Inconspicuous, his presence noted only by the obscurity and the ever growing number of spent cigarette stubs that littered the ground.  It had been a long day and the rain, relentless in its tenacity had little intention of stopping, baleful clouds still  hung heavy, dominating the lateness of the afternoon sky, a rain laden skyline broken only by smoke filled chimney pots and the tangled snarl of corroded television aerials.

     The once busy street was fast emptying now, the lure of shop windows no longer enticed the casual browser as local traders closed their premises to the oncoming night, solitary lampposts curved hazily into the distance, casting little more than insipid pools mirrored in the gutter below, only the occasional stranger scurrying home on a bleak, rain swept afternoon, the hurried slap of wet leather soles on the pavement, the sightless umbrellas, the infrequent rumble of a half filled bus, hell-bent on its way to oblivion.

     In the near distance as the working day ended, a sudden emergence of factory workers told Beamish it was 5-o'clock, most would be hurrying home to a hot meal, while others, for a quick drink perhaps before making the same old sorry excuse... for Jack, the greasy spoon would be closing about now, denying him the comfort of a badly needed cuppa' and stale cheese sandwich.  A subtle legacy of lunchtime fish and chips still lingered in the air, Jack's stomach rumbled, there was little chance of a fish supper for Beamish tonight, it protested again... louder.

     From beneath the eaves of the building opposite several pigeons broke cover, startled by the rattle as a shopkeeper struggled to close the canvas awning above his shop window.  Narrowly missing Beamish they flew anxiously over the rooftops, memories of the blitz sprang to mind as Jack stepped smartly to one side, he stamped his feet... it dashed a little of the weather from his raincoat, just as the rain dashed a little of the pigeons' anxiety from the pavement... the day couldn't get much worse if it tried.  Shielding his face, Jack struck the Ronson one more time and cupped the freshly lit cigarette between his hands, it was the only source of heat to be had that day... and still it rained.

     'By Appointment to Certain Personages...' the letter heading rang out loudly... 'Jack Beamish ~ Private Investigator...' a throat choking mouthful by any stretch of the imagination, thought Jack and shot every vestige of credulity plummeting straight through the office window and amidst a fanfare of trumpet voluntary, nominate itself for a prodigious award in the New Year Honours list.   Having formally served in a professional capacity for a well known purveyor of pickled condiments, who  incidentally, brandished the same patronage emblazoned upon their extensive range of relish as the one Jack had more recently purloined from them... a paid commission no less, which by Jack's certain understanding had made him, albeit fleeting in nature, a professional consultant of said company... and consequently, if they could flaunt the auspicious emblem, then according to Jack's infallible logic, so could Jack.  

     The recently appropriated letterhead possessed certain distinction... in much the same way, Jack reasoned, that a blank piece of paper did not... and whereas correspondence bearing the heading 'By Appointment' may not exactly strike terror into the hearts of man... unlike a really strong pickled onion, it nevertheless made people think twice before playing him for the fool, which sadly, Jack had to concede, they still invariably did... and he would often catch them wagging an accusing finger or two in his direction with such platitudes as... "watch where you put your foot", they'd whisper, "that Jack's a right Shamus...", and when you'd misplaced your footing as many times as Jack had, then he reasoned, that by default the celebrated Shamus must have landed himself in more piles of indiscretion than he would readily care to admit, but that wouldn't be quite accurate either, in Jack's line of work it was the malefactor that actually dropped him in them more often than not.

     A cold shiver suddenly ran down his spine, another quickly followed as a spurt of icy water from a broken rain spout spattered across the back of his neck, he grimaced... Jack's expression spoke volumes as he took one final pull from his half soaked cigarette and flicked it, amid an eruption of sparks against the adjacent brick wall.  Sinking further into the shadow he tipped his fedora against the oncoming rain, then, digging both hands deep within his pockets, he huddled behind the upturned collar of his gabardine... watching.

     It was times such as these when Jack's mind would slip back, in much the same way you might slip back on a discarded banana peel, when a matter of some consequence, or in particular this case the pavement, would suddenly leap up from behind and give the back of Jack's head a resoundingly good slapping and tell him to "stop loafing around in office hours... or else", then drag him, albeit kicking and screaming back into the 20th century.  This intellectual assault and battery re-focused Jack's mind wonderfully as he whiled away the long weary hours until his next cigarette; cup of tea, or the last bus home, his capacity to endure such mind boggling tedium called for nothing less than sheer ******-mindedness and very little else... Beamish had long suspected that he possessed all the necessary qualifications.  

     Jack had come a long way since the early days, it had been a long haul but he'd finally arrived there in the end... and managed to pick up quite a few ***** looks along the way.  Whilst he was with the Police Constabulary... and it was only fair to stress the word 'with', as opposed to the word 'in'... although the more Jack considered, he had been 'with' the arresting officer, held 'in' the local Bridewell... detained at Her Majesties pleasure while assisting the boys in blue with their enquiries over a minor infringement of some local by-law that currently had quite slipped his mind at that moment.  Throughout this enforced leisure period he'd managed to read the entire abridged editions of Kilroy and other expansive works of graffiti exhibited in what passed locally as the next best thing to the Tate Gallery, whereupon it hadn't taken Jack very long to realise that it was always a good place to start if you wanted free breakfast, in fact the weeks bill of fare was tastefully displayed in vivid, polychromatic colour on the wall opposite... you just had to be au-fait with braille.
                            
     No matter how industrious Beamish laboured to rake the dirt there always appeared to be a dire shortage of gullible clients for Jack to squeeze, what would roughly translate as an honest crust out of, and although his financial retainer was highly competitive he understood that potential clients found it bewildering when grappling with the unplumbed depths of his monthly expense account, which would tend to fluctuate with the same unpredictability as the British weather, the rest of Jack's agenda revolved around a little shady moonlighting... in fact he'd happily consider anything to offset the remotest possibility of financial delinquency... short of extortion... which by the strangest twist was the very word prospective clients would cry while Jack beavered around the office with dust-pan and brush sweeping any concerns they may have had frantically under the carpet regarding all culpability of his extra-curricular monthly stipend... and they should remain assured at all times... as they dug deep and fished for their cheque books, and simply look upon it as kneading dough, which eerily enough was exactly the thick wedge of buttered granary that Jack had every intention of carving.

     Were there ever the slightest possibility that a day could be so utterly wretched, then today was that day, Jack felt a certain empathy as he merged with his surroundings... at one with nature as it were.  The rain, a timpani on the metal dustbin lids, by the side of which Beamish had taken up vigil, also taking up vigil and in search of a morsel was the stray mongrel, this was the third time now that he'd returned, the same apprehensive wag, yet still the same hopeful look of expectation in his eyes, a brief but friendly companion who paid more attention to Jack's left trouser leg than anything that could be had from nosing around the dustbins that day... some days you're the dog, scowled Beamish as he shook his trouser leg... and some days the lamppost, Jack's foot swung out playfully, keeping his new friend's incontinence at a safe distance, feigning indignance  the scruffy mongrel shook himself defiantly from nose to tail, a distinct odour of wet dog filled the air as an abundance of spent rainwater flew in all directions.   Pricking one ear he looked accusingly at Jack before turning and snuffled off, his nose resolutely to the pavement and diligently, picking out the few diluted scents still remaining, the poor little stalwart renewed its search for scraps, or making his way perhaps to some dry seclusion known only to itself.
  
     Two hours later and... SPLOSH, a puddle poured itself through the front door of the nearest Public House... SPLOSH, the puddle squelched over to the payphone... SPLOSH, then, fumbling for small change dialled and pressed button 'A'..., then button 'B'... then started all over again amid a flurry of precipitation... SPLASH.  The puddle floundered to the bar and ordered itself a drink, then ebbed back to the payphone again... the local taxi company doggedly refused to answer... finally, wallowing over to the window the puddle drifted up against a warm radiator amidst a cloud of humidity and came to rest... flotsam, cast upon the shore of contentment, the puddle sighed contentedly... the Landlady watched this anomaly... suspiciously.

     The puddle's finely tuned perception soon got to grips with the unhurried banter and muffled gossip drifting along the bar, having little else to loose, other than what could still be wrung from his clothing... Beamish, working on the principle that a little eavesdropping was his stock-in-trade engaged instinct into overdrive and casually rippled in their general direction...  They were clearly regulars by the way one of them belched in a well rehearsed, taken-a-back sort of way as Jack took stock of the situation and was now at some pains to ingratiate himself into their exclusive midst and attempt several friendly, yet relevant questions pertinent to his enquiries... all of which were skillfully deflected with more than friendly, yet totally irrelevant answers pertinent to theirs'... and would Jack care for a game of dominoes', they enquired... if so, would he be good enough to pay the refundable deposit, as by common consent it just so happened to be his turn...  Jack graciously declined this generous offer, as the obliging Landlady, just as graciously, cancelled the one shilling returnable deposit from the cash register, such was the flow of light conversation that evening... they didn't call him Lucky Jack for nothing... discouraged, Beamish turned back to the bar and reached for his glass... to which one of his recent companions, and yet again just as graciously, had taken the trouble to drink for him... the Landlady gave Jack a knowing look, Beamish returned the heartfelt sentiment and ordered one more pint.

     From the licenced premises opposite, a myriad of jostling customers plied through the door, business was picking up... the sudden influx of punters rapidly persuaded Beamish to retire from the bar and find a vacant table.  Sitting, he removed several discarded crisp packets from the centre of the table only to discover a freshly vacated ashtray below... by sleight of hand Jack's Ronson appeared... as he lit the cigarette the fragile smoke curled blue as it rose... influenced by subtle caprice, it joined others and formed a horizontal curtain dividing the room, a delicate, undulating layer held between two conflicting forces.

     The possibility of a free drink soon attracted the attention of a local bar fly, who, hovering in the near vicinity promptly landed in Jack's beer, Beamish declined this generous offer as being far too nutritious and with the corner of yesterdays beer mat, flipped the offending organism from the top of his glass, carefully inspecting his drink for debris as he did so.

     A sudden draught and clip of stiletto heels as the side door opened caused Beamish to turn as a double shadow slipped discreetly into the friendly Snug... a little adulterous intimacy on an otherwise cheerless evening.  The faceless man, concealed beneath a fedora and the upturned collar of his overcoat, the surreptitious lady friend, decked out in damp cony, cheap perfume and a surfeit of bling proclaimed a not too infrequent assignation, he'd seen it all before... the over attentive manner and the band of white, Sun-starved skin recently hidden behind a now absent wedding token, ordinarily it was the sort of assignment Jack didn't much care for... the discreet tail, the candid snapshot through half drawn curtains... and the all too familiar steak tartare... for the all too familiar black eye.

     To the untrained eye, the prospect of Jack's long anticipated supper was rapidly dwindling, when it suddenly focused with renewed vigour upon the contents of a pickled egg jar he'd observed earlier that evening, lurking on the back counter, his enthusiasm swiftly diminished however as the belching customer procured the final two specimens from the jar and proceeded to demolish them.  Who, Jack reflected, after being stood out in the rain all day, had egg all over his face now... and who, he reflected deeper, still had an empty stomach.  Disillusioned, Jack tipped back his glass and considered a further sortie with the taxicab company.

     "FIVE-BOB"!!! Jack screamed... you could have shredded the air with a cheese grater... hurtling into the kerb like a fairground attraction came flying past the chequered flag at a record breaking 99 in Jack's top 100 most not wanted list of things to do that day... and that the cabby should think himself fortunate they weren't both stretched flat on a marble slab, "exploding tyres" Jack spluttered, dribbling down his chin, were enough to give anyone a coronary... further broadsides of neurotic ambiance filled the cab as the driver, miffed at the prospect of missing snooker night out with the lads, considered charging extra for the additional space Jack's profanity was taking...

     And what part of 'Drive-Carefully', fumed Beamish, did the cabby simply not understand, that pavements were there to be bypassed, 'Nay Circumvented', preferably on the left... and not veered into, wildly on the front axle... an eerie premonition of 'jemais-vu' perched and ready to strike like a disembodied Jiminy Cricket on Jack's left shoulder, looking to stick its own two-penny worth in at the 'Standing-Room-Only' arrangements in the overcrowded cab... and at what further point, Jack shrieked, eyes leaping from his head as he lurched forward, shaking his fist through the sliding glass partition, had the cabbie failed to grasp the importance of the word 'Steering-Wheel...' someone wanted horse whipping, and as far as Beamish was concerned the sole contender was the cab driver...

     In having a somewhat sedate and unruffled disposition it had fallen to Beamish... as befalls all great leaders in times of adversity, to single handedly take the bull by the horns, so to speak and at great personal cost, alert the unwary passing motorist...  Waving his arms about like a man possessed whilst performing acrobatic evolutions in the centre of the road as the cabby changed the wheel came whizzing around the corner at a back breaking 98 on Jack's ever growing list... and why, Jack puzzled, why had they all lowered their side windows and gestured back at him in semaphore..?  Rallying to its aid, Jack's head and shoulders now joined his shaking fist through the sliding glass partition and into the cabby's face, "Who" Beamish screeched with renewed vigour ,"Who Was The Man", Jack wanted to know... *"a

I read an article in the news this week,
It was about profiling corporate bigwigs
And the shocking conclusion,
That the vast majority of these pigs at the trough of good fortune
Are psychopaths, a statistically significant majority,
Like eighty percent,
This tweaked my curiosity and so I did a bit of research,
And I learned that a psychopath is someone
who experiences life differently,
they experience all of the positive emotions,
Love, happiness, comradery, all of it.
But they’re wired differently,
When it comes to the sad, bad, mad times.
They don’t feel the way most humans do,
They feel detached from these things
They tend to deal with things of this nature
From a logical and removed perspective,
And this is where the road forks.
Ethical, moral, love-based pychopaths
Release the tension, resulting from the conflict
That arises from this, (aka wow I’m a freak)
through healthy
Or at least, socially-acceptable methods
Others, unfortunately dispose of it,
through darker, more nefarious means
Today, I started to wonder if I’m a psychopath,
Not the hack them, slash them maniac you see on film
The ones that just don’t feel like other people.
I was reading a book about self-realization,
About dropping preconceived inhibitions
Quieting the mind,
And finding “the silence within the silence” as they say,
I started to consider this,
I thought back to my transformation in August of seventeen
I moved from subject to passive observer,
I substituted love for fear, in every corner of my life,
And I found the silence, perhaps just a glimpse,
But it was so beautiful, it impressed upon me
An entirely new disposition,
As a passive observer, I’ve been able
To see myself much more clearly
When you look at yourself from a standpoint,
That leads you to recognize that in fact
There is no you at all, only your perception
And in fact, even perception
Consciousness, the core of experience
Is an illusion in and of itself.
An illusion nurtured by
The confines of society
Because at the level of atoms and molecules
We really all are
Intertwined and indistinguishable
And these tiny points of perception
That we think of as us
Are actually one
As though a block of energy
Was slammed through a cheese grater
And from this perspective,
and the Fear/love paradigm,
I find myself alone,
Alone, and happy,
Possibly,
For
The first-time
Ever.
Today, I started to wonder if I’m a psychopath.
And though I’m not wishing for the way it was
I do wish
I had a friend,
a sounding-board so to speak
Who knows me as well
As the one that I have hurt, and who has hurt me
To really help me decide,
Is this an epiphany,
Or insanity
A middle-aged crazy man
Writing words no one will ever read
Either way, I suppose
You can look from one of two sides
From the loss, and the sadness
The love and respect for the past
Or from the perspective of freedom,
Growth,
And doing what you were put
In this crazy world to do
Today, I started to wonder if I’m a psychopath,
At one point this afternoon
I realized I hurt in my entirety
My body, head to toe
My heart, because I am alone
Self-chosen,
But still alone
And my soul because
I don’t feel the way other people do
I won’t hurt anyone else
At least not on purpose
But every inch of me hurts
Every,
Inch.
And yet, even the sadness I feel
In waves,
By no means all the time,
But when it hits,
It hits hard,
I realize this too is a bad habit at best,
And an illusion at worst
What growth can come,
From pining for the past
Or any attachment for that matter
Because those things
That we can’t stop ourselves from doing
That arise from mind
Such as regret, or loss
Or guilt
Are bad-habits,
illusions
That serve absolutely nothing
But to teach, and move on
To how you might
Make the reality that is now
The best it can be,
For everybody,
Even me!
Today, I started to wonder if I’m a psychopath.

How to cook carrot salad
carrot wash and clean. Grate the carrots on a coarse grater. Apple wash and grate.

apple, honey and the juice of red currants. Also add the chopped parsley and crushed nuts. All well and carefully

mix. Sitemap salad. 

sprinkle with citric acid and mix. Vegetables lay heaped sprinkle with grated cheese and chopped herbs

parsley. Sitemap salad.

Heck, Cook the fish and carrots. Fish and carrots on toast to cut pieces. Cleaned fish and carrots to put in

salad bowl. In a salad bowl add the peas. In add grated horseradish mayonnaise and season with the Sitemap sauce salad.

It really gets under my skin the way I don't hear from you in a couple of days and I become this sullen, anxiety ridden mouse that burrows her nose in the pages of books, filling her mind with the troubles of made up characters so she doesn't have to deal with her own feelings and problems and life.

Is it possible to feel like a mouse and an elephant at the same time?
You make me feel so small while I fumble around and destroy anything with the smallest of movements.
I hate missing you.
It's like my heart is fighting a cheese grater.
Yes. A cheese grater.
I try so hard not to even think about you sometimes I'm sure everyone can just see it on my face.
But I try.
I write. I talk to other guys, even though I find them so dull I want to throw personalities at them and pray it hurts.
I have so many more actual life problems that are right here, screaming in my face.
I need to focus on school.
But I'm missing you.
I need to lose these extra 10 pounds.
But I'm wallowing and missing you.
I need to finish that scarf I started knitting ages ago.
Stop.
I don't have time to miss you.
There are books I haven't read yet
and recipes I haven't tried and people I haven't met and places I haven't seen.
But I'm wanting your arms around me.
And I know this doesn't even make sense.
But I'm missing you.

It is important to add just enough
of the lemon skin:
Too little and the cake is crushingly sugary sweet;
without the sharp texture that tickles the back of my throat
and brings on the threat of a sneeze.

Too much and the tiny yellow pieces-
like gold, like garnets, like tiny crystallized pieces of the sun,
like summer  -my youth-
can overwhelm all else with the sharpness of tears, sour and bitter.

Smell is the sense
Most closely related to our memories
It should be sight -
I can teach my eyes to see anything.

I grind the lemon carefully against the grater
releasing summer in a rush of yellow
too heady for me.
and stare out the window through the pane.

If I focus hard enough, I can pretend I see
your suitcase was only a briefcase
as you hurried down the path,
and the giant lemon tree in the front yard
was budding soft white stars of scent.
But the smell of golden pith springing from the grater
prompts the memory of pendulous fruit dropping to the ground instead –
the wanton tree already ******* for spring’s touch.

The grater grinds against my knuckles
a drop of blood falls into the batter.

I am reminded again that
only the best fruit will hang too close to the thorns,
only the theft that is given makes us bleed.

My mother used to hate me. Shortly after she found out she was pregnant with me she started to hate me. She tried to get an abortion, but I wouldn't die. She tried to vacuum me out but I just wouldn't let go... She was late 5 days on her due day , 'cause i just wouldn't leave. She hated me all the way out of her ******, through the ****** and finally out. She hated breastfeeding me, she hated putting me to sleep and changing my diapers. She hated the day i said my first word, "mama", she cursed the day i started to walk. She hated going to my kindergarten recitals, she hated all the contests I won in grade school. As I finished the 8th grade, I left and I moved to a big city with my sister, for grater education and a better life. She didn't say a word before I left, nor the following weeks. Papa was crushed, she lived happily... Until one day, three months later. I was on my way to school, when, in front of the building I saw papa and her. She looked awful. As she saw me she started crying and ran to me. She hugged me and kissed me for minutes, as she kept saying "I love you so much...I'm so sorry...I missed you so much...". Papa said she didn't eat, she couldn't sleep for weeks and she was devastated. I went upstairs with them, I laid her on my bed and she fell asleep in my arms, shivering and whispering, with big tears running down her pale chin...She never woke up... I love you, mama...
                                                        ­                                             DCimpean
                                                        ­                                                       2014

All the poems have wolves in it* -- Jim Morrison

Man in bathtub with stony eyes
Water getting stiller in the cold, dead night
Hair long and soft as outstretched raven claws
Wilted fingers grip the lip with lifelike vigor
And then slip away

Naked wooden marionettes writhe
In dunes of ****** sawdust
Shedding skin like so much baggage
And baggage like so much skin
Cheese-grater screams on blank faces
Soon the forms are dust and then
The dust is gone

Inked fingers dipped in oft-repeated wisdoms
Picking little crippled words
And someone else's Lego bricks
Shine a light on the beautiful
Laugh at it
Sing to it
Grasp at it
Quit

saying ******* seems so much more
easier when you're petting cats....
they just say it for you...
there he is, Quarus,
the operatic singer nearing sunset,
200 variations of a mulling of meow,
i end up calling him Orbison Rufus,
the ginger Roy of Peckham -
he basically meows lazily like Roy
singing... as said / i.d. (id est): the umbras
or umbrellas - counting the shadows'
version of Apache's yawn: ah-woo ah-woo
ah-woo nagging the reflex...
gave them the yawn and gave them 1950s
America... Billy the Kid talking to the king of
Specs... hank marvin.... cheese grater
with those teeth... dozen cows buckling with
the herding in while the dog carved a feel
for religion in the translation of the Vatican
from coliseum into football requirements...
the movies were great in the 1950s, just after
the technicolour... petting cats was never such a thrill...
the operatic meow, onomatopoeia from echo
in a cave to knock-on-wood...
200 variations of the knock
and 12 whiskey shots downed
while playing poker... 12 cowboys
1 Milwaukee and 30 Turks... classic Tarantino...
i said the Apache yawn... i never said giving
out smoke signals...
Quarus my ginger is demanded as having laughed...
he's Roy Orbison with the meow,
pretty much lazy...
looks like a murmur when he tries singing,
pretty woman, trolling down the street,
Gucci, Chanel, and everything in the scrapheap of lobotomy,
as is Paris necessarily mentioned: chiselled
white collars... Roy knew before Elvis...
the trick came with sunglasses,
and the gluttonous slur of the half-opened mouthing
for subsequent mouthing it off...
no amount of cheese in French could ever
charter the success of the cheeses added to cheeseburgers
with the milkshakes, which were plainly Dutch
laughing cows named Novices....
quick-melts and some said:
dreadlocks of string-yellow Gouda pulled
for a hippies' worth of Chinese chugging down
a pint or two, for worth of gag and the slim mascot;
the Chinese never taught Cannes arithmetic
of the thumb through to pinky...
i don't know how they taught counting
with their complex ideograms, they never taught
arithmetic give their encoding...
they taught pure math.. they never taught the simplest
of assurances... meaning so few of them became bankers.

I believe in Garri
The holy son of Africa
Who was conceived by our toils
Born of the ****** Cassava
Suffered under the grater
Was suffocated in bags, died and buried
He descended into hell
On the third day he arose
And is now seated on the Centre of the frying ***

I belive in Garri
The savior of the lives
The defender of the weak
And the universal mother of all

He just broke
right
down
Lips pushed up against the speaker
leaning up against my heart
I tried to crawl into the phone
but the holes were too small
and here we are now
feeling like we both went through a cheese grater
and no body said 'when'
when the waiter came.

It spreads, it pops,
and the blister hangs dry
stinging like a *****
so you can't quite put your foot down
Well, neither can I
so let's tie our ankles together
and we'll wander on like kid foot races
lean on me
lean on you
lean on me
lean on you
see, we'll make it forward
that shining city is just three years away
we'll be together
just remember
the first aid kit

I've never met Andy Rooney.  So I can't truthfully say I know Mr. Rooney.  But you can't help forming an opinion after watching him on 60 Minutes for more years than I care to admit.

First, Andy's opinionated.  Well, who wouldn't be if they were paid, presumably well,  given an entire week to collect and share their thoughts with millions of viewers, and on any matter that rankled you that week!

Second, Andy has Svengali eye brows that you just can't take your eyes off.  I'm sure CBS provides Andy free barbering, as sure as I am that he tells the barber, "Nothing off the brows."

Third, how many times has Andy told his audience not to send him things.  After which he dips into a cardboard box and pulls out a cheese grater, a bible printed on playing cards, or a logo baseball cap?
Andy, don't worry; I got the message.

Is my minute up yet?  

Fourth, Andy's hand shakes.  Not unusual for a man his age.  It's not likely to happen, but I wouldn't mind shaking that hand just once.

I saw you. I fell in love.
A bit of a cliche,
but such is life.

Only I didn't really fall in love
when I saw you, it was gradual.
In terms of absence, that is, one day
I suddenly noticed you were not there
(I was able to distinguish  how empty
the world was without you in it).

This arrow flew a long time,
which only means that it hit
with grater strength.

You see, this is not love on a whim.
When I see you I don't think "I fell",
rather I flap my arms, taste the fear,
and think "Why the hell I don't stop falling?".

I have never been published
or won a prize,
except, yeah, yeah,
the one in the
Crackerjack box

but from that cheap plastic surprise,
much was learned even as a young boy

cull the chaff of life
from amidst the wheat

plant it well and deep,
then forget all about it,
except where,
t'was seeded

when eyes yellowed,
hair turned a color Disney repackaged as
frozen
white,
normally a gift of a hairdresser,
called mother time,
and your pink skin scaled smooth
now kin and kith of the kitchen grater,

then time is in,
cull your plantings

go back into that yards,
pull out the weeds,
uncovering what only time
can provide -

poetry planted and born from
the summary addition of thousands
of days of life,
well felt,
well received,
well recorded,
drawn from earth and water,
well lived

sometimes my nyc sidewalks uneven,
cause a toe snagging tripping,
this loss of balance,
adrenalin hot flashing,
similar to tripping upon a new poet

every time I say no mas,
I must choose tween
left or right,
one can
read or one can write,
but not
both

a voice on I stumble,
making me ever so foolish,
ever so humble,
ever so confused

so at 12:31am
at it again,
reaping what others have sowed

this woman by her own confess,
Trouble with a capital everything
T.R.O.U.B.L.E

only a grownup chile
writs me a poem
re crackers in her vegetable soup,
a naval battle akin to that of Midway,
that makes me crackers with delight!

saucy, that poetess
you better love her well,
she tells you outright
or she'll sell you, the reader out,
for the next one cruising along,
hence this poem, her good graces sought!

but to get certain memories I want,
but can't recall for I never had them,
she, for me doth record:

Imaginary space within a dream
floats in a subconscious sea.
Our affection grows from
tremulous beginnings
its dramatic unfolding
vestige of the soul whispers
and lingers in twilight and ice

Shared breath,
in time our leisured rhythms
savored sweetly match kiss for kiss.

Words in parody drop,
one by one.
enmeshing me in rippling sorrow,
once again you've moved
just beyond my reach.

curse the teachers and the genes
and my plain vanilla simp vocabulary,
that don't let me write like this,
but to my backyard I go,
where I cull what other's have planted better,
and harvest the new fruits of
crackerjack superior poets

The frumpy ragamuffin is discombobulated
And throws together an out fit
She dawns a fur coat in the middle of July
And begins to eat Alpo
She exfoliates her feet with a cheese grater

The top notch tuba player with a hook for a hand suffers from bed sores and an over active pituitary gland
I ask him what the difference is between reasons and excuses
He seems to be dancing around the question
But answers in a round about way
Implying that one is organic and natural while the other is genetically modified and man made

It's zero hour
As I look at the broken coo coo clocks
And the rainbow colored rocks

The ragamuffin presumptuously tells me that no one benefits from doubt  
Then calls my friend a bed wetter
And tells us she must go to feed her Venus flytraps
She storms back towards her laboratory

I wonder what she could possibly do in there
I'm dying to know
I'm on the edge of my seat
With one foot in the grave

The tuba player returns wrapped in an electric blanket
He tells us he's just suffered from sleep paralysis
"It's a dead zone, can't get a signal"
He goes on to say that blind faith is is a stepping stone to the truth
A game of William Tell, a stab in the dark
A round of Blind man's bluff with Marco Polo

Testing the waters is a building block of wisdom
And a clean bill of health is corner stone of a happy life
That you have to pay for out of pocket when playing the field
And we are the choices we've made incarnate

Now, the ragamuffin and the tuba player come once more
To tell us the mind is as incorruptible as the soul
But the body will bow to time and wither away
They then walk backwards, back to where ever they came

Don’t stand for too long
Or even wiggle
Because that's exercise
And exercising is a behavior
Unless it’s time for the daily walk;
Then you must go
Even if it hurts and you feel like a dog
On an invisible leash.
Never spend too much time alone
In a room away from the people you barely know
With whom you are stuck all day and night and
Forced to share toilets and
Puked-in shower drains and
Cramped kitchen counters and
Painful secrets you wouldn’t even tell your mother.
Precious heartbeats spent alone
Are called isolating and they are bad.

A smear of avocado hastily forgotten on a butter knife
Raises suspicion and a quarter teaspoon more must be replaced.
But heaven help you
If you pour a milliliter too much orange juice.
This is disordered behavior
And the few offending drops must be poured out.
Time will teach you
That wholesome rosy-faced girls much younger than you are
Holding clipboards with your life on them
Will treat you like a child
And disregard your hard-earned quarter-century
As a fish disregards an airplane.
Black tea past three o’clock is criminal;
It must be eschewed
Lest the minuscule amount of caffeine
Affect your sleep eight hours before bedtime
And override the Seroquel and the Ambien and the lithium.

And don’t you ever shut the door or flush the toilet
‘Til they’ve come in
To ogle your **** and ****
And when you’ve finally proven yourself trustworthy enough
To shut the door and flush
Never stay in for more than three minutes,
Even when taking a dump.
You will be suspected of purging
And you will be grilled like that eggplant you didn’t taste
Until you beg them to take your blood and say
Please please check the electrolytes and the pH
And I will even *** in a cup!
I don’t care! I just need you to know
I’m telling the truth.
And never say you feel sick to your stomach
Especially when it’s true.
That’s just an excuse people like us use
When we want to yodel to God
On the big white telephone.

Thirty seconds stolen in your room
To brush unruly hair is forbidden
Unless your waist-length hair
Is nearing dreadlock status
Because you might be Up To Something in there.
You can say **** but not fat
Unless you are justifying a tablespoon
Of Catalina dressing
To the Food Police.
You can’t have a hand mirror because
You might smash it and hurt yourself
But you will be surrounded
With lovely, breakable little picture frames
Full of inspirational quotes.

If you’re upset at dinner
It’s called anxiety.
If your heart hurts and skips beats
From years of puking your guts up every day,
It’s called anxiety.
If you need your space
It’s called anxiety.
If you can’t meditate
And you get so bored that
You let a juicy pregnant wolf spider crawl
Over your hand and arm seventeen times
And instead of OM SHANTI OM your inward chant
Is I Am The Walrus
It’s anxiety.
If you tell them you’re not anxious
It’s anxiety.

You can’t have your wallet
And your phone at the same time
So you’re less likely to run away
But they never check to see
Where your debit card and ID went off to
When you trade in your wallet for your phone.
They never notice the triumphant curve on your lips
Nor the slight stiff rectangle
In the breast pocket of the flannel shirt
That is perpetually around your waist.
You will keep these with you
All day and all night
In case someone drives the final corkscrew
Into your ear and you must vamoose
Before you find yourself
Floating white-knuckled in a deluge of blood
Grasping a cheese grater
Surrounded by seeping lumps of people meat.

But this house models the real world.
You are sick and you have no idea
What’s best for you.
After three weeks they know
Exactly how you work
And if you don’t agree with that
You are wrong.
You will relapse one day.
If you don’t agree with that,
You’re wrong and you will die
Because you can never quit cold turkey with food.

You must learn to enjoy the food
That you fight and claw and scramble to make,
To enjoy each perfectly metered tablespoon
Of peanut butter,
To delight in hastily and stressfully prepared dishes
Upon which you are terrified to put condiments
For fear of being told the selection is inappropriate,
To relish weak iced tea with no ice because
Someone took it all and never filled the tray,
Sparingly seasoned with two Splendas,
Carefully handed out and locked away by the keyholders,
Never sweet enough,
Never ever sweet enough,
The real sugar of real life replaced by
Bitter ******* brandied with the saccharine syrup of so-called safety.

I am not pink lace and bony knees
I am not please and thank you
I am now and because I said so

I am ripped jeans and skinned knees
I am not a thin wafer
I am a loud tongue

my body has never once been a temple
I am a volcano erupting at random intervals
I burn everything I touch

some are born with a silver spoon in their mouth
I was born with a hunger
for something I have yet to taste

I have never been meek
A proper lady
A lamb

I am harsh worded
I speak like a grater
I leave bruises and burns

I am a sinkhole
And if you're not careful
I will swallow you up

It's full of holes.

Emotion

It's taking me over
Ripping me apart
Piecing me together
But it isn't the same
The glue doesn't fill in the
Cracks and the tiniest
Of fragments can't be
Replaced
Like a broken glass
That you once loved
That you once would have
Given anything to
Restore
But it's gone,
Just like me


Poetry

I ******* hate it
I don't know why,
I couldn't ever really tell you
Why exactly
But there's a part of me that
Wishes I never
Rode this train
Never danced with words
Or documented these thoughts
I don't want
To look back on these
Stanzas, or whatever they are
And cry
I know I will
Years from now,
I will


Change

I need it so desperately
And yet I'm so afraid
So bottled up on the inside
Caged heart, caged mind
Wall after wall
In life? I'm a *****
Cold hard, rock solid
Ice for words
I'm relentless
I don't care about
Anything
Because I can't
If I did, I would simply
Die
Of heartache


Honesty

It breaks me
A cheese grater to
My skin
Muscle to bone
No one sees
No one notices
What I've turned into
After your death
Yeah, I said it
I ******* said it
You're gone and I think that
I left with you
Why didn't you just
Take me with you?


Death

I don't want it
At all
I don't want to experience
It and I don't want to
Watch it happen
And I don't want to
Feel the seconds escape
And I don't want to admit
That everything
Beautiful
Is impermanent.


Music

Flows through me
And I've never written
Anything without
My good friend
Mozart
Because I don't think
I could do anything
Without him
Don't be fooled by my
Tough exterior
I don't listen to metal
Because inside?
I'm mush


Loneliness

Is the only real
Company I've ever had
I don't exactly see
Eye to eye with the world
It's more like
Eye to fist
Or eye to throat
I'm not sure which
I don't think it matters
Either way
At the end of
The day
It's still
Just me

You don't know me.
I don't know if you
ever will.
You said you don't
understand
how I've grown
into a beast with
a memory problem of
reality.
It slips through my
fingers quicker than
sand. When I close my
eyes you are just dark
smoke hanging off where
I am touching.
You've grown into a demon
only pure where love
brushes you.
And you have fallen in
love with my touch.
Because my toxin is like
in math
and my negativity is
an antidote to your
empty.

I'm seeing white noise
and hearing white walls
my skin is still running
with the slugs in my
veins.
It's gotten to my brain.
melting, on fire, feels like
it's gone haywire
a needle pricking every
millimeter.
A hand's gone through
my skull
holding all my thoughts
so they
stop passing right
through like cheese
and a cheese grater.
My skin is being
peeled off in slivers
attempting scarification
trying to make my decomposition
some kind of beautiful damnation.
And
you don't know me.
I don't even know who
I am anymore.
No reflection shows in the mirror.
Searching for reality
but getting normality.
I'm out of my head
feeling crazy.
Snort some of this,
smoke that,
drink this,
Suddenly it's okay
that I don't see things
from my eyes.
My medication never used
just stuffed in an
altoid can. Traded for
dollar bills so I can
trip again.

My words slide off my tongue
like my spit when I bend
over the toilet,
too much whiskey,
too much *****,
no chaser was needed.
Don't tell me you know what
it's like to always see your
skin but you never feel
inside of it.
Don't tell me you feel
the ground as if it's putty
because trust me I sink into
the ground if I stay still.
Which is why my mind jumps
from topic to topic
never getting stuck.
If I think too long, I drown
and I don't think I want to die
yet.

He said if I wanted something real
to make sure I involved him in it.
He wanted his life to mean something.
I - apologized if I dragged him down.
I won't hear from him in awhile...
Let me tell you about this man.
He's australian. One of the nicest
men I've met and his accent really
only ever comes out when he's drunk.
He wanted to give me the adventure
I thought I've been giving myself
that inside of my head but my body's
been still for so long I never realized...
The adventure I was seeking set
my putty world is around my
ankles. You see my mind's been stuck,
the film ended it's course,
the person supposed to switch them out
fell asleep, the black screen of my mind
has grown stale.
I'm waist deep in the quicksand of
my memories. The lion of my nightmares
lurking near by and man she really
loves this sink hole and the prey
that the annoyance gets her.

Maybe if I hadn't of shown him all
sides of my personality he wouldn't
of burned holes into each
facet I had.
If I've learned anything from this
I've learned do not get stuck
on the sticky tape in the kitchen
meant for fly's thinking
it can get the bugs out of your head.
The infestation of his black ink
is like a prison tattoo on my
neck like the bruises he left
on my wrists when I fought back.
I no longer know who's living inside
the walls of my mind.
But I do know that he lives on the other side.
He lived like a rat infesting the ceiling.
Rotted like black mold behind my
stove and I tore that house down.
Broke the pilot light, let it explode.
I never looked back, but I think he sensed
the poison in the air, thought it was just his
sweat until he realized I had left him.
He ran to me, got a limp from the shrapnel.
He's like a ghost haunting me from outside,
like a boogy man and I think I might call
the cops because peeping Toms are such
a nuisance right?

Getting nosebleeds from cut straws and the
blended memories I keep snorting,
thinking maybe the drip won't
taste as bad this time
and I've grown addicted to the flashbacks
and change in reality that this monster gave
me when he dug his fangs into my artery.

But really from day to day my face changes.
Maybe I too have become a shifter,
in a world of fun house mirrors.
Define who I am with my horrorscope,
read my palm a couple
times, analyze my dreams.
But darling I honestly doubt
you'll ever know me.

We're humans being humans,
together.
Inspiration from your kiss,
it's leaking from your lips.

Distant eye contact with a woman ******* on a lollipop,
staring at identical twins sharing an umbrella,
punch your legs until you fall asleep.

This life is losing its charm:
dying is the best idea you've ever had.

Ignoring your silence as I scream
you fade into nothing, you're my adolescent dream.

Burying a body to it's neck
you paint the face and
sprinkle dirt on the remains of the rotting life.

Darkness,
or something more?

fifty bricks to the head
cheese grater to the teeth
****** gums and cheeks
crossed arms and a pile of dried out pens
scalp scratched into nothing
a dry desire and an empty mouth full of empty words.

A suicide note scribbled in a composition book
it used to be your journal
but the pain of writing got old
and you needed the time to sleep.

Names dissolve from importance to nothing.

Reflecting from the shadows and burnt out veins
I still believe in those painted remains.

February 8th, 2018 - 11:06pm. In. An. The. How much deeper will this go? This desert. This baron land and escape from the moonlit evenings’ effervescent engineering of short-lived Neanderthals. These voices are enough to split our hides through and through like an cheese grater, that pants-boots combo chases us into the early morning forecast. I need to get out with her. We need to get out from here. We need to go out from this place. There are hexes and hieroglyphs places matte with ill-defined Finnish designs. There is the yolk and that which copies it. There is the phone and the web of tangling eyes whose corpus is mimicry. I am the notes and the music is taking me down, down, down. Whether it’s our dreams or the sweats that keep us ratcheting our bodies beaten eyes hooked to the cadavers we once chose. Now it’s up to you to choose. This is the fuse that we’ve let loose, maybe your furnace can curtsy and observe these sad blackened buffoons while they make us shrivel up and go hide back in our bed cocoons. This is a zoo I tell you and you tell me. This is a zoo of mayhem, hedonists, and 400° degrees. These are the tiny beds we hide in until they melt us down, into the heirs of our highness, our luxuries quick to abscond.

The first time I saw
Betty Grater swoon
and heard Ms Arnault sigh
in expectation
I knew I had found the answer
that all young men seek

Instead of good looks
and the scent of money
I realized that the tippled sound of Thomas,
the piston drive of Cummings,
or shroud and mystery of Rimbaud
could accomplish what fumbling
postures never could

They could make a button come
undone and stay that way
part a leg and have it
remain languid
see an arm brushed
and not pulled back

Ah, but women are not
so easily wooed
You see, poetry is but a beginning
once is never sufficient
and Cyrano found
he was forced to return
and return
to keep those fires burning

Soon you discover it is not enough
to merely sing another’s tune
and you  must learn the art
whose muse is not so
easily tamed

So the new poems to Emily or Mary Lou
are steeped in ignorance, stumbling tongue
and emotion that knows only extreme
a Dickinson hodgepodge of flowers,
spring-rain and metaphor trampled
by testosterone expectation

And as these women grow
you discover the magic is fading
that they have learned these lures
and their virtue will not part quite so easy

Ah, but art is ever inventive
and for those hard to dissemble
there are the more obscure songs
of Baudelaire, Jefferson and Yeats
these will free even the firmest
of corset-strung objections

But to truly reach the promised land
there is need to create one’s own
to wrestle the evening with nature’s muse
and tease a line between the sheets
Then, if you've still a mind
you can glance to see
if her clothes have been shed

But the sad and beautiful truth
is that poetry’s muse will suffer no others
rarely will that graceful form stay the course
she will leave to find yet another
that can keep them
coming

Pale-faced and numb, i lay in bed tossing and turning through the hours
Sheets and blankets flung around
anger and guilt twisted around mixed in with blood rushing through body not reaching head
blinds are closed and little light is let into the room
the dog lays next to me
the laziness echoes throughout the house on a workless Tuesday
and my soul is out
gone fishing
there are many things to do palces to go
only if I had someone to go with
only if there were enough hours in the day to rewrite or revive the life im living
breathe some spirit into
this metiocracy
this routine
the cheese grater questions
the cheese grater conversations
that peel my skin off by the layer
the howl that I hear in a distant forest, country, school, classroom,
a long gone excitement and looking forward towards something great
a long list of withered hellos and goodbyes
a long list of dullness
boredom
and painfully tired moments
painful haunting blandness
living in the past, in the bed of my own bad decisions
the harvest I have planted, sown, and watered
the reaping is not what I wanted
the harvest is gross and wiltered
the fruit is not juicy
this heavy sensation of wrong
wrong directions
turns
and paths
led me to this point
and you’re supposed to know that sooner or later there will be other paths
opportunities
you just have to see them, find them, care enough
emptiness has invaded the space where curiosity used to bloom
and maybe happiness flies down like a bird sometimes and sings in the cage that is my heart
but her feathers don’t get too comfortable
and away she flies into the lonely night
leaving me nothing but the stars that paint the sky
the colors of my fingertips paint everything blue
and the patterns that fall out of my mouth come out like abc blocks
too structured and sharp
cutting my own mouth
my words taste like quiet
and feet could take me anywhere on a summer day
but they prefer mattresses with blankets and sheets
and it seems like I prefer sadness

The wind blows through my stale hair.
My breaths are tight as I adjust to the new weight.
When did I last eat?
who knows...
I feel my stomach,
I don't even have to **** in
to feel my ribs
and other inner things.
These pants used to be tight
but look they're baggy,
a sign of accomplishment.
Look at me
I'm looking frail
I feel so skinny
I feel so beautiful.
The hungrier I am
the happier I am,
the more I feel one day
I will be okay to look at.

My body tells me to eat,
eat everything in sight
keep eating
and once you're full
eat some more
and more
even when you're burst
and your innards trail the floor,
it's best to keep eating,
even when you hate the taste.

It's always on my mind,
the hunger never stops,
so as long as I feel hungry,
I'll sew my mouth shut so
maybe one day it will end.

The hungrier I am,
the happier I am.
No one will ever call me fat again
they'll never say I'm ugly,
I'll never cry again
so long as I don't look in that mirror.
Because today,
I feel so skinny,
I'm starving and ill
but it's okay because I'm getting pretty.
I threw up that
and I threw up this
but it's okay because I'm getting pretty.
I either eat everything
or eat nothing at all,
all or nothing
my brain won't accept anything else.

But it's okay because
I can't remember when I last ate,
and I feel my ribs
and I'm skinny and-
I look in the mirror
and I'm still so fat.
So I'll sit down and cry
and workout some more.
Tempted to take a grater
and peel the fat off layer by layer.
Because fat isn't pretty,
and skinny is.

woman's tennis is always more entertaining than the men's one-on-one, there are more rallies, more play in general, it's not one of those premature ******* stereotypes of a serve >110mph, or three-touch tennis... plus you can just imagine a clean-version of some shady *****, but with maria sharapova suspended... it's gone a bit quiet.

a beautiful day at Wimbledon, a ****** day up in the north east -
calm the nerves, calm the nerves,
go for a walk to buy whiskey and don't
look at the finálé of the Portugal v. Poland
game (yes, that's how i painted the
syllables in, like i manged to get a *sh sound
in Greek, linguistic surgery, i.e.
σ-                       -χ-                  -ι-                   -τ
sigma                chi                  iota                ­tau
s-                        -h-                -i-                ­   -t         used
-igma                 c-i                   -ota                -au     not used)
i would say cheese grater either - you cut the buggers
up, it's a real mean anatomic revelry to mind what
to use, what to snip off, some might say a fashion
statement - or one of those fairy-tale moments
in variations of Cinderella - in the more gruesome variations
the two horrid sisters have their heels cut off,
or their big toes, they put the glass slipper on
and blood starts oozing out - i'm sure i've seen that
variation on the tale; beside the point,
the neighbours were supposed to get a new fence,
the fence installers called yesterday asking for my neighbour's
phone number, apparently they didn't have it,
phoned today, neighbour comes back with her worries,
a scheming ***** by the looks of it,
doesn't want a new fence, a woman, play three men against
each other - a Jewess recently converted to Islam
(never mind that, i like colour, i hate bleaching
people or stripping them bare to a "respectable"
ennui of defining them by pronouns alone,
if someone identifies themselves as... whatever...
i identify them also... there isn't going to be a a blank
canvas of respectable leftist or whatever language here
just like you wouldn't heave the earth by simply
stating it's an orb, would you now?) -
it's her fence and yet i'm talking and later my father
to the person about to put it up - in England
it's like in Hong Kong - you honk honk clockwise,
not anti-clockwise, the fence to my left is mine,
the fence to my right... ain't...
it ends up being a furore - i'm angry, my father's angry,
Poland just lost - but when i'm angry and don't
write my rage into poetry i enter into an autistic simulation,
i don't make eye-contact, i'm not angry with the
person i'm gesticulating to, an autistic virtuoso of
sharp tongue averted eyes - pretty much a Steptoe and Son
scenario - it ends up being a case of finding one email
(that doesn't exist) among 220 containing a supposed
phone-number... god... why did you endow me with
enough patience to enter relationships with women?
never mind, forget i even i asked that -
the ******* is your answer, i admire that conviction,
why would you ******* if you didn't have one?
being circumcised you definitely need a *******,
being circumcised and still ******* is pointless,
waste of the revision, Judaism, Christianity and Islam
thrown in together - that was the warning
to Abraham about to circumcise (rather than
sacrifice, Victorian polite society is done, gone) Isaac,
don't do it... now you need a constant sparring partner,
oh yeah, and here are some rules: 613 minor commands
in Judaism, 5 times a day prayers in Islam,
and this ****** comedy version of atheism in Christianity:
i'm sure atheists don't congregate -
i guess you need a plan-β - given the fact that the mere
idea of god is ****** into us, you still end arguing
and either / or off Kierkegaard -
for some it's a necessity to pursue ritual -
for other's it's a necessary means of writing books
and earning a backpack's worth of wages... win win
whichever side you choose.