waiting for words

i’ve had more drinks and cigarettes today than thoughts

i keep grabbing my notebook all for naught

 

if i get baked can i shake this solitude

and find companionship with my words

 

a lullaby needs to be heard

soothe the disturb

 

but like an abused child

nothing is lingering over me with a lyric

 

*

 

and still nothing…

 

i usually can’t shut up

passing words like farts

loud, offensive

clearing a room

 

somehow a broom has swept all the words away

a stage without a play

curtain drops on an empty auditorium

 

i pantomime to an imaginary audience

comprehending the symbolism of the Mime

 

*

 

i remember past poems like old friends

but i thrive on new conversation

clarifying the now

but there is no milk in the cow

so i desperately write about being unable to write

 

*

 

it’s perfect tonight

stage is set

the lighting director is brilliant

i could pen the perfect script

 

my muse is not amused

i have nothing to say

 

if the dark streets of decay were a play

i would have to take a bow and sit down

and let the abrupt ending make the point

i’ve been trying to make all along

 

*

 

why do i have to write

why can’t the cigarettes i light

the girls i kiss

the beer i piss

be enough

 

instead i live for nights like this

alone

drunk or stoned

pen in hand

waiting for my command

 

but tonight my words had other plans

 

*

 

and i’m so blatto it’s not wise to wander

trying to exorcise the words

with a new experience

 

something to talk about

 

but

damn

i want, no need, to write

nothing else makes me feel right

alive

 

even though i dive into the pulchritude

of pussy and breasts

 

and see the bartender as an anesthesiologist

who is preparing me for the cut

 

*

 

am i in a rut?

 

bound by the boundaries of liquor and l.a.

like charles bukowski on his birthday

 

*

 

had another cigarette but don’t you fret

i still have nothing to say

empty saucers fill the tray

although ants did scurry

when i put my cigarette out in the sand

 

let me try another beer

maybe the words i’ll hear

 

*

 

maybe

 

good thing this isn’t how i make a living

oh, wait, it is

 

i’m too old for hide and seek

olly, olly, oxen free!

 

no words show

i’ve been playing this game alone

 

i just have nothing to say

 

***

 

 

Fire ants on the surface of the sun

We find it funny that some cultures won’t eat pork and find it offensive that some cultures will eat a dog, but it is all a matter of perspective and I’m getting really tired of this discussion. There is no right or wrong, there is only what you believe is right or wrong. Running low on money and gasoline doesn’t mean you weren’t meant to go, it doesn’t mean anything, you’re just low on money and gasoline and I’m tired of living in a world where people think we are more than wildebeest in a concrete jungle. Even time isn’t real, celestial bodies rotate and revolve and we perceive the effects that such motions have as being more then celestial bodies trapped in gravitational pulls. Everybody thinks everything matters and I am so bored with their conversations, it’s not part of some design of a spiritual architect and most people make something meaningful because of how it disrupts what they believe their lives should be. Anteaters root through the leaves looking for food and that is about the equivalent of what we do and when you talk I see a monkey ready to fling it’s pooh. We believe that the things we do need to be done and we believe that our needs are the doctrine of the divine; we imagine therefore it is. I imagine it’s all a bunch of crap, a tail chasing trap, an expectation of everything except the unexpected. We are mammals migrating toward the sun always on the run from the sorrow that can’t find solace in a higher functioning brain that makes more of everything then what it really is – indigenous species on a life sustaining planet whose bodies decompose after death and nothing more.

 

***

 

squid ink and the whispering shadows two

eyes opened

i walked like

a hunchback

to the bathroom

did what people do

in there

 

made my way

to the coffee maker

poured

tried to soar

 

i saw the empty

bottle of whiskey

i had bought

only yesterday

 

am i really up to

a bottle a day?

 

went to the bank

deposited a royalty

check

hit a bar downtown

my stomach growled

from the neglect

 

i handed the bartender

my debit card

ordered a shot

 

he put a shot glass

and a bottle

in front of me

and walked away

 

does everyone know

i’m up to a bottle a day?

 

i pulled out a paperback

of bukowski’s poems

someone gave me

 

said it would be

like looking in a mirror

 

she wasn’t wrong

 

a poet is the middle of winter

by an ice cold sea

on an overcast day

 

i don’t want to drink

a bottle a day

but i also won’t

leave this bar

until i am drunk

 

i’m suppose to be

writing a play

about a parrot

with a pirate

on his shoulder

 

but all i’m doing

is getting older

consummating my

marriage with despair

 

what will it be like

when the honeymoon

period is over?

 

i think i’m gonna go

down to the ocean

go for a long walk

on the sand

 

hold my writing notebook

like i’m holding someone’s hand

 

skip all the bars

watch all the cars

hurry

until i realize

sometimes

the best thing to be

is a poet on the beach

at midnight

under a moon

that is nothing more

than a cold lifeless stone

but still it can reflect

the rays of the missing sun

and illuminate the whole

landscape of the night

 

***

 

 

Settling my tab

         When I was confirmed in the Catholic Church I was given a medallion of St. Jude: the patron saint of lost causes. Ten years later I swallowed that medallion on an acid trip; I don’t remember it ever passing.

          God is good and great and kind, when the church is raptured I’ll be left behind. I’ll flee to the Midwest where nobody will be left and turn on all the vacancy signs. I believe I should still have seven years left to repent.

          Well, that’s the extent of my theological training, I woke this morning to find it raining; an excise tax was levied on the excrement of my mind. A drop of booze I cannot find and no one can sell alcohol for two more hours. It will probably take me that long to shower and get dressed.

          The world is unimpressed with my words, this diary of diarrhea I call The Dark Streets of Decay. Reality exists apart from my perception but I can only perceive and I don’t like to perceive reality sober. I am not in the bell jar or down the rabbit hole; I’m just an arrow without a bow because the archer is waiting for the wind to die down.

          I’m still waiting for the stores to open, staring at the confines of my quiver. The rain makes me shiver or is it the withdrawals? Was there a point when we crawled out of the sea other than to eat forbidden fruit from a tree? Pleasing to the eye, making us die sooner than the sun in winter.

          I am the dancing splinter on the surface of the eye viewing a liquid avalanche of bourbon whiskey and bullet rye. Can there be cinema without circuitry? Can left field be to the right of me? Can I drink enough to empty the sea so I will never drown?

          Why is morning never a habitat for horror films? Waking up is the worse scare, I need to calm my nerves. It’s six A.M., batter up, prepare to serve. I wish I had a windshield with a car attached, I could get there faster, walking is a disaster, but it is probably the only thing good for me I will do today.

 

***

 

 

last call

woke

head pounding

the bottle i had

been giving head

the night before

was still erect

waiting for another go

with my mouth

 

i drained it dry

rubbed my eyes

stumbled to the bathroom

threw up

aggravating my throbbing temples

 

decided i needed something simple

got a beer then spent five minutes

looking for my smokes

gave up

brushed my teeth

shoed my feet

walked to the smoke shop

 

lit up

walked to a restaurant

tacos and tecate

went to their bathroom

threw up

ordered a tequila

to wash the taste

out of my mouth

 

realized i hadn’t turned on my phone

woke it up

nothing from no one

i started deleting contacts

of anyone i hadn’t heard from

in months

stopped when my contacts

was empty

 

outside i lit up

screwed the top

off my flask

walked, felt weak

sat at a bus stop

bus pulled up

door opened

driver stared

i shook my head

he cursed me and left

i lit another cigarette

hands shaking

 

my parents drank, divorced, died

with my first drink

there was a prediction

of addiction

prophecy fulfilled

 

i put a bud in my ear

found my favorites on youtube

tapped eyes without a face

started walking

picked up my pace

 

drained my flask

threw up in some trash

scurried to an alley

and laid down

sally alley the sequel

one minus one equals

zero

 

*

 

an early morning trash truck

wakes me up

as it deals with the dumpster

 

the l.a. sidewalk

is sun baked

i pass bakeries and cakes

till i find a breakfast burrito

 

it stays in my stomach

i sit on a park bench

with a large coffee

light up

check my phone

still alone

 

find a valium in my pocket

chew, swallow

it mocks the coffee’s purpose

 

creep through the camouflage

of other people’s disinterest

buy a bag full of mini bottles

and start trying to find

my way home

until i make a clone

of every bottle

each identically empty

 

change my destination

by-pass the business

lunch crowd

by taking a seat at the bar

 

some wings and more whiskey

i light a match from one of the

restaurant’s matchbooks

blow it out

wished for love

looked around

none to be found

i order another round

while worried workers

walk out on weary legs

 

i imagine they are also

all wishing for love

 

the bartender politely

shakes his head

when i ask for another

i pay

make my way

 

hit a liquor store

walls are gray

buy a fifth

fill my flask

 

start walking

curse the heat

think

“i should go home

sleep

walk in the cool of night”

but suddenly i’m feeling alright

 

turn a crowded corner

come face to face

with a woman

look at her breasts

“asshole”

is her protest

i step aside

let her by

 

the commotion is chaotic

confusing

i see a homeless man

sitting

i join him

light us both a smoke

and open my flask

watch the world task

 

we don’t speak

both of us reek

a food truck pulls up

i buy us both dinner

in this world

money makes you a winner

 

but as the last rays

of the sun linger on

the layers of los angeles

it doesn’t matter

which avenue i choose

to walk down

i will still be lost

 

***