Hunt for the Multicolored Resurrection

Grand Openings

All the sweet dark chocolate
the wet fingers
and the ticklish snails
the blue blue sky and
dry diamond, dust mixed
with sweat

that cry in your arms
the weed smoked in mystical delirium
the cold green bottles that sang, a happy choir,
every time the refrigerator door was opened
scratchy vinyl

a night of voyeurism
opened to us opening us to each other
another late night chess match

the public spaces
vacant but the smacking
of our raw fuck

The gravy drippings
on sweet biscuits
books read after
dreams of an elusive pursuit
my mind too full

thoughts mixing memories times people
(not mine) the glories unknown
great things yet to happen
our happiness measured

by open spaces


Old Mind

through the clouds and
among the bushes
along the rocky shore
squinting from the
sun winking off the
water dry cough
disrupts the fixed eye
a laugh distant and
frivolous a messy
sneeze
the houses pause
the creaking wood
is given over to a slammed
door
unacknowledged across
the great vast map, the
terrain unable to hold it
still, space bound, sparkling
in the ether of the
void past globs of
intergalactic measurements
other forms of life found
in holes in gaps
pauses,
like the houses still,
the expanding microscopic
particles wonder in a frantic jostle
at the exhaling force
of it all, through the minds
of ancient souls, the
architects of artifacts
to trap a moment and
replay it again and again
through eternity’s pinpoint


Lost Memories

An open door and a
sudden flow of stale air nudges
the delicate balance
a hinge in the rust,
as they say, and the
sulking darkness catches
a whiff of it. The ceiling
fan (how long has it been on?
long before the door has open
since being closed,
before the darkness had a
chance to begin its
surreptitious investigation)
spins around, pixilated
and caked with dust.
The broom handle is
splintering, the peeling paint
slowly yawns as the door
sounds a hungry growl, deep
rumble knocks the
picture frame shatters
darkness smothers
the exposed photo, a glance or a smile
black and blank. A small clump
of dust drifts down and
covers the profile. The corners
are already yellowed and curling


Only A Man

a man has only so many
days only so many chances
years disappointed down to
movements a tad too behind
(or too embarrassingly early)
once the virile is extinguished in
an arc of use, leaving only
a shell of a man, good for
dressing up in a tie, or
huddled in an overcoat,
tartan pajamas frayed at the cuffs,
sent into the night with a leaky trash bag,
good for drinking too much wine
despite all the medications
and passing out on the couch
snoring lightly occasionally wasting words
to the darkened and empty room. Flaccid,
the nut eaten away in
greedy chunks by youth
when there was so much, how
little survives,
until even the tie is too much



The Voyage, No Return

I.
We sailed in boats of rotten wood
upon the sea
waves of memory
returned old and sour
the hairs grew so
long on my chin I lost my gold coins
meant to pay the barber.
You showed me how
to retreat inside
myself and we both grew
young waiting
for the sunrise

II.
The dark has been here
so long my sleep extended
I roll over on my side and
tuck my feet gently under
my full moon look up and
notice it’s still night
return to dreams, searching for
your wisdom, fitful
about finding the correct
place to rest the object
out of sorts in my hand
like a word without a
line
or a letter that
lost its sense of word
detached from meaning
I look up and still it’s dark
cold nipping at
the crevices of my poorly shuttered soul
as I wait for sunrise

From the Desk of Joe Gould

Once upon a time, there was a dragon who only ever wanted to be mean. He practiced at least ten hours every day, seven days a week: he worked on breathing scorching fire; he practiced roaring; he worked on flashing his sharp teeth so that they looked ever so sharp; he spent hours meticulously perfecting the slant of his eyebrows so that they were as menacing as could be.

But he had a problem.

There was a bright colorful balloon that wouldn’t leave him alone. No matter how fierce he tried to be, the balloon always showed up, making him appear festive and campy.

Tired of feeling like some ride at some major amusement park, or like some animated corporate icon that littered its merchandise across the world, he tried with all the techniques he’d perfected through his laborious training to convince the balloon that he was a fierce dragon, and not the ideal playmate for a balloon who sought to be a bouncy sidekick.

But the balloon had this idea about himself and the dragon that was like a string he couldn’t let go of. He had this vision of the dragon and himself acting as courageous crime fighters. He saw Dragon as having been alienated by his kind because of his love for all things balloon. As a result of his banishment, he decided to fight all wrongs, and especially to defend all those who were persecuted as a result of their seeking enjoyment from balloons.

Balloon saw himself as a loner who had lost his balloon family when he was barely filled with helium. He had wandered from village to village, at first hidden by roofs and water towers, only to become a lost soul, wafting morosely among the weeds and cracked pavements…until Dragon, with his pure joy of all things balloon, made him feel buoyant again, and gave him a purpose. Ever since, he had dedicated his life to Dragon’s fight against crime(!) as his faithful sidekick.

Needless to say, this is not how the dragon saw himself. Even more needless to say is that this idea of the balloon’s did not make him very happy. That is to say, it wouldn’t have made him very happy if he knew it. Balloon, being a balloon, could not talk. But the dragon gathered the gist of it, especially whenever he felt the balloon hovering behind and slightly above him. Which meant there was a balloon behind and slightly above him wherever he went, adding all together too much levity to the plethora of scorched bodies he left littered across the ruins of his landscape.

Instead of the smell of the charred skin of helpless victims, it became the smell of victory over wrongdoers, all because of the balloon. Instead of gold hoarded away to the detriment of the filthy and hungry human world, it was riches robbed from the indulgent to be provided to the needy, all because of the balloon. And instead of the kept virgin that robbed man of the ability to give birth to his complete soul, there was a damsel in distress, rescued just in the nick of time, untied from the tracks and removed from the oncoming train. All because of the balloon.

A fire grew behind the eyes of the dragon more fierce and dangerous than any he ever breathed. This could not continue…

from Weak Signals

Divergent rules for
evaluating Primacy

Time + Place

evaluate Bias
proximity

Who and for What Audience?
evaluate language, modes of Authorship.
(modes of Authority)

How do we proceed?

check and x-check
vs. other sources
(diary entries can be x-checked
with/against/along newspapers, emails, doodles…
(but not oral communications: unpublished sermons, secrets, whispers)

Correspondence: handwritten, electronic,
duplicate, triplicate,
reread, revised, reconsidered
is this an exercise or a finished thought,
Public or Private?

Mode of dissemination: vehicle (ship fast, but could sink−
read: anxiety of transmission)
Limitations: illiteracy prevents documentation contribution
lack of perspectives
(read: socio-economic factors)
(read: anxiety of transmission)

Maps: large scale view,
modes of reality, Geography is History;
again, to locate
authority a difficulty
when authority is all one can read

What is Purpose?
Government Documents: uncover ordinary lives:
evidence of land ownership, felonies,
vital statistics, immigration, phone taps,
tax records, genetic code, confidential information,
top secret, restricted access, jingoistic (dys)function
Read: anxiety over Information


*
I think about food
most of the day,

what snack do I have
to munch on,

should I consider
extending my search

(when I’m searching,
which is most of the time)

further back on top
of the dusty fridge,

behind the pink and purple
Easy Bake Oven, or

deeper in the cupboard,
behind the messy pile of brown paper bags?

I don’t know when
I became consumed

with the thought of food.
This poem makes me hungry.


*


Some people feel alone in a crowd

I
only
ever
feel,

lost

*

reading your poetry
looking at your photo
for signs of me
in the turn of a phrase,
the lift of an eyebrow,
sinister love lost truths
as your tears pound on the yellowed
pillowcase, blanket turned
twisted in discomfort,
the lines under your eyes
like the worried rhythm
on the page


*
We try to talk everyday,
through emails, phone calls, messages

or at home while the television chatters
dinner growing cold

we speak quietly, whisper
‘goodnight’ across the bed

giving words over to sleep
until the alarm cues our ‘good mornings’.

There is a shared space,
between us, a someplace

that is no place,
where my words echo

back to me
sometimes so unfamiliar.


*


How do I explain it when I no longer understand it myself? It was once all I knew, a time and place that stretched out across my childhood, a place that raised me. A present moment of rooftop activity, drums and dayglow in a Brooklyn attic, the park worn with so many of our experiences: making love as the sun rose around us; tugging at meaning during dusk, a lifetime of exploration in a night of promise. Now, removed by years, those streets are more real in dreams. I’ve been back to that effect: lucid dreaming. This never was my home, the tone. Orphan child jazzy and questioning. Even then, separated by another Brooklyn, where letter trains slumbered in the rain. Lost is a fluent language. Distanced by time, space, and memory, somehow unable to contextualize those decoded mysteries. Yet I find myself so often exploring those fecund brownstones, those streets and avenues, those mimicked spaces of myself seen through the lens of myth.

A Poem About Something

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All Grown Up

The seasons pass with sudden alacrity
but the time goinggone by becomes
was not so as carefree: as were
certain moons marked by cows
(leg broken, milk sour, put out of misery)
soundtracked by that musical cat
(on a catnip bender, gone deaf)
and insouciant whispers of certain cutlery
(and the fork ran away with the zester,
spoon commits suicide with knife--own child!)
leaving only the dog who barks at nothing
(dry tongue hangs from upside down smile)

A Review of the Cuban Revolution, by Joe Gould

Do you want to see a menu? No—no (an after-thought, a need to be polite, to please)…I’m waiting for some people [give too much information] . Thank you, though. The music plays and the staff perform their duties…it’s all soggy…how can I help you? The clink and clang, and occasional BANG of work as the light outside fades and the glow of the strip club grows brighter. They dance inside there. Really shake it. Perform. Duty. To what degree do we pursue our responsibilities in earnest? Can I exercise my capital in a place called the Cuban Revolution? The jokes on who[whom/her/him/Oaxaca]…? This place, a new location, upscale, has lost something, lost some of its charm. Looks like ‘another place’. Who needs another place? I seek no place. I sat at the table [I sit at the bar] so long, I was invisible. (A ghost on the brink of eternity, History flowing forward instead of backward, the want of touch and the need for understanding). Felt good. I tell you what! Felt real good. But also lonely. The smiles were not for me. The black outfits that define breasts that outline ass one precious cheek at a time, not for me. Does that mean no shots? Nuttin’! A question of what’s been done. Almost alone at the bar: he reads the menu, he reads some free newsprint: employment, classifieds, single white male seeks, the biggest joke of all: full spread add for the Satin Doll…He reads the cleavage of the barmaid. Is that the correct nomenclature? Who can I turn to for help? I mean credible help [help always available]? Can I help you? now a different proposition. I help myself and notice the bra is red. Red and black, the colors of liberation….no—of revolution—no of a nun with an arrow through her head dressed in black in white [I’m too anxious for the punch line to tell jokes]. We are comrades. But I do not seek a political revolution. I do not wish to discuss the member of the kitchen staff who wears a Yankee cap backwards and a dirty apron. He’s so important as to be forgotten. Take care of them. A muted trumpet digs out a line with a grumble and a gasp. Affirmation. Yeah… How does he want it? Are you getting frustrated with me or something? What is he writing? Damn I’m thirsty. Look at those amazing legs, fix the chairs [again], do –do-do –dwwaaaa, ice, colognes nice-the smell of Serbian junipers and ground orris root. Feet are swelling, my feet are aching, tonight I’ll focus on the first half of the semester’s reading….gotta score again—c’mon, I gotta get back. Menu. Shift. Sigh. I looked ‘er in the eye. I wonder what my next move is supposed to be (no, when). Yah Yah Yah Yah Yah.

Between Despair & Presence

The soul is left, a bit of it removed,
in the sun, unwanted.
(my soul is dying)
There is a sweetness—too sweet at
times it would seem—yet now its sweetness arrives
exists, for no one.
Dirtied by the bite
(part of its confectionary sugar
hinted on somebody’s lips,
or maybe an animal’s, nameless
transfigured through ingestion, walking on all fours)
saliva wetted and dried, now a busy hive of bacteria.
(Why did you leave me?)
This poem is too sad to read.
Not sad at all if that means commonplace.
We often take a bite at Desire,
(a hunger somewhere between the flesh and the soul,
a meal often attacked
suspicious eyes yield before a trough)
someplace in our being
that too sweet flavor of something fried
wetness in our mouth on our tongue;
(We lick our lips,
let the warm juice of transgression
run
slowly
down our chin…
But this in not how (we survive) control it.)
Reject it. Ultimately.
(Perhaps another thought to make their soul complete, mistaken soul for desire, sweet for bitter, Unfortunate Mishap)
Arrival is no satisfaction
regarding the question of purpose
being belches out a forced response to that
small bite
that you didn’t really want or
didn’t really need. Just a bite (…did I confuse my Desire with Purpose?).
It seemed so small, is so much smaller
so, innocent.
But there are always consequences no matter how
small, how innocent, how biological.
Where do we go from here?
(The soul needs nourshment, but desire walks the streets,
hustling on the corner)
The soul is rotting, uncomplete, unperfect, unsoul
and you have left nothing but a belch
in the air (a sensible question pierces the abstraction, yet dies on the lips of wisdom’s love)
between despair and presence