POEM 2

Grim lines 

form some 

gaunt parade—

a slim
but determined

celebration

in public—
of having

had this

sparsely
attended 

thought today.

CHOSEN

Get up 

and wipe 

your bloody 

nose upon

the following

all-absorbing 

truth—

you were

literally

born to be 

proof—

such luck 

was always

incredibly 

risky.

ABSTRACTION

This whole poem is just
a dumb little

song
for all the long shadows

gradually colonizing city
street corners;

whether dilations
of mirth

or gloom, of exuberant
sky-

scrapers or contentious
nursing homes,

of empty luxury hi-
rises, or

garbage-
crammed and abandoned

mail boxes—it doesn't
matter, so

long as
today and ever

after,
they continue

to afford us
that unconscious-

but very
conspicuous space

in which—not
to think

but simply
reiterate

all of our prior
versions of things,

to bravely, if even
for a

minute,
barely contemplate

the sheer
density

and
the thickness

of every saved
draft waiting

weightless—back
at home.

KILL YOUR IDYLLS

     I love not Man the less, but Nature more. 

     -Lord Byron


This mute potted

plant, that 

handsome

flat rock—help to keep

living here

from feeling

oppressive. 

But—a city,

an entire 

army

of each?

Well, we'll

see—

FAUSTIAN BARGAIN

It seems now, however rare
and however useful,
that certain words cost

a lot more than you
ever imagined. 

And to be sure: a good very many 

you received in
exchange were extremely
beautiful—luscious as pure 

cream, juicy as heavy
redolent fruit, and cut

precise as rare
gems, and inlaid in intricate,
particular patterns;

but precious
as they were, fatiguing to find
and even more formidable

to use (so secretly, 

so palpably inopportune—

that even post-hoc impressions 

of the ulterior labor of their 

assembly seemed
tacitly to serve
as appreciable features)

can you still say 

that it was worth it—when
not one, let alone 

the garlanded strands of hundreds
you've been hawking

alone out here
for years now, has ever 

earned you one red
cent, or turned a single 

head—blond
again?

NEXT THING YOU KNOW

If every moment's

such

a precious 

possession, 

then—

how the fuck do they

always manage

to change-
up all the

billboards—

when you're not 

paying attention?

*

Your desiccated liver pills
expired last month.

In another hundred 

years, your bones'll be chalk.

The prospect of protective containers is starting
to look like a marketing gimmick.

But if life is not a gift, then it must
be just—a bargain.

GUMBALL MACHINE

You can't help but
always eye-up

all the most
preposterous words,

juicy and
jumbled

in sensational
colors

expressing
exotic-

yet-
familiar flavors,

piled to full-
on bursting

in that lustrous
transparent

globe
over

there near the
exit door.

*

So as
usual,

you—quickly

procure yourself
a couple,

and each

dribbles
down

out of

order,
and they're

hard

and too
sweet

in your

mouth,
and the

whole plan

was
dumb.