Tonight I stayed at work until 7:00.
It was dark when I locked the front doors.
Winter approaches again, soon the great coat
huddled like a rug around me. The streets
were active as usual, block residents
hanging out front steps. I said goodnight
to Nydian Figueroa, after school counselor.
I bought a beer at the deli on Third Ave.
from the Arab owner. He’s a bit upset about
the bottle bill.
                          Collecting bottles from small groceries
could be a useful youth employment enterprise.
I walked down Fifth along the park in the dark
drinking my beer and looking at women. I need
a good **** badly. I tried to decide whether
to go to the movies, a Hopi film Howard recommended,
or just go home, watch tv and light a candle.
Maybe I’d meet someone at the film.
                                                                  Can I handle
the malady of going home tonight? If I die,
I die alone.
                      I turned west toward the subway
past the museum, through the park.
I can’t look at the myriad lights in buildings
large enough to hold a small town. It increases
my anxiety and anonymity to the breaking point.
I hoped to be mugged, for the human contact.
Two big guys looked me over, but I lowered
my center of gravity and they passed quietly. Survival
feels fine, proves I am alive.
                                                   The white pines
in this corner of the park hold a cool, earthy air
reminding me of coming winter, that mortality is
restful, of the black bear and swollen river I saw
500 miles away and only one day ago.

A line from a favorite movie of mine goes;
"Marriage isn't romantic,
that's why God invented poetry."
And I could not get it out of my mind.
So much that it kept me up for two nights.
That what if I am to become a wife,
life would be a never ending strife?
What if I can only sit still with a book,
but as soon as I am someone's woman,
I am a runaway and a crook?
What if I can only well rhyme my poems,
but affection for my husband
is something I would always owe him?
What if I am only clever with my riddles,
but fall short with my duties as a maiden?
What if I am only a good artist,
but bad in marriage?
What if I am ideal in theory,
but repulsive in practice?
What if I am a better lover,
but only in my letters?
What if only in fantasy am I a good writer,
but in reality as a foe am I better?

Late April and only
coltsfoot—Tussilago farfara—breaking leaf litter.
Our daffodils, peonies and crocuses
are also making signs.

April is the cruelest month, I forget why.
A sweet slow Spring
no sudden changes
each leg and leaf unfolds deliberately. You can't miss it.

New York City's spring rushes like a yellow cab
into summer. One day leaves are wet,
next they’re leather. I prefer this slow dance,
birds mating on the sky, peepers evolving into frogs.

Repairs take weeks or months. Septic,
garage door, cracked windshield, clean windows,
build bridge, buy land, rake leaves off erosion control,
cut wood, prune lilac, paint lawn chairs.

More carefully inspect, identify, the insect
of the week, a fly with an ant’s body
that skirts the grass and falls in drinks.
Look more closely! It will be gone in a few days!

Then it will be the time of moths or fireflies,
mosquitoes and wasps. Mud road,
red-winged blackbird. The slashing stream
topples old trees. My legs hurt.

The Batman Movie (a review). The clues part was cool, but the end of it got boring. I liked that Batman kept a journal - I like the idea of men keeping journals, because, do men have many thoughts they share? Men’s thinking seems so ephemeral.

In this Batman resurrection, Pattinson’s Bruce Wayne & Batman are Kurt-Cobain-like emo and that seemed to work. Didn’t you just want to take your hand and get his hair out of his eyes? I think guys should have hair - I like hair on guys, not buzz cuts. I liked the muscle-car Batmobile.

I liked Zoey Kravitz, she was girl power, but not in a hot girl way, she had her own motivations, she wasn’t just in danger and served up to fuel Batman.

The movie is too long though. They need to bring back movie intermissions - I’d vote for that. As usual, I drank my giant slurpee and ate ½ my popcorn before the twenty minutes of previews were finished.

It’s a three hour movie. I had to *** so bad by the time the movie was ¾ over that I was grinding on my popcorn bucket to keep it in. I finally had to make a dash for the bathroom - I was afraid I’d miss the KISS scene. Argh!

Let’s talk about Robert Pattinson, the actor, and his arch from Twilight to Batman. Of course, doesn’t every vampire turn into a bat? (joke) but it’s always Pattinson being moody, being hot, figuring himself out and the introspective man - the broody man.

Are broody men ****? I don’t like broody men in real life - I feel that only one of us gets to be moody in a relationship - and it’s going to be me. Pattinson seems almost zany and cheeky in RL so the brood is his method act. I Like that Pattinson didn’t buff-up for the role - I think the buffed-up muscle-man as superhero perfection somehow relates to capitalism. Pattinson’s American accent was good.

What was missing from the movie was horniness. Batman didn’t seem HOT for Cat-girl - he just stood there for her to kiss. What’s boy-girl attraction if it’s not horniness? Where has the horniness gone in movies? Sexiness is missing from ALL the superhero movies - I guess the age demo is too young.

I give it three out of five stars

Tommy guns for insurance
And wads of sweaty cash
To build new empires with

But there are no guarantees
Crime, you see, doesn't pay
You can bank on it

So we already know how it ends:
They canceled his policy
And Dunaway with her

It’s Saturday morning, and even though it’s Thanksgiving break, Lisa and I are in her bedroom, in NYC, studying.

“Ok,” Lisa stops, looks up and says, “give me a *** symbol.”

“I.. I don’t have one on me.” I say, apologetically.

“NAME one.” she clarifies.

“Are there “*** symbols” anymore?” I say, with air-quotes, “Who’s “Marilyn Monroe” today - Kim Kardashian - oooo - or Kendall Jenner?”

“I read Emily Ratajkowski refer to herself as a *** symbol the other day.” Lisa says.

“Is that the model that said she was groped at a naked photo-shoot?” I ask, as I google her.

“Yeah,” Lesa nods, “but it was a naked music video shoot.”

“Do you think I could model?” I ask, as I pose vampingly. “Be unflinchingly honest.” I request.

“Hhmmmm,” she considers, framing me in a finger rectangle pretend camera. “You’re like Marilyn Monroe,” she says, “in a training bra.” We burst out laughing

“Back to the subject,” Lisa says, “name a guy you think of as a *** symbol.”

“Humphrey Bogart!“ I say.

“Humphrey Bogart?? No!” she rejects him, wrinkling her nose, “too old-timey and dead, besides, he was a MOVIE star - come ON, a real one - SAY!”

Michael Gandolfini!” I offer.

“​​Michael Gandolfini??” she says, sounding stumped as her fingers google him.

*I make a dreamy “mmmm,” yummy sound.

“Oh, my GOD,” she says, and looks up for confirmation. “Humphrey Bogart and Michael Gandolfini - HONESTLY, you have the WEIRDEST taste!”

I was shocked, “No, seriously, don’t you think Michael looks kind of soft, cute and.. LUVable?”

She groans, “You’re going to marry an ugly man someday - aren’t you?” She pronounces, shaking her head.

“AM NOT!” I responded, throwing a pillow at her head (a pillow fight ensues).

so many places
I have never been
and never seen
yet they are all here
the world visits me
in my ineptitude
screened
a movie
a moving mirage
expanding like the universe
further and further
away from me
making spaces
leaving traces
my mind fills in
the world becomes picture
framed
Hitachi, Sharp, Sony
so many meetings
greetings
but none of them mine
I am alone
as a polar bear
on an ice cap
a Native American
in his own land
populations explode
and interact
to become lonely souls
the last of their kind
waiting on a final chapter
an end to the movie

DEAR PENPAL PEOPLE, everyone dreams of a movie life that they never had:>


'do you have a movie idea?' she is asked
my piano's stuck on notes that made a blast
'what is your absolute dream?'
no clue!!! I scream
now with that blood reaches my knees when I lie
and shattered glass stains a cry
but one selfish day
of a one grey warning day
on a Storm
out of Vivaldi's norm
I'll make November's violins
spin the veins under my skin
when an alarm's clock won't erase history
nor dust the ink in black poetry
the purple eye
would know a who and an exact why
when a sudden mother's scream won't defeat
the eclipsed expressions or invisible heart beat
nor the recall of empty lines
things that used to be an impossible of possible defines
when a sun's light won't make a memory in sleep swing
nor the unnotice of a summer autumn winter or spring
wouldn't keep the pen's color on a compass' tip
on an adventure of a lost ship
east kills west north kills south
when the kissed would be a clear mouth
to live for the hope of it all
the said would be spit on a train station's phone call
the fall would reach the death quest
the unknown would be unraveled for the moment in rest
but the dream's missing pieces has nothing to do with the recorder
and that is why I would record ONCE then put the puzzle in a folder
**** the ones who saw
burn the **** machine after created in raw
I did title 'Waste Before You Taste' a long time ago surely
some greed changed my idea of mercy
a question to be answered is jeopardy
when no human shall know of there will be misery
when a heart of glass would be dropped and broken
when the darkest thunder of the dream was golden
once the ought to be a secret would be a wonderland stolen
I warned it would be a selfish day
yet you listened and now the death penalty you pay

                                                            ­                              -------ravenfeels