Lucifer Bass: Poem 04/30/2021

Got a half day at work, so I napped nice and long. Woke refreshed and wrote this poem without expecting to. 

Memory, If Nowhere Else 

Smidge shy of dewy, I think of you

each morning and profane, trudge through

near summer swelter to work and

grin under my mask jackal wide. I get

paid to do this. Lucifer bass on the wall

flaps jingles, jangles on about Heaven

as if the old carp even remembers. 

I remember rock'n'roll. Theaters with

balconies and sex fusing with the silver

screen. I pledged never to forget so 

unstuck in time I write, more film 

than human, more literate than bedwetting. 

As Eve bit the fruit she felt

every flower wilt 

while she savoured bitterness. 

Rats: Public Access Poem 04/29/2018

A productive day, edited the entire blog with the help of a Reddit pal of mine. Read my poems at an online reading, than started broadcasting myself. The chat exploded with rats, demands for rat poems and ideas for rat exploits. I was thrilled to include the lovely and uncanny critters in the blog once again, as rats have always and will always be a motif in my writing. 

Rat Pack Sinatra Sewer Songs (Old Gotham Night Song) 

Ratarch VS the Beguiling Ratguin, 

boom bap fist slaps down North Side

L, you never hear the end of it. 

The rabbits just do yoga and 

watch. Oh this old rag? 

They still print it on bequest

of illiterates. Meanwhile

on the amber screen the clown

painting on the wall is in cahoots

with the clown ink in my skin, 

urging me to smile and never

sink below the atlantic, & never

let lovers into my basement. 

Put the Poem In the Basket: Public Access Poem 04/28/2021

I abandoned the 24 hour broadcast after only twelve and half hours. I had gotten slightly sick, and as I am beholden to none so far as the broadcasts are concerned, I canceled the event. But I was back at it again today - no days off. I had only two words written when I quit last night: "goodbye horses,"  a reference to the classic song. Using those words as a starting point I clacked out the poem below. 

Cue Lazarus 

Goodbye Horses. Tripping over

the red carpet all the way to Oz, 

tin heart roaring in Jack Ruby 

Vans, scattering crows swilling

emeralds drinking Red Bull -

all the while I'm crying over you.

Sputtering syllables must mean something 

if directed at someone. So I lasso the 

twisters with my tongue, crystallize

memories of us and sell them with

tin foil hats and anti-government

bumper stickers. Goodbye Horses, 

I'm crash landing next to you. Each time I get 

lit I miss us. Your aloofness gives me wings. 

The First Days of Summer (I hate It Already) [Second 24 Hour Poetry Broadcast Entry]

The 24 hour broadcast quickly turned into a broadcast from the Twilight Zone, downvotes, strange ambiance all round. Odd tripping and still fifteen hours left to go. The early lines of this poem were partly inspired by someone asking why I enjoyed poetry more than any other medium. The most honest answer is that literature chose me for better or for worse. But here are some other sketches to consider.   

Traversing Yesod 

Imperial intimacy. Tapping the mana of 

radio, waltzing in pentagons in step with

the saddest transmision imaginable. 

Could I provide for the next

American Family? I haven't 

recovered from the fact 

I have porcelain inside my skin, 

if I rupture I splinter from inside. 

It makes me fear my fingers.

Souls without bodies are

feathers on snow, ancestral

freedom: a limb sacrificed 

in this plateau is a hydra

upon the next cornucopia. Hark:

the stirring of UFO ink lakes

muddying the deserts of this nation. 

Where else is there silver dollar liberty

and red blooded conspiracy? 

Jim Sullivan, Christ on a UFO

smoko into eternity, without a trace

the bottle's barely a blip in the grand scheme.   

Second 24 Hour Foray: Part One (04/27/2021)

Decided to do another 24 hour poetry broadcast. Started at 1:17 PM. I was in a more sour mood than I preferred, and ended up snapping at someone in the broadcast for no reason. The Redditor asked that I write a "square" poem as penance. The following five lines are the result. 

The Sea Beckons, Kleos on Her Breath 

I'm used to meeting bullets come sunset.

I switch horses for meat and cabbage. I

use mirrors as confessions, confessionals

as subways and beaches for reading. Heat

and summer leave me wanting. Hail Eris. 

                    ******* (b-side fragment) 

Speak Eros and enter. Sip your teeth

like tea in dreams, you hung dry queens

and twinkish belly flop house deans. 

Peter Benchley Eats Shark Salad For Eternity

Finally made it to my wid-week-weekend, a three day vacation at that. My heart is set on doing another 24 hour broadcast tomorrow - it all depends on how early I wake up. Slow day in Poetryland. 

After The Wreck 

Lately my throat itches when I try to sleep. 

I've been told I look like an overdue chore -

a fine line to describe my lovemaking. 

This pestering acidic itch: could my lungs

be secreting it? My love of all things sly

and aesthetic is turning sociopathic, 

barbs protruding from tolerance

predatory phosphorescence   

smirking downward 

into solipsism

as if I know 

what that

means. 

When the waves chop like this my leg aches.   

Another Live Joint From Chicago: Public Access Poems 04/25/2021

An unexpectedly somber poem considering how generally pleasant my mood was while writing it. Still, the pedestrian life in Chicago is not to be scoffed at. I love this city, skyscrapers and grey souls, tips and moles. 

Loop Jaunt 

I misplaced all colors outside of lime,

the way wise men lived off only thyme 

while numbering the genders of god in

the wild terrains. I've got my moments. 

I tilt as train strains platform. 

The smoke this ride cut short

may have killed me, catching

a lift can save your life if you

live recklessly enough. I comb gnats

with my eyelashes, familiar

faces impossible in my craft:

I recognize the drunk in the Sox cap. 

Keeping away the secret society blues:

A paper bottle and a bike made of tin foil.  

Just Another Poem: 04/24/2021

Somewhat stressful day at work followed by some pleasant hours at home. I wrote the poem below during a series of slowplaced and sweet broadcasts over the interweb. 

Tell All Your Friends 

Time to kick out the jams, 

free gloomy Gus form

nursery cathedral, frock the 

priest until he strips while

the gargoyles ogle and play cards.

Kid, I've been pissed at you

for far too long, sour lines and

disemboweling songs, hallow

tapping on witches' gourd. I might

broom aside a few webs

(all's left of you), as I thump

my wagon up the drive, through

your gate and into a juke and a toke

before I even make time to write you again. 

Two Poems Written 04/23/2021

Meh

Not half faulty for a coin toss.

My beloved wasn't there (a plus)

I made a young stranger laugh

off cuff. 

Meanwhile, Miles Above the Freeway....

Not so much a church bell

but the sprouting of angel

wings, angle tails, combustive

trains. A civilian lollygags into

the middle lane, traffic

clots around him. Bodies

bubble red and a cat fiddles

'top a hot tuna roof. 

Leagues above, a luminarie 

observes and tuts: "Cripes!  

There's no point saving

a single soul now

begotten sons are dime a dozen!"

Nautical Botany Ditty: Public Access Poem 04/22/2021

Nautical botany ditty for you this chicago afternoon. RIP to all the goldfish that had to die so Miley Cyrus could create Her Dead Petz and ascend to Ziggy Stardust godform levels of cosmic influence.  

What's Kraken, Jimmy Buffett? 

Dandelion afternoon, useless

and multi wondrous. I weed my

liver of your sacraments - I need

my hull optimal for these penultimate

leagues. I mark my log with your

petals - a habit given to scurvy 

no fruit allotted by god will cure.

Polly, sand the bottle, prepare

our packet. X the map, dust

my jacket. Cast the bottle on

twilight tides, patch my eyes

against Federal Cheron, I will

not be taxed by styx or squid. 

Guffaws denote where my treasure's hid. 

RIP Casa Bonita: Public Access Poem 04/21/2021

I passed many starry eyed childhood afternoons at Casa Bonita, famed whimsy house of Colorado. I never lived in Colorado, but I had close family there, and we would go to Casa Bonita nearly every time we visited. Someone in my broadcast told me that the restaurant had filed for Bankruptcy. Do not go gentle into that good night, Casa Bonita. The people love you! How would South Park remain relevant without you? Capitalism devours another cherished offspring.    

Song for Casa Bonita of Denver 

Don't shutter your fuchsia doors,

Circus of the Rocky Mountains!   

As a child my uncle told me of

monsters chained in your basement -

I wholeheartedly believed him. 

How could I not? After all:

Freerange grizzly terrorizing diners,

men plunging from impossible heights

all while you ate? You kept the west alive. 

Don't let the lavender campfire outlaw kitsch

die out! 

On the bus, headphones busted, the man

repeats: "Everything ends. That's in the bible:

everything ends." 

Blaze It: Public Access Poem 04/20/2021

Terror and Heartbreak at 420,000 Feet

I sleep and gaze upon splattered

mess halls while I film you showering

bullets, planes gyre on the football 

field while you rinse my smell off your

nakedness. Drench the towel while I 

adjust my rifle, spliff cliff hanging from 

lips never to be kissed again by you or any 

god-forsaken sprite. 

Airborne on, I follow the stewardess

to rear of the cabin, back when smoking

was permitted among the clouds. I read her 

this poem, joke about napping. "If only

I could sleep on my feet while we flew." 

She arches her eyebrow, looking at you

passed out in the seat. "Over easy?

Or scrambled?" Diner slang for fidelity. 

"Sister," I sip, "I was never once sure." 

The captain alerts last call to her wife &

you stir.   

Sketch: Public Access Poem 04/19/2021

Had a bad day but a great broadcast. Spent so much time chatting and reading the tarot that I hardly had time to write. Even so, I present this small scrap for your inspection. 

Fragment 

Fresh out, left with a partially

lit bulb. Elevator peeping up

at the thirteenth floor. I've got

nowhere to go but work. Hex

upon the lips of all allies - 

pawn your king for a rook. 

 

A Poem Written A Few Nights Ago

Train Feather 

These periods where sleep sloughs into

gutters, evaporating while I centended with

recolations of prosceniums and false flags

from you. I don't feel literate until I'm on

the L, pricking against the dicks 

and shouldn't I clock in for this? I'm 

standing. What happens the first time

I need to knock off early? 

Sunny Side Up: Public Access Poem 04/17/2021

Had a good morning and a terrible afternoon. As I fixed drinks and cracked open oranges, the cover art for Supertramp's Breakfast in America floated into mind. In a dream I dwelt on the perfect kitsch of that album, while serving the most important meal of the day in the country's third largest city. When I got home my mood soured considerably. I was swamped with loathing for the whole business: food, literature, metropolis, racist cops killing with impunity. The result of that bitterness is the following poem. I felt much better after finishing, as is blissfully typical. Still, the poem can be read as what I imagine could be going through the waitresses' head on the cover of that oldie Supertramp record.  

Breakfast in America I

My teeth should be paste - 

I milk them like big pharma. 

Christ in hell what a Breakfast.

I kept engineering the slow

painful death of those around me,

forcing each sharp object I touched 

deep into every pair of eyes I met. 

Wanton thirst for misery so early; 

Chicago was always known for pulp. 

OzO: Public Access Poem 4/16/2021

Oswald Practices/Locker Room Talk  

Ozzy Oswald aims right for the feels. 

His shoulder lurches, one with the kickback. 

So she may wish - in textbook reality Ozzy

fails across the Depository after first shot.

Safety in numbers: no one saw. 

She reapplies her gait before

making tuna and crackers look 

dainty downstairs. Soon as she sees

Ruby it's all jockular liberal Masculinity,   

Ozzy hasn't the phallus for it. There must

be a third pronoun, putting

from 'top the grassy knoll. Wouldn't 

god plan if we laugh so often? Oswald

hears affirmation pot&pan slicing the din

in sports bars where the politicians make children

safer food handlers.    

The Loneliness is Inferred: Public Access Poems 04/15/2021

This first poem came from a question in a Reddit reading. It was an unprecedentedly lively broadcast - I wish I had more energy to enjoy it.   

Upon Being Asked About Recurring Themes In My Work 

Themes? Someone pipes:

"Do you have any poems

about a mental state?"

Do my poems appear

to be about anything else?

Fair as a flipped coin:

How did I arrive here,

on whose dime burning

what fuel? I was plucked. 

Ask what tune? The needle

hisses to a stop. 

Meanwhile, East of Eden....

Gadianton Crop Circle XXXIII 

Are you jack Mormon enough

to wed Jodi Arias? This winter

I trudge up the side of mount 

Preposterous to meditate aside the

waterfall lap of Eris, midst roaring

twenty first twenties these. Ponderences 

answered defeat my whole purpose,

defined as you like. Stay mute, maestro -

your refracted soul elected silence over

chastisement iterations ago. Daymare 

visitation of the unfaithful wendigo. 

Leave my old flames at the stake, 

Joan let slip her number; Prestige's 

blown. Can you still not stand to see

me in discomfit, oh peach tree in twilight?  

Poetry Palooza: the Final Countdown (04/14/2021)

After a brief nap early in the am I woke to discover the broadcast had crashed. I revved it up again, and starting clacking away again. 

Four Flags in Tatters (summer pastiche)

Perpendicular water wings help disembowel

the Hays code: with sex deleted entirely

America will feed their children to hellmouths 

on the Fourth of July. 

Not bad considering how many

mothers ingest gerbils over OJ garnished 

ruminations about devouring young

blood over granola. 

Steve Martin never talked to a pink panther.

Made me muted for a second.  

My spirits were lifted: split my tab:

Baltimore channelling 

Clouseau & Cousteau & Barnes 

& Noble.

Bat Country Sabbath: the VVitching Hour (Approx. 10 hours left in 24 Hour Poetry Palooza)

I woke at noon yesterday refreshed - the pleasure of indulging in sleep without wasting the day. 

Random fragments sparsely written over a three hour sporadic game of good tune bad tune - where a best of out of three has to decide if the next song I play is a good song or a bad song. People sometimes try to play the grey area card, the Tommy Wiseau card.* That is the whole point of the game. The turns rest on imagining, based on songs I picked prior, what I would deem a good song or a bad song. I did this for a spell, and wrote the lines below as night embraced Gotham fully, than departed by cab. I hear birds killing worms all up and down my block. We still have the light of day to get through, comrades. 

Racecar Pullup

I'm tripping on the numerology now alright. 

What in all of all the counties of Illinois, 

fallen from so queer a star as hell, rain like

great responsibility falls whenever a disposable

moralist bites the dust. 

*A long time ago I sent Tommy Wiseau an email asking about my poetry and writing in general. He never wrote back. Nevertheless, The Room was a titanic influence on this blog.  

Long Highway Ahead: Poetry Palooza Part 2 (04/14/2021)

Side Stage: Wrote this poem about six hours into Poetrypalooza. 

IDK I Never Finished Babbitt

I try sometimes to please the crowd

but crickets play on anyhow. Chaplin 

Chapman enters the chat, shrunken

head of an alleycat on her breath,

O'Malley Babbitt blowing where the 

weeds grow fresh. Manufacturing 

lyres from the reeds 'longside the 

bivouac. The prim polite party line

to violence in popular art: 

glad I don't biff life like that.

The First Four Hours: 24 Hour Poetry Palooza Part One (04/13/2021)

In honor of my two month anniversary of Reddit broadcasting I decided to do a 24 hour marathon. I began at 3:30 PM. I'm writing these words approx 30 minutes into the ordeal. Let us see where the public access caterpillar takes us. 

The first poem was written about an hour into the broadcast, and revised over the next couple of hours. I was going to continue it but u/Deer-Antler, a regular RPAN legend, recommended I leave it as is. It marks the appearance of a new character in this blog: the Backward Mask: caped book detective, silent sometimes like the letter 'E'.  

Walrus Magick Bullet Theory 

What television dares to tune into

the lakeluster hearts of men? The Backward

Mask knows. Stairway to Babylon, only

Manson and Brian Beach Bum foresaw

what the '60's did to the backyard zoo

community. 

It's only human to whip up a golden 

anchorperson while the messiah's on smoke 

break. Did Chapman get Paul & Lennon?

MKUltra-fame choreographed decades apart?

I'm just asking questions. Continuity? You're thinking of

philosophy.

I don't fuck with that.   

A little later I got adolescent nostalgic and wrote the following ditty. 

Little Domestic Slice 

Splatter brained, listening to KRS-One and

missing South Africa. Poetry and citizens

engaging in preemptive strikes outside 

711's near the south Loop.  

This other private dick I know we 

have our own assumptions to disprove. 

What makes the bus late midweekday? 

Starving mouths are inquiring.

Plug 

My best pal from High School is a gonzo

journalist in NYC. Better than this dump,

Club Silencio for chumps: israelthepoet.

blogspot.com. Shout out J in New York.  

I am Izzy's Public Transit Poem 04/12/2021

Not Another CTA Antipoem 

Gooncraft of the highest order. Some 

trapezoid had the gall to cringe at my

greasepaint, or perhaps it was my cigarette. 

How you walk looking sideways, jack? We're 

swinging round the Loop, gawk at the sunset. 

A beat & I catch the caterpillar immediately,

like god gave me a maggot straight from her heart. 

I'm writing about kitchens every day now. Figures

given the Palahniuk pickle I've got in my mouth. 

The only thing artificial about me is what 

I put in the drinks - I smell like vodka 

all morning but I'm pure cellophane,

wrapped around the nozzles after last call.

I glub like a goldfish all the way home, 

to write yet another public transit poem.

Drizzle Day, Dream Away: Public Access Poems 04/11/2021

Was in a particularly sour mood while at work. Must have had to do with all the lemons I had to slice.  

Jerky 

Given that you just pulled a stool out

your ass we might as well sit and hash out

our silverware, light some candles to cut

back on gas prices. Zampano, alert the newspapers!

    Give the press a beer and let

    them talk amongst themselves,

    I have clouds to watch and you

    emails to worry about. 

Previously on lost: someone

decided to pitch a Midwestern 

Manhattan and we got smoke

spines here, bible sales charisma 

    down deep in the wazoo,

    this blog's for the people

    who keep the L smelling of

    dope, use it to sleep or smoke, 

any cats on leashes may mishappen be to be 

skyrocketing under the city this misbegotten 

Wednesday. I muttered "I love 

this here city," driver just laughed.

    He's the third cabbie to announce himself

    as "the only driver who will go to the south 

    side" this year. People talk about violence

    in Chicago like they do the weather.

I told the driver I wanted to die here,

after a bostaurus stretch 'cross the third coast.

A pause preceded a terse laugh. 

Battling radio silence - a real windy pro.  

VHS Pity Party: Public Access Poems 04/10/2021

The same fellow who asked for a dinosaur poem asked for a poem for DMX. The following poem was composed while listening to Flesh of My Flesh, Blood of My Blood. 

RIP DMX

Death of a poet, Jove struck. 

Gurney purgatory - perplexing

fate for such so gritty a Dante. Few can 

practice goetia convincingly while

still flashing such a stern grin...

Lately when I think of you

Cesar Vallejo kicks the bucket. 

Later on this parcel appeared. It contained a VHS which I could not watch as I have not the equipment, but the cover art and blurb inspired the poem below. I could not make out the director, as the packaging was waterlogged, but I suspect Steve Miner was involved.   

Stay Gold, Sunshine Over Sleepover Lake 

                I- Childish Things and Fate 

I've adjourned in your honor,

in spite of myself. You think the

magi ever forgot the star, though

doubt moves through time

like a shark in chum? No dice,

no rocking horse or nutcracker -

free this basement of trifles. No

more of that - strictly business. 

So managerial - I hardly qualify 

as a service animal, so how could

you keep me inside? 

            II- The Old Gas Station Attendant's Warning 

Like naming a lake 'Placid':

you are just asking for trouble. 

But oh, how the sun demystifies

the green. Cafes 'round

this time make me wish I still

glanced your eyes looking for me. 

Lurching through the woods, 

final girls get all the boys. I have

been leaving messages in Goosebumps -

do you read? I know you do - no one

recites scary stories like you do.

I may die missing you, exactly as you are. 

Manager Meeting

Ahem 

If we require requirements 

then I propose we all wear 

sunglasses inside - and leave it at that. 

Funny Papers: Public Access Poem 04/09/2021

Campaign poem, poem about poetry and bum trips. Woke up on the wrong side of the bed on my day off. How many poets does it take to screw up screwing in a light bulb? One, but they will complain the whole time. Wrote this poem comparing my Reddit readings to Garfield the Cat's song and joke routine from the ol' funny papers. 

Garfield's State of the Union Address

Haughty suburbia, hold your scorn

if only for a second! I present to you a

heartland offer, your evening for a 

song! Pass the time with feline girth

and pooft topped by an Illinois lunar

eclipse of the banjo mantras, the kind

of cheep salvation akin to reading

Genesis hungover or Ecclesiastes lit.

All for the price of a shave and biscuit,

gravy rhythm collides on the turnoff -

hey wilde cat, don't you need some of this? 

I can mew your maidenhead back, but 

save your wishes for Father Christmas,

sledding down the short stack, monkey paw

in place of his hand. 

After I wrote the poem above a fellow stopped my my reading. It turned out he hailed from Mongolia, a country I lived in for two years. Before leaving they told me to be strong like a Mongolian horse, something that touched me. 

Mongolian Horse Verse

Pale mare: soot mane thunders across

the plains, bivouac pack weaving

throat lyrics across the hills, elevating

the snowy peaks, reuniting Prometheus

with the snow and mud. 

Wet Mop in April: Public Access Poem 04/08/2021

Poem composed throughout the day. Oh, April you have winded me. I'm exhausted, but writing all the time nevertheless. Whoever is reading this, you keep me alive. 

I Try Not to Miss Anyone. 

I step off the L into downtown Pompeii. 

The groupthink garden had BTK special:

breakfast serial of your choice plus some

Cheesehead doctor's master thesis on Sadism

as Nun Worship in 18th century France. Inside

each box was a Kansas CD, a mop top kit and

a pair of Chaplin pants. I adorned the mop and

trousers, used my past pair to parachute down

ninth until I reached the lake. 

Pawn sacrifice the kisses and smoking in bed - 

once besmirched, loan sharks mostly move back east, 

gradually selling off strips of their social security for 

spliff filters. I mix cocktails before noon, bulldoze 

the afternoon into splinters. Who knows what evil

lurks in the hearts of your replacements for me?    

Two Poems Live from Chicago: Public Access Poems 04/07/2021

A Redditor in my broadcast, u/subsuburban, asked for a haiku, based on the prompt 'curfew'. I told them, naturally, that despite my love of haiku I did not think I could compose one under pressure, so I offered a tercet instead. Below is the product.   

Curfew Tercet 

Easy to sleep aware

government is endangering -

strangers past twelve.  

At the start of my broadcast I wrote the first line of the poem below, and after the tercet I typed about the next few lines. Finished it up the following afternoon. I think this whole post could be safely deposited in the Oswald file. 

The Pain's Worse than the Hangover, Ye 

Got myself a nearly full bowl and a heavy heart 

plus a keyring to a dumpster behind the Chortle 

Shuttle: a humanitarian centipede always tap 

prancing on big shots; a heedless bivouac, clammy

hands across the nation. The think tank with that

awful slogan: WHEN ANY OF US PUBLISHES

WE ALL PUBLISH - what a crockpot. I fired

my last editor with buckshot then subscribed to

Eurydice's OnlyFans & she turned to a pillar of salt. 

I used it to ganish coffee where I work. Got tipped

by bacon in a big truck, took a smoke break and 

the sun was lime under the Green Line. Returned

back to work in time to discover I had lost my

sense of commerce. It's hard to work for tips

after the jury ordered just deserts.

You Son of a Gunn, I'm In: Public Access Poem 04/06/2021

Clacked out this poem after a morning at work: my first shift more or less on my own behind the bar. On the L home I found a strange booklet detailing a feline worshiping cult that has a building on Fullerton group. In purple ink was written this poem; best as I could decipher it.  

Poem Found Written On the Back of a Secret Society Recruitment Pamphlet 

Rackett ship ignite, an Orwellian

cab capitan, swill and swerve sort

eternally typewriter equipped before

that was professionally possible. 

Desowing hoosegow and usurping

the chapels, windmill tilting until

you devour your tongue and topple

from your soapbox - stripes of thus

pretermodern creed I ilk to preserve. 

We don't ID, it interferes with ego birth. 

Picture a house cat in a flapper dress - it'll

last a thousand apocalypses, persist 

past any Patmos Vision. It won't 

eat all the blueberries, like April

tends to. Skin that cat and turn it into 

a sports coat, bookmark or flyleaf; 

perpetual uses for domestic 

pelts. So many styles in wearing

feline furs - the last pure grift:

swindling red paint from bored empaths. 

Stay Noided

I wrote the first draft of this poem a week or so ago, and read it on a broadcast to some fanfare. I was enthused enough with the premise and response to let the poem gestate, and spent this afternoon retooling it. I've grown fond of it.  

Poets of the 21st Century, All Our Heroes Were Paranoid       

The plexiglass covering my third eye

keeps ordering London Fogs. I suspect 

it has to do with plans for our remains -

the aspiration is to have my skeleton

hung in classrooms so when kids 

ask if I'm real the teacher can say 

"Yes." Proffer some sense into the

husky instructors, already so aware of 

death. Preter-occupational hazard.

What sort of sick nation

demands the masses shell out

for a vocation as transgressive as

high school English?  

An honest to ghost skeleton

not just in the labs but every

library and auditorium. 

That's my platform; horizon

of the pyramid. Kids being

mistaught how to read is 

the only thing keeping society 

together - Illuminati funds  

 

the strain of thought that frets 

& writes letters. What nature

of cyclopes would expose 

part of themselves daily,

dare to watch the throne

space? There's gotta be

a phantom casting

this opera somewhere,

nauseated at his own libretto. 

Thesaurus Rex: Public Access Poem 04/04/2021

A regular at my readings asked me to write a poem about dinosaurs. It was a tall glass of water after being on my feet working behind the bar all morning. For those out of the loop, Sue is a Dinosaur who haunts the Field Museum here. I did indeed get to see her the year first met the public, so this poem gets the red tape of FACT wrapped around its neck.     

Poem for Sue the Dinosaur: Foe of Despair (may this city always be a home worthy of her)

The first time I came near the Loop 

I saw Sue. I was six, mollusk sized,

but even my father was taken aback

by the predatory indifference implied

in her yonic sainthood. Death crowned 

immortality like a top hat, Tyrannosauruses'  

last stand against the skyscrapers. That was that.

I wasn't much of a dino kid: I preferred

Art over Field. American Gothic precocious

even at that age. The pre-apocalyptic 

canon that inhabit these museums

never took their eyes off me.

Blume blossomed something

in my liver no academy can fix.

Odd I don't remember Dorian.  

Onwards after that, Gotham meant

two things to me: art

and fangs, gridlocked. Whimsical

bloodlust strictly American. I moved

to Chicago nearly two years ago -

my opinion remains unchanged. 

April Blues: Public Access Poem 04/03/2021

Today was sunny but I wrote a rainy poem, late at night/early morning. I like how the poem came out shaped like the Hancock building, though any semblance is subliminal (as is always the case with the Hancock Center).  

Blue Watercolor in 15 Lines 

Heartsweat cools air across the midwest. 

Like dune spice, lungs wither upon

parting from so pregnant a perfume. All

roads lead to the Loop. Patroclus, Lily, 

I miss the figure eights you skated 'round

my heart last May. Bitterness laces every

habit, your letterhead callous while ever

empathic. Even laying together in public

I shook with doubt, too afeared not to ask. 

Equivocal devotion while slamming about 

in tin teacups. Premeditated care, penmanship 

you could only call love. My suspicions twined

asunder when you asked me to dance. Lies told

in airports always remind me of Casablanca - 

how could you? 

Call me Israel: Public Access Poem 04/02/2021

Poem written over the course of my first day off from the new job. I've had a fascination with Moby Dick for as long as I can remember. Today turned out to be an Ahab day, out here on the third coast. 

Whalesong   

Picture the purest whale, scarred, 

enriched and battled, an entire betallian 

scattered upon her hulk. Greet

her rendered in her own bone. 

Preserved trophy, immortalized

ivory beyond literacy - ultimate

iteration of the devourer,

memorialized in her own tooth, agape

forever yawning, abyss incarnate. 

She swallows every sailor she passes. 

She lives elsewhere - gliding

through the collective trauma seamen's 

lucid buoyhood. Right good eye 

gleans the bountiful ruins of Atlantis 

while left wrong eye wide alert for tentacles.

A man carved tentacles into her tooth. 

They have not reached her, but they

are legion; she is distracted by

the dingy sliding down her gullet, 

right eye on the captain. No hope for 

seafaring men down below, none for her. 

The sea is equal, lunar justice. She itemizes 

Ragnarok, posing adjacent to a mermaid portrait.   

She is without time now. Mascot of the local ale 

house passed between drunken sailors, intoning 

shanty stations of the cross, dismembering  

cabin boys and masticating Machiavelli forever. 

Even men in lighthouses fear her. Not a sailor 

remembers her and loves the sea in her absence. 

Nightly they come to the house of ails 

to swim without fear of drowning. 

Who's the Fool Now, April? Public Access Poem 11/24/1963

Happy poetry month, the thirty day period of solemn remembrance for those foolish enough to read poetry. Also the start of the Tarot. 

Oswald Over Lunch

Beltane crowns the Clown Prince

    with entomologic ease. Oswald 

rises early enough to note his eyes

    are the same color as an old flame's. 

He would drink some tonic but instead

    he uses the spark to light a cigarette in the shower. 

The gold leaves of his bible rust in real time. 

Ozzy buries the golden bible in the upstate

    corner of the Book Depository basement. 

Over lunch he notices a Zodiac cypher reading

    "MANTICORE SMOKES: BETTER THAN

A HOLE IN THE HEAD" and he would have 

    laughed but there was no moon. Ruby 

Rosebud: "Hey what's so quackin', man?"

Oswald is no man so she says nothing.