--not because I am faster than you

--not because I am faster than you,

but because these gloves

have signified change in weather

for countless seasons,

because the inches of snow

mean I claim the streets

again for myself,

because I know the morning's dark

and the night's dark,

and my senses are pushed to their limits,

because I will run in layers

or remove them as necessary,

weighed down or stripped to my skin,

because I know the taste of mud,

and woodchip, and pine, and sand,

the earth spits at me,

because I am of the first,

of the middle, and of the last,

know each and am known by each,

because I run splinted, bruised,

beat, and torn not for glory

but for devilish need,

because it is not glamorous and

I let it become too much

and I have lost some from it

who won't understand,

because I have gained others from it

who know too well, knowing me

as much as I know them,

because I have touched their palms

at ends of long toils, trails, and treks,

and forever am linked with them,

because each mile logged matches

one thousand unlogged

and they have both built me and broken me,

because my shoes and a watch follow me

where I go, a friendship unlike another,

because I have never looked the part,

too tall, too stiff, too slow,

because it keeps me up at night,

a loud, noisy, unrelenting lover,

because I have thrown up

and held my vomit in,

because a small beep can signify

death and failure and birth and success,

because I have been through countless batteries

but run on through them,

because of the recognition of the pack

and the shrug, the grunt, and the look,

because of sundays together,

alone in the woods,

because of adventure and being lost,

because of storm clouds and rain

that find me wet, waterlogged,

headed for home,

because of the time away,

angry and bitter, forced to heal,

missing every painful step,

because of a need to create,

compose, and leave an impression,

because of the small jog,

the satisfied shakedown with friends,

because of anticipation,

what makes our nerves stretch,

what reminds us to be good,

because of the crack,

the tense, terse, careful steps,

because of the elbows, the bumps,

the shoves and nudges for space,

because of all the spots,

the memories, the smells, the sounds,

because you beat me

over and over again,

because you believe that it even matters,

because you give up when you are tired,

sick, or slow,

because I am always tired,

sick, and slow,

because I am made and unmade,

because when it comes down to it,

when you are spent and I am spent,

I will beat you, but

not because I am faster than you--

she sat on the book--

she sat on the book

and covered its words,

passed a coffee

between her left and right hands,

switching between my left and right eye

while our neighbors stop with us

to listen and we don't care

because it's that real and that okay--

I feel in touch with humanity tonight,

without Walt's help for once,

since I never asked her to sit,

yet here we relate while it's cold outside

and the world files in to warm,

distracted by each other or happy to be alone,

seeking out the light, not pretending in either case--

my friend never showed,

but tonight, the night is so dark,

and we are drawn to all kinds of light,

making it okay to drift and be content in drifting--

the Homeric connection will bind us

and close the gaps of seas,

touch together banks of rivers,

old hounds again on the hunt,

fresh scents in their noses,

forever linked to one another

even when separated.

thanksgiving poem

the thought is not enough

when our ways have come undone

to act's a better way

to help the battle won

when you separate your self

from the very things you do

you are stuck with the results

your Creator hands to you

so please choose to act

even if it's very small

for an action past a thought

has the chance to help us all

fall meditation

I wrote it down,

but on the air,

I gasped and watched it go.

I left it there,

upon the air,

to hit another so.

And then a leaf

I slipped on said

its thanks for what I'd done.

I hurried on,

the leaf now gone,

with miles more to run.

sonnet

Gone a dozen ceaseless season

from our languid winter love,

leaving but forgotten treason

and new discovered distance of

emotion far from gentle flame

leaving the glow less gratifying

thus giving it a brand new name

and one much less satisfying.

Unknown to either side then

we could be so distant in heart,

for quick emotion back in time can

convince one season would not part.

Now snows but leave us to our sides,

apart, separate, until our paths collide.

bee sting

O, villainous, blackened bee

that didst send its force to sting me

upon the leg, just removed the knee!

Prithee, check thy conscience!

With mine anger, I doth too much tread

and I should but use pity in its stead

for it is I alive and this poor creature dead!

classroom observations

eager and erect, dumb,

poses assumed so as to grab

that which is strewn

about before them

by nodding, blinking slow,

smiling quick, grunting

often, not to stand out,

but be be hidden away,

frightened to not know,

hiding amongst others

who know not, and don't try to,

wanting to be present, counted only

as among those here,

as if saying, yes, I am here,

of course I know,

and give time, minutes,

and even more is sold still,

by way of postures slumping,

hunched, with faces expressing thoughts,

not possessing them,

writing, furiously,

writing that grunts

and thuds itself and only distracts,

writing without cease

which knows not why it writes

or of what is written,

but it is written, and it is thought,

I have it, at least,

accepted and taken with as truth--

but here I sit, pretending, too,

to give my attention, staring

instead at sets of legs, still paying

my due to the voice in front,

frantically annoyed,

modestly laughing,

mostly distracted, playing the same,

attempting to compose this thought,

considering them

amongst those of others

who mull me over, as I them,

thinking myself different,

them posing with thoughts,

but, myself with the same,

united in another thing, sharing

in another thought, all of us:

to leave! to be released!

let me go, on my own time, please!

Upon Completing A Fine Balance

I come to place my chair,

walking carefully, centering

with the sun amidst spears

of grass, dirt, and light buzzers;

balancing heat and thirst

with cool shade and liquid,

balancing this with thoughts,

words, pages, freakishly before me . . . 

"Birth and death-- what could be

more monstrous than that?"

Us, knit between;

going over the balance

I sweat, gorge liquid, overheat--

a victim of my elements,

or them my tools,

going over the options:

that it is all meaningless,

a quilt that has lost its pattern,

that it is maddening, and we know

we can not pick up each strand,

that we will fulfill its prophecy

avoiding or embracing this all along,

that we take all that we can

and sometimes actually give, too,

that we follow its commands,

ashamed, wishing we hadn't,

that it embarrasses us with a mirror

showing us poor and disgusting,

that we roll through it, brandishing

our hideous features, laughing,

that it is controlled by us, so that we believe

we made the right choices,

that we exist independent from it, only

leaving ourselves alone with memories,

that we fix it, and clash

to sort it all out and are killed for it,

that it frightens us and we are terrified,

wanting to snip bits out of it,

that we accept it and move on,

with a half-smile, scarred from it,

that we balance it amongst things

falling apart, centers not holding,

wavering, staggering, thinking,

concluding . . .  almost arriving,

"the circle completes itself"--

I stretch my legs further, extending

to wipe my feet on a patch of green

moss, fabric-soft, inviting and comforting,

my skin burning above it; leaning back

to shut my eyes, forgetting stinging

bugs by remaining stilled and calmed;

should I rest here? or retreat,

cooling myself off.

red skin, burnt--

red skin, burnt,

dead, and dying still--

calloused, hard,

rough, and stronger yet--

tomorrow,

with new layers,

I'll walk and be burnt,

but slowly grow accustomed

that it may feel less bad,

less bad.

I leave this chair on my porch--

I leave this chair on my porch

as proof of life, that this spot is lived on;

that here I watch, hear and read,

smile to the streets or think

while storms rolling in hard

never quite reach where I sit,

question grass length and cardinal color,

speculate on my neighbors,

their noisy, happy children,

laugh and am made mad

above books and pages,

and watch for the gesture

of a passerby in motion

as I lift my head and nod;

my legs crossed or not, I am content,

in comfort or not, I am content

to let the dirt and pollen stain my feet,

to let tiny bugs crawl and faucets to drip,

and as petals amass I'll not sweep them off,

as this spot is lived on and it is there

I must leave my chair, perched,

leaning comfortably, bent and prepared.

bedroom (re-thought)

who is in this bed?

and who are they with?

(if with anyone at all)

and what is the dream?

and is it good or bad?

and why do they dream?

is this screen a television?

or is it the mind's eye?

and what's on this screen?

and why does it flicker?

who is "he"?

and is "he" alone?

or is it "her" alone?

or are they both alone?

why does he shut the door?

and does he close it?

or does he slam it?

(if there's a difference)

and does he shut himself out?

or does he shut himself in?

and why is it written?

and why is it thought?

and why does it ask?

and why does it beg?

and why is it sad?

and why is it short?

meditation #6 (driving)

as speeding by you pass,

i hope you consider why it is

you jam so hard the gas,

and question in your head the need

for such a silly, unnecessary,

inordinate level of speed.

meditation #5 (bedroom)

nestled in bed,

adrift in dream--

a flickering screen--

he shuts the door

to her room.

meditation #4 (librarian)

out of touch,

style--

old, awkward,

embarrassing--

nervous, quite

depressing--

hand-wringing

and dead--

watching her drown,

and drowning myself.

meditation #3 (fog)

deep air folding,

resting on mats,

electric green--

mirrored, black puddles,

scratched gravel bumps--

neon, flashing scene.

meditation #2 (garden party)

silver trees

and beer--

branches

in the sky--

my head

swimming

with yours.

meditation #1 (zen)

to smash

two bells--

to dream

without sleep--

walking below

the earth.

trio

"every dog deserves

a second chance at life,"

whipped with chains, set aflame;

changed, to believe

that it deserves

to live behind bars;

beat up meat,

tears, bleeding,

and having others bleed.

for charlie

she didn't cry

but i did almost

explaining what i did

changing my life

with him dead

///

driving down the road

manic from no sleep

wanting to be manic

with no sleep

writing poems

and writing this poem

round--

round,

quiet,

swelled,

sketched,

brown

and grey,

blended,

short,

imperfect.

Roll Call

Thank you, "Paul's Boutique"... for bus rides, bad dubs, and rap music.

Thank you, "Personal Journals"... for AM rush hours, rt. 110, and drive-thrus.

Thank you, "40oz to Freedom"... for bicycles, hormones, and swimming pools.

Thank you, "Reflection Eternal"... for 9/11, rides home, and relaxation.

Thank you, "Food & Liquor"... for cigarette smoke, rhode island, and trips north.

Thank you, "Abbey Road"... for minivans, mono-stereo, and silver cans.

Thank you, "Beats, Rhymes, & Life"... for smokestacks, theses, and dusk.

Thank you, "Smiley Smile/ Wild Honey"... for soft light, pet fish, and red wine.

Thank you, "The Bends"... for tears, basements, and brown liquor.

Thank you, "I'll Sleep When You're Dead"... for the cold, the night, and the green.

Thank you, "Donuts"... for being alone, being together, and djs.

Thank you, "Brazilian Girls"... for bottled water, conversation, and empathy.

Thank you, "Grassoots"... for lyrics, cassette tapes, and youth.

Thank you, "Live at Stubb's"... for backseats, house parties, and altoid tins.

Thank you, "High Water"... for poetry, repeat, and learning to be creative.

Thank you, "E&A"... for queens, small rooms, and Alaskans.

Thank you, "Ironman"... for shit talking, high school, and endless records.

Thank you, "Waiting for the Sun"... for new friends, wax, and blue sunsets.

Thank you, "Bazooka Tooth"... for trips home, trips back, and instant connections.

Thank you, "Get Lifted"... for summer, backyards, and jungle fever.

Thank you, "The Taste of Rain, Why Kneel?"... for sunrise, blueberries, and westhampton.

Thank you, "Elephant"... for beer challenges, snowfall, and a long walk.

Thank you, "Dark Side of the Moon"... for jeeps, air drums, and oakdale.

Thank you, "Okeeblow"... for struggles, driveways, and suggestions.

Thank you, "Forever"... for ciphers, maximas, and skateboards.

Thank you, "Illinoise"... for a bus, a train, and a performance with wings.

Thank you, "No Music"... for headphones, silence, and downtown manhattan.

Thank you... i'll always remember you... but more importantly, where i was with you.

Ithaca, again

Odysseus looked for you.

He was lost trying to find you;

Kissed the girls on his way,

Then lost it, blown off,

He stabbed the man in his eye--

For you, I can't imagine why.

Are you supposed to be

The city we all look for,

But never really find?

He should thank the wind,

I think, the island is not my kind.

"Do you dwell in shining Ithaca,"

The name of the straight, just, and true?

No, but I saw them down in Ithaca, 

Drunk, high, and in the lips all colored blue.

"Ithaca, you were--"

Ithaca, you were brown and grey.

Ithaca, you covered me in clouds, snow, and rain-- you showed the sun only once, tempting me.

Ithaca, you were further away than I thought.

Ithaca, how long is Rt. 79?

Ithaca, your skunks smell like skunks-- I fear there is one trapped under this car.

Ithaca, are your bars open?

Ithaca, do people really use the tractor crossing?-- if I'm going to cross in my tractor, does it have to be here?

Ithaca, your room is small, it smells, and my view is of the road formerly known as Western.

Ithaca, stock the fridge.

Ithaca, you let me walk, but you should have said where.

Ithaca, you wanted to show me something-- I said 'yes' then 'no' and left. What was it you were going to pull out of your trousers to show me, Ithaca?

Ithaca, you got me beerdrunk and lovesick and left me here to fend for myself and rot.

Ithaca, these aren't hipsters, these are hippies.

Ithaca, when do your bars close?

Ithaca, you stock your shelves with college teens and local filth-- I don't know which is worse.

Ithaca, they wear the same clothes.

Ithaca, I ate your food and I paid for it.

Ithaca, call my wife and tell her I am watching your televisions.

Ithaca, I don't remember your walk home. Did you walk me back?

Ithaca, your gorges aren't gorgeous-- I watch as people hurl themselves off your edges.

Ithaca, your bananas aren't ripe.

Ithaca, you made a girl cry-- this is the worst thing you did. And this after she showed you such kindness, such concern. It is this I can't forgive, Ithaca. Did you see her face? She tried not to cry. I saw it.

Ithaca, I sat there explaining it to them but you made it so hard to understand.

Ithaca, you were cruel.

Ithaca, I'm not drinking anymore fluids-- not so long as you're around.

Ithaca, your fog rolled in.

Ithaca, I get it now.

Ithaca, you fought to keep me.

Ithaca, my windshield was dirty-- I cleaned it.

Ithaca, how long is Rt. 79?

Ithaca, I slowed, I followed, you fought.

Ithaca, you taught me a black lesson-- I'm staying away from you, vowing to never speak to you again.

Ithaca, is this the reputation you want?

Ithaca, is it just me?

pacings

colored blue from tops to toes
aided by 4, 5, 6, 7 beer bottles.

ack, turn the television back on
to that station with the listings.

calling and calling on you to talk
but it seems you're away today.

i'll go to bed early but only stare
at my ceiling, likely sweating.

these are the product of severe
pacings up and down my walls.

i am detached and angry and
sore and stupid and worried.

series of college haiku

sing, o, brown bottle!
of the beer that awaits me,
of good times ahead.


refrigerator,
hold your ice away from me.
keep you cold, not me.


something worth writing
isn't anything at all--
it's all in your head.


hi, brown typewriter.
sit with your ink-strip waiting.
i'm almost ready.


darkness is outside
just beyond your window-pane.
let it creep inside.


hating this classroom
is about all i can do
unless i just leave.


ginsberg told the truth.
the man IS america,
but aren't we all?


perfect squares are dull.
numbers have become old dogs.
words can save us all.


a study in queens,
informal, scientific,
of how the wind blows.


a puddle of strings
sprinkled by piano keys
drooping from a cloud.


i'm in the shower
getting shampoo in my eyes
and rinsing it out.

"It's an incomprehensible hate--"

It's an incomprehensible hate,
the kind that lies in wait
against the face that is true in its
patience to follow the rules to their fate,

when the face in question shows
a bold, unchecked mask of cold
portraying its honest vice against
that face that doesn't comprehend, is bold.

One cannot perceive the next
and when the card turns, one is vexed
for the true is known only to the false
leaving this one turned, scorned, and checked,

left in a world but to flop and reel
thinking, "Unfair! Only I can feel
the long strand of burning pain brandished
against my face like, from a flame, a blade of steel."

All Points East

"Sorry for the delay,
West Hampton will be next,"
said the bending tips
of grass pointed East

curved into C's shielding
the bare grey branches
stretching in the same
direction but screaming much more

about it. The shucked corn
stalks snapped in half
ashamed beside fields
of grapes purple with stone

shops attached and it pushes
toward Speonk, Amagansett,
South Hampton, East Hampton, as
"directions West" are gone and

we roll toward "all points East."

The Gift (first draft)

In the days since she ended their relationship, she had time to think rationally about things. She deserved better than he gave her. She had known this all along, but was resigned to actually live it, and all that went along with it, now.

The stupid boy, she would think. The little piss didn’t know what he had. Her range of emotions shifted back and forth from rage to sadness to guilt to depression. But, with time, a steady rift of vengeance began to cut into her.

She thought of all the wasted time. She stopped thinking of the sporadic romanticism peaked amongst valleys of complacency and shrugged togetherness. She ignored and forgot the occasional orgasm he delivered her amidst cold periods of celibacy and teenage awkwardness, their bodies slapping together in the absence of rhythm.

He had broken up with her twice. Crushed her spirit and walked away on two separate occasions over their nine months. Each of these two breakups ended with the two clutched in teary embrace mere hours from the respective incidents. They kissed each other back into their lives. On neither occasion could he really walk away. He was too scared to be alone and since she was too, she always took him back.

It wasn’t that she didn’t want him. She did. She just wanted a version of him that he wasn’t quite capable of being. He, on the other hand, didn’t really want her at all. He just wanted anything and was always frightened that he had to jump on the first opportunity presented to him for lack of chances.

She thought about these two times, each of the times she took him back after he walked out on her. Both times were in her apartment and both times she believed that this time was for real. That this time he changed, realized his mistakes, gained some sense, and would make it work.
But it was she who gained sense when she finally got rid of him, shut her phone off, and stopped speaking to him for twelve consecutive days, the twelve days before Christmas.

There was no more sadness. No more longing, except maybe for the orgasms, and only a shy, dull sense of pity for the “little piss” she let fuck with her life for nine months too long.

* * *

She walked out of the bright winter sun smiling as she began to dart through the aisles. She met the eyes of the shop owner on her walk in, a small, friendly, grey-haired, gentle spirit-of-a-woman. The two shared an instant cross-generational connection often linked between similar beings of the same sex. Their years separated them, but their sex and all its harrowing connected them.

The woman behind the counter swept up and fooled with the register in a passive way that only half-hid the fact that she was watching our girl with interest. She found her aisle easily, all the while with her smile fixed in place, pleased both with her actions and the beneficent presence of the elderly spirit guarding the store.

The woman reminded her of someone. Neither of her grandmothers seemed to fit, but something felt familiar about her. She admired the old woman’s cardigan and the sign hanging behind the register that read “Grandmothers are antique versions of little girls.”

After paying for her prize and walking out, our girl continued to smile and could even be heard to whistle as she swerved through the decorated streets, a behavior which she, on almost any other occasion, would deem dreadful.

* * *

“Hello!”

“Hey-Hey!” he shouted back. He could barely hear her over the sound of the music and conversation. And his greeting, which sounded more for a friend than a lover, was the product of too much booze.

“We just landed. Where are you?” She asked him this without a puzzling tone, but with an expectant one. She wanted to know where he was so that she could see him as soon as possible.

“Over at Randy’s. How was the flight? You get in okay?” He half-listened for a response and half-searched through the back of the fridge for another cold beer.

“Oh, you know, we got in okay. My sister is here to pick us up, thank god, but I wish it could have been you.”

To this he responded only with a loud yell then “Sorry, the Yanks just scored.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah, I’m glad she made it in there for you. That was real nice of her. Randy’s is a lot of fun right now. You should definitely come by here.”

It wasn’t that his invite wasn’t genuine but she had told him repeatedly how out of it she would be when she got in. He must have known that she wouldn’t want to come. Having been traveling all day, she just wanted to drop her bags on her cozy apartment’s floor and relax.

“Well, couldn’t you come out to me? I really want to see you. I’d thought you’d come to me tonight.”

“I’m already over here, though,” he said. “And I’ve been drinking, so I can’t drive out to you. I’m pretty drunk.”

The unbelievable asshole.

“Oh, okay. Have fun, I guess.”

She hung up which caught him off guard but didn’t really surprise him. And though she didn’t want to, she texted his phone five minutes later, not even out of the airport parking lot yet.

“Aren’t you even excited to see me?” Send.

“What do you mean?” Send.

The unbelievable asshole.

Once home, she dropped her bags on her cozy apartment floor and relaxed just like she had wanted to after all the travel. But she didn’t get to see him like she wanted to. Later that night, she cried in bed. He passed out at Randy’s and spent the night on the couch, still trying to decode her text.

* * *

She made her way up his shoveled sidewalk. She negotiated the ice, laughing at the thought of him rushing out of his parents’ house one day, slipping, and landing on his skinny ass. Then she smiled thinking of the old woman and her cardigan and also in anticipation of what she was about to do. She smiled, but she didn’t look happy as much as she looked 100% pleased.

She knocked on his side entrance, hoping he’d answer so she didn’t have to go through the front and deal with his parents and baby brothers. For, as much as she was filled with the spirit to strike out with revenge upon the boyish heart of her ex-lover, she had to admit that she got along well with his mother and that she absolutely adored his two brothers, one two-years-old and the other four-years-old. Seeing any of them would alter her mood too much.

All conflict avoided, he answered the door. He was pleased to see her, it was clear. Her twelve-day-refusal of all his phone-calls and text-messages ate at him, for it shut him off completely from any shot at a getting-back-together-again. But this, her showing up in the cocoon of dripping icicles that was his doorway, his own personal entrance to the side of his parents’ home, on Christmas day no less, filled him with hopeful expectancy. Which was exactly what she wanted.

She played nice, knowing this was crucial to her gaining the entrance needed to carry out her plan. He saw that she had a gift with her and his eyes revealed how truly giddy this made him, but she remained calm.

As she walked further into his space, sifting through piles of crumpled wrapping paper and empty boxes left near the door, she said, both energetically and false-cheerily, “I got you a gift!”

His eyes sold him out now. They screamed “Hooray!” while his mouth said “Oh, and I didn’t even get you anything!” It was going perfectly.

She was half-hiding it. It was impossible to completely hide it, for how could one completely hide a fish bowl filled with water and a fish, but she did the best she could to maintain the illusion. So, she half-hid the gift off to the left side of her body, near her ass, cocked to the side.

She fought hard to maintain her performance, for she wanted everything to play out as she saw it run through in her mind. She kept an even smile, resisting the urge to laugh in his face with a triumphant “Ta! Ha! Asshole!” But the illusion was maintained and despite her outward sentiment of ladylike demure, inwardly she was absolutely delighted, enjoying every second of the experience.

Once she had backed him into the room enough and they had settled near the couch, she, carefully, handed him his gift. His excitement could hardly be contained as her couldn’t either. Hers was a different kind, and so she began to unwrap the gift herself. Like a chef cutting into her own broil, she unwrapped the paper around the bowl with a maniacal satisfaction.

She was unwrapping his gift and the situation was perfect for each. Neither would have changed a thing. And finally, she handed it to him, water sloshing, goldfish smiling.

“It’s a goldfish,” she said, adding “you’ll have to take care of it. That,” she said, already turning to leave, “or kill it.”

He stared, blinking into the water, the goldfish circling in its bowl. Then, he looked up, catching a glimpse of her back before the door slammed shut. He didn’t see her face as she left, but if he did, he would have seen the same smile that she worse in the pet store earlier that day.

“Merry Christmas!” he heard her yell to a neighbor de-icing his car. And she whistled down the street.

"all the things I've done," he said.

a gigantic mess
of white,
two of them,
and one of
the brightest blue
covered with sand
with no home,
no real one, and
many brothers
but no real ones,
and a mess of traffic
tickets shoved
into a glove compartment
which he does not have.
warrants,
outlaw, vagrant,
but no identity.
a drug binge, one long one,
one long run, first
a month, then a year,
then five and counting,
and a big brown beard
juxtaposed
with a big grey
beard and I have
a mix of pity and of sadness
and of embarassment
thinking somehow
of him and not of
myself until my wrist
is grabbed and it is
made clear: my chronic
error, fatal flaw--
"all the things
I've done," he said,
"haven't been so
hard at all."

of late i press the gas--

of late i press the gas
only so far as i need
to go, crawling along
with the pavement
with a strong sense
of destination but a
relaxed sense of arrival
with blinking lights
around me and my hub
safe and propelled by
the music and not
the other way around
and as i haven't much
time of late to create
i revel in each inch
of road passed over
taking this pace as
a gift and a splendid
delight worth sharing
with hundreds of motorists
on a daily basis