Born on the Fourth of July with egrets,
which almost sounds and looks like
regrets, and in this poem that similarity
might be helpful, but is absolutely
unnecessary, at least not in mine, but,
regretfully, where I got the egrets, well,
they come from the sky, these things,
it could be while you’re cooking (I am
not a big fan of cooking, myself; I’m a
huge fan of eating, of eating well, of
people who cook, I used to surround
myself with people who do that well),
or you could be walking through (up,
up, and around) Alamo Square Park
for the first time in a few years. I’ve
been here at least once since making
that music video, friends, former friends,
“I feel the need...” for a tirade, one of my
tirades, to pour out the heat about former
friends, but then I get wistful, wishing for
a friend, for one to appear in this instant.
Quickly looking up the country’s most
famous drink, which, as it turns out (obvy),
is a mojito. This wavering on the fringes
of anger, that red-faced temper so familiar
during those formative years. The abuse
we thought we endured. Only to learn,
only to learn, decades later, that we’d
learned nothing. No regrets, though. Sly
tells the adept interviewer that if anyone
says they have no regrets, well, that’s a
bullshit artist. That’s not exactly what he
said. I keep changing the channel. I mean,
I’m getting into long form videos, kind of the
opposite of the direction we all thought things
were going, right? Right. Learning something
of nothing. I’m a photographer. I’m principal
poet. What is it that tells me that these words,
like laundry hanging on the line via clothespin,
airing out, as opposed to what I could spin play
ing the role of a thespian, actor vs. lyricist, actor
vs. musician, actor vs. academician, vs. business
person (that was never in the cards, officially,
but one has to pay rent). Gotta pay the rent.
