But for once,
just once,
I want to be able tell someone
absolutely every crazy thought
that rummages throughout
my absolutely crazy mind      
and I want them to tell me
that maybe I am not insane,
that maybe I am just
different,
and then maybe tell me
that they like
different.

or how to make the eclectic concentrated,
how to make a zemstwa potion (revenge
potion) - long are the days of educated
Germans citing Grecian words -
my bilingualism gives me a patriotism
to use a language foreign to me,
and still embrace importing Church Slavonic:
                 but what a simple word
zemstwa is: less revenge and more retribution.

karakan: a ****** / dwarf -
but in an inoffensive sentence.
    people in the anglo realm always say
the phrases: where're are you from, originally?
and... how do you say it, properly?
        you first employ a knowledge of
syllable butchery: prophets of the surgical
procedure -
                 macron and umlaut both
akin in arithmetics -
                                  for what's later a comma.
Sartre plagiarised Joyce with *iron in the soul,
     left out all forms of punctuation,
akin to the English language leaving out all
forms of syllable punctuation in reverse -
      which goes against Socrates doing the
Kabbalistic methodology of sounds as atoms,
cut up?      so-  -crat- -es.
                                 Dr. Satan said: it's so.
        i already said that language is the most volatile
substance known to man...
             and that the only people who get to write
books in the west: are people who are asked to write
books in the first place.
      there's me, in a darkened corner:
a coroner's phrase -
                i would be a true idle drunk had i no
tenacity to write and drink...
   by now i'm halfway through a bottle of *** -
Bacardi - or Bacardí - acute iota to get a stress /
prolonging into an ee         - because
you rarely hear someone say Afrikaan: or
   Afrikān - they taught you punctuation of words /
compounds - but they didn't teach you
how diacritical marks are also incisors
    stating that there are two hydrogen atoms and
an oxygen bound to in a reaction with potassium -
or such guises lost or forgotten.
                    it's aesthetic in the informal sense,
in the formal sense: power.
                 no one wants a flower-power hippy cuddle
moment these days, it's true:
                   they want fierce knowing -
people want glasses -
                to possess the Galilean power struggle
stated with cyclops Jupiter being noticed
and saintly Saturn -
                      a different spirit rummages through me
and hence the differential vibration of
the hushed lynx: named Larry.
                     in flames: metaphor -
well, you know, you begin the night with
a change of tone: former barley murky gods' ****
                    amber - to Caribbean clarity -
you're bound to find a difference in shaky "the shadow"
stevens of your hands - i'm way past
the absinthe romanticism - sugar cubes alight
are like latex gimp masks: you start yearning for
the countryside hiatus of forever:
    David Attenborough-esque narrated *** scenes,
birds and the bees, and storks.
                       as sure as Moonday in a
monocle i say: the world events shouldn't drag you
into their narrative - avoid them - avoid them at all
costs: you're not a power broker in their final
summit - you can't change them, turn your attention
elsewhere, into niche topography of interest:
with a very minor demographic of shared coagulation
to express it... back when fame was less of a harrowing:
back when there was no personality cult activation:
a banker said to me once, randomly on a walk:
Newton, what a load of *******!
        and hence the ballistic missiles and that thing
about global warming: for every action there's an
equal and opposite reaction (3rd law) -
     Descartes thought would be part of the
conspiracy theorist columnal dogma reiteration -
doubt is wrong (albeit good faith)
         and negation is right (albeit bad faith,
as Sartre already said) -
     so in turn the tongue: the doubters turn the tongue
into the four limbs with boxing gloves included -
  waggle all you want, the pessimism is already
there - the deniers? they had clothes for their tongue
to make the most spectacular claims about
being naked, when actually dressed at Harrods
in that cheap **** that says: all pharaoh cool, cool.
i'll find more pearls in the reflection of the moon
upon an ocean than i'll ever see donned by pearl
necklace ladies at a fashion week goose-step stomping
anorexics show in London - and that's the truth.
     i'm not a biblical literalist - but **** me!
we were given a poisoned fruit, and told we would
be able to tell apart good & evil, but never from
the two divergent stances, hence the bundled up salad
of like for like -
                     this is Moses as poet, rather than
a general - before telling me he didn't exist
and was mere fiction: tell me he was a cunning poet
before being a cunnin general -
                  in a hundred years' time: you too will
be a myth, that's logically applied history after
being ignored for too long it cannot attract
september the 1st, 1939 - because mythology is
a form of history that detests exactness of dating
and hindsight - it happened: people didn't
really give a **** when it did, done!
     we really do not have a capacity to censor
*******...  not in life, on the street, on t.v., or in a courtroom,
           we don't!
                                   i treat it as a puzzle
rather than a fruit though, otherwise, to be stark-naked
honest: we'd be ****** gorilla boring and that would
be the end of our self-projection as questioning
the void we're in: it would have been blindly
nodded to - and ours': such a pivotal and yet also
pathetic rebellion -
                                 yet again, the world is going
into the shredder - looks elsewhere:
i'm looking at a poem by jack spicer -
he's not a great poet, meaning? he has a decency to
be one... which means he's not oratory
therefore he's implosive, therefore he's part of
the magnetic-enzyme strand of writing:
he attracts people to write -
                    he's not a Bukowski or a Ginsberg -
god no...
                  the seemingly mediocre is there
because of the paparazzi sentiment toe-ward
the greats (on purpose) -
                    you end up feeling:
i need to say something - instead of feeling:
a heckler! shut, the, ****, up!
      that's being perceived as mediocre goes:
it's a fatality of what not to adopt and improve;
like that line about the doubter's tongue being
dressed in fists and knees -
   and the denier's tongue being dressed in Gucci
and Dolce to look the part and
         hardly spread a cup of sweated over panic.
      pro-me-thee-us
      pro-me-thee-us
      five years
      the song singing from its black throat (Jack)
  sure... but it's pro-me-fee-oose - right?
this goes back to not having "punctuation"
flint sharpenings on atoms of lingua -
                 sure, have them between compounds,
but never ascribe them to letters?
  bound to be trouble....
             d'eh very point of fought over is to be
count, unawares: thinking.
then i picked up a very ancient text,
ibn sina / abū alī al-husayn ibn sīnā:
variation, properly?
i'd put a macron over y in al-husaȳn -
     otherwise it's almost like a question of
practising punctuation: which is a variation of
constructing from syllables, rather than
alphabetical beginnings - now let's look
at the variation "how do you pronounce it?"
         e-bin   c-n'ah       ah-boo       a'h-lee
              who-sane         e-bin         see-n'ah
this is how English looks like when undressed
from its lack of applying diacritical marks -
god it's ugly,
               get that Texan gunslinger drawl with
it too: like i'll ever be a cowboy: pff!
yes, there are people out there who enjoy
t.v. shows and look at them fish-eyed glassy -
then there are those that like football games -
but then the few of us look at something like the
following as means for transcendental mind-games
above crosswording:
(Kantian 0 = negation,                1 must therefore
                    mean affirmation, and 2 doubt:
as in: being of two minds)
   ibn Sana (tome of wisdom) -

            R  H
A  0  0  0  0  0  0  B
C  0  0  0  0  0  0  D­
            T  G
                                     this diagram is so idiosyncratic
it would well be a diaphragm -
                                   it's a scematic:
but it's certainly not a need to make language
trivia, in a sense trivial:
             it is a metaphysical translation of a pearl -
the same triviality can be applied to it
as our bewilderment ascribed toward the
analogous translation of it via avaricious people
and precious gems -
             it's not even a Xeno's paradox type of
looky-looky -
                 it's a sort of complete human being type
of scenario: an X marks the spot where you
     grow dumb with: does it matter?
      well: logic that's not restrained (on holiday)
produces such things -
                 such schematics:
   they are artefacts of a way to forget the daily
function of language between people:
as way to suggest: there is a way to get things done
by not getting them done.
                   i could have replaced the original
with a higher tier abstract, namely using less meaningful
encoding symbols, given that 0 - 9 are incompetent
of the 26 variabilities, and the why & i
            yumper and jumper,
   cat and kilogram                    cue, q, kappa -
skewers -     which makes it less than 26,
or the said: ∞      and a - z variation limit from
aardvark                    and   zyzzogeton -
zoo... in between.
                            i don't know what ibn is
trivialising / doing an original antidote to a crossword,
but i can say, given that i found the punctuation
scalpel in non-applied punctuation within letters
in the End-leash language - what i found stark
naked: by the way - the reason that philosophers
never applied grammatically categorising words
in their systems, is why we have that sort of
momentum of applicability in the field of robotics:
to categorise words by their noun or verb
is a reason why philosophy books never applied
such words in their reasoning - therefore the need
to write a book with such words being relevant
as translated into their precise irrelevance
and the relevance of the field of robotics.
never mind, i could have written
          
                     <  ≥
£           .   .   .   .   .   .  ≠ (÷)
= (x)     .   .   .   .   .   .  $
                     ≤  >                        thus the denial
of all plausible conversation on the matter:
and Herr Grinch and the rags to riches
fairytale - and the lottery, and the otherwise
grim simga of the yawning grey plateau;
did i get something wrong?
                 this is an example of an alter-crossword,
and the reason that mathematicians aren't
good at mental arithmetic is because
they have to learn mathematical shorthand
for their arguments, they become kindred spirits
of courtroom stenographers.

Beggars line the busy streets
cup and cloth outstretched
the look of desperation etched on their faces
like the dawn shadow of a carved lithograph

they don't ask me for spare change
just a simple nod of acknowledgement;
even after a shower and a change of clothes
I must have their look, that broken beaten look
the look of the street.

George Square is busy today
tourists happy clicking panoramic memories
admiration of forced foolish bravery at the Cenotaph
a list of names they will never know
and marvel at the antiquated architecture
to later revel in the wonderment of how anyone
in a civilised and modern society can do without skyscrapers
while they grudgingly share a half-measure of a single malt

I sit on a bench that marks a families love and remembrance
to the passing of a woman named Judith
the pigeons flock in carnal mass gatherings
knowing I've been there for 3 hours already
because I have the look of someone who hides his crusts
because I have the hungry eyes of the look of the street.

The well dressed man at the end of the alleyway,
the plume of carcinogen cigar smoke
like a coal fired power station  in the sunlight
this is where they go for over-priced craft ales
with Sautéed Wild Rabbit starter and £65 Wagyu Tomahawk Steak
a place for fine pickings in the alleyway ashtrays
dispensed cancer sticks left disregarded
the half-finished defiance of another £9 packet
that was simply spare change to begin with

I hover around making false promises on a deadline phone call
pretending in mime to be semi-OK
that the compadres are running late
and "tell me about the theatre show later"
the misdirection amid the camouflage of plastic peace lilies
while my other hand rummages the unspent tobacco
and the black-on-black door steward keeps clocking me
because I have the look of the street.

It’s fine
Is what she tells everyone
This day
Like so many others.
Fears run through her,
Her mind a mess of possibility
Infinite in number and horror.
Deaths here.
Failures there.
Maybe a grave injury at best.
Can they best this foe?
Is this the end of the Sages?
Is this the end of the world?
She ponders this
Over a cup of coffee
Poured by Moojdart,
All concern and bother.

It’s fine
Is what she says as she slinks off,
Telling Mooj again and again
Don’t worry, don’t worry
It’s fine,
She can handle it.
She always can, she always must.
Grus is worried too
And Milest
And even their leader
Who’s normally too vain to care.
She brushes past them all
To go and hide away
As she tries to fix it,
As she runs through bad ends
In search of a single good.
She can’t find one
Or even the hint of one
No matter how hard she picks
At the threads of potentiality.
There’s only more worries,
Only more failures,
Which darken the flame of Hope
Burning inside
Which she clings to so stubbornly
Even though it’s not her natural Will.
She’s got to.
She’s got to cling,
Got to be strong.
She’ll fix it, she will.

There’s a knock at her door
And it opens
Before she can even say no
Because that’s just how Fiethsing is,
Because that’s just how little she cares.
Really it’s amazing she knocked,
But there you go.
You never can guess with her,
But Zero can know she’s annoyed.
She snaps at her.
An admonition, a demand
To go, to leave.
That you shouldn’t just barge in
“I mean really, Fieth,”
And it’s fine anyway.
It’s always fine.

But that’s not what she came for.
So she claims.
She’s just here to find a book,
Steal it more like,
Like she always does
And Zero’ll never see it again.
It’s just a ploy anyway,
It’s just a ploy thankfully,
Unfortunately.
Fieth sets in on the search,
Looking for a book
And not speaking a word more,
Of concern or otherwise.
She’s simply an annoyance
That rummages through her things
After barging into her space.
Fieth’s one that’ll be ignored.
Has to be, must be.
So she drinks her coffee
And goes to reading,
Or more like looking at pages
As the words blur together
From fear
Now tinted with anger.

It’s fine
And Fiethsing sighs
Finally feeling fit
To make a sound
And even words.
“Wow, it’s hot.
Don’t you think so, Zero?”
There’s more sound too
Of rustling clothes
Falling off
Onto the floor.
A shirt gone,
More than likely.
Still searching too.
She pays no mind,
As little as she can.
She has a book to not read.

A book to not read
As a thought invades her mind
Of what Fieth must look like.
******* and slick with sweat
As she digs through her shelves
Musing to herself,
“Oh it’s not here either, oh dear.”
There’s a book to not read
As an image invades her mind
Of a hug,
Of a kiss,
A touch, anything.
Contact, warm and simple.
Memories flood
And imaginings more
As she has a book to not read.

Still it’s fine,
Just fine.
She’ll just read and think
On all the ways the world can end
Because that’s better.
Better than admitting she’s scared,
Better than admitting she needs help.
Help of any sort.
A talk, advice, a decision
Or a pair of arms
Wrapped around her waist
As she falls apart
Just for a moment.

“Oh, there it is!”
Rings out Fieth’s sing song tone
And she trots on over,
For once bothering to walk
And not float.
Just so she’ll hear,
Just so she’ll know.
It’s a kindness but it doesn’t feel like it,
More like a threat
That makes her sigh
Heavy and hard
In frustration
As she turns around to see
Fieth ******* and grinning.
It’s enough to make her sick.
With fury.
With fear.
With want.
She holds out her book
Arm outstretched
As far as it can go,
A barrier between them both.
She doesn’t want to play this game,
She wants to play this game.

Fieth takes the book with glee
And a pleased, “Thank you!”
Before she rambles on and on
About dull history being her passion
Don’t you know, Zero?
It’s charming,
It’s cute
And she just wants her gone.
Gone and away
With her mirth,
Infectious as always,
And her plans,
Impish as always.
So she turns back around
And grabs another book.
Another thing to not read
As she tells herself
That it’s fine.

It’s fine
As Fieth steps forward and
rests a hand on her
Gripping her shoulder.
It’s fine
When she says, “I went a bit far
Didn’t I, Zero?”
Which she did
But it’s fine
And it’s not.
It wasn’t far enough, not close enough.
She didn’t just grab her
Right there, right then.
She didn’t just force her down
Against her desk
And whisper in her ear
Just what she’ll do to her.

So she falls to her side
Just far enough
To fall back into Fieth,
Head resting right between her *******.
The grip becomes a hug,
Arm wrapping firmly around
Her frightened frame,
So frail,
Right now, right here.

“It’s fine,”
She says again.
This time it’s the truth,
And a lie
And she closes her eyes
And she melts
Right there, right then
In Fiethsing’s arms,
Though she wants nothing more
Than to chase her off.

“Just need a moment?”
Fieth asks
With a sincerity
That she so often lacks.
She’s not going to run off.
She’s not going to lie.
She’s not going to force the matter
Even if Zero wants her to.
It’s frustrating,
The fiendish way that Fieth
Makes her fend for herself
By pushing just enough
To get a decision.

It’s fine,
Frustrating or not,
As she pushes herself up and off.
Just enough to sit up,
Just enough to lean in
As she makes a decision at last.
Her lips part
And she kisses Fiethsing.
A moan escapes her,
A desperate plea
Muffled as Fieth’s tongue meets hers
And as Fieth’s hand crawls up her front.
Up her front, to her shoulder
To her neck,
Thumb rubbing idly, intently.
Intoxicating, it’s intoxicating
That sensation and more
As she leans forward the more,
Body pressed
Against Fieth’s.
Fieth who takes hold of her waist
With a free arm
And pulls her forward and up
To get her standing.
Two bodies, pressed together.
The kiss deepens,
Desperate all the more.

Her hands snake up Fieth’s back
And her nails dig into Fieth’s back.
Fieth who breaks the kiss
As she lets out a hiss
Of pained satisfaction
And who looks down
At her
As she buries her face
Into her chest.
She’s coming undone.
She’s starting to cry.
She’s clinging as she can,
Telling herself
Over and over
That it’s fine.

It’s fine
And Fieth’s here
Resting her cheek
Against her head
And with her hand
Stroking her hair
And her other
Holding her firmly,
Tightly
Just as she needs.
Just as she needs
Until she needs more,
More than a hug
And fingers in her hair.

She slips away,
Steps on back
One step, then two
Until a boot clicks against her desk.
She looks on
Eyes pleading
As she looks on at her
Her shirtless lover standing there
Unsure now of what she wants
But so sure of what she wants.
More, her.

So Fieth steps forward herself
Hands taking to her dress,
Undoing the buttons
As Zero tries to slip out of it.
Abandoning it on the floor,
Her bra goes there next
And her underwear
And her boots too.
It all goes
Until she is laid bare
For Fieth to look upon.
Fieth who doesn’t strip entirely,
Keeping her skirt on
And her boots too.
She dips down into her neck,
Pressing her lips against
That flesh
Vulnerable, sensitive
Enough to elicit a sigh.
Enough to get a roll of the hips.
Just enough
And not enough
As she buries her fingers
Into Fieth’s hair.
Pulling, stroking,
Needing simply to feel
Her and only her.
The her that slips a hand
Right between her thighs
Right then, right there.
A finger searching,
A finger finding
Just how wet she is.
A finger searching,
A finger finding
Just how hard her **** is.
Zero finds too
Once again
Just how skilled Fieth is.
How Fieth can circle her ****
Just the right way, just firm enough.
Enough to get her biting her lip
And resting her forehead
Into Fieth’s shoulder
As she comes apart
In her hands.

It’s fine
As her knees grow weak
And her breathing quickens.
It’s fine as Fieth slides a finger in
And a second.
The welcome stretch,
The familiar tension
Makes her shiver
As Fieth reaches deeper,
Deeper inside
And as Fieth pulls out
And pushes back in.
She pulls her head back,
And lets out a moan
Saying her name
As she pulls her hair.
God she’s near,
God she’s close,
God she’s in.
In her
Both in body and soul
And it’s all she can do
But say her name again
And again.
A fevered plea
As she begs for more,
Begs for her.
As doubts begin to clear
And leave
Just for a time.
Just right here, right now
And it’s fine.

Fieth pulls out again
This time fully
Leaving a dull ache,
An urgent need for more.
She wants to swear at her,
She wants to beg to her
To go back.
Back in,
Take her right there.
She needs it, needs her.
Desperately.
Fieth doesn’t though.
She grabs Zero’s thighs
And lifts as she can.
And she gets it
Though she’d rather not.
Rather not wait,
But she does wait and she knows
And she shifts her weight
Until she’s seated right on her desk,
Until she’s pressed down on her desk.

Fingers out of Fieth’s hair
She gropes at hard wood
That’s cold against her back
While the warmth burns
Between her legs.
She looks at her,
Looks to her.
Fieth’s hands rest on her thighs
As she looks back
Right at her,
Like she sees right through her.
Because she does,
She always does.

A hand travels up her thigh
Tracing a finger across her body.
A touch electric,
But not enough.
Not enough but enough
To get her speaking, to get her begging.
“Fieth, please.”
But Fieth just grins,
Feeling her *******,
Admiring the look in her eyes.
“Fieth please just stop looking,
Just this once and **** me.”
The words excite
And torment
And her cheeks burn red,
More ashamed to say it
Than have it happen.
Yet
The word she hears back isn’t a yes.
It’s “No.”

It’s fine
Isn’t it?
What had she done?
What could she have done?
Is it ending here, now?
Is it ending with still more to go?
What could she have done,
What could have Fieth have done?
Her fears come quick
And they’re tossed aside quick
As Fiethsing’s grin widens
And she says
“I’ve got a better idea.”
That’s fine.

More than fine.
Fine as Fieth bends down
Hand resting against the desk,
The other heading right back down
To her thighs.
Right back to part her lips
And then she feels her lips
And she feels her tongue
Against her ****.
Her fears are dashed
Right against the wall
And she lets out a cry,
A trembling moan.
So satisfied, yet not at all
As Fiethsing traces her ****
With her tongue.
As Fiethsing ***** at her ****
She claws, she scrabbles
Searching for purchase on the desk.
Which can’t be found
And she can’t find words
As she bucks her hips
Against Fiethsing’s mouth.
Not concerned about noise,
Not concerned about poise
Her worries gone entirely
And only this moment exists.
Only their bodies so close
Yet not close enough.
Time fades, distance fades.
A finger slips in again,
Then two, then three
But Fieth pulls her head up
Just to get it all situated.
Just to get it right.
Zero whines,
“Fiethsing please. ”

It’s more than fine
As Fieth dips back down
And Zero grabs wildly
Looking for something to hold
To touch.
All the better if it’s her,
If it’s Fieth and it is,
Her hair.
Her hair that Zero ***** into her fist,
Her hair that she pulls upon
As the tension builds,
As the ache grows.
Until at last it rolls over,
A rush of sensation
And feeling
That shakes her body
And gets her to cry out
Impassioned, fevered ramblings
About her, about her,
God just her.
Just.
Fiethsing.

And it’s fine
As Fieth keeps working at her
Through the ******,
Past the ******
And into the pain
Of too much sensation, too much.
She moans, she whines.
She begs, she even swears
And she bangs a fist on her desk
To stifle the pain, the pleasure.

Fiethsing slides out
And sits on up
And she laughs and prods
Right at her thigh.
“I bet even Milest heard that.”
What can she do
But roll her eyes
And groan in exasperation
At that comment.
What can she do
But be glad
Glad deep down for it,
For it all.
Glad enough that she sits up,
Glad enough that she hugs Fieth.

“It’s fine.”

Explorer of ink smudges and paper cuts,
She pilots her pen along the roads of a page.
With crisscrossed legs, she travels with windswept hair,
Scrawling to him on a route of blue and the red:
"Each moment we are together,
we write a new line of this poem."

He rummages through leaves of paper,
Words scribbled upon the pieces
like freshly fallen snow upon tree branches.
He searches in vain, seeing only her emerald-brown eyes.
Finally, with words at a breakneck speed, he writes:
*"And yet, there will never be verses enough
to encompass the scope of our voyage."

a man rummages a trashcan for his supper
others stare at their plates
complaining the lack of ketchup

As subtle as it may seem I frighten at the pause inflicted
when standing before a knowing crowd
to speak up and be heard.

My brain rummages in a waste paper basket of words
for meaning but finds nothing that will escape my throat
out into the open where eager eyes wait and watch
for the imminent collapse of discomfort
around me like a skirt dropping without an elastic band.

Yet my head bubbles with exotic words all inside the cranium
but no words escape from even leaking outlets.
I slink in fright at what I may say, some unkempt sentence
something funny or fumbling, never intended.

Yet I write such massive volumes of words unspoken
but tempered in some inner furnace and beaten into poetic shape
asking no one for any help, but writing unaided and unfettered.

I write because all the things I want to say have gone past spoken
experience and now desire to be recognised as written words.
When spoken before a mirror  they come alive with different meanings
and wander into understanding without jabs and jarrs or prodding.

Many like me have said the same thing when discussed
and I wonder why that happens so uncomfortably.
Best to leave us alone and not bother to seek our words of wisdom
but our written words as reflections of an inner mirror!

© Marshall Gass. All rights reserved.

the horse rummages on the track
and the victory is owned by the ****.
soon sleep will engulf my body
like the oblivious quietude of Aokigahara-jukai.
things and their semblance of utmost care.
light begins to burst
and there is little left to see,
wide-eyed, crunched by the efficacy of aches.
taking all to the very heart of hurt
as gamblers wager,
and coming back with the sound of completeness:
a man is a man in his chronology of defeat -
left torn by madness,
a cornered beast pressed against the woods.

the moon plays its lyre, white-washed,
sound wading in the very source of quiet,
hauled out of the Sun, its mother.
this hound stalks the world
with woebegone legs, a reflection of the entire world fractured
by a singular shot at the end.
i hear the guttural snarl of engine
unwavering in its limitations. say, at first light, all exists to paint darkness quicker
than any obfuscated conclusion -- hiding in
itself, its mood for squalors.
the mud dug deep for bones
pared from the slaughter of midnight,
hiding them to mask my defeat:
everything around me sparkles with
the vigor of frailty, all the same.

the nights are too long, scarce as froth
from an opened mouth left flat,
a dry gin bottle.
i imagine sad armies dissolving in pale moonlight, and crosses thumbed down to the snaking hiss of its nondescript prayer.
gears gnash like teeth in anger
of you in your young clothes, the pace of cars
hurrying back to homes.
i remember the splintered wood burning
the last in the round kiln of the Red Lion.
the upholstery of night is the twilight's
catharsis. the coast of dread widens like
the vernal metamorphosis of a young ******* in Gibraltar,
come in, come in with undecided ******.
you can hear the fall coalesce with the levitation of ember, landing like feet blunt
on the asphalt beside desolate bicycles
    in seedy parks.

the surreal tabulation of analogue repetitions:
death's myriad, in all corners screaming
the countenance rebel, against the floored masses.

Are we but dream junkies
And all the stars that trail,
In the gloams of milky ways,
But empty islands more for us,
Golden archipelagoes, baubles
Ringing, rounding out heavens'
Wreathing, oceans, nil vastness
To fixate upon from whence we
Once were, by souls' fashioning,
Airy and unrealistic as dear fools'
Child-minded convictions, fables,
Foetal, in smoky amniotic aethers,
Wisps of matter to see unlocked,
Unchained from sparks of nothing,
Wide eyed as supernovae in voids,
As light injects into us such purpose,
Imaginations so neatly dreamed upon,
Once and for all, stories bound in sleepy
Times, or tis more our sole, sun, but one
Dim light in all these unsettled sparklings,
A tapestry which etches our righting eyes,
Into sandy itchings, spiral notches, grains
Ticking us eternal to vested lime beds waiting,
Are we sunk in drunkeness by the overheaded
Skies, fumbling about, numbed, slumbered
In soul rummages?

Sleek dark hair
Highlights of auburn, color of fall
Stern lips
A look of austerity in the dark russet eye
Skin lighter than my own
The smaller wrist
Large eyes
Faint deepening crow's feet
Nursing knowledge
Small, short, slight, petite, and strong
Maternal vanguard
Matriarchal
Beautiful and earthly
Scorpionic elusiveness
Her unused canvas
Frequent Homegoods purchased
Shifts decor in the livingroom like a Feng Shui practitioner
Laughs at the absurdity of modern horror movies
Smells like bath wash and too much perfume
Smells of my childhood
Smells of my innocence
Paperbacks of Hugo and Austen in boxes in the basement
Paperbacks of The Symposium and a biography of Marx in the basement
Secretly likes to cook
Culinary explorer
Gastronomically open
Culinary door opener
Very little circle of friends
Outspoken
Austerity on the small mouth
Austerity in the small mouth
Conviction in her voice
Soft graphite in her voice
Has a lisp sometimes
The slight overbite(?)
Immigrant parent
Unnaturalized citizen
Reminds me of fall
Reminds me of everything
Reminds me of very little at once
Life-teacher, one of many
Protective
Over-protective
Pushy
The way her hand moves on her tablet
The way her voice sounded during a lecture when I was a child
The way she used to hug
Closet full of shoes and clothes she rummages through when she's going out
Meticulous cleaner
The way her voice sounded when she tried to make sense of me
The way her voice sounds
...

people tend to come then fly away here, and we think we know them.
in memory of Busbar Dancer i had to look up James l. Dickey and he is all he said.

Falling Related Poem Content Details
BY JAMES L. DICKEY
A 29-year-old stewardess fell ... to her
death tonight when she was swept
through an emergency door that sud-
denly sprang open ... The body ...
was found ... three hours after the
accident.                                              
                              —New York Times
The states when they black out and lie there rolling    when they turn
To something transcontinental    move by    drawing moonlight out of the great
One-sided stone hung off the starboard wingtip    some sleeper next to
An engine is groaning for coffee    and there is faintly coming in
Somewhere the vast beast-whistle of space. In the galley with its racks
Of trays    she rummages for a blanket    and moves in her slim tailored
Uniform to pin it over the cry at the top of the door. As though she blew

The door down with a silent blast from her lungs    frozen    she is black
Out finding herself    with the plane nowhere and her body taken by the throat
The undying cry of the void    falling    living    beginning to be something
That no one has ever been and lived through    screaming without enough air
Still neat    lipsticked    stockinged    girdled by regulation    her hat
Still on    her arms and legs in no world    and yet spaced also strangely
With utter placid rightness on thin air    taking her time    she holds it
In many places    and now, still thousands of feet from her death she seems
To slow    she develops interest    she turns in her maneuverable body

To watch it. She is hung high up in the overwhelming middle of things in her
Self    in low body-whistling wrapped intensely    in all her dark dance-weight
Coming down from a marvellous leap    with the delaying, dumfounding ease
Of a dream of being drawn    like endless moonlight to the harvest soil
Of a central state of one’s country    with a great gradual warmth coming
Over her    floating    finding more and more breath in what she has been using
For breath    as the levels become more human    seeing clouds placed honestly
Below her left and right    riding slowly toward them    she clasps it all
To her and can hang her hands and feet in it in peculiar ways    and
Her eyes opened wide by wind, can open her mouth as wide    wider and ****
All the heat from the cornfields    can go down on her back with a feeling
Of stupendous pillows stacked under her    and can turn    turn as to someone
In bed    smile, understood in darkness    can go away    slant    slide
Off tumbling    into the emblem of a bird with its wings half-spread
Or whirl madly on herself    in endless gymnastics in the growing warmth
Of wheatfields rising toward the harvest moon.    There is time to live
In superhuman health    seeing mortal unreachable lights far down seeing
An ultimate highway with one late priceless car probing it    arriving
In a square town    and off her starboard arm the glitter of water catches
The moon by its one shaken side    scaled, roaming silver    My God it is good
And evil    lying in one after another of all the positions for love
Making    dancing    sleeping    and now cloud wisps at her no
Raincoat    no matter    all small towns brokenly brighter from inside
Cloud    she walks over them like rain    bursts out to behold a Greyhound
Bus shooting light through its sides    it is the signal to go straight
Down like a glorious diver    then feet first    her skirt stripped beautifully
Up    her face in fear-scented cloths    her legs deliriously bare    then
Arms out    she slow-rolls over    steadies out    waits for something great
To take control of her    trembles near feathers    planes head-down
The quick movements of bird-necks turning her head    gold eyes the insight-
eyesight of owls blazing into the hencoops    a taste for chicken overwhelming
Her    the long-range vision of hawks enlarging all human lights of cars
Freight trains    looped bridges    enlarging the moon racing slowly
Through all the curves of a river    all the darks of the midwest blazing
From above. A rabbit in a bush turns white    the smothering chickens
Huddle    for over them there is still time for something to live
With the streaming half-idea of a long stoop    a hurtling    a fall
That is controlled    that plummets as it wills    turns gravity
Into a new condition, showing its other side like a moon    shining
New Powers    there is still time to live on a breath made of nothing
But the whole night    time for her to remember to arrange her skirt
Like a diagram of a bat    tightly it guides her    she has this flying-skin
Made of garments    and there are also those sky-divers on tv    sailing
In sunlight    smiling under their goggles    swapping batons back and forth
And He who jumped without a chute and was handed one by a diving
Buddy. She looks for her grinning companion    white teeth    nowhere
She is screaming    singing hymns    her thin human wings spread out
From her neat shoulders    the air beast-crooning to her    warbling
And she can no longer behold the huge partial form of the world    now
She is watching her country lose its evoked master shape    watching it lose
And gain    get back its houses and peoples    watching it bring up
Its local lights    single homes    lamps on barn roofs    if she fell
Into water she might live    like a diver    cleaving    perfect    plunge

Into another    heavy silver    unbreathable    slowing    saving
Element: there is water    there is time to perfect all the fine
Points of diving    feet together    toes pointed    hands shaped right
To insert her into water like a needle    to come out healthily dripping
And be handed a Coca-Cola    there they are    there are the waters
Of life    the moon packed and coiled in a reservoir    so let me begin
To plane across the night air of Kansas    opening my eyes superhumanly
Bright    to the ****** moon    opening the natural wings of my jacket
By Don Loper    moving like a hunting owl toward the glitter of water
One cannot just fall    just tumble screaming all that time    one must use
It    she is now through with all    through all    clouds    damp    hair
Straightened    the last wisp of fog pulled apart on her face like wool revealing
New darks    new progressions of headlights along dirt roads from chaos

And night    a gradual warming    a new-made, inevitable world of one’s own
Country    a great stone of light in its waiting waters    hold    hold out
For water: who knows when what correct young woman must take up her body
And fly    and head for the moon-crazed inner eye of midwest imprisoned
Water    stored up for her for years    the arms of her jacket slipping
Air up her sleeves to go    all over her? What final things can be said
Of one who starts her sheerly in her body in the high middle of night
Air    to track down water like a rabbit where it lies like life itself
Off to the right in Kansas? She goes toward    the blazing-bare lake
Her skirts neat    her hands and face warmed more and more by the air
Rising from pastures of beans    and under her    under chenille bedspreads
The farm girls are feeling the goddess in them struggle and rise brooding
On the scratch-shining posts of the bed    dreaming of female signs
Of the moon    male blood like iron    of what is really said by the moan
Of airliners passing over them at dead of midwest midnight    passing
Over brush fires    burning out in silence on little hills    and will wake
To see the woman they should be    struggling on the rooftree to become
Stars: for her the ground is closer    water is nearer    she passes
It    then banks    turns    her sleeves fluttering differently as she rolls
Out to face the east, where the sun shall come up from wheatfields she must
Do something with water    fly to it    fall in it    drink it    rise
From it    but there is none left upon earth    the clouds have drunk it back
The plants have ****** it down    there are standing toward her only
The common fields of death    she comes back from flying to falling
Returns to a powerful cry    the silent scream with which she blew down
The coupled door of the airliner    nearly    nearly losing hold
Of what she has done    remembers    remembers the shape at the heart
Of cloud    fashionably swirling    remembers she still has time to die
Beyond explanation. Let her now take off her hat in summer air the contour
Of cornfields    and have enough time to kick off her one remaining
Shoe with the toes    of the other foot    to unhook her stockings
With calm fingers, noting how fatally easy it is to undress in midair
Near death    when the body will assume without effort any position
Except the one that will sustain it    enable it to rise    live
Not die    nine farms hover close    widen    eight of them separate, leaving
One in the middle    then the fields of that farm do the same    there is no
Way to back off    from her chosen ground    but she sheds the jacket
With its silver sad impotent wings    sheds the bat’s guiding tailpiece
Of her skirt    the lightning-charged clinging of her blouse    the intimate
Inner flying-garment of her slip in which she rides like the holy ghost
Of a ******    sheds the long windsocks of her stockings    absurd
Brassiere    then feels the girdle required by regulations squirming
Off her: no longer monobuttocked    she feels the girdle flutter    shake
In her hand    and float    upward    her clothes rising off her ascending
Into cloud    and fights away from her head the last sharp dangerous shoe
Like a dumb bird    and now will drop in    soon    now will drop

In like this    the greatest thing that ever came to Kansas    down from all
Heights    all levels of American breath    layered in the lungs from the frail
Chill of space to the loam where extinction slumbers in corn tassels thickly
And breathes like rich farmers counting: will come along them after
Her last superhuman act    the last slow careful passing of her hands
All over her unharmed body    desired by every sleeper in his dream:
Boys finding for the first time their ***** filled with heart’s blood
Widowed farmers whose hands float under light covers to find themselves
Arisen at sunrise    the splendid position of blood unearthly drawn
Toward clouds    all feel something    pass over them as she passes
Her palms over her long legs    her small *******    and deeply between
Her thighs    her hair shot loose from all pins    streaming in the wind
Of her body    let her come openly    trying at the last second to land
On her back    This is it    this
                                                          All those who find her impressed
In the soft loam    gone down    driven well into the image of her body
The furrows for miles flowing in upon her where she lies very deep
In her mortal outline    in the earth as it is in cloud    can tell n

Spritzed me with rain, this morning.
   Rooftops unravel inner coating like old scabs
   to wounds. Quiescent mercy of the Sun
   bleared behind curtains of cumulus. There is a far
   more in-depth correlation between an insurmountable
  ex-facto and the fruition of affront:
           something a sutured lip unwraps, a sotto voce.

                                                          ­    Murmuring murmurings,
       tousled the leaves to a zither like salad on a depthless bowl:
    a coarse susurrus unattainable through lip-reading: tongue’s the
   scythe and the message that rummages athwart, something
                                 that rushes in the blood, a scrape on the sinew
                 as I coil in pain like a thing in womb revealing its fetal nature.
                              something that speaks for another one – ventriloquism
                       in its keenest sense,        speak for me, you, both of us lost
                                in frenzied translation.

i'm not someone who's all too willing to regurgitate
maxims...
it's quiet impossible to have to
vouch for so many observational (not objective,
really) truths...
   after all... the height of the maxim came
with (not Nietzsche) - came with
                       la Rochefoucauld...
                - chance and caprice rule the world
   - we are lazier in mind than (in) body...
to pick but a pair...
a western emphasis for all things
    a posteriori...
              to circumstance oneself in a stance:
akimbo...
or at least akin to Pontius Pilate having
nothing to do with the drilling in of mea culpa:
even for him... something about a lottery
of time and an inescapable round of chores...
that some things are certain is enough
to give a day one's privacy...
but everything else: so agitated and in the tier
of meaningful encounters...
always the "matter"...

unlike those ?? maxims -
which mostly dictate things with an a priori
tinge of "sentiment"...
a verb pure suppose: no prior encounter
like that one that i kept and figured:
keep the sponge of a brain suckling up to it:

the only way to aid the world
is to forget the world
and for the world to forget you -

                crazy for that chance: anon. as
being credited to me, though...
   there's another maxim, though,
i must ascribe it to Socrates because it's most
befitting...

some people live to eat...
others... eat to live...

that's a real conundrum for me...
well... why wouldn't it be?
     if i were to take into account something
archaic as the Pythagorean diet schematic...

god-like eating: vegetables,
                     spices, cereals, dry food...
although some distinctions
if eating meat pork > goat > offal >
mutton > beef...
spices are the extreme to beans
(although... a diet without fibre...
and "we" know that beans
are high in protein)
            dry food: well between
burnt offerings and something rotten...

i was surprised... given the status
of pork to the pagans...
then again: it's the most pristine creature
as it's wholly edible...
beside the oink and the hoofs...
and ol' porkies wouldn't survive in
a desert to begin with...
so i don't understand allah's "beef" with
this pristine creature...
child's play of talk...
      no mention of eating crab meat:
scavenger meat... yet most pristine...

yes... but it's a return from my little
hiatus in katakana, hiragana & hangul...
i'm tired of this custard brain splodge
of curating these symbols
of syllable encoding...

back to the atoms of Latin script...
that these letters are as they are...
mostly because
of the Greek eye...
imitation: the latin script doesn't
have names for its letters...
sing-along stipends (etc.)
no clearly defining A a a(lpha)
which denotes a name and a cipher
like a(lpha) male etc.

a "quicker" root: conserved time...
Hebrew, Phoenician, Greek, Latin...
chicken scratching later...
hopes to elevated to pelican... somewhat...

but still the maxim:
some people live to eat
while others eat to live...
it is a double-edged sword...
i can spot the obvious:
when and where people eat
to survive...
it's more important to eat...
than not to:
how this maxim deciphers fussy-eaters
among the Mandarin omnivores...
well...

but then there's also this attention
to detail surrounding:
some people live to eat:
so they will treat their food with
knowledge and tenderness...
that will make eating a pleasure...
who here might quest to make
the antonym of eating a pleasure...
a spell of diarrhoea, for example?
unless of course bombarded
with **** *** imagery:
one would have to quest to find pleasure
in easing out a loaf:
best in one piece...
  than have to imagine the same...
being reversed back into
one's "glory hole" with a pump action
of agitated vibrations...

and there i was thinking about
being in the possession
of a strap-on phallus made from
ice...
some people live to eat
whole others eat to live...

i thought it less to be in the category
of people who live to eat:
then i gave it some "thought"
and figured out...
the people that eat to live
are the ones that will not prepare
their own food...
oddly enough...

i too thought it was a sustenance
statement...
but given that ******* out
is hardly pleasurable...
chewing is hardly too...
digestion can put you to sleep...
preparation of food is most associated
with the sentiment: some live to eat...
it's not a statement of gluttony...

what's the best easy breakfast i could
think of, sparingly... today...
with revision?
when frying an egg
letting it fry just shy of completely
while dressing it with a slice
of chorizo and finishing it off
with a slice of cheese...
placing it on a toast...

   that i eat to live: well i'm not starving...
animals eat to live...
which is why they don't cook their food...
they eat it raw...
and some people have become
wild animal esque...
in the fast food joints...
lazily being... some people are fed...
to take care for what's to be eaten...
i love this maxim because
it's not so ****** obvious
as to why: some people live to eat...
that there's a concern for what is eaten...
you can't exactly expect yourself
to find substance in tree bark
and grass...

to eat to live is out of desperation...
to live to eat comes from
something more aesthetic than...
       previously thought...
not to the extent of treating food as some
Cezanne - humble origins more, please...
rustic - yes... that's another word for it!

i came across this thought as i came across
a memory of her...
it's a real shame... really...
i was so young then...
she was so young then...
i was 21 she was 19...
   a weird year where i suddenly had
attention of a few girls...
but this one in particular...
what sort of girl proposes to a guy
and choses an engagement ring...
the sort of girl that subsequently
gives it back...
because - well where's Edinburgh
and where's London...
but it's not like she would go down south
with me... she went all the way west
with a previous boyfriend...
from Novosibirsk to St. Petersburg...
then again prior bf had a daddy well
situated and i'm still equivalent
to being a carpenter's son...
  
     out of no less... when the heliocentric
revolution happened...
and geocentric us-and-us-alone
and wish the gods real...
the gynocentrism prevailed as did...
           hypergamy -
                       it's no shock it's nothing new
it's like there was no Copernican
adventure to begin with...
since... everything on earth stayed:
pretty much the same...
now there are only about 3 million
a posteriori walking abortions that
could have taken place
but since... the argument came from:
use... the ****** had to be...
used... and there was all the free time...
and everyone else was doing it...
but not these sons are placebo solipsists
and they have to sort of:
give back the existential tax
of having a life on loan...

            hello... world...
but god the *** was good...
   the most thrill from the memory was...
eating her out like i might
divulge - burrow my face in
greasy beef... i would like a comparison
with oysters or... eating flowers...
but that was the best part...
oral *** and a little ******* sgt. pepper
of the index middle and thumb
working with my thumb to grease
myself up before the whole hallelujah
of the genitals in symphony...

i've been to several brothels and
about a dozen ****** and...
well... well...
                 it's not the same when
one of you is faking payment
and the payment is not as clear
as literally for an hour...
she stayed in my flat rent free...
etc.

          my youth... and she...
oh... plus the chance conversation about
liking Milan Kundera's
the unbearable likeness of being...
although i doubt she read it...
she was most concerned with swans...
i remembered swans from the film adaptation
more than from the book...
then again: memory is a fickle creature...
even now as i'm enjoying
this little cameo project of existentialism
(i.e. memory) -
well... i don't exactly have a choice
in what i can and cannot remember...
beside the anti-dyslexic / numeral-savvy
2 + 2 and a + b + s + o + l + u + t + e...

when she broke up with me
she had this way of insinuating i'd miss
the *** with: when we had ***
and listened to music
the dandy warhols' good morning:
play it when you're missing the "****"...
sure as ****
when i think about eating chicken
meat off the bone...
esp. at the tenderness of the chicken
neck with all the intricacies
of suckling and "plucking"...
i do think about...
a fleshy fruit that i cannot nibble...
or eat...

well that was me zenith of ****** endeavours:
i must adored the heart
of the **** i was eating out
since her onomatopoeia of sorts
is still ringing in my ear:
along with her face in cubist contortions:
i still haven't found relief in
having been pleasured:
some variation of an agony of a martyr
having given pleasure:

not state-holding of a saint's repertoire...
but as i now look it...
a life of restraint:
beside the prostitutes and the brothels:
hell... even the Teutonic Knights
had a brothel in their citadel...
if only i were as willing as
to give my heart up...
to weave in
     a sacrament of giving her a pink
rose... no...
i didn't come across something
just as good:
and this "just as good" is too firmly
lodged in my memory-cinema
for me to blink away from it...
i count myself lucky...
how pristine it all was...

a good shaking of the bag
and out popped out a ****'s depth
enough of wriggling for me
to not appeal to some
*****-envy buckle... after that i grew
a beard and forgot to want to play
the fiddle...
but it was a must, something necessary...
me writing about it now, a decade later
might appear as a vanity project...
then again: i wasn't as busy...
she took off and became
"devoted" twice...
the 2nd time a failure the third i'm still
praying for the poor buck to not
buckle...
i mean: she can boast that she drove
one boy mad...
but what a strange man he came out
to be...
a half-baked loaf of bread: with
teeth for a crust...

summa summarum: it was worth it...
i was ruining my time
in bed, of late...
i came across a ref. to the Noyades...
which was of "concern" for me...
but i also came across an entry: GENUG

the last words spoken...
by certain people of "concern"...
kant (genug) - enough...
              agrippina (nero's mother) -
smite my womb...
thomas hobbes - a great leap in the dark;

if i were the latter i'd also like
to reiterate: into the dark...
unless it be the already sentencing of:
a dark of night...
i find nothing universal in the day
but at least by night
i would simply imply:
beside the darkening mechanisation
of life by toil of body
and the fickleness of mind...
ah... pedantry and chastisement
of self-
(yes... prefixing attachment ready)
for whatever requires
automation and scythe...
and rude workings of
   a digestive system...

besides... there's an easier demand
of argument to be met:
some people live to ****...
others **** to live...
i never liked the Anglophonic line
or argumentation from existentialism:
for the masses from within Darwinism
solves all little interludes...
how it's necessary to equate everything
with squared root of ape...

it can't be this whole narrative...
even the ancient pagan had knowledge
of: **** similis...
i'm still searching for this...
vanguard hope of **** sapiens...
i'm yet to find one...
esp. one with strict etymological
obligations that can distinguish
a word like Slav from Slave...
a Germ from..          -an...
mute from niemy... chwek... etc.

this narrative though: concerning genes:
genes are blind like atoms of sodium are
unless pushed out
from extremes of hereditary cul de sacs
of non-replica...
lineage of cancerous-growth-prone-examples...
etc.
but why oh why...
have this baggage of concerns...
these atomic-attachments:
this hiding of hearth...
it's not predicate of genius...
vain hope bound to horoscopic tension
to spit out a desirable temperament
of a man?

character is all Lego...
crafted from both an a priori and an a posteriori
and an a- priori and: summa posteriori
litany of shelved secrecies...
(a-? without)

each time i return to this little scrap:
this little memory of her...
i also return to myself...
what an idealistic ****-lord
of presence i was...
i was the sort of guy that could buy
a girl oysters for a single date...
well... given the "nature" of life...
the "narrative"...

i will relinquish my fascination with
the eastern arts...
the katakana, the hiragana, the hangul...
when someone teases me
wrong... as i show them...

the cedilla in C and the greek
sigma
  i.e. ç
         i.e. there are many sigmas...
there are... satires...
    there are... all opera is tragedy...
there are loan-words! even in english!
sights to see
  si(gh)t?... ******* surds...
   (g)nome... diaGnostic...
                  (k)night... night, nought...
GH & proud...
   it's almost my...
  meine besitzen zunge, das ich liebe
     so viel...

watch the zeppelins rain down blitzkrieg
in slow-motion while
the Danube rummages with
flow vs. tide... and Birmingham is
without tide... and everything else
is everything else with a spare
tire of metaphor...

- some people eat to live...
while other live to eat...
            i much prefer to cook my own food...
i take pride in owning an arsenal
of spices...
along with a black cardamom
that's the equivalent of a
Laphroaig glug...
  since mead: was yet to be
a drank mythological concern for truths...

oh this little vanity project that it
is... when i loved...
when i was in love...
  when i wasn't this beastly secured
in things that would either blush
or frown at things upkept
in the cosmopolitan lineage
of affairs...
  "conversation":
  that it was Paris and me and
these two Catelonian girls went
to the grave of "desperate Michael"...
well, no... who was it...
it wasn't Bill Murray...
the doors' frontman...

        such a revealing proximity
of: my given names i most associate
with...
   konrad von wallenrode...
konrad of masovia...
  mateusz: tax-collector...
       40 ******* months
itching before what remained
Giza... and that's before the dwarf
Napoleon shifted rules of rank...

it was a great ****...
i still love the idea we didn't become
so bored as to be bored
with orthodoxy that we might
have to delve into
****... *** toys...
or... i would love to have
donned a latex gimp... open mouth...
hell... all that gwory hole-ing a limited
status of halo...
i retracted my ambitions...
didn't... i?

i didn't find replacements...
physicality strict-dentures of: failure count?
i made my metaphysical investment?
didn't i...

two weeks without walking...
chant des templiers...
i "thought" myself more a Hospitalier(s)
son in bud...
salve regina...
two weeks without walking
i "decide" to write...
it's not enough:
memory
overcomes me...

the best **** i've had and it's not
something i want
to remember for a *******...
mind you i found alternatives...
donning my hair long enough
and a new found riddle in
a beard...
and a Turk that dealt in
Caucasian memorabilia..
of living extensions...
               you see...
a visit to the barber with overgrown
bush...
of hair and stubble...
became more frankly... pleasurable...
than... what was to be done
with...

         that statue by
            apollonius of athens...
i ****** off to Bronzino's
   venus, cupid, folly & time:
beside the cupping of the breast
the teasing tenderness of the ******
prone tongues...
all ***** on silent mode...
or at least only gesticulating
at marble statues in the process
of being erected:
without promise of a public
ordeal to overthrow (the publics)
Punic details of slou... slow...
slouch... and brittle... karma: wood...

toward an excruciation of justified
meaning: this arrangement of lettering:
how feeble and toothpick prone
this brittle groove & ground...
my harvest of dislodged ease...
sensibly: antithesis grammatical pseudo...
sssssssssssss
side-winding... slithering...
side-accost...
***-seer-Saracen...

          becau­se of some pope
with a name like Urban...
              a finicky genesis...
             from memory
a white serpent of light
   in a crest of illuminate azure
giving border upon the Firth of Forth...
when two creasing crows
staged themselves
on the pinnacle of the Old College,
Edinburgh...
the nights were aflame with
youth...
the nights were... gott-gegeben...

miraculous? no!
    just aided by a stealth variation
and with life...
this mediocre surmounted...

pointer: when is... "it", i.e.:
enough is enough vs.
enough is "it"?
  i'm hardly poignancy prone
to state the difference, proper...
i've levitated toward slouch
for a week or so...
i find not pleasure in writing:
not as much as i arrived at
finding it, once more:
in walking...
boyo... you should have seen
me gear up to a bicycle...

         god what time it was to be gladly
*******!
to be so Darwinistically excated
with purpose!
but also so blind... so unhappy!
no wonder i had to fathom
a retraction: this everyday
into day-by-day...
und grey-labour & tedium &
"good"...
        
but it wasn't a waisting
of a "crown"...
i didn't live up to the expectations of:
the greatest ***** that ever
"lived"...
i wouldn't have...
lived to spar with agony aunt
commentary...
i would be the least believed *******
child of variation of
a prosthetic progeny of "sowing":
all gladly encountered metaphors...
some as ugly as necessarily ugly to breed...
most high i.q. is bred out
and is left to individualistic chancing
of revision...

then again: there's no revision...
the one who i lost my virginity with...
i "tried" to get in touch with her...
5 loads in the basin later...
she's an insomniac of reproduction...
of course she was all defensive...
when i asked her why she was so sad:
five daughters: no son...
she put it down on exhausted from...
she didn't notice i was making
a henry VIII remark...

i can't and therefore will not wish it upon
myself:
merry me: marry me i too were
that father when je suis and hey zeus
asked upon the crucifix dangling:
father...
yes... perpetual bachelor, i...
entombed existentially: no escapee
planning: processed...
            
      alles ist gott: und nothing too...
  my words: before i die...
i'm sure i'll be drunk as a saber
with blood not spilt...
as heavily worked
as a currency of horse
currently on display in the fields
where i walk...
ditto grazing and ditto:
  grass-heaping chewing-heave
          anecdotal.

before the "prized ******* bull" &
entourage of fizzing waters started to throttle
any further mentioning of
libido limbo:
        that's the scarcity of my
****** ambitions...
   mind you: i'm glad i suckled on that
wet oyster pouch before
i was sent back to the "gulag"
of skeleton teasing an imitation hollow...
before the kama sutra provision
***** envy might have taken over...

very impossibly: it's a conundrum
of reiteration of sort
that's not worth more erosion
of memory since it doesn't rhyme...
i wouldn't have lived
enough of the already given
"this" if i haven't thought about "that"...

today i found some compensation
for years drilling ego into abstract
and smiling at nothing
and all things / manners of ape:
everclear's debute e.p.
        marylin manson's holywood...

i still want that king crimson debut
vinyl to adorn my loan space
of a room of a life...
because i have to hide all that jazzy *******
on the side...

stone temple pilots -
that album with the song: art school girlfriend...
anything more -esque to capture
the sentiments of pulp and that
other song: wickerman...
for d'ah bass...

   impossibly delightful to heave
a wounding of a lung with
a morning's daily brief of
harking up excess phlegm
stuck to the wall...
how there's a heart and i call it
a sparrow and how it flusters
and flutter with a difficulty
when i've presented it with
a caging like so...

             Baltic sushi: which involves...
primarily... soaked herring in
spirit vinegar...
with mustard seeds...
bay leaf... allspice... onions & garlic...
tender... fish meat...
curated by curing
by acid alone rather than heat...
evil in the beans: perhaps too much
"roughage" / fibre...
but a constipation of world renown
for 3 days solid...

because of the full-english-fry-up...
which makes you wonder
how it can be served thrice
in a day
if one's lazy about "details":
the same quote revised...
some people live to eat...
while other eat to live...

it's not a statement of gluttony...
it's... some people will eat anything...
while others will tend to curate
what they eat to make
expensive remarks on what's
allowed to expand and what has to...
inevitably... shrink into non alias
null alias nil alias shrugging feline...
bothersome quick-essential...
practice of dangling a kite...
toward (rather than against) the wind...

GLAYVA - a liquer...
          ****... a... liqueur - a L'CUR
   a lee cwuer...
         velsh?!
               simply *******...
          a li'kwer... ditto ditto this that
and anything in between...
i'm rehashing a fancy for sleeping
with a foreign body in the same
bed i leave open to satire: tomb...
begins with cat...
given all my whimsical demands
and idiosyncratic scrutiny+plural..
highten-ed
                what first was a believable
oyster gorge and...
floral patterns agitated:
pound upon pound of flesh...

no... impossible...
some people live to eat
while other eat to live:
statement of not so desperate times...
perhaps...
if necessary i might nibble on
some grasshoppers...
or any insects fried...
but the statement alludes
to... some people will eat anything...
it's not a statement of / for gluttonous
mishandling of...
some people live to eat:
nutritionists...
the statement is clearly abstract towing
so it expand with each reitertion
as any maxim given enough
mantra status...

said true: but prior to...
blindly-being-followed...
it can revise itself...

        rekindle: ashes and all manners of
said... truant...
         bigger no  bigger than
a hyphen interjection within
the confines of conjunction:
Big-Giza... troublesome 1st and omega
sentencing... echoes of melancholy
in a rush to satiate
forests turning into bureaucratic
pyre structures...

      these burning effigies of time
best wasted... off what was readily available:
scrutiny at best:
all that surfaced was to heave...
an amalgamation of prods, touching,
prodding... juxtaposing junctions...
hinterland of diacritical marker demands...
something "Ukrainian"...

something Moldova-esque... old haunts
older grievances...
newly arrived at carpets with
them being cleaned...
a grandfather most impressionable:
death so last random
that it could only have leverage
with(in) the cofines of
a stomach confined to:
squid ink squirt...

misunderstood lyrics...
slipknot's eyeless...
               i heard...
   you can't see California without
Marlon Brando's eyes...
you can't see California without
Marlon Brando's eyes...
you can't see California without
Marlon Brando's eyes...
you can't see California without
Marlon Brando's eyes...

i'm pretty sure that's not Tsar: i.e.
"it"... yeah... that one...
bothersome brother at the till
of a brothel... less chasing chequers
at the hyper-inflated curiosity of need
of a supermarket...
till... cashier... sooner me dead there
with a death prior...
how ignited in the case:
most futile...
not ignited by some plumber credentials
etc.
stash of leftovers...
basin of sudokus...
              crazing over scalp shaves
rite of bone...
"my" kindred... touch-tease a halving of
bone of Iowa...
riddle this scuttle of nuance...

this leftover cold sure: beef
i heaved for a closure for:
the innocent expanse for furthering of "love":
what was made edible..
what was kept indigestible...
this riddle of words...
              these words half kept
as w(h)iddle...
    beg....       big...      Giz'ah...
sigh of relief or give one's purpose...
vowel-catching... within the confines
of sighs... otherwise
the exclamation markings...
letter to the "bone"...
                   hardly anything of note
ex the Iberian peninsula...
a Hebrew would know...

       thank you gimp suited &
boot licking worth maggot spew....
i have outlived my purpose of riddle...
i'm hardly going to appease
the throng of "doubt"
when it comes to clinging to something
"bilateral":
queasy without dizzy...

what's that?
qu-easy
  vs. -izzy..
                        forget it...
letters like lumberjack praise of
pork,,
something to market: sizzle...
gimp suits and all things best kept
tinged with... bride... horror...
my bride.., not some angry african
who-man'ood...
   conservative little hooded
monsters prior to the Levant practice of
the snippet...
skin left so bare...
the eagerly waiting *****
of whitey...
angry baking half angry "noir"..
the women the challenge...

i pretend to dance before mirrors...
my elongation of the hand
looks more like a crab
than what i want it to depict:
i.e. a spider...
the 2oth century is a house
of haunting:
it's not a circa... esp. one might
wish to be born in...

that there was ever an "expectation"
and it allowed itself
a summary... with excuses...
if we are all...
pointing & turning...
the Polacks were not given... TS...

Angels run in fright
Hiding their prayers tonight
Salvation nowhere in sight
The Devil rummages through the cosmos
Searching for a blackened order
To desecrate godly might.

The old man and his bags full of memories in rags
wanders off on one more trip.
I think his ship is coming in.
He just
rummages in one more bin,
they don't make tramps like they used to
No
they don't make them any more
there is no one drinking 'jake' or
supping on a stoop,
'electric soup'
No
they don't make tramps like they used to.

Wakes up, she rummages through an overhead cupboard for some leaves. Overplayed mush on the radio, she turns on a ***** kettle. Lukewarm.
She puts her hand into a jar to retrieve a handful. Loose between her fingers, a memory.

She remembers how he rolled tea.

Jimi poster on a white wall, amidst smoke and rock and roll that hung in his chambers indefinately, defiantly. Books and books, Marley papers, flyers, tin foil, protracted dreams, the sort. His time was nonchalant, a little out of touch and oblivous to the one ticking outside (no windows). Well one but save a view of a narrow hole that was blocked by a chugging compressor; the sound of a nonexistent house guest until the desire to seek outside came to mind.

The sun is veiled again. She likes the grey. Not for its melancholic nature however. It jived somehow with her routine, she thought. Radio mush continues as the kettle begins purring.

iPod, cheap speakers, a laptop that hummed on the bright side of dim. So many songs.
Glow in the dark stars littered the wall next to Jimi. He said dreams hung on stars. Not noose but

like a bug on the underside of a leaf, clinging – till when she wondered.

Rain is coming little bug.

“Wake up”

She fluttered – angel-like, eyes a little grogged and gouged by too much sleep.

“What time is it?”

No such reply warrants. Phones are dead. Both under a pile of blankets like a premature burial. Cold, like their legs touching.

No facebook eulogy. Social media presence a little too truncated for her liking. Puts a newer form of private; that could only be unlatched by pokes that hurt, both ways. It would make both of them quiver which she would silently play in her head from time to time.

She shivered. Cold. It bit on the tips of her fingers. The kettle is close to a boil. She touches metallic just to feel it.

“*******”

Religion, he shared the room with though (much to her surprise). Spoke of eternity and suffering.

Whoever this god is he/she must have one hell of a sense of humour.

“Prance, you ******,”

Laughs, a longing sigh, a whistle follows.

The kettle calls. She remembers. Head drifts back from cloud fluff.

Leaves on the bottom of porcelain, meet the scald of hot water! They unfurl (giving in) and a dash of brown escapes, tickling her nose at the same time.

She went to fish out her phone to set the timer.

3 minutes.

In that moment I knew, that feeling of knowing,
To without any reasonably conclusion,
Have an unyielding sense of where the pieces lie.

And that tasteless grain of alabaster, so profuse
Raining even harder now, the ground a pathetic mixture.
Blood, mud and betrayal.

Two strangers, one in bed with the **** of the world
The other, with an unamused smug, hating the other.
Pausing, the rain stops, checkmate.

For all of an eternity, how does one not know self.
And upon becoming one with filth, why was it so?
In envious conclusion, I sleep, relinquishing control.

He rummages to the forefront, having prepared.
Having mastered this scenario hundreds of time,
So seamlessly did he maneuver.

Casting away the mask of my failure,
To carve forward his dominating force of hand.
This personality, so fiendish but still me.

Hercules is the alley cat
Who stalks the alleys at night
And climbs into the trash containers
To find a tasty bite.

“Cat food is a bore,” he says,
“And doesn’t suit my taste.
Besides,” he adds, “it’s silly to let
Good food go to waste.”

The local cats admire his skills
To manage on his own
And how he’s able to clean remaining
Meat off any bone.

Before the trash collectors come by
To empty the bins, ol’ Herc
Rummages through the open containers,
Keeping busy at work.

Rodents are no match for him
When he’s in the mood
To supplement his diet with
A fresher type of food.

“Residents don't,” he says with sigh,
“Appreciate us cats.
Because of our great diligence,
The streets have fewer rats.

“A problem nowadays," he laments--
“A definite no brainer--
Is how to manage when there is
A lid on the trash container.

“You must learn to be dexterous, agile,
Sneaky, snappy, and clever."
Some give up when they are challenged,
But Hercules will never!

It's said that Herc often receives
The blame for being a pater
After encounters with lady cats--
Sixty-some days later.

“I’m known for being promiscuous,
But that is just a rumor,”
He says with a wink to let us know
He has a sense of humor.

“It’s dangerous at night,” he says,
“For there’s a threatening owl
That flies in from the park, and dogs
Are always on the prowl.

“In order to survive in life--
You can take it from me--
You always need alternatives--
What you call Plan B.

“I am an expert at dodging and prancing;
My skills are hard to beat.
When YOU take a fall, are you always
Able to land on your feet?

"Fate has given me obstacles,
Which I call my 'Labors.'
If you don't believe me, well,
Just ask all the neighbors."

So Hercules, or Herc, if you will,
While not seeking fame,
Hopes that he, nevertheless,
Can live up to his name.

-by Bob B (2-10-20)

Do you hear that sound?
That horrible sound.
Do you know what it is?

Is it an iceberg forming?

Crackling and crashing,
Glacier losing its child,
Broken into the ocean,
Lost and adrift forever.
No.

Is it a tree falling?

All alone in the forest,
Nobody to hear it die,
Tumbling towards gravity,
Deadly somersault below.
No.

Is it a heart breaking?

Passions toned down to blank,
And sheets empty and cold, lost.
Unfathomable reason, love gone,
As yet just another year falls away.
No.

Is it a soul weeping?

The sound of shattered glass hitting the floor as she walks out of bed, still mourning the loss of him.
The sound of an empty beer bottle clinking against the bar counter as he remembers the children he can't see.
The sound of a growling stomach as the child rummages through the trash pile seeking to feed his toddler sister.
The sound of martyrs being slain in silence, with not a single eye passing their way.
The sound of a Father's heart breaking as one sheep gets separated from the other ninety-nine.
Yes.
That's the sound.

Something new
moves within me.

I am leased
to a small, nameless tenant,
who rummages
in the rooms of my body,
rearranging the furniture
in the middle of the night.

Until now,
I had always been sure
of the soft,
but established boundary
of where I
ended
and the neighbours
began.

My body has become serious.
I sit by the front window.

Ready for anything.
My head cocked like a gun.

My child doesn't jump to images
He rummages one or two of his taste

To much degree. Yesterday he found
A piece of a beautiful deer,

Running upward the hill
Ignorant of water, rushhing high.

Creeping to me , that night,
Under the warm blanket
He put up in a surprising way:
Can we run without moving
And still reach the desired place?
Why is that deer there
So nonchalant, though no progress?
Closer to him I did say:
Life is about movement
But paintings cheat us in such a way
That we fall into a ditch of beauty
And forget rhythm of the clock..

I am disgusted with my reflection that ceases to exist.
Yearning for intimate warmth only to receive cold expression.
The rhythmic ***** has disintegrated within my person and all that remains is a gaping hole.
Cold air seeps through but it is beyond repair.
A quest to avenge my pride resulted in a domestic battle.
My heart had subconsciously committed treason.
No longer able to finish the mission my title lies in ruins while my soul rummages through the rubble searching for pieces of my Jane Doe.
But with the heaps of ash covered ruins, how will I ever be found?

Astonished and made clumsy 
And faltering too often, 
The poet tires of these long 
Evenings of Chopin, Verlaine, 
And weird games upon the floor 
Where the law of averages 
Is consistently disproved.
 
Strange to think the girls I knew 
Are ladies now, and carrying 
Some small immortal baggage 
Inside, flickering with life. 
Crouching. Unsullied. With stumps 
For legs and eye like a fish. 
Sounds for all the world like love.
 
And I still in a rented room, 
Drenched with all this literature 
Which pumps me full of wild beliefs 
And the ability to squabble, 
Dare to wish I might have come 
And spilt my warmth into your life. 
And you smelling of babies.
 
Already the wind begins 
To creep through the heavy trees. 
The sunlight rummages across 
Some dull promontory where 
It is squandered and rubbed out. 
The poet tires of these long 
Evenings demanding nothing.

We sit on the train, the past in our shadows,
slowly moving towards our next chapter in
life.  The sky is darkened blue and steady
changing.  The shimmering lights in our sight
are flashing a wave of new beginnings.

The vibrant crowd surrounding our way smile
in our direction and converses a little.  I look
at the melanin magic of your skin, how it enchants
my eyes and enlivens the radiance in my cheeks.

I can see a new life in you within me, the way you sit
positioned in your seat, the way your depictions
embodies the art of a gentleman, how a complex man
has defeated the odds to become a brilliant businessman.

I stare away from you into the vivid view encompassing me,
a pecan-skinned man gazing straight ahead out the window
at the blurred scenery passing his eyesight, while a middle
aged woman rummages through her purse, perhaps searching for her berry lipstick to bring back her youth, as a young mother and her daughter read a book named The Little Engine That Could, their hands fumbling through the soft surface of the pages.

I can see a young teenage boy playing on his smartphone like he’d
won the lottery, while an almond tanned woman around age twenty,
twirls her dark smooth hair looking at the others in her path, her deep glowing eyes lost in the magnificent beauty that possessed inside out, her twisting hips demanding praise amongst the masses.

I watch a couple of kids throw paper airplanes in the air, their eager
faces gazing at how far it hovers above them, how they burst out with bets and seeing who will be victorious in the end.  There’s a young athlete pressed against his char with his earphones in his ear, humming to The Weeknd’s song, Starboy.  I look back in your presence and slightly grin, my thin hands on the arm of your thighs, my heart on the surface of your inner existence.

She wonders what she will write tonight. She rummages through her chest of thoughts, picking bits out one by one before she reaches into her heart for her string of pens.

“What have we got here then.” She says aloud, as she decides on her loyal companion for the evening. It will surely be a night of magic mixed with fierce and fury, just to be extra.

SWEET

The day she went
out of our lives

I offered her a sweet.

'"Thanks love, I'll eat it
later on the bus.'

She snaps it shut in her little red purse.

I still feel my hand  letting go of her hand
see for the last time her never-again-seen face.

Only the little red purse returns
out of its mouth…Death laughs

in blood besprinkled glass
some small change…the never eaten sweet.

For years it lives behind the wind-up clock
in my mother's bedroom

scaring me each time I have to pass
and it sees me     and laughs.

My little brother not even born then when...
jumps up & down playing alone

all by himself
in a world of his own.

He is both good guy & bad guy
falling down dead on the bed

as a quick spat out shot
ricochets & agggh...gits him!

Even by 7
killing yourself is a tiring business.

He stops. Rests.

...rummages around among
my mother's artifacts.

His little inquiring mind
snaps open the little red purse.

Death laughs(but he not knowing)  
is immune to it.

He sees the white wrapped death sweet
almost glowing against the red.

He sees it...eats it.

The Past has been
eaten by the Present.

Unaware of what he has done
(Death defeated)  

he flings himself on the bed once again
pretending he is dead

sunlight streams through the glass
holds him gently in its hand

this the living child
Death dead at last.