poems 7

chance of snow

between the silence
and the bullshit
the lies and
blackbirds lined up on a naked branch
you'll find time
for the light, the truth
words curving like the body of a woman
words raining down
from the wings of angels
and then you can say FUCK YOU
to money and careers and the rent
cuz the only food you need
flows out from yr fingertips
onto the black buttons of your insomniac keyboard.



why vandalism?

she had a bad case of acne

I gave her some friendly advice
on how to fix it

I guess she didn't think it was funny

she told the boss
and I got fired on the spot

I spent the next few hours
wandering the sidewalks
as the cars ran up and down the streets like dogs

it was sunny but getting cold

getting fired always felt both good and bad at the same time—

I told myself
you could stay like this and become a hobo

but I knew I'd have to start looking right away

and there wasn't even a rock to put through a window.



nude young girls

29 Buddhas lined up on the mantelpiece
and that's supposed to be a metaphor of something
but I forgot what it means
after a while a kind of lethargy sets in
you stare out the window at the crooked rain
the roses are dead and the clock is broken
I once walked in front of a moving car
the woman behind the wheel swerved to miss me
and I couldn't have cared less
no, this caterpillar won't be growing any wings
just blowing arsenic at the wasted stars
and waiting for whatever the fuck comes next.



class warfare

in dog-eat-dog America
there's winners and losers
and the beautiful ones
are the losers

the sweetest of all
are the insane
the poets

the ones who talk to sparrows
and the ghosts in their heads

who give a dollar
to every homeless beggar
they see

who open their windows at night
to howl at the moon

and the money
of the smirking winners
can't buy any of that

ever.



ode to a fascist clown

the first time I ever saw homeless people
was in New York
in the 1980s
they were mostly
men
leaning up
against walls
holding out styrofoam
cups
they looked sad
and tired
my mother and I
always
gave a dollar
to this one or
that one
but there were
always
more of them on
the streets
the next day
thanx for nothing
Ronald Reagan.



blue angels

watching my shoes pacing up the sidewalk
the red bricks were all looking at me
strangely
telling me forgotten things
then I found myself floating
up and away like a dove
into the blue air
the clouds told me to stop trying so hard
and the sun said nothing at all.



semper fi

American war criminals
going off to kill
the newest Indians
searching for imaginary
weapons of mass destruction
armed with real ones
like white phosphorus
depleted uranium
and enough lies
to fill a whole country
with mad killer clowns

I'd pelt you with
anarchist tomatoes
but you'd lock me up
without trial
in Gitmo, that once
beautiful place
that you stole
from the people of Cuba
who just want to be
left in peace

white Americans,
I spit on you
and your sheer animal
bloodlust
on the oligarchs who
profit from your wars
and the idiots
who fight them.



the scarecrow men with smiles

rotting in Ohio
in the bowels of the Empire
in the heart
of the Axis of Evil
crows descend from dead trees
and peck out my arsenic mind
I am not safe in the belly
of the beast
I am not safe
in their military-industrial
horror, I fear
the Pentagon media
and the scarecrow men
moving their wet lips
on the TV news
I am not safe from
their sordid lies
the eyes of the beast
are upon me.



I let the door hit my ass on my way out 

genteel poverty
is my own idea of paradise.
I work only
as much
as I want to
make only as much
money as I need
to survive. I'm
a kind of gentleman
when you think about it
old new gentry
in a moth-eaten
small apartment of
a mansion.
the type-A people
can hustle all they want:
if they inherit
the earth
they can have it.
the summer sun
is no match for my
air conditioner
(when it's working)
and in the evenings
when the Buddha stars
come pouring down
a bottle of
hard lemonade
is the sweet nectar
of the good-for-nothing
Gods.



lost my heart over there

ragged streets
under a white sky
if happiness was
something you could
buy from the ice cream
truck when it comes
jingling down the street
or balloons
red yellow and green
rising up into blue sky
under the lying sun …
back when days like
that mattered.
there’s no end to what
they can do to you
and they’ll do it to you
till you end up in
some alley
among the stray cats
hoping more for angels
than Gods, hoping
to catch a glimpse of
silken wings.



still (more dead than) alive in some rathole somewhere in America

I'm still alive
cuz when I wake up
in the morning
I feel this pain in my right leg
like one of those hairy
crippled smith-Gods that
never shave
dreaming of nymphs
Goddesses
and high school cheerleaders
I'm still alive
cuz I hate with the heart
of a true Bolshevik
I mean slitting throats
bayoneting the class enemies
setting fire to the churches
a real bloodbath orgy of
killing before sipping
my lemonade
this world is mostly insanity
like Maupassant going
mad from the syphilis he got
from some Parisian whore
and Henry Miller laughing
at Parisian whores
and Apollinaire dying
a thousand deaths
in Paris
living is slowly dying
like the surgeon removing
one piece this month
another the next
I'm sorry if this poem
didn't cheer you up.



end of the rope

north of here
is a place that
used to have
50,000 people
now it’s barely
half that
the factories
closed down
Walmart drove
all the small
shops outta
business
now everyone
hustles for
minimum wage
wondering how
they’re gonna
pay the bills
everyone but
the very poor
has moved out
it’s where the
American dream
hanged itself
and didn’t even
leave a note.



second-hand view

there’s days when
it’s difficult just getting
out of bed
nearly impossible
brushing one’s teeth
or taking a shower.
days like that
the only thing to do
is sit by the window
look up at the clouds in
the sky. what
you’re born into
is a matter of luck
most of it bad.
I let the blue sky
enter my head, let the
wind carry
my worn-out soul
you can see it among
the trees
rags and all.



no cure for what I’ve got

your unshakeable
American optimism
sickens me.
I never wanted to be one of you
mowing your phony lawns
like in 50s Leave It To Beaver land
getting all teary-eyed
saluting the flag
under fireworks on the 4th of July.
I hate John Wayne and
all fat cowboys.
my American dream is to live
on foodstamps while not supporting
the troops
and not watching football
or baseball
while the cat leaves
headless mice in the yard.
but it’s too late:
watching TV all day
I’m already
a fat lazy
unhappy American.
yes, I’m looking for sympathy.



the meaning of life ...

is white clouds and a lollipop.
the meaning of life
got lost somewhere in
dreams of Loni Anderson.
these pills that I'm taking
make the room lean
first to the left
and then to the right.
what I'm going through here
is some kind of
unraveling of the spirit
or maybe
a Los Alamos of the mind
so I'm writing to you
from the other side
of something
and I'm staring at a clock with
no hands.
these pills remind me
of the dead blackbird
I came across once
it was staring up at me
with its dead black eye
like lost soldiers
in long-forgotten wars
and the poor dead blackbird
never said a word.



fuck everybody

my grandfather was
an asshole
even when sober
but when he got
drunk every night
on rakia
that's when his
demons came out:
screaming at
everyone
his bald head with
a Hitler mustache
looking like
the Devil himself
till he finally
crawled into bed
round midnight
and slept. his inner
demons wouldn't
let him be and
I wasn't there when
he finally croaked
so I'm just guessing
what his dying words
were.



the old country

I remember
a pond
filled with red
and white fish
and a young
Orthodox priest
dressed all
in black with
a black beard
and my drunk
grandfather
keeling over
one night,
slamming his
bald head
into a metal
bed frame (I
still don’t know
how it didn’t
kill him.)
our relatives
say that since
the fall of
Communism
the country’s
really gone
to the dogs
everyone living
in poverty
and misery
all the young
people
moving abroad
in search of
a better life.

shit happens.



betrayed

Ho Chi Minh
kicked some
Yankee ass
reunited
the nation but
now Vietnam’s
“Communist”
government
has imposed
capitalism
on the country.
what American
bombs and
Agent Orange
couldn’t do
greed and the
Almighty Dollar
have. did all
those
Viet Cong
heroes
die for nothing?
Wall Street
is a cancer
devouring
the whole
goddam world.



dig?

worms devour the night
as the Tao drinks wine in a tree
he’s no help at all
just like the rest of you
humanity, you remind me of
the headless mice my cat
leaves in the yard
or the pigeon’s head
she once left by the door.
while Nazis bury Jewish gold
at the ends of rainbows
the angels
of our better nature
are tied to trees
and sodomized
the angels
of our better nature
have slashed their wrists
and hung themselves
with piano wire.