Frozen clothes on
the clothesline, blowing in
a vagrant wind.
My nose red from the
Wine and beer at
the bar.
December of '87 came
hard and ferocious,
forever changing my life.

I was working night shift at
the nursing home up
the street.
A few of us went to
the tavern after work.
I got home around noon,
and went to bed.
21 years old, with money,
a job, and a car.
I didn't realize
life was borrowed.
Mom couldn't find
her sweater, so she
came to my room and
asked if I had seen it.
I said,
"No Mom, I'm trying to sleep."
I should have realized that
there's plenty of time for
sleep when I die.
But youth produces ignorance,
and I was drowned in it.

Mom asked if she could
borrow my car to go
Christmas shopping.
After more discussion about
her sweater,
I, with eyes closed tight,
held up the keys,
and that was the last
time I saw her.

My last words,
"Quit acting like
a *****."
Ever since, there has
been and itch to
punish myself.
I'm not Freud, but
maybe that's why I
drink so much.
Happy Mother's Day
Mom.

Another lunatic trip to
the hospital.
Nine days, this
go around.
For the first two
days, I just pulled
the covers over my
head and pretended I
was back in the womb.
It was warm and safe.
As much as I
wanted to stay,
I knew it was time to
be reborn into this
strange world of
sick streets, and
broken dreams.

My natural instinct in
this flesh wrapped soul,
is to anestasize the
pain and ugliness of life.
Blackout the brutality and
cruelty in the world.
Close my eyes with *****,
drugs, ***, anything to
stop the oozing pain.

And then it dawned on me,
like the dew soaked morning,
opposite action is required.
Walk through the
pain with eyes wide open.
Let love and YHWH hold my
hand.
Sober, head held high.
Call me sentimental and foolish,
but I'm a real *******.

I'm going to embrace the beauty.
It is all around me.
It's painted in the
sunset of the robin's breast.
It's in the
sublime melody of
the starry night.
It's written in the
faces of all my brothers and
sisters in their pain and
struggles.

Love is the answer to
every question;
I have to die to grow;
like a seed, a cell,
a fractured heart.
Bring it On Life!
If you knock me down,
I'm getting back up.
I'm resilient, and
no longer afraid.
Yes, this world can be
brutal, and we often
lose the ones we love,
but I'm choosing
today, at this moment, to
take this wild ride called
life, and live it, and
love every second I have
left.

Then, I can leave victorious.
What the ****?
Everybody wants to win.

The conversation lasted into the
long tooth hours of the night.
She read her textbooks and then heard a mouse with its tail barely caught in a glue trap. It squealed as if it were dying. In my heart I believed it was savable. In the agony I imagined him dreaming of fields and insects and seeds.
She had these cold gray eyes.
In one quick movement, she took off
one of her clodhoppers and smashed its brains out. She cleaned her shoe with a tissue, she said, I neither hate the mouse nor love it, it's just a thing.  At that moment I was pretty sure she was psychotic.
We're both drunk, I kept watching her *** in that tight  black dress.
She said in a very automated voice, I suppose you want to **** me now and then slithered out of the dress.
***** is *****
But I couldn't do it. I told her to put her clothes back on and not **** anything on the way out.

I let what you
thought about me,
and said about me,
matter more than what I
knew about me.
Way too intertwined with
your sickness and cruelty.
Far too beat down under your
brutal regime.
Nowadays, I wake up overjoyed that
I now live the obvious.
Who gives a **** what you think?

I watch life float by
like a dragonfly
riding the breeze.
I need to seize the
current like a
brick of gold,
soar ever upward,
above the swamps,
and dead lilies.
Transcendent light blinds
temporarily, but it's
necessary for new sight,
and stronger wings.

Some poems seem to write
themselves;
I just move the pen.
Others, are like lumps
of clay;
they refuse to be molded;
they need moisture and time.
This one is like
a robin that just learned
to use its wings.
It heads west, on a
gentle breeze, into
a tangerine sky.

Religion and faith are
for naught, if there is no
heart change.
The only thing holy about
Some people, is that they
are wholy mean and cruel.
Once again, I'm ripped out of
my daughter's life, because
her mother's religiosity is
In vain.
Even with her pretend
relationship with god,
small g on purpose,
she's still the most brutal
human being I've ever met.
I miss you baby girl,
Daddy's just a prayer away.

Three *** dreams in a row,
and I wake up lonely and
alone.
I don't need a ***** that
just wants to ****.
I want more, a woman to
love, that loves me.
And that love
cradles us, like
the wind, and rocks us into
a dreamless sleep beneath
an ebony sky.

I dreamed I was at some sort
Of carnival/expo with my
sister and my ex.
Somehow I got separated
from them
I met a young French woman.
She was beautiful, and she
Liked me a lot.
There was a lot
of passion and an instant
connection.
I had cuts all over my
face for some reason.
She liked me anyway.
In fact, she didn't even
mention the cuts.
The attraction was strong.
There was a heat I
could smell.
We started making out,
and we were just
getting ready to do it,
when we noticed a
large crowd behind us.
We laughed, and she wrote
her information on my
hand.
Later, I was playing
with a bear, and some other
strange animal.
I fell in a river, and her
phone number and address
were washed off my hand.
I never did find my
sister and the ex.
I woke up, and felt
Sick to my stomach.
Why are all the
good ones in dreams?
I need to visit France.

Rolling down the hill;
playing in the grass again.
The future becomes the
past like a strangler of
the night.
My fight comes
and goes, I'm no
longer young.
My storage of strength
seems to have
came and went.
And then like
heaven sent, this woman
shows up at my door.
Nowhere to go, lonely like
so many before.
But unlike the others,
within an hour, she says,
"Let's ****; let me **** on it."
And full disclosure, I'm afraid.
My younger self would
have went at it like a
Tom cat.
I said, "slow down, I don't
even know your name."
She says, It's Jenny are we going to
**** or what?"

Look at you my
little bird, have you
been pierced by a
sword?
Are you broken,
afraid?
It fasinates me how
you just. sit there.
Did you forget about
your wings?
The sky is your
home
For **** sake,
take flight.

The blue sky cuts
the woman to shreds
Sunflower saves her
from extinction.
Mountains want to crumble
with her into the lake,
but they can't,
they are strong, and
they have their place.
Time has got her,
she just doesn't know it

They came to me in
a febrile dream.
Whispered screams and
malformed limbs.
They wanted to drag
me to the hell they
came from, but I fought,
and got well.

I was looking for tulips.
I found you, oleander,
deadly nightshade.
Nothing grows in the
darkness that you chose
to live in.
Had I known, I would have
left you to wilt and rot in the sun

Once I began to get heathy,
I cut out all the junk food,
and saturated fats.
No more bacon and eggs for me.
I added fruits and vegetables
to my diet.
I exercise, and I pound
****** Mary's  from 6 am to noon.
The tomato juice is very healthy.

I'm just a lonely
wanderer;
a vagrant out at sea.
My vagabond spirit
knows home is where
I need to be.

Through the fog,
I can't see you.
I'm as blind as I can be.
You're my lighthouse in the darkness,
and your heart is where I long to be.

I hear the patter of
the rain on the leaves
of the oak tree.
It reminds me of my
daughter's soft footsteps on
the hardwood floor.
She's 3 years old,
and has gorgeous blue eyes like
her mama.
She owns my heart.
The neighbor downstairs
pounds on his ceiling whenever
my daughter walks across the floor.
It scares her.
I went to his door to tell
him to stop pounding,
and he wouldn't answer.
As a poet, I'm a gentle soul,
but honestly, I want to
harvest his kidneys and
fill his ears up with *****.

I want to get
the facts out.
The glass from under
my skin.
The rails from the
timber.
Just because I said
that your *** looks
nice in those jeans,
doesn't mean you
get to treat me like
*** crazed dog.
I gave you a compliment;
nothing more.
You're not an object.
And neither am I,
so don't talk to
me like one.
I'm not every
other guy you've
ever met.
Lift your eyes
a little higher,
that's where I am.

I miss her, and
it's uncomfortable.
I'm not used to
feelings.
In the past, I would
drink when I
felt uncomfortable,
or felt anything, for
that matter.
Now, I identify
the feelings, like
a strange new
species of animal:
"Oh yes, that's sadness.
It's indigenous to
the western plains of
the heart."
Feeling emotions is
strange and scary,
but it beats the
alternative;
feeling nothing,
and dying alone.

Gonzo goes out
with a 45 blast.
He was kicking *** in Aspen,
we knew it wouldn't last.
The rambling, gambling
man of journalism
put Fear and Loathing on
the map,
but in the end,
he couldn't stay.
It's bat country.

Everyday that dawns,
you slip away a little more.
The distant stare,
the apathetic eyes.
Your love is as dead
as the roses in
the trash.
Your heart is an
abyss that I'm
lost in forever.
Belladonna drew me in.
The poison kept me there.

Chess in the
afternoon sun.
Jazz floats over
the silky couch.
Backs ache, while
hearts break.
Bishop takes knight,
and France falls again.

The masks are all
broken under the
cerulean blue skies,
while she eats berries,
and smiles in her
pink polka dot dress.
The pawns are all smug,
and queenie's on the rag.
Italy surrenders, and from
the grave, Charlie Parker
still hammers home
those soft amber notes.
I can smell her heat, and
I think they play
Jazz in hell.

There, in the
tide pool, dappled by
the sun, is birth and death,
and the spark that continues.
It leaves mankind in a wake of regret.
What have I to do with the albatross
Or sea lion?
I can but write, while they fly and roar.
I gaze upon the Pacific from this rock,
all its mysteries and grandeur.
I am inferior, while it forever reigns with
every wave and break of light.

Our love is ******.
It swims the muddy rivers,
and creeps on the rocky
shores, slithering
through the dark
corners of our world.
It bites into
the dew soaked dawn of all
our tomorrows.
It breaks the tethers
that try to bind.
It's wet and it smells of
heat and fire.
It tastes like sweet pea
and pomegranate.
It's eyes are full of
desire and untamed lust.
It's the stain on the sunset,
and the paint on the pallet.
Our hearts beating together,
like a metronome, is the only
thing that calms this
****** beast called love.

I know the wind
cries for me.
The birds sing of
my loneliness from
the sky.
I don't even see
you in my dreams
anymore.
Your red dress
hangs from the mahogany
coat rack, and the
storm clouds in my mind
never go away.
Baby, these miles
and miles are making
me soul sick, and this
trumpet will be the
death of me yet.

My alter ego,
Thomas, seems to have the same problem I do.
He's in the hospital withdrawing from alcohol, and also has politicians
taking refuge under his bed.
The lice in Donald's Trump's hair
have demanded rice for breakfast
and it's 4:00 in the afternoon.
Bernie Sanders is under their clamoring free medical care for everybody, but every time I put the nurses light on and tell them what's going on they say no one's under the bed. I think they're in on it.  If this doesn't stop the doctors will think I'm crazy, but we know who the crazy ones are. Right?

I've been so lonely
as of late.
I set out to
create a mate.
Oh, who am I
kidding, I'm not
a poet, I'm a doctor,
truth be told,
more of an alchemist.
Going to graveyards
for body parts, all
in the name of
science, I swear....
to create life....boy did
I **** this one up
royally.

I was helping my
son with his homework
the other day.
For one of his assignments,
he had to write a
public service announcement.
He has been visited
by the muse
at an early age.
His goal is to publish
his first book by the
time he's 18.

It got me thinking about
my life as a writer,
and the young formative
years.
As a boy, I had a
broad imagination,
and much time alone.
I remember coming
up with plot lines in
my head, and then
writng little adventure stories.
My dad was a drama
teacher.
He directed four or
five plays a year.
I grew up watching
the classic plays,
and developing a love
for literature.

In Junior high,
I saw the power
of my gift.
I wasn't a popular
kid; somewhat of a
loner.
But one day in
English class, I wrote
a story about a
***** headed hamster,
with an underbite like
a French bulldog.
The other kids loved it.
They listened and laughed,
and applauded.
Words became my
new best friend.

I grew, and leaned on
writing through the
good times and the bad.
They were my warmth
In the long winters,
and my rain in
springtime.
Through the alcoholic
haze of much of
my adulthood,
writing kept me sane,
and it gave me
the will to keep
living when the
pain grew into
a beast of its own...

My son hands me
his paper, and it's
brilliant--it warns people
about the dangers
of cyber hackers, by
portraying the average
person surfing the net
as a lamb walking along
in the grass,
thinking life is grand just being
a sheep, when along
comes the wolf that pounces and
devours.
He finishes with,
"Don't let this happen to you.
Protect your computer and files
with such and such software."

He asked me if I thought
he could be a good writer.
I laughed, and and told him
that he already was.

You rolled across
my body and
soul,
working the
aches out of my
tired back.
This poem won't
behave.
The writing streak
is over.
I know that
all good things
must come to
an end.
The sidewalk
cracks,
the glasses break,
both bull and
matador die.
And when I lie down
at night
on the living
room couch,
the ten steps
to your bed and
to your heart
seem like
a thousand miles away.

I'm back in the psyche ward again.
It's my home away from home,
next to jail and the emergency room.
I sat under the bridge the other night.
It was January, and extremely cold.
I was jonesing for a drink—I knew what I had to do.
I had only been out of jail for a
couple of days for another public intox.
I narrowly avoided going back to the can today.
My nut-job girlfriend said,
"Why don't you get us some wine? " "Sure, " I said.
Shaking and sick, I walked a mile to
my favorite store that I steal ***** from.
I arrived, and had a bad feeling, but I
don't pay much attention to feelings anymore.
In and out is always the plan.
A bottle of chardonnay down the front
of the pants, and one in the coat.
I thought I had it. I was wrong.
A customer saw me and snitched me off.
I went with the manager to his office.
A cop showed up shortly afterwards.
I engaged the store-guy with talk of literature.
It turned out he was an
English major.
I wrote down the title of my book,
and slipped it to him. He put the paper
in his wallet. He told the cop that I was very cooperative.
Instead of taking me to jail,
the cop gave me a citation with a
court date on it, and let me go.
Sometimes, providence smiles on me.
On my way back to the apartment,
I was already planning the next store to hit,
I needed a drink.
The cop, from the store, pulled up along side of me,
and said,
"Your girlfriend called, she said she didn't
want you at her place anymore.
All your stuff is in front of her door."
I felt like I'd been run over by a rhino.
The cop said,
"I'll give you a lift, jump in."
When I arrived, there were two loosely
packed bags of clothes weighing around 100 pounds.
There was no way in hell that I could
have carried all that crap eight miles to Iowa City.
I grabbed a back pack, and stuffed it with a pair
of jeans, two shirts, my writing, and a copy of Don Quixote.
I went outside and waved to the cop, then headed towards town.
I finally made it back to the bridge.
I waited to get the nerve to make
my next move—steal wine.
I did it, and with no cork *****,
I opened it with a broken ink pen.
I'm not complaining, it was the needed elixir
and it went down like nectar of the gods.
I drank it quick, it was three degrees out.
Life had to change.
This was getting real old.

What's there to say when
your two best friends die a
day apart?

Greg died crossing the street,
smacked by a minivan.
Tibbs, from some strange
brain quirk.
I did C.P.R to no avail.

They're both gone.
They sailed away.
Gone like the last
spider of *****.
Gone like the songs we
sang together.

Sometimes
I still look for you two.
I turn corners and I half
expect to see one of you.
So ******* alive one minute,
so dead the next.

Both of them
fathers,
friends, and men
of valor.
Iowa City is a
******* place without you.
If there's a Brightside,
it's a brutal winter
and you don't have to
suffer through it.

I hope death is treating
you warm and well.
Your hell was
here.
Struggling for that
drink;
to be okay- to get that click,
to carry on, one more
grueling day.

It's over now.
You're gone.
Gone like the last Dodo bird;
gone like your impish smiles.
Gone like the miles we
trod with bags full of
aluminum nickels.

Words can't express the
mess
I am without the two
of you.
I know I'll see you again,
out there beyond the
purple horizon.
#friendship #death

You used to search my back, arms, and even my *** for zits.
When you found one, you went to
work at popping it.
It hurt like hell, but I never
said anything, because it seemed to
bring you such pleasure.
Sometimes, I don't even think there
was a zit.You would just squeeze a
freckle or birthmark.

And chocolate, for God's sake, you loved it.
Whenever I could afford it, I'd
buy you chocolate bars.And when I
couldn't, I'd steal them.
You hated me stealing, but you
loved chocolate.

In those golden Summer evenings,
I remember carrying your son on
my shoulders into the pink and
lavender sunsets.
We had story time on the Shelter couch,
your head resting on my shoulder.

But time, as it always does, rages on.
You have your son, your apartment, your job.
I have my river, my writing. and my ducks.
I feed them bread, not chocolate.
And although they wake me up at dawn by
walking on my back, they don't
mess with the zits.

I've trained them to eat bread out
of my hand.Their little tongues feel
like sandpaper.
I'll never look at
zits and chocolate the same.

I used to make this exotic Indian dish.
It combined so many spices—like cardamom,
coriander, and a hard
pulpy substance called tamarind that I
soaked in hot water and used only the juice.
It was a giant Middle Eastern stew.
It was half science and half art.
It was math at its best,
generally, I despise math.
It smelled so foreign and exotic,
it contrasted with the wife and 2.3
kids placed neatly around the dinning room
table, waiting on
the finishing touches,
sprigs of fresh
cilantro tossed atop each bowl.
An Indian bread called naan was dipped
in the stew—it was wonderful, amazing.
The wine—smiles—laughter,
I can still smell it and taste it.
And now,
on lonely winter nights,
my take-out tandoori chicken
smells like a T.V dinner.

I sit at my window and look out at the
snowflakes; they fall vertically, horizontally under
the grey black sky. I watch the dog break open the
bone and lick the marrow out. I watch the
big white cat sleep, snore, maybe dreaming of
a fat sparrow in his mouth. I think of taking
a bite of the sunset, living in a cave; the way
a marimba sounds when I’m haunted,
how Hamsun took bites of his hand in hunger.
My mind drifts to Van Gogh’s potato eaters,
the ***** that rejected his ear, Lautrec’s withered
legs and beautiful heart. I think of the falcon in
the city, the stranger in the mirror, the brutality
of man and the wonder in the doe’s eyes.

Anything but algebra, I took the compass test for
college, 99% in writing, 96%.in reading and 17% in math.
I have to retake the math and score a 25% or better.
I despise math, my girlfriend says, “You love math, it
gets you loans and grants.”
My brain bleeds with numbers and equations,
but she’s right,
I like loans and grants.

So I’m back at it, like a kid to
the dentist, and math does its job,
it pushes me back to
the word, the line, my dirt road
through the madness.

I've said her eyes had
the color of a madness shade
of blue.
That's not true.
They are the color of
love and angels, and
eternal spring.
Her eyes sing of
motherhood and light rain.
The sun shines through them-
a tepid pool that I
want to jump in and swim;
back float through the
daisies and spilled juice,
through the ravens-
all the way to heaven.

I found this thing when I was a little boy.
It's a beast of some sort; it has fur,
sharp
teeth, and a long tail.It's pulse sounds
like a ticking clock.It's beautiful and
hideous all at once.The thing makes me
feel immortal, like I'm a part of something
big and important.Sometimes it eats
everything in sight. And other times, I think
it might be starving.
It smells like ****, death, and *****.
But sometimes it smells like lilacs and
autumn and different women from my life.
I haven't been able to tame it, but I
feel like it's my friend.

It runs away from time to time.
I stay awake staring at the black sky,
worrying that it will never come back.
I walk the streets looking for the thing on
dark nights and foggy days.
Sometimes, I find it hiding in a patch of
tall grass- all wet and *****.
But usually it comes home on its own,
when it's tired of the vagabond life.
It does tricks that make people laugh
and cry and think.
When strangers and friends see the thing,
their reactions vary: Some people hate it;
they want to **** it, they never say that,
but I can see it in their eyes.
They say, Who needs a thing like that?
But other people appreciate the thing; they
love it and the way it makes them feel.
They say, I want a thing like that.

Sometimes I think the thing is almost
holy, the way it walks into a room and
looks at everyone with its searching eyes.
I'm sure it knows magic.I have a hard
aching love for the thing.It has the
most disturbing eyes; They change color
depending on its mood. When I look into
the thing's eyes, I see people and places in a
different light.Smells take shape and waltz
around the room.I can taste sorrow and
loneliness; I can here the wind blow ripples
across a small pond surrounded by cattails.

I've had the thing so long, I don't know
where I begin and it ends.
We don't always get along, but it's usually
because it won't behave the way I want it to.
It puts up with my selfishness, and kisses
me on occasion.It has no perception of time.
I'm getting old.I'm no longer the boy I
was when I found the thing.I like
it best when we walk together and try
to make sense of this carnival ride of a
world.It sleeps with me every night.
Sometimes, I hardly know it's there.
But I like it best when it snores and dreams,
and I feel its hot, sweet breath on
my face

On my windowsill,
of that indigo night
you took me,
and I haven't
been the same since.

Something about you
makes me want to
be a better man.
I've grown wings,
so I take to the sky.

I used to crush
lightning bugs on
my face. I thought
I would glow in
the dark.
I don't, although,
my liver has given me
a nice jaundice cast.
Almost Miami tan.
The other night
she
punched me, then called
the cops- blood everywhere.
She went to jail for
five days.
She acted like it was
an eternity.
We ****** last night until
we were raw.
Today, she's a stranger;
self centered and
self absorbed.
I've been drinking Cooking Sherry
to keep from having seizures.
She couldn't care less.
She brought home a
six pack and gave me one
beer.
Oh well,
I knew she was no Iris when
I met her.
I just didn't realize she
was Nightshade.

You're so sweet when
you're bleeding, and you're
needing that ****.
You're so lovely when
you study.
Let me give you
this rock.

Don't blame it on
emotion,
the ocean still rolls in.
Don't call it love,
when we both know
that it's sin.

I don't care about
the weather
when the ****
hits my veins.
I don't care about
the tether,
when I'm going insane.

If you were here,
I'd kiss you,
make my troubles
go away.
The problem lies
in the fact that I can't stay.

You can **** on me,
**** the poison from
my soul.
Keep me young.
Never grow old.

I'm always watching you,
through the Windows
of my mind.
My heart is true
even though my
soul is blind.

I dream of ******* you
in the darkness
Of your cage.
I want to slide it in
so you can feel all of my rage.

You're going to take it
Just like you took everything
From me.
I once was blind
But now I see.

I miss you,
but not as much
as I miss myself
I love you
but I hate my ******* self.

You will meet
people
in life that
love to keep score.
"I've done this for you, so
you should do that for me."
They keep a mental ledger.
They're pathetic.
Nothing is ever done out of
the goodness of their heart.
Their mind clicks with
records and accounts.
They are slaves to the
almighty penny.
Nothing you do will
ever
count anyway.
You're always in
the red.

Make the static go
away,
the dead-dog depression;
the fleas tip-toeing across
my brain.
Hate locks the
door to the heart,
and puts the
soul in a cage.
The rage consumes,
like a west coast fire.

Make the static go
away,
the electric anxiety;
the butterflies swimming in
my blood.
Love is a fantasy,
a fairy tale for children.
Devotion
imprisons
the mind and
subdues the heart.

Give me sweet
apathy, beautiful
sedation, let me
float in bliss;
untethered by emotion.
Let me get lost, deep
in the core of the orchid,
and sail aimless,
in the
vast chasm
of the sea.
Give me radical
lethargy.

How can you
blame me when
you made
me this way.
You gave me
free will, and knew
what I would do.
You predestined me
to lose.
I didn't choose
these terrible
wings of destiny;
you did it for me.
I wanted to be
Michael or Gabriel instead
of Lucifer.
I know there needed
to be a war,
and an enemy,
but why me?
I despise this
black soul.

I long for the majestic
sunset of your hair,
windblown, dancing across my cheek…
The burnt orange and lavender…
I want to consume every drop.
I’m thirsty for your
footsteps near my bed, parched with
desire for your presence—your essence.
How long until you wet my
tongue, and quench this fire?
I stalk slumber like a shadow…
my only release from the
hunger and yearning for your
moist lips, like peaches
pressed against mine.

Ten Seconds
You will meet people in
life that like a
fixed game or a
rigged deck.
The dice will feel
heavy, or the
take may be
light.
A jockey might hold
the whip in the
stretch,
or the champ will
go down from
a glancing blow.

Don’t be surprised when

you see it, you’re not
imagining things.
Some people need
it this way,
they’ve been on a loosing
streak for so long, they’ve
even lost
track.

The best you can hope
for is ten seconds
of one day in an entire
lifetime when it’s a level
playing field.
And if you get that
chance,
be ready, it’s
your turn.
Swing for the fence,
win by a nose,
take their *******
head off.

Her lips are like
wet orchids, dressed in
the spring rain,
waiting to be
kissed and
caressed.

It's hard to understand, unless
you've been there.
There is a pull to the streets.
I can't count how many dead
end jobs I've held—how many roach
infested rooms I've
crashed in.
The inevitable day comes when
I tell the boss, "*******, I don't need this ****! "
I walk out into the misty
afternoon—I look left, then right.
I drowned out thoughts of the future with
a cheap pint of *****.

I see one eye George on my travails,
he's half lit—living in the woods.
"Don't let the ******* get you down." He says, as he
stumbles by bent, and taking a standing eight count.
Mickey the ****** stops me a
block from my flop-house.
"Tommy boy, I'm sick…gotta couple of bucks so
an old drunk can get well? "
I slip him a five.
He says with a tear in his eye,
"God bless you Tommy—you know I
had it all, I'm afraid the
streets own me now."
"Keep your chin up" I say as
I plummet down the
street, pretending
tomorrow is a decade away.

I climb the three flights of
stairs to my room,
slip the key in the lock,
turn the ****—it opens.
"I love these little miracles" I say under
my breadth.
My three legged cat Walter saunters up to
me—he's white with marmalade splotches.
He does his best to rub up against
my leg—I pet his matted fur.

I passed out in an alley one
night, and woke up to Walter lying next to me.
I think something crawled into
my ear and made a home,
it's been there ever since.

I crash down on my chair,
and watch Walter scratch at
the door with his one front leg.
He hasn't been neutered—he gets the
pull of the streets.
I let him out and take a long swig of
the *****—the potion does its magic.
Life doesn't look so bad,
there will be other jobs, and I still have
two weeks left in this
dump of a room.
A writer needs four walls—yet there is
always

the pull of the streets.

Let's all go
to Damnation Island.
Let's all go to
the lunatic's ball.
We'll  have
amusements, and
dancing, and the
magic lantern.
The stupefaction
is for us all.

The poor will
be there,
hungry
and tired.
The poor will
be there,
dresses in rags.
We'll all have fun
on  Damnation Island.
The degradation is
for us all.

The criminals
are on
Damnation Island.
They're dancing and
killing at the
lunatic's ball.
The criminals love
Damnation Island.
The mortification is
for us all.

If you go to
Damnation Island,
if you dance at
the lunatics ball,
you might stay on
Damnation Island,
there's a good chance
you'll sell
your soul

How?
How do people do it?
How do people smile, drive cars,
buy loaves of bread,
read the paper, go to school,
go to jobs, go to church,
eat sushi, talk on cell phones,
drink coffee?

How do they ****,
**** and *****?
How do they
get their
shoes shined,
stand in line,
comb their hair,
brush their teeth,
go to the theatre,  
the circus, the carnival?

How do they do
these things and  
so much more when
babies, innocent- beautiful
babies, are born into this
brutal world,
where parents die,
where feral cats carry off
little birds that fall from  
the nest,
where best friends die,
O.D, get hit by cars
drowned or
die from some
strange brain thing.

How do we eat
chocolate, watch football,
and build snowmen?
How do we
visit the zoo,
go to the moon
copulate
*******
******* and
procreate
when hearts still
break,
Sweet Jane dies.
The walk on the
wild side ends,
and the letters we
send get returned?

How do they do it ,
when
dogs get hit by  
cars,
****** roam the bars,
the Dodo’s extinct and
wackos still brutalize
children?
How do people do it?
How do they carry on?

I feel like I'm
stuck in a bad
video game,
like pong, from
the first Atari.
And I'm that little  
dot that gets ponged
back and forth.
Life is like a
Scene from Dante's
inferno...
Abandon all hope...
I need mountains,
The ocean,
And the breath of
6 week old puppies.