Time plays tricks

with our minds

The perpetual reminder

of old wood boards housing chickens

and that man who lives down the road

they say he's part Native American and he drives

an old dark blue stepside pickup

sometimes I'd hitchhike into town 

He'd signal I should jump in the back

no talking to the white boy

Who lives in the fancy house

and they got no livestock 

Times are changin'

 the fools 

catch rain

and play hearts

with their aunt 

sitting in the back of an old storm drain

Singing at the top of their lungs

while synthesizers bang out a delirious scrotum tune

That'll leave you itching with hives

and burying someone's ashes in the old farm

near where the barn imploded 

and the apple tree long burned down

Stop in at Teiffs for some landejaeger 

on your way home

 Sha-nay-nay

 I moved counter clockwise

against the flow

So it seems 

but it wasn't all bad

There were moments;

I found

a twenty dollar bill

In the dorms

at Stanford University when I was nine

also found a Molotov cocktail 

But it was the Sixties

 The talisman of the weary

is old Chinese food restaurants

and sad telegraph operators 

Women with their mothers eating

Cheap Chinese lunch

on a Saturday afternoon

With carts with New Yorker 

Tots bags

 

 I didn't

have a heart

or I did

years ago

                 somewhere along the way

it got tossed

             Not a choice really

    just how do you say 

circumcision

I mean circumstances

Imagine waking up w no dick

Well yeah that's that

 for that

    Roses are blue 

    Violets are red

                When you read this

                      You'll fall down dead

Thank Sister Superball 

for that

       and many other things

like "secret sales"

we won't get into that right now 

But it was a big part of my childhood

Hoof in mouth disease was another 

Leaving Cheyenne we were never the same

Dad worked at the Radiation lab

And I think his brain 

began to glow green

Mom didn't know how to take it

and disappeared into a worried elementary school music teacher driving a Datsun 510 filled with boxes

to Portola Valley three days a week

That was only town wealthy enough to hire her 

Or she knew something about the Chief Administrator

Some days the cowboy brethren gathered round 

and pulled Copenhagen from the circled back pockets

of their Lee jeans and put a pinch between cheek 

and gum and spit regularly

They liked to threaten small long hair kids 

with Sheep shears or worse

maybe NAIR on a Saturday night 

 dirty wasted

  marzipan eating sumbitch

knew nuthin bout Cendrars

Celine Jean Giono Apollinaire 

Fante etc 

He read Hillerman exclusively 

Is he any good?

 Forget the

past

It's asleep

  or gone

  deceased

   sickened

              Like an alcoholic 

withdrawal death

your old leather

motorcycle jacket

Purchased from Wendell's 

on Polk Street

      You gave it to your nephew

 and he lost it in two days

Like an alcoholic withdrawal death

at 37 years old

dying at Sykes hot springs

It's a ten mile hike up

up

    up 

      up

along the ridge

You can hear the river below 

No water? 

Drink 

Drink

Drink

Drink

 A patented mischievousness

stolen Maryjanes

and golf balls

a fencing foil

leather fencing glove

High school football helmet (Blackhawks)

Army helmets (inner and outer)

All stolen

In New Jersey

 I stood on the cross of Gods son

and my best friend abandoned me

But that's what happens when  

people 

move to Milwaukee

 Egalite 

sovering 

Swear 

eyelids

in 

coveralls

and 

mud

  covered 

feet

   hungry

    for a

 Chicken 

foot 

  like 

     Flintlocks 

   and nothing

  To see here

   just be quiet

    and 

     Tend those

     Bygones

  Or 

 Don't

    But life is 

     a joke

  With lots of 

Punch lines

   Nothing to cry about here

   Just laugh

   Laugh

    and wash your mouth out here

You don't have to tell me

What you been up to

Mr Policeman

 Echoes of 

Naughty bits

Toes aligned

Teeth bucked

Eyes sworn

Sleeping the Hutterite Earth

Sadness

Listless non decorative

Where's the fucking joy

Is this what Jesus was all about

Wearing the same clothes

Working working working

Did Jesus sing

He drank wine

Did he fuck

Who did gods son fuck?

No Jesus baby mama 

Hmm

 

 A casual Hail Mary 

a casual embrace 

with starfish eyes 

And rouge

eyeliner and

a casual nod

To the casual hook 

and sinker

breakfasting on chum

  and Super Dupers

the casual sterno jar

Cooking a frying pan

of brown trout thoughts 

A casual brown stare

and Assiniboine fatigues

In Adirondacks, Appalachian, Archaeological(?)

leather boots and scarf

 

 I hate everybody 

and everybody hates me

So we have some parity

That's good 

Now

Die 

Or at least oh my brain

Is fucked

Yeah there's no escape

except through the pit of fingers

The eyes of Mars

The tranopticon cerebellum 

the starving donkey

 Overweight

and tattooed

Eating at Culver's 

The rain came down

and washed as

sin

Piled up 

Traffic stops

and robo cat litter boxes

 Caco-Phones

Blistering barnacles!

I don't like strangers talking loud in my ear (grumpy

old man)

The city is coming back and it's shithead galore

"I went to school at Duke"

Whatcha study how to be a fuckhead?

Oh angry 

Pissed off 

Hating Modern times

Gotta get off this tundra