mmmmdccxx

Elaborate Condensation

diane, thank you again for the long text message up

date.  i know i gave you the brief skinny with what’s 

going on with me, but i am always realizing how little 

time i give to our correspondence, so in an effort to put,
well, a small but hopefully significant time more, i’m
writing you a poem-text. or somesuch. first, i’ll start
with where you started, how ‘time has evaporated this
month’ – by which you mean the month has been vap
orized by time? or this month, compared with other
months, has seen your time evaporate? i like the idea
of time evaporating – i want to connect that to memory
(or my lack of much of one) in some way. i could say
my memory evaporates, unless i take the time (which
might also be evaporating) to write things down or
photograph them. there are large swaths of time
that simply have not existed for me since they, well,
actually were here, due to the fact that i could not
afford a camera at the time (they weren’t ubiquitously
inside of our phones, which i could certainly never have
afforded during these stretches, either, i must say) and
was simultaneously going through that same duration
without notating a thing in what i called my journal –
i had a couple dozen of these journals before losing them,
and all of everything i physically had kept with me from
the years, sometime shortly after i turned fifty, about
two-thirds of a year after i was evicted from my pine
street apartment, became ‘homeless’ – as they say.
i used those journals to make these pieces, which are
even still accumulating, even after losing all of the
original notebooks and binders with which i had written
whatever at the time seemed important to record in
such a way – so that i might remember it. not for the
memory alone, of course, many of which, being recorded
in so-called diaries, were penned with ink that would sound
horrifically as if it were direct from the dark lake of some
tortured soul. anyway. so. time. a lop which seems
to have passed since i began this and i’ve yet to ask
but that one question (did the month evaporate or was
it time that evaporated – and how was this significant
or different from normal?). directly after this first thought,
you mention how you feel as if you’ve been ‘going and going’
without having ‘much to show for it.’ boy, do i ever know that
feeling, which is maybe another reason i make these little
hodge-podges. have turned them into a ‘project’ (oh how i
used to hate that word) the publication of which is something
i can do myself, fairly easily, and have added to these the
photographs and also, now, the videos of each. there are
over four thousand seven hundred of these now. that’s a heap
of things i can at any time point to and say (most always to my
self) i did this. this is mine, something of me, which i leave for
whomever, but, i guess in the end, especially for me, so that i
might have something to show that i’ve accomplished (i’m always
lousy at articulating what i’ve accomplished in almost any other
context) and that broadens my life (extends time, even – or i’d
like to say that; i mean that, even!), allowing me to recapture
so many moments i’ve experienced. in order to remind me that
i’ve been doing things. in order to assess and imagine how i
might do better. doing things. remembering. keeping time
as stretched out as possible. so. that covers i think the first
two lines of your long note. and now i have a meeting i need
to attend in a few minutes so, i shall end this long text in
response to perhaps the least substantive part of your lovely
text to me of, what, several days ago. see? sigh. i just did
this. more soon? -del

mmmmdccxix

Waking up to another dog

in search of a book. Every
day for several weeks. Wasn’t
such a bad thing, I’m thinking,
in retrospect, but at the time,

I mean, my god! I used to be
known for occasional drunken
flirtation, but I have never once
blacked out. In my history of

book-sniffing dogs, I believe
that I was always the book.
But who wants such a meta
phorical existence? Every

memory gives me a sort of
nostalgic tinge, the rose-
colored glasses thing, and
I’m down with that. Yet—

and here I should say I
have always generally been
the opposite of vengeful—
but it’s nice to look at those

moments soberly, too. In order
to assess, to continually rethink
how best to live, to assign

blame and then to articulate it.

mmmmdccxviii

The roses on the tundra survive

and then melt. The tundra in my
closet is not hot. It is not cold.
As weather goes. I lie

in bed waking up. Lying in bed,
I am becoming awake. Awakening,
my thoughts lie

with you. I eat the smashburger
until I am all clogged up. I don’t
mind lying

awake listening to my stomach
as the minutes grow more and
more tense. In light

of Wednesday’s trip to the emerge
ncy room, I exhaust myself
working on ways (while lying

prone, from the Latin pronus,
‘meaning bent forward’) to force
time backwards, which happens,

ironically, in the vomitory of
the university’s most
prestigious named theatre.

The donor, for whom this
hospital is named,
was known

famously for her
liver spots, which,
in truth,

were painted on daily,
precariously, by ex
pensive designer make-up.

mmmmdccxvii

Nevermind Anything

     stuff wrap cram snap
                  —James Schuyler

big bird wing flap
off-beige loo crap
white glove mishap
on the good ship

off of which hart
crane’s purported
life’s torn apart
into ghosts smarts

I don’t have art
who got big parts?
Noah’s cinematic ark
Marvel coven’s harp

this makes plot dark
and jumps the shark
flips through dark pics
back in humble sticks

Maxwell lollipop
Death by drown
On the boulevard
or theatre in the round

mmmmdccxvi

I Had Planned to Stay

      I just thought of you, you see, as indeed I do
      several million times a day. I need your disapproval,
      can’t live without your churlish ways.
                               —John Ashbery (from ”Homecoming”)

I like that I’m not like this. I could add some winks
or a few hahas. But isn’t it true?

Who or what do I think of several million times a day.
They say my mind is faster than most (this as a way to
describe a malady, pressured speech), so perhaps there
are things I think of several million times a day. But are

they you? Or this or that or you? I dare not say. When
what I meant to say was a dare say not. Either way,
what of it? You mean the world to me. Just as you
(way over who knows where) used to. So what would
be weird about that?

I’ve been watching this show which is fictional. It’s about
a group’s chosen friends. How they choose to live in the
same gigantic house. Or is it a hotel? Either way, it’s a
choice they each make, as they each live in this house
or hotel.

There was a little boy who liked so little about the place
in which he was lucky to be born and exist. And in which he 

grew up and up and, well, left. How does one like and yet
not like a family? Perhaps he simply did not like them.
This story, while getting older, is too fresh to know.

And once a man he went about the task of building.
Unlike his father before him, he was not a builder of
furniture, not a painter of houses, not a person who
laid down any law, or saw to it that they were upheld.

Instead, he slowly—and I mean ever so slowly—gathered
people. His people. They were not to live under the same
roof, no. But they were often there, under the same roof
as he.  And this satisfied the man to no end.

mmmmdccxv

“I Have a Diary.” “Do You Write in Yours?”

This last poem is like the meeting
at the train station in the firebrand
television show about people who
work with no memory of their lives

and who also live their lives with
no memory of their work. Astounding
in precision, heartbreaking and then
liberating. It’s the liberation we’re

working ourselves up to here. In this
tawdry diary. Oh, don’t feign that you
never knew. The essence of all of this
is but a record of existence. Not a cold

and scientific record, no. One with all of
the foibles of a 13-year old’s locked journal.

[after several attempts] “Such Childish Habits!”

mmmmdccxiv

I Had Planned to Stay

Or so I thought until I said it
just to plant that seed of guilt.

mmmmdccxiii

Who’s Licked?

     What is the fresh approach?
                               —John Ashbery

Rooms overfilled with both
high and low art are the
things of yesterday or,
by now, yesterday’s

yesterday.  But what are
you asking me for?  I don’t
know anything.  Except the
despair of a chilly insomnolent

night, and how it calms.  I
speak for me and no one else.
To take command and speak
for all is arrogance.  I go both

ways these days, spend such
still hours investing in cartoons,
pricking myself in the wee hours
of high drama just to stay awake.

Portraying both artist and critic,
I’ll stop at each spot on any vector
just for a perspective.  A snippet
of wisdom doesn’t care where it

lands, I suppose.  By the time I’ve 

learned which way is best, the 

proper way to be, however, I am an

antique. This isn’t how I’ve always 

been, of course. But here I am, 

most gracious. And what a relief!

     What I’m doing now is write.
     That’s the real stuff.
     It doesn’t work!
                              —John Ashbery

mmmmdccxii

“A Teeny Tiny Palm Ruffle Fish”

It never dawned on me that it
was the butt of a joke, the rest
of which was unnecessary to tell.

The people you know. There were
additional butts, of course. And you
know what they say about those.

Or don’t you? Butts make
asses out of you and me. “That
cheese was a joke!” shrieked Irma,

who could be seen onscreen
furiously slicing the head off of
her fish with a butter knife.

mmmmdccxi

When I’ve Been Dead

I want to be Alice Notley’s
When I Was Alive today. 

Today, which is only

a couple of weeks

before I’m 58. I’m
alive. I can be the
heat of sex or 
pretty legs and

thighs. I’m no mo
del nor a waif but I
have always been (in
the sunshine, darkness,

on a dancefloor, up a tree,
in the backyard sandbox) me.

mmmmdccx

Artificially Intellectual Ketchup

                                   Please compose a short poem in the manner of poet
                                   Del Ray Cross, using his blog Anachronizms at
                                   anachronizms.blogspot.com as inspiration.

ChatGPT said: Sure! Del Ray Cross often blends a haunting sense of time and

place with a tinge of nostalgia and reflective melancholy in his writing. He writes

with a kind of fragmented lyricism, exploring the delicate layers of memory and

history. Here’s a short poem inspired by his style:

The Field at Dusk

There are days when the light hums—

a pulse beneath the tattered map

of every place I've left behind.

A clouded road, still haunting the hill’s edge,

bristles with the rust of forgotten years.

In the field, the wind carries stories—

half-heard names and the soft echoes

of children’s laughter that no one remembers.

We walked here once,

on the day the sky split in two.

Time wraps around these bones,

and still, the grass does not care.

It pushes through cracks in the earth

like forgotten words,

lost before they could be spoken.

I tried to evoke a sense of temporal dislocation, common in Del Ray Cross’s work, while keeping the atmosphere wistful yet unresolved. Does this capture what you had in mind?

author’s note: this is the second Anachronizm with which I’ve utilized ChatGPT
                     (in the first one, posted many months ago, ChatGPT is uncredited)

mmmmdccix

Often Talks with Strangers

     ...but/leave me beside myself
        like a kid next to a lamppost.
                       —John Ashbery

What are you insinuating?
he sniveled. Whatever it is
[full on sobs now] it’s true

it’s true it’s truuuuuue! Poor
Henry, always wearing that
wounded heart on his seer

sucker jacket’s sleeve. Brett 

was always pushing his buttons, 

of which this afternoon’s

brouhaha was the template
example, but Brett also knew
that after such a push (half

off a cliff, as it were) it was
always best to give Henry his
space, and this he also did

well. In fact, he’d supervise
it into a team effort, dispersing
whatever drama-loving crowd

had gathered for the latest epi
sode of As the Office Queen’s
World Turns before Henry’s

snotty sobs broke into more
of a set of hiccup sounds inter
spersed with quick and deep 

inhalations and phlegmy exhal

ations.  Without even so much 

as a there, there. It was one of

the innumerable reasons Henry
adored Brett. The sobbing man 

uncurled himself from the chair 

at the end of the table and

went about dipping his
fingers into jars too high

on the shelves for him to
fully be able to reach safely.
Something was bound to

break. Or else he’d lose his
footing and fall to the floor,
breaking his hip or giving

himself a concussion or
both. But—not this time.
He let out a staccato’d

yelp surely audible to
any dogs or mice in a
three-block radius, and

after a slight pause (for
effect, even though he
was the only human in

the break-room), with
not the slightest sign
that he was in such a

a sobby state only a
couple of minutes
previous, “Found one!”

And with cookie in
hand, he marched
himself back out 

worked his way through

the sea of cubicles to
his desk, put on his

headset, and with 

all of the vocal
authority of an

army general or
a head of state,
let out a Dallas

and Hines Cust
omer Service,
Hal speaking. 

How might I make
your day better
this afternoon?

Often Talks to Himself

mmmmdccviii

Shaving or Stalling?

I’ve been telling everyone
(which is hardly anyone)
that I’m shaving this beard.

I’ll say or type something
like “last day with my
face hair.” Am I looking

for comments? “No,
please don’t!” Like,
right. The closest I get

is my boyfriend saying
“I don’t believe you.”
Because he knows me.

I don’t procrastinate.
I stall. Either in some
sort of limbo awaiting

particular things to
happen (the expected—
or unexpected—influx

of cash, finishing an
episode of a television
show, writing this poem,

recording myself reading
this poem, posting this
poem, posting the

recording of me reading
this poem, etc.) – there
is always a plan – it is

not that I’m unaware, not

that I am doing nothing.
My next to do list will be

the most efficient. I’ll

make everything happen,
there’ll be no stalling.

Anyway, it’s been at
least two weeks, or
probably twice that,

I’ve been threatening
this all salt no pepper
beard will be gone by

the end of today. So
I’m not going to say
that anymore. Either

I’ll wake up tomorrow
without it. Or I wake
up with it. No drama.

No guilt (For a beard?
It’s metaphorical guilt
for all that I put off.

What of it?).
And that’s that.

mmmmdccvii

Jonathan

Watching the Jons
Lovett, Stewart and
Favreau this morning—
it’s Stewart’s podcast—

I’m suddenly reminded
of the fact that my aunt,
when she was feeling
particularly cocky or,

I suppose, wanted to
condescend (for she
obviously thought this
act did such), would

call me Jonathan.
She’s hold a grimace
on her face as she
drawled the entire

name *(Jaahhn a 

thuuun!) with a 

particularly loud 

and whiny nasal 

tone. She’s my 

mother’s younger 

sister, but I just knew

that when she called

me that—just like when

my father called me 

Terrapin (at first, before 

I began elementary

school, before Sanford
& Son was even a show)
and later, Lamont or, just
as often, Meathead—that

when she called me
Jonathan she was
leveraging her control
over her smarty-pants

nephew. It’s not really
a negative memory for me.
There is nostalgia. But it 

was clearly mean-spirited.

mmmmdccvi

Dead Ones in My Bins

transferred from one most
humble home to an airier
cheerier and therefore much
happier one. i suppose a

summary—“in conglomerate”
—will have to wait, given that
I’ve been here only three weeks
(vs. over 6 years), but as I scrub 

each bin, wash every item of clothing, 

all the linens and wash each dish and
utensil and pot and pan and step
back to decide from what seems

unlimited choices where each item is
to reside, I’m feeling abundantly alive.

mmmmdccv

Brine Your Beans

Slowly settling into my new place
and despite the stumbling blocks
that have made the process such
a long one, and aside from a more

specific loneliness that I feel (best
I can figure this is especially due to
the fact that I’m now living some
place I’d not be embarrassed to

have people over), I’ve mostly
found ways to eradicate my
impatience and have remained
giddy ever since I began sleeping

here. Today, I was momentarily
bummed for just missing “Optical
Day” where one gets a free pair
of prescription glasses just for

showing up—and I did show up
two hours before the event’s
published end-time only to be
told that they had maxed out on

free glasses for the day. They
gave me next month’s flyer. So,
another month using these that
give me limited vision thanks to

the superglue stuck to the rims
of the lenses that got there when
I installed a guard that could wrap
around my head so that I don’t lose

them (because that happens). So
I ran to my next meeting, dropped
by my old apartment building to
thank the folks who helped me get

into this new one, got home, put
on a load of laundry (washers/dryers
are in the building!) and put on some
lunch, rice with beans that I’d let

brine overnight. I installed the
new power cord on the printer
that I lost during the move and
had ordered from Amazon while

I still had a few dollars left be
tween my unemployment checks.
And the new hotspot device finally
arrived from AT&T, and I’m about

to unpack that to make sure this
one works (the last one they sent
didn’t, and the two subsequent
ones they “sent,” well, one went

to an incorrect address and the
other was promised but never
sent, so it’s better not to have
any big expectations regarding

this one). I need to run down
in sixteen minutes to remove
the clean clothes from the dryer.
But before that, it looks like it’s

time to have my lunch, as every
thing looks ready and smells
quite delicious. Or it could just be
that I am hungry.     And home.

mmmmdcciv

Elephants on a Whim

There are no secrets in the room, so I
go outside. I’m Hercule Poirot or Mrs. 

Marple looking for clues. Stick out my 

tongue for a sun lozenge. Sit on a bench 

and doodle in the margins of my—well, 

it’s where i write, it’s leather-bound and 

has emblazoned in gold, all lower caps on
the front, thoughts—until the lozenge has

fully dissolved. It’s a lovely day, and I’d
love to keep it that way. I step into the
bee-chat line hoping for clues, for a bit of
engagement, it’s almost time for lunch.

I’m good with lunch, I like lunch. But do
I have the cash on hand for any? Rather
than dig around to find out, I step into a
bookstore. This will keep me busy for an

hour or two, I’m thinking. I do wonder
what’s happening at home, but I live
alone. As I step out of the bookstore,
I stop to adjust to the sun, and to get

acquainted with the breeze. I haven’t
solved any mysteries thus far. There
hasn’t been anything the least bit myst

erious. I think about the very important 

phone call I took last night. But what 

was important about it? Something about
elephants....    Idiosyncrasies sway like
chaises longues in the afternoon breeze.

mmmmdcciii

No Final Act

It’s not a block, it’s
more a haze. So
the question is what
to do to clear it. This

morning that means
final episodes for
Adolescence and
Andor, the second

season. It’s spring.
See what I did there?
Summer soon. My
birthday. I’m well past

50. Have I told you how
my life has been improving?

mmmmdccii

Not the Final Act

My eyes are all gone. I think it is
age. Or diabetes. Five years ago
I could scrutinize anything. Visually.

I woke up this morning with an ache.
It was a general ache. Generalized.
I couldn’t tell where it began or stopped.

I know I’m not dead yet. There are times
when I feel quite alive. But then there
are days when I want to cling to a bit of

the zest that still seems to bubble up on
occasion. Maybe it was always this way.
As a child I would get headaches much

more frequently than I do now. I search
for a sense of humor and realize that is
almost the same as a search for a

companion. I’m not that old. People
who take on the character of a
curmudgeon, no matter what their

age, seem to serve a purpose. But is
this my default? The simplicity of
these thoughts are tedious with a tinge

of cringe. But mostly these meanderings
are sad. I no longer live in a coffin-
sized hotbox. Just as I am no longer a

hotshot. Haven’t we all witnessed
those of a certain age become rising
stars, be up and coming. Late bloomers.

But that sounds like so much work to me.
I could sit in bed and rock back and forth
until I feel awake. Perhaps there is a salve

for this, a pill that might take me right
out of it. Do I rather want to dwell upon
the tick of the clock, the tedium of age?

To identify every ache and the collapse
of time that supposedly makes them so
prevalent? This character grows tiresome.

No more of this. It seems that I have rocked
myself awake. Now I’ll attempt to continue 

this day from the perspective of my youth.

Fingers Crossed

mmmmdcci

Before science fiction
there was us. We were a
stubborn, impatient crowd.

mmmmdcc

The Audience

I cry out
into my
new room.

Nobody
answers.
But I mean

it’s just me
here, so why
would they?

I was just
reading a
creepy-

crawly
extension
of my vocabulary;

a few lines that
make up what
most might call

a poem. What?
Do I think I’m
a poet? I have

written some
thing and I
look it over.

Then I
wonder,
could this

be my voice?
Confused, or
maybe con

founded, I
read the
thing

aloud.
Invisible,
I flood the

airwaves
with my
words,

both
written
and spoken.

This is my
reaction to 

what I do.

mmmmdcxcix

Up Our Ancestors’ Ashes

I’m not sure about this experiment
as it seems impossible to land on
your point. Here I am, going about
my daily routine, as if there is one,

the carousel clicks, and a new image
appears on the off-white wall in front
of me. What might this scene be?
And who are the characters that

inhabit it? The projection of the
negative image is in black and white,
so it is likely one of my grandmother’s,
handed down to me several years back.

I stare into the lit rectangular patch on
my wall, trying to ascertain any of what
might be transpiring, scrutinizing the
hues for a hint at a particular decade,

screwing my focus in on each of the
several faces, one by one, trying to
see in each any significant character
istic and, as objectively as possible,

trying to catch a glimmer of similarity or
familiarity until I am left craving any con
nection I might have with the faraway
place that’s lit before me, or either face.

mmmmdcxcviii

The Cunning Lingoes of Youth

I have such important things
going on that I want to tell you,
but I can’t stop thinking about
the idea of being made fun of
for doing something rude and
being obviously unaware of it.
Of what I was doing that was
rude. This is a hypothetical,
actually, that is based on a

voluminous list of redundant

and grim incidents. I realize it 

could happen anywhere at any

time and I’d be none the wiser.

Perhaps this is normal, happens

to all of us, but I worry about

performing acts of unintentional

rudeness or being caught totally 

unaware that what just came out 

of my mouth or off of my page is

derogatory or embarrassingly 

inaccurate.  Or getting caught 

using outdated language. Or reacting 

inappropriately just because I have

completely misunderstood some new

lippity smack. When I know this has

just occurred, I will accept my mistake, 

promptly apologize for doing whatever 

it was that I did.  Is everyone just 

making fun of me because I’m older?

And all this time I’d been waiting
my turn so that I could go around
preaching at all the younger folks
about how things were in my day

and how never to sass, etc.  When 

I’d have the upper hand in such 

matters. But of course there’s
always been generation gap lingo.
Elders would tut-tut or act mortally
offended when whippersnappers
sling out their newfangled catch-
phrases. The upstarts never seem
bothered by this.  These days
the new lingo of the lithest of our

populous seem complex, twisting

traditional definitions of words or
phrases in ways meant specifically 

to insult anyone over a certain age. 

Was it always this way? Where the
intent lies so specifically in confusing, 

confounding and generally screwing 

with all of the rest of us? Perhaps.

But I’ve not been here before. And 

am left to wonder if I’ll ever have 

the advantage I spent a lifetime 

awaiting. And I am all but certain

that the answer is that I will not.

mmmmdcxcvii

The Business of Pleasure

I remember getting dressed all spiffily
just to get undressed. Those were the days
of sex. The delight of a mustache over a

cool drink of jalapeños. Juice me this, juice
me that, I’ve no requests except that you
come back with some hair product. The

usual, please. Don’t you hate dreams that
are a little too aligned with reality? I say this
aloud, or would if I were awake, because I

like using my voice. When it can be heard.
I keep trying to press the issue of us pressing
the flesh, but we’re both out of rocket fuel.

Which sucks bigtime, I have to say. But I’ve
picked up all of the maps and all of the forms
and am a professional at making travel arrange

ments. Or I used to be. No, I am. I love being
new places but hate traveling. That’s not true.
I love seeing you but am frightened of air traffic 

and (today) of air traffic control and flippant 

and especially mean government officials. Heads
of state with no imagination, no wiggle-room.

I flew first class once. My one and only
business flight. I mean I’ve made hundreds
if not thousands of arrangements for businessfolk

but only one for me. That was for paid work. 

From Boston to Boca Raton. There were pelicans.
Everything was pink. And the ocean was so warm

I’d surreptitiously excuse myself to it as often as
possible without giving the impression that I wasn’t
on the ball with regard to the official business

of the whole thing. That was my one trip to Florida,
ever, and I plan never to go again.  I have, however,

trekked through most of the states coast-to-coast several 

times. But I very much prefer never mixing business 

with pleasure, even though the boundaries of both 

have grown quite porous over the years. And I swear

that as I get older there’s more surface area in
the overlap of one over the other.

mmmmdcxcvi

Fiction’s Incentive

I can be a bit dramatic sometimes. When I pause
over this (sure, it’s a dramatic pause), I begin to
know that it isn’t just an art that came from discipline
and apprenticeship, but it also comes quite naturally

(both of my parents were pretty seductive—if not
subtle—spotlight magnets). However, if you were
acquainted with my folks, you’d likely feel that I was
putting you on. This isn’t a ruse, though. It is not

hyperbolic. And, sure, I’d have been surprised not
even so long ago at my telling you this in earnest
today. Acting is an art, as they say; it’s the art of
putting on a face. Of lying. The art of being not

who you, from the most reliable perspectives, really
are. Utilizing deceit to reveal myself is truly what I do.

mmmmdcxcv

The Delight of a Mustache Over a Drink of Cool Water

Love-scratches, drugged-out rants
and other deranged scribbles that
had been scraped into the sidewalks
next to apartment buildings, the so-

called poetry that drips from the bricks
of alleyways, these were all as ephemeral
as the missing or wanted or advertised
lesson sheafs stapled to telephone and

electric poles and to trees throughout
each neighborhood. These were city
segments once noted with amusement
and pride by the city’s inhabitants, as

well as the people who crowded into
these denizens’ personal living spaces
during each peak season. As the larger
buildings that once held these countless

citizens along with their friends or families
or newfound flings from faraway places
melted into liquid metal during this
great erasure, the rivers of lava that

formed momentarily held the spirits
of those who’d lived within. These
were quickly let go, disappeared into
the vapor with the loudest hisses and

moans ever to have been heard, would
they have been. No ears here, however.
The screams belonging to the beings that
had such instruments are long gone,

skin and flesh being the most ephemeral
of all of the ephemera. So, in a soulless
manner, this scalding swamp holds no
reticence with regard to their demise,

is as wild and full of freedom as
anything has ever been flying
hurly-burly into space, vaporizing
in all directions until all is nothing.

mmmmdcxciv

Just a Smile to Enjoy

     get up, get out, get busy
     engage, revel in the ephemera,
     the beauty that is everywhere,
     that won’t be here tomorrow                 

             —the author does not lie

Our faces, dripping from the bricks
of alleyways, were to the ground,
their surfaces hidden as much as
they could be with our waxen hands.

Nothing lasts. Nothing ever did.
Not in this city. The concrete blown
roadside and into the tall, craven
structures through chutes by the hard-

hatted battalions downed the most 

vulnerable. It’s not that our armed

services crew were particularly sloppy.
Just that, when viewed from great

distances, things that could be discerned
through the magnification systems from
the perimeters of galaxies afar were always
the ones mostly likely to be targeted.

When such things would burst into
miniature tornadoes dense with
shrapnel and molecular concrete,
the living beings would dance as if

to impress greater powers, divinities,
gods that did not exist, believing their
hotshot means of showcasing their
personalized look at me’s might

eliminate the imminent danger,
would postpone their ultimate and
immediate demise.

mmmmdcxciii

Nothing Is the Right Way

                                         Some are afraid
     that they will fly away.
                                                                     —John Ashbery

When one relishes the marks
made by doe-eyed vandals,
one is participating in vandalism.

Those of us who know that the
Ark of the Covenant was destroyed
in outer space already live in outer

space. The peaceniks turned to
violence at the crowded airport.
The tabloids had named all of the

celebrities who were extraterrestrial;
there were photographs on the covers
of each of them, lined up like disaster

relief stations at cash registers in stores
where otherwise the shelves were empty.
It was the year that grocery stores every

where were emptied with grace, made
barren by the already soulless who’d
pinched off inner toes learning how to

dance on point. The hard way. The lazy
generations were long gone. We were
all that were left on this poisoned planet.

While this was our primary inheritance,
we knew we deserved it as we shoved
our ways to the best spots in the airport

free of all units of transportation just to
glimpse our most beloved celebrity heroes.

mmmmdcxcii

The Urgent Violence That Is Honesty
Calls Me Out of a Long Nap,

like a cat smashed between a row of books
and the wall on the bookshelf you lost when
evicted some eight years ago. A cat you
thought you knew. A cat who knew you as

food. Oh, well. Friendship doesn’t matter.
What matters is love, right? And your
salary. And the economy. What else matters?
I had an interview today. Sure, okay, it was a,

what do they call them, a phone screen? It
was supposed to be just a five minute call,
but it turned out to last at least 20 minutes.
Or at least that’s my estimation. I’ve been

walking things over from the old apartment
to this new one for days now. There was a
fire at the old place when I rented the SUV
to drive the brunt of the stuff I’ve accumulated

over seven and a half years from there to here,
the awkward stuff. It’s a short walk. It’s been
kind of nice, actually. But am I ever ready to
have everything under this new and improved

roof. Nevertheless, I’ve been taking it in stride,
on the phone with Zipcar about the $70 they
overcharged me, AT&T about the $100 they
should never have charged me (that doesn’t

count the $140 that the app, if I choose to
open it, shows that I also owe. They’re
sending me a new hotspot. The last one
was sent erroneously. It was supposed to

save me $10 each month. I’ve been on the
phone with Zipcar 3 times, considerably less
hours than those which I’ve been on with
AT&T. But still no resolution there, either.

Customer service! Am I right? Sigh.
Oh, and my television was stolen. So
I’ve been watching my streaming services
on a laptop that’s on its last legs. Cue

the punch line about legless laptops.

mmmmdcxci

A Lack of Consumer Confidence

My truth is a shambles. But I get at it.
There are, of course, ways in which I
might divert my mind away from a truth
so that I convince myself, at least

momentarily, that the aspect I’m avoiding
isn’t me. To believe that I would never.
I’ve been thinking about this recently,
dealing with customer service at various

companies to which some of the tiny 

amount of income that comes my way

then goes. I’ll be promised a reduction in 

fees, a deletion of a charge, or a way to save 

a buck or two each month by doing this or 

that.  I rarely give in to the sales pitch, and 

when I do, I get bombarded with why I 

rarely give in. An extra charge shows up. 

The ten dollars I was expecting to save per 

month turns out to be an extra twenty that 

appears on each monthly invoice. Or like over 

the weekend, when thanks to a fire that 

flooded out my old apartment building and 

shut down the elevators for a couple of days,

I asked if I could switch the reservations date

for the Zipcar with which I’d planned to move 

my most important items from the old place to 

the new one without getting charged for two 

trips. I had tried to log in to change it before 

the three hours previous to pick-up deadline

but I was having issues with the laptop
internet connection and could not find
a way to switch it before that deadline
arrived. So, I quickly called customer

service, asked if it would be possible to
just switch the date and time of my service
without an additional charge, and I was told
that would be no problem. You can imagine

how the rest of the story goes. Two days later,
after numerous such unexpected expenses
completely undo my budget, I see two $65 

dollar charges on my account. Which is one 

too many, per the man’s promise on the phone.
So I call Zipcar, and am told that the person
with whom I spoke did not promise me what
he actually did. And even if he did, he was

a subordinate that could not have even made
such a promise to me so it’d not count? But he 

did. Thus seems to be the nature of dealing 

with any and all of the entities to which I

pay regular fees. Often, I’m finally able to
have a promised credit or reduction in fees
met, but this almost always involves spending
hours on the phone or in town at some local

spot for whatever service from whom I’m
simply trying to get what was promised.
Fun and games. Such is life. Etc. And I
think of times when money more peacefully

and easily flowed through my hands. To dwell
on such things, even to write these few lines,
can have me reliving the experience in such
a way that I feel defeated, unfocused and

unmotivated. But this is just one of so many
things with which we must deal. If one is me.

All I can do is expect such things and
work like hell on ways to make the entire

process more efficient than it is, less of a
drain on my finances, not to mention my
life. Because living is the thing, right?
Living as well as one can, come what may.

mmmmdcxc

(puff, self, cock, guff)

     We are old and dated
     and cannot of our lives make any sense.
                                                     —John Ashbery

I cringed over thirteen years ago. I’m
such a snotty flacon of prescience, which
isn’t science and is definitely not precious.
Or at least I’m neither. But behold, the

allergic reactions. Maybe back then I
thought I was all that. But it had taken
me so very long. By my standards, at
any rate. Not that I have any of those.

Daddy, is it okay to take thirty-five to forty
years to grow up? But I know what he’d say
if he were here to say anything. It’s something
of his I love to repeat, and probably couldn’t

agree more: You were much more mature at
the age of three than you have been ever since.