in the line of fire 

chapter one:

the omnipotent big-sky-object is shooting again

behind its cloud of icy smoke which seems unnecessary

for an omnipotent big-sky-object.

I’m sick of not having a chance.

I’m sick of being a pre-sighted target, and tired of its face

haunting through the wretched morning mirror.

interlude: the first part:

the television is used primarily as a reminder

to pick up a certain brand of sleep-aid capsules, and eggs.

interlude part two:

getting around the block nowadays is more adventurous

with every approaching corner, (there are four of them) and along the way

I'm rethinking the hasty decision to stop smoking cigarettes.

chapter two:

remember; it was the unrepentant Nazarene who laid down to: "make up my dying bed".. probably of pinewood, or dogwood, and three crudely fashioned iron spikes

hammered for added stability.

well, I guess that's it for now, and.. pleasant dreams, my lovelies !

"make up my dying bed" was lifted from: "In my time of dying'" / Bob Dylan

"my lovelies" is partially attributed to: the Wicked Witch of the West". 

                   of natural causes

to the housefly

it’s the kitchen swatter.

to the opossum

it’s the center lane

of route 6 east.

to the horn of the rhinoceros

it’s the Zimbabwe poacher.

to Donald Wachowski

it’s the failure to function

of a previously used iron lung,

which seems to have short circuited 

at the last exhalation in 1951.

pshhhht…whoosh…pshhhht...whoosh and done.

with me, my money’s on Bella Stai-zitto la’Bocca 

swinging a Louisville Slugger

at my noggin as I nap between lines.

I was her man.

I done her wrong.

but I didn’t think it was that wrong.

geesh! what a grouch.

the end.

           

                    the summer before my cat was nominated for: "cat of the month"

I drove to the park.

It was crowded with people doing things

I’d never dream of doing in public view.

I needed to find a less occupied space

to lie on my back, look up to the sky

and imagine a God up there.

soon enough I was inside the sky

face-to-face with something

who called itself God.

I settled down giving it the once over.

it didn’t look like me.

I was not made in its image, nor

the image of anyone known to me.

but I sensed its omnipotent power,

its fatal instinct for any living thing.

I asked: “why do you insist on killing us"?

God, maybe a lone wolf or one of many,

answered: “because I can! because

it's you who came to me!

because I was busy and you were lazy"!

satisfied, I drove home with traffic

smearing my windshield.

I arrived out-of-sorts only to find

the cat sitting on the formica counter

next to the kitchen sink with its all too

familiar lunchtime expression.

I told it of my bizarre interaction with God

but the cat meowed with a serious intent:

"chicken and liver bits in a savory sauce"!

and I mumbled: "well, okay then".

"Crayola" by: Rosalind Coloratura, age 7 / 2021

                   it happened one day perhaps in your hometown

I walked into a room a standard room and

by that I mean a floor, four walls, a window,

a ceiling,–– and the door I walked through.

and there's a sink with running water, but I can only imagine

the toilet is somewhere out of my sightline.

––nobody has been in this room so nobody has died there.

no flies no pets no television not one man save me and being

my self-centered self, the guy who won't leave well-enough as it is,

I'll welcome guests.

––but who? who would I invite into this unblemished room

this virgin room innocent of heaven and hell and all their demons and saints?

–– priest? ah, yes, of course it’s priest. he's long dead but still feels

I disrespected the institution by dismissing his advances for a secret

sacristy fondling episode below the hemline of my surplice.

Tony Scelsi, benchwarmer, served as my replacement.

but I’ll offer priest a taste of cheap rosé with faucet water chaser,

and take his full confession to exacerbate his historical awkwardness.

––and maybe a friend from the old neighborhood. the drowned friend,

or the one with a self-imposed cancerous lung, or the sweetest girl-child

stricken by the grace of God with a fatal blood.

––or perhaps the personage of Mr. Wally Cox would be a tantalizing invitee,

although his selection may seem unreasonable to others submitting applications.

that's a distinct possibility, but did you know––

this sheepish little guy, this meek Mr. Peepers with the mannered, high-throated

contralto was one of Marylin Monroe’s closest friends?–– so, maybe Wally Cox

might spill-the-beans on some juicy Hollywood gossip, so to speak, and as I see it,

a distinguishing element to fill-out his showbiz resumé for inclusion into the room. 

but of course that "tell-all" would be well before Joltin' Joe stepped-up to Marylin's plate.

love poems to the lost

poems to lost loves 

are often built upon a high wire,

tentative,–– but

there's a tenacity to them which

enables them to hang-on.

on the other hand, they’re incapable

of stabilizing their positions adding to apprehensions.

I blame myself.

love lost is the most poignant and penetrating

aspect of love once gained. few will agree. but

well,–– there you'll find me pining over a beauty

who once was as much a part of me as my blood,

or my flesh, or toward the end, my socks.

invariably, poems of love lost end, swaying for the sake

of their existence upon the wire of my making high above my life.

irretrievable.

 

                  fear no Man from Mars

1.

nor Woman from Venus.

suppose the first contact we hear

from the SETI is the voice of a distant poet

a female of the alien species, with

a sultry voice,–– warning us of the dangers

of sending our puny rockets into space, or to remind us

to pick-up milk and eggs on the way home.

how would our military convene in secret special session

to lay-out its plans to kill her? with tanks? with B-52s?

with the suppression of certain elements of the case?

2.

It begins with a young

couple riding in a heavy convertible

with the top down, always the top down,

through a desert,–– the spiny, parched cactuses

setting the mood under the moonlight,

this serious moonlight, when the strange, otherworldly

sound of a theremin played by professor Lavern Sparks

at the “Institute for Serious Goings On" (ISGO)

startles the pretty young woman riding shotgun.

“Tom! what on Earth was that”? she screams!

––Tom, from behind the steering wheel,

the circumference of which equals the size

of a significant moon’s equator, cries out in fear:

“Sally, that’s no sound on Earth as far as I know!

I think it’s the Woman from Venus”!!… pause, and fade to black.

“this serious moonlight” is nabbed from David Bowie’s “let’s dance”.

                   the new ballpoint pen, an occasionally prose form poem

It’s the latest arrival. It was found in a gift packet

from my health care provider along with unnecessary information

on where I should go, and what I should do before I go, and

who I should see when I get there.

the ballpoint pen is substantial in its heft, twin-tone in color

incorporating a twist-turn of the barrel to expose the tip.

I like doing that. It’s sensational. sometimes I’ll just pick it up

for no reason other than to simply twist and twist back and twist

again before the final twist finds the ballpoint retracted.

I haven’t yet used the pen to write something or even test it

to see if the ballpoint functions. I have coffee mugs filled with

ballpoint pens, and cocktail glasses and drawer’s full.

In the mid 60’s, a TIME magazine cover

graphically displayed an American army officer, an “advisor”

to the South Vietnamese military, who'd been shot dead at a time

when an American combat death in Viet Nam was a rare occurrence.

clipped to his breast pocket was a “Paper Mate” ballpoint pen.

an art school friend quipped: “I bet his pen still works”.

that elementary juxtaposition between life and death, between usefulness

and uselessness was instructive.

as it lays upon the table, this latest arrival is less historically significant

as ballpoint pens go, although its place in the canon of historic events

has yet to be written.

2/15/24

                    sailing westward conning southward

I dreamed I was sailing aboard the “Pinta”––

the boat as much of purgatory as purgatory itself

such as not to be seen in the company of Columbus.

we had horses and goats and pigs and piles of shit to shovel.

at the starboard rail I could see the “Santa Maria”, glorious

at her sheets, the unforgiving hemp catching the wind as if

she were the breath of God !

I’d sell my soul to be aboard the "Santa Maria"!

I don’t recall much of the little “Niña".

she looked awkward and alone like a wayward child being

swept away by the wake of the water.

arr, the “Pinta’s” a working-stiff.

arr, the “Pinta” gets up at daybreak to shovel her shit.

blast if the "Pinta's" stink don't stick to me like the morning's head it is !

––later, when the sun warmed enough, I asked my therapist the meaning

of this dream, but he referred me to someone else.

my dreams frightened him, but nevertheless I didn’t want to drive

such a distance as to affect my mileage, so I didn't show-up for the referral.

––If I was half-the-man I am, I’d say the dream was telling me something.

but it's during the realm of consciousness that the dream reveals itself,

and I fear a coming bout with scurvy from consuming dried, salted anchovies,

and fierce constipation from chomping into jaw-breaking hardtack biscuits.

but such is the life of a common swab, and arr, ye fuckin' "Pinta"!