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ALSO BY BUD SMITH
Or Something Like That (2012) Tollbooth (2013) Everything Neon (2014) F-250 (2014)
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ELSEWHERE
poems
BUD SMITH
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ELSEWHERE
Copyright 2014 by Bud Smith.
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All rights reserved. Printed in the United States of America. No part of this book may be reproduced except in the case of brief quotations embedded in critical essays and reviews.
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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Many poems in this collection have been published previously, some in different versions. Thanks to the following publications, and the editors there: Negative Suck, TheNewerYork, Kleft Jaw, Mojave River Review, Literary Orphans, Hobo Camp, The Idiom. Thanks to Spout, Uno Kudo, Chuck Howe, Robert Vaughan, Meg Tuite, Michael Gillian Maxwell, Heather Dorn, William Seward Bonnie, Mark Brunetti.
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Edited by Robert Vaughan and Heather Dorn
Design by Rae Buleri
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INSIDE
pg.
poem
10 11
Suggestion #1 blue house, blue shutters I’m Not In the Phone Book Main Street 12 Hello Weekend Warrior 14 Artificial Rose 14 Just Some Things I Found 15 Development Peace and Quiet for Ten Minutes MIA 19 Weird New Jersey 20 Mickey Mouse Wristwatch the odd afternoon Dinosaur Liquor 23 Red Trans Am 24 Walking By The Kitchen In Just My Socks 25 Shannon 26 Staring Contest Tomorrow Will Be Warm 29 Elsewhere 32 Poem Written While You Cut My Hair 34 Astral Projection 37 First Date 38 Jane is Sleeping 38 Chipper Chaperone Eaten By a Shark Didn’t Find You There 41 I Was a Teenage Werewolf 42 Party On Loon Moon Swim Suggestion #2 Some Good Talks Psychic Reading College Try
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Nighttime at Mallard Park Meetings Beautiful Maps Somewhere Over St. Nazaire Lakitu Wheelchair 63 Player 2 insert 25 cents 68 Wish 69 Jet Pack 71 Vague Direction 77 Trix’s Marina 78 House Burning Down 81 Fire Hall 86 Today I Have No Dirtbike 88 May, February, May 89 Purple Teeth 91 Note From Your Neighbors 92 Doorbell 97 Mad Max Visits New Jersey 98 New Love 99 Prologue to the US Army Survival Manual Edition 404 102 parkway divides 103 step away 104 When I’m drunk at PF Changs with Aaron Dietz 106 Leaving Las Vegas Being Alive Cherry World Dear Pen Pal Technicalities Remain With Disabled Vehicles Help Wanted Details Of The War Amiright? Uptick Your Favorite Song Now Serving # 86 An Orange Cat Doesn’t Live Here Raw Romance Lemon Rooms
51 53 56 57 61
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110 111 114
Mail Dear Baby Bird Dear Person in the Assembly line Victory Kite Threat of Rain Violas Keep Playing Side B See Ya Later, Alligator The Marine 1-976-NTHRWLD July 18th, 2006 August 9th Prayer to A Passing Waitress Even Steven Cuervo and Elderflower April 27th Strip Mall, 8am, Sunday Fortunes Enough With the Technological Advances Already Check Up At the Record Store Good Luck Side Yard Punk Rock Rituals Poem Written While Searching $2 Cinema Slumping Off New Neighbor Today’s Going Fast Wednesday honeysuckles the zero zero block king kong couldn’t ordinary houses nice to meet you rock Lunch beautiful weather here Couple Days Before memorial Day Getting Ready For Work
117 118 119 120 121 122 123 125 126 129 132 133 134 135 136 137 137 138 140 141 143 145 147 148 149 151 153 154 155 156 157 160 161 162 163 166 168 169 170
The Medicine I’m On Got Your Filthy Letter See You Next Tuesday Joybubble Typical Weekday It’s Only July Can’t Teach The Tour Guide Anything Not A Mountain The Way I Do Dishes The Stairs on 238th Street Front Steps Blow Stuff Up, Gently Rachel In Her Swimsuit terroristic threats, muttered under breath Suggestion #4 Dear Vertigo Point Taken No Matter Reading Till I Don’t Fall Asleep Turn To Stone Pow Wow Crooked Painting
171 172 173 175
176 181
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Suggestion #1 be nice to everyone they might be the Angel of Death or have an in-ground swimming pool
who here has officially fucked up? raise your left hand.
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blue house, blue shutters
have left behind blue petals of life force have slept on the roof in my mortal clothes have been polite to armies of magician’s doves slipped off, high just passing
art levels status here’s to many more Tuesday nights getting plastered.
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I'm Not In The Phone Book at one point I lost this poem slipped out of my pocket somehow and stopped belonging to me it probably fell on a sidewalk the floor of a public bathroom, a dying lawn the gravel lot behind the super market the ER, the laundromat, your sisters room it could be blowing in a circle at the end of a culdesac in a mess of plastic bags and take out menus or in the parking lot of the psychic maybe the psychic could tell me this poem has either been picked up and maybe by now it’s been unfolded opened like a suitcase by a girl dying of cancer a gas station attendant with a limp a child kicking a pine cone (who will read anything lying on the ground) a man late for work but who likes being late for work an old woman who still chews gum a gunless cop, some young mother carrying her baby like a sandbag, for exercise not love—any of them will do I hope they keep this poem put it in some pocket of their own or throw this poem out, or burn it in a barrel at dusk fuck it, feed it to the nameless dog make him bark three times and stand on his hind legs I just hope I don't get the poem back. I don’t like taking things that don’t belong to me.
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main street first I went to the place that sold me my new glasses the girl there melted the plastic with a small torch, and now the glasses fit my face again
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next I went to the book store It took me a long time to find the poetry section and when I finally did I found out they wanted $15 for William Carlos Williams and William Carlos Williams is dead I think, so I decided to buy him later, used, online
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after that I went to the coffee shop and borrowed a blue pen from the cashier, who said "I need that back, it's my favorite pen" I sat at a shaky table wrote this poem on a brown napkin not that you'd know anymore it's probably re-done, typewritten and printed on whiter paper things are always in flux, you know? btw: kept the pen.
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Hello, Weekend Warrior early in, I began to hiccup now I've got this crashed-up car a lone *hic* survivor beer your melted picture in a locket least I know don't know the *hic* true feel of war my dime, useless in a thunderstorm slides in this jukebox, fine in my smoke machine dreams I arrive early no black eyes,*hic* college'd, thinner richer Monday morning the spell pops I wake bubble belly'd broke, dizzy solemn vow: if there's nothing better to do Tuesday night I'll seek out my center for now I'll lie here spinning *hic* not chanting or 1 - 12 stepping yesterday got your love letter from the top *hic* of the golden mountain looks nice *holds breath till blue* *1/2 the life of a house fly passes* *exhales* I'm afraid my kangaroo shoes aren't good for rock peak climbing I know you're up there lotus flowered, purple robed, forever crouching that's cool, I'm in my bathrobe too !15
instead of visiting I've tattooed your nickname across my knuckles enlightenment *hic* happens for me when the sun rises above the yard arm sometimes the things we try at 3:31 a.m. just don't work out.
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artificial rose
did the dishes, now I can die bought a watermelon big as a pony. I don't own a motorcycle. or a lawnmower. a hula hoop. a pickup truck. a house. or a squirt gun. jeez this is hard. walking uphill arms full, objects in sharp piles everything with its own name, own use own rules. it slips from my grip, falls on my bare feet, hooray for everything I’ll fail. remember. you'll fail. big funeral, renegade clouds I’ve lived long enough in peach flavored hell. how about you?
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Just Some Things I Found
please don’t return from the dead I’m enjoying your books fancy dress shoes, gold pen magic maps, paintings combs, cameras, wallet fishing rod, bicycle, belt please stay buried, or melted down or burnt, whatever they did however they did it be kind, remain in every version of the afterworld I don’t believe in I am most enjoying your bed and will sleep there, soundly until one day, someone else comes and takes your things.
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Development
sneakers hang on a power line but the neighbors in the house don’t sell drugs, I’ve checked, twice
this is the bird development mallard ave, loon place bittern lane, tern court so on, so on, every street a bird the builder, whoever it was had a major hard on for birds
houses look the same, but are not
dogs nose under fences until finally free one shows up on my porch a blue eye and a green eye tail slapping everything “go home. go. go. go” and he won’t leave I hang a flyer everywhere but no one calls so now I have a dog
each front yard tree is doomed and each driveway is cracked and each fireplace does not work and each swimming pool is closed at least six more weeks six more weeks, six more! yet, around back, girls jump, leap lunge on diving boards singing! singing! singing!
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nothing is or has ever been blonde here the nameless dog knows no tricks our cherry tree is broken, our sky is weird it’s all renegade fish egg clouds right now !19
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I was born here; I’m ready to move I've closed my eyes in cool darkness, knowing my passenger-side window is open, the interior is filling with sour water from the plastic pivot sprinkler
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I’m somewhere, I don’t know where probably in my room “no one likes to be stopped,” I say.
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peace and quiet for ten minutes
most of yesterday I chipped concrete out of a metal drum, circular and oblong using a pneumatic gun with a chisel bit my whole body vibrating, neon earplugs shoved way in, pushing themselves out —thick dust, and I could barely see in there, hands torn up, even through gloves good thing I’m not a concert pianist
at two pm my boss tapped unexpectedly on the side of the drum, and I came out into the cool crisp air yanking off my respirator and my sweat soaked bandana
he was staring up at the blue sky squinting, an odd look something was way far off, a speck in the heavens but getting closer “hey look at that” “what is it? a helicopter?” “yeah, I think so”
but as it neared us we saw it was a bunch of brightly colored party balloons, with a long strong hanging, dangling, in the wind drifting slowly towards the oil refinery
they’d gotten loose somehow
“well, look at that” when they were out of sight I went back inside.
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MIA
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at noon, the missing in action mailman materializes, passing unhappy on foot he’d rather dump our letters in the drainage pond he'd rather burn our houses down accidents happen and here it is dew slick spring all is green except for him, blue, sweating, plotting no sidewalks here no concertos here no blue sky fountains here or miracle celestial human love artless, artless, and no sharp edges hedges in the shape of dog shit kill me. kill me. kill me. but. but. but. it starts! someone is trying though, red house over there sloppy classical music echoing through a screened in window someone learning, or re-learning the piano it makes the mailman stop standing for a while on the lawn without the grass his head crooked smoking a cigarette even, listening enjoying the mistakes. “so, there it is. a sign of life” his bag is overflowing with dull correspondence and the plan to blow up an ordinary house tonight is postponed.
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Weird New Jersey right hand side, the ocean below our sneakers, green grass to the left, a maze of pine above, a bi-plane flies pulling a banner: HONEYSUCKLES A NEW GENTLEMAN’S CLUB look behind the strip mall find squad cars with bored cops parked in 69, they talk in the shade and move as the sun moves a tour of shade across the town through this town’s main attractions: Dinosaur Liquor Trix’s Marina, Cosmo’s junkyard the All-Nite Diner last but not least, Spider Bar through the narrow middle: a two lane paved road splitting residential developments and run down strip malls I got born here why you’re here: my punk band is playing tonight at the VFW Hall 7:30 PM, fucker.
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Mickey Mouse Wristwatch
probably the most important item on earth from an anthropological view point so far has been that Mickey Mouse wristwatch that touches itself at 6:30 every day twice.
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the odd afternoon
it looks, tastes, smells, feels like it’s about to rain all green and mustard sky the white undersides of leaves snapping, sailing, floating off elsewhere and a kite in the shape of the Angel of Death gets stranded in our cherry blossom tree so humid, and the power’s off already squirrel fell into the transformer by the church, I’m told is just up the road
our dog house, was stolen last night from the back yard now the new dog has no place to lye but the cooler tile floor I suspect it was an inside job the dog tired of sleeping in the yard my ancestors all shared a cave
the quiet space after two but before three when the airplanes don’t criss-cross above the wind moves everything reminding us why we disassembled our tubular chimes
sometimes a few streets over there is screaming child in a swimming pool jubilant. utter joy. and terror, too. the wolf song of youth. at dusk, a police cruiser begins laps of the block. a rookie, I’m sure the older ones just park and wait for the bars to let out
finally, there is the first terrible fat rain drop, rising dust from the yard the heat breaks, the dog is on the kitchen floor !25
looks up, as if to say, “I’ve won” he rolls over, belly up, riddled with ticks the tile floor sweats
I say, “we’ve got to get you a name.”
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Dinosaur Liquor has an electric sign that blinks like a heartbeat in the center of our small town one night, sideways in the back seat while someone up front drove I looked up from the back seat trashed enough that the heart beat electric sign looked like a hundred heart beat electric signs and the street lights rained and the heavens had hovered down pulling the moon too all of it blinked on the street outside Dinosaur Liquor I lifted my head and was about to say to the driver, "I'm never gonna move I'll stay in this town until I'm dead" but just then the car turned we made a right and headed into the darkness of the pines and the world opened up like a door that used to be locked since then, I've moved away but it was very close, I was gonna stay and be mayor or police chief or nobody the spell popped. I've sobered up love me a good electric sign when I'm fucked up though.
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Red Trans Am !27
there’s no sidewalk here killing weeds is the top priority when the season shifts leaves pile by the mailboxes out at the broken curb the leaves, in those piles remind me of Davey and that red trans am he used to drive up and down the block at top speed, blowing through the piles of leaves, scattering them all for a laugh, until one day someone stacked cinder blocks in the leaves and that was that.
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Walking By the Kitchen In Just My Socks the refrigerator door was left open just a crack no one notices for 1000 years the light was off
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life is as exciting as frozen blueberries that used to be wild.
 

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Shannon
it made me think of you lipstick that rolled beneath the seat, lidless smeared the floor mat blue and sunglasses left in the center console one scratched lens other just fine, rosy still and of course a tiny lighter left in my glovebox pink, like how you were before they got you. It's better that we split you used to suck my dick while we drove around town and that used to make me love the town irrationally. yesterday I threw the lipstick the sunglasses, and the lighter out today, I finally sold the truck. somehow. even with all the stains.
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Staring Contest we'll be young only for a blink and then we'll be old and asleep well, I don’t ever blink I'll just keep staring, forever until the orange cat, crouched on this counter, finally does we lean in, eye to eye it’s coming, I can tell, whole world is on it's weird way joy. black blue white and gray. icebergs and clothes left on the shoe sting line in the rain. the job. the car. the green ocean. the kite lodged in the branches of our tree, "ah! there it is," I point at the cat he flinches. "You blinked!" off the counter he leaps and say, “I win.”
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Tomorrow Will Be Warm
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our potted flowers figured for dead will start to bend up from the floor towards the lemon light since November she and I have been cell mates suddenly it's June pollen has eaten snow so, the hose is dragged out and spiderwebs cleared from the plastic pickle bucket where I keep soap and sponge I'll wash the winter from the getaway car barefoot and shirtless while she sips sun tea on the concrete steps looking over at me "you need a tan," she says "no debate. it’ll come, help me with the car you soap, I'll soak” “I'm fine sitting here” “come on, I’ll make it worth your while” “boy, you couldn’t make me move no matter what you say or do” "I could" "no no no" "want to bet ten dollars?" before she can answer I turn the hose on her she rolls on the front steps, yelling drenched, she doesn't laugh into the house she goes dripping all the way up the stairs !32
“she's forgotten how to have fun” I say hi to the brand new bees leaving the ground buzzing into the peak above the porch I start to wash the car soaping it up real good I don't even realize when the window over the garage opens and the seasons first watermelon comes flying out from her hands to crash down on my head the bees fly in mad circles in defense, I turn the hose on myself we laugh. the sky is too blue to take.
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Elsewhere
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elsewhere the night ticks on headlights illuminate exit ramps
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list of wishes: 1. the floral wallpaper peels back 2. I finally find the secret door 3. lost friends step from shadows 4. a brittle envelope with a golden invitation is slipped through a window onto my bed
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any of that doable? elsewhere a dew slick dream jewels forgotten off there glowing and here, goddamn these sharpened rocks discard all useless pebbles feed the fire my flip flops from the bedroom window watch train cars passing advertising far off permanent vacations certain walls must be hollow tap on each one with the tip of your sword and in our sour yard there are no doves dropping navel oranges !34
or opportunities to catch said fruit Wille Mays-style fingers laced in a basket "thank you!" elsewhere, elsewhere the dawn shows up phones ring-a-ding musical "go back to sleep," a boss commands “you’re not needed today stay home, with pay"
still, trapped here maybe without perfumed money no cake, all candle bunk beds akimbo praying for a Caddy to swing into the driveway honk twice grab your things bright corsage and mint leaf suit a free ride to that party elsewhere the cool kids graze but a minor breeze can ruin everything I saw the bomb splash down in the pale park fountain but it never went off some kids concentrate on adolescence chewing confetti channeling celebrations held in distant hotels.
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Poem Written While You Cut My Hair I try not to move the world moves all the stars and sea and lava too, but I'm still out the screen door someone's whistling and on the drooping branches
 the birds are always at war
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this year certain un-insured mountains will collapse we’ll make new things from those re-purposed shards of rock near my eyes the scissors flash your wrist has perfume too a silver necklace dangling a force fields is not up between us
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outside: sprinklers mechanically ratchet-soak the lawn I taste ice water dripping down from the tip of a shrinking glacier on the yellow table is a sweating pepsi I do not want snip, snip, snip
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I hear it all: the lowering of national flags the readjusting of lunar wind the piling of rough salt !36
the eviction of dug-in ghosts the ice cream truck arriving a dog walker beginning to sing along with the music box music
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another flash, another snip hair falling on my lower lip but I don't move the world moves the stars and sea and lava too but I am still even as she leans in to see what she has done as I smell lavender and her necklace brushes against my neck. 
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Astral Projection it's 102 degrees, summertime a dusty construction site I’m standing beside Rory in a trash-strewn field, sweating we’re waiting to land steel now being rigged off a truck by another crew, 100 feet away using a red crawler crane
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I'm in a fluorescent long sleeve shirt jeans, boots, hard hat so is Rory, we look the same but aren't
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we have down time, so I say “where’s the shade?” “not here” we laugh uneasy “hey Rory, what'd you do last night?" “oh …" he says, "after dinner, I left my body, and I drifted high up into the astral plane soaring and orbiting the planets" "how'd you do that?" "easy," he said, "I became a molecular cloud separating from this consciousness I'll show you sometime"
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on the flat bed truck, the crew feeds the sling under the I-beam the sky hook descends over their plastic heads
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"yeah," Rory says, "I floated up above everything, to the moon and beyond and all the stars so bright and blinding I hovered for a while, looking at earth !38
searching for the shadow of troubled people living below" "that sounds nice, like fishing"
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on the truck, a man snaps the green Kevlar sling into the hook
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"when I saw someone who needed help I floated down until the seas shrunk and the marble of earth got manageable houses grew bigger, as I passed trough the tips of trees and between power lines slipping through their roof sitting for a while in the room where they are struggling it helps--my presence, a tonic last night, I flew above a blue car as it drove slowly down a dark and lonely gravel road my palm on the roof of their car—glowing I heard the radio come on and the driver, began to sing ‘I found my thrill, on blueberry hill’”
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the air horn screams a man gives the operator hand signals the steel is hoisted up spinning, into cloudless blue as the machine swings I raise my fluorescent arm so the operator can see the spot we want the beams to land
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"what'd you do last night?" Rory asks "ah, just went home,” I said, “had a couple beers, did the dishes before my wife got home didn't wanna get in trouble.”
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First Date
don’t look for lost keys in your pockets all night or surrender while wide awake current mood, opposite of: crushed, malevolent, done won’t lie to make you feel good love gets a free pass, only when stoned, fall down drunk, odd today/tonight seems uncontrollable walkie talkie me, I’ll 10-4 back telegram a coded map to your room I’ll figure it out, floating on my way towards the treacherous falls how it is: every lock is full of gum but can be cured with fire or a night of well-placed touch and in my teeth, I always have a bobby pin, just in case found keys won’t work.
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Jane is Sleeping
I figured out I’d be alright in life when I came downstairs shirtless in the morning and there was Jane’s father sitting at the table the old brick wall marine with crew cut and simper fi and steaming coffee and dead wife, and no son and so on and so on and whatever his name was I still don’t know well he was sitting at the kitchen table instead of being at work elbows out, and listening to soft rock on a small clock radio and not looking as vicious as she’d warned I said hello he said hello by raising his coffee cup with a cartoon shark on it and then I felt stupid for parking my truck way up the street and sneaking in the house like Jane and I had quiet like spirits we’d been “who are you?” he said “friend’s call me Bud” I sat down at the table and said, “I like the painting in the hallway of the guy standing in front !41
of the burning village holding the machine gun, that you?” “yeah, it’s me,” he said “what kind of machine gun is that?” “M60” “good one” he stared at me I smiled, gave a little wave instead of killing me he laughed and stood up “I’m gonna make eggs” he said, “would you like an egg?” “I’ll take four eggs,” I said, “and please, one for Jane I’ll go wake her up.”
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Chipper
“so terrible” she says then sets the newspaper down “what?” “a kid died, couple blocks over, on Mallard Ave.” “how” “eaten by a chipper.” “what the hell is a chipper?”
chipper, chipper, chipper as if it was an animal, like: look out a chipper is loose in the development they’re as big as a jaguar and hungrier “a woodchipper” she says “damn” “he worked for the tree service” I looked down into my shredded wheat she folded the paper, as if the paper was cursed
and so we went for a drive at first pretending that maybe we weren’t going to look at the yard but that’s where the car wanted to go there was no stopping it yes, exactly true, just a few blocks over it was a small blue house the yard was wrapped in yellow crime scene tape nobody home, too much shade no grass, all moss and lichen a sad lawn to look at
the chipper was still out there it said ‘Travis Tree Service’ on the side of the machine “there’s no blood” “thankfully” from the car, we scanned everything we could see: !43
the siding on the house, the ground, the machine, the leaves in the tree “the people who cleaned up the blood did a very good job” “paper said he got his shirt sleeve caught and was pulled in” “that’s how it always happens” “it stopped halfway down, the machine, there’s a safety … by then it was too late” “mos def”
a green car passed by at a crawl then a group of boys on bikes went past and pointed, but kept pedaling
finally a cop car pulled up, and we watched the officer get out and duck under the yellow tape of the crime scene he walked around the mossy yard for a bit, just looking, staring off then he sat on the steps and stared some more “what do you think he’s looking for?” “he’s probably doing what we’re doing”
she started the car, the cop didn’t even look over, his eyes had become fixed on something caught in the branches of the tree I’m not sure what. and so be it.
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Chaperone Eaten By A Shark we drive death to the edge of the forest and say "get lost" we crush cruel things with sawtooth hearts. we're knee deep in watermelon and gin—doing good. practicing the great improv comedy routine that is self destruction. weaving and ducking and dancing while they shoot at us on the palace carpet. heart made of silver, wild flower blood, teeth like ice box jewelry. driving a taxi with the grim reaper complaining about what we have on the radio. “get out, sir. yes. right here.” you'll know that perfect woozy feeling when you're altitude is oblivious. you’ll detest every color and sound and noise but not this sidewinder kiss. the after party is at the hospital. but the party itself is just starting. got a full tank of gas many years of crushing to do.
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Didn’t Find You There to be drunk young and bullet proof having perfect balance holding the skull of the world in your massive palm seeing through lead teeth like bulldozers lava dreams oozing into day lit corridors somersaulting in the fields crushing every single flower suicide a song you've never learned and cannot play on your infinite saxophone.
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I Was A Teenage Werewolf
skull labeled semi-fragile spine of glass, don't mention it be sure to wear a hat for the long walk, resisting in the rain where I lean, I may leave rust it's for you, consider it art critique it, send your notes affixed to an arrow if it hits me, I’ll take notice I have found myself in the pages of glossy magazines tucked beneath the basement steps.
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Party On Loon
Strangest thing, from the back deck, Shannon actually sees the squad cars as they’re on the way through the development. Lights flashing. I stick my head in the house through the sliding glass door and yell, “COPS!” And then, look at me and Shannon bounding down the back steps! Look at us scrambling through the yard. Look at us squeezing through the crack in the fence, beers now slipping from hand, and watch us run along the neighbor’s yard to the far side. Look at us scale the fence by the road and hop into my waiting getaway car. “Go! Go! Go!” I stomp the gas. We’re laughing. We’re zooming up Mallard Ave. And we’re seventeen. In front of the house, other kids we go to school with, are getting busted. We see them in the glow of flash lights. We see them in the disco lights of the squad cars. My window is down and I hear the chirp and drone of police radios. I turn left on Pigeon and then right on Bittern. And Shannon is cracking up. So am I.
Everything’s great. But the road is curving. And I can barely see, because I’m too drunk. Instead of curving with the road, I drive my car onto someone’s front lawn. “Fuck!” Bird bath explodes. A plaster garden gnome crushed. I dig the brakes in. Soft grass. Illuminated eyes of an orange cat leaping off concrete steps getting closer and closer. The car stops, somehow, a foot before impact. And again, we laugh. And laugh. Swirling dust in the headlights. An orange light comes on in the house. A window begins to open. A man screaming about something, I’m not sure what. !48
“I think I should drive,” Shannon says. We switch sides. Chinese fire drill. Slammed door. Seat belts. Reverse. Peeling off. She’ll do fine on her driver’s exam next Friday. Got home safe.
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Pool we swim all day transistor radio melting in the sun the music got distorted and so did we as the beer cooler descends I gain no faith but build up plenty of hope enough to get us through ice storms, heat waves health and crime
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I have decided your tan lines are high art and I have mastered the dead man's float
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here on my back arms out I can float through air walls, viper's nests, traps vortexes, black holes mine fields, grocery stores libraries, permanent jail airport security, hell and you too, are off somewhere else eyes closed, one hand falling into the water making a ripple swirl around your purple raft.
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Suggestion # 2
don’t take the waitresses’ only pen when you leave.
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Some Good Talks I listened to the kid with the mohawk who suggested a certain sandwich above all other sandwiches: pastrami with mustard, toasted
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I listened to the girl in the rhinestone jacket lisping and listing the better places to catch salamanders for mud lake fishing
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I took the MIA mailman's advice when he finally did appear as we stood on the lawn he said, "I'm a lot younger than I look, had a rough paper route as a kid" so I switched to wine for awhile
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Lisa and I, fake-listened to the car salesman rattle on for half an hour about the car we only wanted to test drive because it would glide up to 125 on the road beside the creek I agreed with the priest when he said, "your friend is now in peace."
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Psychic Reading your acronym will become something horrible.
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College Try passage lead beneath the street where you live let's check them out
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the skies never get blue enough for us here
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I promise to often swim in the drainage ditch at night believing in the ghosts, leaving bending around the tops of trees, greeting far-off things not just mentioned briefly in text books
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some wall must push inward and take us to the moonlit beach this car cannot stand another tour of the county mall and its food court
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one of these tiles rotates one of these piano keys makes the earth move revealing a secret life hidden behind the dusty bookcase
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for your birthday I'll send a box packed with stairs that go up, somewhere !54
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and a postcard, noting: in certain strange religious sects, kids are allowed to smoke freely on the roof
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as the neighbors cement their windows closed dusk starts smoke appearing puffing, drifting out of brick chimneys making a map of sorts I take a polaroid that says, one minute "Believe in Want" till the wind changes the thing to, "Believe in What?"
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start with me
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Nighttime at Mallard Park walk silently around the development find the baseball diamond a lock left off the gate the moon is falling she picks up a pebble points, at the north star calls it like the Babe her wine bottle strikes the pebble sends it over the chain link soaring towards a ring of dark houses and pine trees jet black I'll be on aluminum bleachers ironic cheer, ironic clap watching you swing your glass bat celebrating at second base I raise my own wet bottle and as you round third trotting home you narrowly avoid the stumble sipping the last drop come across home plate looking sharp in shadow tonight there are no shooting stars that we can pick out darkness falls on the dugout for awhile we sit till the bench starts to hurt then we spread out in the sharp grass sharing the last
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of my juice semi-joking about snorting chalk dust.
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Meetings
UFO Sect Local #888: I get my kicks under a black sky the undersides of expansive walls of cloud hiding celestial bodies, sky line advice columns, fortune cookie constellations, Gods signaling with dim flashlights; leave the bedroom light on for me I’ll be in the yard with my drip drop friends power lines humming all night the body electric desires a good time and just a blink before dawn I’ll slip in our room, with new ideas to tremble into your sleeping life.
Anarchists’ Anonymous: Failure of the not cute and fuzzy species drives my head against my palms in certain garages are set aside circuit boards that may or may not work towards the greater good nails, copper wires, random fuel, special powders, poisons unknown in circles beyond this room Ssssshhh
Lonely Heart’s Club: the quiet streets are where I spend my time trench coat dragging gathering around my bare feet the cobble stone is cool and all the windows I can see in, are award winning Nostalgia Society: My version of the truth is blurred so many years later it all seems dusty, yet made of gold photographic time machines !58
black and white, you can never see the red like Hitchcock, Psycho, chocolate syrup there’s one photo in particular my brother with his face all busted up me ripped up too we’re holding 3 scoop cones outside the parlor on main our t-shirts soaked in crimson too see, what had happened was, he was standing way across the road and yelling at me, on the hill “Bet you can’t hit me with a rrrrrrrrrock!” I heaved a flat chunk of asphalt and it stuck him just below the nose no teeth were lost my uncle, seeing this from the window ran out and cold cocked me my brother wept into the clover red dripping on the dandelions and then, to me, shouting “What happened? Why would you do that?” my brother saying, between the tears, “I said, bet you can’t hit me with a rock.” My uncle took us all for ice cream the photo is of us both banged up faces smiling idyllic strawberry looking grey
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Beautiful Maps earth tastes like a ripe cherry tonight
we've survived personal apocalypses left and right came back alive cold beers in hand over here, in my chair I'm focusing on learning to glow in the dark
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my progress report: I fuck up all the time the dust settles you forgive me namaste.
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Somewhere Over St. Nazaire I keep going to parties because I'd like to talk to Alan Magee who’s dead, but was the ball turret gunner who took on fire over Flack City,1943 I'd like to hear him tell about the bullets that ripped apart his B17 named Snap! Crackle! Pop! I'd like to listen to the man talk about scurrying out of the turret age 19 knees to chest as the plane wobbled spinning out of control what was it like as he watched nine of his friends bail out one by one? and then what was it like when he frantically found that his own parachute was one of the many things including the right wing that'd gotten blown apart by the anti aircraft guns below? did he calmly watch the green army men float down away from the silver plane? how long till he decided !61
just to jump. no parachute and four miles up and, what was he thinking as he stepped out of the cargo door and fell forever? Alan Magee who free-falling 22,000 feet out of a B17 Flying Fortress at age 19 Alan Magee from Plainfield, New Jersey 5 foot seven cheerful, talkative who said, years later "god was looking out for me" Alan Magee who loved some girl just up some road Alan Magee spinning, organs compacting arms tucked in not unlike Icarus approaching the earth a regular guy reaching terminal velocity can you keep your eyes open in that much wind? I'd ask him everything if I could corner him at some party I'd pull him away by his shirt sleeve another beer for Alan Magee tell me about tumbling end over end for 4 fucking miles !62
no parachute tell me about crashing down through the glass roof of a train station occupied by the enemy injuries vast but somehow surviving I know the story, man but I want to hear him tell it. the man who fell to Earth and kept living somehow when he is finished talking I'll shake his hand
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and make him tell it again.
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Lakitu
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switch the system off who are you gonna be in the morning what wild guesses in the rain will be true? where is army jacket hung? your flattened hat, your punk rock posters your one tequila two tequila three tequila floor shirt? every window I own has been open like love, like an artificial rose man, doesn't that one hurt? there's a meteor looking nothing like a dove there's your favorite song suddenly dead history pissing on it, by tomorrow it'll be all all all rust there's your crashed up powerless car, there's your wood shop want there's a kiss for you on the roof through dry paper lips, a flinch worried and pulling back let's stay friends but never again will we talk the talk and if a cloud comes across with Lakitu tossing spiked shells you don't have to grow the fuck up if you time it right, you can enter the water where you can breathe forever weaving in and out among the cartoon squid.
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Wheelchair
last week, there were ambulances but now the coast is clear we walk out, for a moon swim crossing enemy lawns carrying tropical towels first I hop the chain link and then I help her over their kid broke his neck in the shallow end of this pool night just like this so now we are much more careful we strip down and slide in as if we are sugar glass fragile the humidity will shatter one day, but not tonight next week he'll be home and then me and her will have to be even more careful will have to kiss secret much much more careful and ignore the thought of him watching the moon and the reflection and us from his mechanized chair at the bedroom window.
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Player 2 Insert 25 Cents I was raised by a pack of wild cherry Pepsi in an arcade closed down after summer wet snow falling on New Jersey I busted out a window cleared the cobwebs from Street Fighter 2 fed my stolen quarters endlessly while my mother worked night shift in an aerosol spray can factory and dad slept sideways on a couch too small for him I got my slow education in isolation waiting for spring battling that blinking machine face awash in blue light.
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Wish I'd like werewolf teeth all the time I want all my guts to glow in the dark so it looks cool during my woodland midnight surgery sessions—I'm an aspiring sky blue ghost living in an electric maze surviving off cherries—not as confident with my knife throwing ability as I should be at 33 wish to be perfectly oblivious wish to drink pointless nonsense wish to sold by sexy destruction in the shadow that the sun throws on our way up to it jet packs, out of control.
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Jet Pack
and fuck it, there you go … you leave by jet pack I squint as you go over Jupiter
but then slowly a little green army man falls in a parachute with a message "miss me?" I nod.
on Wednesday I can't take it I go out to the garage I duct tape everything together chunks of old records, VHS, punk rock posters a black and white tube TV set I put all our photos on the floor I super glue our snapshots to sheet metal, to engine blocks to the glowing molten iron core then, while that all hums I go in and I call up my boss "I should have called you earlier." "why?" "this is my two week notice" "Oh fuck." "I'm leaving." "where? our rivals?" "nope ... off in the cosmos, after a girl." it's a two second notice, I think, feeling worse I get my air tank out cause I'll need that in space and I pack my back pack !68
99 cent used paperback books and some blue supermarket roses then, I climb on the humming garage debris count backwards from twenty-three and act surprised when everything suddenly vaporizes (sorry neighborhood watch) and it's just me and the coldness of space and the weird light of approaching stars as I close in on you kicking your legs on the rings of Saturn waving, school girl style, waiting for stupid ol' me like you said you would for a short time. 
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Vague Direction put on this titanium helmet this neon flight suit climb in this cannon get launched at supersonic speeds through a few brick walls then out over the sea and another sea crash land in Nepal Southern Italy followed by African safari Zanzibar there: continue to have a heart like an atomic bomb but don't hurt anyone keep forever calm in the wilds unless they ask "what's your favorite song?" what kind of a maniac could answer a question like that? always say, "not the happy birthday song" and have a worry that lessens as if you had holes in your pockets on purpose and your worry just dropped out like useless money falling in the swaying grass forgotten elsewhere. 
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Trix's Marina I think the tide is low and those black (spots) blobs floating in the white light made by the moon are ducks
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Sometimes headlights flash from behind the marsh grass and make the dock glow or shadows grow across the cracked sailboat hull laying sideways in the mud
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"I'm just about to cum," I say and her head lifts up Shannon finishes me with her hand her pink watch slapping my thigh
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"That was a lot," she says When I flick on our headlights I see there are no ducks it's two styrofoam coolers bobbing up and down surrounded by seaweed and trash
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she says, “I’m ready to go home.”
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House Burning Down Jane had a pit bull I'd walk the dog for hours up and down the hills of a quiet neighborhood an hour up north
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She'd walk with us sometimes we wouldn't have lasted so long over a year but the pit bull really loved me
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the best night with Jane in fact, was a disaster a house behind the record store caught fire and as we, all three of us walked down the hill to watch the flames throw sparks over the A-frame roofs it started to snow
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the fire trucks showed up Jane squeezed my hand the pit bull barked we stood for a long time watching them douse the house their yells, their flashing lights "This is cheaper than a movie." "And in real 3-D." An ax split the door
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the house was incandescent !72
the pit bull on her haunches Jane said, "The street looks as bright as noon."
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From her bedroom window we watched the flicker me on the floor her on the bed
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Leaving, in my car at actual noon the house we'd visited was nearly gone grey ash, collapse there was a foot of snow everywhere else except that yard
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At the record store they had a bin of warped vinyl bent from the heat I still listen to some of them warbled, alien noise others perfectly fine despite how they look.
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Fire Hall the Lagoon House was full bad music on the stereo I materialized out of my rented room eyes dilated, stars crossed Otto and Trish, who owned this house were at a wedding 2 miles through the marsh at the volunteer fire hall somebody he worked with at the junkyard getting hitched
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we were partying in their living room Saturday night, Jay with acid it was drip drop raining John Sullivan on the couch talking about the time he’d caught a 75 # rainbow trout in the bay behind Trix’s Marina “Bullshit.” “Absolute truth.”
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I went out in the kitchen Shannon was sitting on the counter she passed me another beer “I’m high,” I said, “It won’t do anything.” Sullivan was arguing with Jay about how fast his car got up “210,” said Sullivan I looked through the hole in the wall, where Vic had thrown Paul and could see into the living room the back of Denise’ head. Even the back of her head looked good. “We gotta fix that hole,” Shannon said I nodded. Every weekend was a planned sheetrock party, planned in the evening John Sullivan always offering never showing up in the morning !74
“Maybe even 215 mph!” he said “John’s full of shit,” cooed Shannon.
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In the living room, he called my name “What?!” “Hey man, I need a beer! and I can’t walk anymore!” Shannon touched my arm, “Don’t” “Fuck it.” I popped the top dumped 3/4 of it on the dishes in the sink “Reach behind your head, the cabinet, a plastic bottle.” There it wasbottom shelf alcohol the worst. Boomerang Vodka 'It Comes Right Back' I filled the beer bottle back to the top carried it out to John “Thanks bro.” He knocked it backguzzling it even, instantly turned green, then plaster white Denise was flat on her back now studying the ceiling fan for greater understanding her left tit had fallen out I kept on staring
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The screen door burst open Otto collapsed in suddenly 1 am blood on his face and his Sear’s suit he crawled on the beer-can floor Trish hysterical at his heels her dress ripped, eyes wet Otto bleeding all the way to the bathroom Trish a wall of shrill screaming “GET OUT! GET OUT!” our mutual friends in disbelief Otto puking
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There’d been a crash the two of them fighting !75
trashed and leaving the volunteer fire hall wedding Otto pulling out foot on the pedal he put the Nissan into the side of a parked van parked parallel with Salty’s Bagel out on the street they retreated down the darkness of a dirt road leading through the marsh grass plastic bits of the Nissan shimmering under the streetlight a light coming on in the window the blue house across from the volunteer fire hall
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Otto flushes the toilet I step out into the driveway the front of the car is caved in anti-freeze gathering in steaming pools on the yellow stones Jay and John stumble out on the back deck Shannon calling my name “We leaving?” “Nah, I’m too spun,” I say Trish comes out back “JOHN! GET OUT OF MY HOUSE!” He shuffled off, falling into the vinyl siding, knocking over the recycling can
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I went back inside gave Otto one of my shirts to sop up some of the blood A car started outside John Sullivan driving away from the lagoon !76
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when I sobered up 6am, I recall telling Shannon “He’s dead, for sure, drove right into the bay, he’s at the bottom now with the mermaids.”
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Shannon took me to his street in her red Civic and we found his Buick parked 1/2 on his mother’s side of the lawn but, fine
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that evening we did cut the wall apart in the kitchen and fixed the sheetrock me, Denise and Shannon.
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!77
Today I Have No Dirtbike
have a friend who’s dying who wants a tattoo on her upper thigh do not have access to the secret chord I just hum ‘Spirit in the Sky’
got blown on a train going south, I think have lost love sending morse code over the radio have one more beer in the fridge and people on the way
can I kiss you without it being weird? can we hop this fence and take that walk? can the night get lighter? can some things be forgiven to make room in here?
want a painting of this sky want more piano solos want vs. need and fuck it all no ones looking, drop your pants want everything revealed in a veil of blue smoke lifting
will they visit me in new jersey will you bring polaroids of wayward Jane, wayward Shannon will you tolerate it if I show where the bullet hit? will it ruin everything? asking for a friend.
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May, February, May
the bedroom fan with its chipped blade is tearing pages off the calendar that's fine, I watch the months rip off the wall, one by one July, May, February they slap against the record player and land in the graveyards of paperback books April, June, January left out in the rain mayday, mayday I don't do anything who could? March, December If I close my eyes the computer goes away October, October, May an airplane about to crash in the swamp time makes of this room
for this feeling someone. somewhere has written an inadequate song.
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Purple Teeth the TV glows supernatural I drink wine and more wine after pumpkin pie dad shows me the new assault rifle black death-esc we make plans to shoot it behind the dump next Sat.
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my girl wears leather pants we slug bourbon and lemon juice I tell my brother 'bout Pale Fire he goes into Robocop detail I make a point of setting aside wine bottles and my bourbon skeleton too I'm looking forward to laser sight blasting them both on clay ledges at the black pentagram sandpit edge but he won't accept $$$ for ammo and my brother won't read college bullshit & the house has straight walls & the tV has sharpened teeth So, I pour the last drop of available drink & lay half on the couch half on the floor ceremonially in the perfect dark my girl takes off her leather pants I wake up void of medicinal shock.
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A note from your neighbor I always knew you were illuminati the secret way you tied your shoes I just kept it quiet, ignoring how you cut your grass on a strange diagonal pretending away the fact that your toothpaste was non-whitening for a very diabolical reason There were codes implicit in your driveway oil change patterns. Big deal I am not one to judge I always knew you were Illuminati and accepted you for who you were in the big scheme of things climbing through your window when you were at those secret meeting I ate your Oreos non-judgemental and re-filled your liquor with water to the exacting levels required of our bond.
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Doorbell
the ghosts of birds fill the trees, making it creepy for all the regular birds. I’m in my pajamas using up my florescent markers highlighting obituaries red sharpie circling classified ads for businesses near town selling luxury viking funeral services the things you own, end up owning you but the more you have the cooler the fire gets so there. in the caverns beneath this place ethereal spirits glow hot pink idyllic with their ice cream memorials recalling fondly, pretty girls on green grass in spring when you go, you go for good that’s the rumor anyway the penalty box, that’s where you stay standing around, bored watching the living live well, here I am, very much alive putting new ice in the old glass awaiting the doorbell about to ring.
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Mad Max Visits New Jersey Out there. Foggy wilds. Stars slung low, hidden. Drunk on ridges. City lights tremor. Warm girl/ cold night. Music escapes. Swamp gas. Patient. Myths made of sugar glass. Hypnotize anybody. Charms swung counter clockwise Curses lifted. The floating faithful. A rotating sky. Mumble in sleep about love. Worry dissolves. Help us up. Help us up. Wait here. Blue time pops. Figure out the day. Where the night stops. Other fog. Other lives. Coming back in a bit. Wait here, miss. Fearless with my cartoon shark mug. Sunrise on pause.
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New Love
Gears spinning, balloons sucked in. Stone steps. Hands still smell like orange blossoms. Found good things today discarded by the sea. Smoking ruins. Nuclear rubble. Your telephone number.
Walk with me on the outskirts of the glowing jungle. Toss old promise rings into that nest of vipers. Life is not stored in moth-proof cedar boxes. Birds swoop, dropping flyers for far off car washes. “Crashed my car into the ocean.”
Now, look, watch the eruption. Our first kiss is awkward. All teeth. A week later we’re better. All grow’d up. Don’t need no chaperone. You melt down some black sand, and make me a funny crown. I lead you towards the hidden orange blossoms.
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Prologue to the US Army Survival Manual Edition 404
zero hour: if sirens scatter doves rise from desk or bed burn documents slip down escape hatch proceed with care belly-crawling through nearest mud knife, canteen, Walkman baretta 9, double A batteries fluoride capsules for teeth at the pharmacy pay phone dial 1-976-NTHRWLD leave message age, rank, serial number what you like for breakfast take the bus to muster point 1-7-C mums the word, though, comprende? items inside camouflage briefcase: playing cards, leaflet on edible berries seed packets, vitamin water malaria pills, beef jerky stop at longitude latitude check point A5 dash 5 collect electrified key for buzzing door beware: the easy door may open upon sheer cliffs have an alternate plan for the alternate plan have you studied our brochure on various poisonous snakes? Jesus, I hope so decoded it reveals your destination decoy: hidden inside your left shoe is a fake topographical map !85
if chased, discard fake map to throw them off the real map is right up here *taps forehead* if every earthly item on a slant retreat to a life of caves, minimally prevent the ground bursting open with your feet planted firmly reverse commute the city learn simpler existences in the shadows close the stone curtains call off newspapers cancel premium cable entertain yourself watching hot light sparking up from dim divides dogs, rabbits, fish all for a thousand miles have moved a thousand and one miles away natural romantic disaster me and society on are taking a break but are still good friends with benefits a fortune cookie says: have enough rations guns and iced down beer to last a quarantine of 1000 years starting Thursday.
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Parkway Divides check engine pops on I'm an ocean dweeb but I long for the mountains my tires, get flatter every mile weeble wobble I feel alive fleeing ordinary houses cops lurk, spider-like behind the darkened billboards castle keep, rest stops roll by wide awake, drive all night in dreams I am impervious to fire lectures I have survived jobs shed like used-up fur only made my spirit brighter no passenger to scan the radio distance but moonroof lets the light in motor missing a beat the sputter of the engine ahead, the highway splits veer to the left taller elevation, rock, snow veer to the right salt, breeze, sand, girl last possible second I decide, steering wild swinging in, pedal down Step Away
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we won the week the odds were long bubble bath surrounds now in each glass a slice of lime tongue numb nicely and music ticking out every brick these teeth could cease a bullet I smile most when I shouldn’t paid fresh cash the other day !87
loose now, sprung to my glowing room life temporarily plump’d and bloomed girl, piano, rum, money it never rains; dark clouds elsewhere perhaps they'll hover in on Monday but now it's clear electric red and purple skies dusk precisely, Friday.
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When I'm Drunk At PF Chang's With Aaron Dietz
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things occur to me an emptied glass will refill itself given time
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the bar is made of parts not needed in the tropics today we watched a man with a green bandana over his face, like a train robber shoot a hypodermic needle into his ripped apart leg we were all riding the light rail from one part of Seattle to another part of Seattle the college basketball on TV is better than war
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points of truth: the arrival of lettuce wraps shall determine all earth’s happiness unsweetened ice tea always needs some sugar blue skies are forced to linger but who likes steady rain? sadness can be cured with hot sauce throughout the evening daylight is just a threat my future may or may not be arriving
advice: don't work from templates squint during earthquakes
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hold your breath till time goops up “two more scotches, please”
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the waitress seems to love us I give her my church money instead of leaving it at the church a predictable sacrifice, or penance
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for a decade I accidentally tipped 10 percent see, I’d decimate the bill and forget to times that by two when I tell Dietz that story I always think he’s gonna fall off his tropical bar stool
we leave, in light rain feeling all was forgiven or forgotten oh well
the fortune cookie said: “society is niiiiice now.”
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Being Alive flipped bike went head first down gravel hill shattered self healed slow by the window first day off crutches was tackled in snow, broken things stayed that way threw a rock from 100 feet hit my brother in the face still stutters brought fireworks to school set them off in the hallway searched for glossy magazines in all the upper regions of all the adult closets faked it through grammar school nurse tests for years afraid they'd find out I was deaf and cut apart my skull to fix it moved to a campground set fires in the sandpits to draw the New Jersey devil smashed out streetlights with a football went to one college class English 101, wasn't for me quit the football team when the coach showed up dressed in army fatigues found a fallen nest of robin eggs put them in the refrigerator stole a close friend's girl same girl left me for another close friend we were all once so much closer hit my mom in the head with a baseball she was pitching, I was hitting almost went to the emergency room electrocuted myself with a toaster wet hands, thought it was a ghost !91
I hid till someone came home got my photo taken by the police on a June morning, interfering with a police investigation got pulled over for drunk driving on the side of the road ‘walk this line; touch your nose” the rookie cop let me go wrote a novel in my parents basement refused to hit delete played guitar in a noise band till my good friend, the drummer died in his sleep met my girl at the movies moved from a dirt road to the city burnt myself all up welding everything they'd let me floated out; both American oceans flat on my back, not quite dead.
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Cherry World clear-eyed, patient miracle sober Saturday in shorts Saturday in no shirt sitting on the floor listening to a new legion of songbirds right outside my light leak window they’re still up against the same war they’ve always had since the beginning
today, for me, in here, is easy I have no war, no radio, no TV but outside, holy hell
poisoned green leaves the crush of blue skies carnivorous brick walls maybe everyone is dead on all sidewalks just out of view I can’t tell
I raise my cartoon shark mug full of rainforest coffee and wonder what the fuck is in the rest of that paperback book laying split-spined on the orange couch
we may be out of toilet paper sugar, bread, batteries, love light bulbs, spoons, forks knives, mouse traps, soap time, candles, salt and luck !93
but not life
I open the window wider and try to whistle like the birds do.
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Dear Pen Pal, I've mowed lawns for years shoveled driveways raked the infinite leaves yeah, I've been around now I'm tired of taking a blue BMX everywhere want gas computation not peddle and chain gonna get me a sleek black car no more than 200,000 miles and voyage somewhere other than the public library the county mall the strip mall record store find a Mary Ann, Lucy Melissa, Rachel or Jane drive endless laps around the reservoir, holding hands across the center console necking you said where you live there are mountains wide rivers, horses the ground is compact well here it's all sugar sand below sea level marsh forest fire pine barrens do they have necking or roller skating in your snow capped peaks? here, a hot date is taking the dirt trails deeper looking for the Jersey Devil together a black car would change my life me and the Mary Ann of Jane or Shannon would make a home for in the backseat raise a family there !95
two kids, a Nameless dog and an orange cat better make sure it's a beautiful backseat any more than two kids one would have to live in the trunk I've saved my money for a lifetime hiding it in the basement wall under a full moon I count out three thousand in fives and tens a Scarface stack of small cash laid out on my twin bed and forever I scan the newspaper and walk the used auto lots up the highway somewhere the black car is there waiting full tires, gassed up, waxed I nearly have my learners permit just two more years to go ... how's your summer break been?
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yours, Bud.
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Technicalities they say don’t drink alone does it count when you are asleep and I drink as you sleep in the other corner of this room?
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Remain With Disabled Vehicles the highway is a war zipping by sit indian style on the rumble strips wave to all the blurs, unbutton your cowboy shirt unpack the trunk filled with illegal flowers break the windshield into manageable mirrors on the count of 1,2,3, go—start grass fires chase the animals out of the fields enjoy your picnic in eye line of the billboards your car is a mobile church on wheels now flat the tow truck will be here sometime tonight set up a nest of road flares for the first responders get Shannon on the car phone "I'm on the hood, sipping bourbon" "where?" "mile marker eighty one” “I’m the opposite of coming” cook robins eggs on the last heat of the engine block get my silverware set from the glovebox make cave art on the fenders with the first aid kit sharpen the key down to a small dagger the moon is up and you might meet vampires have ready your license and registration rip out the seats, tear up the map flag down other vehicles at will fall in love, make out tune the radio to something nice hope the battery never dies the emergency broadcast system gets me hard hazard lights blink in time with the beat of the human heart.
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Help Wanted
team member needed; must work occasional weekends, we don’t know which ones, this was a problem for Dennis, and now, who is Dennis? we can’t remember, he’s dead to us; qualifications: recent resume, two years experience in the business of life, clean driver’s license, sharp wits about you; $19 an hour with sporadic overtime, some benefits ie. dental, vision, massages, all done on premises by Gail; this is important, you can’t have a CD or mp3 copy of Sounds of the Rainforest, Walter is also dead to us because of that; drop in whenever you like, there is always a manager on site.
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Details of the War for a little while the love you have is a cloud absorbing the moisture of even your own blood
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during the night the void fills with cherry flavor often I have lived hard to avoid walking barefoot on nails, glass, other people
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when it rains like crazy I hang my heavy head out the kitchen window rinsing the soot from my mouth
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nearly every dawn the floral wallpaper peels back and I peel an orange at the coffee pot holding back both hands of a clock with every psycho-kinetic muscle remaining in apartment 12.
!100
Amiright? hi, I'd like:
all your drugs and books, black velvet paintings, cactuses and baby birds and free car washes and coffee and hope and patience
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for these reasons 1. all the men wanna be you all the women wanna be you all the cats and dogs and even the grass and the crab grass and the bugs wanna be you
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2. I guess that’s it, take me to your leader.
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Uptick kickstart wired, love-us-leave-us, cut it down to the heartless paint, sift through the receipts, find a place and time to appear redeemed
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carved skulls from salt crystal, made a life in the cliffs leaning, telephoned all the marathon sinners, have a fortune in pussy, had no forgiveness for debt collectors
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break apart on the deep rocks, build the day out of unfulfilled bombs, said hi to all your friends, out my application in at your borddello
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found a family in clover, was enough, ten lives. dress your children in death squad black, teach them to smile like tigers, grease the gears.
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!102
Your Favorite Song
for 7 days, walk around the world headphones on, do your best feel like nothing else exists topless girls explode out of cakes easter bunnies fly billion dollar jets snipers on slim towers mow students down but you’re protected by your favorite song and it’s new, it just came on bullets skit by, sparks pop on bricks you’ll live forever, kid
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before, what was life? rewind, wait, repeat your heart and lungs and guts now made from perfectly spliced magnetic tape the plastic wheels spin, eternity is measured out in the usage of AA batteries
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on the 8th day, there’s a bus ride south west, east and north motion feels right to accompany music you gauge all society against the bridge the solo and the weight of the chorus
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the 9th day is good too, you decide to die in your favorite song, but not for very long maybe a hundred and fifteen years from now from now on you’ll only dress in the lyrics sung within the 3 minutes and fifteen seconds and you’ll only drink and eat the bass line you’ll go to college in the fucking song too and have it as a career
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at night you lay with it the sex is soft at first but gets rougher and rougher then there’s a period of time, where you don’t know where you stand with the song try to love it anyway, more and more build a shrine to it, let no one see it !103
let alone hear it, hum it in your sleep let all your wishes be guided by its rhythm
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many years later, wake up on the floor bewildered and crushed shake off the pain, and sit up brush yourself off, slip the tape in your field jacket pocket and walk around the jungle in silence there’s no death for something great. 
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Now Serving # 86
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the girl behind the deli counter is in love with me, I realized it in the cookie aisle there’s something about the way she slices the cheese so thin the moon can glow through it I took a package of chocolate chip from the shelf and hopped away, only red squares the floor might be triggered to explode a man at the end cap had samples of Costa Rican coffee, fresh brewed, I took two small cups and hopped on red squares, past the seafood past the international canned vegetables at the glass case, I stopped, clutching the unspilled coffee and the uncrushed cookies there was one person ahead of me, a lady in a blue coat getting a pound of sale pastrami I waited patiently beside the pickle barrel when we were alone, the deli girl blinked at me and said, “Number eight-six” I stepped forward with her gift.
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An Orange Cat Doesn’t Live Here
the endorphins don’t know or the dumb birds these bus drivers, or microwave cooks, the rain clouds stranded on the roof
I’ll say hello to anybody who seems like they could use it
but there’s all this bright sunshine and no dog, passed out in it I make a promise to learn to whistle lead Nameless out of the shade into the lemon light of the room
the postcards don’t come or the miracle powdered soap the no hiss, no fuss easier than ever, live forever clip out super saver coupons
it’d be nice if somebody simply knocked on my window at dusk when I let in the bright blue moonlight anyway
never really seen anything just heard about it in the cowgirl’s sad song
hold your breath count wrong see the coffee cup glow and the orange cat slips through the impermanence of a chain link fence.
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Raw Romance 1st date was a failure, kinda sorta got set on fire. 2nd was no better. 3rd date, swam out on glowing water. 4th, started living forever. 5th, found passage through another sky.
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6th date, we slow danced on Saturn's rings all night, had fun. 7th, married at Vegas, but not the Vegas you're thinking of. 8th, stopped the star shower of time. 9th, lost my tragic mind. 10th, met her fucking parents.
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11th, moved in, tried a house plant, tried a dog, decision: no kids. 12th, one long deep wet well of a kiss. 13th, laughed about the worst kind of curse, ours. 14th, watched ice spread across the third and fourth and ninth dimension. 15th, fed each other lava in bed for breakfast.
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16th date, left our needy bodies, became elements of shattered light. 17th, split up after a dive bar dart board argument. 18th, decide to split the dog. 19th, alternate weekends with the house plant. 20th, on a foggy thursday, get back together, less mortal than ever.
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21st, remarried & regenerated in the eye of a hurricane. 22nd, settle down at the bottom of the ocean. 23rd, it's so quiet, we are each secretly screwing octopi and ghosts. 24th, read bad books in separate watery rooms. 25th date, fake both our deaths, both say nice things at each other's services.
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26th, renew our eternal vows. 27th, set ourselves on fire again for our anniversary, laugh all night. 28th, everyone else runs for their lives, we toast each other during an avalanche. 29th, decide to adopt. 30th, watch the child eat the sun.
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31st date, I take up golf, she becomes God. 32nd, the population explodes. 33rd, I invent the rose. 34th, now I professionally float. 35th, as a disembodied presence she's even better in bed.
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36th, our parents pass away, we become them. I inherit her father's business: they start to call me Death. 37th, her smile wide, teeth sharper than knives. 38th date, the earth explodes. 39th, black space and the solar wind blows. 40th, she recreates earth, I'm proud.
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41st, we enjoy margaritas and tacos on 59th street. 42nd date, war becomes a popular thing, we toss each other grapes. 43: made the mistake of saying, "you're just like your mother." 44: vaporized the mountains of Mars. 45: began to understand each other out of the dark.
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46th, helped her clean the attic. 47th, went to the vertigo casino. 48th date: took a cruise ship soaring through a worm hole. 49th, skinny dipped the beaches of Hell. 50th, the volcanos of Heaven open, we oww and ahh, it's like ‘end of existence fireworks.'
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51st, Q: "does this all encompassing omnipresence make me look fat?" A: "no." 52nd, the universe rips to shreds. 53rd, we try again. 54th date: we set off our nuclear hearts in Ikea. Dinosaurs rise from tar, magma recedes, rivers unboil, the garden is still full of apples; we go to a movie and afterwards, avoid TGIF Fridays. 55th date: I close my eyes and she's there.
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Lemon Rooms to whom it may concern: the dryer makes a lull better than music through the wall. The smoke detector bleeps in perfect sync. I pull the battery out. Birds po-tweet beyond reach of all the feral yard cats. Pepper, our dog, died today.
to whom it may concern: on July 6th, 1998, an ambulance rolled down our pot-holed street. They took Azure to a quiet hospital—a month of group circle, medicine colorful, halfinflated basketball. I’m not allowed to visit.
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to whom it may concern: when I piss, it burns. On February 7th, 1999, it snows one tenth of an inch and I don’t have work. I guzzle Canadian whiskey in the basement, sharing benignly, with the silver fish.
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dear Azure: Salt finally ran out in the street, leash-less. He twitched for an hour. I buried him half-alive, I’m sure. I’m not humane enough to own a gun, yet.
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to whom it may concern: May Day, 2001, she’s doing far better now, has a rose garden, has paperbacks to read by the widow, laughs at the kitchen table, sings while soaping the dishes, strips away the darkened floral wallpaper, paints the rooms lemon.
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to whom it may concern: bad wreck on the way to work. A grey Toyota crunched sideways in the trees. Six bearded Orthodox Jews crowd around a bleeding boy. Never mind the blue sky. People creep to look, but keep going. I propel over the rumble strip, striking the divider myself. I run to help— and wrap my blue dress shirt around the kid’s head. Cops come. Ambulances come. I get a DWI. But I’ve made a lifelong friend, Eli.
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this just in!: Frederick. Six pounds, two ounces. Eighteen inches long. January 2nd. 3:46 am. Smiles immediately, a good sign.
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Dear Abby: I have a gun safe now. On Thanksgiving Day, I show off our AK-47, saying, a little buzzed, “We can go shoot it behind the dump.” Plans arise. It’s decided, closer to Christmas, we’ll go. “And we don’t have to just shoot garbage, bring anything you’d like.”
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to whom it may concern: I try to not drink during the span of February. It doesn’t work out. My dreams are devouring me, asleep on the scratchy downstairs couch. Sometimes she comes down after work, sits and sips, but doesn’t stay.
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Dear Pepper’s Ghost: the washing machine explodes. I drive my clothes to the Wash n’ Fold. The music of those machines, engulfs me, I tell the chit chatting girls to “sssssssshh!” I’m in my nearest version of church.
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Dear Salty’s Spirit: on July 18t, 2013, we went to the beach, my family and Eli’s. I snuck vodka in my lemonade, and may have imagined a shark in the surf, its fin dark and straight. I paddled out towards it, belly up, gripping beach ball. I’ve lived a full life. From the sandcastle, Azure and little Freddie called my name like a cheer.
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to whom it may concern: the roof needs to be redone. Complete rip down and re-shingle. From the lawn, I figure out where to drop the dumpster. Then I decide another thing, after finally thinking about it all morning. Azure drives me to the hospital, coffee mug in hand. The pills I get are even brighter than hers. We reconnect in the new months.
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Attention! Attention!: House For Sale! 3 bedroom, 2.5 bath, full basement (no silver fish), 1 car closed. garage, modern appliances, 1,691 square foot, above ground pool for those hot summers, new roof! Lemon rooms! Trees full of singing birds! Asking ____
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Dear Eli: our last day there, an orange cat brought a bird’s head to the garage door and left it as a gift. I put out a saucer of milk, then went to get the last box of dishes by the sink. When I got in the car, Azure was smiling and hiding something under her coat, “show me.” Freddie laughed. It !110
was a kitten, unnaturally yellow, we named her Lemon. As we drove away, I made certain not to look back in the rearview. Even I know the story of Lot’s wife. My family, apparently, does not. 
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Mail one night, the post man decides he’s through walking down our pot-holed street, across our lawns up crumbling brick steps to plop our 3rd party mail in the box beside the door he finishes his beer dresses in his uniform drives the mail truck out to our block at midnight smoking, and still drinking he begins to dig a small hole on the edge of the lawn where the mail will go. 
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dear baby bird grown my hair long and half silver disowned all art, thrown the books away fed the record player to the wood chipper the shirts I used to wear are flags now protesting whatever shows up in my newsfeed
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I dunno
there's a rumor that everything we do is meaningless and one day the planet we live on will be crushed flat like a grape in the hand of a kid like me who never went to college think I read that on a patch sewed on someone’s daughters jean jacket
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dats fine, open the wine, dump the sauce over the steak, inflate the basketball, slip your world-famous red dress on/ take your red dress off, shoot every bird out of the sky, bake a fucking pie, walk in the park fully chemically spun and eyes beyond cartoon wide, all the flowers and specs of garbage on the ground, life confirming/ affirming, etc.
dear baby bird let’s live to 135.
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dear person in the center of the assembly line I'd like to grab a beer with you after work we could talk about whatever you want just don't dispute my religious leaning "the universe is a rental car, fully insured, that we're allowed to drive into a brick wall." suggestions: the bar must have a dart board that I’d like to sit nowhere near the bar must have a bartender not from Sweden the bar must have a mirror so clouded and broken that life is not reflected in it the bar must have water damaged posters hanging on the walls advertising girl punk shows the bar must have a pinball machine that is smashed in figure—5pm, home by sunrise.
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Victory
just got laid doing well in the day light
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thought I lost my sense eating an orange, too soon after I brushed my teeth
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still hanging tough so what, the speakers are blown out I’m killing in the afternoon hope to kill during the moon light, too
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just got laid so the war doesn’t matter the lack of money doesn’t matter neither does the buy one get one free the laundry, the roof, gutters glass along the path the mythological 8 hours of sleep joke wishes, joke magics, lists or going north just to get south w e f e l t g o o d laying on the bed sideways we said names/places/times/things over and over again hands gripped her ass her hair fell in my mouth we both somehow survived
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what we call, victory.
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Kite
an Angel of Death kite blows into the tree outside our window Kate says, “I don’t like that.” “It’s fine.” “No way.” She’s sick, it’s an omen. I close the curtains, but we know it’s still there. The next day, I try to climb the tree but there’s not enough branches and I can’t get more than halfway up If I stand on my tippy toe and stretch, I can almost reach “I’ll jump,” I think but just before I can, Kate yells “Don’t do that! You’ll fall.” “I won’t.” “You’ll die.” “Who me? You’re crazy.” Her idea is probably safer we go to the roof with fishing poles, and cast out the lines with the share hook but the wind keeps rising and the line goes wild, the hook goes we reel it in, nothing gained it’s midsummer the world is green but by the next morning the tree has orange leaves that drop the following day “I’ve got a clear shot at it now,” I say. First I throw a football up at it the football gets lodged in the branches then I throw a basketball—no I throw baseballs, a soccer ball, a brick a broom, a boomerang—all is lost, stuck I give up on the Angel of Death kite but Kate gets sicker, another appointment more doctors, she loses weight !116
they can’t tell her why at night the tree groans in the moonlight I look out the window and know in her sleep Kate whimpers at dawn I try to climb the tree again I’ve got a rope, I’m going to get as high as I can and loop the rope around a far off branch as I climb, the lower branches snap the tree is weak now, can barely hold me still I climb. “Stop!” she yells from the widow but she’s gray and fading and I can’t stop I loop the rope, tie the knot, start to climb “Please!” “No!” the branch breaks. I fall. That’s all for a while
the doctors know what’s wrong with me I’ve broken my back, my neck other minor things “It’s a miracle you’re still alive,” Kate says I can almost see through her
that night there’s a storm the tree falls, it crashes through our roof and crushes where our bed is, where we’d have been asleep
a neighbor cuts the tree up he makes a pile by the road that says, “Free Firewood” but no one takes it
the kite must have blown off in the storm into some other tree
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but I feel fine, you know
 I can see the color has returned to her face. 
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Threat of Rain
during the jet black uneven sundown talks I’m not listening, I’m just nodding thinking about golden bullets piercing diamond hearts
let’s have no discussion our teeth get dull, that way just chew gum it’s not the 4th of fucking July
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silence is golden streets on fire the night is an ocean I’m putting shoes against the door so the door won’t open zipped the mouth left the only key that works to the cat that’s fled from this place, this noise
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ask your favors through the brick wall avoid straight forward contact in the mine field our love song was non-prototypical neither of us tolerated instruction manuals
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one promise, now under no circumstance will I lie about the threat of rain I like the sound.
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Violas there was a woman on the radio talking all about eating flowers how great it is to eat flowers bees like them for the nectar so will/do we and the texture! try them in a fucking salad! I looked at my dying window plants shriveled up all sunshine doomed and I took out a carton of eggs instead.
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Keep Replaying Side B when I’m all busted up and lost, I realize it because I’m not seeking out new music I’m just sitting in this same floral chair lifting the arm with the needle and going back to the start of track five but all that will be fixed, today the flowers are jumping out of the sidewalk the cardboard boxes are there in an army filled with cheap wax, three for five dollars yesterday, I got a recommendation Dvorak, The New World symphony that sounds about motherfucking right.
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See Ya Later, Alligator interests include: opening the window, letting the birds in off the fire escape; watching my wife get tan in white sand; grey bats crisscrossing a swollen moon; fireworks not burning any houses down, but maybe catching the top of an insignificant 300 year old maple; swimming, always swimming, arms outstretched in an aquamarine hot spring or thermal arctic pool. not to mention: dark rum, sugar, and shirtless in the afternoon; driving reckless down a yellow mountain, sheer drops on either yellow side; new sunglasses discovered on a sidewalk; everything stinking like coconut, finally; the dew running off the branch, slapping the ledge outside, like an alarm doing its job, right. but this: the other night, for the first time, the ice cream truck arrived. It parked and played its broken-glass circus song on loop for an hour. It would have been more, but I finally put my shoes on and walked out of the apartment. The sidewalks were empty and the sun had gone down. I was the only one, troubled. I said to the ice cream man, “Why don't you move along—you're parked right underneath our goddamn window.” He said, “Not going anywhere.” The song continued. The truck stayed. I went back upstairs. My wife said, laughing, “Looks like that didn't work.” I said, “I know what we'll do. I'll get a bunch of watermelons. And I'll drop them on his truck, one by one.” She said, “Nothing feels more like summer than a watermelon war.”
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The Marine
heard something about a kid from school I hadn’t thought about since I’d seen him by the eggs in Food Universe and he’s said “Hey man! What’s new?” I set my basket down said, “Nothing much” truth too, “Nice crew cut.” his hair had always been long he said, “I signed up for the Marines.” “Aw shit, that’s crazy.” I headed towards the peanut butter off to Afghanistan he went saw him at the bank six years later skinny and long-haired again but we didn’t say anything just passed, me going in with a ziplock full of coins him on his way to his crashed up compact car that looked like it’d been in more wars than him
another guy from school came to work at the refinery and mentioned our friend, the Marine “Crazy what happened to him …” “What chu mean, maing?” “Fucker was killed with !123
a samurai sword” “Where?!” “Mallard Ave” “How? Why?” “You didn’t hear this? Jesus. Well, he had gotten big into pills I guess, and broke into his dealer’s house.” “No shit.” “While he was digging around in the dealer’s room, trying to steal the pills, the dealer’s parent’s came home.” “No.” “Yeah, he tied them up in the living room back to back in two chairs. Went back to digging in the dresser drawers” “Damn.” “But the dealer came home, too found his parents tied up, went out into the garage, got his samurai sword; sliced through him three times as he tried to run” “No way!” “Twice in the front, once in the back as he was headed out the door; if you wanna go for a ride, I’ll take you over there. was a two years ago but the concrete steps are still stained from the blood” “Sure” I grabbed my coat.
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1-976-NTHRWLD affiliation: still not in a pagan death cult was just out on the thawing lawn lying belly down, too soon sucking spiked lemonade (not blood) up a twisty straw life is a string of unknown songs slow reveal, we fake our way along
service: devour wayward stars sing and flinch and sing flop cinder blocks on crab claws conquer ethereal Wednesdays be 1000 percent kissed off scale the lattice, shirtless when ice vaporizes spring has sprung! arrangements:
1. bury me in this motherfucking plaid shirt 2. remember me: eating oysters, drinking tomato juice; bacon was my only religion 3. remember our lovely wood paneling; and how we swam through ice water, with purpose, like mint; how we made a career rolling through the sprinklers, on fire, well pretending, anyway 4. I enjoyed: runny eggs, short skirts, white ceiling fans, the odd afternoons 5. last seen leaving: rivers thawed, having waxed my newspaper boat to float to Hades, paddling occasionally, squinting even in shadow to look cool; when I'm gone though, I'll still say hello, I'm sure the caverns have upward echoes; leave the toilet seat up, the drains open.
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July 18th, 2006 sometimes, average blue sky hurts watch the way I collapse through other people’s eyes easily falling down hill green grass and dandelions pass and when I splash into water head whacking river stones everything suddenly feels right the sun ducks behind a renegade cloud.
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August 9th
a) forgot my clothes on a branch b) then rain c) I fucking wore them anyway all day.
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Prayer To The Passing Waitress
sangria saves lives (repeat.)
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Even Steven
our small emergencies of oxygen and energy the failing orbit in the sludge of our awkward bodies I am yours whenever/wherever you have my cookies.
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Cuevero and Elderflower
the afternoon crash lands it’ll be alright, right cat? been so busy, what a lazy life over-efficient, salt mine ready prayer really didn’t work for me lemon light broke the kitchen window now blood, sugar, spikes—oh kitty! day and night, what’s real? someone on the TV always wants to save me while you lick yourself solution, get couch horizontal pitcher frame, pillows, teak okay lime, ice, tequila, salt, st. germain
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April 27th
cherry blossom and dogwood going crazy all in bloom or on the verge what a good day even here, sitting on the guard rail car hissing.
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Strip Mall, 8am, Saturday
I usually drive into a strip mall and first things first, swing around the back to see the loading dock and the card board dumpster the shadow’d woods behind … you ever do that? I wonder why —either way.
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Fortunes If June 13th is your birthday: this time it's for real. Whatever comes on the radio, go with it, gyrate in public. Capricorn (dec. 22nd—jan 20th): Your tombstone will be a jukebox, but not for a severely long time, ions, possibly. Aries (march 21st—apr 19th): Still don't know the slick streets, or the wayward doves, the name of the bus driver, or why these rain clouds are stranded over the roof? Solve that crisis.
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Taurus (apr 20th—may 20th): Say hello to anybody who seems lost. Eat more illusive fish. Death unlimited, keeps crashing another place. Man, that feels niiice.
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Pieces (feb 20th—march 20th): Get fucked. Gemini (may 21st—june 21st): There's all this bright sunshine and no dogs passed out in it, make a promise to guide them out of dense shade into fine lemon light.
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Cancer (jun 22nd—jul 23rd): A pink fire appears in something mechanical, and of great value. Be on the lookout for this. Carry a bucket of water everywhere.
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Leo (jul 24th—aug 23rd): Old friends reveal themselves as shadows of shadows, seen in a gazing pool. Oh, btw, get/find/ locate a gazing pool some instance before midnight. Virgo (aug 24th—sept 22nd): Postcards don't come or the miracle powdered soap, there's no huss/no fussit’s easier than ever, clip not a single live forever coupon.
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Scorpio (oct 23rd—nov 22nd): It'd be nice if someone knocked on my window at dusk and carried in the blue moonlight rumored in those cowgirls' songs.
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Libra (sept 23rd—oct 22nd): Your best fears will claw on your window at dawn. Aquarius (jan 21st—feb 19th): Wear a bulletproof vest over your bikini. Sagittarius (nov 23rd—dec 20th): try all the doors, book cases escape hatches—two-way mirrored ceilings looming over sometimes conceal hidden passages within reflections.
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Your Lucky Number: 123
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enough with the technological advances already
dear pagan gods. dear moonless days. dear animal trapped here. dear glue rapid terror. dear highways through the thrashing sea. dear purple west, I'm on my way.
you seem so ready. you collapse across the jetty. you set fire to a spring need. you arrive dusted, 1/2 dead, keyed
quiet dream, quiet wind, quiet every sleeping thing thrashing in its violet sleep, quiet.
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Check Up
I know the ocean by first name came to me under electro shock therapy hurts that I can't share violently but carefully carried through the streets won't be love enough as it should be try on as many versions of life as you can don't flinch when the tax return is revealed act your best version of surprised
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try this, in no order: 1. snail mail a birthday card to everyone 2. parade wave at the flickering cemetery zipping by--warp speed in the EZ pass lane 3. make a puzzle from a photograph of a better time
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candles, wax-sunk into every stone step windows reflect match head fires darkness is a certain lack of dream inside seashells, I hear 'for he's a jolly good fellow' try to trust less in police
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and this: clouds show up in dreams dressed in halloween green the roof shines nice, the sailboats bend again take nine and call me in the morning
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the night nurse says: moon just a target for your big ol' eyes spread the metal bars with your buzz saw mind then take a dive in a neighbor's pool drive your neighbor's wife to school
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further advice: keep all your tax papers for seven years hidden in a sand castle guarded by orderlies slipped off !136
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how it is: another couple weeks you'll be free promise.
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At the Record Store
sing the alphabet roaming all the rows reaching out a hand grazing promises sucked inside cellophane endless wooden bins the long haired clerk has his head down at the register drooling on his 3/4 sleeve shirt
when things were new felt like discovered amethyst tossed out into the snow or floating in a metal boat through boiling mist lightning and a first good kiss and all the while, always always, a miracle on the radio some song, what song? thee song I'll never know, the DJ forgot to say, then an ad for soap, life's great mystery what that fucking song was
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so study every sealed record ask the kids by the mall fountain collect call the great beyond fake pray at the foot of your bed for the song to arrive/appear again smoke machine dreams of your favorite band having something in section p h-i-j-k-l-m-n-o—nope, nothing fingers flip the plastic back the red-eyed clerk passes with an empty cart “help you find anything?” break open my bedroom wall !138
find a million dollars in gold coins find Shannon flying low over my roof naked with a parachute help me find the power to blink and stop time help me know everything I'm stoned, I'm staring he repeats, “help you find anything?” “I'm okay,” I say, “just looking.”
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Good Luck
it just happened, a bird shit on me—so begins the good luck streak off in the distance the cowgirl sings her saddest song but I am payday invincible nothing will be wrong every beer bottle that falls does a somersault slaps on its bottom, flat there are not even suds just more championship seasons more blossoms, more meaning sleep walk to a charmed life not off a single rock knife cliff furthermore get no shiners no busted lips, no lies other houses burn down in the spring death night cars explode, the world shakes my tongue sweat dogs sprint offs, get doomsday lost a whistle, all it takes is a whistle and my dog comes trotting back usually I’m busy falling down the stairs and laying there till morning tonight I’ll climb to the top of the sea green water tower this town’s highest point to toss my pennies onto the sparking power lines to make myself happy.
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side yard
the cowgirl of southern new jersey smokes endlessly on mossy cellar steps sipping skunked beer awaiting the plop of rain the motorcycle ripping down the street even the missing in action mailman to bring her a letter from almost anyone.
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Punk Rock Rituals it’s nice to be invited the lovelies spit in circles set blue fires, sip blue poison dance stupid, are un-quiet coo all night like uncaged tropical birds does this cult even have a name? I don’t ever belong here but I’ll drink any kind of punch you have and put nostalgia trinkets into the fat lip middle to be used in the seance of your punk rock rituals.
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Poem Written While Searching
all this distance the girls disappear and out my window fruit trees bloom a TV through the wall murmurs, 300 vanished the first robin has its nest broken by a random wind a man on FM radio mentions again that pesky misplaced airplane from the porch I watch the wind move the leaning telephone pole beside my sleeping car with a xerox of Jane missing since June a thousand nail heads in her lost head staples too, a shredded purple balloon where have all the good times gone? in the bird baths frost had dug in then blammo, one night finally it's warm fans swirl the computer cools off the cardboard castle gets dark by seashell nightlight I search the dryer for my other sock.
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the $2 cinema
the arrow of life is pointing in your direction
every crystal eaten becomes another arrow arms up and around hold hands and m&ms in the popcorn after, pay phone shivering in the rain waiting for goddamn where-is -she-mom
the arrow of life is pointing in your direction
hearts collected blue swords, waterfalls
bleached hair turns green your princess lies in another castle player two insert whatever you can just use protection I’m ovulating
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Slumping Off
I think tonight the stars are flinching
June and I go walking barefoot
hot streets hiss a cracked glass of orange Tang
spiked with anything lost comets cross
power lines know your name glowing clouds
banshees swing over the black earth
strip down, swim we frog out in the drainage pond.
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New Neighbor the dogs learn first they piss her name on the lawn till the crab grass dies there then I can read it from the street ‘Shannon’ I say smiling walking over holding lemon pie.
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Today’s Going Fast
dawn—green lights, gun shots rust, disassemble, eat the clocks life has an off-kilter time table screw everything, youth is plinko still don't know the answer to the never ever die riddle
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noon—no one gets beheaded for fun instant rain, instant fucked, sugar rim meet me at the docks for lunch
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dusk—raise your hand if you have questions in the tornado kick those feet, break all the upmost windows
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moonrise—climbs the slimes here comes the long night arms in a V, collapsing through the duck feather bed never stop to dream live forever, exposed teeth you point, I'll bleed.
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Wednesday
enough of days without tiny rocks lost love in pockets, in shoes letters got quiet all done drink this lemon/lime death get the ringing phone barefoot, glassless a voice says ‘coming home’ me smiling, wide as I eat the phone.
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honeysuckles
There are six cops, I know their squad car numbers by heart. Squad car: 757, 681 222, 112, 90, and 14. The bar let’s out, I walk up the grass hill behind the parking lot and slowly eat honey-suckles growing through the fence. The last drunks stumble out The guy that was punching the malfunctioning jukebox gets in a red Nissan, and is pulled over immediately by car# 681. A woman screaming through a cigarette hops in a pickup and is caught by car # 14 Two lane highway. No escape. I devour flowers under spinning moonlight. Car# 90 nabs a wobbling man on a wobbly bike. That doesn’t seem fair. I lay back in the wet grass to watch the clouds smother the rest of the moon. In another life I’d like to be a wolf, but not a cop. A young couple, make-out, for a long while in a blue Volkswagen beetle, fogging the windows. She draws a heart. He does too. When they finally leave, they’re chased down, whoop whoop, by car #222 and #112 I study the flashing blue and red against the glass of the closed forever hobby shop. My mouth is full of honey, it seems safe to leave, but I don’t. I close my eyes on the wet hill. There is still car #757, and that motherfucker wants to drink my blood, most of all.
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the zero zero block
I want to get lost on the streets I grew up on laying in an X on soaked grass chugging watermelon flavored poison
I hope bonfire billboards spark all night long
and the six cops in this place remain parked wherever it is they park
I wanna survive oblivious in the dark because of a weird kiss from a weirder girl.
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king kong couldn't
on my third beer I begin to know universal truths about all forms of life my immediate reaction is to order a forth no—make that a fifth too yes, bring them both and have the bartender turn off the music, please I am about to give a sermon on the top of the jukebox like motherfucking king kong couldn’t
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wonder who will shoot me down?
!151
ordinary houses
all the while the wildest birds infiltrate our ordinary houses maybe they presage death with the slash of perfect wings color of the sky just after the storm I’m not sure I'm still climbing up little weird vine at a time getting the fuck away from that house.
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Nice To Meet You
after the crash we slid out and stared at our smoking cars “you alright?” “fine, you?” “good, good” the night was big and somewhere was the sea and girls smiling and anti-toxins “alright then” “alright then” we moved on what else are people to do after a head-on collision?
!153
Rock
my brother, four feet tall red curly hair, hands cupped calling in the distance “bet you can’t hit me wif a rock!” a green hill, I’m 9 dandelion lawn my brother, way across the gravel hill road making an X on a wooden platform half of a half pipe nineteen eighty seven he’s jumping now, shouting “hello! I said, ‘bet you can’t hit me wif a rock!” I palm a flat chunk of asphalt from the edge of the driveway and with no worry I swing my arm back perfect it leaves my fingertips and rotates end over endless end as he jumps as he he jumping jacks as he smiles as he laughs the rock a clay pigeon a UFO a discuss end over endless end a part of the horizon every element star, ghost, music non-mechanized art
it hits his face !154
he drops
falling off the platform into the gravel rolling, screaming, bleeding my uncle was at the window watching, eating a bowl of cereal and now! running to me! without a word milk in his beard clotheslining me into the dandelion lawn a sock’d foot on my chest “what the fuck!” weight presses down wind gone
my brother holding his face sitting up, not screaming not crying, blood everywhere “you okay?” my uncle at his side “noooooo!” “what happened?” he’s looking in my brother’s mouth all baby teeth still there just a cut above the eye “what happened?!?” “I … I … bet him he couldn't hit me wif a rock …” he started hitting my little brother
after that we all went for ice cream.
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Lunch one slice of watermelon, swallowed whole its sweet pink meat, white and black seeds the green rind was gone, already before I got here, don’t look at me like that
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two small packs of unsalted peanuts devoured instantly to think some children die from these I would die for them, I’d kill someone I didn’t know for the privilege to keep eating these peanuts I mean, the salted ones of course
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there is no talk here during lunch that is saved for after lunch
coffee for me, english tea for that guy a soda over there fizzes, I haven’t had a soda since I was a boy, that was this weekend before I grew up, but hey, look at me! black coffee, and for that guy, english tea
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now, the sandwich, today’s sandwich is tuna fish, it’s I think, white albacore and the mayonnaise is 2% milk fat or higher but that's just a guess, I bought it off a silver truck that sells cigarettes, lottery tickets watermelon, peanuts, coffee and english tea donuts, bad salad, sodas, ancient pastries, more after I finish my sandwich, everyone else seems to be done eating too, men all eat at a pretty similar pace trust me, I’ve timed them
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while I sip my coffee I begin to write this poem a man with half a mouthful of ancient pastry asks me, “what you writing?” the scratch off lottery ticket guy looks up “a poem about lunch,” I say “lunch? ha, jesus, nothing else left? only topic?” !156
“I guess so” he stops chewing the pastry, lottery guy stops scratching “read us some”
so I start to read this lunch poem our fattest man, sipping the soda looks away uncomfortably he puts the cap on right away the ancient pastry man is shocked “you’d kill a kid to be able to keep eating peanuts?”
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I continue reading, unabated english tea guy says “my goddamn name is Paul” “I know that, Paul” “and you eat faster than anyone” he says
laughing , fat soda man says “you stink like a bad date—you reek like fish”
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I’d love some more watermelon.
!157
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beautiful weather here you won't find me dead today I'd chew a thousand bullets to no ill effect slip all the knives in I’ll crack up about it tomorrow they say it'll rain we'll see, then.
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Couple Hours Before Memorial Day doves cooed at twilight that's all over now I'm sitting still somewhere in the outside dark little bit of moonlight falling through some black trees frogs, bugs, buzz black powder’d new summer bombs the roll of cars as waves crashing on the two lane highway I'm drinking bourbon and lemon slouched here content music-less couple of those tall saint candles burning.
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Getting Ready for Work took a hot shower with the window open just about to thunderstorm 5am I've been waking up hungover then driving my car to the job but not today it's raining all electric and the earth is drowning gurgling, washing away me too, even behind the ears soaping up everything still haven’t lost any hair in the drain still brush my teeth till I see blood think for breakfast I'll have a beer and go back to bed half wet.
!160
The Medicine I’m On
let’s me see the earth spin like a dime flicked on a glass table the medicine I’m on had me float last night through I’d guess 100,000 waterfalls looking behind each for a beer, or a pit of wishes or even the lost plug to the drain the medicine I’m on whistles at ghosts drinking rain and lets dogs loose from clotheslines or cats skidding in the marble halls of the mountain king the medicine I’m on has no interest in pinball town hall or supermarket death the medicine I’m on glues me down slows blue time, makes me understand that when I’m not sick, I can wrestle a lion, for now, I’ll be over here, on fire hit me with the hose if you can.
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Got Your Filthy Letter
rose petals and ripe berries, bicycle spokes rusting super slowly, got a letter in the box it said, ‘JUST WANTED TO RANDOMLY SAY, HI!’ there was no return address, I’m used to it hot tub chemicals poured in a mud hole earth shaped marbles, juggled rumors of bonus spring, extra moon cats trot home, mouths full of pitted cherries our street remains an easy place to cream mint ice water, sprig of rosemary, peachy skin don’t get sick of dew—hate is empty please, squeeze my average sized lemon, the two thousand and fourteenth year, the sixteenth day my garden gate is open, ripped it down no one been reported killed here for years time will tell.
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!162
See You Next Tuesday
I make some water hot in the microwave and put two green tea bags into my cartoon shark mug then I sit down in the lemon light and sweat it out I hope nothing gets cut off me anytime soon.
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Joybubble 1.
The angel of death kite blew up into a tree outside our window. We first notice it, sideways, while we screw. Uncharacteristically, we stop, and draw the shades.
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2. There is one particular dog, she's one of those hot dog ones, and fast too. Lately when we walk past the dog park, she's in there sprinting from one end to the other, snapping her jaws up, pulling frisbees out of the air. All sun. The boy who throws the frisbees appears to be from Japan. I ask him about the dog, eventually. He says, "Nothing makes her happier than this." I ask, "But what else have you tried?"
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Today I found a YouTube video that will probably change my life. It's instructional, a way to finally air condition the room where I sit and do my writing. (I can't put in a window box AC Unit because the window hangs over the street) (splat!) Here's the trick: Get two buckets, one slightly larger than the other. Place one bucket in the other. Drill a 2 1/4 inch hole in three spots, through both buckets. Step 2, put a frozen one gallon jug inside the inner bucket, stick a small fan (pointed down) into the lid, plug it in. Aim the bucket at your ass, enjoy on a hot day. It's what we call in the biz, Sno King bingo.  
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Typical Weekday I'm too drunk to even submit previously published poems.
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It’s Only July
been hiding behind the waterfall even a dog knows to stay out of the rain been night swimming, been faithful been stone carving your invincible name often I sleep on the lawn after I aim big rocks at the moon and the rocks orbit down onto my head, that's why I was gone why do fireflies glow? just so other things can eat them easier? somebody with seniority grant me the serenity to whatever whatever whatever, I cannot change the calendar changes the ice cream truck evades the fuel gauge dives an orange cat in gloves catches no mice and fuck it, I like mice from time to time, I even leave the waterfall cave, mouse in hand I let it go back to the trees coupon-less, sideways, strange there's no more consequence there's no more wilderness there no more negotiations there's no more gentle prayer there's no more invention or doom or hiccups or dare but plenty of life it's the 4th of fucking July and raining but we're alright.
!166
I can’t teach this tour guide anything but I know the way there are places not like this lift both arms float there had my doubts and fears folded in a wallet I lost worry too, fell out passing through some door for the dog to eat for the birds to sip I’ve failed hard, crashed bad lost foot races against certain statues and I may not be able to teach this tour guide anything but I do know the way.
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!1
Not Just a Mountain the sky right now all renegade clouds fish eggs and ball peen wind sparks on the ridge never knew you well enough never licked stamps for you or lied regular-grade or super-grade in a birthday card get well card X-mas card, farewell card tonight I’ll lie on green grass soggy in the moonlight and sing what I can before everything’s sucked into the volcano.
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The Way I Do The Dishes On Bad Nights in the kitchen doing dishes Wednesday night and I was trying not to drink we have no dog, no house plants no fish or cat or lottery ticket all is right in the laser’s path when I come to a glass I’d like to get drunk out of I break it in the sink then slowly extract all the glass and by then, the feeling has passed.
!3
The Stairs on 238th Street The first time I went to this bar it was midnight, tail end of summer I got off the 1 train and walked with Jon and Ros and my wife. The steps surprised us, appearing like sheer stone vertical hell but we went up, and up dragging ourselves up. On a landing in the middle of the climb, two teenagers were lying down, fully clothed writhing, she was on the bottom he was on the top I could see neither face their faces were pressed together as much as faces can possibly be we climbed the rest of the way and went into this bar and there we stayed, until hours later when the bar closed. On our way back down the steps the teenagers were still there writing on the stairs, she was on top now, gyrating, still fully clothed. That’s my story about these stairs.
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Steps
I was seventeen new license, old car had a g i r l f r i e n d Laura, who’d come over and fuck, if it was safe
but the winter was hard
the house had steep steps going way up that my father refused to salt “it eats the blocks” “I’ll replace them in the spring—swear” “no” he said
the ice was two inches thick I called Luara on her line “sorry, I won’t go up those steps I like being alive”
I tried to melt the mess with a small blow torch but he took it from me “you’ll burn down the house go take a cold shower.”
the night went on I went for a walk a friend had beer up the block when I came home, late my mom was on the couch smoking a cigarette in the dark “your father had an accident on the steps” I laughed “it’s not funny, his feet flew out he crashed all the way down” “where is he now?” “his room” “he’s not paralyzed” !5
“no” “so, it’s a little funny” “go salt the goddamn steps”
sure, but first I rang up Laura.
!6
Blow Stuff Up, Gently.
1. Girls toss marbles at us and we chase them down a thousand stairs, bounding, leaping, hands out as we soar towards the soft marble floor 2. Orange jets floating towards glass clouds, reflects— I’m pretty sure—mountains. Or they’re cloud mountains, not glass at all. Who knows? 3. Destruction is inevitable, I said to the kid at the deli counter. He knows. 4. When I drive my car, I imagine I'm driving towards somewhere with pink fog lying on the surface of the wet bubblegum world. 5 Got my work all done. Froze a bunch of black cherries, so yeah, fine, come on over, I live downstairs.
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Rachel In Her Swimsuit on my way to prison in a gray bus with NO CHANCE stenciled on it my hands shackled together and fixed to a bolt in the floor I'm facing a sentence, 75 to life just up the muddy road I think in the dream, I've killed some other dreamer there's never a feeling like “I've been framed” or anything all I have is guilt for my crime the guard on the other side of the metal gate sits with shotgun on lap dozing off, and the other inmates are wide eyed with dull sorrow too but I always feel like I am the only one dreaming we bounce down the muddy road and the driver gleefully says “Half way there, fuckers!” the shot gun guard snores a man behind me begins to weep and I set my head against the sweaty window and almost cry too but then, outside the window I see my wife, Rachel, in her swimsuit and I feel fine, she's waving to me from the edge of the blue spruce pines she puts a blowgun to her lips firing a series of darts that pop each of the tires of the bus we skid to a hard stop and the driver and the guard !8
get out to look more darts get them in the neck they collapse in the mud and everyone on the bus cheers as Rachel takes the guard’s keys and comes back on the bus to free, as she can, only me.
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terroristic threats muttered under breath
in the worst way, we fail—and no one notices. I spend my days waiting by the unplugged phone. the nights are wide open to shell peanuts, to get kinder, to offer this, to offer that. to break a leg at the lip of a wishing well. to toss a tennis ball at my dented wall.
got a non-love letter, saying our love letters are about to expire.
at dawn it all burns down. we’ve been warned.
you’re there. I’m here. we can’t talk. but I have this brush. I have this bucket. I’ll paint your house red when you’re not home. all I can do.
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Suggestion # 4
don't ask cops for directions if you're hiccuping.
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dear vertigo
are you still getting my signals the machine I use now is as old as snow.
!12
! point taken
I wanna buy Beethoven a beer but they insist I’ve missed my chance, I wanna jump through the ceiling and crash down on another version of the sugar glass floor you can take me or you can tell me to go I’m ambivalent, quiet, neutral but when cornered I sing! that’s a warning shot, man I sing bad, break all your windows and mirrors and lots of bad luck tonight all my heroes are dancing it's enough to make a grown man give up, and in the morning go out and get a real job and stop living in another dimension with clouds kissing all down the front of my shirt and pulling my fly open with their teeth what? you’ve never been felted by a cloud before grow up. I got all my world weariness from the usual hells, ignored them all all the hells, happy to be alive and driving this car covered in bird shit.
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No Matter. the people I know are all going to some place that doesn't exist. hell.
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I'm skipping across the road all torn up under the sideways moonlight.
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when they set you on fire you find out how serious they are. no matter, we eat fire for lunch around here.
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Reading Until I Don’t Fall Asleep I read James Claffey in the bathroom and Ryder Collins, and Nabokav not all of them on the toilet I take long baths, you see read Amy Hempel in the bath tub too book is goddamn destroyed I read Bukowski, Love is a Dog From Hell, while pissing each piss, a poem, standing there paperback in one hand and you get the rest and I read Len Kuntz that way too. Pablo Neurda: also a pisser.
I read Seidlinger at work sitting on top of a tower that boils oil into gasoline, fire shooting into the black starless sky over new jersey and inside a big metal drum I read Meg Tuite, I was supposed to be chipping concrete with a pneumatic gun, but I wasn’t I was reading and pretending so be it, they had a night shift too it was no rush
When I crashed my car, I was reading Raymond Carver, the cop asked “is it at least a good book?” “sad book” “goes well with this ticket then” I was reading Meg Tuite again on the airplane when the turbulence started
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and the lights flashed out and in the dark cabin the family in front of me started singing holy death bible hymns in Spanish I kept reading or I would have cried for my life we survived the book ended good too
was reading Dustin Holland at the doctor’s office when they couldn’t figure out what was wrong with me for the second and third time fourth time I was reading Gay Degani now I’m onto Robert Vaughan they still don’t know what is wrong with me
was reading Merce Rodoreda time of the doves, in the park by my apartment when I was on unemployment have read Fante and Misti Rainwater on state checks too, not to mention Kevin Ridgeway Denis Johnson and Frank Reardon I like being unemployed and being state subsidized to read those books in that park by my apartment more of that please
read Kyle Muntz at the beach got sunburn everywhere except between my toes and my nut sack
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read Ben Loory to my friend’s kid who couldn’t sleep read eight of Aaron Dietz’s books in a yellow chair next to my radiator the radiator was chanting and popping and making a fucking racket occasionally I’d yell at it “shut up shut up shut up!”
read In Watermelon Sugar again last night, did that one again in the bath tub again I’m always doing that In Watermelon Sugar and the motherfucking bath tub again Richard Brautigan probably had a good one he brought into the bath tub too wonder what it was.
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Turn To Stone or salt or a frog a soldier, a college graduate a girl leaning on the pay phone at the truck stop turn to pink pills dart leagues, exploration love in the muddy fields crystals when properly clicked can god-damn-look-at-you you-are-healed! turn to lesser skies, lesser need lesser want lesser bullets broken apart sort the ashes sort the pebbles the fragments, the skulls the skills, expectations, losses long may you return my glance.
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Pow Wow other people don't understand our window, washing machine the trick to the shower how to force open the broken cellar door, cabinet, closet where to find our condoms secret fact, there are none they can't stand in our doorways even, and sigh how we can or find the other shoe the secret sugar, the pink candles playing cards, remote controls maps to wherever the dog ran wish I knew too our sheets could use more bleach and our cops need to get laid in this development, our fortunes are invested in beer we raise our fortunes to you as you walk up the driveway thanks for coming to visit tell me about some things I could never understand.
!19
Crooked Painting
I didn’t do good upstairs the body lying in its nest and the people kneeling saying good bye at the foot of the coffin
I never do too good at these things I walked down stairs away—to a quiet spot
the funeral home was laid out like the maze of the underworld, past the coat closet I found a room marked 'private' and managed without asking for help, to open a stubborn door
inside was an old smoking lobby mostly preserved the way it had been back before I was born and comfort was different I blew dust off leather chairs and lamps made of gold-plated knight’s helmets the otherworldly ashtrays were mortally empty newer signs, warned someone, not me—“NO SMOKING” that’s cute, it’s been saying NO SMOKING since before I was born
It was very dim in there I turned on an extra lamp to make it less creepy
a crooked oil painting !20
leaning off kilter caught my eye it had two boats washed up on the shore, wrapped in seaweed little rowboats nestled together the scene dark and somber seagulls overhead like vultures or I guess sea gulls do the same thing
I got pretty upset again looking at the crooked painting with the rowboats because of course, each empty rowboat represented a person and the people the boats represented were together, in death but that wasn’t the same thing that was happening, upstairs upstairs was all separation we weren’t all there yet, together if we ever would be
I sat on the dusty leather couch wishing I had a shiny red apple or a pomegranate or an answer
the afterlife is a room marked ‘private’ you used to be able to smoke there you can’t smoke there any more so as I left the room I straightened the crooked painting.
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