures.
She couldn't care less.
She brought home a
six pack and gave me one
beer.
Oh well,
I knew she was no Iris when
I met her.
I just didn't realize she
was Nightshade.

***** and ***** are
tragedies of Greek
proportion.
Take a man with
potential and then
give him a steady
dose of either (or both)
withdraw it,
and watch him
degenerate.

It’s not the *** act
or
the alcohol its self,
it’s the effect they
produce on
one’s psyche.
We will always
equate that which we
feel emotionally
with absolute
truth.

If one has given
himself completely
(with abandon)
to either pursuit,
when removed,
there will be
a vacuum
a gaping
hole that without an
act from the
gods,
will never be
filled

Maybe I'll find
a 100-dollar bill amidst
the burnt umber
maple leaves.
Maybe the ambulance will
come disguised as an
ice cream truck.
Perhaps I'll find a
warm forgotten can of
beer in the dryer.
Maybe, I'll blow
up the moon.

I'm losing it.
My pants won't
stay up, and I haven't
got a belt.
I'm being devoured by
the autumn winds and
the grackles.

Insomnia is crushing me.
Febrile and ferocious,
I stalk the university streets,
too sick to work.
Maybe this abscessed tooth
will **** me.

I used to pound out
12 hour days in the
hot July bean fields.
Farmer John always
smiling and shaking
his head.

Life is a
bologna
sandwich, and
I write these little
poems in yellow
mustard.
And I wait.

Just wait.