"ANYBODY WHO HAS A CRUSH ON ME
IS FUCKED"


somehow there is a palm tree in the yard,
it surprised me since the yard is so small

i go to the bathroom to find what hurts
i touch all over and still cant find the wound

the neighbor keeps some dogs who always know
when a storm is coming, and they set to wailing

which means its time for me to go on a walk;
i dont have to listen to the dogs but i get wet

these dogs in the coop, i cant even see them
and still they put me out in the rain

i am sheltered under the highway,
where there is a mural and a seat

the furious rain of sub-tropic places
the grit swirling around on the road

i cant remember, but i know it is there
i've done all in my power to heal it
the cut must be real small

quits

so i am the black ship of the family,

yes i have fallen off
the other side
of a flat world

an end where the water rushes
but doesnt wake,
left as it is
for cups lost downriver;
lost to the end
of a world disproven




as long as there is,
there is frontier
a sexless bull-cow america,
rollicking distant past
the fenced part of a flat world

and i said unto my brother that I am a mouth
and i eat because my ribs furnish the boats
with cages to sail on, and over the other side

"When our beloved friend, the fine Governor of the Gret Stet of Loosiana, sent for me in his need at Mandeville, his condition had been so MISREPRESENTED that people I knew said to me, 'Don't you go up there, Joe Sims. That man is a hyena. He'll BITE YOU IN THE LAIG.' But I went. I went to Mandeville, and before I could reach my friend, the armed guard had to open TEN LOCKED DOORS, and lock each one of 'em again after us. And theah, THEAH, I found the FINE Governor, of the GRET Stet of Loosiana....without SHOES, without a sitch of CLOTHES to put awn him, without a friend to counsel with. And he was just as rational as he has ever been in his life, or as you see him here today. He said, 'JOE SIMS, WHERE THE HELL YOU BEEN?'"

say, another black t shirt

tripped in well water;
a country i lived in
because i made it

haha, walking down the street
in the small hours, tiny

full of steamed nightmare,
i pat the blind pony
and ride the iron one

when i tilt the cup
i make it sing

every cowboy brakes his arm,
falls from the horse, coughs in the dust
most dogs gets hit by the car,

how can i have done wrong,
how have i offended?
do you want to write the poem
or be sane? because

we can have it so
the sun will be there
and the world can be still
we will have all agreed;
and sitting with our heads
leaning on our shoulders
like three of them that are hanged,
we can have it that we survey,
without needing to say

did you get what you asked for?
raving in the woods,
talking at yourself with
the assurance of him who is drunk, the drunken poet
who speaks with the hundred selves,
who sways like the palms of day's last light,
who spits long strands that will not break;

he dies in a hospital far from home,
dreams are less than just dreams
they are ruiners; and you curse them

a young poet, he grew up,
he sweated in the jungle and
died paralyzed in a foreign hospital
far from home, the young poet
cried for his mamå and his old bed
and the peace that is dead leaves
blowing across the driveway

who is dead,
there is blue light from below
and no light where we are at,
being in the caverns,
i imagine that it is just like
the quiet reflection, of life
lived under the lake and among the reeds

who has died,
when and how many times?
we nail it on the signpost

it must be this current of life
that i hear so much about

respectable people come to my house,
they won't tell me what they want,
but they wait outside at all hours
so that i'm filled with doubt
and my house is not a house
but a metal boat. sinking and
echoing dully as the shots hit

when i swim in the deep water
i know what looks up from under

my belly must look whiter
than the small moon
you can sometimes see
in a dogs eye

i know that there is a snake
that would take me down

everybody knows;
thats why some people dont swim

no snake bothers me
but i know that the reeds
sleep upside down;
they spend their days thinking
of a secret that is soft and dark;
the reeds are an empty green house
where the ghost never gets upset


i'm not scared of the deep,
but being on top
of all that deep

and im scared of the reeds
and the spaces in them
where we used to live

they're riding in the back
and the dogs are in the front

when the house is burned
the chimney still stands

the trees are all november,
they look so thin in front of the sun

who forgot their damn hat,
if you are who i think you are,
life is easy;
just avoid the mirror,
and go to bed on time

the tire tracks look the same
the leaves, however, are new
and dead

let them dogs loose
let them damn dogs loose