I’m Not Sure About This One...
(Stephen Colbert sticker poem III*)
In my world a magician
is a thief and a poet is
a con artist. Right? OK,
you’d be correct in point-
out that I’m adrift, drop-
ping big blankets over
people. Some people.
Such as those who can
be instantly figured out,
of course. Because, sure,
much art (many, actually)
is a con above all else. If
nothing but. A pro, how-
ever, gets with the pro-
gram, is on the ball (but
why is it always only
one ball?). A pro is a go-
getter, a meat-eater and,
most importantly, a bread-
winner (hint: BECAUSE HE
HAS A JOB! Or two.).
Make no bones about it,
I’ve tried both sides.
Pro. And con. I guess
you might say that
makes me versatile.
*(the title of this poem is from a page from Stephen Colbert’s
I Am America And So Can You which has a set of “STICKERS,”
each with a phrase which he recommends using to show that
you are the “man in charge” or that “you’ve got it all under
control” – I assume to be used especially when the man-reader
actually has no clue, or simply isn’t interested or even paying
attention)
A Page of Thoughts
These (which, my handwriting
was never the best, but is a word
here that looks more like “the hex” —
which I love — but these
days I’ve become the cliché
who can all-too-often barely
read his own handwriting; so
transcribing from paper to
perhaps another draft on paper
[drafts??] before time at the com-
puter to input, type, the part that
seems the most endless of all,
probably because of the limited
timeframes which I’m allowed to
sit at a computer. And so. I truly
never edited for any considerable
length of time, but my situation
over the past few years seems
to have greatly increased my
editing time and process
[process?], while at the
same time, thanks especially,
I am certain, to my transience,
connected also to my lack of
ownership, of a laptop or a
desktop [one without time
limits which have me hop-
ping from library to library,
etc.] or even a decent cell-
phone…. AND [alas!]
there is the problem of
nowhere mine to go, no-
where mine to sit.) Blame,
blame, blame. I do a lot of
blaming. I know. A lot. People
tell me all the time. Perfect
strangers. Today it is just to say
that maybe we are too complex.
For blame. Or remembering your
name. I know. It's me. I do, i swear,
spend much private time “owning up” —
but I take a stand in making certain to
publicly act on attempts to know when
NOT to blame myself, and when to
firmly stick to understanding when
(don't laugh!) I am the victim. Know
when to kowtow. Know when to bow out.
Or when to just bone up. Ow! Just shut up
about it all. You are hurting my head
on a regular but limited
basis. Many people, perhaps
like you, seem very uncom-
fortable with that. But that’s
a horror story and not a thought.
"Let’s have coffee and talk about
this sometime.” With all of the
seriousness in the world, that
request. Because this one is short…
[Or so I thought when I first drafted it.…
and yet:])….
The hex, or these things, while
often wonderful, fun, innocuous,
interesting, odd, not always too
overly dramatic or logical, graph-
ic, sinister without the cynicism,
or, no, I mean the other way
around. I think. Of me. Occasion-
ally (I mean who else?) I am a good
person. I mean I am good, right?
So genuine, so full of crap, without
suffering from the worry
of being too Gemini (a gleefully
sincere lie!). I work hard. Also to
strive for good, to comprehend
what that might mean and why it
might or might not be meaningful.
Air quotes make us similar. Many
things make us forget, grow dist-
ant, relax into that conundrum
like an oxymoron, fall apart. I
fall to pieces. Trying to fix things
shows our simplicity, our com-
plexity, the spectacular spectrum
of our complexions, the horrible sense
of if all. The horrible sensations. The luxury
of baggage. I’m falling into my fading “I’m
right and you aren't” mentality (empathy being
the line that separates adulthood and child-
hood — sadly, most seem never to
find their hidden grown-up. And it has
to be driven attempts, done on regular bases,
at “being as” else. Someone who, preferably,
holds values quite independent from those
of your own (Do you have one? Allow me to
check.), if not at complete odds with it. Shut
up! At least on the surface. We can go now.
Going is growing. You go first. What’s your
cuppa? I am culpable too, sometimes.
Just like you are. Just like Robert Culp is.
Sakrificial Gravy
Milk like
Nick’s (ramp-
ant) rice farm
shudder with the
farts of the wild
rams (and their res-
pective ramettes) and
it’s so totally amped, hasn’t
seen rain in the timespan it
took me to attend three new
Thai eatery’s grand openings
(each, consequently, to rave reviews)
here at the opposite end of the Pac-
ific…. So, it’s the videocam
again, it’ll always do in an in-
stant (neither of us is yawning);
an instant of love over the
mildew of lost connections,
I think aloud with the (by now)
tired and sleepy crickets. A
quick list of the cons of an
unwitting conversationalist
(unwilling, though?) means
much more than a possible
risk that never got a chance
to even return home a pro (a
live one, anyway). Thus, this
prospectus (in perpetuity): he
begs with his legs until he
probably believes he can prove
non-proximal conversion —
but from this end of deprav-
ity he (as usual) spews his top
(which clearly should be crim-
son red!). Stop. No. There is
nary a tract of (his) (thought?)
process (flitting as swiftly and
as flirtatiously as his eyelashes
and as endearingly as his aping
of my own curse phrases —
which I conduct in honor of my
dad, I always say after a spate —
only he twists the phrases so in-
side out until all sorts of hil-
arity simmers deep in my gut and
erupts as an explosion of
gratitude and forgiveness
Then his quick change of
subject, which is intentional,
not in the least non sequitur,
and so dizzying that I forget
whether we’re dining at
The Ritz this evening (or in his
case, tomorrow morning) or at
The International House of
Baloney. But I can clearly
ascertain that the guy sitting
at the table next to ours (or,
rather, mine?) has a lifeless
hand cupping his crotch while
he concentrates deeply into
his phone. This scene is so nor-
mal as to generate satisfac-
tion. I might as well be speak-
ing directly into my table-
neighbor’s crotch. It is, I de-
cide, a good thing I can write
in the stead of whatever I’m
paying for at whenever mo-
ment I decide is payday. I
remember an entire
city filled with internet. But
I seem memory-free when it
comes to the serial dramas and
serial killers that crumbled and
corrupted it. The city is who I
love. Do you? Dehydration may
yet turn out to be true love after all.
I found you in this city, lover
of mine, conducting a wok. It
is a story of two poles on a
big ball of seasons; delicious
with stir-fry (the air is perm-
eated ginseng). The grieving
process is enormous, hyper-
bolic, ignorant (most hope-
fully) and always induces hy-
perventilation. We shall meet
next week when the icecaps
finish melting and will of course
have no choice but to collapse
into a bear hug that slowly
works its grip all the way down
to our twenty throbbing, drowning,
electric-ecstatic toes. You pick
your reality and I will pick mine.
Coiffured
It’s not my tome to pen
(and what a pen it would be!),
but the necessity for this ask task
might as well look like defeat (May
I borrow your set of clippers, please?
My last two pair have been, sadly,
stolen. And as for what remains of
this last set, well, I just accidentally
chopped the electrical wire in
two.) but it is.
So you lost all
sensation in your left abdomen?
Good news: The Depression!
People
go around saying beards are passé
now. But I’m in luck! Because this
is San Francisco. And in San Francisco, be
you an actual panhandler (that word
harks a bit too far back in this neck
of the woods, but I guess could mean
one who doesn’t have a job, one who
doesn’t have a place to live and/or one
who doesn’t have a penny) or you’ a
tech zillionaire the good news is this:
beards are still very much in fashion.
Don’t think for a moment, however, that just
because I am double-up on my luck (because of my
profession) and I live the lifestyle that has been
handed to me that I cannot relate to the guy
here who is in the fishing industry.
And panhandlers?
(Being still, as they say, in on the joke, I have yet to
hold my cupped hands out sad-facedly toward anything
but the internet.)
Also, just because I’m queer (and obviously
have no idea where I am going with this) does not
mean I give a dime to any Tom, Dick or Harry on
the street. I say people need to own it in order to
earn it. Not that I even pay attention to the street.
Or the people on them.
At least Daddy always says
that I like to think of a runway as a garage with a
slice of carpet down the middle (somewhere be-
tween the Jaguar and the Leisure Van. Or maybe
we could place the carpet here, next to the Tesla.
Now wouldn’t that be very today?)....
By the way, the Jaguar is our little family joke.
However, I’m unsure who in the family still
approves of it being a joke anymore. That is, ever
since Skeeter passed during the safari back &rsuo;88.
(Skeeter drove the jaguar once. With Billy Joel in
the passenger seat. Or so the story goes, anyway.)
Honestly, I think this show is going to be such a
crumble. It’s like Eve always says to me:
You do such gritty work, how do you do it?!
I’ll tell you how to do it —
and this is just between you and me —
I make it real, honey. I make it real.
Chicken Ships
Today, I’m of a mind
to beam up every
therapy session in
which I’ve partici-
pated and start over.
Also on my mind
(or on its to do list):
settle up on the dif-
ferences between bro,
bruh, bra and blood.
Sure, what it all comes
down to (and this is me
letting you know that I’m
in on the joke) is solv-
ing such puzzles as
How to act crazy and
not be crazy, How to
reconcile subsequent
crazies with back when
crazy was good (Crazy
good!), How often to
pose as crazy, When
to attempt to pass as
officially crazy (whe-
ther crazy or not) and
How to simply be crazy.
If I make fun of the line
between crazy and not
crazy does that make me
sane? Just in case it’s
worth a try, this has
been my attempt.
that moment
when you
realize that
you’re be-
ing hood-
winked,
and that
you can’t
do a damned
thing about it.
Hell Yeah!
(Stephen Colbert
sticker poem II)
Here’s what I say:
“Hells yeah!!” That’s
at least what I say on
nights such as the one
through which I am
presently scooting.
It's a disaster (this
particular night).
Like Oh, what a night
(Cause I ain’t got no
money...)! But I can dance,
that I can do. Watch
me exit the stage all
by myself, head to the
coat check, suck the
coat check guy’s
lower lip (just a little
bit; it’s a thing), walk
out into the night fog.
Done. Alone. Alone
and done. Not that com-
pletion and/or singularity
in and of themselves is bad,
nor in need of iteration (cf,
further previous hyperbolic
journal entries), except...
I’m a weirdo anyway, we
can all agree on that (right?).
I’m not actually done, how-
ever. I mean, I sit here writ-
ing this to you sitting next to
a brand new friend (also a
weirdo, but I think that’s
probably okay). Oh, if life
were circuitous and evolv-
ing in any significant
sort of way. . . .
