all these people…
talk…talk…talking loudly…
even the sign language screams…
everyone desperate to be heard…
no-one listening…
just noise…waiting their turn…to make noise…
business deals…
office gossip…
incoherent…too much…
tuned-out…
wanting nothing…
silence is needed…
to be alone…
alone…
alone…
where were you…
here…
you were here…
yes…
the whole time…
yes…
here…in this room…
that’s right…
with me…
i was in this room with you…yes…
in this hour…
in this hour…yes…in this room…
watching me…
i was watching you…
watching me breath in and out…
yes…yes…the whole time…didn’t take my eyes off of you…sat right here the whole time watching you breath in and breath out…keeping pace…
keeping pace…
yes…your breathing…
and what did you find…
in watching you…
yes…in watching me…watching me like some lab-rat…a monkey perhaps…seeing what makes me tick you might say…
it’s an observation…
observing me…
yes…
why…
trying to get to the heart of the matter…finding out as much about you as we possibly can…
whose we…
a group of us…
a group of you…
yes…a group of us…watching you…looking at the nooks and crannies of your inner-being…a fact finding mission you might say…
you might say…
are you aware of your sleep patterns…
not really…
you don’t sleep soundly…
don’t i…
you do not…
i do move ’round a bit…
a bit…
yes…a bit…
you do not sleep well at all…
don’t i…
you do not…
and what do you want to do about it…
you need the machine…
the machine…
yes…the machine…
don’t like the sounds of this…
no-one ever does…
attach me to a machine…
yes…your kind needs the machine…
waht do you mean…
your kind has always needed the machine…
i will not be a part of the machine…
oh but you must…
really…
eventually you will all become part of the machine…
what if i refuse…
that is your choice…
so i have a choice…
well…not really…
my breathing is fine…
not what the numbers say…charts…
graphs with colors…
yes…
always graphs with colors…
we like colors…
show me these colors…
in time…in time…
tell me…are you on the machine…
not about me…
yes…not about you at all…
this is about you…you need to be fitted for the machine…
fitted…
very strategic…
i see…
come back in a week for your orders…specific orders pertaining to you…
to me…
yes…the machine will help you…
heard that one before…
see you in a week…
again…if i refuse…
sir…no-one refuses the machine…
and i walk in early morning hours…trains run throughout the night overhead with sparks flying off rails…brakes screaching…neon flashes and spins…flashes and spins…
in darkness Gabriel blows his horn …watching cops cruise Lake and Halsted…below a sign saying FRESH KILLED LAMB…this lamb slaughtered by man with spikes on wood…spikes on wood…
nailed to a cross for the everlasting love of junkies…speedfreaks…crackheads…whores…men in the streets askin’ for a buck or two…while all of Babylon falls from grace… Chicago too…
one sign says LIVE NUDE GIRLS…’cross the street is Windy City Labor…poor blacks and poor whites will be linin’-up soon for the daily slave market…hopin’ to get picked…hopin’ for a check to cash at the bar next door…never is a drink on the house…
and the lamb cries out to his father…forgive them…they know not what they do…blacks killin’ blacks…whites killin’ browns…as rents go up in a town in desperate need of rest while a new-born sucks upon a breast seeking nourishment…as Gabriel blows into dawn… into dawn…wailing is heard…shh…listen…
Lake and Halsted…Lake and Halsted…where white girl dances into morn…boy is shot in the arms of america…and a 40oz. sits in a bag on the curb…empty as a soul on a Saturday night…
as Mary the whore and more cry at the feet of the lamb…praying for his return…some day…some day…come back…come back…deliver us all…
from Lake and Halsted…Lake and Halsted…
i look ’round and there is nothing…a case for glasses…wooden lamp…books…this bed to rest upon at night…not for dreams…not for dreams…
and there are copper cups we drank from on chilly November Eve… a bond fire glowed…smells of whiskey…mint…nights of lifted spirits…here’s to lifted spirits…
we would drink till late into early morn…telling stories from our youth…first drink…first love…first heartbreak…we drank and drank…i miss those nights…
this drink is to us…i raise this glass to us…to our once upon a time love affair which was toasted everynight…i drink this to you old friend…i drink this to you…cheers mate…cheers…
i look ’round and there is nothing…a case for glasses…wooden lamp…books…this bed to rest upon at night…not for dreams…not for dreams…
travels…
town to town…
wandering roads…
wind-burned…
aimlessly walking…
slowed pace…
hope in a god…
soul grows wary…
bones ache…
where is the magic in poverty…
sleep under bridges…
naps in fields with weeds grown tall…
comfort gone…
no couch stretches on Saturday afternoons…
a hoody keeps me warm…
roads crossed…
Missouri…Oklahoma…Texas…New Mexico…
counting license plates…
keeping track of Viceroys…
smoke ’em if ya’ got ’em…
blinding white swept over a highway…
plows pass-by…
trucks from out East do not slow-down…
deadlines to meet…
my body knows no schedule…
the road again…
known too well…
what song will play through my head today…
which story will i remember…
a tale of us…
heard she was in New York…
doing time in corporate america…
business transactions…
contracts signed…
checks cleared…
her dreams came to life…
these american dreams…
the allure of money…
life’s riches…
titles taken…
was not for me…
a life of flights and morning trains…
t’was soul i longed-for…
hunger for redemption…
Lord give us our daily bread…
walk…
stroll to another town…
exiled from the big-time
alone with god…
was all i ever wanted…
our choices made…
decisions thought-out…
writing another line…
this poem…
pieces of us…
A Portrait of the Artist As a Young Man and Ulysses stand side by side…sandwiched in by Norman Mailer novels…on a desk amongst keys…liquid soap…a coffee-pot…
Tropic of Capricorn and Ted Hughes lean upon a red leather-bound Bible towards the end of the bookcase…a silver mug used for Kentucky Mules prevents them all from falling…Unamuno lay on his back taking in Sun-light…quarter filled boxes of fried-rice and lo mein dance ’round the Spaniard…
Cervantes and Simic sit on an Ottoman…waiting and waiting to be read again…and again…once is never enough…while Baudrillard’s, America…bent and warped…cling to Shepard in a night-stand drawer to be read…just before dreaming…just before dreaming…
these friends i keep…
these friends i keep…
tried talkin’ to him…no use…he’d just sit there an’ stare off into space…didn’t know what he was thinkin’…sure wasn’t what I was sayin’…wanted nothin’ to do with me…sit alone…be by himself…that’s all he wanted…
an’ I’d call from time to time to see how he was doin’…answered the phone in this real low voice…Texas drawl…didn’t even say hello…just …,yeah…,ask him how he was…nothin’ was said…like talkin’ to myself…found myself responding to my own voice…repeating what was said to him on the other line…far far away…he was gone…
one day he called me…got this notion ’bout headin’ down to Texas to see where his mom and dad were buried…said he was gonna’ hitch-hike down there…start out walkin’ then put his thumb out…said somebody’d pick him up…
told him that wasn’t a good idea…August heat would knock him for a loop…said he needed to reconsider…he just laughed…said I didn’t know a thing ’bout the road…told stories of bein’ young an’ hitchin’ to Denver from Dallas…an’ from Northern New Mexico to places in Southern California… ‘fore he met mom…then again…he talked of trips to the Moon as well…
keep goin’ by his house…tryin’ to call him…no answer…maybe he went ahead an’ took-off after-all…he just might’ve…
been a month now…
no word…
we’d spend hours lookin’ at old photographs…colored pictures of when we were in love…vacations to Canada…New York…shots of Paris in an album marked, Memories…
always started with a bottle of red…poured till the last drop was gone…we’d just pull the cork outta’ another one an’ continue-on…lookin’ at shots in high school annuals…hair parted down the middle…freckles…tough guy poses an’ pretty girl smiles…
spent our time in the past…her with a family on a farm pickin’ corn during harvest time…football games for the boy who’d go-on to sell insurance…me…talkin’ ’bout a life with a wife an’ a loneliness that was always there…
wine would turn to whiskey…more talk of times in the past…never wanting to face the present…a future…took comfort in misery…multiple affairs…lies upon lies…always havin’ to cover tracks…fresh foot-prints of lover’s paths ’round midnight…
an’ we’d talk till we passed-out…music blarin’…windows opened out into suburbia with blue street-lights givin’ off a haunting hue… the fan blowin’ pictures of old times…portraits flappin’ in the wind…
we’d spend hours lookin’ at old photographs…colored pictures of when we were in love…vacations to Canada…New York…shots of Paris in an album marked, Memories…
people eating alone…drinking alone…thinking alone…no-one looks at the other…they eat grilled cheese sandwiches…salads…a constant eye on a cellphone…a computer screen…fingers pointed…pushing a screen…a new age has dawned…
other than bad 80’s music playing…there is no noise…just quiet…no-one talking…people penalized for conversing…sharing ideas…pleasantries…as if the human voice has been silenced…
maybe it has been…
used to drink and make love everynight…it’d start when we got home from work…open a bottle of whatever sounded good…a Cabernet…Merlot…some times we just headed for the hard stuff…vodka on rocks or straight-up whiskey…we didn’t care…it always took us to the same place…
we’d talk ’bout loves from the past…your exes…my exes…wives…husbands…lovers from a long time ago…people that’d broken our hearts…just talk…talk till the late shows came-on…we’d turn the volume down and colors would fly through the front living-room as we held each other…kissed one another…the bottle was always near-by…
then we’d go back to talkin’…drinkin’ an’ talkin’ in the dark…no-longer a blueish hue…no more sound…just our voices an’ some laughter…you’d start to tickelin’ me..tried to break away…always got me…layin’ on my side all curled-up just both of us laughin’ till we started kissin’ again…we always wound-up kissin’ again…
used to drink an’ make love everynight…i’d think ’bout you all day long at the factory…passin’ along products on an assembly-line while you were away at some store sellin’ paints and brushes…got real jealous when you’d come home talkin’ ’bout how some painter was hittin’ on ya’ in aisle 13…askin’ ya’ if you had a boyfriend…were ya’ single…
made me angry…all that talk ’bout other men…i think ya’ knew that…but ya’ kept talkin’…an’ puttin’ your mouth on mine in a soul kiss that would last till the next drink was poured…always wondered if that’s what happened with your husbands…your lovers…if ya’ set out to make them jealous too…
an’ i was no better i guess…tellin’ stories ’bout times in Canada with the wives…New York stories of how we’d stroll through Central Park…don’t know why i did it…maybe i was tryin’ to top ya’…get back at ya’ for makin’ me mad with envy…i wanted to be that painter in aisle 13…
we just drank an’ made love everynight till we was both done with each other…two lonely people tryin’ to escape the blues with kisses and wine…kisses and wine…
never did it taste so good…
