come back to bed
walk my hallways,
upon my shoulder sleep,
rest in my nooks
soft, well worn, cosy crannies,
let your face go slack,
get back jack,
to where you always belong

I know too well
what ails thee,
know no answers easy
to be found
walking around
an old creaky house's
groaning discordant mystery sounds

do come back to bed
I'll call you babe,
kiss those temples
rock 'n rolling,
soothing them with
adagio classics from
the 1950's and 60's

I'll think of something
just back,
bed bunk, mate,
with me
your roommate of the sole
****** sunset years

let you write poems
on my tummy,
gurgling with the pleasure of
skin and words
tender entwining,
just come
back to bed,
pillow deep,
fund the sleep
your desperate need,
from my countenance and body,
yours,
no needy for asking,
just the just
taking what you're needing,
be my human,
be my child,
and come back to bed,
my very own

still crazy man
after all these years,

before leaving me
sleepy smiling,
from a job well done
with the fluids
of our
co-joinery

that ease,
however brief,
thy tempested brow
one less line,
one less worry

“High in an ingredient called allicin, garlic can help stimulate circulation and blood flow to ****** organs in both men and women. However, because of garlic's mood-killing smell, eat it in moderation.”

while researching mold, stumbled on this factoid,
the one that’s asking
what is moderation in love?
and where in the oddest places, we find answers...

oft thought that pure love is extremist,
and any extreme needs to thrive on its antimatter,
so goodness, needs speckles of unkind,
and ****** promotions, aides that aid,
present an invoice needy for stamping “paid!”

such is the casino we play life in,
you cannot leave till you’re paid up,
paid in full in heartbreak joyous,
so the odor of love, keener, fruited,
when absent and the green grocer
no longer smiles when his ex-best garlic
customer walks by(e)

I toiled in seduction fields, gathering fruits and flowers,
now, reduced to a window-sill gardener whose
crop will grow from citified rain, small stunted,
leaden and ripe for discardation

troll me not, your stuff is your stuff,
mine is mine, when we meet, you will be slow to recognize,
but you will smell my garlic, and know it’s
that poet
exactly

au revoir, no!

it’s not your eyes that will acknowledge
my existence, but the dirt beneath my fingernails,
and the perfume of what might have been therein contained
if you, sadly unlike me,
are!
s t i l l
crazy after all these (tears) years

For Berlinski

<X>
it's so true, can't believe it though,
this fact so well known, my cells fibers denied it asylum,
mocking me with a berating ****** single-cell-syllable of
shut-up

my runted eyes never spake this confess out loud
but here it is,
a silent truth rutting onto the **** mirror paper-white screen
where the pixels do my screaming pleasing easy and the
goldie oldie ***** stains, asking "you again?"

silence reverberates, like a tree falling in the forest,
the screen where I live, holy matrimony 90% of everyday
for better or worse, still crazy, the years get longer and the
the poems stretch out, ******* sag, and pseudo-crazy making me
lazy tired

no shy guy me, but the word waste of pointless,
sends me silently screaming to the bedroom where under covers  
I count threads. herding words, making pleasure gutter noises,
that can only be heard by the audio surgically implanted
in a human chest, and the dust mites

*but the blunt i smoke stimulates the nervous brain system and the gibberish comes furiously fast, trying not to burn the sheets
that just were laboriously added up to soft and silky when served with a side of naked girl and discovered that I talk hugely stupid when stupid and ******, oh so common, and
the s-words cut bluntly and satrap sharp where there and when the plain sentences become bread knife sharp and the poems gestate in 9 minutes because nothing is blurred and all use Exit 74  on
the interspatial, intracellular inter-pet

fully formed, in finery, winery celebrated, spilling wine on those sheets and now I am cursed cause words are the master,
leaving me just the mature, shy crazy boy, the muted tool;
oh god, dear god - Oh GAWD!!!
please let me be still crazy till long after my
bleached bones rumble,
"boy, it is time to be in that in that valley"

For Al*

your limbs,
a finger, a toe,
an arm, a leg,
cannot be amputated,
without your presence...

when the men
drive in the car together,
the women, best friends,
absent,
temporarily away,
their men,
time release the
the secret shavings
of truthful conversations,
the unconstrained sharings,
spoke, untold,
free from the raised eyebrow,
the serious shushing
of censoring partners,
Lionesses-in-Absentia

who else
where else can you tell
the complaints unspoken,
the peculiarities, the ironies,
that make you smile/wince
laughingly grimace

and now the men are
friends

so when he asks,
come to the movies with us,
tho you are neat beat,
dead on the feet,
you now know,
too late, too late,
always and evermore
say sure,
cause,
now that he is gone
in a single swoop felling,
his oak trembling,
fallen
oh my friend,
now on his side,
lifeless

you say sure,
always
sure,
cause you have to be there,
just in case,
it is time they declare
to severe sever
one of your very own
limbs

~~~

Happy Father's Day, God in Heaven!
(A Continuing Dialogue)

~~~

wonder if I am the first,
even the last,
to wish a deity,
happiness based on a human construct

but feeling groovy with you,
meaning we ride sums of the same
curves and the lines, grooves,
connecting holes in the palms of
our hands

ya see,
got some familiarity
with
fatherhood...
and all that entails

the balance of imbalance,
it's tough I know,
load-bearing children,
leave ten ton scars,
but don't expect no
tea and sympathy from me

you and I,
we have our beefs,
and by the by,
master of the universe,
nothing has changed between us,
just saying, for the record,
ya know, for our inscribed
bible personal with our own bible argumentative stories privé

a human has no right to offspring,
but off they spring,
when the '**** dam’ springs a leak,
and them kids then spend
their lives.
saying yes and no
in light speedy abundance,
or worse!
ugh

...whatever...

if
they respondez
to whatever you suggest-see

rebels even when
they hug you
around the knees,
all knowing we papis (poppys)
fully, way in advance,
that in their supposed adulthood,
children will curse and bless you with
the equality principle
of self-righteousness and I know everything

Let us think upon it....

somewhere in the world,
it is a sabbath,
your citizen-creations
are beheading and burning
each other, Papa,
in your name,
so Happy Father's Day...

I mean,
really, that must be tough,
so it's perfectly clear
why you created free will,
all parents need a way to
walk away sometimes from
the children's choices

somewhere in the world,
it is a sabbath,
billions sending you a
litany of liturgy, a sweet songbook
in so many languages,
the simultaneous translation machina
must get overheated,
all those human claques submitting
liar loans applications

the backlog must be
eons in length

you see,  I am,
muy simpatico

of fatherhood,
what is my expertise?

a fair question
from one who provided
us the classic excuse,
"that's so not fair"

two sons have I,
a Cain and Abel,
so in this, expertise,
we've trod familiar ground

but this be about us pops,
not about how our embodied creatures,
bent and beautiful,
sending us formalities of video thanks,
should they remember or be bothered

maybe we should institute
greater frequency
of celebratory notifications,
making it easier for all of us
to forget,
lessen the guilt, the ache,
for it's more convenient, easier
to be overlooked,
with familiarity

nah,
I am not a complaint
in human guise,
not much, anyway,
and don't you fret,
I got you
a Father's Day present

as appealing as it is,
atheism in me won't take root,
cause I look forward to giving you
holy hell, next we meet
it's so richly deserved
so maybe I'll repost this in a year,
or maybe, I’l be close enough
to whisper this in your ears,either way, come hell or
high water,
Meus Pater,
you can bet your last bitcoin or
anything you might value,
I'll be bugging you,

(cause I'm
still crazy after all these years,
from standing upright,
on one left foot,
showing the world the poetry
of your world)

so tween us, I wish us
a Happy Father's Day
*best wishes

for Beau

this mixte bag of nutty facts,
compote of this's and that's,
fragrant but yucky tasting potpourri,
sordid assortment of
seemingly unseemly
random collection of
facts, whoppers,
recipes and formulae, and his 'n her
stories (my fav!)
useless motorized drivel,
running around my head

that you have with me creme-filled,
data conglomerated,
transformed by mongol hordes of grey cells
urged on, nay transformed,
by **** and beer into
a magnificent miscellaneous mile of jumble,
virtuous and verifiable grab bag of
ever so humble,
tuneful melodies of a medley of
snatches and patches
of Jagger and Liszt,
a verifiable pastiche of
vital and downright dumb
Factors and Factoids,

I thank you suchly muchly*

musta taken years, maybe even
decades to collect and codify,
this assemblage of verifiable factoids,
after-all, took you twelve to
feed me in eye dropper ingestible quantities!

though with Wiki this and Wiki that,
I coulda save us all some time,
and since it is all on the Internet,
and any way 99% I forgot
like a cell phone number

no matter, I can reads and counts
and writes term papers downloaded,
but caught my eye you wrote
of a mutton stew denominated as
hotchpotch,
but we variant truants,
ici, aux Etats-Unis, on dit
and spell our salmagundi as
hodgepodge

but in summary summation,
thanks for teaching me creative thinking,
for without this skill,
I would but be,
a tool
of Wikipedia
and not its creator

P.S.  It's gadzooks,
not gad zooks,
according to Wikitionary,
even them Oxford fellas agree,
tee hee,
you could look it up
on the internetsky,
Teach....

~~~

how to cook a poem/poetic theology

so many ways,
but one favored

after oh so many trials
after oh so many errors

taste tastings, plenty,
some good, some feh

some inspired, some liared,
but it's the process

the methodology,
that becomes your
poetic theology,
of

how to cook a poem

slow simmer,
as if it was
a hearty filling stew,
with the red wine,
you flavored,
for style unique

stew
over it,
add pinches of
contradicting adjectives

icy hot,
bland spice
and not everything nice,
bitter herbs,
fatalistic flaws

make it
to
make the left and the right
side of the brain
argue and engage,
let it taste of the foment,
of unease, disease,
and the
coming to terms
with the
alternating au courant currents,
of fashionistas

don't forget
the final seasoning, the finishing
reasoning,
the perfect certainty
of momentary
peace

uncovered, derived, home grown,
after a thirty years war,
and the
perfect uncertainty,
you still aren't sure,
which side won
and why

some fry in nastiness,
some broil,
flaming to burn away,
some boast to roast
of the average angst
that breathing
seems to
require

some peel,
some imbibe the raw,
all get sorted

for even what
writ in haste,
all sourced from ingredients,
taking years of seconds,
in the assembling
the trial and error
the preparation,
required for living a life
cooking poetry

I'm thinking of loving you,
make a note of that!

put a yellow stickum
on the fridge
already curling up,
from the good steam of
the first coffee atmospheric

I'm thinking of moving in!

clear me a drawer,
half a closet will do,
not much for possessions,
thinking I'll stay awhile,
as long as you possess me
and vice versa too!

could be seasonal,
winter marking me,
scarf dug out from somewhere,
but that just means
it is the season for
better slow loving

baby,
don't please misunderstand,
my intentions good,
just human, no regretting,
motives purely selfish,
want to put this self in you,
and see what comes of it

the stickum note,
to the floor now fallen,
in the under the fridge space,
where things go that...

no omen, no, oh man!
cause when I decided,
got past the thinking point,
arrived at the sticking point,
appears to be a long time
such a long time
to be loving you,
so many other things
curled,
neither of us noticed
that first stickum fallen

make a note of that!

“keep your dementia well organized”

it spreads to the outward edges like camera film alit,
burning inside outward, fast and quick,
the mutterings dispersed in voices
precisely loud enough to not be distinctly heard,
but perfect for your
active concerning consternation

you summon different voices for every occasion cause you
keep your dementia tools well organized

order is the successful methodology for maintaining
what otherwise appears and truly is, irrational rantings,
nuggets of chicken, you’re too chicken to loudly scream,
lest someone solves the riddles you are raving

it’s insane to keep your crazy so well managed,
it’s sane    to keep your crazy so well managed,
it’s crazy to stay sane, when your demented nature,
is dewy decimal handy for steady decimation

you laugh while writing this,
recognizing a well organized personality disordered,
is the key to success at anything you do,
like being crazy cool
you, still crazy after all these years,
do not lack for historical perspective

oops! typo, hysterical perspective,
old tricks for new doctors, renewable energy
never fails to confuse and amuse,
hard work keeping yourself entertained
at the medical professions expense

which is why I keep my dementia well organized

the desk drawer was open, extending an invite,
cheap blue handle scissors, easy see, on top,
robbed of excuses, went around the house, all my
personal goods, mission oriented, trimming away
loose threads wherever they were hiding in my life

no expert in love, for sure, but struck by you people
linking love and dying, over and over, like they are
hyphenated, siblings, separated twin children, that
long to communicate, checking each other out on the
internet  anonymously, cause these two linked in ways
not understood, loosely tied, a threaded linkage, can you
please explain?
(mysterious)

is loved only fully realized,
when it phoenixes?
burnt, slowly agonizing,
arisen, resurrecting,
is it one cell endless
dying, re-splitting?

Paul calls,
asking:

“and you wonder why we, why you,
why I am still crazy after all these years?”





12:04am
Wed Sep 9
plague year

never made it past my bed
never made it past my head
never got past pj's
ennobled by a ditty bathrobe
making ditty poems from within
a tequila shot hungry hangover

just past noon,
day halved, brain salved,
with leftover
breakfast shooters

the hairless dog
did not bark in the night,
gelid Angels chanting hymns,
maybe it's just my frozen nerves,
or the eyeballs hi ding ing
under the covers

don't think I'll accomplish much
less than more,
cause I am
never gonna get past my bed

he, hardly fit,
sleeps fitfully

he, like a baby,
up and down at 2am

the cerebrum racked,
like a street *** so needy,
for a low caloric,
non-alcoholic snack

pickles - the almost zero solution,
dill in particular,
or even the slightly bad boy cousins,
the buttered variety

so in his customized original
100% sleeping skin gear,
standing in front of the shiniest fridge
gleaming,
his unfortunate reflection somewhat
steamy,
indecisive, which, his pickle, to to choose,
which to eat, completely complete,
to celebrate his dietetic restraint

so she, the yoga ballerina lioness,
finds him upright but not uptight,
leaving him in an awkward
so to speak, poem, pickling,
naked and speechless,
as the mouth is fully engorged

and on point
she summarizes
most eloquently,
the ****** and the crudités and the et. al.,
with a succinctly pithy observation:

"ah, I see (me wincing),
still crazy after all these years

...and other stories

sliced the thumb quite nicely,
a straight line, it,
the thumb,
applauded my skill,
turning bright infected red from
embarrassment
for me...and my minority complaints,
losing HD sight of the
big screen
of what matters

small woes and big-toes,
got ten times aplenty,
got lawyers and creeps
back in my life,
made promises that can't keep

so for sure
biblically cursed,
Job, and me,
losing parched perspective
under the tree
that gives no shade

dancing on that line called
"why bother,"
the other side of depression

forgetting again,
roof over head,
pizza in the belly,
can still stand up straight,
after a few vociferous
aches n' growls,
though the docs prescribe
what i proscribe,
i.e exercise, diet and blah, blah, blah, hah, hah

got her and got you,
goddess of poetry,
the mental health should be ok,
someday,
maybe even
the physicality

but not nut all of you,
not so lucky,
love the brave,
the courage true
those who ask,
when the time comes,
brave ones revealations,
shame me back to perspective

so do the thing,
some say,
call it the-right,

says I,
it's the no-choice
no thought needed,no praise worthy,
just
*extend the
balance,
bring back the
relativity,
share the
luck,
be as brave as those who
dare to ask

My body

disembodied step by step,
no disambiguation
or neutral observers
to go oy
or shush or protest

disunited piece by piece,
arms disarmed,
legs lanced and amputated,

yet he/she lives on,
chest and head,
and doesn't protest,
or angry curse fate

someone staunches
the ****** words,
the ****** tenants
of the boastful remnants
cry out

beaten you
in every way
as long as chest beats
and tip of tongue
coexist,
I am more than whole
I am undefeated,
nor is ended silence,  a white flag of surrender,
my words live on...

run the hands over every
tissued cell,
race the tongue upon and under every
unsealed pore

linger, tarry,
only if you must,
here, there and where
you stop only to drink
my body's must...

lid to lobe,
crevice to mound,
uncover the obvious,
reveal the infinitesimal,
finite the desire,
end at the beginning,
fire up the cool hearth,
emblazon the shields ofordinary,
exit and enter
simultaneously

refill the apertures
with~not~my
peptones, enzymes, amino acids,
replenish my
well

then drain
well
the abscesses and repair
the wearable wounds ,
reminder remains
of prior contests,
won and lost

make me better
than well

know before,
realize afterwards
that ceasing,
never and always,
is an always never*

for this route
forever changing,
for your hands and tongue
redraw me
every time
they run the course

every time,
ever and when you
exit and enter
always and ever
simultaneous,
the course of
my flesh

we fought, we sweated,
anger spent,
tissues dispensers emptied,
broken vase,
from a cheap Far East jaunt

have had enough,
now let's just
make love
and
salvage Sunday
rebalance the weekend,
our younion

sons,
you don't particularly like me
no, don't run, it's ok,
no blame tendering,
my weaknesses well exposed,
can visible well
historical multi-reasons why

I don't lament,
don't let it better dismember me,
for always I love you,
a platform beneath,
unasked, sacrifice, so much messed up,
being a parent don't come with
training wheels

so blame the old guy
understandable,
grade him D ad

forget eyes whys
don't lament,
being a parent,
sworn to be
a platform underneath
in perpetuity
and so be it,
be it,
I will

~
*The Cubs, The Dog and the
Greatest Leader in the World^

~

humble lives in the spaces in between
our toes and eyes,
where the miracle occurs,
that linty dirt
returns of its own free will

we wash our faces dailies
of the night's crusted leavings
gift of
The Elusives^

a kinda kissy poke in the eye
lest u think stink,
u get a prideful notion of a
a clean start - ha!

the stubble assiduously removed prior,
returns with a scratchy salutation,

"good morning and *******,
you ain't the boss"

just in case u think u got it
rightly wrongheaded
and a passing stray filled your
grateful deadheaded
notional still prone brain,
you,
are
master of the universe,
greatest leader in the world,

go back to bed
it's the weekend

after you walk the dog


~~~

The man who made the Cubs world champs Series winner named best leader. Upon being named greatest leader in the world by Fortune, Theo Epstein, president of baseball operations at the Chicago Cubs, had this to say to an ESPN reporter: "Um, I can't even get my dog to stop peeing in the house. That is ridiculous.

in low tones
caressingly whispers,
use me,
write yourself

pick me to pick you
up,
only with me,
thru my ink flowing
down

pen thy pen.

pen thy image,
craft is the pen,
pen is thy craft,
craft thy image,
you were, you are,
created by,
created for,
picked by,
picked for,
pen

~

the title comes easy,
the rest,
not so much

love rejected,
chest pains as real
as a heart attack

weeks, months,
time intensifies,
doesn't heal,
I stink of desperation

when my mind

-smells her skin,

- tingles as her hairs on the back of neck tickle me madly,

- steals but one of her images from me

I don't care how I smell,
only dream of,
of the smell of skin,
her skin...

The Whys of My Briefcase

don't know where you keep yours,
mine, immediately resigned,
to my black briefcase

the bills I cannot pay,
the notices that I knew
would unfailingly come some day,
the letters to my children,
signed, sealed but never to be
delivered till much later, maybe,
by someone else's hand

and so,
I carry my briefcase
every day,
an appendage human,
opens only for additions,
never any subtractions,
many reminders included,
for letters previous posted, sent,
and stamped~marked
past, way past, overdue

the authorities demand satisfaction,
at the very least they want my
whereabouts

the doctors asks,
what's wrong,
you never filled that essential
prescription~poem I wrote for you,
that was even writ legible
so you could not deny its
existing urgency

that **** briefcase is so heavy,
tempted to chuck it into the Peconic,
but it was a loving gift from her,
not realizing that I carried no case,
just so burdens invisible
were imagined lighter, or extinct,
but easily ignored

where do you keep yours?

the forget~me~knots that you
don't want but can't crush
legally or courageously

when they open that unhappy pandora,
they will wonder why nothing was e'er said,
but they won't ask twice, but understand,
for who among us
does not have a black briefcase?

"Truth is the offspring of silence and meditation"

Sir Isaac Newton


Upon reflection of this wisdom,
I...

{•}

unwanted love

we, the human counting crows, tracking everything, steps, bank balances, heartbeats & especially,
those dastardly calories that need burning

pre yoga, her morning banana,
she takes but a half, and looks to unload the balance on a sucker/victim in the vicinity because a whole
is greater than a half,
and God knows a whole could make you fatter!

fully prepared for her desperate supplication, reply so quick,
"you're forcing me to eat unwanted calories,"
she crestfallen,
near to weeping from guilty feelings,
a crime so heinous!

but more than ready, added words, prepared years ago:

but to save your life gladly give you any body part,
step in front of a vehicle, for a certain somebody,
you may know, to preserve, life and liberty,
put up with your inanities, border-lining on insanities,
answer your questions before you think of them,
and will restrict my singing to sole showers in the basement
but never will I eat for two, that so undesirable,
in the name of love

to which she came to my bedside, kissed my nose, whispering,
"thank you for my life saving,"
while stuffing my mouth with said weapon,
"thank you again,
please don't make this into a poem"*


somedays you just ain't gonna win,
you see she loves me too well
and knows
my answers before I do...

watching the pain dry

you did not mistake -
no word play, not the product
of typo or errant
clenched eyes

labored writ,
the liver is failing,
the interval organs
a joint co-production
contribution,
the words demonized,
but truth cannot be
plausibly denied

all cast members
are rehearsing
preparing the last act,
interrupting with
exceptional,
expectorating refusals,
objections,

too*

this n'that

all their "too's"
are double O'd,
double ****** negatives
an overflow
bloodletting,
excessive overwriting
the playwright words,
maudlin can't be spoke in the present
of his
presence

revolutionary overridden by the
actors,
the words too hard,
to speak sob as long as I am
almost stilled but still
in the room

-wrenching a bemused grin
guiding them & pain to a higher purpose,
admonish them with pleasured pleases

needs saying
as it writ and
carrying  the denouement
to a rightful conclusion
as

"Who am I? I'm a poet."**


from “La Bohème” by Giacomo Puccini libretto

~~~


"My business? Writing.

How do I live? I live.

In my happy poverty
I squander like a prince,
my poems and songs of love.

In hopes and dreams
and castles-in-the-air,
I'm a millionaire in spirit"

“A man is about as likely to ask for help for depression as to ask for directions, and for much the same reason,” said Real, who struggled with his own depression issues. “It's part of the male code, part of masculine culture.”

~~~

when they ask,

I say, parrying fast,
how you doing?

to the persisters, I mutter fine

which is 100% correct...



been fined for the accumulated

made-mistakes, wrong forks taken,

the weight invisible but the

body sags, nonetheless...



you know they know,

you know their thoughts,

why doesn't he snap out of it,

after all he is a man,

he has always been

what we needed,

why can't he

just go back to the person prior...



this code, is not law,

ten times worse,

genetic and culture passed,

double ******,

code so real, like the headaches,

the nightmares, that forbid equanimity...



not true,

we don't expect that of you,

thankful for all you have done,

but eyes betray,

a simpatico misunderstanding,

the instillers, can't take back

what they celebrated previous...



the signals everywhere, few ascertain,

cause the rule is never complain,

don't go near windows,

lest the sunlight diffused, offers no cheer,

but escape temptation ever on offer...



forgive yourself, someone intones,

but what infects my bones,

is non-responsive to the forget antibiotic,

which does not come in pill format



ask me for directions,

I will talk/walk you to your destination,

but when I'm lost,

I'm just a lost man,

who needs to do better,

forgetting is not in my DNA,

but lost is...choking on expectations

of being everyone's savior,

with no one to save you from yourself...