Poetry

A small room, a small porch, a large window, a stove, a table, a chair, a cot, a few books, a few thoughts, a notebook, a pencil, an eraser…

Gary Snyder is a man of the West and of the Far East, which is farther west. Or say you go to the east, and then you’ll come first to the East, but then to the West, which is Europe the seat of Western Civilization. American historians know that Kentucky once was the West and…

Reach your cup into the air and draw it back full of water.

Them that’s got got to lose. Them that ain’t got, can’t.  

At the bar in Otto’s near 5th, both off from work, the heavy foot traffic of silhouetted commuters hastening home outside, and us, here two drinks in. The conversation has just ramped up and he wants to know why I did it, how I could have betrayed our family. The bartender is in night school,…

On the glassed-in back porch of a friend’s house on Folsom, I slept three weeks on a heap of patterned wool blankets, a large ziploc of granola and a jar of pistachios on the sill. I woke to bus traffic in the floorboards and sun on my face, drank thin coffee and scoured the listings…

When the little bulls, so-called, rained down From passing rainclouds like little bullets Unexploded, wishing only To scrub themselves away on their armored backs In postures of convulsive surrender; When we, trainees, young men and boys With imperfectly formed morals, flipped them Onto their sticky ridged bellies With wooden spoons, then nudged them On their…

Over-aged, over grave, overlooked brother Seeks adjoining variable female structure Covered in chocolate, cinnamon, molasses, Freckled, sandy or sunset colored flesh Expressively motored by a blend of intellectual Fat & muscle while several complex & simple Emotional frequencies pulse along her veins. Must be a careful & moderately self-indulgent Cinematographer, modestly self-conscious, reasonably Self-important, spiritually…

A brother versed in spiritual calisthenics And cowboy quiet seeks funny, lonesome, Speculative or eye-glassed lass. Shopaholics Welcomed. Also Prince fanatics, museum Cashiers, & pragmatists conversant (lipstick Or no lipstick) with a hipness substantial Enough to contract around a muscle as well As expand around a child. Fear of boredom is ideal. Fear of dereliction…