poems 2006

This fuckign machine

keeps slowing me

this religion

keeps my head busy

this lady

keeps the rest

in/action

an im getting sick

hallowed

losing me

i got echoes

scraps of papers

and memories of san francisco

everydaying it out

the great ham n egger

the grand could have been

the The

END

or maybe just frustrated

but then again

arent we all

lost to train wrecks

car crashes

an whatever takes our mind

from where we stopped

isnt that why they called it

a settlement

an i never concluded

all this talent

would have me poor

part time

on christmas eve

bickering with my new wife

over

partying

but most terrible people

hate when they see

reflections of

themselves

rubbed off on loved ones

2

brother gone

to idaho woods

an snow plain risk it alls

volvoing

while joe nobody

got warm coffee

an enough room on his lap

for all his children

an lips ready

for dull wifey

its raining today

3

leave the good times

to the young

i get headaches

an sometimes vomit

let them

dance the night away

my hips an knees cant take it

is that salt

an candy

get it away

hope some filtered

water

im almost thirty

an health is it at a priority

if im gonna make a

good retirement

plan

an afford

the rv

or trips

well decay

on

pucker lipping

an ahh nicing

picture

postcards

to grand children

or first children

along with just a big enough

check

to get a response

4

where are the long

cadillacs

with fire

burning

like the nose

of appoclypse's horse

wheres the

fat belly bottles

of carlos rosi

my eyes did seen

but whose got

time for adventure

when theres christ

an leaves to rake

5

bukowski was wrong

shakespere

did most what

everybody else does

we all gotta make a living

an we all gotta struggle

if we gonna make ourselves

too

the gutters been

home to everybody

but the birthrite

so fuck paris hilton

an her phony dirt

covered chanel skirt

its not a real

adventure

if theres no question

about how to

dodge the bill

6

even now

at a most certain plateau

i can see the elevation

rise

an know there is

always more to come

7

shes a real beauty

like a showered lunatic

with a fake diamond

ring

hollering one thing

an doing the other

shes an angel

smashing lamps

and

using a dust pan

to pick it up

sometimes causing her

fingers to bleed

shes real pure

rubbing her sex

an shaking her sex

an moving her sex

across the stomach of

hungry men

while asking about her

husband

claiming drunk

but i dont think

a women ever gets

anything

off anything

an its all an act

but we make a real smart

team

if i can keep my

mouth shut

an stay firm

in my absence

from her

madness

as darling as they are

woman are only after breaking things

now how would that help me?

8

ill go to church

to stand stoic

an concerned

consternated

then off to feed the hobos

for some pentenance

though nobody helped

me

an i made it through

but

to be honest

that was before i

was baptised

an more was

expected from me

so we'll goodwill it out

an then

maybe afterwards

ill come home

an fuck her asshole

yesterday

i get rather
furious
about the things
i wreckingballed
i am no good
at everymanning
whistle necktieing
life away
with credit cards
an spec home
suv
drive to
the local stuff your face
to dim candle look
at this womans face
whom i married
to share
cable vision
an increasing girth
with
i am uncomfortable
in that lavish
successful
lifestyle
employing it out

today

ive taken up painting
an writting software
going on job interviews
finding ways to blow them
entertainment
you
know
theres miles
of life ahead
my guts hurt
so's it feels like a
heart attack
better things arrive
miss my friends...
i need to get famous fast
this workaday doom
dont suit me
on my wedding day
i want to kiss her
with substance
an fury
of a man on fire
irreplaceable
in the pantheon of
american literature
with a life of better
fr newborn babies
an we river run it out
to ocean heaven
not damned up
in spec house
communities
getting numb
an heavy about the waist
as
innocents die a world
away
i talk invoices
or pizza toppings
bless them

she leaves

i miss tonight.
im gonna lose my
heart
for a few days
sleepless nights
but i got a plan
im gonna visit graveyards
an leave fresh flowers
find old ladies to treat for
breakfast
ride
atop retired horses
scream
they
aint lost
their speed
im gonna dream
an write long stories to nowhere
for free
im gonna visit our new home
curse the sun for not
going to bed sooner
understand the unbearable length
of an hour or a day
work
keep myself busy
do pushups
pal with naif
eat mary's cooking
gonna find myself
lonely
an all over the place
but clean
fr her thursday
arrival
gonna
hold on then
an kiss
an whisper
an hold tight
understand
it's real hard some lives
to let go
i'll miss you heart
when yr beating some hundreds
miles away
man
i
love
this
woman
god, please...
home to me
amen.

prayer

in san francisco
i prayed
through all nite drunks
that took me to
midnight drugs
near gasoline alley
or kerouac lane
i prayed
before busses
with dirty knees
in the gutter mop hair
sweat slick
from leaving
her warm belly pillow
i prayed
pre dawn
in golden gate park
with red nose an eyes
to the hum
of the bums
freightrain dreams
with street light
camp fires
an empty carlos rossi bottles
in san francisco
where i talked tolstoy
an wore an old slouch hat
i prayed
to the mooing ships
of the bay
to the ricochet firework towers
of economics an glass
i prayed
to mercy
to end of hunger pangs
to end of hardwood mattress
to strength
an the author's vision
i prayed
innocent an on fire
i prayed
in the city with shadows
longer than the shadow of death
i prayed
an witnessed silence
an more hunger
an more hardwoods
until
forty days later
a box arrived
from portland oregon
containing a sleeping
bag
an eight pounds of trail mix
thirty dollars cash
an a note from home
saying
'your father'
an
i knew god was good
now
tonight
i begin again
in prayer
tomorrow
ill start watching fr
signs
amen

i done hard times, in west ohio
thinking of my better half, to my life...
when that train blows, out my window
tells me cant keep wasting precious time...
so i sold my goat, an i hit the road
with john rudd by my side...
an it took the grains, to ease the pain
so we hard drunk it out my mind...
then we found a stage, where they let us play
standard country tunes to pass their lives...
men in white hats held women in whites hats
spinning in circle squares feeling alive...
then another stage, an another cage
we'd get paid to play an survived...
so i look back, from my ohio shack
an wonder which stop got my life...
i done hard times, in west ohio
watching the sun set on the tide...

ast sunday
visions from jesus
(during communion
when denied
food an drink)
i starved
a sinner
in the desert
of pews an stern
sing alongs
dreaming of sustenance
only to find
most oasis'
are illusions

while

my favorite sneakers
clothes
gained ripped holes
stigmata?
i pray for my work gloves
an favorite long sleeve shirt.

winters coming

be too cold to bury them
an hope
for easter revival

in conclusion

when i had denied
the devil
an returned from my seclusion
we ate american gut busters
i remember most men
from the desert got
deep faces
like wise old babies
good people ...
i appreciate their friendship
an fear their hearts break
as israel bombs away

the morning

i sit
in the grass
watching grasshoppers
when you
abuse yrself
over questioned
faith
but darling
god is good
lets get a gyro
theres no conversation
in these bugs
this sunshine day

i go mad
writ books an stories
met demons
an devils
an angels alike
yr all a motherfuck
self centered
an willing to abuse
willing to wail
of yr better
things judgements an opinons
well motherfuck
we die
an rot
an fade
no matter
yr check size
or pulitzer prize
an if you look close enough
darlings
wont you see
whose the hero here?
it dont get easier
in the graveyard
ghosts
but i got god
to listen too


II
i gave a
child
an
my dogs away
so now
tell me about
the
hard times
honey

today

sometimes things
are a motherfucker
an then that
same day
you could water yr lawn
an watch the rainbow
in it's spray
thinking
'there's gold buried everywhere'
god is good.

to pete and diesel

may god keep
an protect you
warm yr hearts
fr i always am
thinking of you

story draft

1

Liam McPherson is a cannonball of a man, in his mid fifties. He is a man with a wife, Rue, that had prodcued a family. DUring their thirty two years together, their marriage has provided them with two sons and a daughter. This marriage has also produced, for them, a house on the hill and a prodigious income from rental properties and the Landscaping business.
Liam Mcpherson spends his afternoons dreaming of Scotland while his giant weathered hands work the metal hoe, the dirt shovel and spraying hose across his garden. He is a man that protects, he is a man with khaki pants and shirts with ties. Liam is a man with glasses and a recognizably fine moustache. This man, is not only the protector of Savanna McPherson (who just happens to be the love of the life of our hero William Bruce, more on this later) but also the villian of this story.
THis is a man, with his loving wife, atop the moutain working his garden who felt the cool breeze of encroaching danger before the rest. Yes, moustache or not he could sniff out the danger before the birds and/or squirrels took flight and this day, this 10th of December in the 2005th year of our Lord, Liam's moustache could not warm the trembling lip as the sapphire sky became blotted with one single white cloud.
When a man of true grit and character hears the steps of the Devil, on the wood floor of his heart, he naturally drops the work at hand to find a woman to yell at. This was the action Liam was compelled to take. He moved his squat powered body through the concrete steps up the concrete drive onto the light hardwood floor and descended, like an eagle, upon Savanna his daughter of 30 years.
'What are your plans?' said he.
Savanna she of fine auburn hair and emerald green eyes was delightfully scooping a lump of peanut butter past her perfectly preportioned, soft and plum colored lips when he appeared. The television, which had been espousing the philosophy of what you ought not wear with some vigor, now fell nervously silent.
'What do you mean?' said she.
He rubbed his deep set eyes causing the glasses to weave like a ship on troubled waters atop his bald head top. There was a slight scratching noise, that permeated the silence as the glasses arms slid across his perfectly kempt peppered sides of hair. He was as if a monk in civilian clothes, deep stomach from a life time of good meals stretched the fabric with the face of a concerened friend. As his eyes were closed and his lip trembeled from the cold the moustache stood at attention and the belly button kept its penetrating gaze on her waiting for some sign of whats to come.
'Do you have plans, today?' said he. As that single cloud slid slowly across the sun and its shade made the sign of a axe handle moustache or a gallow across the floor of this living room.
Savanna placed the spoon from her perfect mouth, out of her perfectly sized and manicured fingers atop the penaut butter jar. She could run the house on the solar power of her beauty. She was hour glassed in figure, athletic but not overly muscled, soft in the right places. Her smile had once won a spelling bee when there were just two left and the dictionary exhausted. She was a woman who prayed, she was a a woman who danced. She was a woman, kind and loving. She not was but is alive and staring at her father crumbling under the fear of whats to come.
With her peanut butter hand free she took her fathers weathered paw, rubbing half circles with her thumb. He ceased rubbing his temple and tried to battle the smile that crept from the warmth that filled his heart whenever his daughter was around.
Like most father's the relationship they have with their daughters is the closest example of how they would treat all woman if it weren't for the fear they could be abandoned or ridiculed. Like most father and daughter relations they are not just examples but proofs that God exists and loves with a mighty fury.
Savanna rubs his mitt and stares the tremble away from his lip, causing the moustache to fall from attention and the belly button eye to blink. She purses her lips then turns to a smile before saying the words that would forever crush the heart of all fatherkind.
'I don't have plans today, but tomorrow I am meeting a man for coffee...'
The rest fell on deaf ears as a blinding light seized the heart of Liam McPherson causing him not only to descend upon a nearby recliner but to be overtaken by the need for a nap. He did not faint! Just rested his eyes for a bit, and the warm rag that he found on his head, when his eyes were fully rested a few hours later, was only because of a recent chill that had been sent through the house and could have effected his constitution through the bare peak of his head.









2
The man that had caused our villian's eyes to rest was none other than William Bruce. Admire him!
He appears in the morning outstretched on a mattress bathed in morning's glory with his two dogs Walter and Stevens curled between legs and near face. Oh, these three of slow walks in the brisk air to stretch the legs and exhaust the digestive systems, lived in the center of the cities affluence district. They only observed the finest of foods and thus William's clothes were worn and stained by only the finest of sauces and weatherings.
Besides these grand two fellows, chihuahuas, that resided and kept him company, William was a man apart, a man alone, a man without qualities. For if it wasn't dependant or nailed down it had picked up and abandoned him during his seven year stretch with a great vacuum of a woman (but that is another story).
William Bruce of heroic athletic conquests of effervescent personality, unmatched popularity and the adoration of women everywhere had not aged gracefully. So that found seven years later, in a one bedroom apartment bathed in light, his pouch stomach and unshaven chin gave the appearance of a man cast away.
Our hero spent most days either delivering mail for the US Postal Servivce, our wandering to the pub for the one dollar happy hour beers. Our hero spent his days walking with his confidants Walter and Stevens through the tree lined streets, near his home, as each stared wantingly into the eyes of passing females. William would drink red wine and with their excited barkings he would recite long poems of woe and abandonment. He espoused, to them, that better days would be coming, and that they were living at 101 Rock Bottom Lane.
Walter and Stevens, hero's in their own right and of the same vein of L. Zepplin, would wag their tails and leap about towards the idea of better days. Of warm meals and two laps to lay upon. Secretly they whined at night during sleep the happy whines and leg kicks of the future that was almost in their grasp.
William slept and dreamt of Superman III and how one must fight oneself for balance. William dreamt of He-Man and the agony of Prince Adam, but the belief he maintained and courage enough to hold that sword aloft, saying, 'I have the power!'. At this William kicked his own leg, said his own whine of excitement, for one day he would hold that sword again, for one day he would alight the halls with the volume of his personality again, for one day his voice would tremor across the land reverberating through the meadows caves and valleys and they would know, WIlliam, once again had the power!
Admire them!

the moustache

Admire him!
He got flushed cheeks from fatty foods
and a bad case of the gout
once pout now tear drip
that barrel chest gut
feet dug in
stands against shadows
of hate
an absence
everybody got evolution
an everbody got busy
an aint
got no time to listen to
all this
lip smacking
sick belly burping
lemme rub yr
head fr good luck
lemme spit shine
the old bald eagle
put them claws to
good use
an wrap us up in a hug
before yr long ship
takes you off
on yr long trip
an we relegate you
to memory.

In the beginning