It is Friday night
Things have gotten too consecutive
More than 8 nights straight
I’m trying not to count
But today was my first real hangover
Since I can remember
And the smell of the food in the restaurant where I work
Nearly moved me to vomiting
So
I have withdrawn for the evening
Into quiet music
I’ve been thinking about buying a plant
I’ve been thinking about filling up the book Frans’ made for me
I’m somehow unmotivated
Even though his return is immanent
And
There will be certain things that he will expect
A small girl (the owner’s daughter) ruined the remainder of my female friend’s soup
As we sat eating our vegetarian lunches this afternoon
Unable to talk about anything
Because of the presence of an intelligent child
It was emotionally tense
The black-haired babe tossed tattered pieces of our respective napkins
Into spiced cabbage and tomatoes
Before we had the chance to object
Asking us whether or not we wanted
A fan, a bowtie or a tipi
Folded for us, with the paper scattered locally
Throughout the small café
They were all of the same essential design
Heavily reliant on pleats
I am sick of seeing blonde-haired young women
Walking around on the verge of tears
In my workplace
I am unable to tolerate
This kind of non-sense weakness
Now that I – myself – have overcome it
I am apathetic to their plight
Their trouble is a result of their approach
I know that I am at a strict advantage
Because of my uncommon ability to adapt myself
To madness
Without any hesitation or need of explanation
However
I am uncaring and dismissive
When I see their shining eyes behind the bar
Heedlessly they wipe the glasses
Blinded
The Old Man rolls his eyes
Somehow, I suddenly cannot blame him
I return to our conversation about the mountain,
And he blurts its name unintelligibly through his thick accent
With his back to me
As he stares vacantly into his huge black safe
At the many colored Canadian currency
Like the leaves in September at Victoria Park
Again, Frans
He specifically told me not to meet him at the airport
Frankly, I am relieved
He was worried about his unseemliness
Myself
I have been harboring a deep anxiety
That I would not be able to keep my shit together
Around his Mother, Sister and Father
At the terminal
It was very hard
Then it got worse
More mysterious
Entirely disconnected
I’m not sure what will happen
Like seeing yourself in the mirror
For the first time ever
Willing to drown yourself
In a fight for what you already possess
Ending everything
In a mortal conflict with your reflection
A too accurate self-portrait
Friday, May 28, 2010
Thursday, May 27, 2010
Peloponnesian No Non-sense
Robert and I had a drink after work
And he turned the bar television up loud
and then accommodated me
By adjusting his voice as well
Accompanying a PBS documentary about Greece
With proud commentary
About how there is a hole in a mountain
Where you can ride a gondola through an interior river
And see all the
BEAUTIFUL
Stalactites and Stalagmites
He said
"IS GREAT PLACE FOR HONEY MOON - YOU GO THERE"
Of course, we got to talking about you
And where you were
He yelled that I should go with you to Afirca sometime
Thought it over momentarily
And then ammended
"WHEN YOU ARE MARRY, YOU GO THERE. NO BEFORE, BUT WHEN YOU ARE MARRY"
Thanks for the advice Old Man
And he turned the bar television up loud
and then accommodated me
By adjusting his voice as well
Accompanying a PBS documentary about Greece
With proud commentary
About how there is a hole in a mountain
Where you can ride a gondola through an interior river
And see all the
BEAUTIFUL
Stalactites and Stalagmites
He said
"IS GREAT PLACE FOR HONEY MOON - YOU GO THERE"
Of course, we got to talking about you
And where you were
He yelled that I should go with you to Afirca sometime
Thought it over momentarily
And then ammended
"WHEN YOU ARE MARRY, YOU GO THERE. NO BEFORE, BUT WHEN YOU ARE MARRY"
Thanks for the advice Old Man
Thursday, May 20, 2010
Translators
It is not the conclusion that is wrong but the premise.
-Werner Heisenberg
A notable poet wedded
a ten-year-old student.
Their love was never consummated:
he discovered and feared
the hair women had
atop their mons pubis.
When he asked if I wanted to get lost
he told me to look up
and I did and it was gray
and so was everything else.
It ranged from white to black
in uniform and I laughed
wantonly
like herbaceous plants.
A Rubik’s cube that can’t be solved
is still a Rubik’s cube
revolving around itself.
A poem is ink on paper
until it becomes
something felt.
Keep up with me now.
In Edo period Japan,
Jinsui-kidney water is semen
Dokketsus are poisonous lumps near the coccyx
Fundoku is “fecal poison”
(which should be washed with urine)
and Joketsu means “superior ass.”
These terms, created for protection,
classified the body of potential suitors
in the quest of male-to-male love
between a teenage boy and a man.
This is goofy but it is May.
It might be the eleventh.
The lightening struck
a couple miles off
and echoed
I didn’t eat,
the clouds were too fat.
I abstained.
It was wet.
Stark lit in nicotine sweat
is how she remembered
sleeping on a pile of blankets.
She dreamt of shaving
her pubic hair
for the green weather
before a rain storm.
She is watching
the rain somewhere else.
She is drying the dishes.
The cardinal pitcher broke
(the bottom came right out).
Her thumb was almost severed
in a similar accident
involving a hand plant
on a ceramic bowl that broke;
its bottom shattered nonsense.
When his waistcoat advanced
in misty sunlight spots
she watched sand dust
from a garbage truck
that tapered past.
Maple leaves helicopter
from tall canopies,
whirring into the smell
of recently paved street.
The clouds left the city.
It is humid today.
I taste undoing
in the dead rain.
-Werner Heisenberg
A notable poet wedded
a ten-year-old student.
Their love was never consummated:
he discovered and feared
the hair women had
atop their mons pubis.
When he asked if I wanted to get lost
he told me to look up
and I did and it was gray
and so was everything else.
It ranged from white to black
in uniform and I laughed
wantonly
like herbaceous plants.
A Rubik’s cube that can’t be solved
is still a Rubik’s cube
revolving around itself.
A poem is ink on paper
until it becomes
something felt.
Keep up with me now.
In Edo period Japan,
Jinsui-kidney water is semen
Dokketsus are poisonous lumps near the coccyx
Fundoku is “fecal poison”
(which should be washed with urine)
and Joketsu means “superior ass.”
These terms, created for protection,
classified the body of potential suitors
in the quest of male-to-male love
between a teenage boy and a man.
This is goofy but it is May.
It might be the eleventh.
The lightening struck
a couple miles off
and echoed
I didn’t eat,
the clouds were too fat.
I abstained.
It was wet.
Stark lit in nicotine sweat
is how she remembered
sleeping on a pile of blankets.
She dreamt of shaving
her pubic hair
for the green weather
before a rain storm.
She is watching
the rain somewhere else.
She is drying the dishes.
The cardinal pitcher broke
(the bottom came right out).
Her thumb was almost severed
in a similar accident
involving a hand plant
on a ceramic bowl that broke;
its bottom shattered nonsense.
When his waistcoat advanced
in misty sunlight spots
she watched sand dust
from a garbage truck
that tapered past.
Maple leaves helicopter
from tall canopies,
whirring into the smell
of recently paved street.
The clouds left the city.
It is humid today.
I taste undoing
in the dead rain.
Thursday, May 6, 2010
la vie douce
J'ai goute' la douceur du votre amour
comme le sirop d'erable et beurre
de nos jour chaque lit est un peu de mort
pour mon gourmandise de l'humanite'
'sirop de poteau' course dans mes veines sans electricite'
encore toujours mouvement; froufrous!
la vie est la farce a maner par tous
comme le sirop d'erable et beurre
de nos jour chaque lit est un peu de mort
pour mon gourmandise de l'humanite'
'sirop de poteau' course dans mes veines sans electricite'
encore toujours mouvement; froufrous!
la vie est la farce a maner par tous
Tuesday, April 20, 2010
Nothing Did for a Long Time
1.
Sometimes I forget to stop
plucking an eyebrow and
before I know it, one frowns
while the other stares with
an almost open mouth.
2.
Does a moth eat a sweater without
tasting the holes it creates with its mouth?
3.
Depending on the longitudinal width,
a hurricane is given a “type” that is
used to classify the storm’s potential.
The force is then gauged before it hits.
4.
The two boys across the street saw
me pick my nose so I ate whatever
it was that they found so interesting.
5.
There was a year in the fall of 2001
that waited for things to happen.
The non-events that ensued kept us
from living for a very long time.
6.
After digesting milkweed, a
butterfly secretes poisonous
liquid that is necessary for it
to lay eggs which it does so on
the weed and without hesitation.
7.
Like nails, hair grows with little effort.
If a man suggests that both continue to
grow at a steady rate after death, he is
lying: a seat-belt should be worn when
he drives you home from school.
8.
I’m not sure if I derive pleasure from my phenomenal ability to —what was I saying?
I think pleasure is an expression we use when —excuse me—I’m on the bus tomorrow
from eleven to four. How do I use the glue gun? It usually plugs right in. I’m not sure
if pleasure is a virtue but I know sexuality is more of an emotion than, say —that cat
scratched me again. I’m going to have to explain to my psychiatrist that no, I’m not
9.
Looking for truths in written work is
like trying to find twilight in the sun.
The facts are in the classifieds and
a North American atlas from 2005.
Also: ink will not make you blind.
10.
Upon dusting a mirror, how clear
is its reflection supposed to look?
11.
The landlord installed screens on the sixteenth
floor windows because spiders kept sneaking
in and she and her roommate don’t like arachnids.
12.
An earthquake has a “magnitude”
that is recorded by a machine
immediately after its impact.
Asbestos clouds and cries of
help don’t have time to settle.
13.
I fell asleep at the drive-in before the
second feature began. She held a cup
that I woke up stroking until my pinky
was too wet: I offered it to the sunburn
on her back until she miffed Stop that!
14.
Nothing happened when the Boeing
Hornets flew overhead. It was in
the quiet aftermath of their engines
that fear realized it was what we
asked for that year in September.
15.
If everything I ate had to be dug
from the ground, I would be more
attracted to a monarch than the
solitude of a lunar moth hatching
work for crocheting hands.
16.
Skin retracts and degrades long after death which is why
many people think hair and nail growth does not end.
Sometimes I forget to stop
plucking an eyebrow and
before I know it, one frowns
while the other stares with
an almost open mouth.
2.
Does a moth eat a sweater without
tasting the holes it creates with its mouth?
3.
Depending on the longitudinal width,
a hurricane is given a “type” that is
used to classify the storm’s potential.
The force is then gauged before it hits.
4.
The two boys across the street saw
me pick my nose so I ate whatever
it was that they found so interesting.
5.
There was a year in the fall of 2001
that waited for things to happen.
The non-events that ensued kept us
from living for a very long time.
6.
After digesting milkweed, a
butterfly secretes poisonous
liquid that is necessary for it
to lay eggs which it does so on
the weed and without hesitation.
7.
Like nails, hair grows with little effort.
If a man suggests that both continue to
grow at a steady rate after death, he is
lying: a seat-belt should be worn when
he drives you home from school.
8.
I’m not sure if I derive pleasure from my phenomenal ability to —what was I saying?
I think pleasure is an expression we use when —excuse me—I’m on the bus tomorrow
from eleven to four. How do I use the glue gun? It usually plugs right in. I’m not sure
if pleasure is a virtue but I know sexuality is more of an emotion than, say —that cat
scratched me again. I’m going to have to explain to my psychiatrist that no, I’m not
9.
Looking for truths in written work is
like trying to find twilight in the sun.
The facts are in the classifieds and
a North American atlas from 2005.
Also: ink will not make you blind.
10.
Upon dusting a mirror, how clear
is its reflection supposed to look?
11.
The landlord installed screens on the sixteenth
floor windows because spiders kept sneaking
in and she and her roommate don’t like arachnids.
12.
An earthquake has a “magnitude”
that is recorded by a machine
immediately after its impact.
Asbestos clouds and cries of
help don’t have time to settle.
13.
I fell asleep at the drive-in before the
second feature began. She held a cup
that I woke up stroking until my pinky
was too wet: I offered it to the sunburn
on her back until she miffed Stop that!
14.
Nothing happened when the Boeing
Hornets flew overhead. It was in
the quiet aftermath of their engines
that fear realized it was what we
asked for that year in September.
15.
If everything I ate had to be dug
from the ground, I would be more
attracted to a monarch than the
solitude of a lunar moth hatching
work for crocheting hands.
16.
Skin retracts and degrades long after death which is why
many people think hair and nail growth does not end.
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