Results for category "2012"

Shape changers

                 1.

Your mother, your father, were born to die
I feel for that family, I sure do
Collector of stamps, ancient histories, butterflies,
he doesn’t hang on or let go

Marred from the start by
the terror of clowns, memoirs, circuses, book-covers,
makeup, summaries, sweet smelling soaps, prickly plants,
and sweet, sweet cologne

He laughs, he always laughs
Perspiration positively drips off of him
The blandest food makes her sick
More spice, more spice, she insists

He’d carefully analyze the forbidden
Once you see it, you can’t unsee it
Once you say it, it’s never unsaid
Never enough time, time slips by

                2.

Vitriolic soldiers, venal politicians
impress themselves with the justice of their cause
After victory they’ll throw the enemy corpses in the river
We’ve seen it all before, they call it democracy

They’ll make themselves popular, yes they will
They’ll celebrate the innocence of children in speeches
They’ll make a show of help for the old in the public square,
and in front of the television cameras they’ll hand out baskets of sweets

They’ll give themselves medals of honor,
make speeches and get rich and for years
their mediocrity will prevail
like a series of scratches, one itch after another

Death is a terrible thing without pity
Nature is essentially cruel
The river runs over the innocent and the dead
These ashes aren’t my mother, this dust isn’t me

                 3.

He would pursue the butterflies and knew
you can hold their shapes in an instant, their vividness,
their ancient colors, their spines, in a net and with pins
They’re shape changers just like him

We escaped the Bolsheviks, then the Nazis,
each by a matter of hours
She never said essential things about
the wind, changeability, her death, or my father

The Rabbi sits on the couch with the
grief of the children next to him,
with dignity, kindness, comfort, and sympathy, he knows
this isn’t a time for his philosophy or empty explanations

Failure is the boundary
Our shape changers make these masks, those freaks
If we realize some good things alive, we seek for concordance,
the invisible, the absurd, the bizarre, the unique

                 4.

He valued each person he talked to
Don’t worry, this time you’re perfectly safe
He would rather hurt inside than hurt you
This life has too many hurts

The violence of fatigue, separation
Failure by fatigue isn’t predictable precisely
We only really know how long it will last
when it breaks

He barely knew them and didn’t remember their names
Concrete floors pound his feet all day
He carries 50 lbs. bags of chemical alloys,
inhales the foul air,

and will last until he breaks
Here’s what’s true –
he left faint marks in red clay and then
changed shape

-July 29, 2012-

That subtle seer

Okay, they numb themselves
That’s how they do it
They’re numb most of the time

The seer says to him:
“Your joys will be as intense as grief
What you want you shall get, but late to middle age”

This light, this dark, it all streaks
We ate red beans and rice
I did never forget it

He lived in eventful times
but didn’t lead an eventful life
An odd bright sky, light blue and pink

Continual rejection at first, memories of
leaves, fruit, wood stains and bark—family and art,
after that, everything’s a bit dim

It’s the audience that should cry, not you
You smile all the time, you sing and joke—you can sing
He never wore the troubled face

He likes his pleasures but knows when to say no—
He told me women can be peculiar, some fickle sometimes
That it’s always best to have at least two who you are fond of

He wore those thick-sole shoes,
the kind policeman wear
Nothing’s easy when you’re poor

But it would get in your head, blow that gold horn man, hear it—
It could startle, make wild ribbon-like paths in your mind
It comes from his heart and stays way beneath your skin

Let’s sense the unexpressed violence
She doesn’t like to see the fish head so keep it in the kitchen man
We’ll take your word for it—the fish here’s fresh

We shared a glass of wine with water that day
Maybe soon, her vindictive ways will change
Here treachery is so normal

Her dad doted on her when he saw her
but he was drunk most of the time
and died before she was nine

That subtle seer, she wants him to give her three ingots of gold
and a little bit of rare perfume to help fight these evil ways
She’ll supply the magic rocks for free

-July, 1, 2012-

Some observations

                1.

Like a dog before he snarls
in that brief notion of transformation
so familiar perhaps, to butterflies

He likes her big freakish breasts (enhanced?)
and ardent sexual ways
But why should she care?

The terror of the plane’s gunner never leaves
I didn’t like or hate him, he was Dad
Dad was a bit of a hot head, mean and bland

It’s a given isn’t it?
You have it and you can’t imagine
the feel of its absence, its nothing

It will swerve in a different way, change course
Emptiness isn’t absence
Merely human, almost brave and persevering

                2.

The whole damn island was blown away
The coral became a furnace
The pilot’s body never found

Fond of intellectual puzzles, mechanical tinkering
and long distance running
Soldiers aren’t paper, combat isn’t a board game

He had his eyes dead on her
like she was diamond
When it’s once said you don’t get to unsay it

Self indulgence exceeded only by self-admiration
The water, seemingly still, vibrates between us
Each creature a caricature, an exaggeration

She takes the knife, she cuts at his heart
He spits at her face
We were never a couple, she told him, soon after

                3.

Dabbler, amateur, moron...
If you listen even a little bit they will tell you
of all the vile troubles that permeate each life

“I can’t hear youuuu” she mocks into the phone
Suffering isn’t moral, poverty doesn’t ennoble
Optimism’s a joke we tell, to impress one another or sell

The mediocre take refuge in obfuscation and omniscience
“I can’t hear you!!!” she screams
She has a malformed heart incompatible with life

The less truth the more ceremony, the more lies, the more formality
Her speech though kind of slow, kept up with her thoughts
She repaid his kindness, just so

He remains unbroken...
They seemed then alien, harried and rude, if honest
He couldn’t see the beauty in it then

-May 27, 2012-

Fighter Man 2

“PIZZA!!..What ya doing with that Pizza?”
Me and my roommate, we used to buy a bunch of fast food
One day we were walking home with our pizza
The fried chicken guy saw us
He ran from his store and said, loud:
“PIZZA!!...I have children to support
What ya doing with that, where ya goin’ with that pizza?”

I didn’t do anything wrong
I didn’t drive her away—she left
You learn only from doing, from each
fight, a little bit from each
He was known as the “hit man” the “invincible”
You got to find the “tell” and when you’re antsy nervous
you’re ready—that doubtful, antsy fighter feeling

The stream is narrow and I can just lift my foot across
The mud crumbles on each bank, so I slip
My new white sneakers are wet or will be—the water seeps in
I feel nothing, no sensation and stare at the old stream from above
Small acts of kindness may be all that he can see or grant
If he steps inside, strategy wise, those long arms
with their violent reach won’t touch him

They objected all of them—didn’t think we really loved
As it turned out, they were right about you...
He was a little difficult at times, but affable a great deal of the time
He told his daughter how none of the great things in life
have anything to do with earning a living
The marker was on the ground where it lay untended
The name on the dilapidated stone hidden under brambles

Don’t put on airs, bitch, you’re a shoemaker’s daughter
and I’m a farmer’s son—every job after the farm seems good to me—
every new job beats the hell out of shoveling shit...
Honest as they had to be, dishonest as they dared to be
with a rage at the fortuity of life, all that dullness and greed
I might of meant that at one time she said, but I don’t mope about it or lash out
She smiles at him, “No one before you ever did that for me”

Real fighters don’t fight ‘cause they’re mad, they fight ‘cause they can
“Should we stop the fight?”
“Well, his tongue is hanging out of his mouth, he’s drooling and his eyes are white...”
She was nuts—every headache was a brain tumor, every upset stomach an ulcer,
every cold a rare case of pneumonia...
He didn’t hold it against her that she was always scared
He loved her anyway quite deeply

How, after he’s gone, does she know what to like, what to disdain?
Ill health and financial pressure would sometimes eat at his self-control
Don’t cast me aside, she said, don’t even try...
In his 20’s he fell off his horse and nearly died
It felt like sleep, death is like sleep, he’d say
He was a good man to have around in a tight spot, no fear...
Always calm when the shit hit hardest, then always calm, she told me

-April 22, 2012-

A Portrait

                1.

This isn’t what was supposed to be
See you again sometime, ducky, perhaps— goodbye
I don’t know why I thought I could ever be happy here
How fast does this river go?
I can never tell how fast

Racing is death—
the horses always die
Injustices here, there and powerless—
it wears at him
He starts to perform, then looks to escape

All that remains of their former lives
are here within these eggy walls
with their dullish, dirty off-white glow
A life, so far, of compromises and small victories
encased in this stylish, finely, shined armor

He’s here with the blood-suckers,
the crucifiers, carnivores, and swindlers
Defeat after the daring, costly, ruinous campaign
brings his well wrought verbal resignation
But almost getting it done only heightens his longing to stay

This guy, he’s got a high threshold for pain
You should be cautious here because
he won’t feel anything then, no regrets...
Just to see the things he goes through everyday—
even his most spiritless friends are anxious

                2.

Fog in the morning, a little
before first light, blurry
astonishes, distorts the full moon view
Even the smartest of us
continually make significant mistakes

The plumbing’s old, leaky
The skylight’s uneven, wrongly placed
There are still some lines he holds dear and
stands behind—progress is his lie,
his tomorrow is no better than today

She was disappointed as she watched him shave
She never envisioned him that way
The woman he loved thinks less of him again
Hard wired to believe something, anything
they say they know everything about him

They spoke of their illnesses and the illnesses
of others like a couple of old men
When the work’s complete it’s complete
The foolish wish continues
like some old-fashioned, overused algorithm

She really loved funerals, this woman
He didn’t like people much
He was always welcome, always went through the club
He spoke to everyone but you never made
a real friend of him, let’s put it that way

                3.

When she wants to charm she smiles
When nervous she pulls at her hair
They wanted what they wanted and didn’t care
about each other’s complex motives or their consequences
He didn’t get back for the first crack but then he went halfway back

He has close friends or no friends
He loved a good story but wouldn’t tell one
His old teacher’s teacher told him “You kids don’t
enjoy sex the way we did—you don’t think it’s a sin”
Sometimes the wise also failed him

Helpless doctors, tests and crisis, exhaustion, emotions large
too large to bear, determination, confusion, anger – her caustic desperations
Alone, deep within, hidden, overlooked among millions, forgotten
Rationally it’s false, but emotionally—that’s different
Discomfort and depression were among her constants

He could entrance you but only if he meant to
He wasn’t a briefcase, take home the work kind of guy
He was very good at his particular line
Very good at a narrow, complex field
with huge sums of money at risk

If he didn’t want to do other things we understood
That was his privilege
He wanted wealth, social position, servants, travel but only incidentally
That’s a beautiful rug, I said to him just to talk
Look at it, that’s fine, but don’t walk on it, he told me

-March 25, 2012-