Too many mediums.
The simplicity of conversation,
died today.
Died after the eighties,
because,
the neon lights,
and lines of coke,
wouldn't last forever.

You can't buy a cup of coffee.
Take your drink from the counter.
Move out of line.
There isn't a payphone inside.
You couldn't order a large.
It's a Starbucks.
Ask the homeless man in the bathroom,
shooting his dreams,
into his arm,
if you can borrow his iPhone,
to make a call.

And **** it all to hell,
if he asks you for change.
You only have a card.
Your piece of mind,
comes with a receipt.
But give him credit,
because he'll take an I.O.U.

Light your cigarette with the same hand,
holding the coffee.
Pass by people that do,
and people that do not.
Exhaling smoke,
some to which is blown,
up an *** or two.

Today is Tuesday,
or Friday,
and you have work,
or you don't,
but right now,
you are where you are.
At this moment,
there aren't any expectations,
but your own.

And when payphones,
become fewer,
and fewer,
You can take solace in knowing,
that calls will come,
less frequently.

*But a business card is mandatory.

There is a city inside my body
With cars making their way through my veins
People are on rush like they’re insane

My organs make up the industries
And the people are the workers
They work twenty-four/seven, tirelessly

Waiting for the food
Which they make into goods
And supply to all the smaller towns

But in my body,
The day never comes
So they’re accustomed to night-time

And all the routes and all the buildings,
And all the cars with their honking
Even lampposts and payphones

All the houses’ windows
Maybe even TVs and radios
Together, they make their own city lights

Years ago: 93-94
NYC: Columbia
trying to finish that thesis script
in Butler library
sitting at a wooden table in a room full of wooden tables
covered in a vast ceiling
creativity squeezed from my brain
my boyfriend waiting for me
only a notebook, a row of payphones on the first floor
a line forms as undergrads wait for the inter-college phone

Today, 2012
Berkeley: Doe library
Looks like Butler but nicely painted
not ravaged by the weather and city
rows of wooden desks with lamps and outlets
I write on my laptop, a cell phone in my bag
The row of payphones on the first floor are just empty booths

I feel like, I could look up, and you would be standing there
You, my boyfriend, who became my husband
My best friend, a difficult one who I stood by against the odds
You would be standing there, or maybe sitting down reading a
large novel in French, and we would get up and leave together for a dinner on Broadway

I look up.  The room is quiet and clear.
The air is fresh, no sounds of the inner city
You are not there
You live only in my mind
I wonder, how it was for you, years ago, in your year here at Berkeley
before you ran home, uncomfortable on this strange coast, this new world

I wish I could say to you
doe library looks like butler library
isn't that interesting
when I'm here, I feel like I'm there
But you, my past persecutor and abuser, would not listen
you new wife would be horrified.
It's such a simple thought
I don't want anything more
I'm afraid of you
Just wish I could connect, with that good part
at an innocent time when things were working

i can picture it
dusty desert roads
old motels when the
sky opens up and the
holes in the tent leak
the empty rooms and
bare mattresses of a
creaky single wide

a patch of wall where
a cross once hung for
so long the wallpaper
holds its faded image

payphones and
diner booths
card games and
cold pews

(sunbeams dreamily
landing in your eyes)

i can almost taste
cola flavored slushies
cans of beans and
cigarettes and coffee

and smell burnt pancakes
egg casserole the way grace's
mom made it at home
secondhand smoke a bonfire
made from incense and an
abandoned white church

i can hear the songs
the laughter tears and
screams to heaven over
rumbling rubber tires

i know the way they
talk and theorize
argue and laugh
cry and pray

i've felt it before
somewhere here
and there in
twinges of time

but nobody ever claimed
you could wander the
world in one day or that
writing a gospel was easy.

the ceiling
is no place to hide
your secrets or your woes
because on those nights
when sleep eludes you
you’ll sigh
and roll to your back
only to see your fears
watching you from the shadows
the floor
is no place either
for with every step
you’ll stumble
yet again
over past woes
and forgotten secrets
Neither
should you hide your fears
in the curves of your lover
for you’ll see your nightmares
in the bow of their lips
and the crooks of their elbows
as they try to love you
like you need
So hide
your woes
your fears
your nightmares
your secrets
and your plights
Amongst the mail of the corner letterbox
and the pages of library books
and the dial-tones of payphones
where they will lay
or hang
in the air of the lonely and forgotten
And there, in such no man’s lands
they can no longer
cause you grief

if i called you
i think i would say hi
would I say,
"it's me,"
or
my name?
I think you'd know..
but then again,
you hear many voices .

or maybe I'd call
and hear you say
"Hello?"
and hang up.
Just so that I could
hear your voice
cuz
I don't get to do that.

I've become obsessed with
payphones
My phone doesn't work and
I know your number
all I need is a quarter
and some courage.
At  least I know I have a quarter.

crumpled paper is so last century
along with road maps
and payphones