shorts
and
sat down.
luckily
the boy had a
pencil.
he found a clean
space
among all the
smeared and demented
scrawlings and
drawings
and very
carefully
and
heavily
he printed:
HEARTBREAK HOTEL
then he dropped the
first
one.
my buddy in valet parking at the racetrack:
after 9 long races among greedy faces
on a hot Sunday that hardly rhymes with
reason
I have murdered another day,
come out with shoelaces flopping (while
secretly craving to be in a moss-lined
cave, say,
watching black and white cartoons
while wanton simplicity soothes the
muddled brain)
as my buddy the valet races the
machine up, revving the 8-year-old
engine, he leaps
out:
“how ya doin’, baby?”
“things have me by the jugular, Frank,
I’m ready to run up the white
flag.”
“not you , baby, you’re my
leader! ”
“you can do better than that,
Frank…”
I get in, hook the seat belt, put on
the driving glasses, put it in first…
“hey, man,” he sticks his head into the
window, “let’s go out and get drunk and
kick some ass and find some
pussy!”
I tell him, “I’ll consider that.”
as I pull out I can see him in the rearview mirror: he’s giving me the
finger.
I smile for the first time in 7 or
8 hours.
see here, you
blazing bastard fools
poets
with your
idiot scrolls
you are so
pompous
in your
knowledge
so
assured
that you are
on a hot roll
to
nirvana
you
soft lumps of
humanity
you
imitators of
other
pretenders
you are still
in
the shadow of
the
Mother
you
have never
bargained with
the
Beast
you have never
tasted
the full flavor of
Hell
you have never
seen
the Edge of
yourself
you have never
been alone
with the
razor-sharp
walls
you
blazing bastard fools
with your
idiot scrolls
there is nothing
to
know
no place
to
travel
your
lives
your
deaths
your
idiot
scrolls
useless
disgusting
and
not as real
as
the
wart
on the ass
of
a
hog.
you
are rejected by
circumstance.
good
bye.
spark
I always resented all the years, the hours, the
minutes I gave them as a working stiff, it
actually hurt my head, my insides, it made me
dizzy and a bit crazy—I couldn’t understand the
murdering of my years
yet my fellow workers gave no signs of
agony, many of them even seemed satisfied, and
seeing them that way drove me almost as crazy as
the dull and senseless work.
the workers submitted.
the work pounded them to nothingness, they were
scooped-out and thrown away.
I resented each minute, every minute as it was
mutilated
and nothing relieved the monotony.
I considered suicide.
I drank away my few leisure hours.
I worked for decades.
I lived with the worst kind of women, they killed what
the job failed to kill.
I knew that I was dying.
something in me said, go ahead, die, sleep, become as
them, accept.
then something else in me said, no, save the tiniest
bit.
it needn’t be much, just a spark.
a spark can set a whole forest on
fire.
just a spark.
save it.
I think I did.
I’m glad I did.
what a lucky god damned
thing.
the science of physiognomy
long gone along the way, faces
grey and white and black and brown, and
eyes, all color of eyes.
eyes are odd, I have lived with a woman,
at least one, where the sex was fair, the
conversation passable and sometimes there was
even a seeming love
but then I suddenly noticed the eyes, saw there
the dark smeared walls of a stinking
hell.
(of course, I am pleased that I do not often have to
see my own eyes, lips, hair, ears, so
forth—
I avoid the mirror with a studied
regularity.)
long gone along the way, he had a face like a
mole pie, fat and unshivering and he walked up to
me in the railroad yards, I was beastly sick
and that flesh plate shook my innards, my psycho-kid
insides as he said, “I’m