Towel and Loaf

You should look outside
because that's where all the action is
the sky is bright black (a bruise!)
we're all on some calcium high
licking up the medicine
for some fainting spell
or mood change imagined
when you stand up
you fall in love and wobble
to the stool with a towel
and a loaf. I'm on to you.

Thursday with Spinoza

"All things excellent are as difficult as they are rare."

-Spinoza, Ethics V. 42

All of a Sudden Todd

Glazed Todd touching tongues where earth meets Todd
comes to terms with the blue star Todd while tumbling Todd
runs into the woods or sniffs water Todd where someone might be
behind Todd earth to Todd receiving mixed messages teary fairwell Todd
after glee breakfast Todd a sad play with elements of grace Todd
with blood on gray sheets Todd July I love you the unsettled nature
of Todd anxious Todd pressure rises to meet tardiness highway
lumbering by Todd cool wind off jumping man Todd in the middle
of nothing if not glad Todd think about it Todd the triumph of bliss Todd
distant Todd all of a sudden we're bouncing on Todd closing the door
on Todd not looking back at Todd walking to the F without Todd
just late without air sucking up the unsettled Todd it came
so unexpectedly tears for Todd in the middle of nothing if not glad
then panicked fat tongue lips in a dribble lost to salt Todd.

Bob Dylan - If Not for You

The Sweet Morning

Though it be calm but a blink
a flash on a cable of light milky
and dull the thread of metallic
is the pop in the mind
and what comes holy comes
sooner than later if you believe
in that shit wash my hands of the grief
of systems in the boundries of hours
the bolted body frame too heavy too tilted
to sit upright the speckle the throb
starting the day with a gentle call to rain
and peace - rain and peace.

Merce Cunningham, Rest in Peace

Thom Yorke

The Olympic Oval at Ironman Lake Placid 2009

Thanks for this, Jake!

To the Harbormaster by Frank O'Hara

(this is one of my all time favorite poems--the entire poem, but mostly the final lines have been bouncing around my head for the past several days)

I wanted to be sure to reach you;
though my ship was on the way it got caught
in some moorings. I am always tying up
and then deciding to depart. In storms and
at sunset, with the metallic coils of the tide
around my fathomless arms, I am unable
to understand the forms of my vanity
or I am hard alee with my Polish rudder
in my hand and the sun sinking. To
you I offer my hull and the tattered cordage
of my will. The terrible channels where
the wind drives me against the brown lips
of the reeds are not all behind me. Yet
I trust the sanity of my vessel; and
if it sinks, it may well be in answer
to the reasoning of the eternal voices,
the waves which have kept me from reaching you.

3 from Lake Placid

Dreaming in the Language of Lake Placid

Stillness comes to town
in a caravan of light plastic
and nerves. It is painful to think
of going but not going to be
home again for some time.
In the event of an aftermath
a linking of arms or sleeping
of a certain wet sleep
under red sheets. Think of
this and whisper the language
I tried to make you speak
from the heights of your love.
This a place of purpose not doubt
filing in one-by-one
a circus of thoughts
and still so much to be done
I yawn the night away
next to thoughts of you.

Three

Ultraviolet Light Safety Month

The hormonal rays of the sun will
lift you should you let them cream you.
We make a little play up
and in the play I am the merchant with
a cloud over his shoulder, but ready for bread
and butter and brighter days.
There are salespeople and clicks of the tongue
on the roof of the mouth that signify
nothing more than sticky food and plaque.
I am yours to desire should the moods become
more or less shattered we'll count the moments
with taps on the back of a monster.
What monster? It's raining all the time now
that it's summer and the people are all
helpful with their glazed skin. They make you feel
better about not being able to help them.
Still there are moments of bliss that
can barely be contained. The musicians
are tuning up, you enter the room and there
is a swell of delight, wings spread, butterflies
flap against the steel blades - that sort of stuff.
I might let you in should you want in.
Actually, you're soaking in it.

For Everly

This doom silt is a blockage that won't sit still
the words come as shafts of light
lit up on lips through morning blinds
each stain a reminder of some bird shot in mid-flight
or that people made love here or desired to be enveloped
in the comfortable hope of companionship here.
Ill-at-ease in a skin suit that is tarnished and frayed.
There is only one way out but that seems too complicated
too final, too doused with remorse to remain viable.
This is a real situation for the most benign of clowns.
What's past is past while the labor of forgetting is more
than all the field hands lift spirits to feed mouths
with rain-soaked strawberries. I've hummed your name in far fields,
I've pressed my nose to the same flowers,
I've licked chocolate from your fingers.
I'm not one of them or even half of them
the sadness of my labor sweeps away all the joy that came before
this day, it's conclusion so sullied by emotion, where it crests
or blooms but is not forgotten. I'm trying.

I Love Plywood

Patti Smith - Horses & Hey Joe

Thursday Night

I'm so dirty now that I'm broken

Listen

Give the Lion a Rest

It might take a year of rest
to incur doubt the seed in the middle
of green fat a body with trouble
that shakes the soap into the drain.

The robust awash a saddle
some basin to fill with plum wine
and a fork to stick in a thick set
vibrant and shiny you planted a tree.

So live in it thin meadow with milkweed
scooping the insides out of a doll a layer
of dill the tug of germs escapes the couple
on the floor a demand or a rug.

Venting comes in breaths then an opening
lit up to make bent what stood straight a gash
in the tent and then again a slit
opened up the question the solids.

Seep inside you fill your belly with
winners salad spice looms aches asleep
your arm asleep your dry dreams
cast a wide net in the smart class a likeness.

A humming bird or a bear I really need
to take extra care I just wonder if there were
a number assigned to each day how many
if we were counting down to something a figure.

Because I Was Alive Then

Think of a place and then go there
even if it seems harsh people
gathered there might entertain you with
biting your arm or slapping at you
for your successes. They might tell
you things about their moods and how
wallowing in fatigue is just one way
to smother yourself and get
swallowed by the night. They might
expect a lover's hand on your back to greet
them too when they taunt you
with words whispered into your ear
in the dark all the loops of the same scenes
they haven't invented a remedy for.
There is a spool where it touches the lobe
you should just shove it the fuck in
and get out of Dodge on a Schwinn.
In your books all the words are smudged.
Nothing tells you its over everything shines
begin so lets collect your dust
and put it in your dumb show.
You make scenes all the way up 7th Avenue
vomit silver choked up once so breezy and wise
a sassy college kid in crazy sunglasses
signified rebellion to you but
you don't know and you still don't know
so you don't even know where to begin with me.

Riceboy Sleeps

Summer!

Saturday Morning

Devandra Banhart - At the Hop

When the War Comes

Read this because I'm only going to write it once
this respectfully yours hear me out
I remember almost everything
so let me help you take off your pants
in the TV room I am skipping tongues
playing robots with the kiss ass
all over the place people are eating pie
and diving into chips and slacking off
like they were in a documentary
about losing their cool and collapsing.
Well we are not for that we have established facts
to ward off the dreaminess emitted by the cool kids
who, no matter what you say, were not the drama kids
by city lights and the sounds of neighbors
through the pipes in the bathroom
you are not ever alone now that you know us
we brought these tools for you to use
your brain has an emergency room and there
is something aching in that room
now you understand all about
clanging and tears and being anxious about
vinyl and paper and recycling the news.
Some people have to be put under just to sleep
enough to let their organs regenerate
in a heap on the floor is a list of things
that can be chewed off your body
when the war comes you'll be hungry for
those parts of me but I'll be long gone.

Talking Heads - Warning Sign 1978

Thursday in Photographs

It's Tuesday

Oh mid-July! Oh super dim or bright!
Nothing feels just right!
Now z-slices the graphs of analytics
while the words you use are like tiny ice baths.
The aroma of spearmint is waiting
in the vestiges of my ache yesterday
or today. To keep a close watch
on this heart of mine. To exercise
caution with chaos because it dims the path.
Morning glory and heart hole - hair smelling
of mesquite and earth and bear.
Find the calm center - nothing is predictable.
Then a musical program with mustard
and strep. This mint. This morning.
This molecule of grace and understanding.
This life. I'll lay back down - too dizzy to run.

John Cale - I Keep a Close Watch

William S. Burroughs

3 from the 4th of July

The Grates - Aw Yeah

Telepathic 23's & Still Life Collaboration

I Will Not Eat a Bird Today

A bird is something you can listen to
and then eat should the feeling of hunger
come to you in the night you can listen
to my breathing. My face can be eaten too -
you wouldn't eat that would you? How
would I smile when you come back home?
I trust that the night will not
make you leap in that direction.
If you haven't made out to Led Zeppelin
then you haven't ever really made out.
I can't stop hopping on one foot.
When you move to me I know what adagio means.
The light makes my heart flutter -
are you hungry? You wouldn't eat my heart
would you? I'm dancing, you should see it -
but I'm not dancing now - I'm thinking
about sky and light and the way the city
is a trumpet blaring into my eyes - can you hear
it in your canyon?

Radiohead - True Love Waits

Pina Bausch: Rest in Peace

My Day

I have a fancy harness that lowers me
into the subway via diamond studs
the emeralds some rubies on my cuffs.
I have attained VIP status in the mass transit system.
I have a sandwich and think about
being here in Brooklyn while
people wander the desert
or stick stickers to notebooks.
There are cars on every block
the buildings here look tall and sketchy
there are a few animals making
dirty sounds and some rabbit is languishing
for the fall of that lily. That honeysuckle tree
is a fragrant drug that I'll pass on.
Put one foot in front of the other
do a math problem at lunch
find a note and let out a little yelp.
Cradle the doorknob like a lover's
wet throat or a doorknob. Think about
the people and do what you can for them.

Sonic Youth - Sacred Trickster