mmmmdcccxli

On the Horn

                Alternate-side-of-the-street parking has been suspended,
     as has parking.
                                                                  —John Ashbery

But we haven’t had a car in decades.
In case a memory needs to be refreshed,
we is, simply, me. We were on the horn
to Microsoft earlier regarding the suspension

of account since May. That was about five
months ago. Needless to say, we’ve been on
the horn with Microsoft for an entire workweek
and a half since then. That’s at sixty hours. If

you don’t count the time online. Or vice versa,
who can remember? The situation was escalated.
This marks the 3rd time. Or is it 4th. With a pro
mise for a phone call and/or an email of explanation

between 48 and 72 hours from now. Oh, they’ve taken
out the $9.99 monthly subscription, despite the suspension,
each month now since June. Except for this month, due to
the depletion of money in my checking account. This may

go on for some time, I’m told. The depletion. And the
fading of my memory, thanks to inaccessibility. This happens,
we are told. We do not have to be reminded of that.

mmmmdcccxl

Learning to Play Games by Ourselves

     Those who came closest did not come close.
                                          —John Ashbery

We learned to play that game.  “Hello!”
we’d say.  There was, of course, no
response.  Meanwhile, we were decaying,
filling our bottles with poisoned and sedi

mented creek water.  It was probably
irradiated, as well.  How were we to
know?  We were just the ones to whom
no one got close.  When I say we, I do,

of course, mean me.  It was just me here,
filling up my bottles, watching for the per
sons who never arrived.  I tried to make a
game out of it.  “Let’s count the minutes,”

I’d say to myself.  “One.”  Then a bit later,
“Two.”  Then “Three,” of course.  It went on.

mmmmdcccxxxix

Shorter vs. Longer Pieces

Shorter being more succinct,
poems of this size tend to
encapsulate.  Encapsulation
is more memorable than

anything long, and gives one
the opportunity to take a pill
that might solve something.
The longer ones are less

worthwhile, which is by no
means saying anything about
attention span.  It just means
the author, the speaker got

lost, perhaps, had more to say.
These pass the time and are unremembered.

mmmmdcccxxxviii

Let this be the last

poem with a foul mood, for
such a foul mood, about a
rotten mood.  Let this be
the last time I feel so alone.

If poems are answers, then
you tell me, what is the
answer to how I’m feeling
right now?  As I dive into

this, I realize I’ve been here
before, I always get myself
out of this.  That should be
lesson enough, but it doesn’t

change how I feel, does it?
I just checked.  It does not.
If I seem a lesser poet for
dwelling on this, then so

be it.  During times like
these, perhaps I should
go with my normal mode,
which is faking it.  But not

today.  Today’s mood is just
too foul. If poems are made
to hold answers on how to
be, then this is no poem.  It’s

just a rotten mood, that’s all.
Like mine.  And what of it?  Isn’t
it rude of me to expose myself
in such a way as this?  I’d say

so.  But also, today, I’d say
so what?  What of it?  What
would you have me do?  What
I normally do?  I could come

back with Isn’t authenticity
king these days? Well, who
wants an authentic horrible
mood?  Who wants an

authentic rotten day?
I think this was not the
best decision, going ahead
with this while feeling so

incredibly defeated.  So
how about I promise next
time, the next one I sit down
to make for you, how about

if I promise to somehow,
even if I don’t feel like it,
knowing that sometimes
if I try, it does help, the

next one I decide to make
for you will include at least
something positive.  How
about that?  I promise.

mmmmdcccxxxvii

I am the representative

of kink.  Don’t I look it?
Don’t give me any sass.
Don’t call me names that
you’d rather I not call you

back.  And what if I was?
And what if I am?  I do
this job, so therefore I
am.  What of it, will you

now disobey what I’m
paid to kindly say to you
in direction?  Just try it,
I suppose, I’m much

louder than I look.  I’m
proud to be the sole
representative here at
this way station.  Even

as when I do what I’m
told I’m not backed up
by any of the other reps,
the cops and the meter

maids, they let me go
my own way, only I’m
just following orders,
and in doing so get

called every name in
the book.  Ask me
to rep again next
year, dear, I rather

love such hilarious
and sinister lip.

mmmmdcccxxxvi

Things I Say Repeatedly

     All the oceans
     Of emotion.  All the oceans of emotion
     Are full of such fish
                                            —Jack Spicer

Oh, well.  The tide,
she rolls.  She rolls
and rolls.  Life in
suspension.

mmmmdcccxxxv

Song for the Widower

Eat the lamp that lights, I say,
yes, eat the lamp that lights.
So that everyone’s darkness is
mine, he said, so that everyone’s
darkness is yours.  So that no one
says anything and the face grows
dumb.  Nobody eating nothing.
There’s anything but love in the
room, until there’s anything but
love.  But we must have light
like we must have food, I say.
Light keeps us from going hungry.
You’re wrong, old man, he says,
all the light and all the love having
been already eaten, sucked out of
the room with its bed-caked floor 

and its ahistorical walls.  And then 

the poor man wakes up.  And he
begins to stretch and and he beg

ins to yawn.  It’s well before dawn

and on the table beside him lies
a plate upon which lies a slice of
some delicate cake, which, with
a forlorn fork he begins to eat.
And he chews at the pieces of
cake that are delicate with the
taste of, what?  Of nostalgia?
And swallows a piece or two,
thinking, recollecting, Down
the drain, down the drain,
well, that’s when memory
awakens at last and once
again.  Oh, how he’s ripped
apart and torn asunder, this
relapse of unbearable pain
with the wheel of memory’s
reignition.  It’s not yet dawn.
Why, why these blinding
lights with the curtains
all drawn?!  Eat all the 

lamps that light, he 

sings. Eat the light, 

and eat the love. 

We must suck all

the memories out.

mmmmdcccxxxiv

Gag Reel

They’re supposed to be
embarrassing, but I don’t
care.  I’ve always been
a bit of a clown.  I don’t

know what to do and I
don’t know what to know,
but I’m pretty sure that
Jack Spicer was often

quite depressed.  At this
point, I’m weighing the
possible merits of turning
this into a play.  But I do

not.  All of these bloopers
remind me of Dad and Burt Reynolds.

mmmmdcccxxxiii

Desire Path

There are many places
I’ve been, many more
I’d like to see, yet habit
and finances have me

wearing down the side
walks of my neighbor
hood in much the same
way that my father’s

cattle beat grass down
into dirt paths; along
fencerows most often,
but occasionally, into

the thicket and all the
way in to the shadiest
tree, next to which a
cow-sized silhouette

is revealed, mostly
just loose dirt, around
which a few tufts of
grass and trodden

winter leaves sur
round an earth in 

dentation sculpted 

by a sleeping heifer 

leaving a cool 

rural cul-de-sac.

mmmmdcccxxxii

Stuff I Can’t Say

     Who did the crisis there?
              —John Ashbery

There are many things
I shouldn’t say, but do
anyway.

That’s all well and good.
We can plea embarrass
ment.

I forget a lot of things I
was going to say.  Some
times

some time after.  Other
times mid-sentence.  But
when I

catch myself at the top
saying something and
quick

as a flash I shut it up,
because I just can’t,
knowing

full well what I’d begun,
or what had erupted
nearly

forth during my mean
derings—well, maybe
the timing

was off, but it’s these
things, what gets stop
pered,

that I should soon as a
pinch get focused on so
that

whatever it was that I
couldn’t say then gets
clearly said.

mmmmdcccxxxi

How to Speak

Look each of them in the eyes,
lock sockets, you know, and
glare lovingly. Do not, how
ever, under any circumstances,
open your mouth.

mmmmdcccxxx

Should Have Gone Frozen

My Ghirardelli chocolate
has melted in the sun,
making this too late
for one of those

rarest of San
Francisco’s
September days:
a sundae Sunday.

Up the steps and
down the steps
with chocolate
all over my hands.

mmmmdcccxxix

     heart is also blank—
     it either grows invisible
     or clamors for attention
              —Wayne Koestenbaum

Please allow me to....
Let me—might I?—find a way
toward some meaning?

Smoke and mirrors
are my default, my
favorite fallback flavor.

A plea’s length, I have it on
experienced authority, is inversely
proportionate to said plea’s success rate.

Please, hear us out the door,
therefore.  Where we may,
armed each with megaphone and flail,

make our legal, logical and anguished point.

We’ve had it with you, the boss of us!
You know, as we do, how
intolerably wrong you are!

The way you deface us!
The way you displace us!
The way you dispose of us!

The more gargantuan the monopoly,
the more miniscule its citizens’

prisons.  

They’re barely alive,
by no choice of their own,
as if they’ve ownership at all.

Enough is enough!

[loudly, through the megaphone:]

Hey assholes!!
I’m not an activist!!
I’ve not a penny to my name!!

So I can’t sue you to the hellish grave you deserve
in order to earn more justice.  Woe are us, you
and the rest of those lying inert beneath your thumb.

...[putting the megaphone down because it has become very heavy]...

...[sitting down slowly onto the ground]...

I’m so exhausted. So
I am just going to sit here
and stare each of you criminals down

as if that is doing something that matters,
knowing full well that it does not.  Until my eyes..
..won’t..open..again....

Don’t worry
(as if you would),
this’ll be over in no time.

mmmmdcccxxviii

What a Wasteland

Such a pretty mouth
so afraid to speak.  I’d
open those lips with
unspoken consent.

Don’t say no to the
world you were given.
This decadence wasn’t
meant to last.  If only

I would have been fore
warned of that.  Lest
you think me a pig, my
love is harder than you

could ever feel, my heart
is wider than can be con
cealed.  I’d fall upon the
ground if I knew which

crater, what quicksand,
what lava-filled cavern
led the way to anything
with which I could give in

to, even if such binding
be my foregone conclusion.
This confounding country
which I for years misunder

stood with tears of joyous
lust upon your mountains
and lush wetlands, your
gardens bred with sweet

onions and potatoes, your
creek-brimmed pastures
and mesmerizing desert.
And here, where you 

allow such endless slaps
to your precious cheeks,
your dissolving face, too
late for me to see you

as you truly are, impos
sible to treasure what
would have been such
an exhilarating connection,

now that I love you so
completely, you are all
but eviscerated, fevered,
gouged, and excavated

by this poisonous divisive
throng you once invited
into house and home who
now live like feral rats who

scuttle blindly under floor
boards and within your
hallowed walls.  Where,
if only, might I go?  I’d

travel anywhere you say
to become your very heart,
if but to beat for you an
extra hour, a solitary sec

cond longer.  But as it is, I’ll 

never know.  I failed to know. 

And with such inexcusable 

guilt I do surrender.

mmmmdcccxxvii

Ordinarily

     Who did the crisis there?
                     —John Ashbery

“Did you bring the jug of wine?  I
did ask you to bring a jug of wine.”

“If you think we have a lot to discuss,
I would likely agree.”  “What are the

topics?” “Why, Cancer and Capricorn,
of course.”  [“Why, I oughtta!”]  “At any

rate, how shall we sit while we have
this discussion?”  “Ordinarily, I sit here,

on the left side of the sofa.  As you know.
But for purposes of having a most effective

talk, tonight, I’m willing to be open-minded.
Would you prefer the recliner?  The ottoman?

The cushion over there?  And do you mind
if we keep the television on during tonight’s

engagement?  There’s something of import
that I’d like to see.”  These, at least, were

some of the various voices they heard in
their roundabout heads.  Perhaps it was the

misrepresented tropics.  We have low humidity
here.  Generally.  Perhaps it was the blaring

television, which was in the middle of one of
those procedural criminal dramas.  It was

crime, after all, that was on both of their
minds.  Which is a pity, given that neither

were criminals.  Not of the hardened sort,
at any rate.  “Come over here. Let’s sit

side by side on the couch. Like this.”
And so it began.  They were both so eager

to please.  Or perhaps it had been too long
since either had the opportunity to stare

into the unsettled pools of the other’s eyes.
Both had pairs that were brooding and lacking

distinct coloration.  They both remembered
the days of black and white.  Homes with

but one television set.  And wood-encased
stereos with turntables hidden inside and

lots of static.  These were so elongated
that one might have it sit underneath the

entire lengh of the living room window,
with the television tucked into the darkest

corner, ready to light up the night once
the hubbub subsided from each member of 

the household’s arrival home from work, from
school, from the day’s appointments, etc.  

Each man sat cross-legged on the couch facing

the other, anxiously readying himself for what were

wildly separate scenarios that each had envisioned 

regarding how the night’s conversation would end.

mmmmdcccxxvi

How to Be Heard Over All of the Noise

Brand recognition is your best ass,
or so I hear, and can put your assets
indelibly in the minds of all of those
who glare upon it.  I’m no dangerous

liaison, I do this for a living.  To liaise
is to engage and can make for strange
bedfellows.  The light in the attic is the
last one that goes off in my building.  I

live and work there.  But I stay clean and
can cut my own hair.  Everybody’s a penny-
pincher in this day and age: the age letting
go of all of the pennies.  The channel that is

still on when the light in the attic dims.  How
much are you willing to spend on the lederhosen?

mmmmdcccxxv

If a Door Opens

And You Happen

to Be Standing

in Front of It

     trouble with
     lost decades,
     trouble with cast
     of mind that consigns 
     a decade to the
     category of “lost”
           —Wayne Koestenbaum

Yeah, it’s weird I’m old,
who feels old, but I am.

I’m not ancient, I’m just,
oh, it’s all relative, as I’m

told, as they say, but I’m
old, just not ancient.  And

what of the past, those
decades that led up to this,

are they lost, are they gone,
but of course, in a way, but

they’re here, in my heart,
where a lot of that stuff stays.

Which is food for the brain,
I would say, as it guides me

from old to (I wouldn’t mind,
let’s hope) ancient. And I’ve

got a man less than half of my
age, what’s that say about me?

What’s that say about me? At
least that’s the word that occurs

from the outside looking in when
such fantastic stuff comes to light.

Those lives outside our sphere
they must think us mighty queer,

so perverse and so mental. I don’t
mind, I’m sentimental, love is love,

and in fact, I’m perverse, it’s not a

curse, love is love, I’m a man, he’s a

man, leave the people’s mouths agape,
I don’t care, I am here, they are there,

and I’ve put a little spin on the good old
marketing trope that any news is good

news, I say any news, any gossip, bad or
good, it’s an avenue, it’s an opening for

engagement, and I’ve spun that way for
most of my life with some educational

results.  But it’s weird that I’m old, when
I think of the number of years I’ve been

from there to here.  It’s just a number,
some folks say, and that’s true, but yet

what does that number mean, next to,
say, sixteen or a hundred and four?  It

has meaning, just like I have, just like
you have, too.  And those are meanings

(those defining you and those defining
me) that give me such delight when I

decide to do my damnedest to ascertain.
Which takes patience, equanimity and a

lot of curiosity, I suppose, but it’s an
absolutely fundamental thing when it

comes to ascertaining best who I am
and what it is I might do to better be.

In that regard, age can be a treasure,
but also something that keeps us from

getting there.  So there’s no time to
waste, is the thing.  No time to worry

much on how weird it is that I am as
old as I am.  Less time to find those

avenues, those inroads to the gawkers
and the gossips who go about their days

already finding something interesting
about me about which to think or at which

to ogle.  But forget about them, since you
happen to be right here.  Let’s start now,

and get right down to the business of
making such important connections.

mmmmdcccxxiv

Time to Put Out the Xmas Decor!

Who’s buying time from the demon in 

red?  I wonder if he means me.  I put
my soul up on eBay once and got but

one offer.  A nickel.  Who wants the soul

of a sourpuss, anyway?  Although, even 

a sourpuss would elevate this dried-up 

husk of a fool today.  So spiritless that 

I’m about the task of chopping down a 

tree triangle, sweating bullets.  What’s
got you so down?  Red Demon asks, 

ever so sweetly.  That’s nice of you to 

ask, Santa, I respond as nonchalantly

as I can muster, knowing full well there 

wasn’t a snowball’s chance in hell that I’d

make it home alive with this monstrous
conifer pointing so greenly heavenward.

mmmmdcccxxiii

It’s nearly 11:30pm, it’s Friday, I’m just home

from grabbing some snacks and
nearly walking into a gal on the
sidewalk, the spitting image of
Leah. It stopped me cold. I

thought for a moment, I might
shed a tear, but I don’t believe
in ghosts, really, and while sad
to be reminded she’d been gone

how long now? And way too soon,
so young. I wouldn’t have shed a
tear, probably shouldn’t have said
that, but I was stunned. And more

than appreciated the triggered
reminiscence. The era she was
one of the folks with whom I’d
enjoy the fortune of her presence

were good ones, although dwelling
a bit long on those days the happiness
gets entangled with bittersweet residue,
simply because there were people, and

a good number, with whose presence I
had the good fortune to experience back

then.  But I do try, am working to build 

a new coalition of cohorts. It’s ard to

think I’ll ever have a new chosen
family like I did; and that’d certainly
be for the best, given how it turned out.
I suppose that, try as one might, one

shouldn’t cling too earnestly on those
with whom we might feel tightly and
convincingly connected. It has always
taken me quite a while to warm up to

individuals, even when there used to
be plenty who worked hard at getting
close. But despite my longstanding
attempt to build a bond that I might

call my own, my home, my cherished,
and watching each and all vanish in
nearly an instant, seemingly, and me
in the depths I hope never to sink at

any point ever again, I know I will
keep trying, keep believing it’s
possible. Oh, woe is me, you might
think I’m thinking. I am not. It was

lovely to see her again, my old friend.
Happy memories warm the soul. And
provide the motivation to make more.
In the meantime, it’s good to be aware

I’m yet here, am no ghost, much as,
at times, it might appear that I am.
I’d like to keep it that way for as long
as I will, remembering to remember

mostly with peace and with joy, even
when sitting in solitude, resting up
for tomorrow, when perhaps I’ll look
you in the eye, say hello, and then,

well, who knows?

mmmmdcccxxii

I disagree

with myself.  What I said
last night, I no longer find
true.  I’d like to think I’m
fairly steady when it comes

to my values and beliefs, but
truth be told, come on, aren’t
most of us waverers?  At least
from time to time?  Sometimes

an artist just wants to entertain.
Sometimes a poet pens a pastoral
with no higher purpose than to
expose a bit of what, to their mind,

is gorgeous, or pretty, or unusual,
or maudlin, etc.  The intention,
or more to the point, whatever is
received, can by varying degrees

be purposeful, needed, appreciated,
can sometimes be just the thing.

And furthermore, a clown might
move a grown man to tears.

mmmmdcccxxi

A Strange Prayer?

Spilt most of the chunks of honeydew all over my thin blank
et, the one upon which I sit, the one upon which I sleep, right
before bed.  That it’d absolutely not be me to deduce this ex
perience into a lesson not to eat so late might surprise you,

might even exasperate me.  Am I really that stubborn?  I am.
So what?!  So.  What, then, is the lesson I’ve learned today?
Because it is very much me to gather lessons incrementally.
From, say, a 24-hour period.  Or a given year.  During a class.

During a late-night discussion in which you and I disagree on
something we both find incredibly important.  Can you not, then—
might I call you Stranger?—begin to estimate how many lessons
I fail to learn during any given fragment of this life?  And might

you desire, as I do so intensely, taking as much time as you want
researching the accuracy of your estimate?  Starting right now?

mmmmdcccxx

Flat Chew Lance

     The way you look tonight
     is perishable, unphotographable, laughable.
                                           —John Ashbery

“Excuse me, officer,” said the driver’s license
to the trophy wife, “but might you have time
for a quick selfie?” The police officer seemed 

to puff up a bit at the query, and with an Aw, 

shucks! stance meekly came out with “Oh, 

now, well, you know, I appreciate the offer

and all, but I’m just not feeling myself today,
no, I’ll have to turn you down there, maybe
some other time.” The license was carefully
placed back into the appropriate pocket of
the wallet of the sweet man behind the
station wagon’s steering wheel without even
a Thank you, ma’am! The driver seemed a
bit embarrassed as he shifted into gear and
eased back on to the highway as the officer
stepped back to allow him to do so. Then
she went about sifting through her pockets,
careful not to disturb the holster, eventually
taking out a stick of Chapstick, which she then
uncapped, and with two swift slashes applied
a waxy layer to the top and then her bottom
lip in that practiced, not the least bit awkward,
verging on violent manner that folks from the
east side of the city were known to often do.
And then she pocketed the stick of balm, 

slowly walked back to the squad car 

to set about the business of what

ever might come next.

mmmmdcccxix

Story No Tell

Heartbreak well.  Note
the depths of.  Dead
girl.  Oh, come on!

You want copilot?
Buy jetliner.  Falling
from pocket whilst

ziplining, eyeliner.
Clouds with grape-
colored streaks.  No

body cried.  Plop in
bed with next pilot.
He was hung til

morning when
boom.  Hangover
erasure.  So stuck

up he’s ear-sure.
Goes for broke on
cocky certainty.

Lives to regret
most certainly.
Now that he’s

flatlining, bone
structure shatter-
fracked, can’t

live, what’s the
dif, pennywise
is penny-free.

So don’t go
hobo down
Hoboken.

mmmmdcccxviii

Breaking the rules

is common.  And sometimes
appropriate.  At least if you 

believe all of that Emily Post, 

Amy Vanderbilt stuff.  They say

sometimes it’s best to dispense
with a rule or two in order to
present oneself in the most
proper manner.  But where do

you reside on the Rules Were
Made to Be Broken scale?  I
am not an adamant no, I break
a rule or two most every day,

at the very least.  But I also
find civility and the rule of law
necessary.  And when those
who are given the role of

making the rules begin to
break them—and at great
cost to those of us who
aren’t the ones designated

to do such? Well, there’s
always revolution, I suppose.

mmmmdcccxvii

Breaking and Entering

“Ooh, look, that’s expensive
champagne!”  Boy, did I get
a look when I made that
exclamation.  Here we are,

clamming up in the hallway
of the home in which we are,
what, breaking and entering?
It’s a game we like to play

on occasion.  I mean, it’s our
home.  Our cozy little place.
But then, “Look, the pictures,
here on the wall, who are

these people!?”  And so I look,
and am suddenly so far removed
from cozy, from comfortable, my
heart races, and I’m transplanted

right into that moment in the film
before which the criminals are
found, just before they are
pulverized by the good guys.

mmmmdcccxvi

Selfie at the Garage Door

Whenever Brenda was in there,
boy what a mess.  And the noise!
It wasn’t just the electronic music
that had the cinderblock walls in

flate with each boom of the beat,
but there was the conglomerate of
the whirring and banging and plip-

plopping of all of her tools.  It seemed

there were always multiple ones
being used at at any given moment.
It could be the jigsaw slicing a two by
four in two while she was simultaneously

banging a nail into something with a
hammer and hacksawing pipe or some

such as if she had a third arm or tele

kinesis.  And she’d be in there for hours.

Then, at a moment when one would
swear it was going to go on all weekend,
out she’d come, saying “I’m rett to go!”
And what a beauty she was in that new

outfit, materials soft and billowy that
looked light as fresh white rose petals
falling from the bloom, highlighting the
chiffons and the cottons and whatever

else made up her fancy dress du jour. “I
said I’m rett to go!” “Oh, there’s no
need to ask twice!” And off the couple
were to the danceclub, the belle of the

ball and her awkward sidekick, out for
another night that would not be forgotten.

mmmmdcccxv

Meanwhile, Marked

This will pull me out of it.
Marked for days like a
sugar plum in hell (with
diarrhea and the croup).

A girl can dream, can’t
she?  “Whoa!” is what
I instantly say to this,
the fan blades whirring

for their thousandth
consecutive day.  Maybe
something remembered
would have me smile,

chuckle, or talk aloud to
myself in a cajoling, light
hearted manner.  When
everything else is sheer

swill.  Leaving a gas station
in Connecticut, someone sees

me wave in exasperation, and

skeptically waves back.

mmmmdcccxiv

If I’m embarrassed

it must be working, whatever
I’m doing.  Because what’s more
embarrassing than having your
diary found, opened, and read
aloud, in public, when you’re,
say, thirteen years old?  I can’t
recall such a thing ever happen
ing to me.  Is that what I’m
going for, then?  Really?
That feeling?

mmmmdcccxiii

Cherubs Getting Plump

That was never my intention.  Yet I
was.  And I did.  I’m growling with
hunger as I mull this over – all too
aware of impending hibernation, go

ing about the business of chopping wood
for days (What, you don’t think I can
work an axe? Try me!).  Nothing has
me reflect more on mortality than

doing such.  My grandfather had
arrived home from doing so one
late morning, having never spent
a night in hospital.  My grandmother

brought him an aspirin because he
said he was in pain.  By the time
she returned to the living room
couch with a couple of powdery

pills, he was down for the count.
For good.  A slide show of Baroque
paintings with voluptuous women
cast somewhere in the vicinity of

the under-lids of my eyes click at
quite a clip in my head, it cannot
be helped.  I relax often, as is
common of folks shaped and aged

similarly to myself.  But I can never
quite confidently relax into such
relaxation.  My idea of pleasure, or
one of them, is climbing up and

plodding down the many hills of my
gorgeous city.  Sure, some people
find cherubs gorgeous.  People pay
abundantly to plump themselves up

in certain areas.  But do not speak
of such things to me.  It would only
distort the delusional image I have of
the skinny scoundrel I still think I am.

mmmmdcccxii

Sitting Out the Mystery

     Little wonder that home is a bright place to be
     if living’s your thing.
                                     —John Ashbery

This only makes sense in a place wherein
there are walruses crowing.  Fantasy worlds
unite!!  And it won’t be here, in this place, my
new home, much as I love it, am almost in love

with it.  Because any living that transpires doesn’t
take place sitting solitarily inside a box of one’s own.
I say this from experience, he said inappropriately.
But the truth can be inappropriate sometimes.  And

also simple, even as confusingly elaborate as some
whodunnits can be.  If the mystery of having one’s
crossed legs half covered by the comfort of personal
bed linens, a torso in some semblance of upright

while catching the latest episode of Murder, She
Wrote intrigues you then how about we Freaky
Friday ourselves out of here to check out some
fresh new looks we lock into, meet with a few

fancy words or a tissue?  Now that I’ve made
my point, I suppose I’ll hit resume and watch
the rest of the episode.  Even though I’ve
seen this about a dozen times and know

damned well whodunnit.