ALADDIN SANE

Instead of demanding 

that he live 

forever

(against the rules 

anyway, to hear it from 

its servant's mouth), 

the unlikely true master 

of the power 

of that lamp 

merely rubbed it 

gently as he wished 

under his breath 

for a swift but lasting 

end to his perennial 

fear of death.

THE SHORT POEM

Like a wink of the eye 

it departs 

as it arrives; 

it's an opening gambit,

sans the tedium 

subsequent

to the knock-em-down, 

drag-em-out grudge match 

which follows it.

But it surely isn't 

some boldly 

unsinkable Titanic;

it's more like

a kayak 

which cannot be tipped 

because it's small enough 

to fit between 

the waves 

of all our lives—scanty, 

yet unflappably 

demanding: it survives.

MARKET VOLATILITY

Shapely runes 

I gather 

with such

passion every morning, 

by evening, speak 

a language 

I no longer 

understand. 

THE TRAGIC HERO SOLILOQUIZES

Not infrequently, there are evenings

when every light 

is green 

on the bleary 

return-trip 

from the place I was meant to be—

which is a way I have

of knowing 

that I'm a whole universe,

but I always, 

impossibly, seem to be trapped 

inside another universe. 

SUMMER BREAK

Finally, the sound 

of children

flooding the post-rain park, 

squealing 

at earthworms, eager 

to learn things.

ODE ON THE LACK OF A GRECIAN URN

I don't know 

about quietness, 

but I'm sure

when formlessness 

divorces its brides, 

it never says

goodbye; 

it just whispers

an empty

see you later.

Okay, so

maybe beauty 

isn't truth,

but sometimes, it's 

truth's and my 

mediator.

GHOSTWRITTEN

Instead of composing,

I've been sitting 

in the kitchen, 

listening 

for silence, but hearing 

myself think

that just 

doing nothing 

is a kind of action,

and action 

is a kind

of music.

JOB DESCRIPTION

Is your hobby 

to take 

note of things?—

is that phosphorescent sheen 

of night clouds rimming 

city skies 

greener 

or bluer than the evening 

before? 

If the time it takes 

for the furniture 

to grimace, or 

for every flower 

to earn its

own word—

and each word, 

all the time it requires 

to mean—

then, you might qualify 

as our key change, 

as our modulator,

as that flat sixth 

which transmogrifies the mode 

of the day;

redresser 

of all 

status quos, recoverer 

of songbirds—

over 

and over again, 

but always

in some 

new way.

SELF-DEFENSE WEAPONS

We all like 

to think we've 

closed the book 

on such studies, but 

could it be 

that, evolutionarily, 

the "purpose" of these 

tongues was 

not so much 

to speak 

as to 

tunnel themselves

firmly 

into our cheeks

as we 

effortfully cultivated 

a relationship 

with our melancholy 

which allowed us 

as a species 

to never mean 

what we feel,

to feel only

what we know,

and worst (read: most 

advantageous)

of all—to never know 

what that means?

DELIMITED

It's just as I thought: 

this evening's 

dim tide,

mauve-gold and 

unfolding
gradually before me, 

at last reveals 

not bewitched bliss

but tranquility—

to be just one term

of a sprawling 

equation—

to humbly read 
proofs until 

glumly convinced

that absolute 

anything 
does not exist.

QUICK HITS

As the distance

increases, all images 

dissolve themselves—

all objects, 

in the big 

bang, white hot 

mania 

of their expansion, 

are spun into the beatific 

clichés of dime-

store mysteries. 

Take that distant 

undulating 

scramble 

of pigeons, for instance;

 

to witness it 

hurtle 

toward cheap abstraction, 

like a cut-rate 

cigarette, is  

still my small pleasure—although

to not comprehend 

what the purpose 

or goal is 

still my great 

privilege.

NIGHTMARE

One by one, but soon

in multiplying 

throngs,

our words 

grab experiences, 

hold them down, 

crack them wide

open, and feast upon their 

contents. 

No one had told us 

they were so strong.

Yet we fail 

to connect this 

to the zombie 

apocalypse we'd 

read about; 

so we go right 

on talking, 

doomed, like 

nothing's even wrong. 

LATE STYLE

Now, as then, 

we write essays—op-eds.

Only, now 

that we aren't being 

graded on them, we must 

cash-out our paychecks 

and get numb 

to feel correct.

But, 

worse than 

"not working," 

we no longer find it

necessary. 

*

What's left 

when the symbols 

we once held 

hostage 

refuse to validate us,

other than a sense 

of satisfaction 

which our children 

find embarrassing?

*

One electron, 

it's been shown,

will emit  

its own photons. 

Another electron 

swallows them 

up again.

The world is 

the world; we have had 

no effect. 

BUCKLE UP

I have held forth 

before, of course, 

about my clambering 

into the car—

the weapon 

on wheels—

the metal machine—

the loud suit 

of armor—called language 

and imperiously putting 

the pedal to the floor. 

But 

what I hadn't 

mentioned earlier 

was that I

never learned 

to steer, 

so that renegade DeLorean  

just excursions 

where it wants, 

and I'm frightened 

a little 

to be its servant 

from inside it—

less like a storyteller 

mowing down his readers, 

and more like 

a hapless country squire 

who used to dream always 

of becoming a knight 

but never 

of having to go 

to war.

PERSONIFICATION

The way the light 

by which I

write is 

elemental—

but in no sense 

compulsory. 

The way the wind 

wends through birch trees 

to buffet me in 

short sleeves 

at this spot 

on the planet

on this particular instant, 

but never 

can be said to have 

properly had a beginning. 

Perhaps this 

is what we mean 

by essential:

a thing like hunger

which never was 

invented, yet

comes to us unbidden,

grabs hold 

of the void in us firmly 

by the handle, 

 

and fills it 

to the brim.

HEAD-ON

After everyone who smiles 

when they say your name 

has died—

after every insincere 

prophet out there

eye-witness-testifies—

after the government 

files are 

declassified 

and you learn, 

as the tide 

turns, that God 

was never 

on your side—then 

you may know 

how the horror film 

heroine feels: 

like the black hole 

at the center 

of the universe,

or the last one 

which vicissitude has 

deigned to leave alive—

not out of grace 

or compassion, 

but as a plot line,

as test 

of her capacity 

to look head-on

at the epiphany 

as it dawns in her mind 

that, this whole time, 

the calls have been 

coming from inside. 

INDEPENDENCE DAY

Cool morning, 

for July;

white dew intensifying 

scent off the pines.

No more 

tapped mines as 

relationship metaphors;

silence 

is general—freedom 

is mine. 

WELCOME TO MY MASTERCLASS

Just know this: 

a certain chill 

is essential.

An iciness, 

wherever it's 

applied, 

will act as a signal 

to bring blood 

to that place.

In just the same 

way, you can't 

pontificate 

or ramble; 

you must write 

with restraint 

before your 

audience 

will assemble

or any latent 

meaning can begin 

to radiate. 

MUSEUM PIECE

How cruel 

that the futile, over time, 

becomes the natural—

that barbarism, 

give or take a few 

millennia, grows canonical. 

Temples burn 

and cave paintings fade, 

but 

something harsh 

and unusual 

remains in their material—

some residue in the ash 

of our past inhumanity

yearns to be discovered.

And when, at last, 

that savagery's 

unearthed, 

lifted 

and placed under glass 

on display, 

we pay 

in cash, and we form 

a neat queue 

to view for ourselves 

how little 

has changed. 

DISLIKE

It's a thrill we feel 

deep in our bones, this 

self-loathing.

For once, we are

at one. For once, 

we are part of something—

we are part of 

the problem; 

we are wolves

in wolves' clothing, 

and we hunt our own

revulsion—not 

with a fury, 

or even 

as a joke, but 

because we're so 

engrossed by vulnerability 

exposed 

that we long to catch 

up with our goldbricking

souls

and hold them so close

that they choke.

PROP POEM

Relax, dear 

reader, you don't 

have to stick 'em up; 

this poem's not 

fully-loaded like 

Leaves of Grass was—

this poem (compared 

to that one) is more like 

a cap gun.

You know how, 

sometimes, you feel braver holding

something in your hand, 

more for the look 

and the feeling 

than anything?

But it's safer

if you practice with 

something more synthetic 

as you toy 

with the idea

of hauling-off eventually 

and holding-up 

your audience with

something that's authentic. 

SOLITARY CONFINEMENT

I think I 

get it now: these bodies

aren't temples—

they are small

locked rooms, which 

we're doomed 

to get to know 

too well

after pacing them

in circles 

for forty years or more. 

Before long, we know

the placement 

to the millimeter

 

and relish 

the smell 

of every stained 

stick and nicked-

up corner of their furniture.

And soon, 

we become so at-one 

with all the clutter 

that we don't think 

to to clean 

or run a quick 

vacuum 

underneath it anymore,

because 

even though we 

can't function without it, 

we don't even know 

it's there.