I'm in a funk about writing.



Kids, it's true. Unless you devote hours to writing each day, to the practice of it, it's hard to make it stick.



Alright, enough whining.



(On the reading front, anyway, things have been viscerally satirical, scintillatingly and essentially sound.)



If I'm in a funk about writing, this I'll just have to figure it out.



It's a bad week for this however, what with the playoffs starting and the Red Sox ascendant.



God, how painfully obvious is it that I don't have much this week, at least not yet.



However, I do have this.



Thanks to Bobby Ben for linking it in the Comments.

I am sicker than shit.

I sound like that Sling Blade character.

The cough is dry and hurts.

Funny thing is, it's not too bad.

This I attribute to my quitting, entirely quitting, religiously quitting

smoking cigarettes just under 5 months ago.

The cold I have now is the one that, for smokers, indicates

the inception of seasonal chronic bronchitis.

As it is now, it sucks and it hurts, but it's not torture.

To think: when I was smoking, I actually used to smoke

through this kind of cold.

Inconceivable. Not really, but you know what I mean.



To boot,

I was trying to fix

something fast

in the basement

2 nights ago

before something else

started pumping soapy water all over the floor

and I had my (dull) jackknife out

trying to cut this cord fast fast

and the knife slipped and I ended up JABBING it

HARD into my left wrist

I almost hit one of the more visible veins, this one can see,

but the wound hardly bled. I think I knicked a tendon however

as my wrist is totally stiff and it hurts to curl that index finger.



Both of these things coupled with the fact that I had to make a critical run

to our town's dump or else tempt another bad situation, the one that arises from letting

house and pet debris accumulate and stew



led me to take the day off yesterday.



I went to the library though. That was a plus.



And the Red Sox clinched the Wild Card last night.

That is a major plus. I watched the whole game and post game

revelry from out of a deep Nyquil funk, and that was a plus.



I'm only here now to display my sickness to co-workers.

Keeping it real. I'll be out of here I hope by lunch.

And that will be another major plus.



Only reason for this entry is to have something to replace that

idiotic last entry with.



Oh shit, I forgot to tell the ironic part about the moment right before my physical health

went to minor shit,



but, too late now. It was boring



anyway

Meanwhile, the city seethes.

work sucks



fuck man how come

I can't get into this mode

where I'm up all night



maybe gee I guess

if I eschew drink

when the evening is young



attention high school

kids: go to college,

or else work on lawns.



or the road crew.

that might sound cool

now, but trust me it isn't.



all H.R. sanctioned

positions engender

the potential for hate,



however,



you want to be inside

cat-like in your cynicism

while eating bandwidth



like it's a personal means.

maybe it's luck keeps

you off the lawns and the roads



and maybe it ain't.



fuck it,

whatever makes you happy

you dumb little hooligans,



I couldn't care

less,

get back to your bullshit.



now, back to my original

thesis, why can't I get all into the ur-

Kafka modality of being up all night



with my head on fire?



because, barring that

activity,



I'm just another shlub in khakis



and a polo shirt



dreaming

of weed no of funds no



of

morse shit



I'm so tired I haven't slept a wink



Oh shit not that old song



But my mind is in fact on the blink today



Oh shit not that old excuse



If you don't have anything to say it's better to say nothing at all



is not a precept I could ever



ah



well



ah



on second thought,



fuck it



me



them



her



you



(I wish I was writing some crap about some chick's ice menageries



and how she



slept with the town



but oh,



that's all



slipped



away)

Bach blew me apart in my truck this morning



I could have written more this morning.

The house was empty. The one good radio station

was playing Tom Petty's "Even The Losers...Get Lucky Sometimes."

I stood over my coffee musing over the verb "to rock."

I could have written more. The dog was making his investigations,

policing the kitchen, the front room, searching for cats.

Then he ate a little. The two bay windows were open. The wind puffed

at the screens. Somewhere there's a hurricane but here only dark

cool wind. I wanted to write it. I took out my new

machine, plugged it in and typed on the soft, silent keyboard.

I read what I had written two days ago and it was not bad

but I knew it could be a lot better with more brought to bear,

if only I could. I wrote some, but I could have done more.



At 6:08 I leashed the dog and we stepped outside.

The air was colored like ashes and I could smell rain.

The air was cool on my wrists and face. We headed

up the road, the leather leash loose, the black German Shepherd

glancing over his shoulder and up with his foxlike brown eyes,

his gait an easy trot. The light increased in such a way to be felt

as much as seen. The sky appeared lavender. I thought of "Lavender Mist"

but not so much of Pollock. I felt a terrible yearning I could barely

name. I looked at the sky framing the trunks of big pine trees

at some short distance, say three stone throws away.

I was without human company. Of this I was glad. Still I felt

broken open. I thought if only I could write it. I could have this morning.



We made our way down to the field and the fence beyond,

the light

still increasing.

www.abhorreditfeatass.dik



A yell for cover.

A cellblock mother.

A well-stocked cupboard.



A dose of sanity.

A gross magnanimaty.



Fuck this dumb shit, I'm bored.

year old stew



My muse is the ghost and everlasting spirit of Carl Jung.



He's got this illusory blender jug that he periodically screws into the crown of my skull.



Channeling residual dust from the atomic explosions at Hiroshima and Nagasaki, he's biannually enabled via the jug to sneeze 45% of the harpies from Pandora's box down through my memory hole for capping, blending, and non-selective processing by me.



Stray strands of Pandora's lank, fervid hair drive the old man mad and send me in search of Milwaukee's Best.



*



damn your bullshit

I screamed

at the hallway mirror



damn your blank eggshell cover

I screamed at the wall



You do not own me

is a phrase

shouted at



(what's the opposite of martyr?)



*



she's probably 20



she handled that bottle of wine

though



with expertise



*



turn the radio on



adjust the fan



be wired in the smoke



*



how did you perform?

Incremental Blues



1.



every electric guitar solo he ever played

was a transmission



from God to man from Man

to God from Man

to other men



but now that that transmitter

was a broken



soliloquy of gnarled fingers

composed by a four dollar

fish plate in a diner



south of the city



the static white blue

patter snake

language of

lightning

was rainstorm static

synapse

ghost torture

strangulation



insanity.



his

vacant horsetooth

punch drunk

infantile mouth

now gapes



over whitefish

leavings



why does God destroy a man?



why give him strange wonderous

voices

and a cage for a



soul?



2.



He was just thirty-five years old.



Born an orphan.



There was yet a single woman who pined for him,

wondered if he could possibly



be alive,



doubting it.



His talent was known to her,

as was his curse.



Mute, she lived alone many miles to the east

on a farm in the hills,



fearing all men.



She alone could make him sane

again and whole,



if only he could find her.

muzzle loader



Hunting season is back.



They're

out in the woods

right now



trying to

find it,

kill it,



bring it

on home.



Hunting season

is back



and me too.



When I find it



I'm going breathe on it



and

bring it to life.



It hunts me.



Whether to find or be found,



loss



possesses



before the fall.



(I will not again,



so can I?)

any man's gonna take my horse gonna have to kill me first



It had been a health rehabilitation facility before, but that was done with. Hollis had known about the place from way back I guess when he used to landscape or whatever.



The grounds of this place were immense and all overgrown with field grass and brush. It was late in the day. We cantored for a while around this huge island of trees out in the middle of this sloping field behind the place, popping off our .22 pistols at cans and crows and little mammals when we saw them, just for the fuck of it. We didn't kill anything.



After a while Hollis's huge white bay just sort of quit, stopped and stood there, all done. Hollis climbed down and just left him standing in the field as he humped off toward the abandoned loading dock, hitching his cords up over his fat ass as he did so and hollering over his shoulder at me to come on. I watched him bound up some concrete stairs and disappear inside the building.



I reined the yellow mustang to trot over to the iron railing at the edge of the long concrete wheelchair ramp and looped the reins over the rail. That old white bay would probably hang around in the field but I didn't feature looking two towns over for this boy or maybe losing him altogether.



I paused to piss by the dumpster, thinking about all that beer we had cooling in the stream. If we were going to stay here awhile, someone would have to go get it.



It was getting chilly, then sun on its way down, firing the sky back of the field deep hues of blue and orange. I hoped there would be some old, dry wooden furniture to burn.



Also, I was seriously jonesing for some fucking nicotine. I wondered if any of the old simps, dupes, druggies and critical care patients had squirrled away any fags up here in this big abandoned bitch. I knew I'd be looking soon.



Then Hollis yodeled above me, "Woo HOO, motherfucker!"



I looked up to see his cracked blond mug hanging out the fourth floor window, grinning down at me. He looked happier than a kid on Christmas morning. I called up to him.

"What'd you get?"



"Pills," he cried. "Mercy mother of Hay Zeus, we gots us some pills!"



So it was going to be a rare one. A fucked up night bar none. I hopped up onto the loading dock, then stopped for a minute to look at the yellow mustang.



It was looking back at me, its brown eyes complacent.



I should probably let him out in the field to graze, I thought. I didn't know if he'd run away or not. I was far from a fucking expert when it came to horses.



I could hear the thumps and minute grunts of Hollis just beginning his apeshit routine upstairs and then I thought, You better fucking watch it tonight, you don't want to wake up dead quite just yet.

My good friend.

what I couldn't know was what was about to happen



Pale blue dress shirt untucked flaps over flithy, thin white corduroys, narrow hips, thin chest. My hair really does feel like a kind of sandpaper. I smooth it back with the palm of my left hand, then look in the restroom mirror to realize I've smudged the side of my head with blood. String of blood falling from nose to stripe shirt. I bunch up some of the white paper towels to stop it then I'm like fuck it. Blood in my sandy grizzle, blood in my mustache. I whip open the heavy door and step back out into McDonald's, digging in my pocket for change. Just a small black coffee will do. The black girl at the register looks through me like I'm already dead. I find myself back out on Sixth Ave. asking anyone who's smoking if they can spare a butt. Some high-assed packed in skirt & blazer platinum haired cunt of I'd say 45 opens her horse mouth in revulsion as she passes. Big glistening teeth. Looks like someone I knew once maybe back when they were purer. Can't say. I look to the sidewalk and see I've been trailing blood about half a block. Sure my self-respect is gone. These people don't know me. I peel off down a side street about halfway into the West Village and start humping it toward the river. I'm halfway there before I remember it's the East River I want. I just want out of this fucking hate eating kill me as you fuck me city but it's just not that easy, it's not that easy man, it's just not that easy.

death on the land and no man can evade



Cold dusk. A crawling sea of cars on the northbound interstate. As people ran out of gas they just got out and started walking.



I sat on an extrusion of granite up on the ridge. I could smell the cook fire. They were cooking something, some kind of meat up on top of the ridge, camped up beneath the water tower. I could hear their voices, laughter. That water tower hadn't held water for years, even during the last good years before the tragedies.



Curious, those walkers. I watched them awhile longer. How they simply got out of their cars and continued right up the road, walking in the breakdown lanes, carrying things, kids, blankets, or else carrying nothing. I wondered where they thought they were going.



All I could think about was getting a gun and getting a horse.



I climbed to the top of the ridge. I was surprised to find my boy Hollis out of Warren, chubby in his red and black flannel, his back to me, pissing into a stand of sumac. I called out to him. He looked slowly over his shoulder, leaning to spit a trail of brown spittle in the dirt. His blond hair was matted and there was a huge shiner under his left eye.



"Holy fuck," I said. "What happened to you? You got dip?"



"Whole sleeve of it."



"What'd you, plunder the 7-11?"



"Uh-huh" He shook his cock briefly and stuffed it back in his cords. "The one up on Rt. 9. Them Indians."



"What'd you, fight them for it?" They had a fire pit going and a huge piece of meat on a spit made from a chain link fence post and a bunch of torn open 30 packs of Bud, Coors, Pabst. There were a bunch of other people up there, wandering around drinking and smoking, a couple dudes I recognized from the bar, a couple girls I didn't.



"Nah," he said. He worked his lower lip and spat again as he walked over to me. "You want a damn beer, or what?"



He was drunk. I wasn't yet and didn't know if I ever would be again.



I'd could hear you whispering in my head and that would've scared me, if not for all those people walking on the highway. If not for the knowledge of these late days and what had made them come.

The last thing I asked for was an expulsion of rage. With characteristic silence you unwrapped your hands and complied. At the end you ripped your burning hands from my head and plunged them into the bathtub full of lamb's blood. The blood exploded. In the morning I started afoot northwest for the mountains.

mine is a bird aflame



Maybe more could have been said but the couch stunk of whiskey and only I could vouch for the extremity of my actions. My friend, he used to hurl empty bottles of Dortmunder at the wall to watch and hear them shatter. His life was all flexible molds, the figure, and a gray-green Rickenbacker solid body strung lefty that I was helping him learn to play. I used to sit in a brown straight back chair up there in his studio and sing blues out the window to the brown Indiana sky. I was usually drunk and could barely get a girl. the one I did get she was magical and loved me on the basis of a single song. But I couldn't hold her. She tried to paint me once while I sat on her mattress singing songs, sloppy, obsessive. Finally she had to refrain and put me away. No one could blame her but I, I became that Stephen Crane poem, feasting upon my own bitter heart. Some great music may have come from it or not but anyway it's all lost now, gone like the days. Though traces remain in consciousness and blood. All i wanted to do then was run insane, just go. I nearly lost my mind in a Georgia jail, awake in a raving dream of her and the end of the world. It was a vision of the apocalypse straight out of Jung. The heart indeed can hallucinate crises of despair and renewal. I'm glad it all happened but now I stay put. Back then I forgot how to be territorial but I sure remember now. To me, it's critical. I ain't bound to forget again.

twin yellow ropes

draw me through the foothills



my mind too is grey and white

lines



to myself,

I can be as unknowable

as the ridge

at Franconia



as unreachable

and irreperable



that's all



this blog needs the sandwich bag's emergency medical attention



a council of earless goats

a council of earless goats

a council of earless goats



tryin to avoid contact



with the other bipeds



my crowd skills and some other skills are still there but for the futility of their employment



the invisible sex lady told me I could write again but to do so I would have to will myself insane again



and never bother her with the excuses conscious or corporeal



I said OK