Part 1
"How about some long beautiful hair" the Santa says
The little girl rubs her head bald and veiny
She looks like a baseball

"No. It doesn't get in my eyes anymore when I play basketball" she says

The bunch of us
Sunken eyed and balding
In wheelchairs and on crutches
Some of us holding our I.V. stands for support

I can only imagine how the Santa feels
The tiniest zombies
All waiting for a turn

Me
I have silver caps on my top front teeth
And dentures
Look like an old Cadillac
Insides all rust and rumble

We all want to know if we were good this year

Part 2
Cut to the bunch of us
Watching the Blue Angels air show

All getting pictures with a man dressed as Shamu
He is supposed to write something on the backs of all the pictures

I try to imagine
What you could possibly write
To a group of kids that looked like us

Each photo
In shaky black ink
Because whales aren’t prehensile

He writes
I love you

Part3
When the circus came to the hospital
We all gathered on a balcony
The news was there

Clowns painted our faces

I asked if they had room for me
Told them I could be like that guy
From the 007 movies
With the silver teeth that could bite really big stuff

They said I might miss my folks
I told them I wouldn’t
Then took off my gown
To show them my scars

They weren’t impressed

Ever since I’ve wanted to join the circus

Part 4
Despite our qualifications
We could not join the circus

But that is okay
All we wanted really
Was to know if we were good
And that somebody loved us

We were
And somebody did

Inside
At my desk
In the late afternoon
The hiss of traffic passes
On the wet street
Outside
 
My thoughts migrate
To an eastern shoreline
Where my love walks
A peninsula path
 
All around her
The wind’s breath
The waves’ play
The light’s glitter
 
Sand and stone
Kiss her shoes
 
I am a now-distant arrival
A wind-blown speck in the sky
A floater dancing high above
In the corner of her vision
 
Down on the sea-strand
She hears nothing but
Wind and wave
Merging seamlessly
Sound upon sound
Within sound within
Sound upon sound

how you feel in the dark( uneasy
imbalanced weirdly strong) feels

like ( coy unearthly howling) rain
feels deep with smelling after (
prickled millions of cold and hot )
mingling with the seaair and is
gently acrid salty wafts of gulls
crying scattered threading the
moonlight through their coarse
throats ( little tiny trillions of

kissing droplets slightly ) like
you feel in the dark ( imbalancing
coyly acrid howling ) feels like

THE SEA

I’ve been picking away
metaphorically
I think
at the edges of my skin
for a while now
trying to find the end
of the coil of string
that I dream about
Excited by the thought
of that moment
when I begin to extract it
slowly
very slowly
feeling it unravel
collecting it between
finger and thumb
slightly damp and ******
still white  

I see others
scratching at their surface
trying to find the same thing
I am guessing
trying hard to experience the removal
the extraction of something self
yet other
I walk behind the crowd
amongst their cigarette butts
wrappers and chewing gum pellets
I see
yards of string
some knotted
some platted
and some rolled into a ball
I collect them all
dry them
and box them

I still dream
of my skin
the string
and that feeling of
excruciating pleasure
not sure what it means
if anything
not sure what I learned
but the tactile
facile
act
of drawing out
that which is within
unseen
itching and coiled
stays with me
and by inches
satisfies

It would be
a psychotic friend
who would look at the work
you choose to share and say,
"This is *****!  You should be ashamed,
You'll never make a living from this,
you fool!"

I like you:
that means, I like what you do
and I like the fact that you share it.
Remember this when your art makes me smile -
it does not necessarily mean that you are a genius

It simply means you have a friend
and that might be enough.

Some may achieve
objective experience
and a final, infallible arbitration of good and bad.
But I like it
when art and life hold hands
and stroll off into the sunset.

the words won’t come out…
it’s as if they have shut my metaphorical spout--
truly nothing verbally fruitful will sprout
maybe I am having a protracted senior moment
where nothing creative will attempt to foment
perhaps I really never had anything important to write
or my neurons have given up the fight
and my imagination has taken flight
and left me with thoughts of where to go for lunch
or whether I’ve had an accurate hunch
about where the market will close tomorrow
sad that I once could write on the nature of the Tao
and now scribble numbers about the falling Dow
tomorrow may bring more creative flow
but for now I’ll decide where for dinner I will go

I was at the street shops, seated below the canvas
and drinking my sake
innocent to the world
and lost to my cup
when she walked past
smooth, elegant, slow-time
her eyes straight and her manner modest
O I only had eyes for her
that was all there was, that desire
as she glided through the street
her kimono red and strewn with flowers in bloom
her scent lingering in the air
the gold clips gleaming in her black hair
O the kimono was like a cloud ablaze
that wrapped a Being from the Realm of Desires
and my own being was in chaos and stirring
and then just at the other end
just at the bend
the beauty turned her head
and she cast her eyes on me,
just a flitting look
O the beauty looked back
and it is on me she cast her binding gaze

And now, for me,
as for a madman
there is no looking back
I must go where she beckons