mmdcclxiii

What’s true of labyrinths is true of course

Of love and memory.  When you start remembering.

                                                                –Jack Spicer

You have created with-

in me a hole.  Well, an

open eye (with no leaks),

and it is a very cold hole.

I did not know what to 
say to you who had such 
a bountiful half-barrel 
of the sweetest apples

as you placed them on

the dock of your choice

for the world’s apple

junkies to gather

around and to adore.
Not until it was almost

a minute too late did

you take the most

beautiful one in your

precious hand with

its elegant spindly

fingers and offer

one boldly to the

threshold of my

younger lips.

“Here,” you said,

as I took a bite.

“There,” you said

as I swallowed it.

Where I am now

is anyone’s guess.

Even my open eye,

which is con-
stantly leaking 

(liquid which

is obviously

from some-

where in my

head), hasn’t

the where-

withal to en-

vision a map

to provide
me with gui-

dance, nor
offer a single

token of advice 
regarding which

direction my next
step should go.

mmdcclxii

Alice, I wish you a factory.

                               ♥ Lucas

I wish you a

factory for all

of the same

reasons I

wish the ex

who stole all

of the rest of

my clothes (ex-

cept what I am

presently wearing)

peace.  The news-

paper clippings my

grandmother col-

lected and carefully

arranged into a sort

of funerary scrap-

book had no sticker

price, of course. 

Upon the clippings

were photos of men

who were killed

during the second

world war.  The

whole set was

enclosed nearly

airtight in a large

ziplock bag.  By

now, perhaps,

the fragile yel-

low clippings

which hung

onto the fragile

black pages of

the antique note-

book have been

blown into hun-

dreds of pieces

and flutter like

autumn leaves

over the crooked

streets of my city –

a city that knows

neither autumn

nor winter.

mmdcclxi

Two Good Years

As for my perplexed reaction,

I need a good playing field.

You giving me good playing

has a certain come-uppance,

the silence of which was the

silence of the Nevermind,

the area we both penetrate.

Never mind the era in which

we both penetrated the

Netherlands.  Purportedly.

Hold off!  Be silent!  Catch

your breath, Bill!  The

suspension (which was

the truth that was killing

us) had never spoken so

softly, swaying, as it were,

in the hillbilly breeze,

which was full of the

distinctly indecipherable

whispers of that voice.

Said perp (the sotto voce

perp), who hasn’t been

seen (nor heard from)

since either before

or after.  During which,

the march.  The long march.

mmdcclx

     What a beautiful and violent day today is!

                                                   —Joe Brainard

The city slowly

exhales.  It ex-

hales forever.

I know this be-

cause I hear it

out my new win-

dow all night. No-

thing going in. It

is not a direction

tonight.  I’m a

slave to the

clouds that

carry away

this incessant

breath.  Gulp-

ing everything

I can from this

vacuum, I scream

Come back to the

ground, you mon-

grel clouds!!  Come

back.  Be fog.  Be

like I am.  Square

in the face.  Hazy.

Pinwheel of in-

determinate

temperance.

At a loss.  Death,

that last gasp for

breath, is but

the clean sweep

of this infernal

breeze.

mmdcclix

2018

    1970

     is a good year

     if for no other reason

     than just because

     I’m tired of complaining.

                  —Joe Brainard’s poem “1970”

                     in its entirety

2018

is a good year

if for no other reason

than just because

I’m tired of complaining.

mmdcclviii

The Happiness

                I lack the courage to talk words very much

                because they are terribly finite and

                final and I don’t enjoy the risk.

                                                                  —Joe Brainard

Memory of a late May

tarot card reading

on a pile of rubble.

Don’t multi-task be-

cause it’s literally

impossible to multi-

task.  Give each step

your complete atten-

tion (totality).  The in-

ternal attention that I

am unable to see:  Pro-

jection.  The outer influ-

ence that I already know

(all too well): Playfulness.

In retrospect, all too well

turns out to be not nearly

well enough.  So what do I

need in order to resolve this

playfulness problem?  Well,

it says here “a ticker-tape

parade.”  And “I should ride

on the tiger of success” and

“squeeze every drop of juice

out of the happiness.” The

memory, a few lines written

on frayed and yellowing note-

book paper, ends obliquely:

first, with an “AMEN!” and,

all by itself near the bottom

of the page, “The Monster.”

mmdcclvii

Chocolate Grape of the Day

What’s un-

settling isn’t

just the shout-

ing/shoving

match in in

the “Quiet

Room” on

Christmas

Eve.  It’s

simple

math;

it is you

and me.

“What the

future holds,”

you say, “isn’t

pretty.”  You

don’t actually

say that.  To

be honest, I

summon that

up on my own.

mmdcclvi

Diary of a Landmine

This year’s word of

the day is calm down.

I know this because I

hear it regularly all

year long; more

than I hear any

other word.

This strikes me

as humorous,

out of the ordin-

ary, puzzling, frust-

trating, defense mech-

anism and hopeless.

In that order.

Chronologically.

Because it is a year.

And, true, it is not a

logical year at all, but

it is humorous, puzzling,

frustrating, defense mech-

anism, throwing up (yes,

a whole lot of that), surreal-

ism (which numbs rather than

stings, because it is not reality),

dread, fits of dead end, which,

when you find yourself there,

are pretty hopeless (nowhere

to go but backwards, and all),

etc.  Every day there’s another

obstacle.  Until you find that,

pausing for a breath, you

have rested your foot

upon a landmine

(which, you have

to admit, is a pretty

solid example of

“dead end”).

At this point,

you look back

(as I did) and

question where

that path you were

on to begin with must

have led.  And where it

it all went wrong.  Where

you somehow deviated, and

wound up at the end of this road,

instead of another one.  Instead

of any other one.  Instead of

each and every end of each

and every alternate road.  So

it’s safe to say, I do believe,

that calm down land mine

is the word of this year

(thus far).