for my dad

I crack myself up,
twice
once, at the doctor's office,
a steady stream of me~repartee
made the waiting room, the warring harried receptionist,
and ultimately herr doktor, his royal himself, as well,
somewhere combobulated, somewhere beware and between chuckling to uproarious clutching their sides,
and many stations/gradations in between

finally the teary eyed doc inquired not how
but why I do it,
well, replied I,
somewhat of a family tradition,
doing waiting room shtick,
because the sound of infectious laughter,
fills in the cracks quite nicely
where you cut me open, and also drains away
the deposits of chemotherapy poisoned sinful residuals
just a tad quicker,

and that is why I crack myself up first,
when I boldly look in the mirror and

laugh at the silly scarecrow I have become

<•>
  For A:

The Pleasure of Infection

10:53 pm

our all about
is to be the whittler of our personage,
to both hold the knife with care,
but with risky, reckless artistry,
as we shape of what raw materials we are possessed,
into our own reshaped, reformed
most prized bejeweled possession

never mind the shavings and cutaways fallen,
they are fast away, castaway choices made and cannot be retrieved,
for when we whittle, whether our shape desired
which may be prior envisioned or a vision
from the discovery of performing,
they matter no more,
let them go, in their absence too,
they are part and a whit of you,
but not of you, no longer

our commonality in this: everything,
in everything else, so little

but your honesty and crafted, almost dishonesty both ring true,
and infect us with pleasure of recalling
when we
being cut designed and preparing our statue for
an unveiling, but with no date yet set,
and the loveliness of our mistakes,
were precious do-over opportunities

seek out the infection, the infection of discovery,
the risk of pleasure exposed and
your poetry may be either  
the antibiotics
when the result is red and unpleasant,
or a celebration,
an invitation to us to be a
semi-silent beholder of your artistry

infections heal after pain and discoloration
but new skin always forms,
but at a different pace for each of us

I see the faces in my carpet nodding agreement,
"always new skin"

oh boy. time to go to bed

go seek out the pleasure of infection,
sadly, happily, it is the only way

good night
from an old man who dreams and schemes of
new skin nightly
but never mind me,
my piece long ago writ
and in need of just a tweak here and there,
call it one too many close shavings,
his poem's treasure trove,
a list
of life's minor irritations
and major lifts

<•>

11:16pm

maelstrom meltdown on Third Avenue**

<•>

the crushing came from nowhere external,
walking calm, southbound on Third Avenue, 7:00am,
found myself lost, slumped up against an unopened bank

copious weeping an acceptable addition to the malignant,
maelstrom meltdown turmoil, turbulence,
such tumult that weighed so-heavy that my disordered confusion recognized no boundaries of shame,
all chaos fission fussing into fusion

new friends, passerby's all, asking, even pleading,
offering water, coffee, solace with milk, counseling kindness,
the inexplicity, thereof, a suited man, so normally workbound;
the timidity, to inquire what's wrong, fearful of an answer's danger,
the enormity, thereof, worse, the hollowness of any responsive words

there lay I, till the police asked me to move along
or be arrested; I moved on for was I not already arrested?

my vortex, center of a swirling eddy,
a wind whipped maelstrom whirlpool,
shortly to consumed, bedlam no more, and the blood in me revererbrates that mournful prayer music of my child that cohabits,
never departs or wavers,
n'ere ceases or changes,
Les Miserables
"Bring Him Home"
supplanting the desperation of a living sin,
mine own breathing sounds

as I said,
the crushing came from nowhere external


<•>
for Steve and Tonya

if only I knew how to love...

for my Victoria

winces-grimaces, that these words even leave my fingertips,
reminiscences, a chrome bookmark tab full of decades of near misses,
instances, subway sideway stolen daily glances of she who would be the only, the one, but one day failed to appear, left to dream peer,
and/or
decades long of romanced lasses, flying spectacular super crashes, when my heart-blanched, lanced, and the lawyers danced, poems shriveled as dried ink crack'd and words rusted shut,
cut by so many p'raps, and ugly motives, beautiful covered up, disguised as synapses of sin and insincerity, and I,
the sad man,
both the sinner and the sinned against,
totalities, of shoulda-woulda-asked/kissed-her-gallantly,
activities, when kisses were doorways to trap door rooms
and an over decorated monte cristo prison cell

ah well

the 'and yet,' the 'but for,' a single finger, sealing silenced lips,
passions mourned and irrevocable sensations, frittered, fractured,
all that I calmly called love was sprigs and broken branches,
cut flowers destined to shrivel,
not of what I believed in, something akin to a tree rooted, an oaken strong unbreakable love

of this certain, all approximations, all failed incantations,
for surely, if but only one escaped, could have been saved,

and if truthful love it was,
I would have known it,
for would I have dared to let slip away?

market report: spinning on an axis of complexity

phrase captures and enraptures, buried deep in one of the
countless market reports that arrive every minute out of date by the time they press the end/send button but this rises
up from the forged gorge throat and all the rest falls away

spinning on an axis of complexity

sticks like Elmer's glue, white viscous, good for paper & skin,
cause you knew precision revision incision instantaneous,
they are intended for your eyes only, pasted to your eyes,
tinged tongue screaming you man, you poem
there is no
difference, for both at 1:55am 
 where time is sleep verboten,  
when words are blood platelets in a mystery entitled

spinning on an axis of complexity*

human must eat
human must work
human must love
human must sort the juggling orbs,
too much new information constant and brain incapacitated

while falling-spinning
when eyes now fully glued shut by the
complexity of clashing algorithms
writing this market report on the state of me,
the passionate impartial analyst who boldly reveals, he proclaims
he owns stock in himself and issues a
sell recommendation

the complexity-situation trending signals crash a-coming,

and at 1:59am after composing this hissy fit writ,
he downgrades the official outlook to sell and
lies down on the kitchen floor and laughs
with the angel dudes eating bagels and holding their sides,
cause they have  been running a short position up in heaven*

6/22/17 2:05am
nyc