brother

you left when I was eight to be with your father

I sat at your desk--in the country,
by an oiled gravel road in a wooden house
in a dank basement-- and let the lamp light your papers
your drawings
your precise
your signed and dated

I undid your locked box
the one you made of cheep wood and a dollar lock
I found your porn
your not even porn just ads trying to sell porn
a breast, stars covering the other place

you left when I
had no door to walk through
played on the stairs
hung down arm stretched out like Stallone in Cliffhanger

commandeered your dinky cars
your stinking smell
your Peanuts bed sheets

Just Simply

Gawd loved the little children
He made them a fence to keep them from trouble.
Troublesome, troublesome kids.

Gawd loved the little children
And told them to keep off the trees.
Oh the fall, the fall.

Gawd loved the little children
He only smacked there little hands when they done bad
But what he could have done!

Gawd loved the little children
He did it to himself don’t you know.
On a hill. He done what he coulda done ta them.

But spare the rod spoil the god
Isn’t that what they say?
They say Gawd works in mysterious ways.

They say it takes Gawd only six days
What takes them Atheists zillions.
And all dem bones, all dat bull.

Gawd loves the little children.
To the museum He takes them
To learn the lie.

Gawd loves the little children
Home schooled Jesus
Wrote the textbooks Hisself.

Genesi One s’all you need
Leviticus 20: 13 I don’t mean to be mean
I just read the page, I just read the Word.

Gawd loves the little children
That’s why he can clear the land
That’s why he can move the armies.

Gawd loves the little children
And when those boys love eachother more than friends
Gawd is an envious Gawd


And when they keep the oil to themselves
The black gold, made over millions of years, so they say
Gawd hates injustice

Gawd loves the little children
When they follow his precepts
When they don’t love too much
When they keep back from the fence
When they don’t fall far from the tree
(But he only spanks their little bottoms if they do)
When they don’t go an do like Eve.
When they just simply read these words.

heat

you radiate.

with the friction
it’s unbearably

warm. we curl up
we touch knees

I think of all the times I’ve done this with other people

no one.

now back to back
my spotted touches your perfect white

at least no one who counts.

so much depends upon

so much depends
upon

a Grande Caramel Macchiato
iced, extra drizzle

cubes of purified water
splash in the white milk

layers of civilization
distillation, bovine secretions

the yield of so many
farms

steam-driven into
tiny glasses

trapped inside a clear
cup

thinly glazed with
perspiration

I’m so very glad
everybody has one

I post this poem to commemorate leaving Starbucks, for good this time...

The echo's of Willam's poem The Red Wheelbarrow are purposeful. I love his poem but wanted to express a negative image of it with his piece.

Beauteous are the Cranes

Beauteous are the cranes swinging in dazzling red contrast against the blue skies fading to a gorgeous gray.
Steel piles higher and higher,
A pillar to hold the floodgates closed.

They pull the cranes away,
Collapsing, bending at the foot of the structure.
Hard hats look in awe.

Then I remembered how this all rests on dirt:
When for a new escalator they cut a hole in the mall.
Rectangular
Deep
Dark

I remembered how towers fall:
When the god of the mountain decides they are too tall.

I had a dream once,
The skyline was Christ’s domino set.
He flicked. We fell.
He rearranged the pieces, did it all over again.

Oh beauteous new and lush Riverside Villas!
With your views and your balconies,
Underground
Parking
Security

You will never be a ruin.

Thə Tootər

Yoor lúrning ay láng gwij fawrmd owt ov ri béllyən
Spṓkən in spīt ov Náwrməns

Mōst ov it is French

Yoor lúrning thə wurds ov slayv ṓnərs
Swét shop spṓksmen
Áartists, “di zinərs”
Leedərs, tirənts and non-vṓtərs

Nō law is fin'l

Thə wurds ov Wil
(William Shakespeare. notable poet/ playwright in England. 1564-1616)
But áwlssō Jawrj
(George Bush. President of the USA. Noted for his bad pronunciation. 1944-)
Ay láng gwij kwik lee di sending intoo ákrə nìm
Ik spánd ing intoo
Yoofə mìzzəm

It wil chaynj in ay yeer awr too

Theez wurds Ī wil pass on too yoo
But bi fáwr Ī tel yoo them
Prə nównssing wot is sə pṓz too be
Ay tíkit intoo mī wurld
Hélping yoo fīnd thə díffrənss bi tween L and R
(yoo névvər wil)
I wont id too tel yoo thə truth:
Íng glish is just wun big ín sid jōk yoo wil névvər get.

The Tutor

You’re learning a language formed out of rebellion
Spoken in spite of Normans

Much of it is French

You’re learning the words of slave owners
Sweat shop spokesmen
Artists, “designers”
Leaders, tyrants and non-voters

No law is final

The words of Will
But also George
A language quickly descending into acronym
Expanding
Into euphemism

The terms will change in a year or two

These words I will pass on to you
But before I tell you them
Pronouncing what is supposed to be
A ticket into my world
Helping you find the difference between L and R
(you never will)
I wanted to tell you the truth:
English is just one big inside joke you will never get.

The Day We Left

It was after the “broken plate” day,
Sunglasses inside.
I stopped asking questions.

It was my job to vacuum the living room.
I sucked up pieces of the Yellow Pages and pulled my cheeks with its suction.

All my stuffed animals were packed in a big black plastic bag.
I jumped on it to push the air out.

I stopped asking questions.
But my younger brother hadn’t figured it out yet.

It was simple:
We were leaving, at last.
Who cares if it was your dad?
I had no use for one.

But his teary questions made her break down again.
I didn’t look when the glasses came off…

All my crayons were placed in a big glass jar.
The shaking truck made them write all over the inside,
As if they were trying to escape.
Trying to find a new home.

Step-nothing

“He made the bed with another mom.
now we hate him”

I saw him. I stared from around
the corner.
He was sitting on the coffee table.
smoking, naked.
The moon shone on his black curls
The moon shone on his tattoo of Casper the ghost
The moon shone on the empty room
(the hole in the wall
the blood on the carpet)
I turn and walked back to my room
He is nothing
He was not really a Christian
He gave me asthma
He gave me a brother

“Say ‘fuck you’ to him.”
“No, you do it.”
“No you. I’ll get in trouble. You’re too liddle.”

Mom prayed everyday for a man to come.
One came.

I opened the door to ask—
the godsend was on top of her.
I saw his butt.
His fucking ass.

He made promises.
He was a blessing.
now we hate him.

X and Yang

Five years going out and going
steady. Now for
the first
time
I
e
n
t
e
r
.

w
i
t
h
m
e
there
is no room
To fuck around

Diversion

Death is that line between the grass and the gravel,
Driving with the wind blowing through all the windows,
Turn the handle to put them up and keep the dust out,
What would I do?
Such morbid thoughts.
I exit the car upside down,
Find her lying on the ground,
Find her breathing no more.
What would I do?
Such a thin line,
If he would have been looking,
If he would have kept control.

And I heard a cry so loud,
A heaving, aching moan
From my own mouth,
A cry that
I have never made
Before,
I cough from the dust,
Blood on the grass,
My ears are ringing.

A mundane thought enters my head unannounced:
Why do ears ring?
She is dead!
Does it have to do with the eardrum?
I don’t care.
I don’t care.
I don’t care.

Kindly Advice

Read your bible every day,
listen to the pastor.
This is how one is to pray:

(prey on the weak!
Become their master)

Father in heav’n hollowed be Your words.
Kingdoms come and buildings fall
On earth, rapture me to heaven.
Give us our rations everyday.
Forgive us our fallenness,
(so loathsome, so undone! In need of a savior, in need of everything, you can do nothing, you are nothing, fallen fallen fallen!)
Just as we look away from their filth.
And lead us not into defeat,
But deliver to us the evil ones.
For Yours is the kingdom,
Yours is the power,
Yours is the choice,
Yours is the government.
Forever and forever and forever

Amen. (which means let it be)

Now take this spell into your home
chant it o’re your offspring.
Loving, humble will they become
Praises will they sing.

And when they grow, how beautiful!
And when they die, what glory!
And when the Lord returns, so merciful
An End to the Greatest Story.

World of Goats

Better is one day in your house,
Better is one path to your door,
One God is better that none,
One is more than three
So says the trinity.
And on that

There will................A back door, I hope

Be peace............There is. A piece that
On...........................Will fit, there has to be
Earth. ..........................A home to live and love in.

When
Christmas
Is white again.
When the eyes of
The blind see what we
See. Me just a sheep in this
World of Goatse, world of goats.

Canon

When we first met an evil bloomed within
My chest, perhaps not evil, simply strong.
My hands would reach towards you though I tried
To keep them in fists upon my lap. My eyes,
Wild! grazed not on trees and field, but only
On neck, chest, hands, nose, lips, eyes, hair, on you.

Cast out, we sleep by the light of angels,
Guards that remind me of the choice. I tried,
I tried my love to get inside the gate,
Crossed flaming swords, they blocked my way back in.
Perhaps that deity would let me in
Alone. Outside with you: sweet desolation.

What made me eat? The ancients never ask.
When sudden panic took you and your eyes
A sinful gray, I saw that you were alone. I died.
I could do nothing but join in your act,
And sin with you forever, two stray leaves,
Twin sightless stones are we, two lovers scorned.

Material

When light hits a moving body,
Then the colors reflect.
Primary things unravel
And come together
Into a new complexity
Then my eye-my evolved
Created eye-records the image.
Then it sends the signal,
My hand moves
And records the signal.
Then the light is contextualized
Into a shape; labeled and dissected,
Spread out and explicated,
Then it is concentrated
Into one word.

And when this body
Moves around another,
This is relationship.
And when the bodies separate,
This is distance.
And when they rub,
When the particles of one
Transfer to another,
This is love.
And when my hand
Records the signal,
This is poetry.