I’m in Vietnam right now overlooking the city at 3am watching the ** Chi Minh lights work their shades of violet and jade into the black mass of night.
there’s a lot of poverty out there and with it a lot of generosity.
I commend them for that because while deep-rooted in the garden bed of desolation, I can’t override these frustrations on feeling defeated.
I went to school, participated, put forth the effort and made the grade but the board felt I wasn’t worthy enough when it came to the final test.
the only thing I achieved was retaining monikers such as loser and failure because I have lost and I have failed.
the smallest obstacle had become my biggest hurdle and I am too mentally and physically exhausted to quash it.
each step I take feels frozen and keeps dragging across wet cemented floors
& the skies have listened to my screams
but delivers no answers.
my god, have I given up?
it’s not likely for me to do so.
especially when so much was riding on life.
I watch the motorbikes zoom pass my psyche
as a Tiger beer falls from the balcony and shatters in the debris. a wet heavy sorrow suffocates my heart.
I sob. I weep. I cry. I fall. I wail.
I must resurrect and rise like the sun, the smoke, the symphony but my focus escapes me and I lose my hope.
my mind turns to the system; they decide
who makes a better world and who gets
tucked away in the dust.
but I can’t blame the system, only myself and
my inabilities to try once again until
I’ve reached my success.
I gaze over a man yelling at a woman while roasting a chicken down below.
they’re trying to make it out there on the ***** streets of Saigon.
fighting to survive. one more day. one more time. one more ounce of life.
and my biggest struggle is only with myself.
my stubborn brain clashing against everything I worked so hard for.
beating myself up, tearing myself down,
all that time, money and effort: wasted.
it was all  for nothing, I screamed, it was all for nothing as my half naked woman sleeps behind a green curtain and a red rooster crows at another new day full of possibility.

all that pain
and belittlement
you served me
day and night
when no one
was looking
made the little
man within you
feel much, much,
much bigger
but now you
stand before me
weeping
with no teeth
and the big man
within me
has forgiven you.

this is it, man
the last stop before hell
the final chapter before knowing the unknown
I prayed this day would never come
and I have feared it more than death itself
but now that it has arrived, I can’t move,
I’m paralyzed, comatose,
almost vegetable-like
too many nights were spent
laughing with diesel-powered killers,
singing with mop-haired lepers
in monotone slate
& dancing with minotaurs around
the open flame of age
it’s all behind me now
my days roll through soft and fuzzy
like peaches in the August heat
a cozy bed, comfy pillows, secure blankets
and yet, I felt safer in more dangerous places
(I always preferred the acid rain dripping from the mossy underpass over the holy water bubbling in the Vatican jacuzzi,
yeah dig?)
but now that I’m surrounded by all this
security, comfort and warmth
I feel less alive, almost finished,
when I’ve got so much more to unleash
like a mad dog, old and vicious and untrained by its master with enough bite
to inflame your wrists with rabies.
it’s been one hell of a picnic, lemme tell ya:
kissing death under the ring of vultures
loving women like a broken bear trap
delivering music like an olive branch
cleansing myself from these filthy poems
it’s time to turn it over to someone else
let them abuse the night
and listen to it scream
me? my nights weep themselves to sleep
and I join in on their sorrow.

looking around this empty room right now,
I’ve come to accept that the gig is up;
the party’s over, the lights are off
and everyone’s gone home:
the music here is quiet and tame
the basement echoes in phantom laughter
the window panes are no longer broken
the pyramids of beer cans have crumbled
the late nights have turned into early mornings
the dancing girls have turned into career women
and I had it good for a while, maybe too good;
shooting dice and rolling sevens and elevens
but now everything comes up snake-eyes.
I finally understood that the foundations of people
were more unstable than water and
less faithful than a Rush St. ******.
friendships and other relationships
sank faster than a mafia ****** weapon
(maybe that’s why they call them “ships”)
but as the aging hours of time came
crashing through like lightning:
I found love when love was unkind
I found hate when hate was merciless
I found people and stubbed them out like cigarettes
where by and by, it all turns to ash,
just mounds and mounds of ash,
windswept by gentle persuasion
and now they’re buried in their shrink-wrapped lives;
dropping kids off at soccer practice, attending PTA meetings,
hosting chili cook-offs, yelling at football games,
disgusted with Tuesday’s, bowling on Wednesdays,
pretending everyone’s doing fine and living quite well
while I am left here with myself
and this eerie moment
of reflection, now realizing:
it’s all gone.

I don’t know how it happens
but every nut job you meet in a bar
has a story they’d like to share with you
about their wild days of youth
or about how things and people were
decades ago without the usage
of what we have now.
they seem to be unstoppable,
their mouths are like pistons
running on an everlasting engine
pumping out these useless words,
these agonizing words that don’t
amount to anything
and the crazy part that blows my mind is
I continue to listen with great anguish
I am their ear, their therapy
I am the light to a handful of moths,
an oddity freely roving amongst them
these people were once people
a long time ago
fulfilling fantasies
they could never imagine
and now they have found me and latched on
as if anything had to do with anything
but I need them though, I need their agony
I need their glory and their damnation
because without their uselessness
how would I ever continue pumping out
these meaningless poems?

do what makes you happy
and the rest be ******

forget the critics
the naysayers
the reviews

forget those who pounce
at first glance with
unsolicited feedback

forget those who wait
with serrated edges
for the unveiling
of your back

forget those who lambaste
and castrate your creativity

or worse, those who
try to help you
improve it

and then there are those who
uplift and support your work

say thank you
and
forget them
too.

forget about polishing the knobs
off the editors of poesy or
the literary brotherhood
and sisterhood

forget about your friends,
your enemies and
your audience
all together

they are a cough drop
trying to cure an illness

do it
the way it was meant to be done:
without obtrusion
without approval
without asking

don’t allow them
to cloud your mind
with judgment
of any kind

do what makes you happy
and the rest be ******.

alright, alright, the records sound good
and the mulled wine tastes great.

everything here is tidied up;
swept, mopped, vacuumed, wiped down
to an immaculate degree

it matters very little though
when your utterly alone
on Christmas Day
in a clean house
without anybody
to ***** it up
again.

all I have are these thoughts,
these tiny flashes,
you appear,
then disappear,
then reappear
once more.

I can only imagine you bringing us a drink
while we laugh at the same movie
we’ve seen for the 400th time
and the kids are playing at our feet
with their new toys and board games
and eating oranges or chocolates
or walnuts on a white cozy afternoon

but looking around now
while dipping into the 5th scoop
of wine from out of the ***,
there appears to be
nobody here.

I add cranberries, an orange slice and a cinnamon stick
as I switch the record to Leatherface or Joy Division
or The Shocking Blue or Black Sabbath or
the collected works of Richard Strauss
but it doesn’t help my melancholia,
only suppresses it
for a while

and as the dog stares wide-eyed
and the cat leaps out wildly
and the gloomy clouds roll by
and the poem writes its obituary
to a silent response,

the music grips my heart
and squeezes it like the
blood of an
orange

and I am
utterly alone
without
you.