Say sayonara
see ya later
adios amigo
and we know
you'll return.

it's always goodnight Vienna
and then a farewell,
waves and
a promise we hear through a
shell on the beach.

Clenching my teeth,
I cringe while you read my old poems.

Ahhhhh!
That's not me!
I swear!
I've changed!
I'm not so immature!

There would be nothing more satisfying
than crumbling that **** up
and showing you how great I am.

But those poems are the legs I stand on.
I can't cut them off, can I?

Those awful poems!
Sporn from longing and lust -
I called it "love" -
my cranky post-grad years,
living with my parents,
and working minimum wage jobs...
all I hide is there, for you to see;
most people don't look.

I want to erase it all!
I sometimes hope my old poems
are accidentally thrown away.
Then I wouldn't be at fault for
all those lost thoughts.

I don't want you to read them,
but I just can't rid myself of them!
Even now,
when those reflections seem far from the truth.
I hoard them. They are pasted on my mirror.

So I stand,
begrudgingly transparent.
Front to back, see through
and scared shitless you'll
discover I'm not perfect
in this personality economy;
I prepare my list of apologies:

Sorry I'm scarred
Sorry I'm chopped
Sorry I'm *******.

So please —
don't talk about my old poems.
Let's pretend you haven't read them.

Who was it said?
"who was it said"
and when was it said
do you know?

Questions have been raised
since the days when days
were counted in Moons,
monsoons ago.

You might know who I am,
a trier?
take a rain check
I'm a train wreck

I know who I am.

But who was L.B.J ?
and where was he when
the flags burned that day ?

Turning away because we
subconsciously do it
don't want to see it
or
hear it,
we fear it

a natural response
a human resource.

Another walkabout around the roundabout
to end up in the place I began

you might know who I am,

I am a universe in the mind of
each man
a star cluster
a storm chaser that races through
rain clouds

a train wreck of a man on a stretcher
stretching his neck to see
beyond the beyond.

The old man with no luggage
wears a pilling houndstooth jacket
and suede fedora with a
leather strap and horse-bit buckle.
Stark seams line his trousers.

He has:

Wirey gray hair, calloused wrists,
a popped blood vessel neath his thumbnail,
and deep crevices in his palms.
He folds his boarding pass into a kite,
as he looks into the sun
through the tiny cube of a window.

He sees:

The geometric shadows
cast in early afternoon.
And skyscrapers.
They cut through the sprawling
grid like an artery.

In the private hostel
and
a tiny bit of gospel
because we still have to
sing for our supper.

They still try to sell you
on things that they tell you
and we listen and
pretend we believe.

I saw Satan in the soup dish
and an angel in the cake,
fourteen knights and old King Arthur
who were
standing by the lake

I take communion with the lady
in the shower meant for men
and a mass for me at midnight
when the lady comes again.

We are eighteen carat diamonds
Methuselah wears us well
and we're in the private hostel
halfway home
half way to hell.

They talk of data,
seeya later
what do
I need to know?

The sisters of the holy cross
gave me up,
I said, it's
your loss
but
in the end it
was mine

date stamp
blue lamp

data

crime report
caught on camera
seeya later.

I operate a first come
first served,
parole on application.

In the olden days
we all had
accordions
mouth organs
flutes
but these days
we got
data at a rate of knots
spots before my eyes
lie detectors
truth inspectors
digital
toothbrushes for Christ's sake
and they make dental
impressions
free form soft ****
and
false confessions

I drown in the data stream
**** in the powder keg dream
and explode.

Five hours sleep
to keep body and soul
together.

Not,
why do I or whether
I want too and whether
I want to or not,
I get what I'm given
and I'm thankful to keep
five hours of my life wrapped
in five hours of sleep.

and it's Saturday
so if I start as I mean to go on
I won't be getting too far

Oh for to change
how nice that would be
I'd change myself into
a house by the sea.

(Waking's taking some time, please start without me)

We could have gone there and done that and been one with Mozart, but you wanted ersatz
the cats in the cradle and don't we get the cream.

Punk rock,
we knock it, no better than the critic when it comes to it.

I prefer hip hop that stops at the last stop before I kiss you goodnight.

in the porch light holding you tight for the last dance before dawn.

I had
Franklin D on a C note
until Quinn stole in and
stole it
now I got
Jack ****,

I've been poor
and it sure ain't a crime
but if they catch
Joe Quinn
I hope he gets time,

lots of time to consider
the error of his ways.

She has eighty seven
ways in which she
likes to **** me,

we're up to number fifty nine,
she says that on completion
we'll go another time.

She keeps me in suspense
past tense,
she kept me in suspense.

Portents:

the door that creaks
the pipe that leaks
the hole in the bedroom wall,
all lead me to wonder why,

she kills me but
why is it
I never seem
to die.