86 Scripts
Western medicine
has been minding me
for one third of my future life,
according to Western medicine.
But I will probably lose my life
by the time I double my currency,
and I am currently in the process
of transferring my accountability.
My future finger has been pointed,
and I say I'm sorry more so
than I ever thought I would,
and now I'm tipped out.
A Messy Trade
I can't
I won't
I don't
I know
My age
Is flexible
Sixty
I mean
Twenty
I know
Division
I'm thirty
A Real Thought
she couldn't stand
still
she couldn't stand
the way
I wrap my words
in a way
it's a more clinical
man or her
ways can
be gender neutral
or even
gender neural
and that's a thought
and that's real
Amateur Daze
a breath
is not far
from death
a cape
a casket
a break
a basket
no life
is far
from life
Amnesiac Stint
Entrepreneurs in lust
with flaccid peanuts
packed in real tight.
Zip tie my love
with the wind
that blows me.
I am a slim lamp,
trying to do my job
in this dim ageist life.
It all begins when
the abstracted end
enters the rear-view.
Drive away like decades
that meant nothing to you,
and look forward to reeling.
Anchors
Bowling for grape leaves,
I leave my family in pieces.
Balding for stability,
I cough up security.
In some ways,
I am who I thought I'd be
by the time I was fully wilting.
In some ways,
I'm just a dent in the wind,
and I'll surely die a tumbleweed.
A face is a world,
a body is a lifetime,
and feet are certainly a mouthful.
Striped lives always fold over,
and seeded plans choke all life.
Anchors are never anchors,
and dusk is only dust before dawn.
Bedside Monologue
I feel like the crumbs
of a trampled croissant
when I flood your face
with El Niño thought waves.
But really, sometimes I lose
my planet to ego obesity,
and then I am just a sad stethoscope,
unable to properly read heartbeats.
I want to write a general letter,
similar to a strong suicide note,
in which I apologize to everyone
whose air I’ve ever stolen.
I never meant to be a thief;
I think I listened too much
as a young boy, and as a man,
I mouthed off the right route.
Beta Meditation
Deny actuaries;
plead sanity.
Spare spark
at the race track;
you got my legs
caught in a crawl.
Soma sofa
in a poppy field;
you got my arms
tied to a trophy.
Deep awakening;
peasant sanctuary.
Blackout on the Back Route
Hit these pills if you must
Got to get it in the gut
I’m not a problem
I’m not a costume
I’m a Bin Laden mascot whistle
In the MacBook ghetto scene
Pull those strings or pull that metal
Hit that glass or hit the jackpot
I was a neutral sock youth
Thinking freely in Yonkers
Perfecting critical chemistry
With paradoxical pupils
Shaved the armpit of Bushwick
And my French got hard in Philly
Trip up the fame engine
I’m a buzzed rebel on the run
Blue Scripture
Smoking oxygen
Drinking gin
Calling bullshit
Gambling quick
Benjamins
Are dangerous
Angel dusting
Up in restaurants
No luck
No lies
Cut it
Fuck it
Spit it
Get it
No dough
NoDoz
Die slowly
With nicotine
Now in the temple
With Mr. Clean
Survival is a sword
My tongue is my word
Liquor got me bent
Hope my words ain’t spent
Born Again, Based Forever
how can I know your face
if you don't know your name
the lesson can still be prescient
if the agenda is to be lessened
you have proofread my life
so many times by now
you have chosen to type it out
and somehow I'm still alive
in China I am nothing
in Hong Kong I am less
in New York I am a memory
now I am a body out West
Born Again Till Death
Chicago is a cold place
to be institutionalized.
Don’t feel sorry for yourself;
I don’t feel sorry for your self.
Isn’t it funny how some bodies
become a sharp knife to fall on?
If you’re not laughing, you’re falling;
if you’re not falling, you’re laughing.
So the thing about knives
is they become dull with age.
We’re not getting any younger,
and patience is for hospitals.
Jog your Nikes down to their souls
until I-90 becomes a childhood memory.
Cardigan Strip
There are no birds
where I live now;
only stray quadrapods,
trained in the wild.
The digital thermostat
has overheated again.
Sometimes I talk
to myself at night,
perhaps especially
when others are near.
And it's not so embarrassing
to come undone now and then.
Chain Reaction
Ice cold
Shit happens
In this life
In the Bronx
Million dollar puzzle
Peaced out of New York
Living better now
Vegas weather now
No money
No cops
No problems
Chasing Bullshit
Christ is drunk again
Like an off-key model
Dubbing blood in the club
Singing and smoking weed
While Chloe privatizes fashion
I’m going somewhere novel
True writer for the night
Real narrative for the wife
I profess zero fucks for dicks
Stay hot in Los Angeles
Avoid the cold in Dublin
Always hustle with amnesia
Cinema: A Being
stay awake
long enough
to love
stay asleep
long enough
to die
compliance
is defiance
of one's self
what makes you
yourself after all
when your actions
are sequenced
when your words
are infrequent
when most of all
you're climaxed
and credits are due?
Das Boost / Die Oath
Alone again
with
asthmatic
synthesizers
I feel
like a trill troll
in the dungeon
of a drunken dragon
and it's like
can't we all be
masters
of our own
fantasies?
Dip on the Hollow
Car-kicking boys
Getting sober for girls
It’s all good in the hood
I’m so hood when I’m good
Cops and mobsters
Peep what I say
Know what I mean
I’m like Van Damme
In the Grand Canyon
I’m like my momma
Chilling in Morocco
I stand in as a ski mask
I stand out in Montana
Squeeze hammers and homies
Mount heads of phonies
And paint lead on canvas
Bail money trust fund
Court ain’t stopping this fun
Trust the sports bar guru
To slap claps for diplomacy
Dish Verse Can
It’s lonely in the basement
Dealmakers look up to God
It’s even lonelier in the closet
The rest of us try to get high
Up in the attic or is it Atlanta
I’m just a white bitch in my zone
Trying to duck traps
Like a shark in a drought
Look down if you need it
My money don’t need cleaning
I put my schooling in the vault
I scale up before I chalk out
Disobedient Hustle
Drinking beer by the case
Comfortable with cognac
Lounging, e-mailing
Putting down police
Drunk off bleach
Ditching petty shit
Sitting pretty on
Metropolitan goals
Real white man
Frail motherfucker
No money in the plan
Nothing but perspective
Society is tripping out
Talking back to folks
Fuckers slapping down
Ones trying to come around
Pointing fingers
Walking away
It’s automatic
After 1979
Do The Dishabille
Barometric pressure
is impossible to gauge
in inflatable domes.
And bad decisions
cannot be determined
with two-way mirrors.
It’s almost summer
and everyone appears
to want to get naked.
Dosage Decreed
No bite
in the game,
but yet you
are still hungry?
And what to make
of a table with no legs?
Burdensome
feats of fear...
I eat what I want;
I eat when I want...
sometimes my words;
sometimes my world...
Dropped Feels
I live crazy
Like
I’ll live short
You know?
I keep my game tight
But my mom taught me
To stay polite though
Don’t talk to talk
Discuss something
Don’t laugh to laugh
Love something
No knowledge
Left on the L
Just Groupons
And groupies
Alone below
The Range Life
Drought Slurp / Crank Night
Bottles are legends
Down in the South
Let’s be honest tonight
Let’s fuck repercussions
If we can forget model matters
We can spit chatter tomorrow
You know I never chose to run
Nosebleeds ain’t improvements
Momma’s gonna be grumpy
About my shit ugly summer
Your ego is some kind of mood
Mine is another language
Eagles, The Nastiest
Five-O survivors
Swing on the town
Like soldiers count
Men on rooftops
And on this rooftop
88 well-dressed girls
Click-clack and bring back
A Grey Goose perspective
Earth Days
Doing simple drugs
In Delaware is the cost
Of living a window life
And it’s like can you relate?
Grew up with legends
Haunted by the horse
Sold my birthday twice
To get dirt off the mound
Get raw with this money
It’s free like your clothes
It’s free like your God
Not even close to the crown
Missing death theme
Fitting in the throws
Head-butt a car door
Settle into the relapse
Eight O’Clock Coffee (Standard Time)
Who is that under the comforter?
I am uncomfortable (again).
I have come for the table (a gain).
Let us be thankful for us, and not much else.
This next year will be split between bananas and leg warmers.
Come to my window, and sing me a song of restitution.
I feel a cover coming on; I feel some kind of wonderful.
Who is that under the comforter?
Everything Must Go: Prequel to Sequel
Losing pants
Making diagrams
Typos and negatives
I am so positive
About maybe a few things
Flexing in flux mode
Oh so Cavalier
In a Pagan Clown World
I am like a fly in a McDonald's
Every day I shave my head
Poorly like a poor monk
And I'm patient if I know
You're good for it
You know you're good
At popping pillows
And pushing buttresses
Ah shit goddamn
My back is thrown again
Dirty old fuckers
Got me bent alright
But I'll stay as straight
As the frays can tolerate
Exhibitionist
Loose noose in the kitchen
Bruised seat in the Zen Den
This is no place for vulnerability
This is a warehouse of mirrors
Lying naked on the floor
Like a model from below
Everything I do is for when
The blue comes to surface
In this painted bird world
We all try to escape the red
Not all chickens default to yield
Most turkeys are flashy in pants
Ducks are a color field series
And geese puff up to get down
I am a brief neighbor jockey
Consuming sex on the beach
I am a shadow-boxing champion
Brewing herbal tea for mobsters
I let the streets have their ways
I look at the overlooked always
Exile on High Street
Powder
Your noses
There's
No sweat
In the game
Key out
The sockets
There's
No blood
In the Thames
First Sight of Water
Daydreaming
Nightcrawling
No plants in the Valley
Slight a cougar
Spill on frijoles
No chants in the Valley
Retrograde renegades
Bumping dicks on the road
No pants in the Valley
Pouring distilled beverages
In a De Stijl home
No chance in the Valley
Focus
Boss women
Get it
They get me
A soft-spoken girl
Once told me
In a parking lot
Don’t trust anyone
In their twenties
But then again
Nothing is forbidden
My one ear is open
The other ear is free
And I don’t slip
On what I sweat
And I don’t sweat
Anything I say
And I don’t say
Anything I don’t do
Fodder Meds
You, my fat mountain of a man,
are Mussolini in a Chaplin costume,
and I will slaughter your greased pigs
with my own bespoken hands.
And your nutmeg scent of a woman
and her World Series of Poker pupils
can dilate with the news prompts
I will feed her ears, prudently.
Fuck your pork-eaten pines
that wipe U.S. sandpaper asses
and shove your shoveled
density in some other ditch.
It’s plain to me that I have seen
the bowels of humanity
in this fallen season of fate,
and sometimes destiny is putrid.
Foie Gras
Fashionable gossip,
and the unhinged hubris
of professional songbirds:
operatic backhands,
handstands at the opera.
Birdbrains naturally acquaint themselves
with high-perched opinions of peers.
Of course, black tar geese fly south for the winter.
This is the stuff self-revolving global dreams
are lubed up with on graveyard shifted scams.
Freedom Less Violence
punch me in the nose
and wonder where
the feeling goes
feeling is a word
but it's something
you can feel too
too also has two
other spellings
as well and well
language is a religion
and religion is foreign
and I am just a noun
oh my god oh my
don't you believe me
when I tell you I'm free
From The Wood
Full-on geek out the gate
Chain link the brain for good
Green creeps like a slow war
Front hard on the low brow
Still a steel mouth in the racks
Still walking bricks off the gas
Smoke minutes in Belgium
Pocket life like a hood trick
Gravedigger
We are horses bucking
on wet grass hampers
We are runway models
keeping secrets to ourselves
There are gas lights
setting fire to mornings
There are black nights
setting companions free
I am dogging myself
in a pet cemetery
I am planing myself
on a clean white tarp
Grim Ripper
Wardrobe for the week
Weak closure for the peak
Getting high in the den
Feeling spent on the trek
Marked by luscious slips
Dragging lacquered nails
Across loose goose lands
Flying new pigments
With crested armatures
No more pants for days
Halftime
A number
in a notebook
is maybe a lock
or maybe a key
depending on
the dash holes
sweating it
--&&&--
time out
in time
our time
is now!
International Air Waybill
everything
is the same
everywhere
eyes are eyes
sex is sex
death is death
everything
is the same
everywhere
Jazz On Behalf Of Blues
Hard bumps in the Valley
Thrown like a broke bastard
Nothing but concrete shoes
Yawn on Mission
Wash the morning
And dry leaves pale
Free health party
Soap under nails
Cups of Old Style
Hypnotize men and women
And kids punch words like rain
The shit I smoked in Cologne
Kimono Love
Dress me up
in your fortune.
Your patterns
rock bottoms
out from under-
worn wormholes.
On these paisley-
rich walkways,
wisdom crumbs
fall upon soles.
And if my foil
has any holes,
your fingers
fill with flair.
Eastern minds
talking bodies
on Western fronts,
over and back.
No plateaus to see
where we go to be.
Labor
Unions
abound
because
what else
is there
but us
in world
exchange?
We are
as free
as free
ranging
chickens
afraid of
ourselves
on shelves.
Last Call
Pride evaporating
with the shatter
of a shallow mug;
I am the shell casing
of a stationary bet,
double down on the Solo.
Lawyer Fees
I’m flossing skulls out here
I’m Walter White out here
I’ve got an avalanche
Of sweet butter shit
Breaking necks
Like gym bitches
Bonding over quarters
Trapped in the living room
Counting money in the closet
Rubber band men
Keying Benz lives
Eating pills now
Like powder girls
At a wedding
Your god ain’t gonna stop this
Your old lady gonna watch this
Live Like This
Patience got me mental
Doing circles on myself
I admire my own authority
However brief it might be
I got mad clapped procedures
Expectations can’t let me sleep
And codeine can only dip the pain
If you’re conveniently in the Valley
Lock my wired mind in my tired body
Codes keep my head close to my feet
Lost Land, Lost Life
When I was halfway through a man’s life
and a third through a halfway house
maybe closer to a quarter life crisis
I met a prairie girl who duped me
into an encyclopedic subscription
to a great millennial depression.
The oasis I had lapped in and around
for two decades prior to the downed outs
had dried up and I was thirsty and proud
and I was looking for love or a rebound
but of course I found a shared needle
in a crowd full of berries and beans.
And until I felt the stone cold drip
of the North Country’s winter grip
my knuckles were stiff like the tips
read from a newspaper’s bagged body
dropped into my lap and bred for dead
announcements in the springtime.
This was an old-fashioned suicide
crafted in Manhattan like disco
and my karaoke can sure get twisted
in the twilight sung songs of sorrow
and I’m sorry I ever met this temptress
who tempted me into indebted darkness.
Maiden Man
You could have been
the synthetic believer
you once threatened to be
while we were stuck between
the turnpike and the freeway
smoking Turkish cigarettes
and listening to witches
crush brushed broom beats
but you nicked yourself
and rode the long handle
like a pagan gone pacifist.
Menagerie, PST
"Tough dirt,"
says the high heeled plains.
All the marginal Flatlanders
watch Saturday Night Fights,
and Sprint is their cellular provider.
Boxing gave me depression,
but I do like the cheap shots;
although grains aren't vegetables.
&
All the palm tree Vikings
hike on their Star Trek sets,
and pretend Variety is diversity.
These rolling rocks are so typical;
they're so typically playing roles
of making the rules or being wronged.
"Tough shit,"
says the mills and the mines.
Mesa Rounds
Benching
outside
an Exxon,
I saw you
pulling hair
and I thought
this desert
was on fire,
but attendants
are sometimes
so careless
with cigarettes
and gasoline.
A mirage,
a sequel,
sequenced
with well-lit
foreign texts.
Speak to me
in French,
in whispers,
and I'll speak
back in time.
Mime in Mind
I forgot about
the times you
rifled my tomes
like an orphan
assured with
cocky flair.
The panache
soon panned out
like a flooded flame
and out with the old
you said as you left
but you never spoke.
Monastery Dropout
nobody deserves a hood pass
especially not in this urban life
nothing deserves a title without
the privilege of having earned it
forget your name forget your age
you are only what you believe
remember to have faith in death
it will happen with or without you
Money in the Middle
Hollow coast
Suspicious style
Lick dirt
On arrival
Grip trust
For survival
Material peels
Cold clienteles
Stay savage
In the zone
Get gone
In the dust
My Own Private Mexico
Some roads are built with dirt and powder. Some bodies are drawn with sand and paper. Some walks are talked over cornbread in a corner.
My Word Is My Word
Sipping purple
In my prime
Fade back
Into the Gap
Firstborn son
Second grade nerd
No grandfathers
No privilege
I’ll pay the cost
I won’t take the loss
Never Going Back Again / The year is now, and now I am me…
exchanging rumors
at the old record mart
going to college
for the first time
circling back
around
on
elliptical decades
picking fingers
out
of
gutsy depths
& then
& then
again
any
relationship
can
be
clipped
or
filed
like
how
narratives
can
be
news
too
& then
& then
again
getting lost is just something that happens
New Jersey Commas
Weak claims
Mark hearts
Real bad boys
Bust fools' jewels
With steady hands
Clique bitches
Take money
Like they know
How the rules go
Like they know
Them young pieces
Leave you deceased
And
I don’t fuck around
With them pull-up
Peeled-off wax homies
I’m fatal as fuck
Like a Big Mac gas trap
Get spanked for style
Get shanked in the paint
I can feel it
I can reel it
I can real it
I can fill it
I’m a California puffy jacket
Looking to flex like uh
Now I’m just smoking
Now I’m just like uh
Wearing Eddie Bauer
You bout that clout?
Newport News
I could have been
an opera singer
instead of a miner
and yet here I am
crossing rivers
drowning in threes
but I am so grateful
to have your mystery
and your crystal hands
craning downward
getting me high again.
Night Rattler
I am no country western singer,
and this is no cowboy song,
but I am nostalgic for a woman
who will teach me something
about how to be less of a fruit fly.
I almost overdosed on self-consumption,
probably at least two dozen times this year,
and I had nobody to give me a cold bath.
It’s tough out in the molten streets, anywhere, you know,
when you’re a splayed and flayed dog with dirt in your ears
and mud in your face, and it’s like, “Why you pissed, God?”
I never really believed in God though,
and to be honest, I’m not sure if I know
what I can possibly believe in anymore;
I do believe this country is going down and out,
and I’m staying out West, despite the forked stress.
No More New
Is it possible for a city, this city,
to have an objective agenda?
I believe this blunt force aims
to discover the pawned strength
of vessels. Wood, flesh, or PVC:
Do we soak up within ourselves
or funnel something of ourselves,
and float away with buoyancy?
I believe this city measures
strength in numbers, like metrics,
like science, like Europe, like blood;
if you let it, it will let you—will you?
Slit a side of one's sight of one's self...
drowning is a commitment, you know?
Is it possible to sail away for good,
and still remember old horizons?
Non-Profit Relationship
You got arrested for listening
to The Crystal Method
in a deserted national park?
You say you need someone to talk to...
I say go flip a burger for a year,
silence your characters, too;
then we can talk about some times.
At least you have a life insurance policy...
Oh, Hell
The smell of vinegar
Creeping through cracks
The smell of Band-Aids
Covering up the cracks
I did a bad thing to my body
Like a Country Western singer
Up in Minneapolis on vacation
You’ll never guess the tons I’ve dropped
I’ll never amount to the funds you got
I’m washed up like a barrel in Niagara
Past Gone
A day in the now
Now in the know
I am long in the wind
No time in any place
No space to spread
I am short on change
A day in the now
Now in the know
Patient Quotient: A Cat Crying In An Alley Doesn't Need A Hand To Feed It Fear
Rust looks the same
in Paris as it does
in Los Angeles…
as it does in Detroit,
as it does in Brussels,
Milan, Miami, Basel,
New York, and Berlin.
Rust probably looks different
in places like Tokyo and Dubai.
I wouldn’t know—
I prefer public deaths.
But the low
doesn’t have to
get high, in rehashed
reverse rubrics,
as we’ve come to
corner in the recent
organic burials
of selfish coffee tables.
“I take my coffee with cocaine…”
And I just wonder
how these people
do this as I wander
along more canals.
Benders become blunders;
blunders become forever.
I’m not even kidding anymore—
I just want to walk my dog.
“My neck, my back, lick my pussy, and my crack…”
Let’s start over:
Crack the selfish asses
in half; split the fools
up, like a tribal tattoo
on the lower back
of what pages stuck
together with hair gel
or hot semen call culture.
Cull cultures of past,
and greet them
like a masseuse
in the fringes of
any rusted city:
THANK YOU. YOU’RE WELCOME.
And then you’re gone.
And then I’m like, “How many times have I seen this episode?”
And then it’s like, “Oh, wait…have you been looking at Contemporary Art Daily this entire time?”
Pfizer Love
I used to sit on flannel
until I slept down under
cheap fake feathers
I used to get curdled
by a lactose intolerant
in my Brooklyn dreams
I used to let her milk me dry
and slice meat off my bones
like a butch fairy in a freezer
I used to be used to cracks
in my back I couldn't put back
together but we had each other
Pitted Over Moon
Banana Boat
Sliding along
Wet pavement
Like Stockton
Desert dribbles
And now I feel
Deserted plain
But across plains
There is a fantasy
Peeling oranges
Rotten fruit spoils
In wintertime rags
But seeds sprout
In and out of bodies
Experienced as one
Polemic Party
In the garden
I wait
for beetles
to ding bottles
like the bot I am
I recite
the words
of Eastern soldiers
I imbibe
and tell lies
to new comrades
I refuse
to drink
fruitful beverages
by mountains
or by sea
You see
I am a Communist
in common places
I am a Capitalist
in capital cities
I am a glutton
inside and out
Positively A Ballad (Or A Negative Creed)
swallowed enough bleach
to tie-dye my insides
that's slang
like
piss water
or
hooch
mom's mad
and nobody blames mothers
unless they bleach their kids
or something to or of that effect
I haven't thought about a girl
since I got one
and
I haven't been thirsty
since Mexico
Pretty Boy Flow
Bitch-ass man
Hanging heavy
On the street
Got a fat jump
On the lawn though
Smoking bunk pot
Like God in Milan
Like where my clothes at?
Like where my car at?
Like where my money at?
Real World: Earth
Pissing the bed
until I catch a leg.
I will drown you in my life
until you choke on my vibes.
This is real, this is real;
this is the real world.
Rear Window [CC]
Rotten apples—
gnarled like a sofa
bought in Burbank
years prior and pried
apart on a dirt patio.
I ask myself what kind
of diet I will go on now.
My new life tells me
it's going to feed me.
And I say I didn't mean
I'd watch my weight.
It's just like, "Wait,
which valley am I in?"
And then I hear a trumpet.
Regal Funk
Who to find my place
How to get on the grime
A life like this is metallic
Bent reflections cut enough
I'm retiring this week
I have no more guts
I've pissed in too many rivers
I've got islands of sick homes
I swear I'm just a cat now
No more visits to the pound
Regency, Nix, Onus
Blocking cages
just before dusk,
it's October again
in theory, and you
are milky; the moon
whispers in Italian,
and collections
lack agency now.
These fickle pickles,
slipping through
vinegary palms
have forced my will
to crystallize;
and in a season,
I will be seasoned,
and by year's end,
all can be novel.
Writing rote notes
forever and then
some, this can be
more than real;
acting in acts,
turning out turns,
I will plaster bodies
of work, of course,
to play out on streets
for your consideration.
Route Construction
Raw dogs at the rave
Smearing lipstick
Like heavy jail hustlers
Drop the attitude
You know rich kids
Don’t give a shit about shit
Doing blow like Eddie in a wig
Forget the kids
Kidnap my head
Slap my throat right
Smart men aren’t violent
Kill the temper
Nonsense drawer
Safe razor in the crib
Liquid conscience in the hood
Take the money
Rustic
Mist most
of the time
in this city.
Gabriel
in my eyes;
Delilah
in my ears.
Missed most
of my time
in this city.
Self-Help Writ Wrong
Bought a box of adrenaline
from a Chinese pharmacist
near my local massage place,
and thought I had a real plan.
Licked powder in a parking lot,
stretched out in chino pants
at a Moroccan-themed pool party,
and thought I was high on life.
Ended up with a month’s worth of infections
and a game show host’s list of regrets.
I’ve lost a lot of hours in the ink sink.
Self-Made Market
Windows up
On the ordinary
Bricking test earlobes
Grinding ice in Chicago
We’re all empty as banks
Grisly-ass young ones
Get shredded for the psyche
Sporting blurred vision
Twitching out at the Ear Inn
Straight respect for the hell piece
Soft haters at the door
And you know they’re crazy
Tight white bitches
Still mad like Spike Lee
Stacking Prozac all night
Ain’t a dealer
Ain’t a killer
But I’ll stay hard
In my front yard
Until the day
I go to sleep
Singapore Migraine
Mind full of heart
Hammer state of mine
Graveyard journeyman
Sawed off at the funeral
Sip on orange juice
In air conditioning
Take authentic naps
In the midnight mist
New state lights here
Maniacal lava fucking
Haul off with the tears
They wreck your bedtime
Sling
Office hours
are a luxury
to be dismissed.
Some men
are perhaps always
fascinated by mud.
There are catfish
to be noodled
on every level.
So Cosmopolitan
Today,
the Internet is in Braille only.
Tomorrow,
I am taking a break from myself.
Sometimes,
I feel like
I am overbooking
my immediate life,
and I’m not even
staying at a Marriott.
What do I want anyways?
It would be nice to see
Brancusi on poppers.
It would be nice to hear
someone sleep silently.
It would be nice to taste
desires without showering.
It would be nice to touch
someone, metaphorically.
It would be nice to smell
Relational Aesthetics again.
I have total recall
of ulterior motives,
and I prefer watching
things on parked screens.
“Nothing lasts forever”
is a shitty line for a poem,
but an important reminder
to do something in life.
But then again,
from what I’ve read
in women’s magazines,
length isn’t everything.
Sometimes NyQuil
is maybe better
than vodka
and the rock
is only an alias
for alliances
in perpetuation
and we dance
long and skittishly
in a haze of sorts
in the deep south
or north of fear
wherever is near
Sprung
A pleather belt
on a cold clavicle,
busts open the phlegm
seamlessly hemmed
and stiff at both ends.
Like a virgin,
I will eat peanuts
in a cardboard seat,
limber for all
and all can wait.
In good times
and windy times,
palm trees still stand;
sand swerves though me
and ice cream goes soft.
Stationed
even when I have
not peeled out of beds
full of aluminum
and shot petals
I've still been driven
by necessary scents
and now I smell
dinner for two
and I'm hungry
for your rare feed
tonight and tomorrow
and next week still
I am a root vegetable
bound to the ground
stuck to my foundation
and all I want to do
is to grow with you
so don't be chicken
pots and pans
cannot contain
the explanation
required in full
to illustrate heads
gone empty again
Steal Those Cuts
Digging deeply
webbed contradictions
on time
sensitive,
time-stamped
facsimiles,
(cotton clear,
caught on fear)
while tending to
surface level scratches;
(braising bruises,
traipsing truces).
Someone always gets hurt.
I’m sorry for my apologies,
but also, is it just me,
or is it the relative content,
or is it the relative context,
that leads me to ask,
“Why don’t people pay
as much in attention
as they do in dollars?”
Stranger Than Days
Loose cops
Living heavy
Without warning
On children
Just chilling
In the morning
And it’s like
Fuck minutes
Guns punch screws
And bullets mace faces
In situational seconds
Renegade government
Intent on outlawing
All Bad Brains
And them wild wounds
In bedroom ceilings
Felons and snitches
Sticking and stinking
On surface streets
Con job comeback
Obey like a Fairey
Or be terminated
What party?
What warrant?
Where the mattress?
Where the Hamptons?
I’m dead again
Thinking about my lady
Street Bruises
Dirty job
Dirty business
Salty problems
I dissolve them
Bounce again
With the slugs
Float and die
Buzz takes a toll
Sunken Turf Channel
I thought you were you,
but you were a hologram.
You were false hope,
staged like Tupac.
We're all animals,
surrounded
and shrouded
by plants and water.
Life is a game
with no rules.
Death is overtime,
unfamiliar to film.
Syndication Nation
Italian dinner
for an Irish drunk
Not me man
but I can relate
Eating sedatives
on the 110 again
Quarter pound
towards my weight
Collateral doomed
a plain aging punk
Taking The Highway
Snarling past midnight
like a Siberian Husky
trying to go vegan
to impress his owners,
I will sink into the ditch
you dug for my liver.
I can stomach anything
but another day with you.
This road goes nowhere
aside from my direction.
Talking Money, Talking Funny
Plastic planet dive
Measured in liquor
Rubber gossip scene
Bumping like Catholics
Grinding pills outside a Starbucks
With some white girls from Yale
I’d pawn my own mouthpiece
To keep my tweak peak tender
Time Zones
My mom sees me feeling
Leaving the world unlocked
Like a sleeveless model
My dad sees me watching
Shit in gold and copper goggles
Like a player in a top dollar opera
I’m just cooking eggs with a fever
Hot and high like a proper popper
On some full throttle BBC bullshit
Too Real Punk
Smoking in Texas
Born again
It’s a circle
Too real
Scrape the pipe
Can’t see anything
Scrape some cars
Why not?
One hundred thousand
Chrome towers
Dripping for miles
Why not?
Money spent
Money paid
Money spent
Do it again
Too real
Thinking
Painting
Sipping
Painting
We’re all frauds in the game
Tracking
Your head:
a crown
in a crowd.
Your hands:
pawned paws,
fawning at laws.
There are only butts
of cigarettes on streets
in this neighborhood.
There are only footprints,
proving desire on carpet
in this spectacled arena.
Karaoke in a room,
with others or alone,
we undress and address
the fading songs of regret.
You're a fantasy
and I'm a bastard,
but we're each other's
to own on our own.
Two-Thirds Purely Wrung
From January until maybe May,
I will be your Mary Magdalene,
but all through the summer,
I will have to be a beach poet.
From September until maybe forever,
I will let you enter through any opening,
but you will have to undress the work
I put into this private pillory exhibition.
Use My Illusion
I dragged a Harley
into the Harlem River…
and shit, once I got to Brooklyn,
I drank two black coffees…
and later, I huffed some poppers,
for a while, just because…
and while I was throbbing,
I realized life was worth more
than New Yorkers realized…
and, well, it was time to go.
White Men Can't Jump
AT&T got my phone drunk the other night. It group-sexted some punks in the beerlight. I felt the kind of shame that only a person with a camera crew can ever feel. And now I’m bombed out. It sure seems like there is more sun these days.
Shit, man. Some Americans are so American…
Planet of the Apes, Lululemon, Tazo Iced Passion.
Detox redux. Turn back the clocks.
Where are you now? Amsterdam...
What can you do? NOTHING...
I guess I could get drunk with my phone the next time this happens. Or maybe I'll just switch to Verizon. Sometimes things are ironic in an Alanis Morissette sort of way. But nothing is ever funny in a Dave Coulier sort of way.
PS There is a difference between hearing and listening.
White Whale (Wander, Wail)
up in the valley
down for whatever
I shredded aluminum
for a night of you know
it’s like hell on an island
and I’m not sinning any
longer than I have to
these days these days
I’m an oasis I’m an
oh I wonder why I’m
up in the valley
down for whatever
World Truth
“We’re all alone, despite ourselves.”