I feel like I am neurologically deficient
That a lot of my brain cells are missing
Like a punch drunk doped up punk boxer
A pimply muscle bound ***** on steroids
Hanging out at my old high school locker
No shocker that I am no medical doctor
But I always thought I’d be just a bit better
I guess on average I am a little bit smarter
But the bar is set so low that it requires
Very little to grow and go over it, you know
In comparison to the other young men
I may be grandstanding and one upping them
But when it comes to grand scheme of things
When compared to past people
Who shared my glorious dreams
Like Percy Shelley and John Keats
Like Ginsburg and the other Beats
I think I am drifting of course just a bit
Lest we all forget the **** cut the crap to fit in it
Maybe I’m okay few travel this way anyways
So who’s to say if I’m doing it the wrong or the right way
But I still feel like my brain needs a chemical treatment
A diet with more nutrients and sufficient Supplements
Because I’m feeling neurologically deficient

everybody’s angel bodies
find happening midnight
on Kansas pavements
hipsters’ motherwords are wholely robed by time
instant everything is ordinary
buggered city  immortals --
annoyed, parentless, marijuana everymans
swiftly digging unknown eternity
groaning strange in the long mysterious night
roaring, vibrating kindness
from their holy tongues
blazing inner hideous human gold
draining ***** forever
draining everything
forever -
Moloch, Buddha, Abyss
Reduce, Reuse, Recycle

When I wanted to be a superhero

I forgot how important it is to have a sidekick

I forgot that when I tried to go into that good night gently

I did not have to go in alone

That when I fell face first into mud thick puddles

In places so dark it feels like drowning

You could have been by my side

I forgot that I am only human

That the only weapon I’ve ever held is a pen

And the notebook I keep in my breast pocket

Would burn up at the thought of a bullet

Superheroes don’t wear pocket protectors

So when my editing pen broke

I saw what a bullet wound might look like

But I still let you fall behind

The voice of reason

Of clichéd comedy sayin’,

“Holy Ginsburg crazy man

Poets don’t save people

They just look for reasons to cry”

And if you had gone in there with me

I might have come out alive

Gone back to my day job

Loved you proper

With 9 to 5 weekday normalcy

And nights so silent

I’d have to press my ear to the wooden floor

And listen to the sound of the cold expanding

Just to fall asleep

I made it to the other side of the city

I’ve since removed my armor

It sits wrapped in slowly thinning paper

Trapped between the lines I secretly wrote you into

I never had any powers in me

Just a lot of passion in me

But I still keep forgetting

I can’t do this alone

Wow, what even is this?
Terrible, terrible.
Why do you even bother, it’s no good
Thanks, now get out.
I admit I’m not the next Frost
I may not even be the next anyone.
So, without further ado, I’m sorry.
I apologize.
I’m sorry Blake, Burns, Wordsworth.
I’m sorry Poe, Frost, Ginsburg.
I’m sorry Plath, Petersen, Bremer.
I’m sorry Church, Winter, Dychkowski.
I don’t measure up, I don’t even rhyme
Selfishness is my reason for this
Feelings on paper and thoughts in obscurity
All written without form, no scheme
Is it real if it doesn’t make sense?
I’m not stopping, no, I’ll persevere
But I offer up these apologies to those who are poets
Somehow I got labeled with you
Somehow I ended up here.
Poetry. My one stay. An escape I can always turn to.
I’m sorry.
My apologies.
Forgive my excuse.

Life is purchased
with metaphors
you jingled those coins
loaned them to anyone
gave your students
a lift
down alliterative avenues
danced at the front
of the room

The plantation overseer
cruel as dominion allows
stirred your fears
made a ***** in your confidence
Schooled in permitted wrongs
she let the lash fall
on those on whom it is allowed
Indulged her charity
honeyed harms for some
obfuscated raw aggression to others
hooked the faithful
for the delicacy of a minnow glittered soul
because pain like tears
is a universal taste

You rallied and held on.
Recalling the poverty
of the adjunct
you feared falling
through that trap door
Oh faithful moon man
you leapt over the danger
turned fear to comedy
showed us the stairs
with howling laughter
and for a time
climbing the career steps
out of the basement
I tried a Vaudevillian
performance too
at your urging.

You cultivated adoring lines of students
your succulents
yearning for the secret
how to survive
in dry times
how to nourish the roots
when life is scorched
and fragile and taut
You imparted the gift to sustain the soul
to anyone who would listen
a verse on the tongue
is the secret wellspring
and you showed them all
how to find it.

I have seen, I have seen, I have seen all I need to –

The illuminating ideas rolling gently from your lips, caressing my mind,
vivifying my thoughts, reviving lost electrons, electrifying burnt out neurons –
charging my mind, challenging my intellect, changing my perspective – there is no Starry Night, no Mona Lisa, no Shakespeare sonnet, no Ginsburg “Howl,” no Ezra Pound on a black bough, that likens to the magnificence of your words, the radiance of your smile, the wonderment of your eyes, or the fun of your laugh. There was nothing special about the moments before, not the jester, nor a stunning sunset, but something charmed happened after the jester exited stage right, a simple phrase, uttered from your lips, the what matters not, just the swift insight that I was in awe. Never have I been in awe before, a new experience, that never faded, that stuck with me for the days to come as I wander aimlessly dreaming of the greener experiences you will open me to. I leave myself unguarded, there are no masks, no sad howling mask of despair, no happy grinning mask of cheer, just me, open to you, your ideas, your enlightenment. Paint, draw, sketch, mold me into who I should be for you, I am your canvas, you are my artist, this will be a masterpiece that will hang on the walls of museums, in the halls of temples to come, to put people in bewilderment as they rub their eyes for they have seen all there is to see now.  

– nothing can compare to what I have now seen, life has meaning, and it’s before me, in your eyes, your smile, your mind, your you.

I dig Joe Rogan
Suheir Hammad
And Alix Olson
Truth seeking
Artists

I dig Howard Zinn
And Noam Chomsky
Dead intellectuals
Truth seekers

I dig Marty
McConnell
And Jason Carny
Poet lovers
Of Humanity

I dig Shakespeare
Mark Twain
Edgar Allen Poe
Emily Dickenson
John Keats
Percy Shelley
Ginsburg and the other Beats
Writers and poets
I will never meet

I dig The Daily Show
The Colbert Report
The John Oliver Show
The Young Turks
News and fake news
Comedy Shows
That expose
Deep truth

I don’t dig me
Always
But I like you
And all the potential
You hold
You are not a black hole
But a blazing star
Waiting to blow
Waiting to be born
The only good form
Of a hydrogen bomb

That reminds me
I dig Einstein
Tesla, Da Vinci
Gandhi Thoreau
Bruce Lee
Great Minds
That are dead

My list goes on
Forever in my head
So instead of
A dissertation of love
I would like to know

Who do you dig bro?

Let's run away together
and buy a cramped, one bedroom apartment
in New York or Prague or San Fran or Bristol
wherever you like
(I could never begrudge you anything)
I'd sleep so much better
with you in my arms
(I wouldn't be scared
that you would **** yourself
in the night)
I'd learn to cook
vegitarian
just for you
and
I'd make you tea
when you were sick;
You'd tell me
"You're pretty"
every morning
and mean it
and
You'd read me
Nabokov and Ginsburg and Shakespeare
over breakfast on the weekend.
We'd go to the museum
and discuss
artistic movements
and painting techniques;
We'd go to concerts
and dance (though
neither of us
can)
We'd lie in the grass
under the stars
naming off constellation
basking in each others' proximity.
In short, we would
love each other;
*** each other;
make each other happy.
Let's run away.
let's run away together.

"Hope is a thing with feathers"
They read, confused.

The only feathers in life were
On TV or locked away in a zoo.

They read the poetry of Whitman
The dictates of Emerson
Of Ginsburg, Steinbeck, Salinger
Nothing made sense

When you spend your life being prodded
From concrete box to concrete box
Stuffed, squashed and barely managing to survive,
Imagination is rare

It's hard to picture feathers,
Red hunting caps, blooming lilacs,
Open roads
Between ***** pavements
Glittering broken bottles, and leftover plastic

Beauty became an expensive concept,
Best left for academics

I have seen, I have seen, I have seen all I need to –

The illuminating ideas rolling gently from your lips, caressing my mind,

vivifying my thoughts, reviving lost electrons, electrifying burnt out neurons –

charging my mind, challenging my intellect, changing my perspective – there is no Starry Night, no Mona Lisa, no Shakespeare sonnet, no Ginsburg “Howl,” no Ezra Pound on a black bough, that likens to the magnificence of your words, the radiance of your smile, the wonderment of your eyes, or the fun of your laugh. There was nothing special about the moments before, not the jester, nor a stunning sunset, but something charmed happened after the jester exited stage right, a simple phrase, uttered from your lips, the what matters not, just the swift insight that I was in awe. Never have I been in awe before, a new experience, that never faded, that stuck with me for the days to come as I wander aimlessly dreaming of the greener experiences you will open me to. I leave myself unguarded, there are no masks, no sad howling mask of despair, no happy grinning mask of cheer, just me, open to you, your ideas, your enlightenment. Paint, draw, sketch, mold me into who I should be for you, I am your canvas, you are my artist, this will be a masterpiece that will hang on the walls of museums, in the halls of temples to come, to put people in bewilderment as they rub their eyes for they have seen all there is to see now.

– nothing can compare to what I have now seen, life has meaning, and it’s before me, in your eyes, your smile, your mind, your you.

High school's like a jury - let us all be judged
the righteous and the wicked and especially those in love

The jury's always watching - it has a thousand eyes
it's in constant deliberation and it hears a million lies

some think there's popular immunity and that's how the system works
but celebrities are piquant targets - it's one of the systems quirks

Ladies and gentlemen of the jury - I address you here today
to plead the cause of justice for a girl who was drugged astray

I know this girl’s not popular - she's known as "what's her name"
But the prominent guy who “seduced” her used methods vile and lame

I work cloud-like opinion and gossip pointedly outside stalls
I direct lunch-time chatter and I'm "overheard" in busy halls

I'm a regular Bader Ginsburg - you WANT me on your side
and If I'm coming for you - there's no fu*king place to hide

What's in a ******* day?
Ten days ago, I was in the
backseat of
a 2008 Chrysler Minivan.

One hundred days ago,
I was stumbling and
climbing in
Burlington,
reborn.
What's in a ******* day?

What's in a ******* day?
Three hundred and sixty-five days ago, I was trapped,
homeless and loveless,
in a private, Stepford-studded
sort of way.

What's in a ******* day?
You tell me--
but I've learned that while my streets may change,
the concrete is always the same.

One thousand days ago,
I passed the baton to Richie Sullivan,
thus turning my wild,
private reality
on its dainty little head.

Five thousand days ago, I learned that
Gregory was going to New Zealand
for three hundred and sixty-five days,
give or take a few. But
what's in a ******* day?

What's in a ******* day?
Yesterday I spoke with Janina,
today I did the same,
and tomorrow I will speak with her as well.

Yesterday I did not speak with Conor McCall
or Brian Gagnon
or Julia Ginsburg
though I knew them all once.
I will not speak with them today,
or tomorrow, either.
What's in a ******* day?

the beautiful muse
beauty beyond the restrictive nature of language
Woe is me, unable to describe such radiance. the problem of a wordsmith.

conclusions lead to new inspiration
but conclusion, leads forced end
to eternal broken wheels
The Beauty of language
stifled by despotic definitions

The Muse has my soul
she squeezes my *******
and won't let go until I write her songs

explosions of spastic action
muscles under the command
of a proverbial *****.

life mundane,
like an addiction
music getting sweeter
and life around brings only apathy

all that matters
is the swaying hips of the muse
the heat of her groin
the atmospheric morphing of the air around her
whispering every word that is to be written
her hands over mine as I type
her breath on my cheek

she visited me not as a first
Witman,
Ginsburg,
Burroghs,
Kerouac,
from all she demanded verse and chapter

from me,
from them,
centuries old games.

No Wolf, no Ginsburg,  nada de Sylvia,
all my precious, deadened,
all my possessed, to dispose,
the garbage the city won't haul away,
even Potter's field
issues a writ of habeas corpus refus-us,
***** you-us,
our graves runneth over
with nobody's nevermore,
perfected howling
~~~
murdered victims last
murderers to the front,
howling innocent,
got no room
panning for second raters
poetic pain poseurs
~~~
some cells, microscopic, preserved digitally,
aged to imperfection, thrash my eyes,
making me speak in tongues I do not recognize,
but fluently possess, no wonder there,
the memory place fairly empty,
room aplenty for passerby's and and of the
vagaries of hasty parted spotted pitted words~~~

Long arm gendarme
My mistake namaste
Backpack bivouac
On the Road with Kerouac

Brilliant stars, silent nights
Fireflies, Northern Lights
Mountain streams, fresh air
Fall asleep anywhere

Small town, take a chance
Pig roast, barn dance
Allemande left!  Do-si-do!
Spontaneity here we go!

Long arm gendarme
My mistake namaste
Backpack bivouac
On the Road with Kerouac

Beat Zen's hey-day
Doing things our own way
Nonconformity, anything goes
Kerouac-Ginsburg-Burroughs

Shot to pieces, picking skin
Benzedrine, adrenaline
Don't forget the Phenergan
Notify our next of kin

Long arm gendarme
My mistake namaste
Backpack bivouac
On the Road with Kerouac

Don't wait until you hesitate later when Ruth Ginsburg's out licking
a gator, pulling tails off lizards & having Siamese twins with Ralph
Nader, whose methylated spirits decry dipsomania eight years later.

Letters of old dancers dancing to music, touching undone turbulents, formulating makeshift sentences, releasing their fury onto the world, the saints who have done no harm but are forced to make all the decisions, delivering daggers, of fury, in their brass outfits, off iron loviung, of bows and arrows locking into the hearsts of men and women in the same place, of peopple, yes, of humans loving intimacy, of loving dominance and power and in acceptance, of superiority or infiriority, clowning at majestic paragraphs, that are meaningful then meaningless, that are gibber gabber, edgar allen poe, allen ginsburg, allen allen allen clowning in your ear get back there in a fury!  make of an echo and make out of a whisper!  and do and do and do

Ginsburg threw me a line…

"on the black waters of Lethe", as I floated by.
A ware, launched in antiquity as tonal code,
lazily waiting the call,
dum did dum dum dum, drum drum drum

Big bass,
tickled in tune to the whistler washing dishes,
in the back, we've all seen
in the back, on TV

but are you,
really, for all reality is worth,
are you experienced, have you gone this far
before?

Have you changed a diaper on a rich old lady?

Seems like, right, one word to another,
line upon line, precepts perceptively retained.
Precious little is as it was.

Pre is a time-wise measure, how can we think
past thoughts,
we never cross the same river twice.

No question demands an answer in truth,
demands are put on servants, while we
are known as friends,
to all those floating on the Lethe,

well below the leavee, see, there those
same ol' good ol' boys discerning whiskey from rye.

They see time's a river, and I agree,
says this story to me, but
I say, it is a river of light on a bubble's inner edge,
I been there, Age of Lethe, a game I invented,

-- a virus, plays by lethargic rules, no effort needed,
living to steal and **** and destroy,

a minimalist First Person Shooter, steal **** destroy,

then it was hacked, steal **** destroy, mutated into
take **** destroy give,

which was odd, because all truth comes in three
pointy things, if then else
oops opposites spoo ffffffff effect

****** drama writ large, it was us,
the muses, dis-mazing the mazed again
a loss of time,
too bad. Three points equal one try. Aim.

So sad. Grieve for the fallen all we never knew,
the heroes unsung.

Goto the ant, thou sluggard living in a floating Barco
Lounger, drifting aimless--- ah, what if not,

what if I know a place,
just around the next bend, and

we get off there? What then, it's my story?

Letters of old dancers dancing to music, touching undone turbulents, formulating makeshift sentences, releasing their fury onto the world, the saints who have done no harm but are forced to make all the decisions, delivering daggers, of fury, in their brass outfits, off iron loviung, of bows and arrows locking into the hearsts of men and women in the same place, of peopple, yes, of humans loving intimacy, of loving dominance and power and in acceptance, of superiority or infiriority, clowning at majestic paragraphs, that are meaningful then meaningless, that are gibber gabber, edgar allen poe, allen ginsburg, allen allen allen clowning in your ear get back there in a fury!  make of an echo and make out of a whisper!  and do and do and do



Jolted, ready for action, body ready with a menacing pride, ready to unleash some kind of chemical, what kind of chemical, of brass of of object, some sort of metal recurring in me, let it go, release the fury, how to learn to let go proprery, let it go with some sort of a grace, doesn’t seem to be entirely possible, how does one really, really, let go?  exactly?  how do I know when my concioesnneseneses which I can never spell right is actually functioning?  when is it actually functioning at the proper measures?  I ask this humbly, as if talking to my therapist, who is thrilled with his PHD, who really really really wants to help me, and understand my disease, my disorder, where did this guy come from?  He’s full of grey hair and he knows nothing and everything and his advice is that of a weight which drags me down and sombers my tone, but is left a note in my boats prolonged brigade of bridges, bringing me back to basics

poetry with two spoons and a salt shaker

~for poet, writer, Lora Lee, unexpectedly~

my symphonic orchestral accompaniment today, musically
unlimited, except by lack of disowning skill, a voice unkempt,
spoons and salt shaker, there in-nate rhythmic opinions off key,
worse, my manly word-smithy, out o’town in June, July, August too?

He, having an affair with my she-muses, left me bereft & berated,
helplessly hoping, the timpani of my words clashing, overrated,
woeful under-something, betraying my need for spicy sriracha,
poetry, sans hamburger helper, no-tasty, even less-than-average

everyone comes rushing in to the kitchen, hearing my to-sky-voices
howling, thinking something wrong, the four instruments rack up a cacophony of rhythmic-less noises, words emerging, to-a-person, they announce, “you’re no Allen Ginsburg, ppp-please not so early next time”

alas, they don’t know the poems are coming hot and heavy, guess I’ll
go outside, serenade them birdies in the trees, the striped bass in the bay, the rabbits procreating/sleeping/eating under their (our) dock

the squirrels know better, have skedaddled to the next-door-neighbor who feeds them classical stuff with a dollop of jazz creme mixed in, but I don’t care, cause I got all day, the rest of my life, to amuse me & you too

to refine the qualitative, to improve my creative, I’ve gone “native” and the rush is the best, the wind beneath my spectacles (haha) drives my rhyming to lowlight heights of prosody, besides seems

everybody has gone to a different beach, so it’s just me and the giant blackbirds cawing holy hell noises, and I’m thinking seriously about baking pie, but they just don’t get the hint, how annoying is that!

harrumph!

BESIDES GOTTA WRITE SOME SERIOUS STUFF...

I wasent cool,
Or a fool.
I was new to the game,
See why im not the same?

Who writes for today no Ginsburg Gonzo or Blake,
Just books in print not words no one could mistake.
Write to free your mind,
possibly the last freedom we find.

I went through a length where I did not write,

I feel like how some poets feel, when they really feel they don't belong anwyhere

Charles Bukowski would say, "like your jacket, have a cigar"

and dylan would earnestly, yet directly ask "how does it feel"

and I'd probaby land on top of keroacs dusty hotel room, listening to bluetooth jazz

reciting allen ginsburg at the northwest point.  yeah.

lay a ray,

lay a ray,

lay a ray

RIP: The greatest show on earth

The announcement came:
This was the last year for the circus–
The working man's circus,
The last ******* child of Ringling Brothers
And P.T. Barnum

Good, my wife said
Think about the animals.
I nod in absent agreement -

But I am at Coney Island as it might have been, once.
And watching amusement parks in Celeron, Bay Ridge, the Palisades and a hundred others places vanish -
One by one like altar candles extinguished before the recessional.

I am a young boy staying up late tearing through Ray Bradbury's "Something Wicked this Way Comes"
while everyone else in the house is sleeping.

I am at a City Lights book store in San Francisco
Where Lawrence Ferlinghetti is sharing his cotton candy with Diane Arbus and Allen Ginsburg

I am listening to "Take Five" in stereophonic sound.

I am behind the Big-Top
with Edgar Allan Poe and Charles Dickens
trying to catch a glimpse of the show through the shadows -
Then being told to get away by a large sweaty man who doesn't smile.

I am eating peanuts salted in the shell.

I am holding my daughters tiny hand
while my son hides behind me–
a clown is walking by.

Though I rage
against the days
on blank screens
and white lined pages
I know Dylan Thomas
wouldn’t give a ****
and neither would
T.S. Elliot.

Robert frost
is not my boss,
nor is Allen Ginsburg
any sort of mentor.

I like the Romantic
movement,
but the modernist
and symbolist
do not direct
or reflect
the truth of my existence
and trifling experiences.

I love Plath, Poe,
all the Bronte sister,
and Miss Dickinson.

Though they are
all deceased
I do not surpass them
with my own vision.
I am merely on a
parallel mission.

Ruthie Ginsburg is gone, and we’re glad.
Trump has found her replacement to add.
Let us look on and cheer!
The appointment is here
And progressives now drive themselves mad.

From the ACLU to the Court,
Ruth promoted the right to abort.
You may claim she was God’s
but she seemed, by all odds
more a midwife of murderous tort.

Say hello. Ginsburg’s honor is spent.
The new judge now begins her ascent .
Ruthie’s star has gone dead.
A black robe . . . or a red?
(Only Jesus can say where she went.)

        Postscript:

     Amy’s IN ! (and appointed to judge.)
     Rabid Liberal: curse not, nor begrudge.
     Are you feeling resigned?
     Your own team failed to find
     Any dirt; not a stain nor a smudge.

By: Cedric McClester

The rule of justice
They will abort
If they place Brett Kavanaugh
On the Supreme Court
While Ginsburg and Bryer’s
Time could be short
Kavanaugh is everything
His Conservative base sought

We can say goodbye
To Roe v Wade
If this devil’s bargain
Is finally made
Kavanaugh unfortunately
Doesn’t make the grade
He’s the President’s puppet
Whom we must forbade

Kavanaugh clearly lacks
The judicial temperament
Of those sitting Justices
Who’ve already been sent
To the highest court
In this troubled land
He’s a liar and past drunk
From what I understand

Mitch McConnell seems
In such an awful rush
That as far as he’s concerned
The FBI can just hush
Because he wants Kavanaugh
So very much
Which just goes to show us
That he’s out of touch













Cedric McClester, Copyright © 2018. All rights reserved.

melt into the sun, the infinite glow and breathe
penetrate: filter the soul’s contours
and grasp
closely
all that is holy and that which believes it is

dance in the infamy of a thousand giggles, a thousand *******
caress slowly and hold close the eyes of a lover
and surrender to your greatest fears
betray the demons, dance with butterflies

find the place inside where hidden lies
desire and indulge in chocolate covered kisses

sing songs of peppermint songs of rubberband questions
why is she smiling and fall breathless
making love to life to god
to all that is holy within;

pray

surrender guilt into cotton candy, skeletons and
sink into mint cookies, ******* moments
palm trees sunflowers and dante’s inferno
the hell of a thousand lies and conquer the night

worship stars swirls rocky road ice cream smile
twirl up up down in laugh breathe sing holy holy holy
pray surrender demons and questions

surrender

give into ginsburg captured on that last day that last morning\
desert songs cholla and speak their names to the sky
the night chris nate take back your stars
perched granite sacred rainbows and forgive
fill love into crevices bend shape hold

breathe

breathe a thousand roses splashed into the sky
swallow grains granules lick and ingest strength
heal heal conquer and give
trust the skeletons trust the fall trust the touch
of a donut-flavored tongue and whisper i love
to hear your laugh words small words
big words words of accusation words of love
words words words

loose yourself fall into another and let your universe
turn upside down shake time
mock lies delve into the abyss

embrace falling stars fallen souls fall slowly
sink into strawberries sticky with ***
lawnchairs and graveyards

find beauty in everything in every vaginal opening
and give life yourself and seashells
to that last morning

surrender to the soul’s embrace melt away
the flesh of yesterday and rebuild forests

find forever in teardrops lovers in strangers
the matrix of the possessed centaur and wrap icy fingers
melt fire and give into yourself

pray

pray to the moonlight earthworms dasies
pray prayers of solace prayers of death
of intangible misgivings and of all things holy

and melt
fall away
rebuild
caress
B-R-E-A-T-H-E…