For my cousin, Chris Goldrick

Lacing my skates
after walking two miles
in girl-strictured delight
Mom's stories of Sonja Henie--
No, not ever

Lacing my skates
with  snow-ball pompoms
felt skirt
and nylon tights
Cute little hat with matching scarf
My thighs and fingers
already freezing
icy burn
from miles on foot

to get there
the lake where--

I must get out
I must get OUT!

Knowing what
to expect from my body
the quick-twitch of muscle
Could always sense
specific--
gravity of water    
at 22 degrees

Desiring to feel
the motion between ice and steel
Read speed's vibrations through my body
The brain registers relation
to weather's effect
Tell of velocity
possibility of fall
Feel the slash of the blades beneath me
Throw my weight sideways, sudden
to hear that furious hiss
An object in motion tending, dire
to stay in motion

Threatening to stay there
always
in its heights-- of speed
away--

from the crowds of skaters
swirling distant in the lights

Seeking instead
the farthest reaches of Porter Lake
speed and speed and more
to overcome
inertia
of what it is to become
undone

at the outer edges, of humanity
A force  
centrifugal unto myself

Avoiding

Pregnant and slow
with years and babes....

The best
must be broken and tamed
of what it takes to stay free

catching the edges with every stride
catching my toe in the quick
180
spray of frost
to the sudden still

Listen to the frigid chill

and the heave of my breath
tumbling into evidence

Gliding
Once

Forever--

on, into darkness
of woods on frozen water

The wildness of it all

So infatuated with flight
so full of grace

I forgot Sonja

The moon rose
from her seat in the treetops
and applauded

Oh Muse! endow my verses like the
grease
which in a pliable state, straightens
the choppy motion.
Dear Apollo! enlighten my words like
the hell fire
that light gives, yet a sharp gaze
broils the eggs.
Oh wretched Hydes! weep but one
more time for me
for the constellation bears rain no
more.
Oh Jove! rain the one pacific upon me
for I will to drown myself today.
Ah flora! the color of spring has
blanched away
for the pompoms bloom ashen
Lovely Aurora! why you withhold
yourself from me?
She's glum with me, why trying you
too be?
Eye some Aphrodite! take care of and
preserve the winsomeness.
for the lass* knows no value, it has to
me...

that’s the thing with those trophy wife types,
never really mandible in *** like a jaw ought to be,
too stiff, too anorexic model type:
pooch pooch a handbag full of duck quack pouts of the lips.
i like mandible women, scary scarred women,
the types that will grow into fond babushkas
and cook you a broth.
ah all this crap with daddy longlegs walking into a paparazzi
web of flashes is ruining the red carpet,
i was about to frizz it up into cushion afro softness
that would be quicksand for high heels.
i need blotches i need survival skills that hold the skin together,
every wrinkle, every passing jest of “irrelevance,”
every amulet glow of feeling through the kaleidoscope of depression,
jet-lag i call it, although i rather call it trombone,
with the numbers it was bound to happen, leaving the mammalian
kingdom and entering the insect kingdom, it was bound to happen,
the lost identity tiling the earth, ploughing the eardrum for symphonies,
it was just waiting... just waiting... like a spider waiting
with the flies of the urbanisation of green & green...
can’t change my mind... blotches on skin and bulges of missing protein
on the hips... perfect girth for child rearing...
i don’t like perfect... it’s supposed to have an aesthetic aura of an art
gallery... instead it has an aesthetic aura of hygiene of a hospital;
i arrested all the beauticians while talking to the paediatricians
painting my nails with u.v. liquorice in this hospital of hygienic looks
but unhygienic romping pompoms that swayed man to chlamydia.

Now the first leaves, golden,
Falling, fluttering tranquilly.
Breeze becomes wind,
A slight chill present.

Summer ending,
Fall in the air,
You can smell it, see it,
Touch it, even taste it.

Saturday, Freeway fills with cars,
Flags flying, team colors displaying,
Car Horns honking, people waving.

Mighty Ducks are beating their wings,
Getting ready, who could have known?
That Ducks having no teeth,
Could be so very ferocious,
Tenacious, combative, thrilling.

Tailgating celebrating,
Throngs of laughing people, moving
Pennants showing, blowing in the wind,
Through the gates into the huge arena.
Filling the stands, waiting spectacle’s beginning.
Band blares spirited tunes, people and
Students cheering, Ear splitting, the grandstands
Vibrating, spines a tingling, tension mounting.

Among great fan fare, the Gladiators emerge,
Regaled in colorful Costumes for combat,
Helmets gleaming in the sun,
Muscles bulging young men strut and pose,
In spirited pent up raw anticipation,
Soldier-players moving now as one,
As a well practiced oiled machine,
Each part supporting the other.  
Each knowing its own function,
Resulting in precise synchronization.
A time and place where boys become men.

Beautiful young women, under dressed,
Bosoms bouncing, pompoms waving
Add to the Circus flavor of spectacle rising.

Only a game? None in the bowl knows that.
No one cares to think so, it is more than that,
It is war, it is life, it‘s aggression without death,
It is pride without regret; it is a melding of hearts,
And expectations, of loyalties to a common goal,
It is a Saturday in the sun and fall air, a chance to
Yell and cheer for youth in flower, to feel and fear
An inevitable outcome not yet predetermined.
To ebb and flow all human emotions,
To hopefully all, end the day a winner,
Or perhaps display compassion for the looser.  
To feel alive, to participate in life’s cycle of living.

Football, just a game? Don’t you believe it.

The ice queen attempts to be more fact than fiction, but her eyes are covered in placenta. She can’t see through the burden of her mother’s expectations, the pompoms and Bible shoved down her throat at an early age.
The ice queen attempts to be more fact than fiction, but her eyeliner is smeared and so is the world. She’s always loved women, and hated herself enough to be with men. She’s always drowned out the protests of her own mind with liquor, finding refuge in the ability to ignore.
The ice queen attempts to be more fact than fiction. Is unsatisfied. Disgusted. Displeased. Dear Academy, for your consideration, would like a new self image.

Rickrack, got cataracts
My vision is so blurry.
Surgery done, not much fun
I wish healing would hurry.
Zip zop, roota zoot.
Hate backless hospital suits!
Clap clap, standing ovation.
For a successful operation.

Wave pompoms, ziss boom bah
For magic modern medicine
In just one day, as they say.
The right eye is all fixed again.
Go back in a few weeks
And have the left one done.
Huzzah hurrah and yippee kai yay
And the healing has begun.

Colors I never noticed before
Are now bright and shiny.
If I had known that before I
Woulda been petulant and whiny.
But, nothing noticed, nothing lost
I am looking forward to the day
When I can see completely better.
Harroo and blinking hurray!

i want
lavender beaches
strawberry bubblegum
willow-wood bed frames..
i want
sweet summertime
on crumbling tectonic plates
with my burlap baby..
i want
grapefruit pompoms
painted on my cheeks
telling stories in the fluorescence..
i want
everything
everysinglething
everylittlefraction

and that still won’t be enough.

The Tiara is back on the dresser.
My party shoes are on the floor.
The clock is well past midnight
And I’m the Birthday Girl no more.

My day was rendered as perfect
Everything went just as planned.
There were no major mix-ups -
A blessing from God’s divine hands.

The floats were created from magic
They were stunning in their appeal
The roses in so many colors made
It hard to believe they were real.

The bands each outdid the others
Their Tubas lined up in big rows.
The flag girls and pompoms were twirling;
Drum Majors were putting on shows.

The weather was cold in the morning
But warm in the late afternoon.
My tiara caught other’s attention
And that sent me over the moon.

We ended the day at the movies
To watch whatever was playing
“The Aquaman” was a debacle
That’s only if I’m kindly saying.

This birthday is etched in my mem’ry
A diamond among yearly pearls.
A treasure bestowed by a loved one
Who crowned me the luckiest girl.
                        ljm

squirt (title): pompoms scream (body) - to bypass the 502 Error Gateway...

second shift at Craven Cottage, the Fulham stadium...
well **** me...
i was in luck! Tony, this ex-military supervisor
asked me straight up: you want to do pitch-side?
do i?! the first shift i did was walking around
the park outside the venue, meeting & greeting incoming
fans... but to be allocated a more responsible role?!
you cannot believe how refreshing work has become:
you cannot believe how refreshing tiredness from
work has also become...
i don't know how it happened, but...
ARBEIT MACHT FREI is... ringing high and loud...
perhaps that slogan over a concentration camp
was always a bad joke...
i can't imagine that the Germans thought all the Hebrews
were lazy, not diligent workers...
even my grandfather remembers Hebrews in Poland
selling matchsticks and getting rich,
after all, what was that pre-war saying the Hebrews
had when putting down Polacks?
ah... wasze ulice, nasze kamienice...
your streets, our tenements...
maybe the Germans thought that a lot of Hebrews were
studying in the Yeshiva? nothing practical for society,
or that all Hebrews were somehow rabbis...
whatever it was... well a slogan above the entrance
to a concentration camp: where in a concentration
camp you'd perform a parody of work,
e.g. move one sack of rocks from one end of the camp
to another, to later move it back...
it's not like concentration camps were... munition factories...
a German bad joke...
but if, like me, you spent your 20s and early 30s
working in patches... the odd week on a construction site
doing some roofing, the odd month...
but mostly concentrating on writing...
and now this, steward at a football match...
some rigour re-imbued, some strategy,
some responsibility... i can't press the matter further...
sure, i'm not a football player, i'm not a film actor,
i'm not even the head safety officer in the ground...
i only put on some identifying clothes...
an accreditation badge and a uniform...
what did i get? people asking me questions as to where
to go, if they were sat in the correct seat...
for a man to feel useless, to be without authority:
that's horrible, writing poo'ems would never give me
that...
a compliment from a supervisor when i pointed
out that a woman was drinking wine in view
of a football pitch: which is illegal...
'nicely spotted'... after he approached her and asked
her to finish her wine from view of the pitch...
at the end of the match three boys came up to me
and asked me whether they could
pinch a piece of the pitch...
i let them... how their faces illuminated the place:
it was so dear to them: i couldn't just not let them
(mind you, they only pinched a piece of the astro-turf
lining the actual grass pitch, they didn't hear
that they were pinching fake grass...
let me leave them happy, after all...
i was providing a service)...

prior to leaving for Putney Bridge from Newbury Park
(first getting two buses there,
oh, i'd say a good decent 2 hour trip,
i've started to fall in love with commuting)...
one quick hot dog, with a Turkish toppish
of squeezed onions, parsley,
white wine vinegar, salt, sugar, gochugaru chilli flakes
& some sumac - well... squeezing the onions
releases their juices, making them less bitter:
actually sweet...
i only came back to Romford on the 86 bus
having arrived by train from Stratford
to Goodmayes - it's still zone 4...
all buses are zones one to four... Romford being
in zone six (if using a train or the tube)...
a two piece chicken meal with fries & a coca cola
zero... gulped down at approx. 12:20...
then... the most glorious cigarette to add smokiness
to the digestion...

starting work, proper, in your mid-30s...
while your 20s were spent unravelling a psychotic breakdown,
borderline schizophrenia:
that wouldn't fly, my supposed "schizophrenia"
dissolved when the element of bilingualism came in...
why should i only "hear voices" in English...
when i didn't hear them in ******?
the illness made no sense...
it didn't tap into my bilingualism...
why?! i read up a lot on this topic,
from Julian Jaynes, Jung, Richard Bentall,
R. D. Laing... no mention of schizophrenia coming up
against bilingualism...
misdiagnosis?!
i was never going to be merely a ******* victim...

now i see the bigger picture, music always helps...
the overseer - glass + unbreakable soundtrack,
James Howard's theme...
sure, the bonus of being pitch-side was also being
able to watch the match...
making new friends... well... colleagues...
i talked with Danny about our interests...
his was crypto-currency mine was music & cycling...
he used to cycle: until he hit a tree...
blah blah... time flies when you're talking...

oh such a little role of heroism on my part...
just minding people...
all this life truly requires is these little roles of heroism,
of responsibility...

i was at university, dated... i worked as a sub-contracting
roofer on construction sites...
i'm sorry to say this...
no relationship with a woman comes close...
to the amount of satisfaction received from
having a role that's more than a mere job you get paid for...
being responsible for the safety of others is...
probably somewhere in the hierarchy of where
the status of teacher is placed...
yet not with the current affairs of pedagogy:
of indoctrinating younglings into ideology:
whatever it's called these days...
intersectional *******, anti-racism, critical race theory...
teach them ******* English: the language,
teach them geography, chemistry, history,
don't turn them into spineless zombies
where they resort to a "rebellion" of succumbing
to football fanaticism...

me & Danny concluded: he "supports" Arsenal,
i "support" West Ham... but, "support": not really...
i just love the sport itself... i wouldn't be found a mile away
from the nearest crowd of avid club chanters...

my god, how refreshing to be in a position of authority,
even if it involves being at the bottom
of the hierarchy, being merely a pawn...
i can pull it off though... a welcoming yet intimidating look...
6ft2, 98kg... two jackets clad...
arms folded in front of me, arms folded at my back...
calm, collected... smiling... observant...
perhaps relationships with women were great...
they filled that void i was fed by literature prior
to my engagement with the opposite ***...
did i leave these relationships disillusioned?
of course!

   would i ever return to them? my heart is a stone...
mein herz ist ein kleinstein...
it has stopped bothering me, it bothers me less & less...
i'm not built for love, for romance,
that's why i don't want to write about it,
or even think about it...
i imagine that should a scenario present itself...
i'd be loved: but i wouldn't be able to love...
i'd merely... insinuate... i'd be on the receiving end
whilst doing the utmost minimal to
reciprocate... i'd be a cold-hearted *******...
oh... the mushy-colt aged 21 is long gone...
thank god...
could i love again? intimacy i can get with
a ******* in a brothel and not think twice
that a girl outside the profession of prostitution might
not give me an *******: again: is there something
wrong with me? why can a ******* give me
an ******* while some random girl picked up
in a bar, can't?!

i prefer talking to strangers than i ever preffered
talking to established friends...
it's not high-school anymore... there's no more
high-school banter... come to think of it...
the formality and the clear lines one cannot trespass
when conversing with strangers / colleagues...
come to think of it:
i'd tend to tell strangers more than the people
i was friends with... taboos enter the dynamics of friendships...
you can't tell of your innermost woes to friends,
after all... with friends you're supposed
to have a good time! no?

**** that... with strangers, with my shadow...
i burned down the bridges of my friendships a long time ago...
now i walk in the realm of Hades...
and i'm all the happier for it...
there were four major attachments in my life...
i lost one in the past year: my grandfather...
under circumstances that are, to be frank... rather horrid...
and... now that over a year has passed...
i feel... no... not relieved... i feel: RE-LEASED...
from some sort of heartbreak *******...

it's coming up to a quarter to 3am...
i have a shift this Sunday at the Wembley Stadiun
for the women's FA final,
my supervisor told me as i left Craven Cottage
that there was a good chance i'd get a chance to work
indoors... **** yes...
plenty of children to burn my eyes out:
not mine, not mine, thank god for that...
i don't need to be a father to them...
what a release from some bogus obligation that
in life you have to procreate...
hell... others can do that for me... i can just stand watch
and observe how...
this be the verse, Philip Larkin...
little chance of failure, or disappointment...
the Pontius Pilate approach...

it's a quarter to 3am and i just finished my shift,
my feet are somewhat sore, somewhat chilly,
who would have thought
that standing in one place, or two places
could be so exhausting: i'd rather walk a length of
a marathon than stand on duty...
the air outside looks like... a glass of water
with someone having splashed a dollop of milk into it...
it's so... murky, so... ambivalent...
so literally foggy...

no, not me... i was once the great romantic...
after being injected with the three musceteers,
with Stendhal's the scarlet & black...
i'm the one now saying:
work is better than an intimate relationship with
a woman... moi?! pour putain de l'intention
(is that, for ****'s sake?)
i'm trying to word with with spite...
i'my trying, i'm trying... no... no good...
on the way back some girls eyeing me up...
i try to think of the guys not being eyed up...
invisible creatures...
i hope i'm not much to look at either...
but can a woman do more for me than work?
i don't think so...
i'm such a fan of this hierarchic dynamic,
a work ethic, professionalism...
i don't think i could give myself up, on a whim...
my life can leave traces of fulfillment i generate myself:
this writing... well... it's obviously not Tolstoy...
just a product of these times...
i'll settle for that...
i'll also settle for being merely any overseer in a football
stadium than a rock-star, or actor:
never mind being a heart-surgeon...

but me, the once great romantic...
reduced to a function that mere guarantees him
a pawn status... the microcosm of overseeing
a football match: it is merely a microcosm...
in the grand scheme of things:
a newly found focus... returning with gladness to:
i am small... i'm a unit...
i am insignificant... writing creatively can rob you
of this perspective... infuse you with a sickly
megalomania...
it's best to return, to reality, to people...
away from the high-brow insecurities of an ivory
tower... it's so... refreshing...
after all, no Hamlet here, no Auld Lang Syne...

no... and all the better for it...
maybe it was a bad joke that the Germans posted on
the entrance of concentration camps:
it was... if concentration camps became
munition factories... but sieving sand:
in order to sieve more sand... to perform
Sisyphus tasks... while also exterminating the potential
workers? why not think of it as essentially failing:
when the essentiality of existence was lost?

but... translated, outside of the context
of a concentration camp? arbeit macht freit?
work set's you free... i can forget about my shortcomings...
my shortcomings are replaced with responsibilities...
i can forget about elaborating this tongue to my idiosyncrasy
and focus on formal communication...
i can live parallel lives...
i can have two lives...

as i have a prowess to wield of two tongues...
i can also... wield two lives....
and i don't even need to have a wife, to have children...
i can pass off being some loner since,
i hold a relationship with myself that grounds me
differently to others: others who are exposed
to their solitude, those who do not write,
who do not add form to their being,
who refuse to experience themselves with depth...
who switch off after their swift rather than switch on...

oh, these people are apparent... chamaleon me...
i turn into a right extrovert when a situation imposes itself
on me... yet writing is not a clear aspect of extroversion...
writing is an introvert's project...
yet how these two (aspects) are consolidated has
become... rather: a revelation to me...
i never put it into practice, mind you...
now that i have...

should all the final connections of significance die
and i'll be left alone...
just give me a "lesser" creature to bother me...
perhaps a dog... but more likely a cat...
i like the cats' take on placebo solipsism...

père corbeau...

   me, disavowing the chance of romance with a woman
over a desire to fulfill the role of steward,
sure, while i do my idiot writing on the side...
"idiot": it's never going to reach Fifty Shades of Grey
traction... then again:
i don't think i'll ever write something that exhausts me,
disappoints me... i'll just write what's made available...
what i want... come whoever may wish to come...
and a nice filter to boot... this will never be spoken
in either audio or a video format...
why bother unwanted attention,
made all the more accessible via audio or video?

what's it called? camaraderie? a select number of people
don't want something being spoilt,
by the intrusion of a greater number of people?
a loss of familiarity?
it's life... a phase of transition...
we're only taking a few people with us...
within the framework of memory, of a shared experience...
it's very much unlike a football match...
a football match consists of 11 players...
either side of the opposing teams...
the staff involved with the teams...
the stewards at the venue... blah blah blah...
very much unlike writing...

walk the moon - shut up & dance with me....
that sort of colt is not coming back....
even all those regretfully looking girls coming out of
clubs in Romford, stumbling, obviously not being
able to handle their drink...
oh, that guy is not coming back...
once upon a time taking a ******* a date to
the Tate Modern for an Edward Hopper exhibition,
then to the cinema to see a movie, Troy,
then some sushi... sending her off on the train
with my then friend messaging me
she said she felt butterflies in her stomach...
said "friend" later, years later, sending her a phallus-"selfie"...
ah.. RE-AH-LI-TY everyone's worse nightmare...
any psychotic's bread-and-butter...
so engrossed in it it would be impossible
to simply vacate it, leave it...
come the marriage with death... only then...

servus! neugefundenmann!
oh... hallo mich!

It’s easy for them to slip into the ice,
the big crack of nonjudgmental water,
absorbed entirely in the joy of now.

First winter blankets them, then the frost,  
the quiet, until the last of their woolens,
the black and red squares of their scarves,
their blue and pink pompoms trailing down
become the final gender reveal, the last
memory of their life that skates grief circles
in the frozen lake of their parents’ memory.

The water will lift their lost children
back into their parents arms,
the only mercy the lake will grant them.

Some will replace the weight of
their grief with other newborns.
They will watch them put on weight,
watch them weigh them down,
always keeping their new ones
from the cold weight of water.

The rest will dream every night
of the white cloth that covered
their small and silent bodies.
They will leave a light on hoping
their children will open the door
and come home again—

not lost
in the dark water,
come home again,
not lost
in the eternity
of their blue life.