mmmmdcclxxx

I wish that I were

purple tulips swaying
in the Dutch breeze
in such an expansive
field that the earth

was but a royal bruise.
Better still, I wish I were
tulips of fresh-petaled red
opening on a chilly morn

ing in the Himalayas, which,
it says right here, is from
where tulips originally came.
I’d pick just enough to make

a bouquet with no seeming
dent in the lushly blushing
garden and I’d walk them
over the mountains and

carry them with me on a
ship or else while riding a 

swift-moving water creature

all the way to wherever

you might be.  And even
if they’ve been long-wilted
and dispersed along the
mountain trails and into 

the billowing ocean, what 

ever their structure and 

state when I arrived at 

your doorstep I’d drop 

them all and give you 

the biggest kiss ever, 

regale you with the
wonders of my tulip

adventure, recount
the beauty of the
purple tulips of
Amsterdam and

the burgeoning
blood-red blooms
in the steeped
regions of Central

Asia, and we’d pour
ourselves some wine
and as the day grew
dim, I’d let you know,

as if all but nonchalantly
that I’d not be setting
foot out into the world,
no, never, not once again,

unless by chance you
were to accompany me.
And out we’d go to
wherever we’d go.

mmmmdcclxxix

More pleasantries

from the boyfriend of
the art intruder.  It was
behavior we normally
don’t tolerate.  I told

Roger that our glamping
trip was canceled.  He
didn’t immediately cry,
but I baked him a cob

bler for solace.  It’s so
difficult not to compl
etely smother yourself
within the arts when

there’s nothing else to
do.  Don called, then
brought over a bottle
of expensive champagne.

mmmmdcclxxviii

We are all incarcerated

inappropriately. I meant
reincarnated. When I was
a child, I was a terrapin. Or
at least that was my father’s
first nickname for me. This
is no extraordinary tale. But
I suppose that this particular
diminutive was transparent,
was, of all of the ones that
would later come, the most
direct nickname of all of the
names that my father called
me over the years. So it was
just the beginning of a trend
of condescending sobriquets
that my dad would anoint me.
And when it came to my father,
as related to me (and we were
definitely related), condescen
sion was most assuredly his
language of choice, it was
something he could (and
would) do, and it was some
thing he most certainly felt
that he could do well. I
don’t recall how it went
exactly, but this trend must
surely have begun when my
father decided, perhaps as
I was doing something he had
asked me to do, to his mind, in
a manner that was too slow for
his particular taste. Perhaps it
was during those sessions that
transpired each day for many
months during the year that
would have been my kinder
garten year—which also
happened to be a year when
kindergarten was not offered in
the smalltown Arkansas school
which I attended from first grade
through twelfth—in which he
somehow used alphabet blocks
to teach me how to read (some
thing for which I cannot but be
immensely grateful). Or maybe,
and perhaps most likely, it had
begun on one of those weekends
or summer days in which I’d have
to go out to whichever pasture
he’d be keeping his cattle that
year, to tend to them, to help 

him build the fences that he 

so perfectly built (most 

often in exchange for the 

use of the pasture). What

ever the case, at some

point he decided I was too
slow, and so, for a while,
I became Terrapin. Of the
later nicknames, each to
his mind surely more
derogatory than the last,
other tales will be spun.
But this is the story of
the first—to my memory,
at any rate—of many a
nickname that my
dad would, over
my childhood
years, conde
scendingly
dub me.

mmmmdcclxxvii

There is no crisis.

This came as a surprise.

The love song I wrote

for you all of those

years ago was just

now playing as upon

the silver screen

the credits were

rolling at the end of

the movie that I had

just watched.  It was

short film that had

ended in tragedy.  I’d

been crying in what

felt like a violent

fashion, but when

the music began,

I stopped silent,

sat briefly until I

recognized the

tune, then bolted

up out of my seat

and rushed out of

the cinema, and

ran with great speed

all the way back

to try to catch you

while you were

still home.

mmmmdcclxxvi

Absence vs. Death

Not having a job, I cannot
accept this challenge, I say
aloud to a social media post.

Who is the audience?  Me,
or those who disappear from
me, or those with whom I once

felt close who have since left

the living, died, passed on?
Who’s gone?  I know that I am. 

Who is here?  I know that I am.

Listening to the news as I type,
becoming further alienated....

But I’d rather be elated, happy
optimist that I am, right?  I re
peat something I frustratingly

fingered into my tiny pocket-

sized internet a few hours 

earlier when I was walking

Market Street in search of a
few beverages.  I was thirsty,
but was I alone?  Were these

creatures littered upon the 

sidewalk like me?  I was, 

in fact, communicating.  To

someone.  Who was some

where.  Something came 

back to me which seemed

a response to what I had

almost haphazardly sent 

off. These untethered

thoughts cannot integrate.
I’ve experienced disappear
ance.  I’ve been disappeared.

I’ve had people, if people we

are (names are also given to

ghosts) permanently remove 

themselves from my presence.
And I am reminded too often
that those who have vanished

show up elsewhere, presenting

themselves in ways that I can

see, or mostly believe I see,

can point to this purported 

proof that they are probably

somewhere.  If I look hard

again it seems that memory

and logic, if these can be 

trusted, provide hints that

the life of those permanently

gone from me are loved, that

they have joy and community.

And that all of this transpires

parallel to whatever might be

happening here.  Where I am.

With me.  Oh, it could all be
an act.  Witchcraft.  Or it could 

be that nothing exists, not even

me; not depression nor anxiety,

no grief or memory or love or

loss, this absence or dearth I

sense on the outside, relative

to what might have been, and

one that hollows out the inside, 

that burrows into the soul, 

removing its substance. 

Imagine that, the digging 

out from the inside.  Of a soul. 

What’s material?  What’s ethereal? 

Everything?  But what am I telling 

you, if anything is being told? 

Someone, who is here no more

but once probably existed, said it 

much better.  But before she, no
longer of this world (yet her words
very solidly, materially; and like the

cable I’ve connected to the device
upon which I type, are filled with
electricity, which is something like

life, perhaps—and a force that also
might remove it—should there be
movement, forces, actual words

with which to contend)—before I
give you what I am trying to say,
because I cannot say anything

with clarity, I’ll say what I can say,
like Come at me!  With all that you
have!  So that I am compelled to

resist.  And in that resistance, to 

feel.  And with such feeling and 

resistance I could come toward 

the notion that I am here, and 

even, perhaps, glimpse that I’m 

not alone.  Can you do that for me?

                    Absence is harder to accept than death.
                                                                    —Etel Adnan

mmmmdcclxxv

Running races

around a few of our more
esoteric words just to for
get (or remember) them

is not an authentic heart-
on-sleeve mode. smart
moves don’t always have

to be incoherent. chin
up, though! now that
you’ve got diabetes,

you’ll be needing a
real eyeglasses
prescription. that’s

the kind of authen
ticity that it is near
impossible to fake.

mmmmdcclxxiv

Hold fast your slippery bosom!

[In this scene we are cock-fraught
pirates.]  I ran into your middle name 

last night.  You were rocking out on a 

Mac somewhere over an ocean, where

you now live.  We had a seat at your
ocean sofa and, as I recall (and how
couldn’t I?) you served me a slice of
water and a bug, a waterbug—the ones

that skitter across the surface of ponds 

as if they are Jesus.  I know that you are 

spontaneous and that you’d say “anything 

is possible, so to speak” (i.e., miracles can 

happen), but I have to say that I cherish all 

of our earlier dream sequences much more.

mmmmdcclxxiii

I could have eliminated many

of these words, but I have just been so
preoccupied with this sky. Know what I
mean? That’s when things got heated.
Or wet. But it didn’t last long. Thanks to

me snapping Don’t shower me with your
tinny music, mister!—looking him square
ly in the jaw and strictly utilizing my upper
register. We were both so frazzled from

vacation. And that’s a curse I’m sure we all
can comprehend. In retrospect. (To this day
I absolutely refuse to visit Versailles.) Clouds
so heavy that they simply cannot make it over

that cute little park in the next block, the one
with that hill that seems to climb out of nowhere.

mmmmdcclxxii

I’m eagle,

inimitable,
Endymion,
because I
look so

god-like,
beauty is
good when

you’re loved

by the moon.
I’m elf, eleven
elvin drawstrings
flinging sharp

hearts up to the
sun, four hit my
moon, my moon,
a guy.  I’m just a

toy of a boy
getting man
handled by
godless

thieves who
place me on
the pages
more and

more unfairly
as they kill
my lover-
moon, a man.

mmmmdcclxxi

We’re loosening the bar

just to unhinge a martini,
having wobbled over to
Belden with Jenn.  Strap
in, she said, as we put on

our helmets at Helmut’s,
pre-Belden.  Enabling
good digestion and heart
health, we make those

martinis pomegranate.
You can’t do those dirty.
As the engagement be
comes more and more

inebriated, we spout non
sense like Practice empathy
for trophy housewives (Jenn)
and Therapists full of hot

air and lukewarm blather
(that’d be me).  But the
best trick of all is when
we become hell-bent on

the dispensation of com
plimentary vodka.  Four
strangers from the bar,
the only ones who had

arrived, like us, upon
scooters, snaked all
too swervily through
the almost non-exist

ent traffic home where
by morning we were all
the best of friends.  Let’s
be weeks-on-end home

bodies! we kept exclaim
ing over stir-fry, waiting 

on Monday.  And then we
laughed until we cried.

mmmmdcclxx

With 9 clear windows

across your face, through
each of which, 6 hills gazing

back through the windows
at me.  Unless it hurts too

much to tell the truth, switch
gears whenever necessary.

Ten minutes earlier, I walk
into a closet of my own.  It

is our annual Mix ‘n’ Match
Day.  And then your face,

glazed with multiple panes
utilized normally for observ

ation.  But it wasn’t until I
began taking your pill that

I realized how intense social
anxiety can be.  Is.  A bike

messenger, as if on cue, has
knocked on our door, having

entered the building’s lift
with his one true companion.

“Knock knock,” I clock.  “I’m
here to clean your windows,”

comes the answer from behind
the door that will remain locked,

bolted for ten hours, one hour more
than the number of windows earlier

found twinkling across a stranger’s
face.  “And this is my routine,” I

write upon a line in a notebook,

already crowded with funny-

sounding sentences, before
returning it to my back pocket.

mmmmdcclxix

I baked

a hundred and one cookies
the day before I left for San
Francisco. They were most
ly peanut butter, but I don’t

put in chopped peanuts I
don’t like the crunchy.
There was also this celeb
ratory cake at the labora

tory. That’s where I worked.
Well, if you think about it in
a certain way it is. Upon the
cake’s white icing with sprink

les was iced in red “The Road
Not Taken.” Frost had lived
where I was going until he
was eleven, then came

almost all the way to where
I was eating that celebratory
cake in a metaphorical labor
atory filled with real laboratories

within which the most renowned 

chefs had come from all over the 

planet to labor.  Each chef wore a

long white cotton lab coat and carried 

around Bunsen burners filled with 

boiling bubbly stuff. Their goal: to

find the tastiest or the healthiest or
the cheapest peanut butter that had 

ever been concocted. The irony of it all 

was that it had exceeded expectations, 

that some dimwitted flunky’s dumb idea 

for a contest was nothing short of a rat

ings bonanza. One way I have lived
with nary a regret is remembering
what a toll it took to live each year

with SIX MONTHS of winter.

mmmmdcclxviii

A series of short naps in the morning

relieves the sky of its clouds.
Hooray for sunny workdays!
So I begin to march myself to 

the board meeting with elation.

But the moment I start mov
ing, I’m back to feeling witchy, 

sluggish, mopey and edgy. 

And this is how I have been

all week long. In summary, 

it was a no good boardwalk,
followed by a no good
board talk. Eventually,

I get home, exhausted
and itchy, sweaty with
an upset tummy, and
that’s when I get the

call that underlines
everything. One tiny
sermon that solves
all ailments. After that,

my dreams are in that
beautiful language I do
not even speak. Perhaps
what I have been doing

is astral projecting. Into the
Southern Hemisphere. Which 

never gets old. Until I wake 

up, my alarm screeching:

Get your ass to work!
My witchy, somnamb
ulent ass that knows
no electrical languages.

mmmmdcclxvii

We had two helpings

of who wants to report the
news, anyway (?)—followed by
a dessert of chicken legs and
white rice. This was our way

to close the blinds, to put on
the blinders. But we still could
not shield our eyes from the
sun, could not stop gawking

at our bodies, at our world gone 

wrong. Nobody told any of us 

to go jump off the upcoming 

cliff. Our shame was enough. I

danced a little jig, and all of
the survivors that I’d just met
did so, too, but much better.
And within that dance, we

locked eyes steadily, learning,
as always. The fragility of agility.

mmmmdcclxvi

taking a pick-axe

and heaving it at a cello,
surely. that’s the music
we’re going for in this
scene. i have a headache

because i’m not on set.
i’m at my not-so-fancy
office in my not-so-fancy
home trying my best to

be on top of things, flu
or whatever this is that
my body is fighting not
withstanding. these

classy headphones exp
lode into my ear as the
blade hits the gorgeous
instrument. i’m drained

and emotional and i’ve
just been asked for input.
my input is the sudden
stream of tears that are

slickening my face – my
head is tilted a bit so
there’s a sort of lachry
mal pond that has built

up just to the right of the
bottom of my chin. as
the pool grows large
enough to let go of the

tears via newly formed
droplets. the first one drips
on my dog, skip. he’s just
a puppy, really, so we’re

still calling him skippy.
he’s been asleep at my
feet, despite all of my an
xiety. but with that drop

he’s up in a huff and out of
my office to someplace he
finds better than lying 

next to my feet. and that

was the extent of my input.

mmmmdcclxv

I shall not fall

at the feet of a foot-
long sandwich, even
as hungry as I now
am.  Even as I have

picked specifically
each pre-flavored
meat and slightly
over-aged hip con

diment.  I have
asked for the 

softest, whitest 

roll within which 

this cluster of flavor 

shall soon be smashed.
I shall have patience, 

for I see now the 

order I built with
my very own choice
words, from the mind-
numbing, stomach-

churning profusion of
options, and after watch

ing a person wrapped 

in cellophane stack

each item exactly in
the order that I had
uttered, each beauty 

I mouthed signified

each of the ingred

ients, in the order 

they were given, to 

the bread that, com

bined together, are

now being profession

ally spatula’d from 

an oven that has 

heated this work

of art into a warm,

slightly crusty, perfect

ly tanned exterior.

and this tailor-

made delicacy 

will be a thou

sand times

more satisfying,

more nourishing
and delicious—in
essence, it will

be superior in
every way—to

this tall, thin
layer-cake

that I have,
for patience’s
sake, for the
sake of hunger,

concocted
while awaiting
the pure poetry
that is this

scrumptious 

sandwich I shall 

now sink my teeth 

so deeply into.

mmmmdcclxiv

2 things 2 easy

Are you too hard on
yourself?  I find that,

generally, people are.
Nobody else exists,

you know?  No one
but you.  Once you

figure this out, I
could say the same

about myself.  But 

until then I offer you

a small and loving

pair of ideas that are

not only simple and

a piece of cake to

remember, but have 

often assisted me on

occasions such as the

one into which we both

have no doubt inadvert

ently stumbled.  They are: 

avoid permanence and 

steer clear of perfection.

I know I’m not really
here. But could you

kindly let me know
if these words help?

And of course they will!
Now try not to forget we

never met.  And do stay 

tuned for more hot takes.

mmmmdcclxiii

Needless to say, we attempt to finish

an entire day. Sitting on our
bed, each in our pajamas, not

a thing happens. Okay, obviously.

mmmmdcclxii

Today I am

And I actually believe
he is telling the truth.
Which is the root of
all cavity (I’m at the

dentist at the moment).
In my mind, I’m at my
dentist’s office sipping
nitrous.  Pardon the inter

lude.  I’m hungry, my nose
is dripping, and I’m waiting
for the exterminator.  Skept
icism is an ally.  Do not, like I

do, believe anything I say. Would
you please pose for me all sexy-like?

Bottom-Heavy w/o a BBL.

mmmmdcclxi

He calls me over my soldiers

and forces the Bay Bridge into my mouth and
down my throat.  I remember how happy I was the
last time, my jaw nearly torn in two, that feeling
that I’d so helped my countrymen out of their
beds and onto the battlefield.  There’s no melodic
metaphor that could bring us an ounce of justice.
He tried suggesting we fit together better than must
ard and ketchup, but I hate ketchup, suggested am
munition and gunpowder instead.  No complicit
benzo bar could ever put me more at east than the
knowledge that our bold actions—laden with high-
minded intent—that the fruits of this war would provide
confidence and nourishment to our kind for generations.

mmmmdcclx

I’ve created

for myself a fiction to slip into every
once in a while.  And I don’t have to 

tell you how that can be a bit problem

atic.  But I’m an optimist, and rather than 

focus on the negative, I’d like to, for a 

moment, celebrate my fictional space.

Except, how many jobs might I have in
quired about in the time it took to slip
back into my routine here?  Shouldn’t I

go deposit this check?  Plan my wedding?
Take that trip outside of the city, something

I’ve been wanting to do for years, yet haven’t

done in too long, embarrassingly, like driving 

up or down Highway One, should it still be in
place by the time I get to it? There are

neighborhoods in my beautiful city that
I haven’t walked in longer than it has been

since I have driven outside of it. Understand

ably.  But all of the reasons that I might come 

up with that have prevented me from doing
so don’t outweigh the benefits of just getting

up, getting myself out the door, and doing it....
These thoughts aren’t going as planned.  May
be I need a new therapist.  Or maybe I just need

to retreat further into myself and this fictional
world into which I can collapse so neatly.  I’m
just kidding, of course?  Just trying to be funny.

I’m good for that, surely.  A little bit of humor never
hurt anyone.  Except.  Name a bully who doesn’t
consider themself a comedian.  Surely you can.

mmmmdcclix

Evabodywantasugadaddy

Unless you already have one, of course,
or are one, which, in either case, poor
dears, lucky sots, etc.  What a dream,
it must be nice.  Naivete saved my day,

that’s all I have to say on that subject.
No, actually, I’ve got plenty more to say,
but I’ll not go that long.  First, I’ve had the
misfortune of living on a shoestring for

about a decade now while at the same time
having young men come at me calling me
Daddy.  Constantly.  And for those uninitiated,
let me just say I do mean constantly.  Or you’d

probably be surprised?  I learn to live with it.
But worst is the disappointment when each 
and every one of these guys learns, as inevitably
they will, that I barely have a dollar to my name.

And what’s the shame in that, you might be a bit
dimwitted to ask.  Well, nothing really, except that
you get to be the lucky guy who gets to teach those
from whom you’ve the gumption and the inclination to

garner a modicum of attention some real world
lessons.  And trust me, you don’t want to be the one
doing that.  But if you do, please send me yr deets
post haste so that I can forward these folks onto you.

mmmmdcclviii

Snow-Covered Boston Today.

The snow also ate New York. I
have not written for several
seasons. Here is a head filled
with bottles of Pine Sol. Re

member when such things
came in glass receptacles?
Please note that this is just a
reminder of how I learned I had

Covid for the first time. Other
scourges were soon to follow.
And memories of heads filled
with bottles of Perrier, instead.

Here is a glass of New York. Strum
your guitar because you like cake.

Frozen Chocolate (no candles)

mmmmdcclvii

Marriage. The presumption

that you can be bothered, that
you’ll laugh most of the times
I laugh.  Yesterday’s mad dash
becomes next year’s potato

sack race toward another
broken record.  Steaming
at the fact that he wore
that damned suede

jacket again.  In reverse,
of course.  Afterwards,
to the sauce.  The
sauce that pickles

the liver; the sauce
that mummifies.

mmmmdcclvi

I caught the glass

flag of scripture as it floated
between the two buildings,
yours and mine. Mine, sleek
and slim at 182 stories and

yours, ornate and Gehry-like,
at 190 stories, looking like a
new animal every day. We had
had just walked to our offices

and gone to our respective
floors. I saw the fragile ob
ject floating flaglike through
the tiny window I have at my

cubicle, through which I can
see into my boss’ office, which
comes in handy when I catch
him asleep before his 5:45pm

appointment. As an added
bonus, I also caught your eyes
staring out of your 180th floor
office as you followed that

glimmering glass flag while it
floated between us and then
out over the boiling bay before
exploding into a swarm of color.

We immediately called each
other on our office phones
to ask what holiday the day
might possibly be. Neither of

us had been able to read any
of the text that seemed at first
to be of our very own language,
yet upon scrutiny was decipher

able to neither of us. We were
so caught off guard, giddily
unaware of what was being
celebrated or advertised.

mmmmdcclv

It was cold war

last night.  Today, it’s a
nightmare of humidity.
Defenseless pigeons
swing around the

prison bars outside
shop windows in the not-
so-fancy parts of the city.
Earth to Pants, come in

Pants! whose genitals are
nearly frozen.  Humans,
defenseless to weather’s
extremes, freeze and then

melt on the slick sidewalks,
are buttered, over-easy.

mmmmdccliv

Things go downhill.

Indeed, its circumference
was staggering. Debates
about the health benefits
of walking upstairs versus

those of walking down the
same set of stairs. We were
watching the couple’s hands
for nearly two blocks. One

playful hand from each person
connected the two in ways we
imagined electric, universal
(as in the couple became a

universe unto itself). Then,
as was our custom, we each
took a seat upon one of the
benches facing the fountain

and concentrated.

mmmmdccliii

Even the sterile campus

bleeds its dawn.
Smoke bells.

It’s impossible to
describe how

pleased I was
with the new

apartment.
We live for now;

past tense is
but forgery.

mmmmdcclii

Perhaps I should walk

back to my shoes. I was
getting ahead of myself.

Then we walked up the
steps to the Fillmore

glitches. Smoke bells.
Ten words to jumpstart

elocution. At the top
of the hill, I opened

my mail. There was a
small book in a manila

envelope. I read the
first four pages aloud 

to him and then we leaned 

back into the grass and 

watched the clouds pass 

over us for several hours.

mmmmdccli

I don’t want to turn

the page because the clouds
will be gone, my nose pressed
against the airplane window.

mmmmdccl

Also, we got a new coffee table

after three years. I removed
all of the spices from the
cheap rack and placed them
each into the tall white cabinet

in our kitchen. The one I found
in a trash bin somewhere and
you repainted bone white. When
I first moved to East Coast, I lived

in the attic of a lady’s home in
Jamaica Plain. She ran a nursery
(children, not plants) in house. And
on certain nights of the week, she

would go trash picking in nicer neigh
borhoods and would sell her loot in
the fashion of, say, Fred Sanford. For
the first time in nearly a decade, I now

live in an apartment of my own that is
charming, is airy, and seems grateful to
have me. Or is gracious, as apartments
go. I was happily walking my new neighbor

hood a few days after moving in, or, well,
it took me a month to move completely in,
but I was sleeping here as soon as I could...
anyway, walking around in a state of free

dom I found a short two-tiered shelf, with
simple black metallic legs and supports
for two square wooden planks, like new,
that now stands next to my bathtub, in my

very own bathroom; these are two typical
household features I lived without for
eight or nine years previous to moving
here. I wash my dishes in a bathtub

for the first time in my life, now, but at
least I have one that is mine. As well as
a cute table upon which my motley
assortment of dishes, pots, pans,

glassware and silverware can now
sit, either waiting to be washed (on 

the bottom shelf) or drying (on the 

top shelf over a thirsty placemat).