There are only two ways to truly know someone: sleep with them or take them bowling.
Phoenix Aime was the woman of my dreams. So, I took her bowling.

Paid for a game. Rented shoes. Got the little, sticky bracelet thingy that said Slippery Joe Lanes.
That way if we got in some sort of accident on the way home,
the guy at the morgue could identify us as bowlers. Anyway, here's the bulleted list of what I knew about Phoenix up to that point:

• She looked like Diane Keaton circa 1972
• She talked with great pretension concerning craft beer
• She only patronized two restaurants: Denny's and IHOP
• She was eight years older than me
• She kissed my sister once on a dare
• Her shoe size was 7
• She was perfect or a near synonym

The bowling alley was empty save a World War II vet in a wheelchair and his wife at lane six,
and they were barely there. Country music played over the loud speaker. And I felt cozy. Predictable. Like a payment plan on the QVC.

That was until Phoenix said, "I forgot something. I'm going to go talk to Mack real quick."
Mack worked the front desk, according to his name tag. Talk to Mack. She just talked to Mack. Mack was sleeping with her. I untied my shoelaces. Oh, Mack, love your red polo with blue tiger stripes.
I pulled my sneakers off. Oh, Mack, I love it when you dip your finger in nacho cheese and feed it to me. Slid my right foot into bowling shoe. Halfway in with the left, and my socked foot struck something plastic. A stick of tiny deodorant. Like unsavory truck-stop-to-truck-stop deodorant. Oh, Mack, I love it when you deodorize -- so hard. Pull the strings tight on the left shoe. Oh, Mack, rub the deodorant until your underarms are SO CHALKY AND WHITE.

"You okay?" Phoenix asked.

"Yeah, what do I look like something's wrong?"

She carried a seafoam green bowling ball with a ****** Mary insignia. "It looks like you triple-knotted your shoes there."

And I said something dumb like, better safe than sorry.

"Sorry about leaving you all alone. Mack holds onto my ***** for me," she said.  I bet he does. "I hate talking to that guy." What? "He's a vegan."

Now, at that time in my life, I was a vegan. And had planned some stirring remarks about the processing of sweet little piggies into cancerous hot dog machines on the way to pick her up. Thought she would think me full of passion, "on fire" for a cause, you know? The wise thing would have been to say, oh well, I'm a vegan. But instead I asked, "What do you mean?"

"You know serial killer's get a last meal before they're executed, right?"

"Right." Where the hell is this going?

"Well, have you ever heard of someone on death row requesting a last meal that didn't involve some sort of animal product? Gacy had buckets of chicken, Bundy had a medium rare steak, even uh, ****, what was his name, McVeigh, Timothy McVeigh he had two pints of mint chocolate ice cream. Dairy."

"I'm not sure how this refutes veganism."

"Nobody is a vegan for their last meal. Nobody. I'm not going to subscribe to a diet that I can't follow until the very end. Live every day like your last, that's my motto."

"That's your motto." I said. To be a great listener, just repeat the last three or four things anyone says to you and raise your eyebrows a little bit. (Examples: "My dog died." -- "You're dog died.", "I never ate breakfast burritos again." -- "Never ate it again.", "I love you." -- "You love me.")

Over Phoenix's shoulder, over by lane six, the wife wheeled the World War II vet up to the lane. And he tossed the ball. Good team, I thought. Want to know someone take them to the bowling alley.

Phoenix removed a glove from her pocket. She had her own ball. Brought her own badass, jet black bowling gloves. And if her carnivorous tendencies hadn't already put a ***** in the Golden Days of Josh and Phoenix, that glove did.

She typed her name first on the scoring computer. Didn't ask if I wanted to go first. That's fine. Approached the lane, three fingers inside the ****** Mary. She brought her bony arm back with the grace of a ballerina tucked away stage right in the shadows. Mary cut from grace slid down the lane with a spin.

Strike. I couldn't really see the pins from my angle. But I recieved a transmission via the "yes" and arm pump. That was two marks against her, and I was going to three. I'd call it strikes, but well, the whole bowling skew.

Here's a bulleted list of what a "yes" and arm pump immediately taught me:

• She takes bowling serious.
• If you take bowling serious, when do you relax?
• She'd never relax.
• My life would be tucked shirts, matching belts and shoes.

For six frames, I picked up fours and sevens. Phoenix, though, nothing but strikes. I threw a gutter on frame seven. Like a normal human being, I shrugged. Made a face out the sides of my mouth. Kept it light.

"I thought you were a grown *** man," Phoenix said.

"Me too."

What happened next, I willed. I'm not god or anything like that. At the time, just cosmicly ******.
Her step stuttered. 7-10 split. "Mack!" she screamed. "Floors are slicker than a used car salesman's hair."

From across the alley,
"Sorry, Phoenix, baby. I'll bring you some nachos. That make up for it?"

"Ain't gonna knock down two pins is it?"

"So, uh, no nachos then?"

"Actually, go ahead and bring those."

She lined up. Back straight. Legs together. She rolled her neck. "You're about to see how it's done."

And I didn't. She broke it down the middle. Field goal. In that moment, that holy moment, I was knowledge plateau. Vindicated.

For about 10 seconds.

Mack swaggered over, nachos in hand. "Phoenix, sweetie, you okay?"

"Do I look okay?"

"No, that's why I asked."

"Just give me the nachos."

"Ah crap." Mack had gotten his pointer finger in the nacho cheese.

"Let me see it."

And right there, right in front the ****** Mary seafoam green bowling ball, she slurped the cheese off his finger."

Frame seven, a good as time as any to call it a match. The wife of the World War II vet kissed her husband's forehead. Handed him a ball. As I walked by, hand on shoulder. "Struck gold, dude."

(song lyrics)
Verse 1:
Now I can’t go fishin’, ‘cuz ya’ sold my rod and reel
Can’t go snow-racin’, ‘cuz ya’ sold my snowmobile
And I got flaws - that’s for sure - and sometimes run amuck
But the final straw that I can’t take: Ya’ sold my pickup truck

Chorus:
You can burn the house, shoot my dog and stomp my ol’ guitar
But when you sold my pickup truck, well, Honey, ya’ went too far

Verse 2:
I didn’t care when ya’ bought that stuff on TV’s QVC
Or ‘cause ya’ always thought of me as your private Money Tree
Or catalog-orderin’ ever’thing from within ol’ Sears Roebuck
But I’ll be danged if I’ll sit still since ya’ sold my pickup truck!

Chorus:
You can burn the house, shoot my dog and stomp my ol’ guitar
But when you sold my pickup truck, well, Honey, ya’ went too far

Verse 3:
So I went and saw a gypsy gal, and a curse on you imposed
To put sand in your chewin' gum and runners in your ***** hose
And all your clothes and accessories to never, ever match
And chiggers in your bed sheets - so you’ll always have to scratch!

Chorus:
You can burn the house, shoot my dog and stomp my ol’ guitar
But when you sold my pickup truck, well, Honey, ya’ went too far

Verse 4:
I seen ya’ last Saturday night at Bubba’s Bar and Grill
The image of you in stripes and checks remains within me still
And them red chigger welts upon your nose and face
Tells me that the gypsy curse is workin’ ever’ place!

Chorus:
You can burn the house, shoot my dog and stomp my ol’ guitar
But when you sold my pickup truck, well, Honey, ya’ went too far

Every true crime documentary resides in me.
Binge used to be tied to drinking. The language, I think,
is evolving, and I walk the black part of town at
night on a double dare from a lady poet whose
lexical purview lies somewhere between her
**** and the moon. I'm a beacon of fairness,
fair trade coffee stains my teeth, my lenin pants
imported from Bali are ethically made, and I speak
in a respectable and thoughtful half whisper
like the women of the QVC.
I return to the loft free of gunshot wounds
and love my lady poet thin and love my lady poet
tall and she says confusion is the only sustainable
state of being and I say I can agree with that and
she says she's been thinking about transitioning
and I say into more responsibility at work? and she
says haha no. Into a man.
And three weeks later I watch her read a poem
entitled "Traffic My **** Transgender *** to Heaven,"
she goes home with one, two, three Sylvia Plath lookalikes,
and I get swabbed at the doctors and I get prescribed
a moderate dose of Effexor and I speak in high school
Spanish to my office crush — she's from Venezuela, I think.
Power. Control. Stockings, I tell her, I have a thing for stockings
and pink cotton socks. One more drink and I'll hit my
groove. Chill. Power. Control. Put on that soul song I like.
Didn't I do it, baby?

no one wants to be
the seats at the
front of the movie theater
where you only sit
if all the other seats are taken

no one wants to be
late night television
which you only flip to
cause it's better than
infomercials on QVC

no one wants to be
that t-shirt at the bottom
of the drawer, that you
only wear because all
your other clothes are *****

no one wants to be
wanted at three AM
when you're bored
and lonely cause everyone
else is asleep

no one wants to be
used.

How odd you look, Madame Olga
with that ridiculous turban
wrapped around your graying head
and that careless slash of red lipstick
that does nothing for you
(unless you're channeling Lucille Ball)

The truth is you're stuck here,
    Madame Olga,
in your tiny, seedy parlor
with its stained floral wallpaper and
dim lighting from a feeble lamp

Do you find your "client" vulnerable        
    today, Madame Olga,
a lonely widow waiting nervously
    for you to speak,
waiting for you to tell her about a
tall, dark, handsome stranger
coming into her life,
a man residing in an unnamed
wonderland, a savior eager to
share his vast fortune with her?

You ask her to come back tomorrow
after she cleans out her savings account
and pawns her QVC jewelry collection

It will be then when you plan to take
her money and regale her with
prayers, chants, incantations,
when you attempt to dazzle and
divert her and make her money
vanish like the proverbial rabbit
in an old-time magic show

But I have to question your fading
    psychic power, Madame Olga

You seem NOT to know intuitively
that your creation of her mythical lover
and his nonexistent wonderland is
headed for extinction once the hidden
wire she's wearing performs
its own
inimitable
trick

Abracadabra indeed!

2020 - day 103 -- a long and winding story, fun, I re read it twice.

Wednesday, April 22, 2020
8:04 AM

Pharoah-ism is a thing.

It's in a class of words holding forms for governing,
herds of humans,
who can be fit to the form, walk this way,

like an Egyptian, indebted for all your worth

Trillions and trillions, soon enough,
the ghost of Everett Dirkson laughs at
another billion attributed to Carl Sagan,
"we ain't even thinking real money any more."

To whom does the government of, for, and by the people,
owe all the nation can invent

Some day we will learn each bit of reality, but

we, as a specie, a valued mod on the base line
must access our global brain.

China -- that is -- the military mind of China,

has egged on
the military might of the USA, offering hope

for all-out war on peace, for no reason.

War has never had a reason for which any good
could come. Never.

And I will defend to the death your right to disagree,
but not your right to fight and destroy me.

If peace and war were to meet on a distant shore,
peace might move inland, but

now, we meet here on earth as mere ideas empowered
by the codemaker; peace and war

tete a tete, cabezo y cabezo I betcha, like dos cabezos

peering ahead on I -10... on the road again...

this is a changing station stage of life...

fold down time.

monster employers, users and maintainers of
common flesh and blood eyes, ears and hands,
people of the commonest class;
some times sitting in boxes,
some times standing in lines, sometimes

watching welder robots do your dad's old job.


--- capital
= money = time.

Gotta minute?
Invest it in imagining you think, as in,

think

who holds those, no, not those,

these truths, these factions of the whole
truth
faction, not fraction,

truth
and nothing but as sworn to on tv via mirror neurons
and solidi-fied, pur-chased, caught, netted,

in plebeian pledges of allegiance from first
grade, in the sorting of useful citizens,

some may serve at the highest levels, lifted via
lessons proven learned in standard tests,

-- number two pencil, fill each box, complete-ly,

so a machine can discern your answer, and punch
through the insulating paper, to signal
each bit of evidence

coming into piles of assorted usefull knacks,

mark this one. Feed him Wattie Piper, make him
think, I can
think, I can, think, think a little think...


We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of

How did Einstein think?

AI ai ai, we know. Not in words. Einstein was taught to think

in whatification. What if I

--- nail the sun to the sky and feel the earth move me at
-- twenty-five, or so
-- thousands of miles
per fifteen three hundred and sixtieths of a day
-- and a night, one whole day...

but N D Tyson taught me that trick, not Einstein...
and not all things count as worthy,
relatively, of attention paid.

The worth of a thought's open door invitation to the curiosity we
enjoy


Semantics (from Ancient Greek: σημαντικός sēmantikós,
"significant") 
is the linguistic and philosophical study of meaning 
in language,
programming languages,
formal logics,
and semiotics.
It is concerned with the relationship between signifiers
—like 
words, phrases, signs, and symbols
—and what they stand for in reality, their denotation.

On the subject of secrecy in general,

ah, no, we've no secrets, for here we have no truely
believable lies,

the truth will out, we say.
Life ain't fair, death had no hope, that's just

the way it is.
Wait and see. We had ein kleiner Gedanke, once
upon a mythical histerical time,

ah, think of any first blood in a world of secrets, such as we

formed from, even in famine, some seed was sown
each season,

some seed remained from first story peoples, preserved
in sacred places, safe,
until the dawning on you, that this is true, life always wins.

brightly lighted stage of history

no weakness... save where the blade meets the soft flesh
beneath a noble head bowing to think


fringe brushes my gnostic-itch, son of a gun,

son of a blade, edge, point

pierce the air, no pop, no apoptosist apostasy, see

we use words with no definitive meanings, right?

significance is cast aside, who cares
that's just semantics, I don' quibble bout {sign-if-i can-sense}
significance
or sign.
I wonder did we double down on a word righting there,
did we give meaning to a barely breathing

wind born lie, some interruptions signify engagement of

a clutch, a tool to grip the wild spinning trans-
*******, while

we slip into something more comfortable.
A higher, cruising 12 to 1 gear

My neighbor from two hills north, is coming to sit a while,

the guy has been called Cowboy, as a name, since all his siblings
knew him.

He is a walking archetype. And my friend. We share some burrs,
from wild meadows ridden on sole leather,

leaving a steaming auto-mobile by the side of the road,

aaah, the interruptions {more, with Oliver gone}

any line in context, is a step past last, a first of all the nexts

Nexts?
Options. Who determined this? My will being to discover this
fringe connection to the persistence on the fringe

of string theory strangling struggling

genera general, whole sorts of hu-mongolian signif-if-if ier yous.

Yous guys includes girls and nobody makes me say,

wombed AND un-wombed, man. So yous, youse, y'all you all;
you,
samesame, okeh. Plain and subliminal, wait and see. Losers win,

when they stop fighting fair.
Die and see what happens,
or imagine
you
know some body who did die and before he did he said,

Hide, and watch. AND now, you see,

caution once cast to the wind, calming all the rage required

to oppose the forces

¿? quare, sistere, wait, feel the urge to know, a click calque

see, new old idea, an old idea studied to the point of a word
formed to signify a set of things

cal-que-able, in curios kurio terms derived

from Phoencian merchants, who set up benches in all the ports.

Users of money, milkers of the exchange, worth-ship of silver,

balanced on the craftily formed me-assuring thing,

eight silver tid-bits makes one golden one, tid-bits fit

fingers, excluding thumbs, for thumbs play a role

mechanically in holding any thing, even

steady -- com-pre-hensive press press sure...

you got it, knowledge

ex-spands into wow... did it work?

Did we make a handle? Or a tool? No pressure, guess.

And Dave Goodman, rides into the west, with a QVC Lid-Lock

full of fabulous pasta cheese and celery, with peas.

A culinary experiment conducted by the grandmother
of all my grand children,

a most mazing teacher of balance's pre care-ious role

on an inclined plane sure to flatten the curve

--- are we in historical moments a generation long,
--- with second generations arrows
--- never quivered, these shafts I shot by faith at unseen things,

for which I have reasons. Were now the war,

we all agree war always cost far more than its worth in death,
robbing life from mankind,

unaware if there ever were a gospel truth. I say don't study war with carnal weapons.

Words carry us into real contextual contests for human sanity as a whole,
we can make peace,
we all can breathe easy, loose the tight jibbs {jaws}, gritted molars, loosen up...

Historically, it seems riddles became de riguer in ifity, but plainly,

only surviving stories survive.

Science knows no story which was eaten up and troubled m'bowels and made me know

boom boom boom, montezuma's revenge

in the spirit kah-blewy con ef ef ef fectual fervent

prayer/sayer saying/praying in timeless harmony

if we can agree... no good we imagine can fail,

let chirality meet diversity and error meet ciliation

conciliate celebration,

conciliate (v.)
"overcome distrust or hostility of by soothing and pacifying," 1540s, from Latin conciliatus, past participle of conciliare "to bring together, unite in feelings, make friendly," from concilium "a meeting, a gathering of people," from assimilated form of com "together, together with" (see com-) + PIE *kal-yo-, suffixed form of root *kele- (2) "to shout" (the notion is of "a calling together"). Related: Conciliated; conciliating; conciliary. The earlier verb was Middle English concile "to reconcile" (late 14c.).

take away my anti-grace, de
ify my chance appearance,

dance, mirror neuronically, sitting your chair-saddle,

y'put y'left foot in behind your right and

boom
y'hit a but, but this, but that, but some other thing,

you got only so much mortal attention,

so when one door closes, whatever you need, is not there,

here we see the old wise man who saved a city and no one knows his name,
he say, redundancy of instruction is the way of life.

fectual per effing e fect, non sensicle semantical ice, Gibsonian ice,

no sweat, we are wrapped in white linen,

we broke on through and waited for you.

Yea, a sword shall pierce through thy own soul also.

words we remember were words
meant
to stand tall understanding all things


differently, re
reading, the scene from Night Scenes in the Bible,
that
was a level of knowns
effectually un provable but by
common movie-complex unbelief release, let it be

-- lower missing efs, finding more attention {behind the scenes}

ef-fectual is conjugolly confusin my prudent nature.

or higher, north or sout, plus or minus h

who cares. We made it. This is today.

Meek inheritance day or the spirits judged by the degree day,
a holi
day
in which they trouble their own house, and recall the point that
pierced their own soul,

so to speak,

survived hating your own self for other's sakes,

sakes meaning  goodness and graciousness which

constitute the happy bits in ever,
the treasures found,

where a man's heart is,
my diamond farm is yours now,

my gift to you... only words.

I inherited the wind, my job is to finish melting the ice.

God and sinner reconciled is a song,

does that make it less true?

For us, ever began before today,

so today is that day or it is not, we wait to see

or we wait and see, seeing if

this were the day, when all things go my way,

or come my way, in the course of human events,

I may be ready if readiness is some form of kurios

assurance, blessed, said *****, in a song,

I agree, blessed assurance,
Hey-sus is mine, find his words bring comfort

2020 paradigm shift is common parlance, Cowboy uses that
and logos regularly and he is

old, by mortal standards, for an archetype he's barely ligandary
to most receptive sub caudal imps.

they can feel

him biting the bullet,
gritting his teeth on the Gerber Bowie-wannabe blued steel
blade, re-imagined in reread instead, bullets bitten can go off,

I know a kid fired a deadly-for-a-mile bullet,
with a hammer and a rock, so, knifes are dangerous, too,
so
as a mime-ical biting down, per
haps this hero-in-forming bites

a wooden drumstick, beating now with one,
biting down on the other
boom
boomto doom boom
boom
boomto doom boom... and as the beat goes on,

fringes find loose ends and latch on...

Dirac was an early Cher fan, and she was something like dys
lexical survivor of the year,
if she can, anybody can
I think I can read faster than

hmmm, slippery *****,
speaking memes as old as I remember, then

by the time I wondered if she were real or
a con structure
I lose my footing

slip on something comfortable, this promises to be

that night, in the legends, just prior to a marked, edge of night,

ever after post. Will you still love me,

tomorrow.... deeedly violins lift away any hope

of redemption, oh, ma, it was 1963, you had to have me

to sing your blessing into,
to hide your gift in me, no one must know, oh god
bless his heart...

no part of this vision is clear, nor plain, why is this my beatrice
cockatrice

Olden day, Robinson's cowboy preacher son, sowed a saying in my
core, I sup-pose, put
his phrase formed
an ever more pleasant link to Wikenberg,
on this shelf, see, we can remember the target by re

reading... remembering never drink from the Hasayampa.
and you can tell the truth
by
aquiring point on conscience. Taking thought.

Ethos keeps insisting we are in some offensive mode.
Thus the call for concentration, we are tunable now,

on some oldies but goodies websites...
Kenpepiton.com, for one.
mytechpeople.com is possibly in the archives.

Calebland.com long left to a bland b-break lacking dash,
early urls. imaginable as answers to
either wishes or prayers,

or desires... unseen, unthinkable tools to augment a

satisfied mind, completely ******, no direction home...

here, my heart, my contentment container,

at the moment, indistinguishable from any mortal concept of heaven.

Robinson's father's saying: {remembered just in time}

some times you have to stomp your own snakes.
he may have said, you gotta stohmp yerown dam'snakes,

but never would he have said: one must stomp one's own snakes.

Didd it,
with a tip of my five hundreth hat:
Dance in the afterwords, wondering if we
were we
the ones who swallowed hole and fell
on
hard times, past
emptied heart and mind of worthship
appraised unworthy of mention
compared to the stars on TV.

Hey, see.
Written on  Grandma's wall.
A sign for those who read,

then the written declaration appeared
on a tapestry from QVC

Home, home at last,
Each heart is singing
Home, home at last.

And above the festive table as on a scroll
dis plays plentiy fructifity of ludis-hermes
Live Love Laugh

And tell the tale of the times
that came and went as all times do

this too, shall pass.

I’ve decided to never be a grandmother:

to never wear grandmother hands
or simper in grandmother clothes.  
I won’t stand
in a grandmother kitchen
baking grandmother bread
and pull crabgrass in the afternoon,
crabbing about my grandmother back;

dying my roots
to a color other than grandmother
just so I don’t look so grandmotherly
in these shoes
with this gait
and gardening silly-faced flowers
to spread on the ocean

like my grandmother did.

I refuse to play bridge or hearts
and any other grandmother games;
to smell like moth *****
rolled in the hems of grandmother cardigans
and broomstick skirts

or heap salt on my broccoli
because my grandmother tongue only works
to chide my daughter
time and again
about how seldom she visits

or to buy a grandmother clock on QVC
so that I can await the stillness of its hands
buried deep in grandmother exile,

like my grandmother did.

Do you scoff at the monkey 

clinging to my back?

And do you think his presence

is strength that I lack?


Ignorance is weakness

and you reek of its stench.

I don’t know your stuggles

And you don’t know my strength.


Pretending to be shocked,

you gawk and stare at me,

with my ever crazy monkey,

while yours tries to succeed.


Or are you the class clown

that needs to laugh and mock, 

at the expense of others,

so amused by my mug shot.


Before you cast your judgments

on your pedestal so high,

let’s take a look at all 

the monkeys that you hide.


Pills, pills, everywhere

from the good ‘ole doc.

That’s how the “better half”

of society like to rock.


And isn’t it a shame…

Curious George has gone wild,

playing in a Google jungle,

with his world wide web of lies.


Weekly drama overdoses,

that glamorize a world of crime,

with your children in the room,

and you call it “Family time”.


And you knew this was coming… 

Over eaters who refuse,

to believe they have a monkey

and ignore their health issues.


Or maybe your monkey

is cute and hard to see…

Like all you shop-a-holics

who get high on QVC.


Have I said enough?

Or should I pick up the pace,

with more evil little games

that monkeys love to play.


Hmmmm….


Worried Winos, Workaholics…

Poker Nights and Prayer Group Gossip,

Steroid Freaks, Casino Junkies,

Candy Crush obsessed monkeys…

Girls night out and Man Caves

are sweet bites that lies crave,

Cheating Hearts, Lying Eyes,

***** Mouths, and Idle Minds,

Jealousy and Vanity, 

Rebellion, Pride, and 

Selfish Me…


This monkey business could destroy

your nice civilized values…

So don’t you dare judge me, 

inside your monkey zoo!