the night is never enough

this is the third poem i’ve started tonight

my mind is stuck in meter and rhyme

but that’s no longer how i write

 

i hate cars

i know i live in l.a.

but my incessant walking

is probably what keeps me alive

amid all the partying

 

i’ve been dragged to car shows

cause, they said, everyone drinks

i was as bored as if i were

sitting here listening to you talk

 

one poem i started earlier said,

“is this bowl microwavable?

i really need to know

your petty thoughts have always sought

to be one who extols

you talk as if i’m listening

believe me i am not

you say your words as if you’re sure

you talk and talk and talk”

 

it didn’t feel very

dark streets of decay

 

the other i started

while listening to a

time life cd containing

60s love songs

“an empty bed leaves me for dead

the love songs shed what she once said

a woman’s charms leave me unarmed…”

 

bad poetry

now i’m just drunk

walking

l.a. has seen a lot of rain this winter

reminds me of when i wrote

my first volume of

the dark streets of decay

 

i’m tired of masturbating to my muse

but all my literary heroes are dead

no new works to anticipate

so cumming inside a rotting corpse

is all i have

 

but it beats listening to you

think you are intelligent

not understanding why when they

did a scan of your mind

they had to use a microscope

 

in elementary school the system

made me do speech therapy

because, according to them,

i didn’t talk normal

imagine what they would do with me now

 

writing deep poetry

about lighting another cigarette

and licking the lip of my whiskey flask

to get that last drop

 

although i am a man of many interests

i started with fireball

then moved on to peppermint schnapps

now i’m drinking beer

 

anyway

started with a syndrome of being down

words about being anti-matter

in a world where everyone thinks

anything matters

and words about an empty bed

now i’m just drunk

and walking

in a $160 jacket

my most recent bought for me

 

l.a. is next to the sea

coastal consciousness creating relevance

with crayons

like claiming you ate crepes in paris

 

clueless capitulations

and i’m so tired of trying to explain

if you don’t understand relevance

based on perception

then you will never understand

 

just please stop talking to me

 

***

 

 

i only feel out of place among the human race

house party

got invited via text

i did the accept

haven’t seen them

in awhile

 

their house is on a hill

you can see the ocean

there’s a bartender

a catering service

 

i got a kabob

and a corona

listened to the limousine set

defined by diction

the “issues” dance

of all we must enhance

in order for there to be order

liberty and justice for all

you’ll grow tall

if you eat your greens

 

if they knew what i believe

and what i write

i would be a leper

to be put out of sight

although one of these stifled

bored trophy wives

would want to sleep with me

but she wouldn’t understand

a word i said

 

the meat on a stick

is now just wood

the corona drained by my lips

i ask the bartender

to make me something strong

 

go out on the back lawn

crest of their hill

light a smoke

stare at where

the moon has painted

a white stripe

across the salty sea

 

i feel like i’m alone

in a tiny boat

in the middle of that ocean

a no moon night

surrounded by darkness

eternal emptiness

a no hope solitude

let myself ooze

into the ether of

the surroundings

and finally be at peace

 

my paradise is slithered

by a princess snake

she doesn’t seem fake

one of the caterers on a break

lighting a smoke

next to me

 

i switch my drink

to my cigarette hand

reach into my pocket

pull out my flask

offer

 

she takes

with thanks

drains half in a swallow

my kind of girl

 

“you look out of place”

she says

as she passes me my flask

 

“only when i’m with

the human race”

i shrug

 

she appraises me

with a long sideways look

 

i offer my flask again

she drains the rest of it

while i down my drink

we both light another cigarette

 

“so what’s your art?”

(great, she’s already got me pegged)

 

“poetry”

i tell her

then wonder if she is imaging

a terrified effeminate boy

cowering in a closet

or

a tortured artist

puking his self-destruction

into a tawdry toilet

 

either way

i doubt i’m getting laid

 

“mines painting”

she tells me

(oh great

an art form

that requires talent

i’m feeling out of place again)

 

“my break is over

thanks for the drink”

she smudges her cigarette

in an ash tray she passes

as she goes inside

 

i return to the bar

offer the bartender

a hundred dollars

for any bottle he can spare

go out the front door

and start walking back down

into the heart of l.a.

and my dark streets of decay

 

***

 

 

nose deep in noah’s rain

tacos for two with tecate

her eyes were so blue and bright

skin so fair

blonde so hair

she was a beauty

and her smile made everyone look

forest nymph innocence

and i was so bored

 

remained polite

kept her eyes in my sight

but she talked about all the things

i feel just don’t matter

 

walked her to her car

she drove in to meet me

graciously granted goodnights

watched her drive out of sight

lit a smoke

opened my flask

and started my sidewinder slide

down the sidewalk

tongue flicking at the l.a. evening air

 

i hate being dressed up on the streets

every eye you meet

appraises money

and might motivate a murderer

for my pocket change

 

i rearrange with plugs in my ears

select “i don’t believe in god”

by eye

from their album don’t sleep

and take a long swig

of peppermint schnapps

 

the gutter is just a hop away

but on the sidewalk i’ll stay

i have a whole night still to play

on these dark streets of decay

 

l.a. receiving rain

and for the moment i am happy

keep your amazon fire stick

your internet netflix

this is how i want to spend my time

living my rhymes

in inclement clime

 

already drained my flask

liquor store ask

375 ml fireball

the pennies change i don’t collect

sidewalk

light another cigarette

walking

soaking wet

 

no one gets

my poems are meant to be meaningless

actions reflect

belief

philosophical thief

stealing purpose from all that’s portrayed

you may

and probably do disagree

but the fact that no one perceives

like the me i choose to be

is why i walk alone

 

wow

she just texted my phone

thanking me for a wonderful time

with wishes it will be again

 

i power down my electrical device

buy a cup of ice

from an a.m. p.m.

pour in the fireball

pass another strip mall

straw sipping an insoluble solution

tasting the afterbirth of my affirmations

 

god and his claymation

are congregating

claiming causality with consciousness

while i select cigarettes after sex

and listen to the full album

 

my publisher said i should be

considerate of my fan base

but long ago i erased

from the periodic table of elements

the atoms mixed

into a volatile molecule

of giving a damn

what anyone else thinks

 

my jacket’s never on the brink

of being penetrated

by rain un-venerated  

threatening the ruination

of my cigarettes

and mp3 player

although my soaked socks

are making my toes uncomfortably cold

 

shit

i don’t know where i am

i should turn my phone back on

select my gps app

and tell the lady with the

annoying automated voice

i don’t want to be anywhere

but here

 

***

 

 

 

vertiginous

(inclined to frequent and often pointless change)

 

i miss the days when we would play and bring our gods to life

but there’s no god diving rod beyond this present strife

the caterpillar butterfly are autographs unsigned

i can’t have conversations with the images aligned

 

her past was fed to the undead and crystal linen white

nobody saw the skin rubbed raw from catching falling kites

and mother says a miracle will make me find the floor

i lick the dust off of the rust and go in search of more

 

i paid a whore to keep the score of every game in town

i paid her well but she could tell i never wrote it down

i’m writing until everything is everything i write

the moon is wearing nylons and removes them every night

 

i’m finally done with any sun that shines on apple cores

disquiet is the ocean breeze sold at a desert store

i mixed a moment’s mockery and left it in the bowl

the skin graph laughed until the math could no longer console

 

exfoliate and double date the windows that regret

the lingering of liquid pain after the lions left

i heard the word that you endured espresso empress lips

and the reprieve that you preferred came only when she sipped

 

the airport asked the astronaut to anchor angel wings

the cyber age has filled the page with words that look like bling

nobody never needed nothing except for the nine near me

only formless fruit will flourish when frozen by decrees

 

the spell check sect request respect and urges line revision

but all of this makes sense to me within my dark derision

your mundane mischief makes believe that matter matrix melts

but all the dew drop dripping vines are simply what is felt

 

so end the poem with promises of sugarplums and hugs

i’ll forage for the fabric fray on every single rug

and let forensic architects sift literary chatter

where everything that’s ever say will never really matter

 

***