A Few Poems
Rock is Dead
I was, or should I say me and my band were finishing up a Thursday night residency at Lester’s Lounge, which is kind of a misnomer because the place is a real dive, though it gave me some pocket change to get through the spring, and I’ve about hit the halfway point in my act when the yokels start chanting boooooo, and I respond Quiet, or I’ll cut short the denouement, although they probably don’t know what the word means and anyway I’m busy noodling through an extended jam cover of “Paperhouse” by Can, which if you recall is the opening track on their classic Tago Mago LP, hell, I told Lester we were a Kraut Rock tribute band since my grandfather was in the Hitler Youth with Pope what’s-his-name, and was always playing this sort of oompah music on his phonograph which might explain why I dig the motorik shit, but I’m trying to get into the Damo Suzuki finish when I hear a beer bottle whizzing past my right ear and I’m like, damn I’m taking fire, but the next thing I know I must have been hit because I’m in this hospital room with only my guitar and some German House music pumping out the walls, so I run, run, run until I make it back to Lester’s to get my cash but I must have been out a long time cause the place is demolished and they’ve built an abandoned warehouse over it for their little techno parties, kind of like how all the Hard Rock Cafes have converted to Happy Hardcore Cafes and the people I see move with such efficiency I think they might be robots (or Germans) and this, maybe, the future.
(originally published in 580 Split in 2009. Access here.)
A Member Of a Family Leaves Home (The Hero is Introduced)
Decalcomania gets the first word.
Skylight peppered with paper mandalas.
Sky for shooting skeet or shoeing horses.
Light projecting ugly yonder barn.
Hero takes stock, slice of windowsill pie
cooling cloud-level ‘top the rusty slats:
owls bats
skim-calves (ducks)
chicks w/ dicks “scum pond”
piggy rabbi
cats
rats
worms, worms, worms
Periplus gone to rue.
My kingdom for
A. Hero laps what seen. Loves. Sticks farm another spell.
B. Hero out.
But
But
But Hero’s stupid indecisive. Couldn’t pick
his sign out the sidereal lineup, let alone to be
or not adventure us. Removed from questions of
audience, wax edging the cotton swabbed decks,
Hero proves anally fruity. Pushes the needle
to a vein of 7-inch vinyl. It’s A Greek Chorus Line
and it feels, more or less, like Christmas.
(originally published in wheelhouse magazine in 2009. Access here.)
from tucson, not quite a view of iceland in vespertine
i've spent the day up
to my shanks in papier mâché.
valentine's work. glue fumes
vault me sky as venus, high
as venus as a boy, i wanted
to build you something snowflake
perfect with shoveling frosting
for cheeks and my face melted.
a rube takes sun in mouth, spits
a pox on phallic desert, dear
but wouldn't it be perfect? matthew
barney? tricky? goldie? zach-
ary? so cavalcade compleat!
speaking of suffix, our cremasters
flex in unison and i'm famished.
maybe let's do lunch. let's
possibly do jóga? i want you
swanning around
in $5,000 worth of dead.
put on the bird dress for me.
(originally published in Juked in 2009. Access here.)