Wednesday, March 14, 2018

Bookworm


I've been keyless and phoneless
even penniless more often than
I've lacked a book
in a pocket or a pack.

That was the tease
from my Portuguese uncle
who fancied himself a wit.
Not enough to make me quit

reading about mastodons
and saber toothed cats
trapped in the La Brea tar pits
or searching for dinosaur eggs

with Roy Chapman Andrews
in the sands of the Gobi Desert.
Saving seventy five cents for something
by that old racist, Edgar Rice Burroughs.

Tarzan was always rescuing the fair damsel
from some leering savage just before
he was about to ravage her pale virginity.
Hoping that for once he'd be too late.
But he never was.

Childhood's naivete gave way,
darker fantasy held sway
and I found myself enmeshed
in a military reality
grimmer than the pages
of any dystopian book.

I drenched my mind in the philosophies
of Schopenhauer and Nietzche, Mills and Locke. 
I had plenty of time and crystal meth.

I always kept a book tucked
inside the logbook of my Jeep.
Which led to the amusing incident
when a visiting General discovered
that I was reading that little red one
that millions waved over their heads
in Tiananmen Square.

He asked me where I got it.
I said -at the Stars and Stripes bookstore
back at the battalion headquarters.
My other job, when I wasn't driving
the Battery Commander, and visiting Generals,
was separating edible from inedible garbage.

Thank you Mr Beckett for your novels.
They led me to find some satisfaction
making impromptu compositions
with leftover mess hall mashed potatoes,
lima beans, and jello salad.

Dark trashy mysteries and mayhem
are still hard for me to resist
especially when flying on a long trip.
I want something as easy to digest
as the packet of pretzels they give you.
I save the good ones for the destination.

Thursday, March 8, 2018

Autonomous Sensory Meridian Response (ASMR)


Tuesday Tuesday Tuesday,
at two forty seven
in the afternoon.

Stanley shuffles the deck again
-for the forty or fifty or sixtieth
something time.

Deals the cards into four neat piles
gathers them  back into a single stack
without looking at them

and shuffles them again.
Stacy says, do it again please,
I'm almost there. I'm almost  -there.

Stanley isn't there yet either,
his hands are automatic,
he's staring out the window

where the kid from down the street
he's hired, is raking maple leaves
into piles on the lawn.

The riffle of the cards synched
with the rhythmic scratch of the rake.
The prickly pleasure that Stacy seeks

arrives, and as it shoots down
from the back her head,
along her spine and leaves

a tingle just above her ass,
she arches her back
in a delicious shudder.

Good? he asks.  Yes! she says
but would you please
now brush my hair?

Tuesday Tuesday Tuesday,
barely midway through
the afternoon and five o'clock

feels as distant as next year.
Stanley says, I'll brush your hair
but then it's my turn, okay?

I want you to carve some soap.
Palmolive or maybe Dove
Irish Spring doesn't fit the season.

Stanley goes out to the garage
and inspects a row of boxes
on institutional metal shelves.

Flips the flaps on a large one, sniffs,
and takes out four bars of Dove.
Peers inside the box and frowns, getting low.

Back in the living room
he slouches on the couch,
hands a bar to Stacy.

She unwraps it with a flourish
because he loves the sound
of the waxy packaging coming off.

Which would you prefer today,
the potato peeler or the box cutter?
The peeler. Maybe start with the peeler

and finish with the box cutter?
By the way, we're down to less
than half a box of Dove.

Better get over to Costco and restock.
Get some Palmolive and Ivory while
we're at it. Stacy smiles at him and murmurs

Sure, honey. We don't want to run out.
Want to smell the first one
before I start to carve?

She begins to shave long slivers
of pale soap which falls into the apron
she has spread across her lap.

Stanley watches her slender fingers
push the peeler through the bar,
the soft sound of it's resistance

and the pause at the end of each
gentle stroke tickles his eager ear
and the first shiver stirs on his scalp.

That's exquisite, dear, you carve so well.
He lets his head roll back against
the cushions and waits for Stacy

to unwrap the next bar of soap.
Ready for the box cutter, Stan
or shall I keep going with the peeler?

Keep going, love, there's nothing
sweeter than the way you work a potato peeler
on a freshly opened bar of Dove.

Those carvers on YouTube
are butchers compared to you.
No one has the magic touch you do.

Friday, March 2, 2018

Past or future


Later, sheltering in a shallow alcove,
a man not dressed for the rain,
mimes asking for a smoke.
I had two left, so I gave him one.

He asks me if I've ever experienced
vibrations of the past and future.
Demonstrates with an
outstretched trembling hand.

Points to the crook of his elbow
as if injecting something.
Says the vibrations of past and future
go away with Dilaudid when you dream.

Then you wake up and discover
that you've written yourself a letter.
We share a chuckle about that.
He wiggles his fingers at the sky.

the in between


Two guys hustle across
thirty feet of bricks at Market.

One says to his tall friend
it's all meat, you know?

He's wrong of course,
the vast in between is empty.