AMBITION
When I was a
kid, I heard a really, really
scary story in which the moral was to suppress desires as they arose and turn them
over to the authorities. But now I’m a long way from the campfire, a
mystical cornball in a place of
cruel beauty, enjoying the stir created by the ceiling fan and spiced with
positive ions. My mission
is to stream live branded entertainment into every Service Department
waiting area in North America.
LASHED AND
LASERED
In the beginning
was TV. Then there was the Big Shatter. Pieces of TV created a universe. Tinier
shards are constantly being discovered still, we collect them and call them
devices. One murky night after
ending the crazy insane lunacy of my 12-tone stage, I danced with acrobats
and office assistants. When garment lines became symptomatic I had to look away, their physiques were too bright to
watch without incurring retinal damage. Like staring at an eclipse is what it
was, or Ulysses lashed and lasered and listening. At
the tribe casino I ziplined to recovery, with Cleopatra providing joy, resilience,
and healing.
CIVIC
RESPONSIBILITIES
Minotaurs
trending to the factory outlet bonus tag rebate sale, heeding the traffic light,
respecting each others’ hopes and fears, aiding each other to advance and
delight. With complete happiness
downloaded directly to their rewards cards, it was like all right let’s go as
the signal changed.
HEY RACHEL WHAT
DOES YOUR BOYFRIEND DRIVE ANYWAY?
She commutes to
the alternate universe in a leased vehicle under individually wrapped auspices
and with an earthquake squeezed into a suspicious package. Supernal laziness
prevents an overactive imagination from fronting the wrong party, but she swears to God the daily toll from
tweaking the smart white oligarchs with post colonial questions and fighting the professoriat with brooms and tongs
exceeds that of being in the ICU. With the skittish orioles back and forth
between the tree and the Juniper
Flats jelly we put out for them, and the smaller birds at the seed feeders in a
frenzy of husks and feathers and shit flying everywhere, the world is insane.
MOTHER BASE INVADED
I love watching the treasured item appraisal
shows on TV, laughing at the disappointment and stupidity that shocks the faces
of the owners, like a cow that just had the wind knocked out of it, when their precious
heirloom gets appraised for shit, and laughing even harder when they get told
the price “at auction” would be lower still.
BAD DECISIONS
He is not
respect the women. Employing parasites on a regular basis. They managed
to stole a million dollars the piece of shit whore (accountant) never wrote the
amounts because a client was paying cash to her.
ASK ME
She threw a
colorful bouquet of flowers, vase and all, on our bed one time out of anger
when I left for Dodger Stadium without her. And that’s about all I know of
romantic relationships.
GLOBALIZATION
OUTPOST
This is the
place. Wind brachiating through the trees, surging like choppy water. Chemically
imbalanced woodpeckers and other ill-attended sovereigns unable to afford
insurance fill the debtors’ prisons in periodic roundups by police, flushing
and replacing them with synthetics. Eight boats, 232 anglers. Trained like dogs
to stay behind the invisible electronic fence. There’s a lot of movement at the line of scrimmage. Trash day war drums
being beaten red, raw, inflamed, infuriated, infected. A biodiverse
beginning to the homogenous day.
A WHAT?
The message on
my screen says You are missing out on a
smoother, faster experience. I’m thinking what are we talking about? The
day stewed on in its own territorialized puree, tranquility-fouled, like a shots fired call every five minutes. Just as I
finished clearing the mint from beneath the apricot tree, Dana and Sparrow burst into the yard, profound day dreamsters,
emplumed resonators, prayer flags moved by the same wind that inspirits prayer
flags and music from trees. We talked and drank like we was deadheading east.
MY HORSE IS
STILL RUNNING
I knew I’d
written my final dewy-eyed impromptu behind drawn curtains at the bitter end of
an unsuccessful afternoon that had begun at Portland Meadows. A composition of harsh whistles and
melismatic scoring, an ode to my greatest fear—that I’ll be expected to believe the official absurdities
while aging disgracefully—blubbering like a coffee maker concluding its brew.
AVERAGE NIGHTLY
RATE
My head is the
hotel where journalists and anthropologists gather, red wine, blue lamps, rainy
winter night, the map of our empire spread on the table before us—Africa, Asia, parts of Europe, and Australia back
in business as a penal colony—staring at it like slot machine players stare at the
desserts in the buffet, rubbing their hands out of habit over the sneeze guard. That
sort of traditional, you could say strictness, that a person should have a
dream, that if you try your best your dream will come true.
STEWARDSHIP
I don’t know whether I should just pick up the lake and
move it because of the cyanobacteria,
or
allow enthusiasts to bring lawn
chairs and sit beneath the pergola. People
have been trying to lose weight since the beginning of the Bronze Age. Movement is substance. Empathy is in
short supply, sympathy vanished. The mountain peak hid
in a knitted cap of fog pulled low over its head. Either way, I need to get me some universal trimmer line. I’m out not
hiding under sunny skies, trust me.
WITH THE
CANDLESTICK
Cosplay event
goers at the Multispecies Ecosystem Megaplex suffered weight loss gains as
flowering burlap glitched unexpectedly and completely covered the to do pile.
The blush wine with the cabriole legs
had stopped breathing by the time emergency crews arrived. Sun and shadows lay
in each others’ arms on the roof. Behind the yellow tape, rabbits were eating
apricots and watching along with the neighborhood Tiffany lamps and
leather-bound books that walked over to take a look, art work from Dahomey (the
name I prefer to Benin). I’m sure the extra toothbrush was left out on purpose. A clew
even I could pick up on.
A VERY
FRANK BRIDGE
Interactivity is
the worst concept ever. It fouls the conservatory. Interactivity is nothing
more than off-gassing vertically discharged horizontal rage, causing Earth to rotate faster. And then
I remembered bringing ice up to the room, and why; so I rose from the chair. Isn’t there another way out?
