Life without addiction
feels dull,
I am more numb now
than I ever was while using
the only difference sober is
I am so painfully aware of it.

we do not write poetry
we write mirrors
which are held up
to curious faces
who read
looking for their
own reflections

One moment of pleasure
can unleash a lifetime of
pain.

XXVIII. TO ATHENA (18 lines)

(ll. 1-16) I begin to sing of Pallas Athene, the glorious
goddess, bright-eyed, inventive, unbending of heart, pure ******,
saviour of cities, courageous, Tritogeneia.  From his awful head
wise Zeus himself bare her arrayed in warlike arms of flashing
gold, and awe seized all the gods as they gazed.  But Athena
sprang quickly from the immortal head and stood before Zeus who
holds the aegis, shaking a sharp spear: great Olympus began to
reel horribly at the might of the bright-eyed goddess, and earth
round about cried fearfully, and the sea was moved and tossed
with dark waves, while foam burst forth suddenly: the bright Son
of Hyperion stopped his swift-footed horses a long while, until
the maiden Pallas Athene had stripped the heavenly armour from
her immortal shoulders.  And wise Zeus was glad.

(ll. 17-18) And so hail to you, daughter of Zeus who holds the
aegis!  Now I will remember you and another song as well.

there is always that space there
just before they get to us
that space
that fine relaxer
the breather
while say
flopping on a bed
thinking of nothing
or say
pouring a glass of water from the
spigot
while entranced by
nothing

that
gentle pure
space

it's worth

centuries of
existence

say

just to scratch your neck
while looking out the window at
a bare branch

that space
there
before they get to us
ensures
that
when they do
they won't
get it all

ever.

some say we should keep personal remorse from the
poem,
stay abstract, and there is some reason in this,
but jezus;
twelve poems gone and I don't keep carbons and you have
my
paintings too, my best ones; its stifling:
are you trying to crush me out like the rest of them?
why didn't you take my money? they usually do
from the sleeping drunken pants sick in the corner.
next time take my left arm or a fifty
but not my poems:
I'm not Shakespeare
but sometime simply
there won't be any more, abstract or otherwise;
there'll always be mony and ****** and drunkards
down to the last bomb,
but as God said,
crossing his legs,
I see where I have made plenty of poets
but not so very much
poetry.

don't feel sorry for me.
I am a competent,
satisfied human being.

be sorry for the others
who
fidget
complain

who
constantly
rearrange their
lives
like
furniture.

juggling mates
and
attitudes

their
confusion is
constant

and it will
touch
whoever they
deal with.

beware of them:
one of their
key words is
"love."

and beware those who
only take
instructions from their
God

for they have
failed completely to live their own
lives.

don't feel sorry for me
because I am alone

for even
at the most terrible
moments
humor
is my
companion.

I am a dog walking
backwards

I am a broken
banjo

I am a telephone wire
strung up in
Toledo, Ohio

I am a man
eating a meal
this night
in the month of
September.

put your sympathy
aside.
they say
water held up
Christ:
to come
through
you better be
nearly as
lucky.