#Poetry - Glass House Rule

I live in a clear glass house,
Most would call this beautiful.

I am free as I come and go,
I am honest as the day is long.

Anyone may stroll by and peer in and see me,
Anyone may know most of what I do.

There is only one room in my house with opaque walls--
My neighbors go insane wondering what I do in there.

#poetry - Black Sting in Mitosis

I got a sting in mitosis,
About my ears and my noses.
Such a hazy psychosis,
I wear my mom's panty hoses.

  Moses    shows his
  Holy   roses.

  Marbles  stop my
  runny    noses.

  Fingers  seper-
  ates my  toeses.

  I's and  me's and
  My psy   chosis.

Black nylon for hoses.
Black red buds on roses.
Black blood lines the noses.
Black sting in mitosis.

#fiction - On Pissing at the Girls Room

I was standing in line at the Druid, waiting for my turn in the men's room.

I wandered in thought.

Thinking about an Irish musician who said Paris is where he will be for St Patrick's day "Because that is where the money is."

It was taking the first gentleman extra long, so as I thought out things that had to do with the Irishman's proclamation, I drifted toward the door marked "Women"

I opened the door and moved to step in. But an arm extended in front of me. A women started talking.

"You cant go in there, its the ladies room."

I responded,

"I'd be rich if I had a dollar every-time a woman came out of the men's room."

"That's different," she said dismissively.

"Why? It may be true that I piss straighter than most women."

She waved her hand and responded, 

"I could piss any way I want as long as the seat is up and no one would notice."

I looked at the man standing next to this woman, he smiled. I looked back at her,

"That's great, but I'm still going in there."

She asked

"Do you like this place, yes or no?"

"Why?"

"Yes or no?"

"I don't have time for this."

"Because I like it, I live here. It's my favorite place.  And if you go in there, you'll violate them on the sanitary code."

"Sanitary code? What are you, Health Department?"

"Yes, I am."

"Here in Cambridge?"

"No, Boston."

"What's your name?"

"Kelly."

I took out and passed her my business card.

"Kelly, my name is Robert. I've been in ten thousand Boston apartments. You are doing a horrible job."

"Well that's residential. I'm commercial."

"Oh really. You know one time I made my entire class raise their hand without saying a word by just raising my hand and leaving it up."

She looked at the fella she was with and said

"You know, one time, in band camp--"

I cut her off---

"It has nothing to do with band camp. It has to do with black mold in bathrooms, bed bugs in the bedrooms, vegetation growing on the walls in the living room, and 16 people living in a 1 bedroom apartment. Among other things."

"But that's residential, I'm--"

"Set a proper example in one segment of the market, it affects the other segment. Do that. Now excuse me."

I stepped toward the woman 's bathroom again , and again Kelly's arm went up to block me. She said

"If you go in there, you will violate the Druid."

I looked at her arm then into her eyes. I pointed at the sign "Women."

"You see this sign? Well 'A Rose is a Rose is a Rose is a Rose.' And that comes from Gertrude Stein, the most femi-nazi of all y'all. So, I'm cool. Good night."

Her arm dropped. I brushed past her, stepped into the Women's room, closed the door. I proceeded to piss straight into the bowl. My piss stream landed in the very center of the water and stayed on target. My piss never touched porcelain, only Cambridge City Water. I used a wad of toilet paper to flush the toilet and the same wad to open the door. I did not wash my hands because they only touched my clean dick.

Kelley was gone when I came out. The man she was with was still there. He shrugged. I finished my drink, paid my tab, walked home, ate peanut butter and fell asleep watching True Detective.

#poetry - Faster than rolling foam

Pill good,
feel good,
let it be known:
I am the master
of the doggie bone.

I should,
we should,
best be going.
There is the last
of my soggie tone.

I took mine
so you take yours
and we all can
now do our chores.

Left foot, right foot,
bed bug sores,
what's that beyond
the failing shores?

Bench wood!
You could
lift this on home,
if you are faster
than rolling foam!

#poetry - On Snowflakes

in collaboration with Melissa Ross

There will be a tree
where you can
   put the snow flakes on
or my name isn't
                --Robert Frost

#poetry - On taking a piss

That's information!

I inform you
   O Dutiful Sea,
let the Whales, Fish, Lobster and
   Scallop
know about me!! 

#poetry - On Stepping Out for a Smoke

I crushed an empty box
   of Marlboro Reds---
It was such a good box,
   and felt good under my foot,
but it was no match
   for my weight...

   ...wait, what did I just say?

#poetry - Thank You, Mr. Keeper (A Note from the Rabbit)

It's a real bad habit
that I can't let go of.
No, I can't shake it loose---
it's a real bad habit,
   Duck, Duck, Goose.

I'm a real bad Rabbit,
found a hole that was deep.
Went down it deeper and deeper,
Yeah, I'm a real bad Rabbit,
   I went down to thank the Keeper.

I couldn't get enough,
you saw that, Duck, Duck, Goose!
though I never made a peep
while looking for the Keeper
of the carrots at the bottom
of the hole in the center
of the inverted mountain

I came down to say thank you,
and now eating this note in the walls
of the inverted mountain
in the center of the hole
at the bottom of this carrot:

     They were real good carrots,
     so juicy and sweet,
     each bite was oh! sweeter and sweeter,
     and they were real good carrots,
     I love you, Mr. Keeper!
     just ask Duck, Duck, Goose.
     Yes, I'm a real bad rabbit
     but they were real good carrots,
     and now they're gone, message done,
                                     ~and I'm loose!!~

#poetry - of worth and reason

if worthy i am
then worthy i be
getting all parties
to agree
for of course
a fee
constantly
and with only
good reason
negotiably

#poetry - making sway the unmonster way

i will be your unmonster, baby
and come to you in the break of day.
i will take the apple from your hand
and place it back in the tree
where it will stay.

can you handle that power, baby?
won't you give it a whirl anyway?
there could be something grand
and fulfilling in this sea
of your erring way.

yes, i will be your unmonster, baby
you will take what i am about to say
to the grave but not for a thousand
years yet or more---for we
gonna be making sway.

#poetry - to the immigrant idealist

you are young and naive,
but your parents are realists
and sent you here for a dose.

so, i know its fresh water
we expect you to piss on here,
something you'd never do at home,

just do it, kid, take the dose,
like your parents wanted,
close your eyes, if you have to---

close your eyes, kid,
and become an American.

#fiction - when the prospect suspects you

i am a salesman. i am what i say i am.

now, we're going to go into that house right there and i'm going to attempt to sell it to you. we're going to go up there and i'm going to use all the pyschological weapons in my arsenal to sell that house to you, i'm going to empty the cartridge on your mind, i'm going to dose you high, high, high.

all sorts of things can happen when i do this. you can like it, you can REALLY like it, or you can not like it, maybe even REALLY not like it. its up to the mind. and that's all that's really going to happen in there.

now, depending on the experience some have, you can find and read an excited exultant positive review or furious and scathing negative one. and that's what you did. you found and read a negative review from a mind that was unsatisfied by the magic spells his salesman used upon him. he hired a magician, on the word of a prayer, hoped for a sorcerer and never saw the wizard---and so because he can't except his own failure in the venture, he broke the code of his prayer and murdered his magician in the full light of your laptop or iphone.

so you read this review-thing and are affected by it. and want to carry a chip on your shoulder. and with every passive aggressive opportunity you have in our conversations, you want to unload that chip on my shoulders. like, your learned cynicism is my cross to bear. because think about it now, if it wasn't merely cynicism---if there was validity in the claim of those reviews, it would have to be true that i really am a liar or in some way incapable of working the magic spell on your mind, using nothing but the truth. but now you see, its only the absolute truth that i use on you. its funny right?

can you think about it? can you show me a smile? good. now, do you want that negative review to interfere anymore than it already has with our positive experience, with our dream about to become true? no, of course not. alright, cigarette break over!

now you're ready to see your new home.

#poetry - all the books , art and poetry have gone

"all the books, art and poetry have gone"
taken from the mind of another "poet"
   found lying flat faced on a forum,
i am smoking cloves djarum and---
     we are among the ruins.

Mr. Lawrence reamed us hard
with that knowledge
and we loved his lover,
her crisis and carriage,
and should we ever wake the Lady,
              let us wear the bottom half of her
ectasy and marriage.

in fact, let us eat lettuce,
and if we are ESL,
let us not quit over
homophonal phrases---
by the noon and lunch hour
come the proud show of daisies
so grand no one may tell.

what else could we ask for,
what else could total more
but grammar checks and traveler's cheques
     and maybe GWB's head on a spit
and the sound an arrow makes
when it hits dead center its target
and the dead-eyed archer's tremble as he quakes?

who's got the conch, anyway?
i'll trade you for some hooch!
and later we can get real busy
growing some our own,
don't you think? or don't you think?
you must not have gotten lost
going round the rink.

hey mister, or if you're miss or
misses, hey---hey now, you know
what i want to say is only this---
i'm not a papa, but i've got a bone,
     and i love picking daisies
when the sun is done for the day

and i'm a son, my life is one-third run!
    and who could be in love
and who could be on the run
     and who could enjoy the sound of the pop gun
when its not what you look at,
but what you see matters most?
                            ...uh-huh
    
     and i see you eclipse the wind sizzle
and i see me lip syncing your eulogy
   how fantastical you operate my mind
thought i would think otherwise?
thought i might think you were behind?
in the middle of the moment
cough cough ignite night,
            right right right right!

isn't that fun?
want to do it again?
go ahead---you next!

#poetry - Hey Honey Song

I'm going to go do my thing
do my thing, do my thing
I'm going to go do my thing
yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah

I'm going to go laugh and sing
laugh and sing, laugh and sing
I'm going to laugh and sing
yeah, yeah, yeah

I'm going to go have a fling
have a fling, have a fling
I'm going to go have a fling
yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah

I know you can't do a thing
do a thing, do a thing
I know you can't do a thing
yeah, yeah, yeah

I'm going so laugh and sing
laugh and sing, laugh and sing
I'm going so go laugh and sing
yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah

Laugh and sing while I have a fling
Laugh and sing I'll have my fling
Laugh and sing while I do my thing
yeah, yeah, yeah

#poetry - God plays Twister

..well, if I don't touch you,
Sister Mary Francis,
like I am right now,
well, I'm afraid you
         won't exist anymore.

#poetry - The Godbolt Reviews

Rolling Stone called it
"A waste of time."

New York Times replied
"Never heard of it."

The New Yorker said
"Not right for Slate."

A guy who had visited
four or five times tweeted
"Menacing."

Its creator says
"The hairs on the back
of your neck will turn
into ice monkeys and
dance you along ancient
corridors luminous
with psychic understanding."

The man with his hands
in his pockets
jiggles the riddle:

Old news and then some

#poetry - breaking down chicken town

here we go not so slow
it takes more than we got
but your hot so we go
if we're ready or not

like the pill and the drill
we get more than our fill
but its still as we are
so we hear its a thrill

so be ready cause i'm steady
and i'm coming your way
and its you and its me
and that's how it will stay

break it down i'm a clown
in the middle of sound
chicken town oh my god
look at how we were wound

#poetry - Artist Preoccupied by While Talking to His Subject

i would have you, if it were not you
and could not be traced back to me,
die in that corner a thousand times,
so i could see it from all angles
and hear its myriad echoes
and feel the gamut of feelings.

i would have you be subservient death,
a subject, an appetizer, an observable condition,
because i have two loves that surround you---
to be the painter worthy of paint
and to quiet my mind of this concern
ready then for another subject.

#fiction - like some fishermen

i heard this morning someone say,

"i don't want a lesson, i just want to complain."

i thought then immediately of pirates boarding a ship. angry amped-up pirates coming aboard an intensely valuable ship. but not to seize its plunder, or capture the vessel as a prize and, after executing its captain and commandeering its crew, sail it off to the secret hideaway paradise island they call home where it would be refitted to possibly become a flagship that could sail hard terror across the waves and guarantee forever hegemony over every sea.

that's not what these dream pirates wanted to do.

they wanted only to bore a very large hole at the dead center bottom of its hull and stand there adding their own weight to its then fast sinking. i can't seem to know, neither by concentrating hard upon it nor by wandering with every intoxication, exactly what motivates these pirates. but they have seized a hold of me metaphorically.

in flesh, i just ignore the person who says a thing like that, maybe write about it afterward, see if i can get a laugh in and then carry on to the next day like some fishermen do. that there--is just a storm my boat does not have to be apart of.

#poetry - The Beating

The beating was horrible and persisted despite cries from bystanders and all through the wild noise of blood gurgles and fist to face slaps and screeches like car tires calling for the authorties, like a teenage football player in flip-flops descending staircases after the first three muscle tearing spirit wearing days of summer camp.

The beating does not stop until the beaten are dead.

This is a hearty truth. This we must accept. There is no stopping it until then. Most prefer it this way.