mmmmdviii

Dueling Surrealisms

     The sun shines like
     a spoken wheel
            —Robert Glück

         In the movie
     sad nipples die.
              —Robert Glück

It’s Halloween
or the Night
Before Mariah Carey.

It’s time to get down,
but there’s exhaustion,
ongoing election dysfunction,

and work. I haven’t escaped
city limits for nearly a decade,
but I’ll be leaving the country

soon for a vacation in the
tropics, to meet my best
friend, to get married,

the great escape.
Unless they throw me
in the slammer for

unpaid back taxes.
What’s real? Turning
on the television or

having my bag full of
tomatoes kicked by an
innocent bystander,

which turns my park
into a blood-soaked
garden. I torch her

you. She torch her
me. We split the
dif & meet at the

equator just
to beat the hell
out of the heat.

mmmmdvii

Opening Up

How someone so closed
can open up. Anxiety
tends to the darkness
of being holed up inside

a box, no sunlight in.
How do you open? Some
say with a knife. Some
with a drink. For others

it’s in dreams. Meditation,
astral projection, a twitchy,
burrowing trance, a mid
night to six in the morning

dance. A drug, recreational
addicts pump their hands
in the air, fell themselves,
be it feet to sand, sidewalk

or dancefloor, rise toward
the ceiling or a boundless
sky and eventually evap
orate. The god, a goddess,

in all that, resections each
vaporized eye, recalibrates
it, then penetrates all of
those gorgeous pupils,

a rainbow of them, we
look down at each other,
accepting our bodies re
formulating as vessels,

but not before, numb to
the day’s pain, with the
help of the penetrator,
cleansing each particle

of evaporated body, which,
by sometime between four and
six in the morning, having re
combined to slink down the

sidewalks of our most indus
trial streets feeling more alive
than the last time, sensing
within the twilit glimmers and

the yet resurrected shadow
E V E R Y T H I N G. I go
from here. I start now.
Lean in with arms open,

heading whichever direction.
Ready to embrace what lies
ahead, recognizing anew and,
in giving, taking, reverberating.

mmmmdvi

How I Turn Time into Pleasure

I’ve this I suppose you could call it
(as I will, especially if I spend too
much time on it in one stretch)
guilty pleasure of going through
old photographs of mine online,
correcting the dates, the locations,
tagging the people I know in each
photograph, and even the lives
of my forbears from as far back
as I have such photographs (and
that’s pretty far back as I’ve some
family photos that date from the mid-
1800s), essentially piecing together
a life, my past, what got me here,
a rendering somewhat outside of
myself of who I am. I say “guilty
pleasure” because I can get lost
in the task and in doing so ignore
for hours or an entire day or so
the things I surely need to be
doing, things much more
important than this habit
I have. It’s a useful habit,
though; it is quite practical,
at least for me. I write to
remember, as I always say. For
the same reason I generally take
a photograph. Because I’ve always
seemed to have trouble remembering in
whatever way or ways it is most people do.
I imagine that there are six or seven ways
people generally remember things, and
whatever my way of remembering is,
it seems unfamiliar or rare, at least
when I try to compare it with others’
methods, which becomes clear when I
attempt to discuss memory with other
people. These photos, I might add as a
reminder, and the words I’ve slammed
together over the years, I have saved
just like the photographs, they are all I
have left of the first 50 years of my physical
life. I lost everything in one of those ordinary,
almost cliche, yet tortured ways people often
do, it seems: standing at the sidelines watching
it all disappear, so to speak, in a resigned,
exhausted, helpless way. The loss of these
things, this physical stuff, is not for me a
hard loss (except when I think of the shelves
filled with familiar books that always stood
stacked like walls around me; and only then
sometimes), especially since I had the
forethought to begin at an early time
cataloging these pieces of me and
my life and the life of those around
me, including pretty much hording
every random photo I’ve ever taken,
as electronic files, going to the trouble
of scanning all of my photos from before
a certain time period, making all of
those electronic as well. The files
which I now spend maybe
too much time getting
lost within, cataloging,
tagging, dating, as a
way to piece together
a life, so that I may
better understand
who I am. And,
despite or through
it all, this life, these
pictures are there,
representing where
I’ve been, from whence
I came, act not as a reference
to a place or time I yearn to go back
to, although they do fill me with such a
warm and pleasant nostalgia, but mostly
they continually teach me about myself, each
time I sit with them it seems I learn something
uniquely new to add to the collage of my idea
of who I am. They don’t answer all
of those questions, but they give
me enough to know which way
I should aim, which direction
my legs might take me next
in order to build in the most
appropriate way upon what
I have become, who I am,
what I’ve learned about who
I am and the things most
important to me. So, here’s to
guilty pleasures, I suppose. And
perhaps curtailing my time spent
with these pieces of my past so that
I might build more and better using
what I am at present, becoming who
I might best be, who I can be, during
the finite but luxurious stretch of time
that I have been allotted.

mmmmdv

The Sequel to That Coming of Age Piece

I just watched the best,
most unlikely performance
of a broken heart. I could
spend these lines explaining

why best, why unlikely,
maybe point out that it’s a
coming of age performance,
explain why that seems to me

to be the case and therefore is.
But why waste so much time
on youth. For people like me
who are late bloomers, youth

is a metaphor all too real.
When did I wake up old? I
mean mature. All of what
led up to that point, that

transformation, an entire
lifetime almost, if in retro
spect that feels like such
a waste—and it does,

absolutely; where was
meaning, why so much
vapid nothingness, the
unlivable planet of just

getting there, of just
pining, and what a farce
if all we can do when we
finally arrive is look back

and grieve the nobody
that we once were, and
with tears in our eyes,
with such a soul-smashing

nostalgia, wake up each
new morning celebrating
the night we spent soaked
and flailing around for what

seems like an eternity,
finally to pass out and
inevitably awaken a
man. I sure fooled

you, though,
didn’t I?

mmmmdiv

I’m feeling too overwhelmed to begin to explain
why I’m feeling so overwhelmed, but here are
some thoughts on that subject anyway.

Staying inside again all weekend because, in my mind,
there’s too much to do (note to self: need to edit the
MS Word preferences again, the fuckers change back to
their template every few weeks or less lately, is it because
I’m a beta tester?) (This is going nowhere) (And on a day
when-) (I go back to uncapitalize the w at the beginning of 
that line – fuck!) This wasn’t my first intention but do you see
what I mean here – too many things to do today – getting
sidetracked and having to backtrack at every action I take?

Last night I made a long to do list of what I wanted to get
accomplished today. According to an expert in her field who 

gave a company-wide speech, imagine it a bit of a corporate

Ted Talk – many of you know what I mean – anyway, she 

says that the days when the experts thought (via research, 

of course?) that writing in a journal each day before retiring
to bed being such a great thing to do in order to get that
all-important sleep has been kicked to the curb for a new,
more predictably workable way to ease oneself into sleeping
with a bit of productivity (productivity being the key word
here, this woman speaking to a corporate crowd, and of
course the importance of sleep, which no one seems to deny
– it’s a practical lesson) thrown in, which is writing up a to 

do list just before bed. So that’s what I did. It was over four
pages long. Thus far, I’ve done nothing from the list, but
did wake up realizing all the things I didn’t put on the list
which I needed to, like cut my hair (done), read some
poetry (about to do) and watch the Michelle Obama
speech for Kamala Harris in Kalamazoo (done). There
was something else that I’ve forgotten, which I’ve
been sitting here trying to think of for a minute, which 

seems like my old standby now: stalling.

I’ll work on the list. The one primary two pages of which
is to write a long letter detailing my quibbles with regard
to this SRO I have lived in for 6 years which, all of a sudden,
I’m being told I owe even more each month (even after 

a 150% upgrade in rent thanks to the fact that I have a 

job now, and despite the fact that my paychecks are now 

being garnished by the California State Franchise Board 

or whatever they’re called) (income tax; state income 

tax). And this amount plus around two months of back 

pay! So, without even talking more about this giant 

mindfrack of an election, nor about the fact that my 

job’s about to end and I’ve only just begun sending 

off resumes for a new one and between those I have to

go down to Peru in order to maintain and hopefully finally
normalize a 5 year relationship, followed by getting the hell
out of Dodge if someone the color of a fascist orange gets
elected--and then there’s all of the rest of the bureaucracy
of the world. And here I am trying to climb my way out of
a 10-year old disaster that I seem to have found myself at
almost a precipice from which I might escape it, the
most depressing journey of my life. I’ll not sugar-coat it,
but I’ll not continue this meandering set of depressing,
throat-tightening complaints either. This has been today’s
words pelted out into the ether in this now nearly twenty
year public project about me. I can’t feel good about it,
but I do what I do – and I send it off to you. I’d recommend
not reading it unless you’re in a very particular state (knowing
it’s too late to say such things, and having no idea how to
describe such a state)….

mmmmdiii

The Painter’s Shotglass

    Dix parity
        —John Wieners

Me and my first guy,
my first guy and I,
people would think
out loud all the time

that we were brothers.
Nope. We didn’t meet
until I was 19. “Don’t
smirk,” I say with my

best Boston accent.
Maybe I was 20. On
this, I’ll get back to you.
Thing is, that’s how I

know I’ve evolved. I’m
an evolved kinda guy.
You see these lookalike
twinks holding hands

down the sidewalk and
what’s your first thought?
Narcissist, right? (“Nahhhcis…”)
And my mind’s moved on

to Pollock. And with such fore
boding. Something blood-
splattering was surely about
to happen. But nope. In the

end it was another boring
night at the beginning of
another boring month.
We had several years of

these. Clement Greenburg
came up with the name.
“Where did you get that,
what’s it called, your—

cologne?” I sputtered
an exhalation so quickly
that I nearly choked.
“Lavender Mist.” It

has a delicate, sweet
smell that is floral, herbal
and evergreen woodsy at
the same time. It has

soft, powdery, or
smokey notes as well.

mmmmdii

Two-Headed Sanity

Knowing I can get caught up
in anxiety, I don’t believe I’m
deranged or delusional, much
as I am, much as Del has always

been short for it, delusional, but
do I know deep down any real
reason for my name to elongate
into any further complexity? I’m

Del, in Spanish the combination
of preposition and article. Oh,
how I’ve angled for more depth,
more mystery, more than just

those one or two levels before
the game is over. But as I was
suggesting, I do think my head’s
placed firmly upon these shoulders.

It may be a bit wobbly with age,
but within it are the ringing alarm
bells being hyperbolic? I truly
hope so. A clean objectivity

comes and goes, I suppose,
when dealing with one’s inner
workings. But it does seem to
me that if ever there were a time

to act, if ever there were a moment
when having a contingency plan on
top of a backup plan might be a
feasible mode of existence….

I keep looking at clocks. I haven’t
worn a watch in years. Outside, 
people are banging on doors, walls,
shouting obscenities. Does it raise

my anxiety even further? It does. I’ve
saved some money. Haven’t traveled,
even outside of my fair San Francisco in,
what, over nine years? Common Sense,

keep speaking with that soothing
voice. I listen, nodding my head,
as all in as I get. Yes, yes. I think
you’re right. Let’s not make it ten.

mmmmdi

How to Break the Spell

To make sense
make sense. Pile
all your lofty verses
in Latin or whatever,

one on top of the
other, ’til you’ve
got some sort of
doddering tower.

Life is short.
Let those words
simmer for an ex
cruciating amount of

time. Then boil them.
Boil those bitches* away.


          Curses

          And remember,
          it’ll never work
          if it hinges on
          a sexist trope.

If Witches Were Words
If Words Were Witches

*wise-ass signifiers

mmmmd

Four Thousand Five Hundred

Of the many dueling
messages here, what
is one of them? Can
you rate a few of them

from predominant to
less so? Might you
rate a few of them
from least interesting

to moreso? Do you
have night blindness?
Are you aging well?
Would you consider

yourself a relatively
healthy human being?
Would you consider
yourself a human

being? Would you
consider this more
a case study or a
fictional account?

Does there appear
to be sunshine
lighting the path
ahead of you?

Do you find your
self more often
in the daytime
or night time?

Relative to this.
Can you relate
to it at all? Are
you being too

generous?
Define critical
thinking. Define
soul. Define

solitude. Are
we there yet?
Have I arrived?
Will you? Do

you think you
ever will. List
all primary
values. What

is today’s to
do list (read
it aloud)?
Turn in

a grocery
list. Was
it real or
imagined?

mmmmcdxcix

The Analgesic Painting on the Living Room Wall


I was staring way out into the distance

through a window that wasn’t even there.

I’m sure my eyes were glazing over, as

they say.  Yes, I remember now what

I saw through that window.  But the

horizon’s various aspects grew more

and more blurry, less distinct, the

stark colors that defined things

got softer, turned pastel. “Swas-

tika the matter, Johnny?” Of

course Esther was concerned.

She always was. It’s nice to

have people who look out

for you, upon whom you

might lean for a bit, in

times like—“What?”

Something had

snapped me out

of my funk, at

least momentarily.

“What did you say,

Esther?”

mmmmcdxcviii

A Lot to Carry

This decade of his work
was quite heavy. Was
actually only two to
three years in
duration. We
go to work with
so much on our
minds. Later, we
try to tuck ourselves
in without having glimpsed
how the other half live. Knowing
already that it’s so repulsive.

mmmmcdxcvii

To Be Frank, Art’s Not So Pat.
(IMHO) (but maybe someday I’ll talk pretty, too)

     Writing letters counts as writing.
     Writing emails doesn’t.
                       —David Sedaris (during a MasterClass ad on YouTube)

The man also says unless
you’re sitting at your desk,
[writing is] not gonna happen.

I used to wonder why everyone
but me thought him funny. I
felt problematic when attempting
to go along. Although I don’t
have an intentional fake
laugh.

Also, where I live these days,
where I’ve lived for nearly
six years now, I really
don’t have room for
a desk. Not that
I haven’t done
a lot of work
at desks. And
I continue to do so,
standing up and
walking around
as much as is
feasible.

I laugh when I laugh. I cry
when I cry. Sounds funny
to me, my insistent attempts
at being so transparent, at
being real. I’m

straight up (not straight).
I’ve tried being on the DL,
but it’s entirely too stressful.

I have two degrees in
theatre, but not
being me IRL
is just not me,
apparently.

So WTF, David Sedaris?!

I have tried hard to like you.
Not in a play-acting sort of
way, though. More from an
anthropological perspective.
Which requires research.

Do you do all of your
research sitting at your
desk? I wonder.

Quick change of subject,
but sometimes I forget about
the impending apocalypse.

This thought comes to me 

while I’m sitting on the thinker.

Which, by the way is not a desk.

And now here I am 

taking snapshots
of dawn as it 

creeps over
my city.

mmmmcdxcvi

Love Lifted Me

I’m in such a state of
flux, unable to focus,
and this literally float
ing above the surface,

over whatever floor or
sidewalk I am gliding
over, that when I look
down I almost catch a

glimpse of the top of
my head as it basic
ally aimlessly floats
over the rest of my

semi-transparent
self as the body I
look down upon
commingles with

the automobile ex
haust, the fog and
the bodies that are
less transient than

mine. Me? Where
I’m going I cannot
tell. Always some
where. But this

destinationless
place that I’m
always moving
toward yet at

which, at which,
where, I’m not,
I’m never arr
iving, to where

am I going,
Where are
you going?!
all of my

everything
asks, think
ing SCREAM,
wanting KICK

HIM! And the
ghost responds
by gliding faster,
more aimlessly.

mmmmcdxcv

Stolen Fantasies

Not that they weren’t
pilfered already. Some
one told me recently that
Craigslist gay want ads

still exist. Can we fact-
check this? Of course I
can, but I’m angling for
group participation here.

Misinformation. Disin
formation. But I’m no
formalist. I’m just a
fantasist. A person in

sistent on an entertaining
imagination. Don’t trip on
where these thoughts came
from, rock out on the scene,

the circumstance. Tune in,
turn on. That’s my arena.
Or it’s mine now. It is the
play we act together. And

for that, I apologize for
my thievery. But if I had
to do it over again, I’d
pillage it all once more.

In fact, if you’d like to
collaborate on a little
more magic, just hang
tight and I’ll be right

back with a bit more
plunder.

mmmmcdxciv

A Tortured Life Is Not a Tortured Love

One might give up one
for the other. Or darker

still, live with one en
shrouded with optimism.

For that release. At what
point would I have ever

said that you can’t have
one without the other?

Not today. For now, I
might awaken most days

afraid of what the hours
might bring me. But

settled in that peaceful
hemisphere of my soul

is an electrical connection
so strong that dust daren’t

settle around it – see but
how it floats like a moat

that guards my crook’d
and hiccoughing heart.

mmmmcdxciii

My Redundancies

If I could just but
bitch for just a moment,
maybe two, my love life,
my financial well-being
and my mortality might
have a thing or two to
say to you. But where
would I begin? And
what, pray tell, could
I say that hasn’t been
said so many times
before? So I retreat
and say that for starters,
most nights I sleep. I do.
These days, at least. This
tiny radar blip that used to
beep and beep and beep.
And when I reach as far
as I can reach I count
ten fingers (and that
while squinting). This
extroverted hermit
keeps his own company,
unless by luck of placement,
like, say, at work, a place
I try to go from day to day,
a few people pass me along
the way. Some say hello,
some even stop to shoot
the breeze for a mere
minute or two. And
those moments take
precedent over most
others save for those
in which I’m gabbing
for hours with my
most beloved, who
lives well below the
equator. So our
intimacy is of the
more 21st century
type. But most of
this you know already.
Or probably not. Either
way, for whatever reason,
I do like to share with you
that which I most treasure,
alongside that which causes
me the most distress. But
I digress. I always do.
In this one-sided
conversation that
goes from me
to you.

mmmmcdxcii

An Ageless Couple of Yucks

Sick day. Slept through
almost all of it. Then
had a brothy lunch at
a local joint. Forgot

my phone so grabbed
it to go. Sat for an hour
in bed yucking it up with
my boyfriend who was

celebrating his ancient
brother’s birthday. The
ancient part was a joke.
It’s his 26th. His elder

brother. Which, if multi
plied by 2 and added to

a nickel, the yucking bf’d
find my age. He already

knows this, of course, and
we continue yucking because
we like to laugh at things in
life that are funny.

mmmmcdxci

Blood Pressure

If we could gauge the up
tightness, not strictly the
constriction of the blood
vessels but a certain kind

of...emotion raging thru
the veins. “Is it anxiety?”
“Yes, I’m anxiety.” “How
do you do? I’m Frank.”

Frustrated by the amount
of pressure you’re under?
Try Lucy Goosey. Commer
cials. All the rage until those

pesky requisite side effects
roll. “What do you do for
a living?” Oh, so that’s
how this works . . . .

mmmmcdxc

Oh, Relax!

I could do this all
day. These Glück
collages. What a
blast! At what point

does one put the
kibosh on so joy
ously (greedily) tak
ing things in and

start returning the
flavour (riiiiight)?
Hit reverse! I can ex
claim. And I do, to

myself. Even w/o
a Boombox. (LOL)

mmmmcdlxxxix

The Day

If I put a lot
of thought
into it, it is

gone. On
to Sunday,
the bluesiest

of days (and
evening the
worst). But

if I skip the
focus, look
outward, no

interior rum
ination, a
swagger

might be
enticed out
of the hole

in the broken
jar, a kick in
step, so to speak.

Were there 8
days in one
week (or 9),

wouldn’t it be
nice to have a
couple of them?

Look out!
Don’t sink,
blighted week.

mmmmcdlxxxviii

Hamlets & Burgs

His airplane landed
in Paris, France.

He hopped into a
taxi that took him

from the airport
to the train station.

Drifting across the
continent in a sleeper

car was the best way
he’d ever traveled

upon land, he
thought the next

morning. He’d
awoken in Köhn

where the train
had stopped just

long enough for
him to hop off

for a bit of
breakfast,

which consisted
of a nice, wet

omelet with
gruyère and

ground beef
decorated

robustly with
lots of potato,

after which he
swiftly returned

to his car on the
train where he

napped the rest
of the day away

dreaming
intermittently

of being on a
snake-like train

as seen from
way up high

that slithered its
way on a map

through endless
dots with long

names that no
matter how hard

he tried, he could
never pronounce.

mmmmcdlxxxvii

Prayer

Peace, my God,

Who doesn’t exist,

Put Me in a trance,

Something mildly electric

That connects Us,

Fuses clover to the

Patchwork quilt. Clover

Upon which a quilt

Is billowingly laid,

Upon which We Are.

Picnicking. Not panicking.

Peace. The chicken,

My Chicken,

Which I hold in my hands

And eat with my teeth and lips and tongue

Similar to how you hold yours.

Fried chicken.

And how you eat so differently.

In the event of a perfect picnic there is

No judgment.

And We’ve eaten,

Stretched out upon this quilt

As unaware of it as We Are of the clover

Smushed beneath Us. A patchwork of

Peace made whole by Us upon it and by

“What fine weather we’re having this afternoon!”

And the Holsteins chewing cud seem to agree.

God help Us

To a picnic every weekend,

And every day glorious

Like this one.

And once we say goodbye

To our escapism

May We re-enter the action

To find that the

Storm has

Subsided.

And there is Peace

With and without US.

A Men.

mmmmcdlxxxvi

The Baloney Dilemma

I saw someone online,
a friend I do not know,
suggesting that lyric
too afraid to reveal

itself, a poem layered
in secrets, is by its very
nature corrupt. I’m para
phrasing to the point

of warping the strong
opinion all out of whack,
I am sure. As for me, I

disagree.  And then a

tiny, colorful fish popped

up out of the drainpipe

of my kitchen sink and

flew itself all the way

to Turks and Caicos.

I heard much later,

from Katherine, I 

believe, that it was

the best vacation

ever.

mmmmcdlxxxv

My Experience Was Different Than Yours

Some things in life are difficult.
Do you ever experience giddiness?

Refraining from using Who here,
What turns you on? Do you travel?

When do you experience a heightened
sense of guilt? Not ever? Are your

eggs bland? Here, have some salt
and pepper. Now are they better?

Your exam results in a frowny-face.
How do you feel? With whom do you

discuss this? With any depth? I think
about those underwater cliffs. They

often light up on the silver screen of
my mind’s eye. What cinema!

Yes, I remember how dark it was
down there, but on that imaginary

screen.... Those vivid, sheer bluffs.
Remember falling? As we fell

together I remember feeling so
high that I felt like crawling out

of my skin. But then I looked
over at you. I know it was dark.

Too dark to see. But I look over,
and you are so dapper in your

semi-dry. Our breath is in
sync. Inhaling and exhaling

together as we fall. . . . It’d be
years before we ever reached the

bottom. That’s when I blacked
out. No more silver screen. No

more light from darkness. The
climb up took but a week. I’m

never sure why I left you there.
Was your leg broken? Were we

playing hide and seek? I rose
from the shore a hero. But I

know what I am. I lie awake
most every night thinking of

falling, the memory of it, its
brightness, and the everlasting

solitude of celebrity. No more di
ving. Surely we can agree on that?

mmmmcdlxxxiv

A Hermit’s Way to Repartee

I like how your nose
scrunches a bit at the
sides as it rises when
you pause at the end

of a particularly gos
sipy sentence. Am
I saying, perhaps,
that your disdain

is your charm?
I am the kind of
person who shuffles
through crowds in

search of even the
tiniest glints of hope
from those who, along
the way, I encounter.

(Casting Aspersions)

mmmmcdlxxxiii

Extending an Arm to the Bleak and the Dead:
A Selfish Endeavor

     Damned and cursed before all the world
     That is what I want to be.
                                            —John Wieners

I’m fine. Really.
Not making any
promises, but
it’s been a good

day, I’m not in a
bleak mood, I’ve
been out a bit this
past couple of weeks,

I mean, besides work:
Folsom Fair, Badlands
(first time in maybe 5
or 6 years!). I’m just

thinking about how
John Wieners said “I
try to write the most
embarrassing thing I

can think of.” Which,
to me, begins to app
roach the freedom I
seek at times when

I’m writing, but in a
most limiting and
flabbergasting way.
I do love to complain.

Or one might certainly
think so if they dug in
to my scribbles of the
past decade or so. May

be not so much at the
beginning. How long
did that beginning last?
Depends on how you count

it, I suppose, but it would
have been 16 or 17 years
if I start from that moment
I called myself poet with any

sincerity. One can shift rather
dramatically. And that I’m
counting on, and working
on, and I’m okay, truly.

And I do not like to com
plain. I just do. It isn’t

justice I seek, but perhaps
a bit of fairness, equality.

Or I really don’t know. If
okay is what I am. Or if
I’ll ever get another such
shift. I guess, if I’m talking

to myself, I’d say You’re so

much better, that’s for sure.
And I can, with confidence,
concur. Depending on how

I look at it, better than ever.
But mostly I mean these have
been fairly exhausting times.
As compared with the times

that were so stark in their
opposition to these. And
I don’t mind embarrassing
myself here. It’s one way

to stay a bit humble. But
when it feels like humility
is all I’ve got... Well, I can
find other qualities. It’s just

that some tend to stand up and
be heard, are louder and more
demanding than others. But what
I really want is to, in the most

straight-up fashion, tell you how
wonderful I’m doing, or at least
all the good stuff that’s happening.
And I’ll get back to that. I always

do. But today I’m reading JW’s
Supplication, his poetry selection
that came out nearly a decade ago,
back around when I was blindsided

by a stumbling block that I tripped
over and didn’t stop tumbling for
quite some time. And as I continue
to pick myself up and brush myself

off and—for what seems like an
eternity—climb my way back into
a familiar vicinity, I can empathize
with, and play the part of, the

tortured poet. Just not endlessly.
I need my hope and my humor.
Doesn’t mean I can’t appreciate
some of the best of us who so rarely

seem to find much of either. But 

my heart goes out, it really does.

And with each line I find myself
climbing further and further up.

My Hero

mmmmcdlxxxii

The Threshold

All I had for a while
after 50, were pictorial
reminders of my past.

I won’t say nothing
substantive, there
is substance, even

if but fleeting, hard
to catch, hard to
touch, not hard at all,

really, especially now
that I can barely see.
Is that how it is? It’s

not so bad. I like to
complain, much as I
hate doing so. Is that

how I am? Always
have been. Anyway,
so now that I’ve moved

a few years beyond 50,
have I gained anything
substantive? A couple

of small bookshelves,
a bag to carry some
from here to there

and back. There’s
a bottle of wine on
top of my microwave,

a tiny path separates
the shelf atop which
that microwave sits

and my bed. I built
the shelf less than a
month ago. In this

place 6 years, I’m
always running out
of space. Substance.

There’s nothing living
here but me. And the
stuff I’ve collected since

losing all that came from
before takes less space
than what I had in my

car when I left for college,
I’d guess. But this is the
largest bed I’ve slept in

singly for any amount of
time (the only one, if that
amount of time can be

counted in a couple of
years). And by far the
largest television set.

But still, I’d sit for days
pilfering through these
endless photos. Present

day down to my youth,
and a century further
still, given I had the

wherewithal to scan
them all, even the
ones of my great,

great, great grand
mother. I’ve come
to know the resemb

lances between her
and me, me and her,
even though I never

even laid eyes upon
her, given that we
were never alive at

the same time. I
wonder what all she
lost while still living,

what she had that
might be lost. It’s
odd that I find her

here, know her more
and more, the more
I look at these photo

graphs of photographs
that live inside this
little box, so filled with

non-existent figments
of memorabilia, this
ephemera that keeps

me company, builds a
presence and has me
feeling somewhat alive.

mmmmcdlxxxi

     Cool wind blows in open window,
     I am happy being alone.
                           —John Wieners

But this contentment gives way to
desperation only three stanzas later:

     Won’t you come and see me again,
     please?

Given the source, what else might you
expect: torn heart, tempting death, love
spilling everywhere, mangled, almost
lifeless body on the parquetry. How

does this compare to this October day,
during a San Francisco summer’s hottest
week of the year, in a one-room home

that’s never once experienced a cool breeze,
either coming or going, through it’s one
window? Six years now of toiling with

whatever trickery that might exist when
it comes to ventilation. As exhausted
as the burning mouth of a tailpipe, all
attempts to move tepid air as it sullenly

refuses to stir. Unless this lint-grayed once-
white Woozoo fan blows directly upon my
overripe, mostly unclothed person and the

double-fan that sole window’s pane closes
upon in as airtight a configuration as is
possible clings for a moment to a bit of a
breeze stirring in the courtyard behind it

and the door is splayed wide open to
expose the lower depths of the city’s
riff-raff crammed into similar rooms
in tepid states spewing their infernal-

eternal nonsense all hours of the day
and, especially, the night (as I do)—
only then this classless occupant might
but barely feel the movement of a

few breaths of warm air crawl, say,
upon and mostly over the tops of his
shoulders, or through the glistening
hair that covers his forearms. Happy

being alone would be a nice epilogue,
sure, would it not? Would it ever! But
no. I still, however, can’t shake my mind’s
aim toward tomorrow with a tinge of

what, I suppose, might best be called
optimism. So, in camaraderie with a man
whose shaking hand I once proudly clasped—
there is always that. As of yet, at least.

mmmmcdlxxx

Self-Imposed Delusion

Now there’s a phrase that might
give you the heebie-jeebies, should
you consider it for a moment or two,
depending, of course, on your mental

acuity. Those last two words, though,
might uplift, given their meaning in
relation to the original phrase’s final
word, one which I often use, aiming

for comical, when I say “Del is short
for Delusional.” But am I just shooting
for comical when saying that? Or is
there a part of me I feel might be,

irrevocably or not, incapacitated?
There’s a pun in that question, for sure.
How might one really feel about stumbling
around with one’s head in the clouds? As

my hopefully lucid thoughts move further
in that general direction, it seems clear
to me that I, myself, would much rather
be delusional than decapitated.

mmmmcdlxxix

Speaking of Remembering


It’s the top

of the day,

I am slowly

gaining a

bit of focus,

and then

out from

what seems

nowhere, I

remember

something

I’d much

rather

forget. I

clutch my

heart near

the cliffs of

the banks

of memory

and repeat

the prayer

of erasure

15 times.

In hopes.

mmmmcdlxxviii

Getting Somewhere

Today I’d love to adjust to your reality.
Mine is just no good. What a turn-off
of a complaint. I wonder if I could
exist inside anyone else’s reality, a

notion that hurts my brain. Thusly
my process of waking up goes. Until
I find my attitude adjusted and mostly
positive, forward-leaning. Was that

mere fantasy? “Hope is a muscle,”
I keep hearing someone saying,
someone famous. I can’t remember
at the moment who keeps saying it,

but I’ll remember it eventually.
Most likely. I know what she means
every time she says it. But now I
just wonder, hoping I’ll remember.