Moonglow Reading

An invitation to join me at mi casa this Sunday, January 17th @ 4pm (MT), as I will be doing a live Zoom reading from my new book of poetry, Moonglow on Mercy Street. 

This event is part of the SOMOS Poetry Salon Series. During the reading, there will be trivia opportunities to win free, signed copies of Moonglow. 

Zoom link: https://zoom.us/j/5757580081?pwd=SnZncXlvUUZPY3F3OEhyOXM3TnVxQT09

MOONGLOW ON MERCY STREET: These fifty poems, most of them written in 2020, comprise a kaleidoscopic palette of tones, moods and styles, in crafting living mythology from the world at large and within. Metamorphic bop, scat-alchemy, bare bones blues and gospel, love songs and odes, pagan pop, and cinematic remixes, make of Moonglow on Mercy Street a free-range concert aimed at the imagination and the senses. And, as a lyrical pilgrimage fueled by hope and wonder, it stands as a shining testament to Henry Miller’s claim that “One’s destination is never a place, but a new way of seeing things.”

 

Posted in Artwork, Books, photography, Poetry, Press, Prose, Publications | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

State of Address

A salon. After hours. Dimly lit.

We see a red styling chair. Behind it are a counter and a wide mounted mirror. In the right upper-corner of the frame there are dismembered mannequins set against a wall.

The salon OWNER, a woman with fashionably short hair, enters the frame, sweeping the floor.

The sound of a door opening, faint sound of traffic in the background.

ABRAHAM LINCOLN enters. The stovepipe hat, the beard, the coat, the whole Lincoln bit.

LINCOLN nods to the OWNER, who gestures toward a chair.

LINCOLN takes off his hat and coat, sets them down on a table.

He proceeds to sit down in the chair which is set against a sink, facing backwards.

The OWNER turns on the water, then eases LINCOLN’S head back, his neck slotted in the cleft built into the sink.

The OWNER rinses LINCOLN’S hair, massages his scalp. She applies shampoo to LINCOLN’S hair, repeats the rinsing and massaging.

When she is done she towels off LINCOLN’S head and gestures toward the red styling chair.

LINCOLN goes to the chair and sits down. The owner covers LINCOLN with a smock.

The OWNER turns on the radio. Albinoni’s “Adagio in G Minor” is playing.

The OWNER gives LINCOLN a haircut. When the haircut is done, she prepares a hot towel and places it over LINCOLN’S face. She removes the towel and proceeds to give him a straight razor shave.

After the shave the OWNER gets down on her knees, between LINCOLN’S legs, wrangles his dick out from his zipper, and gives him a blowjob.

When she is done she rises to standing and wipes at her mouth.

The OWNER exits the frame.

Lingering shot of LINCOLN slumped in his chair, eyes closed, “Adagio” still playing.

LINCOLN gets up, puts on his coat and hat and exits the frame.

Lingering shot of the chair, the counter, the mirror, the mannequins.

Sound of a gunshot, a body thudding against the floor.

“Adagio” is suddenly washed out by static.

The OWNER re-enters the frame, turns the dial.

We hear Lincoln’s voice, in scratchy-time-weathered audio.

LINCOLN

A house divided against itself cannot stand.

(Dead air, popping and crackling with fuzz)

LINCOLN

(scratch-repeating, techno stutter-effect)

I-I-I-I-I

do not expect the house to fall, but I do expect it will cease to be divided.

(Electronic lounge beats kick in)

The OWNER goes offscreen, re-enters with a broom in hand, begins sweeping.

Electronic lounge plays as she sweeps up.

From the far-right corner, we see dark blood seeping into the frame.

FINIS

Posted in Cinema, Prose | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment

On the Nature of Daydreaming

In America,

daydreaming is fast becoming

an anachronism,

and endangered species,

with its habitats

being destroyed,

and its numbers in the wild

decreasing at an alarming pace.

Which raises the question–

What would daydreaming’s extinction

mean in relation

to the internal travel industry

as a whole,

and will its ghostly echoes

reverberate within

a stream of celibate downloads,

upon which the birth of Imagination, reconceived,

swaps slow, sovereign wandering

for breakneck usage rate?

Posted in Poetry | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment

A Love Poem

There are some lovers who,

in the spacious means

allotted by respect,

green toward one another,

as gardens

hold reams of moonlight,

without constraint

or undue possession.

Posted in Poetry | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

Root Cause

The offshoots

of roots

spread everywhere

under your feet.

They are the architectural tentacles

of a magnificent culture.

Ground there.

It is the tended prelude

to most solid

flight plans.

Posted in Poetry | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

Dr. Seuss Meets Buddha

Building a rocket-ship

of a meditation chair,

low to the ground,

in my sawdust workshop

of a heart chamber,

so as to comfortably

leave my body

and astrally roam

with medicinal curiosity—

Oh, the places you’ll go!

Posted in Poetry | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment

Ink

There are some of us,

a strange lot,

who enjoy rolling around

in spools of text

and bathing

in wet ink—

for fun,

for pleasure.

It is not a recommended past-time,

but rather one that is born

from the necessity

of invention

as the supplest means

to vital connection.

Posted in Poetry | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

Cosmos

To have an open dialogue

with the cosmos

through a sensitive antenna

of a flower

with lavender petals

crowning my head

was something I used to scoff at

or dismiss.

And now?

I am a gardener,

tilling seeds of moonlight

in the holiest lay of space,

or nature herself,

facing the sun

with a thousand shoots

merging across the divide

into one.

Posted in Poetry | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment

Death Rides In On A Pony

When Death showed up on a broken-down pony, I scoffed.

This, really?

What, Death said, looking around, unsure as to who or what I was referring.

You’re Death, right?

Yes.

THE Death?

You can check my I.D.

And you’ve come to collect me?

When it’s your time, it’s your time. Nothing personal.

I’m not upset about that . . . it’s just . . . look at what you rode in on.

Death dismounted his pony and gave it the once-over.

Yes?

A pony? And not just any pony but a broken-down one that looks like, like . . . well, like this!

Death was perplexed.

What’s wrong with this pony?

Death slapped the pony on the rump. The pony let out a sound that was half-cough, half-snort.

I filed through a laundry list of all the things that qualified the pony as “broken-down,” and when I was done, Death laughed, thin and metallic, the teeth of a comb scraping aluminum.

This is about you, isn’t it?

Me?

Yes. You. And your ego. You feel that Death, your death, deserves more of a ceremonious farewell, that Death should ride in on some mighty steed when coming to take you away. Am I right?

Well, now that you mention it, a mighty steed would be more suitable for someone of your . . . stature.

I think it is your stature, not mine, that is in question.

My stature?

That’s right. To be carried off by Death on a broken-down pony does not confirm the powerful and poetic exit you imagined for yourself.

Now hold on there, Death, you’re the one that came for me. I’d be happy to stay here and forego this powerful and poetic exit plan you imagine I’ve fantasized about.

Very well then.

Very well what?

Stay.

Stay?

Yes.

Just like that.

Just like that.

Let me get this straight—You, Death, rode in on a broken-down pony to carry me off, and then when I say I don’t want to go, you say, Fine, and that’s that.

That’s that.

Wow. Death is nothing like I thought it would be.

I work in mysterious ways.

Isn’t that God?

Death grinned a glowing skull-faced grin. It was equal parts comical and terrifying.

Well I guess … bye for now?

For now, yes.

Where you going next?

I have others to collect.

Will you be picking them up on that broken-down pony?

What broken-down pony?

I somehow had missed the part when Death’s broken-down pony had been transformed into a hobbyhorse with a frayed mane.

Death riding in on a hobbyhorse. This somehow made sense.

Through a gaping sleeve, Death’s skeletal hand emerged, waving goodbye, before he reared back on his hobbyhorse and rode away, kicking up trails of dust.

Okay, then. Review. Death had come for me on a broken-down pony, accepted my suggestion that I should remain among the living, and had galloped away on a hobby horse en route to collecting other poor souls.

I looked at the clock. It was still early. I wondered what the rest of the day would be like.  

Posted in Poetry, Prose | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

Please Don’t Tell Me It Is Reality

Please don’t tell me it is reality.

Please don’t try and persuade

and convince me of how very real it is

or must be

because it has appeared in a dozen social media feeds

cross-referenced by noise

layered on top of noise—

a sandwich

of amplification

beefed up in the middle

and sealed at the edges

by a thousand and one

moistened lips

does not, in my book,

substantiate reality.

Please do not tell me reality

means this, or looks like that,

sacrificing its glorious verisimilitudes

to a fast-track narrative,

or that it has been mandated by standards

agreed upon in chat rooms

or on assembly lines

cranking shopworn opinions.

Do not try and school me

on the reality of hard knocks

as if the world was uniformly squared

into concrete blocks

and X-marks-the-spot slabs

of tone-deaf guarantees.

Please

do not waste your breath

trying to commandeer reality

into rigged notions

that leave no room

for sliding doors

and rimless visions.

Please

share with me

the beauty of the stones

singing ancient odes

into the grace-fingered wind.

Please

throw away the word reality

for six unnumbered minutes

as you share a cup of black coffee

with the Impossible

and laugh at all the crazy shit

she pops off about.

Please,

show me the secret loveletters

you wrote to the moon

and never sent,

show me your bruised blue valentine

of a heart

that continues to dispatch postcards from the edge—

Please

let me breathe

in that ultimately real mist

where the shore receives the tides,

and let me hear

the moist smacking of lips

when a dew-wet daisy

kisses the honey-fringed lips

of the rising sun.

Please,

let me know,

deep down inside,

that there are more things

in heaven and earth

than are dreamt of in

algorithms and talking heads—

Please remind me,

ala holy silence,

of the worlds unseen

and in-between,

of all the relations

who reside there,

and let me remember

to remember

that cliff’s edges

and sparrow’s wings

bear far greater wisdom

than reality’s slideshow

as filtered through newsrooms

and branded directives.

Please do not relegate reality

to yet another rote, fatigued

and uninspired definition.

For you see,

Reality

as perceived by Imagination,

demands the suppleness of wonder

and participation mystique.

Sincerely Yours,

the lovers,

the dreamers

and we.

Posted in Poetry | Tagged , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment