$1200



ah



another wholesome circle jerk in the cubicles



everyone make nice



everyone laugh



louder



longer



neither cease nor desist



not here



(we don't have to)



apocalypse elsewhere

this year anyway)



here whisper gossip



feign in envy



expound upon Web design



tv shows & movies



sport



never a dull



gesture



get wasted



rhapsodize where we went what we did what we



ate



how too bad it wasn't



infested heads



o virtual humanity



go down



fuck



in unwitting depravity



all you lottery winners



suck it eat it



prance around it



you



auto-savants



salivate, drool



on



the many ways



to live and die



in your luxury sedans



watching porno



(you majored in)



what me?



not mine//////////







i got to get out of here

williamsburg is dead and gone



put the special liquids in now

mingle the blood

chart the extrusion

and head for the river bank



the great skull of post-industrial civilization

shattered and strewn

punched in the soil

the old black guy with six dogs



waits by his forge with brandy

maybe some for you

if you stand the right way

and keep your eyes light

all those empty rooms you used to paint I see now were your child



your painter's fingers



drew petals

from my flesh

to grace one



blue,

sun-mottled

bureau top



with ovarian

night lilies,



blue mist in your crying corner,



white light slanting in,

shadow-slat ceiling,

one bulb dangling

like a polyps,



a trace of Celine

breath



(mine)



animating

the chain



saw you in the dream again,



skin white as ever,

yellow hair pinned

tight,



parochial grin,

hard brown eyes,



your legs

a thin envelope,



such a sweet



bottom

1.

craft a little curio of productivity



though it may result



in some nasty



bruises



2.

sing the song



with care



articulating



notes, words, measures



breathe



3.

be clear and cool



and



maybe



once again



feel



the old autumn



magic



welling

parenthetical disgust



a cubicle

sidney carton



To a man, to a woman, to every single individual, to wake up in this here everyday America is to every day be made subject to some self-serving sociopathic moron's humiliating charade.



Can you fucking deny this?



To wake up on the land between the east and west shores of America is to wake up beneath twin, undulating, ceaseless tsunamis of bullshit. Strike that, it's to actually wake up underwater where most people have metamorphosed into bullshitsluice breathing amphibians.



Awkward metaphors aside, to be able to unerringly discern the constant reality of Grade A American Bullshit is to be very, very unhappy.



Sometimes you might try to step outside the game, try to nudge nudge and wink wink with the surrounding players, whoever and wherever they might be, try to get a little mutual acknowledgement and recognition of the bullshit. Only if you are very very naive will you often attempt this. What you will find most of the time is that the other players think that they are righteous and that you are insane. What is bullshit to you is simply wonderful true and right to them. Certainty.



And in any case all is a matter of opinion. What I think and feel to be true is indeed true. Because I think it and feel it. Etc. And what I say is true because I say it. Because I have said this, this is true. And because it is true you shall believe it. And if you do not believe it it does not matter because you do not matter.



GWB SOTU



The moment you lose your self-possession and register anger, frustration, resentment toward the Bullshit, you risk everything. Because they will come for you if you carelessly alert them to the fact that you are not daily, merrily licking your shitstained plate utensils cup and fingers clean.

They will come for you and they will want to destroy you.



The paranoia you will henceforth need to sustain yourself can be aptly described as a semi-permanent mode and policy of an attitude called "Fuck You, Just In Case."



The strong move quiet.



If you are not a professional athelete or popular musician, your only recourse is to write disturbing books of fiction.

Fell off this week



(I mean year),

warped in my head now



pressure,

the way I feel,

no one can

pretend to here



I do, but I really

lose myself



in



anger and nowhere to put it.



fucking people don’t know me



misery purely my own fault



I’m the one to blame for wasting whatever I had



hate myself. And hate everyone



involved with



bitch,



make him grow horns.



I write this with teeth gritted.



A portrait in self-immolation.



No one could get a bead on that other Vincent, either.



At least he had a brother who believed in him.



Here, in poisonous age, people like us

have no such

fucking luxury.



I’m sulled up,



man

give it love



your eyes

are ovaries,



oceans

sought,



future miles.



now in

the grass,



light wind

sifts



your hair,



a low



shimmering

field-borne



odor



feeds our breath.



I touch

your long



fingers



in the bare

cool



night

I feel the day singing or else



in the pictures of New York City he referenced



I once again felt it:

the mesmer,

the trance



view streaming humanity

harbor bodiless sense of witness a sense

of floating, a sense



of senses



looking for kicks, feeling

like art

might happen.



immortality,



a dash of the feeling

I can't be killed

or, rather, won't be



that I shall



not

be in any way

compromised.



in the pictures the young people's faces are gentle, guarded, intelligent, interested, amused



going for drinks, knowing you can



I was always broke and alone even in good times,

slept with rancor

pinned to my chest.



were time an opera mine was

Humiliario



who wrote the score,

resonated the timbre



maybe instead of this

garbage I should be

posting homegrown

images of a dog,

a can of beer,

a cloud,

a girl's arm,



my frame of now,

a fenced backyard,



so I can see if



I'm happy

a resume



The breed has a distinct personality marked by direct and fearless, but not hostile, expression, self-confidence and a certain aloofness that does not lend itself to immediate and indiscriminate friendships.



The man must be approachable, quietly standing his ground and showing confidence and willingness to meet overtures without himself making them. He is poised, but when the occasion demands, eager and alert; both fit and willing to serve in his capacity as companion, watchman, blind leader, shepherd, or guardian, whichever the circumstances may demand.



The man must not be timid, shrinking behind his master or handler; he should not be nervous, looking about or upward with anxious expression or showing nervous reactions to strange sounds or sights.



Lack of confidence under any surroundings is not typical of good character.



Any of the above deficiencies in character which indicate shyness must be penalized as very serious faults and any man exhibiting pronounced indications of these must be excused from the workplace.



It must be possible for a judge to observe the teeth and to determine that both testicles are descended.



Any man that attempts to bite the judge must be disqualified.



The ideal man is a working animal with an incorruptible character combined with body and gait suitable for the arduous work that constitutes his primary purpose.

my new thing



measured silence,

a clear-eyed

listening strategy,



a witness

strategy

The Astral



For two years

my place of residence

was a corner apartment in the Astral

a shabbily grandiose behemoth of building

on Franklin Street in Greenpoint, Brooklyn

less than two blocks away from the East River.



Though I never knew for sure,

I always imagined that the Astral had once been a hotel,

a destination of nineteenth-century romance and intrigue,

frequented by sailors, merchants, wayward European couples,

gamblers, ex-gunfighters, dissolute scribes, etc.



The building, six rugged stories that loom

the entire block between Java and India Streets,

is in fact cited on certain maps as one of Greenpoint's

historic buildings.



Whatever its past, today these apartments

house a diverse assortment of folks of modest means,

ranging from solid domestic types to utter bohemians,

from hard-bitten immigrants to the bitterly indolent,

from the vaguely criminal to the criminally vague.



Affordable rents and close proximity to Manhattan

recommend the Astral to many young people,

while the proximity of the East River,

not to mention mounds of curbside trash,

recommend to the Astral legions of huge cockroaches.



While living there, I had ample

opportunity to consider the obvious relationship

between affordable rent

and an abundance of vermin.



There may or may not be gargoyles

incorporated somewhere in the Astral's façade.



From the roof, two things are apparent:

a magnificent view of Manhattan and the East River,



and the bizarre, seemingly random sprawl of the Astral itself,

as though the architect had been a proponent of free-association,

or else a drinking man.



Probably both.



Walls and parapets erupt weirdly

from the rooftop.



Small mice appeared routinely in my apartment.



I found it agreeable to imagine a lone, itinerant mouse

including my space as part of its usual circuit,



rather than seeing one as the immediate representative

of an infestation, of which it undoubtedly was.



In this way, as well as others,

I was victim to a fond, ubiquitous fallacy endemic

to Gothamites generally,

and to many Astral tenants in particular.



The fallacy involves being dedicated

to the idea that uncomfortable situations

somehow become optimal in light

of one's geographic location.



The larger fallacy being that New York City

is somehow

the ordained center

of the Universe.



Days I was utterly, tragically

earthbound in Brooklyn,

I would return to my Astral abode

to ponder these and other useful delusions.



Then the World Trade Center

was blown all to shit by airplanes

and people were jumping to their deaths

and dying

in other fantastic ways

all that whole morning



and I had to say fuck it all



just like everyone else



and evil is everywhere all over this whole earth



so I'll save my Astral shit for projecting



projecting positivity into a world that needs it



and fuck New York and all enemies



wherever they reside



(they are everywhere)



find the fucker bin Laden



impeach the fucker Bush



I think that'll settle some of it



(the parity

in this assertion



is what's most



depressing)

waiting on my system boot



crack open the dictionary



shame



shameless



shaman



I'll put $50 on 3 to place



all those things I should have been doing all along



I'll do them now

weeds and tall grass have overtaken

the old Texas Instruments plant



facility abandoned



I take note

the car hadn't stopped



before he'd kicked the door back

and fallen to the gravel



rolling, busting his elbow



he had to smash the side door window to get in



but then he was in

and self-medicating



while she waited in the running car

blanket party of one

auto-defenestration

a look in the eye