Poem-A-Day #361 : Recipe :

Recipe :

          broken hand
                    mill gris
               sound of ball bearings catching
     sleepwalking murderer

Mix thoroughly :

          until smooth
                     poster paint
               smell of egg
     pours like density

Bake at 350° :

          until a knife comes clean
                    golden like waves
               sizzle
     then

Poem-A-Day #345 : Breakfast

I think I get weirder as I get older.


Breakfast

How smile you
are today a leaf
fanning chains
of fire -

Smoke is teeth
purl & knitted
sound of fog
growing -

How ominous
cooling though
ice forms from
coffee
          it didn't
have the chance
to even operate
to glow -

Poem-A-Day #326 : Broken Poem

Broken Poem

Your zoology is confusing
A tongue on your skin - mine - in the creases of your arm
Let the broken blood be the broken glass
A light comes into the room - it is a ghost expressing discomfort with limes
Trees become fish for you
Scales leaf and collapse - they make a paste - they pop
Animals on our bodies and our mouths and our left parts
It spills and spills and spills
Cages erupt around the world - they fill and open - they burn
A missed connections ad on Craigslist mentions the figure of Orion
The arrows land in the yard
We chase the Chinese New Year and try to name the puddles
Squeeze citrus - squeeze eggs
There are things we can build and not build - nothing else

Poem-A-Day #311 : Listen you fucks -

Listen you fucks -

The plaster
falls from the ceiling -

Molds -

Spiders come for us -

There was a city
flooding with fingers -

Direworks going off -

Crumbles galore -

Someone sneered faggot
another wet themselves -

No one was holy -

A man named God
lost his car keys
while picking up a pizza -

He swung
a flashlight at the sunset -

A mantis rode a beetle
black went pink -

There was a sense
that the tape holding it together
was cheap -

A horse walked into a bar -

A sandpaper crane burned at the sky -

A ballgown in a weed dispensary sobbed -

Sound of ice cream melting
the universal 'you've got mail' -

Poem-A-Day #268 : Floor

Floor

We dance like we've seen everything :

                              The light channels the look of venetian blinds - 80s music videos :
                   
                     There is an inexplicable horse :

There is a child walking along the road - she is 6ish - she is alone - there is a baby carriage yards behind her - she is tired of this shit and is heading for the train tracks :

          I am tired of being told everything will be alright :

                    An endless consumption - the lights are on then off and the sound of music is a thrum on your sternum - a broken pen pressed into your trachea - blowing your neck like a balloon - you collapse in the waves of time coming off the 4 on the floor :

There is a need for semicolon :

                              The ability to hinge :

                                                            Trains run on time - half the time they clack until they hit the bends - the other half they wonder why the sound dropped out - there is a sense that everything is conscious - that the world is not a cold dead thing - but the yet that hangs on the end of that is where the beat drops and the room goes dark :

Poem-A-Day #259 : Lucy Looks into a Wardrobe

This is an erasure of the first chapter of The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe. I'm not entirely sure it works. But here it is.


Lucy Looks into a Wardrobe

Once
something happened
during
the war

There were children
sent away
because
of the country

The odd
afraid
night
trying to talk like mother

We've fallen and no mistake
this
anything
won't hear us

Doors empty
beginning to feel
an owl
falling so thick

Quite empty the
dead blue window
always expecting
woodwork

Cold queer
open
other light
coming

Poem-A-Day #138 : Legion

I have always wanted to experiment with structure and form. Not in a traditional way. In a weird way. This poem is long. Is weird. Is meant to be read in a ton of different ways with rules that I don't entirely remember. It was to be read by 5 people. It is my attempt to retell the story from the Christian bible of Legion, the man who is many.

The parts can be seen as a cacophony slowly being filtered. A is the most muddled, B retells the narrative from A. C is a sort of clarification of the story as a whole. And D is the implied threat that the creature represents.

I was a weird kid.


Legion (4/9/99)

A (read by 2 people in unison, the words of 1 and 2 should almost alternate, they will create two different meanings)

1
voices endless ceaseless voices enrapture madden voices swirl to mud in my head voices we are existed once sane voices speak of evil voices voices take over

2
we are many never to be whole in our power we are many whole cities in our completeness we are many entwined into an overwhelming force we are many as always forever and ever forever we are many none but us exists here we are many we are many you are us


B (read by one person)

wondering the desert
we discovered a fountainhead
drinking this elixir
immortality

this cleansing syrup is all we need
on earth
drink the air
we are millions

wondering by herds
taking all we cross into ourselves
drink humanity
we take all

we are many


A2 (read by 2 people in unison, the words of 1 and 2 should almost alternate, they will create two different meanings)

1
voices someone must bear this cross voices someone must bear this burden voices someone must set us free voices someone must take this over voices together voices

2
we are many many exist with joy bloody we are many many exist as one no more we are many many exist up to fall down we are many many exist away from we are many others we are many


B2 (read by one person)

for thousands of years
we searched for peace in normalcy
drinking beauty
we could never find

this purpose is clear
as we find that this is our end
drinking in end times
we fall to our feet

for years we knew of him
at his feet we cried
at the feet of him we found
disgrace

we are many


A3 (read by 2 people in unison, the words of 1 and 2 should almost alternate, they will create two different meanings)

1
voices we cannot concentrate voices we will someday escape this shell voices we will no longer be here voices will someday end . . . .

2
we are many who rule this body we are many who never die or end we are many after this body there will be another we are many and we are all . . . .


B3 (read by one person)

threatened with exile
we are dishonored wholly
drinking from this elixir
the stuff of mortality

this man is against us completely
drinking in hatred
lashing with
fists

threatened with exile
we hate him and
drinking from his blood
is all we want

we are many


C (read by one person)

He came to expel us
To make us one out of many
Though we wanted it, we do not wish
to be forced

But we are

driven out

We float away

Driven on

we will find another

Driven

We search for peace
in the desert
Bask in the voices
We are many


D (read by one person)

We are many bring us your children we are thousands give us a toy we are millions bring the young we are many growing we are many biding time bring us the children give them to us we are multiples allow this

Give us what you want
Give us what we need
Give us what we want
And we will go away

We are many

Poem-A-Day #134 : Vessel

I'm pretty sure this is a really sarcastic response to Ode to A Grecian Urn by John Keats. I'm not sure where the oysters come in. I didn't keep notes. It is obviously me trying to ask what is and isn't art. A question that I still struggle with.

Keats dies at 25 and only published 54 poems, yet he is perhaps considered one of the most important English poets of the early 1800s ,if not of all time. This is Poem-A-Day #134. I've already written over a thousand other poems. Either I'm winning or I lost before I started.


Vessel (10/13/99)

Is it kitsch?
Tacky?
Does this object
leave you a little cold?
Is it the appropriate time
or place
for it?
Is it art?
Or is it
boredom
formed into shape
Is it social commentary?
Is it egocentric?
Does it deserve attention?
My span can be short
so it needs to shock me now
This could be art
Or worth nothing
Is it subversive?
Does it mirror?
Is it just a vessel
filled with oysters
and hydrogen
fused with oxygen
and nothing more?

A drawing by Keats of the Sosibios vase.
Which he never actually saw in person.

Poem-A-Day #132 : Untitled (Feeling Today)

This is from October 2000. It kind of sums up a feeling that is absolutely not describable in language.

Untitled

Feeling today
like my arms are gone

Poem-A-Day #79 : Sexy Poem

Sexy Poem

The challenge was to write about sex in a way that was thoughtful - that pressed against the sides of its box and filled the space with a marshmallow softness that was enough to leave indentations where your head rested - and what would that sex look like - would it involve ropes or feathers - the sun comes through here at exactly 2:36 will you please have your clothes off at 2:20 so we're fully in it by then - how does sex get expressed in a new way - why sex how sex when sex - do you sex - if this finger presses gently against your pubis is that sex - what if it lifts you into the air - sex crumbles under the weight of thinking about it - it is stone and fingernails pressed in drying sugar - would it involve cardboard houses and barrels of oil - hands floating over skin - did you cut your nails did you shave your chest - cover your eyes while this happens - the sheets are good cover - the darkness of the blindfold will concrete your senses - look the writing about sex is boring - the sex is boring - put in and then rotate - again - again - again - it's a pick - a spatula - it we underquote it will convey dirty - like ,,this,, - no - yes - the challenge was to write - to sex - to do that together - was it coming -

Poem-A-Day #47 : Making Salisbury Steak

Making Salisbury Steak

Meat hitting marble
                    ))((((                    ...

          How clean is this counter

          ...

Don't think about the smallness of bacteria
how they creep like the waves of sound
                                                                 ))))((

                    The boards p o p
         and black
like in water                    like full of mold

Do not think about mold

                              ...

                     How the small hairs reach
and catch at your lungs

                                        The rasp
                                   of knife on metal
           / /
                    the knife on     \ \

Don't think about the time the knife was
at your throat

          ...

     The small presses of the serrations
                              the pin pricks rising     ...

                    Bake at 350
          until golden          until pink

Psychograph

This is sort of an automatic writing moment.


Psychograph 9/13

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;;;;;;;;;;::::::;;;;…..,,,,,’””’’’’’’’’………;;;;;:::::……
,,,,,,,,,,,,,:::::::;;;;;;;…,,,,……
:::::::’’’’’’’’’

tres aboreal shantih catorce de juliet

burn break blow

!?

This - ‽ - is an interrobang. It asks an excited question or expresses excitement as a question. It can also be used to ask rhetorical questions.

It's your punctuation of the day!