This Way Please

A stage hand steps out of the wings of a 747
his pock marks, circa fifteenth century, map the location
of a hidden cache of manuscripts.

A yellow blurb raises a ruckus on the seven PM newsbreak.
The anchor, your neighbor's kid who dropped out of med school
when graying cadavers began texting him,

rebounded to bagboy before landing on his head.
Consider Leonardo. His celibate hands separating the quiet tissue
encrypting his legacy with mirror-writing

remaindered to coffee tables at the close of business.
Tell me if anything ever was done. Like him we await
the final bed to review the patterns of fence posts

driven randomly into the earth
the quick starts on cold mornings
the madness of the emissaries in each of us

brandishing semaphores against the gathering storm
leaving us to conjure the hustle-bustle of late arrivals
searching for coins to deposit into the solitary parking meter.

Tomorrow Is

Reluctantly the book opens you to another voice
to the promise of past miracles
a long lost friend
an ex-lover perhaps
impersonating the silent screen star
you saw late last night on TCM -

the silent screen star who later
swept you away across a field and into a pine forest
where you spread a blanket
and listened to freight trains
wailing through crossings
on the outskirts of your childhood.

Was it enough to revisit that strange neighborhood
where interruptions withered you with IOUs?

The voluptuousness of the model in the painting on the cover
erases the bric-a-brac and cheap souvenirs
from your memory of the shore -
a memory you are better off without.

Later in the book, an old man - your father? -
squirrels away pocket change in a poorly-lit closet
his wife, again, missing from the family portrait
their daughters, in the next room, arguing,
party dresses at Goodwill.

Like him you worry that tomorrow
is a boat on a rough sea
without sail or oars
a car idling at a traffic light
its tires flat.

Your high school classmates are in there as well
hovering in the white unbroken snow of morning.
Are you surprised to find them in there?
Are you surprised to find your high school yearbook
bristling with Post-its?
its pages dog-eared from your searches?

Faces from your childhood
pop up in the last chapter
knocking on your back door
looking in through your back window
like the shadows from your favorite films
that lately, late at night, awaken you
as they enter and exit the roundabout
just outside your window.

With Freud in Vienna

He took a couch that had belonged to his wife....
          - NPR’s The Writer's Almanac, May 6, 2008

I’ve strung paper lanterns around my room like garlic
and climbed onto a huge wooden horse
penknifed with the names of Greek ghosts.

I will joust with the characters in the next graphic novel
that crosses my bath water.
I admit to doctoring phonebooks

and confessing best sellers to interim chairs.
I am responsible for the murder of crows on my front lawn.
Their cawing is peppered with references to the Oedipal Conflict.

It’s as unsettling as castration anxiety.
I can’t blame them, though.
They’ve been duped along with the rest of us -

duped into thinking all roads lead to orgasms.
My dreams are populated by gas guzzlers lining up at pumps.
My ex-wife had a closetful of pumps.

She kept them in their original boxes.
She had an affair with Freud.
They shared an affinity for cigars.

Freud borrowed his wife’s couch
and set up shop with Josef Breuer.
I found a footnote that characterized Freud’s wife as a whiner.

She wanted to invest their Deutsche Marks in a winery.
Freud opted instead for a tobacco plantation.
To him, everything was a cigar.

Freud’s wife demonstrated the use of a Pocket Rocket for Anna O.
Freud and Breuer watched speechless.
It occurred to them that talking was the cure.

They called it The Talking Cure.
Freud, his wife, and Breuer became known
as The Talking Threesome.

They had a successful run in Vaudeville.
Because of Freud,
glass menageries have been targeted by PETA.

Rapt by Her Angularity

I am held without reservation
and shown to a table near the kitchen,
a schoolboy sans homework
each breath interminable
as if, in slow-motion, I am forced
to restock shelves against a deadline.
I do my best, however, to weather
the strange ineptitude,
the discoloration of the senses that follows,
but before I know it,
a certain triviality arrives
with its own list of demands.
Later, after the downsize,
several strangely-costumed female leads
appear on cue from installations
and reappear one by one
as if in an infinite loop
offering monologues and soliloquies,
odds and check-out times,
well-wrought and well-received,
thorough in their encryption
yet lacking in their payback,
while outside a rickety milk wagon
continues along our narrow one-way street
depositing its ancient bottles
on one chipped stoop after another.

Black-Haired Girl  by Egon Schiele

At the Clinique Counter with My 14-Year-Old

My grandfather stops by from the grave
none the worse for wear
trailing Philip Morrises and Dobler Ales.
He’s decided to resume his stint as blacksmith
figuring an entre into what many are calling
The Second Coming of Steam.
Steam locomotives - huge, black, hissing -
are being redeployed;
tracks laid in the mountains.
Mid afternoons, I join him on the wrought-iron bench
in the middle of the vegetable garden.
A young weeping willow shadows us.
A local theater troupe stops by
and gives us the thumbs up.
My grandfather offers them Doblers
then launches into a re-enactment of Act 2 Scene 4 of Henry IV:
Do thou stand for my father
and examine me upon the particulars of my life.
They assure him there will be plenty of time for that.
I try to explain but am shushed by the audience.
At the Clinique counter
I can see my image in the mirror
between my daughter’s and the Clinique rep’s.
The Clinique rep’s skin is as white and smooth as steam.
I begin to believe in the Second Coming.
I begin to hope for the Second Coming.
My daughter and the Clinique rep discuss foundations.
I mention that I prefer poured foundations.

On the Road, They Cup Their Hands

And in the book-length ''Flow Chart,'' Ashbery beguilingly
decided that he would write a poem of 100 single-spaced pages
that had to be finished on his 61st birthday.
          - Nicholas Jenkins

On the road, behind the wheel, they cup their hands.
The backs of their hands are smooth.
Their back seats are filled with cans of Reddi-wip.
They have sampled the lush life.
They know what they want.
They resist altercations.
They amass alterations.
They have knelt in makeshift pews around the world.
Forty percent floss daily.
Ninety percent know they should.
There's a right way and a wrong way.
They know both ways.
They've seen the sun smirk.
They've seen the sun through its ups and downs.
They've captured condolences in Bell Jars.
They're privy to insider jokes.
They're aware of the volatility of insider trading.
Their policy papers are well-known.
Their policy papers are checked for accuracy.
Their policy papers include points of contention.
Some of their policy papers are white papers.
Some of their policy papers are one-liners.
Some of their policy makers are one-trick ponies.
Some have been retired.
A few have been rehired.
Their terms of service are filled with exasperation.
They have been known to leave broken pencils on copiers.
A few have skipped to the middle of the chapter.
A few have read themselves into a corner.
A few know that all hell could break loose.
This is not without precedent.
Outside, the quaintness.
The traffic jam refused.
Birds of different feathers quibble.
The authorities have been notified.
The fjords are flimsier.
Dinner was served by unknown perpetrators.
Several were led away.
A few were led astray.
They had nowhere to turn.
The heavens opened.
Bits of paper bearing algorithms rained down.
They sat back and enjoyed the popcorn.
Free logarithms were handed to them as they deplaned.
Several were relieved.
Many were held back.
They reviewed their notes.
They reviewed the script.
In Scene Three, someone entered stage left.
There was much hubbub.
There was much rubbernecking.
No one wanted a spoiler.
The director ordered a rewrite.
Others ordered the special.
A few ordered Mahi Mahi.
They were ordered to leave.
There was concern for the environment.
There was concern for endangered species.
They left after breakfast.
They had miles to go before the weather reports got serious.
The weather reports were not user friendly.
It took them a while to make heads or tails of things.
Suddenly, a door opened.
The door was quite ornate.
It captured the fancy of countless passersby.
Heads turned.
The windup and the pitch.
There was a break in the action.
It was a clean break.
It was a breakout.
Kindergartners were flown in in the nick of time.
Criteria were set by greengrocers.
Someone wanted a say in the matter and was shown the door.
It was a different door.
Several marched to a different drummer.
It was later revealed that it was not a Pass/Fail course.
The audience emitted a collective sigh.
Everyone began cutting back.
Everyone began cutting class.
Everyone began cutting coupons.
It was a Buy One Get One Free Sale.
The sailors were ordered into the raft.
The rafters in the theater shook.
They had lost their credibility.
They had lost their identity.
They began tap dancing.
They began backpedaling.
The floor gave way to an argument.
A few began litigating.
It was a fine mess.
A hooker chimed in with the Dow.
A reference librarian brought in a dog-eared instruction manual.
They were told to leave well enough alone.
They were reminded not to forget to plan ahead.
They emerged from the shadows of their former selves.
They dawdled.
Time was running out.
The implausible happened.
They stood in silence.
It was as if they never were.

Writing to be Read

The writer writes to be read, he said,
and yellow and blue, too.

Begin with the primaries -
always a good start.

It's not enough to be informed.
You've got to part your hair

and comb the beach.
It's a thankless job

but no one has to do it.
Unconventional wisdom, you know,

believes in the magic
of a single grain of sand.

Which reminds me, the sugar bowl
needs to be refilled.

Refined sugar, though harmful,
is OK with me.

I have to stop for gas.
I'm almost empty of recriminations.

I'm not sure of the exact meaning
of that word

but I wanted to use it
before it was too old.

Writing a poem, for me, you see,
is like crafting a piece of found art,

which, some would say, is oxymoronic,
and a good place to end.

I Step Gingerly Over My Body

I step gingerly over my body and out the door,
trailing wagons of red words
across the remains of the comet
that passed ever-so-briefly through the heavens
and into the eye of my needle.
I'd been waiting for the pass for centuries it seemed
oblivious to the calculus of the day.
I bothered neither with landscapes nor with portraits,
having abandoned perspective years ago.
Life, for me, bumped along without a blink:
caskets were crafted by the light of pyres,
spores threatened the world's wonders.
A friend of disappointment,
I paid tolls without flinching,
pumped gas beneath the Self sign without logging on.
Above, celestial arguments grew louder and louder.
I hid in the laundry room among the unwashed.
One day, while channel surfing, I learned to whistle.

The Last Crusader

It's your last chance to take note of your lookalike
before he burrows into your coupon-laden dreams
and awakens you at three AM with a disconnect.

You who were always there
when we needed a tire changed
as if your superb failures weren't enough.

And while you're at it, please clear out the plasticine figures!
They seem to have taken on a life of their own
appearing pro bono as anchors on the midday news.

A wok would give us a chance to clear our heads,
spiral out of focus.
But let's not get bogged down in depositions.

Put yourself, if you would, in her choreography,
dispensing merriment to hordes of last-minute honorees
as they scramble for the exit.

Quite intricate, wouldn't you say?
Maybe you wouldn't, but what about those waylaid orders
spilling into the street, creating havoc

glistening like plastic porkpie hats
on freshly-painted park benches?
Why does everything suddenly seem muted?

Once upon a time, you know,
whiteness like this enveloped the last crusader
as she tried to return home.

Making Other Arrangements

With my long-range plans sputtering,
I retire to the sun porch
where a made-for-cable miniseries
is being shot on a shoestring.
Inside, the room continues its cornucopian spin.
The light fixtures complain of burnout
and threaten to move to Duluth.
Sensing a quandary, the leaves
take up a collection on my behalf.
Nonetheless, I proceed, realizing
too late perhaps that there is little sense
in assuming an arresting vision
if you lack the wherewithal to get to first base.
Midway through the second reel
a curlew advances. This is too much!
The last time this happened buttresses
with the determination of Kamikazes
flew around my grandparents' doilied parlor
as a red tuxedoed ringmaster
announced their entrance into the center ring.
Even the dog came out of retirement.
Plums and avocados strolled hand-in-hand
through the labyrinthine garden.
The sun primped. There was nary a stump in sight.

Your Childhood

A shadow passing through a courtyard resembles your childhood.
Streetlights in a nearby town go out and refuse to come in.

Empty canvases await your image.
The faint-at-heart carve pumpkins and antelope in your likeness.

Demitasse cups bearing your name surface at garage sales.
The letters of the alphabet await your first paragraph.

Fellow scriveners wrinkled and preoccupied hand out free passes.
Some opt out, occupying themselves with backward glances.

Introductions are waived leaving you smitten with apostrophes.
You realize you've misplaced your yearbook and address book.

Perhaps it's time to query backgammon players and coatchecks,
to fill grocery carts with rubble and breakfast drinks.

Perhaps it's time to try once again to locate your siblings
who have scattered and are subletting, besieged by telemarketers.

A Greyhound rolls in. Words float in over the transom.
You recognize your childhood among the passengers.

Etude

This piece will have to do for now.
There should be enough in it to keep you busy
especially the second movement
with its surprising reprieve.
There will be coffee of course
and squandered days before confusion
enters the room and bolts the door.
Again this year the soil will be turned
hours set in motion against the dwindling light
yielding memories like meaty tidbits
picked at by gnarly-clawed
Rhode Island Reds, their strange,
soft, drawly clucking filling the void.

mismatch.com

The alleged perp on the six o’clock news is your double
his eyes enhanced by Etch A Sketch
follow passersby like the eyes of Jesus
in the velvet images hawked on the boardwalk
by shell gamers whose rusted-out Lincoln Continentals
sport curb feelers and parking tickets
as a matter of principle.
Your bowl of ramen noodles looks lonely.
Your flask of Robitussen has lost its appeal.
You begin thumbing rides into perpetual darkness
forgetting the Magic of the Method
your posthumous publications falling far short
of morphing into the yellow Stutz idling curbside.
Your ashes drizzled along the backside of billboards
merge with the runoff ringing
the toenails of pedal pushers.
Tagged in Facebook
you are subjected to a full body patdown.
The frequent flyer miles stuffed into your Jockeys
irritate the metal detectives at the airport
and in a huff you one-eighty
without emptying your pockets
without cleaning the litter box.
Suddenly you’re being eulogized
as a metallic taste with an erectile dysfunction.
Your pajamas with their self-fulfilling prophesy
are slated to appear on Oprah in April
as part of the Cruelest Month Syndrome.
You never should have trusted them.
You never should have bought into
the slumdog millionare scam.
The devil behind the unpainted wall in your apartment
a master of the mini-diatribe
continues to egg you on
despite the Chapter 11 banging on the back door
replaying rook to queen eight
goading newhires into flagellation,
while you, awash with nuance, rue the day you moved in
under the pretext of repairing circuit breakers
as a born again pornographer.
Meanwhile Philip Glass appears at your table
in a sidewalk café in the American remake
of some European film starring Catherine Zeta Jones
and applies the Heimlich.
I guess it’s true what they say.

What I Did

          after Frank O’Hara

The day began
with some Bukowski
from the library
posthumous stuff
published by his wife
Linda Lee
the name of my friend’s wife
from decades ago -
high maintenance
moody
eventually left with
some guy
who worked with her
at the hospital.
I don’t remember
the name
of the Bukowski doc
I saw a few weeks ago
on IFC
but he struck me
as raw and rough
but then
what would you expect
from a guy whose old man
beat the crap out of him
every day
with a belt?
I got up for coffee
and Sunday Morning
whose segment
on celebrity chef
Anthony Bourdain
led me to Google
and Salon
and I exited
with pretty much
the same writeup
of Bourdain
as for Bukowski
though I’ve read somewhere
that Bukowski
unlike Bourdain
had a bluebird
in his heart.
The sites I visited
got me
thinking about
serif and sans-serif fonts.
I browsed Wikipedia
for a crash course
and found that
serif fonts
have little thingees
that supposedly
help the eye
move along
a string of words
though sans serif faces
are the font of choice
for blogs and websites
worldwide.
Google brought up
MoMA’s celebration
of 50 years of Helvetica
which is not what
I’m using here.
I decided to run
quick brown fox
past all my fonts
to come up with a list
of favorites.
Into the whole
typography thing
I found a 2005 article
in The New Yorker
about Matthew Carter
acknowledged as
the most significant
designer of type
in America.
Tall, lanky, seventy,
he lives in Cambridge
with the artist
Arlene Chung
and designs fonts
on his computer
out of a room
in his apartment
which reminded me
of the time I got lost
looking for a bike shop
in Harvard Square.
We ate at one of Boston’s
oldest eateries
plank floors
low ceiling
the whole bit.
I thought I heard
Ben Franklin
in the cramped
men’s room
and made a mental note
to reread
his Dream essay
with its well-known
suggestion to fart proudly.
My daughter
a freshman at Hunter
called to say
she was homesick
and to complain about
her media prof
who comes to class
without books or notes
and talks nonstop
about things at random
for two hours at a pop.
We’ve all had
at least one of those.
Mine would come
into class with a can
of Pepsi and a cigarette
and carry on about
so-called
Theories of Learning
for three hours.
Tenured
with textbooks
he was more interested
in the Arabian horses
he bred.
Years later
his mother and mine
ended up in the same room
at a nursing home.
His mother told me
he never visited.
My mother
spent six years there
after my father’s death.
I visited her every few days.
I kind of enjoyed
the respite
from the outside world,
sitting there
among the residents
who at various speeds
were on their way out.
One of the last things
she said to me
was someone
should take a stick to you.
I attributed that
to dementia
preferring not to drill down
any deeper.
I miss her frankness,
her stamina,
her ethnic dishes
and regret not jotting down
their ingredients
along with her secrets -
a right regret
I guess
à la Arthur Miller.
My daughter asked
if she could come home
for the weekend.
Sure, why not.
I hung up, brewed tea
and opened
Mark Strand’s
latest book
New Selected Poems.
Paging through
I was disappointed
to find no new poems
only newly selected
old poems.
And this from a poet!
He too was probably
beaten bloody
daily
by his old man.
I have little interest
in sports, so,
with temperatures
in the unseasonable 70s
I headed out
for a walk
along the country roads
that border
my apartment.
When I moved in
after my ex and I split
I asked the landlady
if she allowed
six-month leases.
That was nine years ago.
I guess Andy Rooney’s
right about life
being like
a roll of toilet paper.
Outside,
as expected,
I found bird shit
on my blue SUV.
I’ve decided that birds
target blue vehicles
more than others
thinking them
bodies of water
to better carry away
their waste.
Maybe I’ll Wikipedia
that later today.

Sometimes After the Alphabet

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.

Is That You?

The funhouse has been rehabbed by an enigmatic avatar
who was fingered by the mob
for selling love seats door-to-door.
Her rap sheet included a moratorium on rehearsals.
Her lines, brilliant, were changed by an unknown assailant.
Her voice, scratchy but beloved
by those in the nosebleed section,
failed to weather the latest blur of retractions.
You however emerged unscathed,
again, the hands-on favorite
eyes on the lighthouse
tap dancing to the rhythm of uncertainty.
Even the chameleons were impressed
by the cool architecture of your footnotes
as you stepped up to the plate
in full technicolor
with the right credentials, no less,
and took on the boarded-up storefronts
in that neighborhood that’s been all over the papers lately.
This is not new.
You’ve gotten to second base many times before
despite the allegation that you’re all thumbs.
But don’t be fooled by the latest spam.
The weather will again turn ugly.
Roll out your alternative workplan.
Remain unfazed by telemarketers
who will be ready to give up their ghosts in the foothills.
With luck, you will be off again, Prozac’d,
ready to face the music - a cacophony
by some twentieth-century composer
whose name is synonymous with transparency.

A Well-Known Stranger to Many

I am sucker punched by a segue
caught off-guard
without a leg to stand on
chuckling at the memory
of the boredom
that permeated the classroom
that afternoon
however many years ago
with its mitten tree
and Escobar's missing mitten
among the ornaments
each with its own story
though none
satisfied my curiosity
which continued to morph
into the evening
triggering an episode
of restless legs
a syndrome common
among hall monitors
who on the word
of a news anchor
move their diversified
portfolios elsewhere
and later
in some strange and bullish way
are as thankful as the man
at the vegetable stand
who has this habit of shouting
to passing motorists
that he's seen worse -
worse than that smidgen of promise
in our otherwise desultory lives -
lives misspent in the off-hours
drilling down deeply
at the drop of a hat
fretting over
the indifference of gas guzzlers -
an illusion put upon us
by that well-known stranger to many.


ICU  by Tom Corrado



Leave Taking

And who am I to suggest that the tables
be bussed before being turned?
You know as well as I that when that happens
there's no telling which things will end up.
And what about the Grand Opening the other day
with you standing next to the condiment isle
amidst petit fleurs, balloons, clowns,
and various other artsy types?
I went back to the musical notes
I had so dutifully played
throughout the unfolding
when artist statements some better than others
came blizzarding in from the four corners
inundating us with inconceivables.
Did anyone really care beyond the requisite texts?
Beyond the lint-picking uneasiness?
By the way did you put in for the door prize?
What's there to lose at this point, at the gaming table,
trophies cluttering the breezeway?
Later, to occupy myself, I thumbed
through yellowing pages
while studying my reflection
in shiny metal clothes racks
trying to figure out
what became of the person I thought I was.
The person I wanted to be.
I even considered the suitability of past players
bundled against the seasonably cold temperatures
but found no one who satisfied my predilections.
I eventually left with a trio
of 25-watt globes under each arm
and spent the rest of the evening spellchecking.
I did see you again though
as you were leaving
folding yourself into your late model subcompact
all leather and lace, receipts trailing in the backdraft.

The AARP Guide to Mating in Captivity

There was Burt in Atlantic City.
Susan at the window with lemons.
Oranges in the fridge.
These helped dispel her fear of headlines.
She could crochet with the best
dreaming herself a croupier -
a croupier with lemons.
She could accommodate the variety of strays
at the animal shelter - strays that had somehow
made their way to her kitchen table
and attached themselves to her pound cake.
Volunteering two nights a week
kept her in good stead
and good spirits for that matter.
Just ask the young man in the tight jeans
at the neighborhood liquor store.
Isn’t red wine good for the heart and soul?
Red wine and red sauce? she would ask herself.
Yes, there was the occasional dry, sleepless night -
Doesn’t everyone have them? -
but these were blogged into oblivion
dissected on her cutting board
in full view of the television crew outside her window
pestering to film A Typical Day in the Life of.
There were no typical days.
Every day, a first.
The trash disclosing new secrets.
Feeling this way need not be cause for despair
she'd heard on some late night talk show.
There are over-the-counter potions for everything
and yes she had sampled quite a few.
According to the AARP
mating in captivity sharpens one's erotic intelligence.
She imagined herself two standard deviations above the average.
Nervous excitement and mystery?
Keys to uncharted sanctums.
She took this as gospel.
She would accept her facial hair and crankiness
the blue days that stopped her in her tracks
the stiffness
the impatience
the general upset.
This is who she was
now and most likely forever.
There would no longer be a wrong time.
A wrong place.
No mistakes.
No waiting for the tapping at the window.
The opening of the door.

The Days Pass, Inconsequential

True to form the ducks the ducks uncooperative
but what the hell, off with the sport coat,
grab the jack, get down to the nitty gritty
the nuts and bolts of it all. The jig finally up.
The hum of the Internet. The whole thing
captured on laser disc for review, with commentary,
a colorized feed tracking the procession of electrons
trickling through the labyrinth of homes
awash with the glow of information.
Kindergarteners bemused. Ducks imprinting
themselves upon freights meandering
through the twilight and into Act 2 Scene 7
where Winifred - dear departed Winnie -
comes clomping in - As if what? As if nothing
had happened? Nothing had transpired? -
demanding lunch money, an explanation,
a getaway car, a full tank of gas.  Something.
Anything. Desperately trying to match
the tempo, to capture the speeding bullet,
trailing a wake of Pik-Up Sticks, dancing away
her cares and woes under the watchful eye
of canvas, driving home with every step,
every gesture, every blink of the eye,
the importance of rain, the importance of sunlight,
and the days passing inconsequential,
leaving their mark on every last one of us.

Your Next Vacancy

You google your next vacancy, and discover America:
potatoes boiling on a stove
pork chops simmering in a pan
a swimmer chasing a whitecap
the claw-toed combing the beach for pebbles to sell on eBay.
A Magic Eight Ball welcomes you like a benediction;
it's open arms the cruise you've been waiting for.
The lyrics from your childhood Saturdays repeat unchanged
populating a Whitmanesque landscape
as familiar to you as the baseball cards
you so foolishly traded.
The code scribbled onto your palm
during a stoop ball game
reminds you of your high school sweetheart
whose photo surfaced last week on Facebook
with the lines you failed to deliver.
Your station wagon worries a roadmap
like a blackjack player who can feel the next hit,
the hit that will carry him on its shoulders -
a cross country runner returning
to his small coastal village victorious.
You know where this short story is going.
Again you will try to rewrite the last line
as it happened when you opened your fist for your father
and three nickels spilled out onto the table.

Relentless First Buyers

You repackage yourself in a desperate attempt
to overnight to Atlanta -
Home of the Braves
and Coca-Cola
and wellspring of relentless buyers
who line up each morning
with characteristic aplomb
for first dibs and coffee
having watched public television
much of the previous evening.
SUVs occupy your inner self -
a self patterned after others
luring drivers into the castle's insidious moat
dumbstruck with free passes to the furniture expo.
The jetty you long admired will soon be erased
the drawbridge raised without remorse
as you shun the mundanity of musical chairs
for the frenzied insistence of the Tango.
Before long, that scene too will change
and you will be off again
on yet another flight of flimsy
to relearn foreign alphabets
and collect phrases disproving the obvious
remembering at the last moment
to turn off the gas burners on the pale stoves
in the sad, cramped kitchens of your memory.

The Definite Article

The postmortem yielded little
so we broke for refreshments
comparing notes on the different containers
we had drunk Coke from over the years
one hyperbolic guy insisting
that he had drunk Coke
from a hobble-skirt bottle
so designed to make them easy to find
in a bucket of ice water.
We were able to reach a consensus
on a few agenda items
including overuse of the definite article
whose red flag had taxied many to Google.
I pulled my backpack onto one shoulder
and was struck by the connect-the-dots simplicity
of a huge wooden waterwheel
surrounded by loaded brushes
pointed at several hundred gessoed canvases
strewn about a makeshift landscape.
I returned to share my excitement
but the cupboard
merely echoed the rigors of rehearsals.

Glass

They too had planned for la dolce vita
waiting for the 7:10 on Track #5 to whisk them away -
away from the boredom
the open-ended gestures
the semicolons -
only to be returned
side shows up their sleeves
prestidigitators all
the towers tolling another wishing hour
overwriting the previous 744,600.

A dog-eared copy of Cliff Notes holds the key
to this rat's nest of bottlenecked Geri-Chairs and Hoyer Lifts
questions dangling
vacant expressions captured mid-void.

You too are among the chosen
among those advancing to the finals
confused
indifferent to the cut of cloth
the secrets of Icarus dumbed-down
back pockets bulging with respites.

Your fingers tickle the ivories.

You listen for the sound of your parents.
You walk in the footsteps of your parents.
You have become your parents.

There is no cab awaiting your departure.
No bell ending the round.
The season has changed
the community room repainted and recarpeted
for incoming Freshmen
ill-formed products of texting
truncated, housebroken
laden with knock-offs, gloomier than Milton
idols of the kings and queens of darkness.

You should have asked for a doggie bag.
They should have asked for a doggie bag.
We all should have asked for a doggie bag.

Too late.

Review the script before the table-read.
Before the run-through.
Try to nail it this time.

Scene 1:

The iron gates open to Philip Glass's Metamorphosis.
A unknown figure autographs the bibs of those who ask.

From One Hour Photo

We spent off-days playing hide-and-seek
and kept secrets in seed catalogs, dog-eared and crusted.

A wobbly Victrola bounced Hallelujah, I'm A Bum
off the two-families.

Every Friday night at ten, flat-footed palookas
bloodied each other for pocket change

on a snowy round-screened Stromberg-Carlson.
Strangers came and went

some promenading through the grape arbor
and into the amusement park

where a troll squirreled-away recyclables.
The music of the midway swept us into other rooms.

We wandered through berry patches
taking care not to disturb the picnickers.

Someone suffered a memory lapse
and appeared in Who's Who.

Leaves turned inside out and were bagged
by majorettes who popped up from sidewalk cracks

insinuating themselves into our dreams.
The changing of the guard didn't.

We worried that it was akin to nothing.
And it was, or wasn't, I'm not sure.

Blindsided

He never ever saw it coming at all.
          - Regina Spektor

You imagine crying spells
in front of a muted TV
a pizza man at the door
several small animals underfoot.
There are two sets of books
in every room.
A cobwebbed chifforobe in the basement.

Then the scene shifts:

a man and a woman are driving along a coastal road
in a black convertible.
There is a newness to the sky
and to them.
They laugh through the curves.
Of course, anyone can play the extra.

Meanwhile, the siding continues to fade.
The foundation crumbles.
A toehold is lost.

And here they are again
sitting in a car
in a parking lot
surrounded by blue
and the faint wail of the lead singer from inside the bar.
It's cold.
Their bodies have become short stories.

Ballet dancers pirouette on a stage in the middle of a dream.
Someone enters from stage left with a picnic basket
a baguette and a bottle of Merlot.
The matinee is about to begin.
All eyes are on the principal dancer
who later will spend hours on the phone.
The potted plants have shrunk away.
There's half a birthday cake
in the middle of a faded mahogany table
a gravy boat
a violated cookie jar.

In the final scene
kids play in the backyard
of a house on the shore.
There's a deck with a high-foreheaded man
sitting at a small glass-topped table.
A tall woman has just gone inside through a sliding screen door.
There are elements of crossword puzzles here.
And short-term investments.
A laptop would do well.

Given the Number of Items on My Plate

I prefer short novels, better yet, novellas
something longer than a short story but shorter
than one of those sweeping Russian doorstops
so chock-full of characters with unpronounceable names
I fall asleep with the reading light on,
the book spread-eagled across my chest.

But not too short.
I want something I can sink my teeth into
something with a money-back guarantee
should the escape fail to span a three-day weekend
something that'll survive the bullet train trip to the city and back
something I can bookmark.

A few well-developed characters will do,
characters who won't mind waiting while I put the kids to bed
perhaps a pleasant landscape and some animals
including a yellow Lab
but above all some space to stretch out in with room to spare
between once upon and ever after.

Scholar of the Dark  by Gina Litherland

Promiscuous Trappings

Increasingly they elbow their way in
along with parents and siblings
surrogate companions

travelers from distant lands dispatched as extras
some well-versed in fractals
others with experience as sommeliers.

Processionals too have a way
of creeping into our papers and musings
as well as scribbles from exes

who linger with the tenacity of wolves
posting promises and threats -
stipulations laced with extensive footnotes.

We continue to fret the circumstance
that brought us here -
the sidelong glance, the misstep, the misspoken word or two -

and the well-wishers
always the well-wishers
laden with fatuous tales of adventure and romance

the inconsequence of half-lives
trudging willy-nilly
through a snowy, timeworn landscape.

Intaglio

Your moment awaits in the wings
drenched in the solitude of nights
spent with the covers pulled up to your chin
the curtains in your room
choreographing the key to the question
you posted on Facebook.
Did you do it in jest as they’ve suggested?
As a gesture perhaps against the disarray?
Against the confusion?
You have continued to ignore the road
beneath your window
the one that weaves through violins
studded with the fingernails of minions -
the minions tattooed in relief
on your right shoulder.
You are out of practice, you know.
The knock at the door requests a refund.
The back door has been nailed shut.
Step up to the plate.
Resume your memoirs with the contents
of the certified letter returned unopened.
Nightly on the screened-in porch
you rearrange photographs of ne’er-do-wells
as familiar to you as the siblings you don’t have.
You had hoped your cosmetologist would reveal
the answer to the puzzle that sideswiped you
in the condiment aisle at Hannaford.
This too has eluded you.
How often will you prime the numbers of forgiveness?
How often will you exchange your face for a newer model?
You have been blackballed and blacklisted and blindsided
and now you find that your knees are giving way.

Wichita

The name Wichita could happen to any of us:
feet up, innocently cooling our heels,

waiting for the curtain call.
Your high school sweetheart arrives on a dustjacket

to brew tea far from night’s tragedies
where eyes reach out from sunken sockets

like the hands in your mirror at three AM.
You draw a blank on the name of the actor

whose performance sent you to Google.
There are too many unknowns in this room.

Inking in the details won’t help much either.

Extrication

          on Harry Houdini's 137th birthday

He began reading books about the Great Houdini
pausing at photographs of handcuffs and leg irons.

He spent hours with newspaper clippings
of the Chinese Water Torture Cell

and made dozens of drawings
of intricate trapdoor mechanisms

carefully labeling each in the upper right corner.
It mattered little that he lacked the stage presence

or showmanship. He knew what he had to do.
It would take time, but it was all there

in the notebooks and journals of Erik Weisz
the boy - and this too he believed

having read it somewhere - who, while standing on his head,
could pick up needles with his eyelashes.

The Great Houdini

You'd Think the Facade Would Have Been Repainted by Now

We spent the morning fashioning earthenware vessels.
Putting away the groceries, we found raw data
sprinkled with quotidian delights and chuckled
over the cantankerousness of the corner grocer.
In times like these serious types make doughnut runs
which always seem to help.
Nonplussed, we are borne aloft.
Beneath us, gandy dancers skitter about
the aqueduct filling with memories of war lords singing.

The Undoing of the Do-It-Yourselfer

Bespectacled crusaders against the weatherbeaten
against the inevitability of decline
the insistence of wear and tear, of demise, of oxidation
eschewing orange-aproned yeasayers
trafficking the intricacies of replacing a washer
in a drippy kitchen faucet, running numbers
on fixer-uppers with free tickets to after-hour haunts
where sequined curtains part for whisperers
filling in the blanks. You will be applauded
by the graffiti-stained, heralded by street corner profiteers
and by all members of the extended familia
your boats moored in the marina at La Mancha.
There is nothing left of the landscape
nothing left of the ideas that ballooned
above the congregation - the congregation that now
at a drop in the Dow scalps tickets
to sit at the feat of the next double header.
If you can drive a nail, fine; if not, no problema.
Browse YouTube, punch in your query
and be buried in multi-lingual, detailed instructions
for rehabbing your backyard gazebo for those -
and isn't that just about every one of us? -
who in a weakened weekend moment would pounce
on the trifolded specs of the Gates of Hell
where, when summer begins to unravel -
as it most surely will - we will assemble, reassured
that in these dark days of terror-ists and global warnings
every do-it-yourselfer will score a bogey
in view of no less than 10 neighbors
who moonlight as anonymous purveyors of blogspeak.

Has spring sprung?

Earlier today in the food court
a know-it-all handed out sentences
waxing philosophic
for innuendos in tight jeans
twitterers and power walkers
rubbernecking.
I tried to follow the topographic map
from You are here!
but the Buds
reaching down into Stella Adlers
in the groves of academe
hacked my attention.
The air was fresh and free of regrets.
Egrets dotted grassy knolls.
Strollers jostled for changing stations.
It took me a while
to find an unoccupied portal
but eventually one popped up
to a show of hands
and escorted me to the parking lot
where an epauletted attendant
practiced umlauts.
The sun was fanciful
filled with expectation and delight.
As it should be, yes?


March 21, 2011 Berne, NY



But Did You Think It Was Not Over?

Toggle between the ellipses and you'll see
that everything worth writing
has not been written
despite the folds of enlightenment
curling the ends of the paper in your hand
fingertips etched with the smudge of ink.
Blame it if you must
on the carbon fiber centerpiece
you convinced yourself
you couldn’t live without
but don't be surprised
when the flooring gives way.
Yes, far too much preening is televised
but can you blame them
for going where the money is?
Just where is one supposed to stand?
Lose the trepidation.
Get off your high horse.
Slip out of work early tomorrow.
Take the R Train to the end of the line.
You’ll find volumes there
among the sandcastles and storefronts
describing in minute detail what happens
when the words being keyed
lose their ability to transport the reader
into a living breathing pack mule
and your world slips out the door.

Too Late to Go Over Your Words

The wind chimes tried to warn you
but you were too busy being seduced
by the pitter-patter of rain
reminding you of the tin roof
on the tool shed
behind your grandmother’s house
where one summer
you tried to read all the books
in your grandfather’s library.
Your achievement fell short
but was impressive enough
for those gathered ‘round the shortwave.
Later you dialed her number
and wowed her with some makeshift whatnot.
That moment will resurface.
Perhaps the misspellings
or the absence of transitionals
will suffice to identify you
as the author who tried to follow
the path to heaven. Doubtless
your meaning will again be misconstrued
taken out back by two burly bouncers.
It’s nothing personal.

With Fingers Curled ‘Round

Sometimes we find it in a half-empty cup of coffee
or in the faint strains of an aria
drifting through a curtained window
or in the backward glance of an untied shoe.
We all crave it
yet for some small strangeness
we shy away from it
seldom discuss it
especially during dinner
when the UPS truck makes its tiresome rounds
amidst the clockwise passing of rolls
and the smattering of knives and forks
engaged in the usual.
Is it ever too late to play the lottery of a lifetime?
To ponder the waffling of resolutions
scribbled with crayon in the final hour?
A voice on the answering machine
is trying to tell us something
but we ignore it
skip over it
busying ourselves instead with vacancies
shuffling the cards for one last go-around.
Why do we insist on waiting
until the books are long overdue
or worse lost?
Why are we afraid to retrace our steps
arms filled with might-have-beens?
Can you imagine life
without the convenience of a cough?
The comfort of a shadow?
Without fingers curled 'round the familiar?

Topspin

It’s the topspin that’s troublesome
the way the ball hits the net then spikes upward
suspended momentarily
as if awaiting divine intervention
some celestial force
the force Byzantine monks prayed for
to guide their trembling hands
in setting down the words of the Father
before it drops to one side
an intertidal moment
that moment between the high and low tides
when the water recedes
and the flotsam and jetsam
are rudely revealed to weekend
hand-holding beachcombers
who have pined for this getaway
since their last three-day weekend
that they may be rejuvenated sufficiently
to re-center their life
which has been sorely wobbled of late
by the hits of devaluation and decline
and again accept and ride the flux
that has become the everyday
of their existence
the resignation spinned into enlightenment;
this dropping of the ball
to one side of the net
this seemingly innocuous randomness
as powerful really as the call of a line judge
in awarding the point, prompting one
to collect one’s baggage at the turnstile
assume the role of weary traveler
the journey’s detritus highlighting crow’s feet
and face the blur of cabs curbside
each driver festooned with the barnacles
of a life spent underwater
pearls dribbling from their mouths
a half-eaten ham and swiss
moldering on the passenger’s seat
accusatory in its resemblance
of a vinyl mockup by Oldenburg
for those who have left their hearts in San Francisco
and sought renewal
among the high peaks of the Adirondacks
the ADK or ADKs sticker
broadcasting their achievement
from the driver’s side back window
to other motorists fighting
the Friday night retreat northward
to Clifton Park, Saratoga Springs,
Glens Falls, and beyond
their state service security badges
dripping from their rear-view mirrors.

Giant BLT  by Claes Oldenburg

Furniture Music

Why choose to be separate from the essential?
          - Anne Carson

I thought I saw Catherine Deneuve
a few minutes ago
in a sweater buttoned almost to the neck
but then I remembered
I was in Schenectady New York
rounding a corner
daylight savings 2011
just out of the starting blocks.
I guess I was wrong
but doesn't she hold a chair in philosophy
at some local university
where every Tuesday and Thursday
she sits at the head
of a seminar table and expounds
on the postmodern aspects
of  Winnebagos and wing chairs?
Or am I confusing reality
with the French film The Thieves
in which she plays
a philosophy teacher in Paris
(I don't love women, I love Juliette!)
a classicist, bent on conserving the past?
Regardless, I have a bone to pick with her
and with all semioticians for that matter.
Where are they when we need them
the professional kind
the ones ensconced
in white trapezoidal uniforms
(maybe that's not the right symbol
but they know what I mean)
making us think the inner dome of heaven
had just crashed onto Mars?
Besides, there's too much talk these days
too much talk-talk if you will
about contrapuntal blips
and the upcoming installation
being blogged to death
as the inter-ocular event of the hour
featuring a redhead
in a light green Ford Pacer
license plate S-A-M-E-2-U.
I was in the condiment aisle
checking out a few pinch shoppers
when the news broke.
The midday mist was soupy
so soupy in fact
I could hardly make out the labels.
Should I have rewound the tape?
I think not.
The store manager -
I knew he was the store manager
because he had a photo ID
pinned to his shirt
with the name
Bill Jobs followed by
Store Manager - was blurbing
about his Apple iPad
with Dvorak layout
the key pattern
based upon letter frequencies
introduced in the 1930s
by some efficiency expert
in Seattle Washington
to go head-to-head
with the more popular
and ubiquitous
QWERTY system.
(I hunt and peck
with four fingers and thumb
so the question
of  Dvorak or QWERTY
is pretty much moot
though I am a fan
of  Symphony No. 9
From the New World
aka New World Symphony
although we're probably
talking about a different
Dvorak here.)
Anyway, he - the store manager -
was googling
Arvo Part
the Estonian composer
whose tintinabuli style
based upon mystical experiences
with chant
has given us mesmerizing
arpeggiated pieces
which as I mentioned to a friend
in Bruegger's the other day
would dovetail nicely
with Philip Groning's 2005 film
Into Great Silence
a look at the Carthusian monks
in the French Alps.
I loved every one of its
169 minutes
filled with hooded monks
and snow-capped peaks
after which
a few friends and I
went to a Japanese restaurant
where I ordered sushi
wondering
whether sushi
ever appears
on the Carthusian's  menu.
I decided it's flown in
for special occasions
which injected images
of flying fish
into my cortex
so that I began browsing
flying fish artist
and came up with
J. Vincent Scarpace
whose name triggered
memories
of Chicago, Al Capone,
Tommy Guns, speakeasies,
The Untouchables
(the 1959 TV series with Robert Stack
as Elliot Ness NOT the 1987 film
with Kevin look at me Costner)
St. Valentine's Day,
and a young Al Pacino
but settled ultimately
on artwork
by a schizophrenic patient
displayed in my intro psych text.
I switched majors from English
to Psych in my junior year
and helped one of my psych professors
who was finishing his Ph.D.
open his pool that spring.
His wife served us lunch poolside
in a black one piece
launching me into a fantasy
about psych majors
and faculty wives
no doubt fueled by the release
that year of The Graduate
starring a very young Dustin Hoffman
as Benjamin opposite Katharine Ross
who went on to become a Stepford wife.
In the film, Benjamin's father's friend,
Mr. McGuire, gives Benjamin
one word of advice
plastics
a myopic suggestion
vis-a-vis the hindsight
of today's landfill sprawl.
Last week
I saw Last Chance Harvey
with Emma Thompson
that charming atheist
who likes to remind us
that she feels Scottish
and a 70-something Dustin Hoffman
still cool
still plying the Method
prompting me to browse YouTube
to replay James Lipton's
2006 interview with Hoffman
the 200th guest to appear
on Inside the Actors Studio
in what was
serendipitously
the 12th episode of the 12th season.
I guess Anne Carson's right
when she says
You only learn things when you jump in.

Last Chance Harvey (2008)

Wine Gnats

A bottle of kee-yan-tee
(I love Hannibal Lecter’s inflection
to knees-glued-together
Agent Starling
in my desert island favorite
Silence of the Lambs)
from the neighborhood
wine store to go
with the angel hair
and jar sauce
and I’m thinking about
the wine gnats
hovering over the bag of Ripple
being sampled by Bukowski's
alter ego Henry Chinaski
played by Matt Dillon
in Factotum
a three-star on IFC
that made me rethink
my criteria for evaluating films.
But it was two AM I tell myself -
the spin doctor has entered
the building, oh joy -
which didn’t stop me
from drawing a bath
with Ashbery
and stemmed glass
to comb the beach
for a peach of a word
to jumpstart my pencil
amidst the steam.
It usually works
well enough to transport
the wrinkled yellow pad
to the keyboard
for transcription
with editing
and commentary
(Did I write that?).
For 25 years I’ve slept
on a futon
and feel compelled to read
a paragraph
a line
a word
before clicking off the bulb.
There are mornings
when the light smiles
into the apartment
and my toys beckon
and prying to disembark
is next to impossible.
I putter
turning green
at the thought of friends
who have crossed over
into the twilight zone
of retirement
that for one or more
of the assembled reasons
as well as those
which for whatever reason
remain undisclosed
I convince myself I cannot do
just yet.
On those days
all roads lead to work.
There are no detours.
No walking away.
No hugging the far wall
bordering the lawn
before making a mad dash
for the gate.
No vehicle
idling in the alley
waiting
to take me
(and companion)
to the airport
for that long-awaited trip
abroad.

Price Check on Register #5

Bare midriffs parade the latest reincarnation of Neverland
matching wits with flecks of cream
vying for the morning coffee’s surface tension.
Little Bo Peep is jailed for public lewdness.
Even my somersaults go unheralded.
Across the street, flags of speculation are hoisted
against the moon at its jovialest.
It’s likely the birds too have caught the mail-order bug
their flapping loud enough to derail a commuter train
onto the front lawn flattening a pink flamingo.
An old man stops to clean his bygone eyes on a park bench
where permutations of parking meters
blind indifferent well-wishers.
Aisle 5 of course is still the hands-down favorite
with its multicolored fruit loops
bracketed by canned juices and breakfast drinks.
The driver of the hit-and-run shopping cart remains at-large
but the checkout girl has wrapped my attention
around her softly woven thigh and quietly led me to safety.

A Breakdown of Significant Magnitude

Every now and again the room had to be rehung.
We slipped back into dreams possibly in deference.
The phone rang.
No one was there.
A news anchor interviewed interlopers on TV.
A pizza arrived.
Someone went grocery shopping.
Someone overstayed his welcome
and had to be pried away under watchful eyes
leading to a breakdown of significant magnitude.

Putting Your Affairs in Order

You still see the overturned car in the breakdown lane,
hear the sweet sound of the clothesline spanning the backyard
from the upper and lower flats of the two-family

where the peeling paint effected a sort of medieval mural
whose intricate cryptograms
you documented with a toothbrush.

The pages of your biography
appear in a snow globe on a piano in a doilied parlor
where a tabby paws her way through a dream.

The two small boys huddled in a stairwell
paging through pictures of monsters in Life
offered to edit your musings

but you were too busy with stoop-ball
and with tomatoes pilfered from your neighbor's garden.
Later you were awakened

by crows cawing in a cornfield
and by a greengrocer pleading for an extension
which would never happen

because of a news anchor's special report
on deadbeat dads
who call in for take-out and disappear.

The music teacher down the block
is offering cello lessons at half price.
How many times did you talk about cello lessons?

How many times did you finetune the lawn mower
threatening  a journey
to the seven wonders of the neighborhood?

The fortunes in fortune-cookies
leave you breathless and eager to catalog their hidden meanings.
You spend hours googling Oreos.

Your friends were as surprised as you were
when you closed the blinds to your apartment
and took up residence in a cemetery, where daily,

between rounds of stripping wax at the local elementary school
you watch others place flowers
on what you believe to be the graves of little-known castrati.