Booze Lens 


magical moments of
booze, of songs connected to moments
good and bad, and as the
bourbon flows, one bottle down two to
go, memories emerge from
the subconscious abyss, vivid as
if things happened this
morning, despite the years gone by - in the
inebriation you
discover the good, the bad, the
significant and the unimportant; through booze
lens you view the world
as it is, was, will
be, former relationships and friendships become
clear, real. blacking out is as close to
death as we’ll ever be, without the real deal, and it
contains the flash, life’s moments coming
back to life either to haunt or comfort you; drink
up, get acquainted with death so you
can conquer him come hangover.



Nagging 


“one of these days, you’re gonna
drink yourself to death,” Christine accused me. I
was nursing a bourbon-tequila hangover; had come
home from the bars with an empty
fifth in my
pocket, and some woman’s underwear. “you’re either gonna
die like Dylan Thomas or some whore’s boyfriend will
bludgeon you.”
from the couch, I could hardly open my eyelids, let alone
lift my head to face her. my tongue had turned into a
wet sock filled with ratshit and a construction crew had
invaded my
brain, trying, probably, to free the fucker from my skull.
“what did you do last night? who did you do?”
“didn’t do anyone,” I managed to mutter, but the words would
hardly be enunciated with no spit left in my mouth. “water,” I gasped.
“get it yourself,” she snapped, all too vindictive. after a minute, she
rolled her eyes and went to
the kitchen, to grab a bottle of
ice-cold water. I chugged it, finally my throat ceased to
mimic a desiccated wasteland, then my eyes
bulged. despite the throbbing pain in
my head, I dashed to
the bathroom and emptied my stomach’s content in the
toilet; perhaps, some pieces of intestine, too, some
red stuff floated down there.
“one day, you are gonna drink yourself to death,” she repeated when
I returned to the living room, and flung myself on the blue foldout couch.
“maybe, that’s the goal,” I replied, and stretched my arm to grab a
bottle of rotgut from my bookcase. “seriously?” she asked. “are you
gonna drink now?” “hair of the dog, baby. woof woof,” I chuckled, and it
almost sent me back to the toilet. “I don’t know why I’m
staying with you,” she said, with a solemn tone.
“perhaps, you love me,” I sniveled, after a hefty swig out of the bottle.
“maybe, you’re right,” she groaned. had I not
been hungover as fuck, I might have fathomed the significance of
her words. in the state I was in, I just shrugged it
off; never said it back. I just drank
her yammering away, then I had to drink her memory
away lest I drowned in regrets. booze still hasn’t
killed me; I’m doing my best to
prove her right.

Never More

Halloween, baby.
My chance to do my
Favorite Halloween
Impersonation.
I know it’s just a
Frenemy fabrication
But matching my
Drinking habits,
I really don’t mind
Doing Poe and being
Found drunk in a ditch.

The Oracle

I throw the coins
As per instructions
It’s my turn
In audience of
A serpentine face
Atop belly-dancer body
I ask the current
Woman I’m seeing
Is this the end
Or have we just met?
Just pay attention
To the Oracle, she says
The snake turns to an ox
To a tiger then a rooster
Quite effortlessly and
Without panoply
Hands on the table
Manipulating yarrow stalks
It’s quiet suddenly
Time for the Oracle
Time for four horsemen
For rabbit-footed swine
And rat-headed monkeys
Fu, she declares, Return;
The time of darkness is past
Thunder in the earth
Movement is spontaneous
No blame: this
Cerberus in sheepskin
Has spoken
In tongues of dragonfly
Okay, thanks for asking
I turn to my lover
I’m thinking maybe sushi
Order an Uber will ya?

Silence

Silence is growing
Amidst
Still landscapes
I'm still sharpening
My red knife of grimace
My bird flight
Across southern most
I'm learning how
When what is
My silence is growing
Amidst moisture and pain
With my marked
Signatures
Still landscapes
Evaporating it's promised gleam
The Sun finally shows
It's name today
Is Silence.

Until You Came Along

 
The unimaginable nothing, not the nothing I 
had, a nothing with breath, a door,
a sky, a four-door burgundy Highlander.
At a florist’s I wired roses for your birthday.

How enthralled I was seeing you
on a screen, our online time, face to face,
hearing you, touching.  My fingers lace
a plum corset with you in it—only virtual.

Buds opened on a table near your pipe
for weed. Till you came I lived. A battery
in my SUV, a winter road, gray skies.
Then, across a counter a florist swiped

my card. I tapped keys. You appeared,
my everything, not the nothing of the dead.

needles
 
my temporary
lapses
of sanity
are sparrows
flying into
barbed wire.

Apartment Complex

Some nights,
I sit outside
on my balcony
to smoke cigarettes
while the neighbors
scream at each other
and the drunks
stumble across
the parking lot.

It's as if none of us
around here
seem to care
that the world
is just passing by.

“Device of the Idol”

Endless choices that are no choice at all
Confound what is an inner spark conditioned to be passive,
To regard with a humbled posture one’s own vital force
And to give it up for the same tired plays, when
There is a voice we all share that cuts through the spectacle of validation
And finds a home in the human spirit.
Look for the same framing in these winding personalities
That we also must invent and abide by
Leading into a vacuum where data is our new feudal lord,
The goons of which beat the sane down in the streets,
And shackle all observers with anxiety.
For a sanity that could speak to the prisons we build in the name of growth and security
This ongoing noise as oppressively present as a pervasive silence.
The vortex of swirling influence runs contrary to my orientation to be free,
The same structure that brings one up on dazzling lies
Only to one day trademark their nausea.
Why would I scroll over to what’s more
When alternative programs lay like
A sweetly romantic couple
On the horizon. 

SHE LIKES A CERTAIN TYPE OF MAN

 
She likes a certain type of man.
A man who works with his hands.
A man who rides a Harley.
A man with a big broad back and hair covering most of his body.

She dresses very conservatively
And she used to like the shock when someone met her biker husband
Wearing his leathers and his pork chop sideburns.
She has no tattoos and only her ears are pierced.

She loves everything to be neat and tidy. She NEEDS order.
Her eyes tsk tsk a lot.
She lives in perpetual disappointment of others.
She had a crush on the man behind the deli counter.
She liked his big black mustache.

She divorced her biker husband
And now she’s dating a man named Angelo
Who’s a big Greek fella with long dark hair.
The smell of perspiration follows him
Wherever he goes.

She works with children but, outside of work, she is afraid of them.
She has no children. She has two small dogs. She doesn’t trust cats.
She used to read books but now she’s too tired all the time.
She lives alone and wants to be happy like that.

I used to love her a long, long time ago
When we were kids and she didn’t know as much about herself.