Sometimes After the Alphabet

(reposted from Saturday, April 9, 2011)

Sometimes after the alphabet I would rewrite the script.
Sometimes after being thrown under the bus I would lip-sync.
Sometimes after being taken to the cleaners
I would text a random phone number.
Sometimes after preparing a meal I would eat out.
Sometimes I would wait for the light to change.
Other times I would follow the yellow brick road.
Sometimes I would sit on the bench for the entire third quarter
shouting out differences between evergreen
and non-evergreen growth patterns.
It’s all in the ring tones, I was told by an impartial opportunist
the draperies of her gestures
immobilizing me momentarily with blueness
after which I would make my way
through the throng of extras
flown in as expert witnesses
to engage an unemployed harpist caught unaware.
I’d heard of the tampering, of course, the tintinnabulation
of shutters and shudderers
but thought it best to continue with rehab
which had left me with a facial tic
and a strange indifference to Netflix
that I seemed not to care much about.
Sometimes after letting my fingers do the walking
I would check for lifting -
areas that had been damp when the first coat was applied
areas that on other pages in others books
would have been overrun with brown baggers
on lunch break feeding pigeons from forest green park benches.
This is not rocket science; it is someone’s bailiwick,
a smattering of unknowns reminded me
with the effortlessness of a man at the end of his rope
tossing his iPhone into a river
watching it sink slowly out of sight
sans disclaimer, sans influence, sans alternative.
Sometimes after channel surfing
I would dream of a life filled with recipes.
Sometimes I would dream of a life filled with blank pages
the unspoken rush that spreads from head to toe
upon being unfriended on Facebook.

Screen Dump 456

And I need you more than want you,
And I want you for all time.
          - Wichita Lineman (1968)

Indeed . . . the blurbiness of blurbs:
I write you . . . you write me . . .
bundling software for coders
as the night twinkles with bug juice in trash cans
lined with garbage bags . . .
I am become . . . a lineman for the county
splicing telephone lines . . .
as an aperitif . . . an insinuation . . .
the enthrallment of the table read
with you costumed
for yet another audition
the runner-up benched on fouls . . .
This will be a night to remember
a Titanic-ramming-iceberg night to remember
and you're buying into a stairway to heaven
to the magical realism
of a room filled with mirrors . . .
gorging yourself on ample food
at the wolf's table
the-wolf-with-groping-paws-table
before engaging the matrix
of permutations . . . and combinations . . .
the morning's ride back to the future
as time clocks Round Three . . .
and the gappiness of cubicles
mimics The Shining's snowy maze
while Freud and Jung
arm wrestle for your backstory . . .
the doubtful guest insisting she is Anna Freud
at the free-throw line
during the madness of March
which some documentarian chortled ain't much . . .
Daily we review takeaways   . . .
the guns and roses . . . and guns . . . and . . .
the bowed heads of aftermaths
squeezing through metal detectors
into three-ring circuses of misdirection:
you can't go home again! . . .

Mario Sorrenti

The Generous Logic of Friendship

(reposted from Tuesday, July 12, 2011)

Little pieces of us fall away
as we move along
through the same doors
down the same hallways
into the same rooms
sitting in the same chairs
at the same tables
using the same utensils
enjoying the same meals
the same bottles of wine.
Some across bodies of water
to float to distant shores
others through tunnels
still others into wood.
Coming and going
appearing
disappearing.
Nothing demanded.
The held hand slowly slipping away
until years later
sitting on the back porch
on a warm early summer evening
we reach for our glass
and find a piece
innocently clinging to our open palm.

Egon Schiele