Screen Dump 355

Moments like these when you feel adrift:
you're here; you're not here . . .
your life . . . a novella . . . or flash fiction . . .
soundtracked by dissonance
as if beguiled by harpies
in the palms of pallbearers . . .
You wake with the urge to use
the phrase in the know . . .
As misdirection, perhaps? . . .
Consolation? . . .
You enter the fray
disabling the tried and true
with the words of oglers
vying for redacting . . . and blueness . . . again . . .
Which would you rather be? . . .

Screen Dump 354

The day . . . overcast and strangely industrial . . .
armpit saddlebags
with full-blown cholesterophobia . . .
tipping the go-between to encapsulate time and attendance . . .
rehearsing the commonplace
three standard deviations above the mean . . .
Have I been duped into thinking there will be another? . . .
All this posthumous posturing, pshaw . . .
Back then, I suppose it mattered . . .
But now with deadbeats in ascendance, forget it . . .
An octopus-in-training inking nonsense syllables
itching with false promises . . . Instagrammed with time-outs . . .
insinuating itself into the best of times
when no one is looking . . .
How so, you ask? . . .
I am filled with the music of DakhaBrakha
a Ukrainian group I first heard on an NPR Tiny Desk Concert . . .
The preferred costume of flâneurs? . . .
Flannel shirts of course flapping on clotheslines . . .
Could be the beginning of a novella . . .
where readers cut to the chase . . . and regret doing so . . .
Reading between the lines . . . you backstroke beyond the breakers
as if in a scene from Beneath the 12-Mile Reef . . .
CinemaScoped and soundtracked with a little help from Terry Riley's In C . . .
And now, ladies and gentlemen, the last line . . .
the one-trick pony has vanished . . .
with just enough time on the clock for some to call it a miracle . . .

Screen Dump 353

I've been Kerouwhacked!
          - Anon

A fly in my eminent domain . . .
or a cockroach . . . or a pole-sitter . . . or dog-walker for that matter . . .
I suppose it would take a village, yes? . . .
Kiosks awash with how-tos . . . and instructions
for un-dancing . . . tipping the valet
who tripped on his way back to the Wayback Machine
with lines from Proof:
Let X equal the quantity of all quantities of X.
Let X equal the cold.
It is cold in December.
Gwyneth Paltrow trading eights with Hannibal Lector . . .
Armpit hair be damned . . .
it all boils down to goop, yes? . . .
He/she got Kerouwhacked brainstorming . . .
or barnstorming . . .
or talking through the walk-through or walkabout or walkout . . .
The steps of a proof are murky.
The steps of a proof are snarky.
The steps of a proof are nestled all snug in their beds.
Let X equal their beds.
And then someone took a shine to someone
and that someone opened it up to someone else
and now someone will have to take the hit . . .
Always looking the other way . . .
as if a periscope popped up in the Middle Ages . . .
your middle ages . . . when your juke joints
began stiffening with a creaking
that shook you awake at 3 AM
to speed dial your doc
who was on the third hole . . . teeing off . . .
thinking about Lexi,
his daughter's jodhpur'd friend from riding class
but first, do no harm . . .
You're not waiting for the phoniness to end, are you? . . .
Please tell me you're not . . .
Please tell me you've handed in the assignment
and that you're OK with the seating chart
and with Einstein's definition of insanity
instagrammed by iGens or Y2Kers or GenZs or whatever they're called . . .
many of whom sport Muffy's Lean Cuisine gap-toothed grin
after she was bad-touched by Dilbert,
the animated crossing guard . . .
super heavyweight Xboxer . . . regular contributor to Emojipedia . . .
awaiting the release of his feel-good single,
I Just Wanted to be Friended on Facebook . . .
And now what? . . . The neighborhood clown
has just trotted out his/her yoga mat
and is about to contort in full view of a selfie stick
which have been shown to transmit STDs
when you ignore your mother's warning
to never leave the house without wearing clean underwear . . .

Walking the Cat

(reposted from Wednesday, February 16, 2011)

[audio]

He prefers to spend his days lazed
in the stuffy arms of a chair by the window
where he can keep an emerald eye
peeled for caricatures in the street.
His pleasures are unparalleled
though this morning he carried on
about the hot cereal being anything but.
Later, despite the coming snow
he insisted on our usual walk -
the side streets troubled by student drivers
at ten and two, the vacant lot flecked
with white. We stopped for a paper
which pleased him to no end, knowing
it would eventually wind up in his box.
He doesn't seem to mind old news.
On the way home he mentioned
the snow blower which I should have
had serviced in the fall, and his wish
to return to his pastime of compiling lists
of restaurants with take-out sushi
at reasonable prices for friends and acquaintances.
But you know how that goes.

Tara and Corleone

Screen Dump 352

It's here somewhere . . . it has to be . . . I just know it . . .
Wind chimes . . . catching the blizzard's tail . . .
and you . . . journaling your odyssey . . . now in its nth year . . .
worrying the lines . . . that deepen
with every footnote . . .
nostalgic for the look you had
at the beginning of the New Millennium . . . aka Y2K . . .
Do you regard past playaphiles with a smile? . . .
Should you? . . . You're asking me? . . .
You paid the price for their best behavior . . .
You made the best call . . .
We all make the best call . . . in the moment, yes? . . .
when roads diverge . . .
and the photo-montage of smiling faces . . .
Smiling Faces Sometimes . . .
Smiling Faces Sometimes . . . pretend . . .
The Temptations, yes? . . . Psychedelic Soul . . .
The Wayback Machine . . . back to the '70s . . .
If they can do it . . . I can do it . . .
with Jack in the Beanstalk's goose laying golden
eggs on your face . . . after-hours clubbing
seals . . . awaiting their ship . . .
brimmed with henna intimacy . . .
and the dead silence of phony phone numbers . . .
Who knew? . . . Certainly not you? . . .
Then the stumbling began . . .
the eyeliner underlined with stilettos
and role confusion . . .
Erik - son of Erik - Erikson's Moratorium . . . and the hiatus . . .
I retreat . . . into my children . . .
I am my children . . .
I become my children . . .
I become untouchable . . .
I accept my sentence . . .
my paragraph . . . the entire book . . .
a cautionary, confessional tale of two people . . . me . . .

Patti Smith

Screen Dump 351

A cautionary tale of the imagination propels a cold plunge
into night which ends with back alley anonymous embraces
down a stairwell . . . into the street . . .
notebook jotting your cross-country gambit . . .
The morning after faced head-on
with words-of-the-day about false eyelashes . . .
and the misunderstandings . . . of playing the part . . .
Yet it did indeed feel good . . . almost . . .
filtering as a go-between
hinged on recording the latest in Odyssey Tales . . .
in which faceless extras being fed fried chicken
audition for the part of a modern day Caligula . . .
bipolarism notwithstanding . . . the meds suffice . . .
charting clang associations
and that darn thread through the labyrinth . . .
I am circus . . .
I am three-ring circus . . .
I am four- five- . . . six-ring circus . . .
careful, of course, in the derangement . . .
The requisite basic disorientation
and the need to temporarily unshackle the mind
from ordinary semantic logic . . .
There is absolutely nothing fortuitous about this . . . or that . . .

Eugenio Recuenco

Screen Dump 350

Tripping on bad soft-core porn
you are hurled into impenetrable writing
full of postmodern gewgaws
and whirligigs . . .
a room lined with waxy lemonwood paneling
deep in the bowels
of an unheard of snow day . . .
I don't think I like where this is headed . . .
I'm dog-tired from shoveling
and misunderstood besides . . .
OK, we'll back it off a bit
and cut to the symbols
of the unconscious:
a heyday of Freudian slips
and Jungian archtypes
with your tendency to pigeonhole
taking a back seat in a rusted-out stretch limo
pinned by first-timers . . .
The driver is hosting an open mic
reading his/her latest installment from an
uncooperative smartphone . . .
and we're here on the cusp of ordering-out . . .

Screen Dump 349

New and a bit alarming . . .
          - Beauty and the Beast (2017)

The bloated script toggles your erotic other . . .
as if at a meeting of sorts with a chameleon-like character
who never was . . . and never will be . . .
pushing a Something-of-the-Month Club app
celebrating the opening of the New NY Bridge . . .
Scalpers run lines down blind alleys . . .
Friends with benefits bottleneck stage doors . . .
The millennium's magic beans, yes? . . .
A portal to The Time Before the Time That Was . . .
cryptic codes choke galley proofs thick with odyssey . . .
costumes . . . understudies . . . extras . . .
liner notes nuanced
with clues to your whereabouts . . .
last seen being whited-out by sheets of snow . . .

Bruno Aveillan

Screen Dump 348

The thought of Klein's patented riff on ultramarine
and the high romance of pursuit
saturate your jealousy of time despite a high wind advisory . . .
Gym rats crowd onto a blue continuum with feigned defeat
pained by the thought of your strange repetitions . . .
their ineptitude straining the windows with halftime images . . .
You were climactically rebuffed, yes? . . .
but who's to say why? . . . Certainly not page-turners
who know the morbidity of sand
slipping in and out of costume and into the role of street
only to be shunted off into a siding . . .
You, not unlike many, are mired in the phrase bald-face lies . . .
its etymology as elusive as imaginary numbers
skipping beats to the turntable's scratching . . .
An obsession with interludes will soon spell relief . . .

Anka Zhuravleva

Screen Dump 347

You were kept up at night by Joan Mitchell's Les Bluets . . .
A book on the terrace . . . at the entrance to Monet's cottage . . .
now a pile of pages . . .
ghost-knowledge . . . a mark of erudition . . .
passing the plate . . .
like Beckett's Film starring Buster Keaton . . .
who remained confused . . . throughout . . .
asking Beckett if he had eaten Welsh rarebit . . .
freely improvising the lines . . . the melody dictates rhythm
and shared admiration
of facticity and the poetization of form . . .
What are you talking about? . . .
Not quite sure . . . but little matter . . .
especially now . . . toeing the high wire . . .
though costumed we are recognizable . . . spooning a hard conceit . . .

Samuel Beckett and Buster Keaton

Screen Dump 346

Under a fermata . . . as if the book's deckle edge . . .
With amplification your silence will inhabit
the margins of this poem
not unlike a ripening of sorts . . .
perhaps indifferent-seeming . . . at first . . .
then a buttoning-up against the cold . . .
You have become unsuited for tangentials . . .
play-acting . . . breathing in . . . breathing out . . .
trying to convince yourself
and the other (named after the main character)
that this is the language of lost things . . .
that this too is the way it is . . . as good as it gets? . . .
tagged . . . archived . . .
to be studied . . . continued . . . forgotten . . .
He/she enters you . . . becomes you . . .
The odyssey as virgule . . .
Your first tea . . . miles away . . . down the hill . . .

Francesca Woodman

Screen Dump 345

A fairer House than Prose.
          - Emily Dickinson

Instead the twitching vocabulary blinds us
with its patina . . . demanding entry . . .
You have experienced this yourself . . .
[see Journal entry #365]
Without reassurance then . . .
How we manage to traverse March Madness
on a snowy March day . . .
your bad ear tap dancing to Keats's Impossible Music . . .
flirting with segues . . .
past players working an audience . . .
Meditation as foreplay, yes? . . .
You haven't refreshed the pages, that's why . . .
There's a blueness to it . . .
hypnotic . . . despite the trepidation of icosahedrons . . .
20 questions? . . .
And why the cormorants? . . .
Instead of rewinding . . . try resetting . . .
It doesn't matter . . . the directions are misleading . . .
off-putting . . . thick with errors . . .
Of course, he/she wants to re-up . . .
Relegated to inefficiency . . .
the oversight of an overnight of the 10th order . . .
Recheck the code . . .
You embody the Pleasure Principle . . .
skim Freud . . . flag Jung . . .
You deny insensitivity, yes? . . .
arguing instead the pressure points of the body . . .
Little wonder the insinuations . . .
The algorithms wax geometric on your eyelids
providing a welcome respite to food shopping . . .
I can only imagine . . .
Unclothed . . . wrinkle-proof . . .
escaping into the figurative
as if a swell carried you across the jetty
on an overcast day . . . brimmed with extras . . .
Regard the script, please . . .
You were well-versed given your days at the manhole . . .
with its triangulation of
hand . . . mouth . . . womanhole . . .
Is that it? . . .
Shape-changing . . . and leaving before the sun . . .
not unlike a vampire . . .
Reason #3 for why your mother told you . . .
If the sitcom rolls in, be noncommittal . . .
the honester you'll become . . .
These elements will magically take flight
as if from your scrapbook . . . minus 18 minutes . . .
where someone reminded you to hedge your bets . . .
And, of course, the buoyancy . . .
You insist numbness, but that wasn't it, was it? . . .
as you sucked on your lower lip
waiting for the Windows 10 Update . . .
You were lavish in your arrogance
and partied-on until the bubbles were pried open . . .
your odyssey threatening to be something other
than what it was? . . . is? . . .
You continue to catch the wave of enjambment . . .
fresh from Neverland . . .
prancing ostentatiously . . .
and this is good . . .
indented on the next line to show that the break
is the result of space limitations
not the actualization of the self . . .
which tries mightily to crash the servers of past players
who insist the seduction of bass lines . . . not baselines . . .
for no reason other than buy-backs . . .
a pumping segue to the requisite . . .
your meter hashtagged as a dream sequence
intuiting its possibility via ekphrastic verse . . .
laid out on a picnic table astride cobs of corn . . .
Of course, there will be afterthoughts . . . as always . . .
a celebration of the "I" and the "you"
straddled with nary a homestretch . . .

Emily Dickinson

Screen Dump 344

That the room is spinning . . . spinning . . . spinning . . .
Unhouse your face . . . and begin . . .
Time bookends itself . . .
You have made-do . . . and made-off
with the likes of nobody . . .
Evidence bespeaks versatility . . .
I have been verily amused by your analytics . . .
and antics . . .
Intentionality 'R' Us, yes? . . .
Arrange the chimes farther down the row . . .
You have crossed yourself
past the row houses
seemingly at ease with the accoutrements
being examined and codified
in the makeshift alcove . . .
Of course I remember the locomotive works
qua casino . . . where the slots
found a home . . . and await the starting gong . . .
Isn't it as if you were pre-empted? . . .
It wasn't written that way . . .
I don't know how it was written
but I know it wasn't written that way . . .
A switch must have occurred . . .
and flipped . . .
Nonetheless, you will be less remarked upon
astonishingly mild-mannered
with a ripple-effect to unfurl your socks
in full color
in full view
in full payment
in retrospect . . .
His/her latest novel plays upon dot matrices . . .
It's a Fulbright . . .
Imagine the centrifuge . . .
and the particle accelerator
gathering dust
especially in that moment of anticipated reactions . . .
The Law of Anticipated Reactions . . .
Perchance to dream? . . .
And yet a smidgen, perhaps? . . .
While you're up, could you please flip
the complications . . . of that encounter . . .
when the reds, whites, and blues partied hard? . . .
Trust me, it wasn't allegorical . . .
There was no dispensation involved . . .
further, happenstance was not called upon . . .
You would think the obvious
but the outcome surprisingly took on
a broader issue
and made its way . . . tail between its legs . . .
to the photomontage
as if nothing had happened . . .
We were caught off-guard . . .
All of us . . .
And it was a good thing to be in good company . . .
We got the story straight . . .
with the attendant ifs, ands, and buts . . .
Things can get muddy . . . as you well know . . .
especially with the threat of climate change
and Holly Golightly . . .
You do remember Cat, yes? . . .
The knitsch was knotted . . .
We were about ourselves
with five minutes left in the quarter
and leftovers left over . . .
Please review the conscious avenue of deceit . . .
It's always there . . .
I have your back . . .
Thank you . . . and be well . . .

Audrey Hepburn and "Cat" in Breakfast at Tiffany's (1961)

Screen Dump 343

Caedmon, the illiterate cowherd, learned to sing in a dream . . . The seductiveness of the transcendent impulse, yes? . . . The words sometimes coming . . . sometimes not . . . sometimes the wrong words . . . No watcher at the gate, they enter the arena and the ears of others . . . their attempt to hurdle the ho-hum foredoomed to failure . . . You steel yourself . . . against what? . . . conformity? . . . obsolescence? . . . Free-wheeling afterthoughts stampede pageviews . . . provide just enough fluidity to prime a cold winter's night . . . the moon taking on all comers . . . in all weight classes . . . The concept of an afterlife . . . so day-before-yesterday . . . Are you still there? . . . or have you retreated into the deep woods of derivation? . . . Day-trippers choke supermarkets' aisles . . . fall victim to the trumpet's dissonance . . . without the bells and whistles . . . without the enthusiasm . . . of post-coital anaerobics . . . All for naught? . . . If push comes to shove, applicants will be required to submit their soliloquies in triplicate with a Sharpie . . .

Gemma O'Brien, the "Sharpie" Lady

Screen Dump 342

Your last time out was played . . . in mime . . .
good will hunting à la if-he-can-she-can . . .

a disastrous hookup . . . where less was more . . .
and more was even less . . .

with you lost among ceiling tiles
while outside Stevens's snowman orchestrated

nothing that is not there and the nothing that is . . .
And you ask . . . Why "now" the drama? . . .

Wendy Bevan

Screen Dump 341

You're a liar!
          - Tilda Swinton in Young Adam (2003)

But the expectation trumps the whimsicality, yes? . . .
Of what? . . . sleeping with someone? . . .
Ring around the rosie . . . earwormed . . .
and we're all falling down . . . the Urban Dictionary
reminding us of the Black Death
and the monkish chime . . . blurring genres . . .
as effortlessly as the banality of domesticity . . .
But I can do this now, having done time as a footnote . . .
Forget the intrusion . . . there was none . . .
But what about posed pics? . . .
Aren't they filled with lies? . . .
What are you talking about? . . .
Welcome to The Age of Lies . . .
You're kidding . . .
I'm not kidding . . .
Casual lies à la Billy Joel?
No, not casual lies . . .
Again you capture the fancy, better, the fantasy
of many . . . following a hiatus . . . of how many years? . . .
The voice in this line is unrecognizable . . .
Savoring the rush . . .
The rush, yes . . . yes . . . it's all about the rush . . .
Aware of the seamlessness of thought and action . . .
the invisibility . . .
And now? . . .
Zero-out the counters . . . and proceed with the scene . . .
He/she will attempt a comeback . . . at an open mic . . .
But what about Thomas Wolfe? . . .
Didn't he host an open mic? . . .
I don't think so . . . he was too tall . . .
besides, I don't have time to phone home right now . . .
Then make time . . .
Make time? . . . whoa, the designated optimist
has elbowed his/her way into the room . . .
Deliver the lines as written, please . . .
Pedal to the masses . . . no doubt . . . wait . . .
I'm googling as fast as I can . . . and now my eyes close
as I enter the fifth of seven levels . . .

Tilda Swinton in Young Adam (2003)

Screen Dump 340

The plausible deniability . . . wait, that's a bit too strong . . .
The plausible desirability? . . . no, no . . .
OK, waking to a snowstorm . . .
Another iPhone day chomping at the catch-as-catch-can . . .
Chomping or champing? . . .
Google it . . .
This will in no way be altered or elevated to make it more
conventionally literary . . .
Little matter . . .
I am at my best when I am at my best, yes? . . .
You are at your best with obfuscation . . .
Undiminished . . . he/she wanted to shout . . . I am undiminished . . .
by the inopportune . . .
by the sharp questions being hurled at me . . .
by the light of the silvery silence . . .
Walk with me . . . take a number . . .
How many times . . . how often . . . when did you begin
to feel like this? . . .
Excuse me? . . .
OK, you reek of hyperbolism . . .
Huh? . . .
You exaggerate . . . embellish . . . the idea
that your experience . . . oh, forget it . . .
But who among us does not? . . .
Among us? . . .
You know what I mean . . .
It's part of the bigger picture, I mean, poem, yes? . . .
Are you on the heels of . . . or on the coattails of? . . .
Please stop doing that . . .
Doing what? . . .
Regressing to one of your tried-and-true motifs . . .
like when walking along a roadbed . . .
Yes? . . .
You sense the locomotive . . . and wish for corrections . . .
the corrections you weathered in fourth grade
reading a graphic novel . . . on a snow day . . .

Screen Dump 339

The unbearable lightness of you sporting a bowler
(à la Lena Olin?) . . . slipping through an incognito window . . .
The notion that what goes around . . .
goes around an infinite number of times . . .
cameoed . . . cinemascoped . . .
as if Super-8s were the new now . . .
You sidestep the warp . . . and buy time
on the dotted line . . .
the nearness suffocating (as always?)
the decades-old memory of lovemaking
on a bunk bed . . . deconstructed . . .
with you pining for an inspection sticker . . .
a Möbius strip ensuring non-orientableness . . .
maintaining the mystery . . . for the before-after crowd . . .
rainbowed and enigmatic . . .
The naiveté of post-Internet security thugs
libraried . . . in the 800 stacks . . .
Purging the past with a keystroke, yes? . . .
There's always a room of one's own for everyone on this tug
chuffing its way through the Isles of Langerhans . . .
All you need is faith
To hear the diesels humming . . .
News that's fit to 3D print . . .

Lena Olin in The Unbearable Lightness of Being (1988)

Screen Dump 338

There seems to be a disparity . . . the images fragmented . . .
the lighting off . . .
and now you're squinting . . . at the camera . . .
trying to clarify the choreography of the odyssey . . .
He/she presented with a revised script . . .
and a smattering of masks . . .
You balk at the masks . . . and sketch an alternative . . .
The dialogue begins . . . off-cue . . .
and does its best to preempt the confusion
which is fogging the lenses . . .
The scene is re-shot with filters . . .
a waste of time . . . nothing seems to be working today . . .
Perhaps the reason is buried in the footnotes . . .
along with your memorandum of understanding . . .
How ill-equipped (unprepared?) . . .
especially now with an albatross as metaphor . . .
In this poem you are all artifice . . . the language frayed . . .
the letters of introduction misfiled . . .

Anka Zhuravleva

Screen Dump 337

Most of the time I don’t run and hide.
          - Bob Dylan

You seed the illusion
comfortable with the aloofness you've affected
your undeniable self awaiting word
wind chimes buffering fragmented hours . . .
You page through
taking notes
the photos yellowed and brittle
the footnotes tiresome
pages missing or hidden . . .
Why go there? . . .
Why not? . . . It all fits . . .
Or so you'd like to think . . .
But there are elements of happiness
of enchantment
of times spent with eyes wide shut
composing lines that . . .
That what? . . .
That were never delivered, I guess . . .
Aha! . . .
I could have followed the thread, you know . . .
And ended up where? . . .
Not sure . . . But not here . . .
And then? . . .
Look, most of the time not unlike the rest of us
I just try to soldier on . . .

Robert and Shana ParkeHarrison

Screen Dump 336

Apparently, you were comatose all those years . . .
a marionette to nimble fingers . . .
an automaton dispensing emoticons willy-nilly . . .
off-shore laundering muddying the movements
color-coded from your days
in the dorm hustling Monopoly . . .
The hidden room behind the grandfather clock
maps your seductions with wide eye-shadowed eyes . . .
the undertaking inevitable
as you surrender yourself
to the lusts of strangers
initializing tick sheets in the sun room
while picking lint from shirtsleeves . . .
Surprised? . . . And now, ladies and gentlemen . . .
the darkside . . . the underside . . . the blindside . . .
the other side of then . . .
the other side of now . . .
lip-syncing Regina Spektor's Hero:
He never ever saw it coming at all . . .
Wait! Can we stop with this outpouring of theater or theatre
this close encounter of the un-kind
this semiotic overload
this de-con-struc-tion
this rewinding of the tape
this ripping of musical addenda? . . .
You bought into the notion of restorative solitude
a power higher than the unremitting void
environmentally friendlier than dishwashing detergent . . .
You are doing your part . . .
Correction . . . You have done your part . . . And now? . . .

Francesca Woodman

Screen Dump 335

How does it feel . . . with no direction home? . . .
          - Bob Dylan

As if boarding a tram in an end zone of irregular verbs . . .
You . . . clothed in the outlandish . . . just to be oppositional? . . .
How many were there? . . .
No idea . . .

You mistake indelible for inedible
and jump into a brief novel of waiting
your Etch-A-Sketch sapping the body of eroticism
courts and rejects intertextual references . . .

No black and white idiom here . . .
the moments between objects and events . . . invisible . . .
You're invisible now . . .
you've got no secrets to conceal . . .*

Pocketing variations of enigma
flexing with the urgency of an unorthodox kind of desire . . .
you begin negotiating angles . . .
raging against outliers . . .

The ultimatum as pre-emptor . . .
as mystery tramp . . .
Genre-bending as gender ploy
skipping the discomfort . . . just when understudies arrive . . .

This is how it played out . . . in the dream . . .
how it devolved . . .
when all else seemed suburban
and you resurfaced as if at an impasse . . .

*Bob Dylan, Like A Rolling Stone

Francesca Woodman

Screen Dump 334

[audio]

Of course you remember those days, yes? . . .
soundtracked by Jaco's unfettered unfretted bass . . .
Can you spell Word of Mouth? . . .
Looping back to a mind of winter's pink skies
and the remnants of past players
infiltrating your portal
when 1 + 1 was an imaginary number
that laddered its way to the top of your Wish List
where Utopians sported recoilless Doc Martens
in colors to tweet home about . . .
There was no need . . .
no worms drilling into your OS . . .
Your play station was your life . . .
You were warned . . . acoustically . . .
Dylan's gray-sleeved The Times They Are A-Changin' . . .
as you made your way to the corner mini-mart
for Ed's toast (taste?) of the town . . .
circumnavigating the razor-fenced delusions
that profited everyone . . . and no one . . .
while vacuum tubes leaked
the words of poets who had signed off
on beta versions . . . bringing home the bacon
that would one-way-ticket them to an MRI
just when their buckshot ducks were all lined up
and the ovens were ready for the next mitochondrion . . .
Uber Drivers of the World deserve a break today . . .
A Room of One's Own . . .
Do you have an ARoOO? . . .
Of course you do! . . .
There's no telling . . . Yes, please go on . . .
rejuvenated . . . and rejuvenated . . . and rejuvenated
Come . . . You Master(bator)s of War . . .
stepping in and out of a series of dreams . . .
autopiloting plants from bulbs
commonplace bargaining chips YouTubing
your audition for a seat in the orchestra pit . . .
the pendulum swinging
back and forth . . . back and forth . . .
to Vincent's head on the body of a fly
in the flick's parting shot . . .
You was dumbstruck by the Creature from the Black Lagoon
and the mysteries of Julie Adam's white one-piece
that filled the screen
and your head
especially the scenes in the cave
on some backlot no doubt
which led to the bowels of the Paris Opera House
where the Phantom keyboarded
phantasmagoric seductions for Christine for over 27 years
besting Cats as the longest-running Broadway show . . .
Those were the days my friend
unfolding one after another
with suits papering the A Train
which morphed into The Polar Express
for most . . . if not all . . .
Little matter though . . . Little matter . . .

Creature from the Black Lagoon (1954)

Screen Dump 333

[audio]

This way or no way.
          - David Bowie, Lazarus

Tell-tale hearts tell all on morning talk shows

slotted with errant knights and distressed damsels . . .

wakeup calls . . . ignored . . .

Mavens . . . encrusted with sobriquets

enter roundabouts at speeds

unsafe for Bollywood trailers . . .

and you . . . without reprieve . . .

reminisce through the third chapter and beyond . . .

plotlines folded into money belts . . .

The absurd drama . . . at one remove . . .

anthologized . . .

repeated . . . repealed . . . for the better? . . .

What does this tell you? . . .

about him . . . about her . . . about him and her? . . .

About Eleanor Rigby? . . .

Where do they all come from? . . .

upstaging the Simon and Garfunkels of the millennium . . .

bookended . . . whispering in our ears . . .

anguishing over troubled water . . .

storefronts retrofitted for the now . . .

the without . . . and then some . . .

thinking back wistfully . . .

for however long it takes . . . to count out the coins

and assume the role of lead . . .

The deadline passed . . .

The language poets of Abyssinia . . . silenced . . .

demand a recount . . .

while shooters . . . at 20 paces . . .

with chips in their brains . . . and chips on their shoulders . . .

randomize death . . .

Like Bowie's Lazarus . . . Everybody knows me now . . .

David Bowie, "Lazarus"

Screen Dump 332

With camera obscuras [sic] on the virtual beaches of your odyssey . . .
the white sand studded with the vexing asymmetry
of indulgences flattening your life to a morality tale . . .

in which he/she becomes increasingly enamored of inked torsos . . .
This of course will be addressed in the next chapter . . .
along with the history of illuminosity . . .

Excuse me while I trot off to the deli
for a provolone and tomato on sourdough . . .
Trudging through the snowstorm . . . and all that, yes? . . .

There's something to be said for the interiority
of this short austere work of fiction . . .
It grabs from the get-go . . . with its refusal

to stick to the customary protocol of story-telling . . .
not unlike the days of pushing paint . . . sans serif . . .
Elsewhere sommeliers await the rematch . . .

Interruptions . . . make for interesting bedmates . . .
Why the reluctance to take ownership . . . after all these revisions? . . .
Mayhaps the iffyness of it all? . . .

Girl with a Pearl Earring (2003)