you can bet life is weird
weird life on a lawn mower;
mountain streams, water from the earth's center

the western parts of the new england states,
everyone we know is from the north or the east
lads, a shared memory of long hair
and smoking in the back seat with dark snow and mud
like dad sent us out into the fog
for a full tank of propane
long hair and bacne, driving past sunken islands
everything flew out like confetti and we chased it into the hills

its no joke being 400 years old
other things pre-date, bubble out from earth's center
life is hard, good god

i dont believe in cities and i get addicted to drugs in the country
well, i get addicted to drugs in the city too
but i'm scared of young professionals

these fuck boys with white hands
write poems about going into the woods
then they cry about wanting a maid
like you just call a maid to your doublewide

 'stack my poems by the bucolic props
we'll lay them out in the morning
and perhaps
a kindred soul will pass and see'


its enough to make you disrespect old guys
i drove out here and talked to a man about renting an inner tube

what he sold me was more like a firestone
but i never feel like a fool after i've been jipped
who am i to worry about $15; i partially float, sort of sink
by myself i guess, all poems should be about lads and rivers
who am i to explain drinking too much and burning easy chairs?
blissed out on this rock


























here i'm jogging, an old man with packs of young dogs
all my friends here want to do is get drunk and clap
my daughter turned into this parisian bitch

along the highway are rubber gloves, they in the slipstream;
you forget how green the world can be


i never had grandparents, i dont know old people
i remember my dad's dad wearing suspenders
uttering incomprehensibles,
he would say

'tinker to evers to chance'
and 'uno, do, tre, quattordici'

all mommies and daddies,
you really beefed it now,
here's our house on the map, and if you were a cop
nearby you would see lime green dots, glowing;
thats the little poets copping the bad guy,
the smell of plaque, the shrill horns
cutting the mountain

these guys are almost in their mid-20s
should it have gotten like better or something?

ha! like we have a reference point,
we're full of walnut shapes, riding the caboose
come through rooms into darker rooms,
we'll be in the mummy bags like a frankenstein

peeping out with the easy smile, conspiratorial
winking and walking like a spy towards doom,
walking the corpse that wears a white mask

the wind blows and what is dead falls out of the trees
why would we bother mourning,
the branches like clasped hands

crawling around in tide pools

the yellow grass where the birds live, it slices you
theres something that bugs in the air and makes me sick
the clouds swelling with the blue blood

old people echoes, things that stay in the halls
then they all seemed like where the ghosts were
i was pretty small then, walking around with a flashlight

the light shone down on the dead mice, dust winking like time
the mice are dead next to the pile of rain boots
the mice are dancing in the spotlight, shimmering brilliant

'here squirt, spondoolies for you'
'gee, 23 skidoo!'

i always wish i hadnt had
all those times of high riding,
throwing trash out of the car windows
pretending the world wasnt fragile and small;
plumes of smoke reflected in sunglasses

i about how a castle falls off the cliff
and stones go down into some waves;
i didnt have enough gas to get us home,
you're in my head, on the phone,
saying "my baby my baby"

the sun is steering slow and crazy like someone
who cant get the fog off the windshield,
hopefully no one will ever love you because you are weird, sad, or lost

they were listening to nostalgia songs in the coffee place
the bathroom smell reminded me of when i was at camp in the woods
with screen doors and moths flying in circles around a light
and the little boys have pissed on everything possible

all these troubadors gathering around a dim fire
they each wishes that they were alone, so they could dream of families
without anyone else seeing their lonely coming out between the holes,
at the very least they put their tears to good use and put out the fire

its about 4 times a year that i find myself crying,
i mix it in the recipe with the bright colors, patterns,
rain running around the pillars, chicken fights,

the steam goes rising off of the pot
and the spiders hanging on the ceiling,
all swaying a little in their houses

being stupid and having good intentions
has never done anyone much good;
to be the burden of smarter, more careful people

but i'll go by there sometime
they'll pay me,
traffic lights light up my room

and all the lads
all the lads were on tip toes wearing sleeping bags
headed for the kitchen, where the pot was steaming
each of us has our own cup, we mix the pot, yes we mix and spit

you crazy diamonds, you days, i always fall for your traps
bad things happen because i make bad decisions

 I studied joy,

But who remembers an abstract lesson

Mugginess in the day, a sun

One or two small clouds,

like stomachs drifting

a blimp is carried away;
i dont fight anymore

I ride a motorcycle around,

the street is lined with trees

on my way to you

I’m hiding a bouquet in my jacket,

So inside me are silent flowers

There is so much emptiness,

that what we have is full
i dont fight it anymore

murk

caught in the alley

wearing the long johns,

mayhew rolled the junkie

i knew theyd get me later

all the houses had crosses

i imagined their insides

hollow and rife with echo

outside holy angels

they busted me

with the whistle

the chickens 

were gold and green

pecking at my bike

it rained and rained,

my kicks blown off

"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