After Las Vegas
comfortable here, at ease somehow
far away from those who won’t
hear what I have to believe
speak what I need to believe
comfortable here, easy to slink in and out of places
unseen, unheard, disavowed
burn the fields that hold the trees
and keep it there, keep it bled and broken down
blues for the holy kid
and flowers torn in pieces in your hair
February 9, 1999
She Hears Their Stories
spread out like crowd noise
they call her to the quiet red room
and on splayed-out couches
she hears their stories
she notes their theories
she listens, nods, and writes it all down
for her own book of mercy
her own company of thieves
for her own cool divinity
her own taste in fallen trees
it’s a good pure way to be
curled up in cottons
they call her in her kitchen floor dreams
and with gifts for the children
she hears their stories
she notes their theories
she shivers, shakes, it’s January now
in her own winter city
her own town of counted sheep
in her own cool vicinity
of rested toes and rousted wolves
it’s a good cold place to be
February 9, 1999
The Gold Theme #2
Jesus doesn’t care about your hairstyle
Jesus moved to Brooklyn in 1997
Jesus doesn’t care about your golden birthday
Jesus is a monkey and he’s going to heaven
you lost your keys...so what?
it rained a little...it rains a lot
Jesus doesn’t care if you’re not hungry
Jesus likes his Thai food mild and weak
Jesus doesn’t care about your picture frames
Jesus is a martyr and he’s saving the meek
your roses wilted...so what?
it’ll rain tomorrow...it’ll rain a lot
February 17, 1999
2.10.2009
Three From the Red Notebook
14th Street
If I get it all back
And I'll get at least half
I'll put it away
Until a sunny day
When the cloud cover
Disappears by 11
Like it used to
In my unemployment days
I'd get in the car
And drive to 14th Street
Park in the restricted zone
Listen to an upbeat song
Heaven knows I'm important now
But then I could breathe
Or cry in my sleeve
Which - I've got to admit - was something
January 31, 2009
Louder Roar
It would have been laughable
Trying to recreate
The inner world of 19
Basements, corners, dead spots
There would have been swan songs
Corrections to long gone wrongs
Questions of great length
Tears and rain and snow and ice
And the redheads with their sage advice
All of it comedy
True and fitting
A long great tribute
To a small good time
And my drives up the avenue
To the north, to the single digit streets
Would have had soundtracks of spent time
A scent of lime, discarded papers
It would have been nice
To sleep in peace
But here I am
A louder roar but the same man
I avoid difficult streets
I beg for better songs
I crave the kinder call
I have none of it, I have it all
February 5, 2009
The Competing Narratives #1
And if in this rain
I have no enemies
Just those who come to me
With their narratives in which I fit
Like jigsaw pieces, perfectly
Then I'm a happy man
In this winter rain
In this merry month, 20 years
After the fact
20 years
After it all came true
February 8, 2009
If I get it all back
And I'll get at least half
I'll put it away
Until a sunny day
When the cloud cover
Disappears by 11
Like it used to
In my unemployment days
I'd get in the car
And drive to 14th Street
Park in the restricted zone
Listen to an upbeat song
Heaven knows I'm important now
But then I could breathe
Or cry in my sleeve
Which - I've got to admit - was something
January 31, 2009
Louder Roar
It would have been laughable
Trying to recreate
The inner world of 19
Basements, corners, dead spots
There would have been swan songs
Corrections to long gone wrongs
Questions of great length
Tears and rain and snow and ice
And the redheads with their sage advice
All of it comedy
True and fitting
A long great tribute
To a small good time
And my drives up the avenue
To the north, to the single digit streets
Would have had soundtracks of spent time
A scent of lime, discarded papers
It would have been nice
To sleep in peace
But here I am
A louder roar but the same man
I avoid difficult streets
I beg for better songs
I crave the kinder call
I have none of it, I have it all
February 5, 2009
The Competing Narratives #1
And if in this rain
I have no enemies
Just those who come to me
With their narratives in which I fit
Like jigsaw pieces, perfectly
Then I'm a happy man
In this winter rain
In this merry month, 20 years
After the fact
20 years
After it all came true
February 8, 2009
1.27.2009
Santa Monica Cemetery
Next to the graveyard
it's a funny world
bushes and caper vans
motels with flags
soft serve
There you can find the secret, the key
to all happy, to all good
to bad and everything in between
to death and ice cream
palms and parking meters
The blue college
forever in its footprint
smells like chlorine and art paint
and planetarium dust
breathe it all in
The secret to all happy, all good
it's there as I read the news
I already know
let it settle, walk back west
step into the mausoleum
at sunset and close my eyes
January 24, 2009
it's a funny world
bushes and caper vans
motels with flags
soft serve
There you can find the secret, the key
to all happy, to all good
to bad and everything in between
to death and ice cream
palms and parking meters
The blue college
forever in its footprint
smells like chlorine and art paint
and planetarium dust
breathe it all in
The secret to all happy, all good
it's there as I read the news
I already know
let it settle, walk back west
step into the mausoleum
at sunset and close my eyes
January 24, 2009
12.07.2008
We Came Into Town Under Cover of Night
#1
The drives home were sluggish
Perfect for a heavy heart
To step inside was to catch the eyes
Of cats and mirrored lasting impressions
And heroes, what were they anyway?
Or villains, face first in the snow?
No, no, I don’t know
And I’m almost there
Almost to the edge of falling back into
What happened first, way back then
When the shadow light was just physics
And my favorite songs had choruses
I could romanticize that spring
And call Caroline my savior
With her little hair and little head
And little hands and big words
I gave her a book and a stack of papers
She read them all, I believe it
But she’s in Columbus and I’m still here
And in Columbus, as Mark says, there’s no spotlight
To dazzle and that’s alright because dazzle hurts the eyes
I listened to Tallahassee almost every night
As I drove the two big boulevards home
It made me feel better about my own circumstance
But it still brought out the hurt
That I wore in my eyes, wear in my eyes
As I pictured peacocks
And Cuban planes and empty roads in college towns
And you
#2
Hey you, “No”
Where did your little hair go?
To other towns with colleges
Big ones and little ones
Santa Cruz, Columbus
And hey you, “No”
I never went anywhere with you really
I only went outside and back in
I only went to Pico and that other street
And in the cruelest of ironies
I was in the goddamn Gap dressing room when you cancelled
Our second date and we still haven’t rescheduled
This is my own sweet time
I can say what I want, want what I feel
There’s a hundred years to live
And a thousand years to heal
The secret is, no one knows
Hey you, you never said ‘yes”
And I imagine you leaving Los Angeles
And then that other town and that other town
In the bright white dazzling morning light
#3
I slept on that floor for months
I slept on that floor for 9 long months
I slept on three blankets, sometimes two
And a soft thick rug on the hardwood floor
(The rug is gone now, sold or under the bed)
(Two of the blankets are still here but I only use one)
(And the hardwood floor’s still hard, with little short nails and splinters)
I think I’m going soon, I’ve got a feeling
Maybe down to Long Beach or up to where I’m from
And anyway this isn’t the town we came into under cover of night
That was 2002, that was some other place
Two cars and one truck and a posse of friends
All spread out, Midwestern now, like brown sugar on waffle plates
Santa Monica was misty that night
Santa Monica was misty every night
The mist cut into me, messed with my sinus and the bed wood
But whatever I loved and missed that air
So it was with heavy heart that I left
In the Caroline, No and Peacocks spring of ‘06
I don’t remember what the sky looked like that day
I remember it was Saturday
It was morning
It was heavy
And then I’m gone again
Some day
#4
So March and April I listened to Tallahassee almost every night
And April and May I dated a girl from Tallahassee once a week
I didn’t treat her as well as I could have
But we learn from mistakes and we shake up the breaks
And May and June I found a Milwaukee swoon
And June and July I was back in the heat and yeah
It was the hottest endless summer of my life
I can still feel it
(should move closer to the water)
But what about that girl from Tallahassee?
Where is she now?
She’s in Burbank
I’ve never seen her place
But I hear it’s nice
No air conditioning
Must have been hot that summer
#5
Sail on sailor, come sail with me
Sail away with me
Between the moon and Kansas City
Fly with me on paper planes
Feel the freedom in the middle states
Interstate, in the dark, in the light
They make the trucks yellow and orange
So no one misses the fact
You’re moving away and you can fit it all
In one vehicle
(I’d rather drive a UPS truck)
“There’s danger of me losing all my happiness”
Then she lost it
I can’t see it anymore
I can hear her voice
I hear the call
I hear it all
And if the words were 50 years old
The happiness was only 20
And still not hitting 21
There’s morning
And afternoon
And evening
And sleep
Floor, bed, side of the road
And you
December 7, 2008
The drives home were sluggish
Perfect for a heavy heart
To step inside was to catch the eyes
Of cats and mirrored lasting impressions
And heroes, what were they anyway?
Or villains, face first in the snow?
No, no, I don’t know
And I’m almost there
Almost to the edge of falling back into
What happened first, way back then
When the shadow light was just physics
And my favorite songs had choruses
I could romanticize that spring
And call Caroline my savior
With her little hair and little head
And little hands and big words
I gave her a book and a stack of papers
She read them all, I believe it
But she’s in Columbus and I’m still here
And in Columbus, as Mark says, there’s no spotlight
To dazzle and that’s alright because dazzle hurts the eyes
I listened to Tallahassee almost every night
As I drove the two big boulevards home
It made me feel better about my own circumstance
But it still brought out the hurt
That I wore in my eyes, wear in my eyes
As I pictured peacocks
And Cuban planes and empty roads in college towns
And you
#2
Hey you, “No”
Where did your little hair go?
To other towns with colleges
Big ones and little ones
Santa Cruz, Columbus
And hey you, “No”
I never went anywhere with you really
I only went outside and back in
I only went to Pico and that other street
And in the cruelest of ironies
I was in the goddamn Gap dressing room when you cancelled
Our second date and we still haven’t rescheduled
This is my own sweet time
I can say what I want, want what I feel
There’s a hundred years to live
And a thousand years to heal
The secret is, no one knows
Hey you, you never said ‘yes”
And I imagine you leaving Los Angeles
And then that other town and that other town
In the bright white dazzling morning light
#3
I slept on that floor for months
I slept on that floor for 9 long months
I slept on three blankets, sometimes two
And a soft thick rug on the hardwood floor
(The rug is gone now, sold or under the bed)
(Two of the blankets are still here but I only use one)
(And the hardwood floor’s still hard, with little short nails and splinters)
I think I’m going soon, I’ve got a feeling
Maybe down to Long Beach or up to where I’m from
And anyway this isn’t the town we came into under cover of night
That was 2002, that was some other place
Two cars and one truck and a posse of friends
All spread out, Midwestern now, like brown sugar on waffle plates
Santa Monica was misty that night
Santa Monica was misty every night
The mist cut into me, messed with my sinus and the bed wood
But whatever I loved and missed that air
So it was with heavy heart that I left
In the Caroline, No and Peacocks spring of ‘06
I don’t remember what the sky looked like that day
I remember it was Saturday
It was morning
It was heavy
And then I’m gone again
Some day
#4
So March and April I listened to Tallahassee almost every night
And April and May I dated a girl from Tallahassee once a week
I didn’t treat her as well as I could have
But we learn from mistakes and we shake up the breaks
And May and June I found a Milwaukee swoon
And June and July I was back in the heat and yeah
It was the hottest endless summer of my life
I can still feel it
(should move closer to the water)
But what about that girl from Tallahassee?
Where is she now?
She’s in Burbank
I’ve never seen her place
But I hear it’s nice
No air conditioning
Must have been hot that summer
#5
Sail on sailor, come sail with me
Sail away with me
Between the moon and Kansas City
Fly with me on paper planes
Feel the freedom in the middle states
Interstate, in the dark, in the light
They make the trucks yellow and orange
So no one misses the fact
You’re moving away and you can fit it all
In one vehicle
(I’d rather drive a UPS truck)
“There’s danger of me losing all my happiness”
Then she lost it
I can’t see it anymore
I can hear her voice
I hear the call
I hear it all
And if the words were 50 years old
The happiness was only 20
And still not hitting 21
There’s morning
And afternoon
And evening
And sleep
Floor, bed, side of the road
And you
December 7, 2008
12.02.2008
I Don't Think Of You That Often
I have empathy
unlike you
this is why
I'm better than you
hot cocoa and s'mores
for all the poet's whores
is an appropriate reward
for years and years
of praising perfect verse
your best friend told me
you worked as a sailor
for months at a time
in the seventies
the implications of this
are too numerous to mention
until more data is ready
data that demystifies
the certain blurring
that such an endeavor implies
there's an intimate moment
at the end of our movie
that defines us as people
you know the moment
it's after the guns come out
and after the tension breaks
I love the way your green shirt
brings out the green
from your green green eyes
now here come the anesthetic
feel the pain, common worker
there's a part of me sleeping
a part of me you don't know
because you have no empathy
there's a part of me sleeping
out in the desert
next to the windmills
in the heart of the beast
I'm better than most
but not better than others
this sums me up
in the eyes of the caged one
and in the eyes of me
this tells you that
I'm coming home, but I'm coming home alone
that's the way it must have been meant to be
so where's your pride?
your pride's on the radio
I've heard the only song
you ever knew how to play
I've heard it sung badly
I've heard it sung falsely
you were the only one to do it right
October 26, 1995
unlike you
this is why
I'm better than you
hot cocoa and s'mores
for all the poet's whores
is an appropriate reward
for years and years
of praising perfect verse
your best friend told me
you worked as a sailor
for months at a time
in the seventies
the implications of this
are too numerous to mention
until more data is ready
data that demystifies
the certain blurring
that such an endeavor implies
there's an intimate moment
at the end of our movie
that defines us as people
you know the moment
it's after the guns come out
and after the tension breaks
I love the way your green shirt
brings out the green
from your green green eyes
now here come the anesthetic
feel the pain, common worker
there's a part of me sleeping
a part of me you don't know
because you have no empathy
there's a part of me sleeping
out in the desert
next to the windmills
in the heart of the beast
I'm better than most
but not better than others
this sums me up
in the eyes of the caged one
and in the eyes of me
this tells you that
I'm coming home, but I'm coming home alone
that's the way it must have been meant to be
so where's your pride?
your pride's on the radio
I've heard the only song
you ever knew how to play
I've heard it sung badly
I've heard it sung falsely
you were the only one to do it right
October 26, 1995
Allies
the sugary one is stirring up trouble
making threats and speaking loudly
of canyons and the yodels therein
I haven’t seen you smiling lately, why?
packing your things
you think of going
but really you’re staying
because tomorrow
you’ll be back
so you may as well
leave it all be
climb up a tree
and make your own threats
the trouble, once stirred, is absent now
the sun is falling from its sleeves
the gauges we have are unreliable
and I think that’s the sound of trouble again
it couldn’t last, it wouldn’t
but that doesn’t mean
my eyes aren’t green
my skin isn’t soft
my lips aren’t dry
but that doesn’t mean
my angles are worn and rounded slightly
because, brother, sister, other, they’re not
June 6, 2000
making threats and speaking loudly
of canyons and the yodels therein
I haven’t seen you smiling lately, why?
packing your things
you think of going
but really you’re staying
because tomorrow
you’ll be back
so you may as well
leave it all be
climb up a tree
and make your own threats
the trouble, once stirred, is absent now
the sun is falling from its sleeves
the gauges we have are unreliable
and I think that’s the sound of trouble again
it couldn’t last, it wouldn’t
but that doesn’t mean
my eyes aren’t green
my skin isn’t soft
my lips aren’t dry
but that doesn’t mean
my angles are worn and rounded slightly
because, brother, sister, other, they’re not
June 6, 2000
Sightings
I'm looking at the fog, can't see the hills
I'm thinking about a revolution
I'm thinking I should announce my retirement
I'm sitting on my couch, can't feel my feet
I'm remembering the drives along the west side of Bush Lake
And then it spits you out
By the highway, near the glassy buildings
People I didn't know worked in
People I didn't know slept in
I'm waiting for an answer
I'm confiding in you, can you feel it?
I miss the mollusk, I miss the ocean
I miss the lake, I miss the muddy feet
But I can't just do what they say
I can't just covet the end of the day
She saw me on 3rd Street
I saw her on Chapman
She saw me on Pico
I saw her on Colorado
She saw me on Larchmont
I saw her right back
She looked away on Normandale
I looked right through her on Burnt House Hill
She saw me on 3rd Street
I punched the little spaces on my iPhone
And considered a move, eastward in the dark
I waved
She drove ahead
And in the fog I will know you by the trail of what I've never said
December 2, 2008
I'm thinking about a revolution
I'm thinking I should announce my retirement
I'm sitting on my couch, can't feel my feet
I'm remembering the drives along the west side of Bush Lake
And then it spits you out
By the highway, near the glassy buildings
People I didn't know worked in
People I didn't know slept in
I'm waiting for an answer
I'm confiding in you, can you feel it?
I miss the mollusk, I miss the ocean
I miss the lake, I miss the muddy feet
But I can't just do what they say
I can't just covet the end of the day
She saw me on 3rd Street
I saw her on Chapman
She saw me on Pico
I saw her on Colorado
She saw me on Larchmont
I saw her right back
She looked away on Normandale
I looked right through her on Burnt House Hill
She saw me on 3rd Street
I punched the little spaces on my iPhone
And considered a move, eastward in the dark
I waved
She drove ahead
And in the fog I will know you by the trail of what I've never said
December 2, 2008
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