More Poetry Brute

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

More Poetry Brute

St Valentine's Day

 cold bullets of rain

ecstatic static on the radio

abstract thrill of romantic songs

vicarious moans

misty roses

melancholy Chet Baker

my funny Valentine

saxophoned out of temporal reality

whispering highway nearby

late night BART train sound

hive-like midnight

tomorrow over-rushes

the saint's feast day

love is distant omnipresent

held  aloft in one's faith

joy in one's self  all life

pervasive humor

suffice in the void

between

 

 

 

 

 

One great auric cloud

with a setting sun within it

a fairytale lantern

coming toward me

others rise up as well

in classical gestures of defiance

aereopterix gulls

reweave the tarnishing fabric

the iconic sun gives in to

grey wall of storm

subsuming the Maxfield Parish sky

neglible difference made

to the whirling acrobats

 

the sky the sky

I have a lot of sky

 

 

 

 

 

 

The tide went out and did not stop

Everything we left on the bottom

came back out to shame us

Then the water all came back at once

and it didn't end at the shore

 

Broke at the Altamount pass

and shot through the Caldicott tunnel

Alameda remained underwater

Oakland became its estuary

With high rise mirror buildings

remnants emerging at shoulder length

Seagulls adjust albino raccoons

expected as much

Scavengers came in rowboats

to salvage all that floats

Clocktower goes dark at moonrise

The stars reconnect like ferris wheels

Whales arrive out of curiosity

Too many fish in the sea

All of us eating each other

Kites comprised of sea foam

mount the breeze

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The green hills of now

host stones of forgetfulness

oncoming cloudscapes

 

 

 

 

Winter night of rain

last Fall wildfire smoke snuffed me

chilly wind and rain

 

 

 

 

 in the wind and rain

passersby seen from inside

 my dry windowpane

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The universe is not big enough

for the two of us

 

 

I'm sensual but deep

you dig your own grave

if you go too deep

 

 

If I sleep now

when I awake again

it will be raining

 

 

 

 

The Pit and the Razor

when the very last stroke

scraped my poor throat

 

 

 

 

 

 

I decided

I don't want to hear

what the shitheads

of the world

have to say

 

 

 

 

 

Danger of spending too much time

in the backyard of the mind,

Hours spent idling

in the attic of memory,

The quicksand of

old photographs,

Each turn of the hourglass

may be one's last

 

 

 

 

 

1980

 

A swanky shop used as a polling place

on Post street San Francisco

We came over to vote against Reagan

Where we used to live

where we were still registered

though moved across the bay

On the way back polls still open

the public address voice

of the BART train

in the tunnel under the bay

informed us that Carter

had just conceded the election

at the exact point

of no return

 

 

 

 

 

 

inner radiance

the perpetual sunrise

I sometimes forget

when I stare too long

in the dark pool of myself

light coming on

the happiest day of my life

 

 

 

 

 

Alone between di Chirico buildings

Sunny chilly empty streets

lone figures walk slowly and savor it

A place with less wind

beside the floating lighthouse

the wind in scintillating

reflections on the estuary

clarity of Winter

the sun not weary on my eyes

A long freight train

sounds its deafening horn

Freight cars with graffiti

ten feet tall

Others with fresh red lumber

from forests north of here

tanks tanks tanks

helicopter passes over me

like an unattended thought

National holiday

without joy or purpose

None can celebrate presidents now

People in sleeping bags and refuse

doze on sunlight sidewalks

seek refuge and shelter

few look in their direction

 

 

Highgate cemetery in London 

Some ghoul attacked the grave marker
of economic theorist Karl Marx
I was there many years ago now
a cadre of Chinese Marxists that day
made the pilgrimage as well
Everyone was quietly respectful

Karl Marx bones lie
a-moldering in the grave
Karl Marx'  bones lie
a-moldering in the grave
Workers of the world
remain in chains, remain enslaved

 

One wind made me stop and spin
made me hide in my hood
in a Chinatown neighborhood
Youth society in dessert shops
anywhere out of the high rise
every port in the storm

No take no bills no more
at the bizarre pharmacy
 closes on Saturday afternoons
But a stable mailbox
and no one begs for money
though they let people sleep
on these mean streets

A sidewalk along a wall
has the stored possessions
of the absent dispossessed
The self-sustained camp in tents
under the infernal overpass
where the State in its fairness
no longer forbids the poor to sleep






Occult Scatology


He complained to the city
that the house across the street from him
neglected their gardening
Wild trees and plants were an eyesore
But his neighbor was a witch
and put a sore curse on him
That the next time he moved his bowels
he would not be able to stop

The next morning he entered
his bathroom at his regular hour
Copious continuous excreta
soon filled the commode
What did I eat he wondered
He tried flushing in flux
but after two successful whirl
it soon stopped shut
the steady shift of ejecta continued
across his sink instantly filled
he resumed his enforced extrusion
into his shower bath

Sweating he soon had to
tug the shower's glass door shut
to contain the swelling mass
of firm heavy dejecta
In frantic desperation at last he
climbed on a hamper opening
the laundry chute to his basement
 to crap down its chasm
By dark he had filled the basement
and the crawl space beneath
with this terrifying ejectamenta

At last in shame
mortification and depletion
he fainted and fell over
expiring in the end
of dehydration



Epilogue

Sufficient structural damage
made repair out of the question
His estate was happy to have
 the lot filled in and bulldozed
No buyer ever showed interest
and the place became overgrown
a arboreal glade with animals
herbs and birds
with incredible mushrooms
The lady across the street
seemed more than content
with her new view
with her new neighbors










Rainy escalator
in impoverished Oakland
a wet dollar bill

February 2019