mmmmdcccix

Life Switch

     I repeat I want my life out of here
                          —John Ashbery

Talk about a real life saver!
So, I lost the switcher, that
thing that changes the chan
nel.  Does this happen to

you?  You get up, walk to
the bathroom, do whatever
you do there, take a shower,
etc.  Then you come back to

the living room, take a seat on
your favorite cushion, then dit dit
dit dit.  You’ve sat on the switch.
The switcher. The channel changer.

And then you just wish you had
one of those for your life.

mmmmdcccviii

Soft Launch of an Imaginary Imagination

     a hundred yards from my home
     what home you haven’t got a home
     I do so have a home
                                       —John Ashbery

I can’t do Ozempic. Long story, and not
a very fun one, I might add. And I’m not
on a diet (an old-fashioned word, that one,
right?). But I’ve lost a few pounds over the

past couple of months. I have a few theories
why, and each have me imagining myself
healthy. Healthier, in fact, than I’ve been
in years. But the news! Even as I type this

to you, I’m listening to political talking heads
by way of YouTube. So I’ve turned that off.
Just now. And am going to close my eyes for
a few moments. Bear with me, please. Damn,

it’s too bright. And my new fifty something inch
television is on pause in the middle of a laundry
detergent ad (picture a hand in the middle of the
screen with all fingers forward, toward me, holding

a square swirled with three colors: green, blue and
purple. Imaginative. It’s almost a miniature abstract
piece the likes of which one might see casually strolling
through a museum of modern art. Oh, now I remember,

I was in the middle of the latest episode of Strange New
Worlds, which I suppose I’ll get back to now. With so
much focus, so much concentration, there just isn’t any
time for the imagination, it seems. Is that really so bad?

mmmmdcccvii

The aunties are on their way

to a hippie convention.  Oh, evening!
thinks John Ashbery, who doesn’t hold
to convention like I do.  Then the world
sets about trying to discover the identity

of the narrator.  The poor thing!  Must
have been drunk out of his mind.  Or
worse!  Most everyone was quickly
distracted by about a million different

things.  Some had to tend to their
gardens.  Others to meals already in
progress.  As for me, I just kept directing
traffic and confusing the pedestrians.

At night we saw the stars and the moon,
annoyed the neighbors by reading aloud
until about four a.m. Then we made a
bunch of recordings of boiled eggs

set up in various postures and poses.

mmmmdcccvi

Junk Science

“It’s horrifying, isn’t it?”
“Truer words couldn’t
be uttered!”  But then,
what’s true and what’s

not seems to be the head-
exploding query of this 

particular era. I may play 

an artist on a tiny soap 

opera transpiring right 

here on this very channel,
sure, but I’ve always been
more left-brained than

otherwise.  I mean, I nearly
finished a chemistry degree
as an undergraduate.  Before
flipping to the dramatic arts.

But which might you picture
more easily, me in a lab coat
in an actual laboratory, fun-
colored liquid bubbling in

a test tube I carry from
the Bunsen burner to a
microscope, or me in a lab
coat on some gentrified

stage in some mid-sized
American city’s community
theatre’s whodunnit, say,
it’s latest summer hit?

mmmmdcccv

Prissy December

is all the rage like No Nut
November was for a few
years, or am I confused?
Are all Airheads sour like

I am?  It’s hard for me to
tell, even though you have
a right to your anarchy just
as I have a right to live in

the library, where I got a 

scholarship.  It pays well but

doesn’t come with wireless serv

ice nor even a mobile phone.

You spilled my cup of watered
ink with occasional brain cells
on the sofa go home, you’re
wasting my time, you gave

me a migraine, no more good

mood!!  no more prissy, just

overwrought and pissy.

mmmmdccciv

The arc of a story

is its own story. If taken
independently it might be
independently poignant,
it could be a life-changing

narrative (metaphorically),
but if it doesn’t in some way
work with all of the other parts
of the story within which it is

just one aspect, i mean, if it
acts too tangential to the
sum of the rest of the story,
or in a way that detracts, well,

that doesn’t necessarily mean
that the story, on the whole,
is not an award-winning story.
And yet who gives a singular

award for the arc of a story?

mmmmdccciii

It’s a slick paradise

but somebody’s got to do it.
Could someone explain how
to ease into this?  Don’t say
get out of bed!  Don’t say
get off your ass and do it!

Say what you a want but I
am generally very driven,
goal-oriented and motivated.
I’m hard on myself when I
think I’m just wasting time,

so it’s good to be able to
justify whatever you do.
Masturbation, watching
television, spending the
last bit of cash or, even

better, money you don’t
actually even have.  Literally.

mmmmdcccii

Somebody made me

a movie in which to get lost,
inside of which to lose myself.

Get lost!  Make me a movie!
I’m just clowning around with

Charlie Brown.  I adore him.  And
miss him.  I forgot where to go

to break the glass in case of an
emergency.  Just last week, I saw

that break glass for Narcan film
where my neighborhood played 

an evil villain?  I know a guy who 

can control his remote with a glass 

of water in his hand.  He always has
one eye on the weather and the

other on all of the latest movie
trailers.  I guess he has a third

eye, too, because he watches a
lot of trash on the internet.  I

wonder where he get his eye
glasses.  I spend all afternoon

making an outline of these
serious questions.  I like tables

with my bullet points.  The holes
in my head need something upon

which to rest their weary gaze.
I know that sounds like a slur,

but I take you all very seriously.
My advice is that you get your

butt off of that couch, walk out
of my apartment door and go

find your happy. Wait! Come
back!! I was only kidding! Now

who’s going to make all of my
movies?  Me?  [Linus and Pig-

Pen were the first ones to scurry
away.]  Whatever.  I’m a child

without a celebrity cause.  I’m
an infant of no regret.  Vengeance

is for cowards!  Make mine a turkey.

mmmmdccci

Bleep

Bleep and the world bleeps
with you. I’m too lazy to
bleep. The key was in the
ignition, but the bleeping

engine refused to turn over.
Romance is dead, said the
man bleeping all of the
stars. You can go bleep

the moon then for all I care!
wailed his companion, the
former star-bleeper. At a
quarter past two in the

morning, the shyest sheep
bleep. Who bleeped you?
asked the earth of the passing
asteroid. After regaining its

composure, the bear scampered 

away, leaving a momentary trail 

in its wake upon the leaf-riddled
ground, and a huge wad of bleep.

mmmmdccc

I’m falling

so steadily asleep that i read
summer fireworks as summer
freakworks on the hottest day
of the year in san francisco.

hey, guess what? i live in san
francisco. even as a zombie
there’s a little thrill that crawls
up my insides at such a thought.

would that i were as composed
as don draper falling, falling,
as he does in the opening
sequins. but falling in love.

big pop out my new window
sounded maybe like someone
fell from the roof, or their up-
story window. too much a

thud to be the sound of fire
crackers. and the 4th of july
long gone, like democracy.

mmmmdccxcix

Theories of Ancient Underwear

Oh, cast out Vanity, come back!
I can barely smell your presence
Where are you hiding? Show your face,
Show your ass, let me press my ear to your chest
And study what might flow through your mirror-glass heart

And then let us repair to the boudoir
Where I can witness the spectacle of your
Miraculous edge, your bowl of swirling nasturtiums,
Your wall vase filled with narcissi,
Flowers of the lower-caste’s depiction of love,
Theorems brought to light from Asian underworlds

And then to the pond out back
Trembling with catfish and we’ll
Roll our eyes back into our heads until our
Unseen pupils tremble, fluttering with the ripples
Of the oversexed pond and the moths that flap as
Dusk arrives in their craven approach to the fireflies
That begin to appear in your proximity in swarms as if
To expose your ruddy complexion throughout the night
That you may never disappear

I am an invisible giant in your presence
Held captive by the intoxication that blows from beyond
Just in the direction of your precious garden filled with blooming roses
Our desolation of riches knows no bounds

Ribbet! Ribbet! go the concupiscent frogs splaying their legs wide
As each leaps into the pond in an attempt to cool their bellies and groins
The catfish swoop and sway at the surface just to meet the frog-flesh
Their madness is my madness, my obsession with you is a mirror
Of the surface of your pond

Oh, if you could lift your eyes to see me, try, try,
As if I were one of your bedroom mirrors,
But nothing, especially not me, takes you from this
Cacophony with which you are one—and I,
Rising, am left alone, myself, to wallow in sorrow

mmmmdccxcviii

Customer Service

I want to scream. What
is this horrible disease
that I have wherein every
entity to whom I pay fees

on a regular basis has
found a way to rip me off,
to snooker me into paying
way above and beyond what

I was originally told? Usually
verbally. Calm down. Should
I list them all here, along with
their wrongdoings, as if this

were some conglomerated
horrible review? This is not
the stuff of poetry. Art has
never stuffed me full of such

anxiety and frustration and
dread. While waiting on
an online representative
to finish reading my file,

before spending yet another
hour or two glued to this screen,

then  promised access to my
account once again, yet at the

end of our conversation not
one bit of movement in the
right direction has been made,
my account is still inaccessible,

they are still charging me a
monthly fee, it’s been nearly
four months of this and maybe
a dozen hours on the phone or

chatting online with help—and this

is just one of many companies
whose names you would today 

recognize, which always gives me 

pause, like, how do they stay in 

business? And why me? Perhaps I 

should be whiling away this time 

writing a pastoral, taking a nice, 

long walk around the city snapping 
shots of beautiful ephemera. The
customer service representative
is still reading through my file. I

hope I don’t have to explain for
the twentieth time the problems
that I have had with my account,
to which I desperately need access. 

Please come back to the chat screen 

and tell me that everything has been
solved, that my account is now 
accessible, that I’ve been refunded

of the payments taken from my
bank by your huge company for
the services that I have been
unable to access for so long.

This is as far as you get from

beauty.  This that I’ve written

in such fits and starts is no art

but a headache tightended by

a crown of thorns.  The burden

of the sum of the sins I drag to my

death, or to the prison wherein

I shall await such a foul conclusion.

mmmmdccxcvii

pride-shamed

     You had proms
     I had glory holes
                   —Wayne Koestenbaum

is it a joke? i look him up.
he’s eight years old than i am.

my bit about wishing i’d had
more gay hanky-panky in those

early years is just a bit. isn’t it?
maybe it started in earnest.

but i went to my senior year
prom. and from what i can

recall of it (i mean it was my
senior year; it was prom), i

had a blast. on the subject of
anonymous sex, i only

condescend. with upturned
lips, all of the what ifs re

soundingly hiss a response
in unison: not on your life!

mmmmdccxcvi

speckles

     They’re terribly, terribly, terribly moody
                      —Björk (from Human Behaviour)

the freckles flecking the skin over
the tops of my cheekbones. am i
nine? so fresh-faced.

can’t remember the word that was
on my mind (did i speak it some
where between the dream it
came from to) as i was waking.

wake up, america! quack, quack!
it wasn’t a spoof it was an homage.

besides, i’m only ever catty when
i’m in a great mood. and i’m not
in a great mood very often.

“i was crying?” “he was crying.”
                                   “shut up!”

nostalgia kicks in as the burden
of youth is lifted. actuality goes
unremembered. instead there are
a few tableaux, the faint recollection
of emotions twisted (tainted) by time.

a harp’s melodic somersault over
life’s peaks and valleys. the
tragedy of a last hurrah, how it
sticks with us, suspensefully.

impossible to placate,
day in, day out, something
always stirring at our depths,
unshook.

mmmmdccxcv

As if after a day in elementary school,

I watched a quartet of tubas
play Yes, We Have No Bananas
for The Gong Show win. The
entire episode is on YouTube.

The Tenderloin’s Edinburgh Castle 

Pub, featured in So I Married an

Ax Murderer, and where I used

to play an occasional game of

pool with former friends, now
rests in peace, per today’s
Chronicle. It’s the last sub
scription I’ll be able to afford

for the foreseeable future. I
get up to clear my bed, move
the clothes I wore earlier around
the television to the top of my desk,

and a half-eaten tub of Ben & Jerry’s
Salted Caramel ice cream, which
I’d placed in my jacket pocket,
leaves a trail of ice cream tears

on the floor of my new apartment.
It’s a hardwood floor reminiscent
of the one in the house in which I
lived from ages two to seventeen.

mmmmdccxciv

You must encounter a lot

of weird people. Or am I just
projecting? I certainly do. I even
count myself amongst them, and
historically I’ve done this with a

bit of pride, but after losing a
goodly amount of senses roam
ing the city homeless for a
couple of years, the pride I

once felt with regard to any
eccentricity fades considerably.
Or it certainly has for me, as
the years go on, and there’s

rarely a soul around who knew 

me before toward which I can
bounce words in an effort of
engagement, even if strictly

to gauge how much of said
senses might have vanished.
One needs a clear point of
reference for such things.

And that, despite my best
efforts at attempting to hit
reset on those who knew
most every foible, most

every idiosyncrasy, well,
they just cannot seem to
be lured back, even if for no
other reason than to help me

with such a perspective. There

fore, the best I get, at most, 

is less mano a mano than

loopy to loopy. So, anyway,

I guess that means I’ve no
real way to tell who is more
out of touch, me, or the fence
post with whom I’m awkwardly

attempting to engage. So maybe
just forget everything I’ve relayed
to you on this fine day as I retire
for a long meandering walk. Ciao

for now. And thank you ever so
for listening to me once more gab 

so erratically.  As always, yours....

mmmmdccxciii

Today

things are ugly. I’m ugly.
It happens. And so I stall.
It’s 5:08pm on a Sunday
and I have a very large

amount of work to do,
things I want to have
accomplished by the time
I head to bed tonight, or

whenever it is that I man
age to get into bed, but
I’m still in bed. Have
yet to shower. And under

this exterior, I’m scared.
There are so many vari
ables that I can’t end this
quite yet, and I normally

would have by now. This 

has been happening quite 

a bit of late. And so I get up, 

at least, even if ten hours

or so later than I originally
expected I would, to shower.

mmmmdccxcii

You must encounter a lot

of weird people.  This can be
serious.  I mean You can’t
be serious!  We lock into each
other’s sockets for a moment

with an Oh, but I am! certainty.

mmmmdccxci

I pay no heed,

but we have joggers.
If no heed is paid here
at the Cliff House where
brunch is being served,

why when we lock eyes
with either of the three men 

bobbing by outside, in full 

view, do we muscle up?  Or,

more accurately, do we
declare, Let’s muscle up!?
It’s all feelings after Xmas
depression and we have

lists to lay like pavement
and then rearrange at 
which we stare blankly
before checking slices off. 

Firstly, afford a car?  Never!
Next of course, save up for a 

new kitchen?  Dreams!  Self-

evaluation says we afford no

thing.  We regroup.  Cruise 

more joggers.  Self-pity is
less of an evaluator,
but it knows that I afford

nothing.  Not a thing.
Reassess.  Remove
myself from the
dream of having

brunch at Cliff
House.  Refrain from
the primary goal of steak
and eggs scramble, of 

self-evaluation.

mmmmdccxc

the antique bookshelf

barely hangs on to the wall;
is at only the angle greater than
which the journals and books
would all fall to the floor.  even

rubber ducky batman and rubber
ducky wonder woman look like
they’re about to fall bills first
onto the floor.  perhaps, if so

flummoxed, they might flap
their wings a bit and land in
the soup that’s being brought
to a boil upon the miniature

stove just below and to the
right (of me, not to the right
of the ducky superheroes).
a pink bunny bookend stares

at me while i’m in bed, the
lights bright, typing this
abrupt homage to my grand
mother’s journals, each of

which, in somewhat chrono
logical order stand upright
(but at that odd slanted
angle) one by one past

that cute bunny bookend
that i purchased long ago
somewhere in japan.  they
are each dated, beginning

in the 1930s and ending
in the mid 1990s, which
amounts roughly to the
span of life of my lovely

grandmother, whose
journals i inherited
after she passed.
she kept diaries,

was always the
bastion of fashion,
upbeat no matter
how down the times

might have been or
how browbeaten she
would surely be from
the toils of whichever

day.  she was the best
half of a blue collar
romance of the ages.
and she was a poet.

mmmmdcclxxxix

Always is always on.

This is meant to break the rules.
To never take a break, to never
sit silently (unless you are so
on that sitting silently is what is

called for, and keeps you going,
keeps you top-notch, keeps you
in the spotlight).  Even though
this is number three on the list,

never look away from it.  Always
(always, always) keep it at the
forefront of your mind and in top
form.  Don’t be a hermit, extrovert!

Keep yourself going, make the light
come to you.  It is best to be always
at your best.  What about sleep, you
might ask.  What about it?  Dream in

gold.  So to speak.  Wake up running.

mmmmdcclxxxviii

When nothing else,

write.  I’m better now.
But what to say?  I do
not know, so I’m watch
ing television.  It’s a

science fiction series.
While putting together
a new table I got at
Ikea.  I divert my att

ention.  I shouldn’t
feel so trapped.  Log
ic says I’m doing my
best, better than I

have in a long time.

mmmmdcclxxxvii

“Are you defective?”

he asked. I was half-dreaming,
asleep in the driver’s seat of my
car. Perhaps it was a rental, yes,
I had already moved into the place

on Bush Street on my own and had
to sell it. The parking tickets were
piling up, and, well, I was on my own,
and somehow between now and some

time soon I had to get some furniture.
“Huh?” I caught the slobber before it
dripped. There was a man at my win
dow. “Are you a detective?” “Uh, no.”

And then it dawned on me. I was getting
cruised just above the ruins of the Sutro Baths.

mmmmdcclxxxvi

The bland resolve

of taking a shower in
the middle of writing
a poem might be the
best description of

what is happening.
What is happening
to me?  People say
I’m dramatic, but I

can’t be sure if it’s
because I ham it up
on purpose or I’m
authentically so

reactionary.  What I’d
rather be is revolutionary.

mmmmdcclxxxv

Seagulls

I live by the ocean.  Not
directly on the beach or
anything, but within a few
short miles, maybe five.

This new apartment is the 

first place I’ve lived in 25 

years in which I actually 

use a heater on occasion. 

I'm not sure why I men

tion that part.  It is just a

thought that I had.  Some

thing to communicate.  This 

morning is quite the occasion. 

I can hear birds squawking 

in the distance, a whole lot
of them, and I hear tires

screeching.  Just the one
time.  But otherwise, it’s
quiet.  Okay, there’s an
occasional car passing

in front of my apart

ment building.  The

alley that i live next to,

you see, is a bit of a

sound trap.  I’m a block
from the mayor’s office,
so, on weekends especially,
there are these protests,

and some of them can

get pretty loud.  I hear
those; I don’t get out too
much.  Not like I used to.

And anyway, those birds,
they remind me of some
thing familiar, having grown 

up in a landlocked state in

the middle of a country—
where I was born, still call
home; well, I’m from there,
but now I’ve lived here more

than I lived there.  Same place,
in a way, same country.  But
now it’s just that I live by the
ocean.  In a city I truly love. 

With apologies to all of my 

family and to everyone with 

whom I spent my youth, I no 

longer like going back, really.  

Well, it’s more complicated than 

that.  Some things are.  Also, 

I’ve been through some tough

times here.  Many wonderful

times.  Mostly wonderful.  
But thanks to the not-so
great ones some occasion

al pangs get mixed in 

with the love and and the

happiness and contentment 

that I have about my city. 

Occasionally, when that 

bitterness, which never
takes me over, becomes 

just a bit of a burden, I’ll 

trek out to the beach, sit

on the sand, watch the 

waves roll in.  Like me, 

they’ve come quite a ways 

to get here. And I really 

appreciate them.  I like the 

roil and the spindrift-dark

ened beauty of it all.  It 

gets chilly there, most 

days.  I mean, I don’t go 

all that much.  But when

I’m there, I can just
watch it for hours, the

massive, magical, sinister, 

monstrous living thing
that is the ocean.  The
one that I’m pretty

much always aware of,
my bearings always so
dependent on the fact

of its existence in my

vicinity.  It’s there.  I’m 

here.  In a place where 

I’ve withstood a few not-

so-silly challenges just to 

remain.  I can’t imagine 

living without it.  My city,

and the ocean that it 

touches.  Yeah, that’s 

what I wanted to say,

that’s what those seagulls
are telling me to tell you:
how happy I am to be here.

mmmmdcclxxxiv

Color TV Fog

There’s a mild stroke
of rain in the forecast,
and we feel it now, but
it’s actually dense fog

splattering our faces
with miniature tears.
Would that we could
hop in a Jaguar and

speed down the Photo
grapher’s Highway into
the daffy future. But no,

I stick with my fantasy 

of lips kissed thoroughly 

and champagne bottles 

popping at the heat

stroke of midnight.

mmmmdcclxxxiii

I seem to be missing

everything.  The apartment is messy
and I’m afraid to look my paycheck
in the eye.  But what do we have
here?  I have received an email

from the attorney with the list of
necessary documents.  I call the
phone company and for some odd
reason I’m no longer on hold.  “Hello.”

“Did you receive last month’s bill?”  Oh,
how random we are not.  It’s the day
the television, the new one that just
arrived, spoke to my heart.  Or shot

a harpoon through it.  And the morning
after a friend called, deep into the night,
to ask a few questions about my current
goings-on.  Because friends care.  And

the night before last was part of the
weekend.  What is weekend?  Can
weak humans make good on such
promises?  Oh, look at the time!

mmmmdcclxxxii

ill-fated

it was meant to be.
people say this a lot,
and it has turned me
off, for as long as i can

remember, as an excuse
to live life lazy.  but today
i’m wondering exactly what
is meant when it is said.  it

seems to me that there are
at least a couple of unsatis
fying options.  the most
obvious, i suppose, would

have some grand plan laid
out somewhere out of our
reach that gives us each a
predisposed destiny.  yuck!

or it could be more of a
complex tautological shrug
of the shoulders, something
like a well, that happened, and

there’s no going back; it can’t be
changed, it is what it is, what’s done
is done, it was meant to be.  either
way, as far as i’m concerned, it’s a

pretty lame way to give up all
accountability and, furthermore,
if one were to believe such, why
set any goals at all?  when some

thing bad happens to me, first
i get all bent out of shape, sure.
but, and quickly, i go about moving
forward, learning from what happened,

readjusting whatever plans i have for
achieving whatever i want to get done
on this earth, how i’d like to be going
forward, and double down on getting

there the best way i can.  i guess
what i’m saying is that i don’t mind
being a sap so long as i’m not a lazy
sap.  i’m in as much control as is

humanly possible, or i damn well try
to be.  and when things go awry,
well, long story short, logic dictates 

that i remain as optimistic as possible, 

under whatever circumstances.

mmmmdcclxxxi

I slice my left arm

into his long tummy
and instantly his
fingers fork my dry
palm. Before that,

they (we) are as
if extensions of tor
nadoes off a pair of
Prozac prescriptions

spending tons of mon
ey on pyramid schemes.
Our thumbs interlock as
if in agreement upon these

new ground rules, and he
shudders swiftly to sleep.

mmmmdcclxxx

I wish that I were

purple tulips swaying
in the Dutch breeze
in such an expansive
field that the earth

was but a royal bruise.
Better still, I wish I were
tulips of fresh-petaled red
opening on a chilly morn

ing in the Himalayas, which,
it says right here, is from
where tulips originally came.
I’d pick just enough to make

a bouquet with no seeming
dent in the lushly blushing
garden and I’d walk them
over the mountains and

carry them with me on a
ship or else while riding a 

swift-moving water creature

all the way to wherever

you might be.  And even
if they’ve been long-wilted
and dispersed along the
mountain trails and into 

the billowing ocean, what 

ever their structure and 

state when I arrived at 

your doorstep I’d drop 

them all and give you 

the biggest kiss ever, 

regale you with the
wonders of my tulip

adventure, recount
the beauty of the
purple tulips of
Amsterdam and

the burgeoning
blood-red blooms
in the steeped
regions of Central

Asia, and we’d pour
ourselves some wine
and as the day grew
dim, I’d let you know,

as if all but nonchalantly
that I’d not be setting
foot out into the world,
no, never, not once again,

unless by chance you
were to accompany me.
And out we’d go to
wherever we’d go.

mmmmdcclxxix

More pleasantries

from the boyfriend of
the art intruder.  It was
behavior we normally
don’t tolerate.  I told

Roger that our glamping
trip was canceled.  He
didn’t immediately cry,
but I baked him a cob

bler for solace.  It’s so
difficult not to compl
etely smother yourself
within the arts when

there’s nothing else to
do.  Don called, then
brought over a bottle
of expensive champagne.