"pamplona" poems
A greased pig at the county fair,
A roller skating tween chips her tooth,
The junky's pupils: pinned.
Heavy-lidded gaze notched up: a higher degree of horror.
Ecstasy and agony: life's charged poles, opposing,
I, dysthymic before the blister of try,
have touched too close to life's hot center,
A cliché, a disposable metaphor,
The insulin syringe (use once and destroy) of metaphors,
Oh restless boy (you're a man) you don't see it?
Beyond the sour vinegar of feet and let's pretend,
the mildew funk of gym-stale ****
the recess bells gave way to sirens.
Oh, valor—Toro—pinned Pamplona,
Gored by c**k, though, not by bull
Cause see it seems—yes, Spain then.
Nothing written really happens, see,
mind to bear this burden.
Tense of verb fit the charge in air,
a crunchy taste like seizure mouth, the sockets blown
some smoke slips out the corner of my mouth, my eye
regards you trying to seem real.
2011
Aug 17, 2011
Aug 17, 2011 at 8:18 PM UTC
Grandpa'd take me fishing down to Watson's creek
He'd hold his finger to his lips so I knew not to speak
He'd show me how to shoot a gun, how to turn the other cheek
How to be a better person, and how to duck instead of deke
I remember where I was
When I heard Grandpa died
I was standing in the hallway
With my brother by my side
He put his arm around me
While I just cried and cried
I don't need to jump out of planes
Or run with bulls in Pamplona
I don't need to swim with sharks
Or race a car down in Daytona
Two lines don't make a bucket list
Yes, I said....only two
The first one is to wake each day
And the second...be with you
We'd watch the trains stretch our pennies that
we'd lined up on that track
Smoking stolen cigarettes as we watched the train go past
Lying there, two brothers, hiding in the summer grass
I remember where I was
When I heard my brother died
Shot down over Vietnam
I ran to the tracks and cried
I could still feel him there with me
Stretching pennies while I cried
I don't need to jump out of planes
Or run with bulls in Pamplona
I don't need to swim with sharks
Or race a car down in Daytona
Two lines don't make a bucket list
Yes, I said....only two
The first one is to wake each day
And the second...be with you
I've grown up a little since, fell in love with a great girl
I take her fishing to the creek, let her into Grandpa's world
I've shown her where the track once was
Where we stretched pennies just because
I remember where I was
And I remember that you cried
We were in the same front hallway
Where I heard they both had died
But this time you were crying
Because I took you for my bride
I don't need to jump out of planes
Or run with bulls in Pamplona
I don't need to swim with sharks
Or race a car down in Daytona
Two lines don't make a bucket list
Yes, I said....only two
The first one is to wake each day
And the second...be with you
May 31, 2014
May 31, 2014 at 8:41 PM UTC
what about that "strange, mortal" coinage of: i just don't want to be here?!
i just can't imagine why
i landed among you depressed rejects -
i really can't, i wrote
poetry, and i guess that's
my excuse, but i like emotional
retards - it makes me feel
alive, i can feel like i can have a beer
and talk Pamplona and Hemingway
and **** oh yeah, they mentioned
go easy on them,
there's me and my blabber mouth,
or as the n.s.a., make new friends that aren't
required extras for the new Hobbit Movie,
jokes aside, i am actually making a investment quote,
no new movie, New York and all...
hmm? what a ****** question,
certain words should never be a question,
rather... what a ****** word to leave a question with;
i mean, what word is imbededed with nuance? oh, right,
the underlined one, robotics microsoft
villa and the twenty two toilets... hmm,
too many guests taking a **** i guess;
i mean (i can say this with a hardened expression
learning to be my father while he un-buried his to
be a father to me made only welcome to a mother,
and no celebrated deity of flesh worthy of **** and whatnot.
it's not fair given the 1990s and Bon Jovi,
and Ghost, and Swayze... it's, just, not, fair!
so agonising to be the choirmaster, you get me?!
no, of course you don't, cos you're Harry Potter.
i know your benevolence,
and it's truly a Ronin tale, all i know is a no toward
Samurai of your idle heart to save a beat, my heart a Shogun,
that was to be - yet more verse i wish to write impaled
worth the pain, for your eyes to sleep entombed
missing spring - as you are, unknown to me, Greek,
because i know no other love worth a mention.
Jun 19, 2016
Jun 19, 2016 at 10:20 PM UTC
the bees are sharing their dreams
with me
and I want to know what
it feels like to rob a bank,
to run naked through the moonlit garden,
compose a sonata,
stare up into trees
then pause to listen to blue birds singing,
the bees are sharing their dreams with me, today
and I want to run with the bulls
in Pamplona
I want to remember
time insane
when untamed dreams
ran wild
in the dim light
of a room without windows
desperado,
purple eyeshadow and lips
dancing through misty memory,
she comes
quiet midnight settling in her eyes
bare foot waif, never kind...
the thief of my dreams
Jul 8, 2024
Jul 8, 2024 at 3:54 PM UTC
This years winner is portulaca.
She has overrun the competition.
I pronounce her pour – chew - laka,
as if her presence isn’t already
pronounced enough.
A watery **** in disguise,
she slips beneath a bed of color
when the sun comes out.
Hundreds of little umbrellas
protecting her from the heat,
or rather gathering it.
Like those big dishes in
the Arizona desert
that listen to outer space,
she sways and moves toward
the voice of the sun.
Three colors dominate.
Neon pink,
not glow in the dark pink
but glow in the day pink.
Red,
a red as red as
“B” horror movie blood,
and lemony yellow.
In the afternoon they hide.
Delicate brushes dipped in color,
their daily quota of light fulfilled.
Those not in direct light
still fight,
open and searching,
leaning and bending toward
leftover patches of day..
I see one standing alone,
upright and outstretched,
tall and wiry.
A netted wing dragonfly
hovers nearby.
The dianthus lie
silent among the portulaca.
Like gored runners at Pamplona
they have been trampled and overrun,
their white garment petals
splattered in red.
The roses fade in the August heat,
tired of continuous expectation
they don’t even try anymore.
They will be pruned for their indolence.
Near the garage,
The Mexican heather sways
in the intermittent shade of fountain grass,
Running this way and that,
trying to catch a random ray of light
between the blades of taller grass.
In the corner of the yard
the fountain sits bleached and tired,
weathered by a season of sun.
It bubbles in slow motion,
the mossy birds lie down in its flow,
too tired to stand anymore.
Sep 13, 2015
Sep 13, 2015 at 1:54 AM UTC
I ain't ever belonged to no one--
not even those that came before,
those frightened immigrants and spanish tangerines tumbling
below deck, toppling into the scattered bed rolls that still smell
like cumin and tarragon, sea and spiced salt seeping through the strong lungs of every youthful San Fermin boy in Pamplona
the raised voices in Seville singing San Jose and my mother's
maiden name--
i fumble in the dark for things to keep me rooted
the strong arms of working men and their weak hearts
barely beating
secondhand boys breathin' dollars an' truck exhaust
lookin' for their match, someone that'll fit
or do 'em just right
sharp things that'll sit pretty and
look good in lowlight,
and me with my tulip bulb heart
plantin' myself in wax, in muck,
in Utqiaġvik, Alaska
during the Polar Nights,
in my palms, beneath pillows, sproutin out the lungs of
those unassumin' who think i'm healin' them
of all the silly, misplaced ideas
but they got me creepin' out the sides of their cheeks
hookin' these delicate stems
leaving thin perforations all along their sheets
gratin and sharpenin they's teeth--
used to think i was the sun
real pretty and smooth like them stones
you find down near the river
or leaves just 'bout to fall, clingin
to low hangin' branches
just askin to be plucked or swept away
but i'm not any of those things
just a girl
lord, the awful truth
just a girl.
Dec 17, 2017
Dec 17, 2017 at 12:38 AM UTC
The Seine a tongue of midnight ink.
Montparnasse, a tepid August night,
star-bundles like quartz-splinters in the sky.
The Dingo bar the place.
Jazz coming from somewhere, melody of mystery,
throng of conversation and smoke,
grey curlicues swaying above our heads.
Hemingway, feuillemort shirt, telling me I look rough.
*‘You sleeping well?’ ‘Well enough.’
‘That wife of yours is pure mayhem, I tell you.’*
The same old chatter. Besides, Isadora was worse,
cradling her drink as if a glass of jewels.
Then he was onto his Pamplona jaunt,
a heat that careened off from the streets,
undulations of warmth in the air
quivering like whispers.
*‘Look here, we’re the best writers in this city
when you’re not gallivanting over to your wife.
Two women, one body, you know it Scott.’*
I sighed, ordered another gin.
‘Transparent poison’, Ernest said again.
On the way home, faded trill de trompette in my ears,
night thriving to every pocket of Paris,
fields of unidentified liquorice flowers.
Young and in love - young with intimacy
skittering around our bodies
like delicate bees.
Apr 28, 2020
Apr 28, 2020 at 11:21 AM UTC
Check them off one by one
Till my list is finally done
First item of the day
Is pick up my crap and put it away
The dusty book on my floor
The marked on notebooks behind the door
Trinkets and toys I never use
The games which no longer amuse
The old black book of names refused
I toss them out whether their old or new
Second item on my list of things I need to do
Clean out my closet filling up a bag or two
With things, and memories to give to you
C.D.s, letters, sweaters, and P.S. two
Drop them off on your front door step
Then drive away all by myself
Third thing on this very long list
Though this heartache still persists
Though I know you are still ******
And we will never get through this
Here is a letter from me on my way out
Explaining what this list is about
With one ticket and two tough suitcases
I leave this town to see the Pamplona bull races
Many men intend to run and I count as another one
This bucket list you see is a list of my fantasies
A large lump and two terrible masses
Clog my natural flow through which this refuse passes
SO before I go I had to make this trip
And finish off my bucket list
Apr 2, 2017
Apr 2, 2017 at 5:47 PM UTC