There are faces
In the clouds
They fade
As have those
Of people
I have known
The clouds shift
And different faces
Take form
As do those
Of passing strangers
On the sidewalk
The clouds stay
For an ephemeral moment
That lasts forever
As does the face
Of my lover
Looking down at me
Originally written: Sunday, Jul 18, 2021, 7:49 PM
Have we done enough
In the meantime
To earn our right
To eat and sleep
Again
God damn
That’s all we do
Eat, sleep, eat, sleep
Try to fuck
With a semblance
Of the passion
That some great great
Grandfather of mine
Who I will never know
Fucked with
The passion he fucked with
That birthed
All the generations
That fucked with
Gradually less and less passion
As certain men and women
Fucked with such passion
To birth, not more
Men and women
But advances in science
That established so strongly
Our position on this earth
As a species
That those of us now
Don’t know what the fuck
To do with ourselves
It’s all a big sham
In these modern times
The only life that’s real
Is the surviving
The eating and being eaten
The sex and reproduction
And these originals acts
We still perform
But we are only
Going through the motions
There are no
Noble professions left
Other than
Being a burnout
Our species has burnt out
The only generations
That had to fight
In order to survive
Have long since died
Everything we do now
Is just killing time
Literally thousands of people
Over thousands of years
Have spent their lifetimes
Trying to come up with
Some meaning for our existence
And they can’t fucking do it
We’ve taken over the whole planet
And now we just want it to mean something
In the meantime
As we continue to exist
On the planet we’ve conquered
Each of us as individuals even
Want our individuals lives to mean something
Fuck me man
For once I should publish a poem
With all the expletives
And the rawness
As I wrote it
Because god damn
Of course I’m going to edit out
All the curse words
When I’m sitting in the apartment
And not feeling a damn thing
Other than the desire
To make the poetry good somehow
August 08, 2021 at 02:58PM
The stage is set
For the band to come on
The musicians
Are doomed to play
They could not
Walk out onto that stage
And do anything other
Than play
Their instruments
Are already set out for them
The opener has already
Come on and gone
The crowd has waited
For long enough
They could not come out
And take a nap
They could not come out
And eat lunch
There is not a single other thing
They could do
Other than walk out
Onto that stage
And play
Like we all expect them to
August 08, 2021 at 02:53PM
I walk by
A professional dog walker
In the park
Holding the leashes
Of six dogs
And wonder
What the rich owners
Of the dogs
Are doing
Such that they cannot
Walk
Their own dogs
July 20, 2021 at 10:05AM
My girlfriend told me
That my grandma told her
That black people
Had slaves too
We sat in the cabana
At the rooftop pool
In Nashville
And talked about
Whether it was worth it
To try and convince people
Who are stuck in their ways
I told my girlfriend
I didn’t think
It was worth it
Or even possible
She said she thought it was
Because all people have souls
And all people have depth
She is making progress
In convincing me of this
I am arrogant to assume
That some people
Aren’t worth talking to
I assume they can’t
See the truth
But I am guilty
Of the same inability
If I won’t talk to them
And listen
And really try to understand
July 18, 2021 at 10:45AM
It may seem lazy, but it’s hard work keeping the world from crashing in on all sides, like being inside a box deep underwater. None of the sides of the box are sealed together and they all have handles, so you’ve got your two hands holding two sides and your two feet looped underneath the handles of two of the other sides, but there are still two sides left. So you’ve got to clench onto one of the two remaining handles with your teeth and still the handle on the sixth side is left free, so you’re always playing this alternating game switching one of your hands or your feet or your teeth to hold onto the unattended side, keeping the sides sealed together so no water gets in.
Oh, and the walls are clear, so everyone else is swimming around like they think they’re supposed to and they can see you inside your box and they say among themselves, “Why is he in there just sitting and not out here swimming like he’s supposed to?” They don’t see your effort just to keep the box together. They only see that you are not like them and not doing what you’re supposed to be doing.
The waters of this modern world are filled up to the brim. The waves are crashing and the riptides are strong, so it’s a real effort just to tread water.
The older people
Joined our dinner party of five
To make it eight
And after
The introductions
And the small talk
To figure out
Whether we had anything in common
And if not
If we could at least get along
The old people
After so many drinks
Started to thirst for more
For the youth
And us young
Started to want for some things
Too
That the old people had
Like money
And power and respect
So we sat there together with our drinks
Half drunk
And our empty plates
And sucked off each other
Originally written: Friday, May 28, 2021, 9:48 PM
I wonder about the limits of being yourself. They say you have to play by the rules before you can break them. But they also say that just being yourself is the key to success. How much of myself is really me? Not much, I think. Unless, of course, all that we mean by “being yourself” is that you just stood there and let it all happen to you. Well, then everyone would be themselves by default. There’s no way to escape it. From whence does one’s self surge up? I am vaguely remembering Sartre’s essay on existentialism. How can the seed of yourself fall on anything but fertile soil? But then who put the soil down and who pulled you out of their seed bag and dropped you there? And these questions go on ad infinitum. So there is really only one true individual, and they are either the chicken or the egg. But we’re not talking about just any old chicken here. We’re talking about the Chicken with a capital ‘C.’ Or the egg with all the Alpha and Omega-3s you could ever ask for.
But I’m losing my head. Back to being yourself. Let’s depart from the true philosophy of the matter just for a moment and talk in practical terms. I think we can agree there are some actions that can be taken or decisions that can be made by an individual which seem to be willed or otherwise brought about by their own individual selves. In other words, we would not say of said actions or decisions that they were a result of the individual just following the rules or doing what everyone else is doing. In some way or another, an individual is capable of really doing something on their own. Now, I don’t think this claim really holds weight philosophically, especially for determinists, but let’s just hold it as an assumption for now.
Maybe it is an aesthetic argument. Because what I really want to convey is the sense of beauty that I get when I see someone who appears to be beating their own path. And I don’t think we get very many of these. Because the default is to walk the trail already traveled. Before you can even think for yourself, you’re already on that trail. And, if we’re subscribing to determinism, then the inclination to step off the trail might also be determined, which is why this is not an ethical argument. It is not good or bad to be on the trodden trail. But, oh, the aesthetics of the young girl in the dress running off into the tall grass and away from everyone else—oh, I want to chase that girl! I want to finally catch her in a glade and ask her all the questions that the travelers on the trodden trail could not answer for me. Why did you run? Where are you going? What have you found so far? Will you go back? Why? Or why not?
But how beautiful will her answers be? And herein lies the heart of the matter. Because it is beautiful to watch her run away—this much, I can understand. But how alien will she become? And how quickly? See, this is what I mean by the limits of being yourself. Because on the trodden trail, we can all understand each other. We have had relatively similar experiences, we speak the same language, we know the same people—we hold things in common; most importantly, in this context, our methods of communication. This is important for the aesthetic argument because how can something be beautiful if I cannot understand it? Now, don’t rebut too fast. I am not talking about complete understanding. A little bit of the unknown can be tantalizing. But this is different. I am talking here about not even a beginning of understanding. Something so alien that you can do nothing but stand there and gawk. Maybe there is some awe in the gawking. But if there is awe, then there must be some starting foothold into which your understanding has stepped. Otherwise, it is only hollow-minded gawking as your mind tries but fails to fit the experience into an existing neural pathway that isn’t there. This is the limit of being yourself that I speak of. It is the ultimate outer limit, so we now have a scale. The minimum of being yourself is the cookie-cutter human on the trodden trail. The maximum of being yourself is the girl that runs off into the forest who turns out to be a totally non-human alien.
Now, what does this mean for an artist? I think it comes down to appetite for the risk of being an alien. How far out are you willing to venture in order to find something new?
I do not feel dreadfully the need to conform. I write “dreadful.” You read this and think to yourself, ah, it’s not so bad! “Look here,” you might say to me, “here I am conforming, and it’s really not that bad. It certainly isn’t dreadful.” I would respond, “But you are past the worst of it.”
Of course, to already be conforming is not so bad. But when was the last time you walked into the woods alone? When was the last time you didn’t agree? When was the last time you were hungry? In how many small ways did you, at first, think differently? And then, not all at once, but over time, your individual opinions slowly acquiesced and joined the general consensus.
See, it is a subtle dread. You will not have felt it if you have gone slowly over time. Like the criminal in his cell, awaiting the gallows. But the hangman is patient and cunning. Each night he comes to the criminal’s cell and asks, “Will you be ready in the morning?” And each night, the criminal says, “No, please, one more day.” Until one night, the hangman takes a different approach with the criminal. He says, “You know, I think you have learned your lesson. How about if we make a deal? Instead of hanging for your crimes, how would you like to serve as the hangman in my place?” How might the criminal’s view of the hangman’s position have changed, while he faced the prospect of his own hanging?
Which is the worst? To hang, to spend all your days in a cell, or to become the hangman? It is a trick question. You were never going to hang. The death penalty has been abolished. Exile is the worst that can happen to you. So the question becomes: how much do you fear exile?
A transient walks by a restaurant with outdoor dining. He shuffles his feet. His pants sag. A folded newspaper hangs out of his back pocket. A jazz band stands by, holding their instruments idly, in between songs. Seven or eight tables are set up outside of the restaurant. People are eating and talking at their tables. Forks can be heard clinking on plates. The transient starts to shout, something indiscernible. People stop what they’re doing and stare at the transient, as he stands there on the sidewalk. He looks at one table in particular, and continues to shout. Nobody does or says anything. Forks have stopped clinking. The transient stands there. For a moment, there is silence, other than the street noise—cars passing by. Then he continues to shuffle his feet, moving on down the sidewalk. The band picks up their instruments and continues on to the next song. Forks resume clinking on plates.
“We’ve started our descent,” the flight attendant says. The plane banks to the right. When I look out the window, I can see straight down to the trees and streets and buildings. The houses are each about the size of a penny on the window, even smaller. We’re low enough that I can make them out as being houses with grey shingle roofs. One house has a circular driveway. It’s larger than the other houses and bordered by trees.
I wonder to myself, “What’s going on inside that house?” Is anyone home? Are they on vacation? Does a family live there? Are the parents happily married? Are the children happy to be children? Have they had lunch? Do they have a dog? Is someone taking a shower? Is someone doing something they’re not supposed to be doing? What’s going on inside that house?
I wonder, and I bet nobody else on the plane wonders about exactly the same thing as me. The plane levels out and the big house with the circular driveway slides out of view. White clouds fill the window again.
I got caught peeing in public by the park police today. My girlfriend and I were walking on the sidewalk through the Presidio on our way to the beach. I stepped off and took two or three steps into the trees. When I turned around, the unmarked police car was making a U-turn in the middle of the street with its lights on, but no sirens. When I saw the car, without even thinking, I said out loud, “Oh man, are you kidding me?” I looked through the passenger-side window and the officer was motioning for me to come closer to the car. I walked over and bent down with my hands on my knees. He rolled down the window halfway. He said, “If you’re going to urinate, walk back far enough into the trees where people can’t see.” I said, “Yes sir. I apologize.” I tried my best to look scared. Truth be told, I was a little scared. I didn’t want to get a citation. He nodded, seeming satisfied, and rolled up his window and drove off. I stepped back onto the sidewalk and kept walking with my girlfriend.
I see kids careful
Now that grown ups
Are watching
About what they say
In a circle
Of parked bikes
On a side street
In suburban San Francisco
Covering their mouths
Telling their friends secrets
About what they watched
On television
When their parents
Weren’t home
Prose:
A closet seems to be so private, if we are to measure it by the same standards as other private things. A bedroom, for example, is a very private place. Usually it is behind two doors—the front door and the bedroom door.
If a stranger were to come to your home and knock on the door, it would not be unusual for you to first look through the peep hole, and then open the door just a crack in order to ask what they want. If they give you a sufficient answer, maybe you would consider letting them into your front room. They have, at this point, passed through the front door.
But for someone to pass through your bedroom door, it is usually a great deal more intimate. For a person to pass your bedroom door, they must usually be a lover, a family member, or a close friend.
What then shall we say of the closet, this third door? To pass through this third door must be to enter into the depths of intimacy within the confines of a home, even if there are only old coats and forgotten boxes in there.
Poetry:
A closet of stuff
Alone
And closed away
Behind
A closet door
A bedroom door
And a front door
Friends come and go. You intersect on your paths. If you are to remain yourself, you cannot stay together forever. Doing so would cause you to become more alike, meeting on the middle path, somewhere between the two paths you would each otherwise walk on your own. There is a rare friendship where you can walk side-by-side. Some paths run parallel just by chance. Some will deviate from each other and then cross again at some point in the future. Some will deviate and never cross again.
Do not be so greedy
As to try
And steal away
With what you have been given
As it goes
You must return
Because you can only carry
So much on your back
By your going
Do not burn the bridge
No matter how much you take
And think to yourself
I will never have to return
I have this much
But you will
Such is life
This give and take
That to participate
Most fully
One would be best off
Giving away
What they have taken
To return
And tell the giver
When asked
What you did
With all
That you were given
And say
I gave it away
And then the giver will smile
And give you that much more
I read it lazy like
Looking past particulars
Paying poor attention
Preferring to play
Privy to pondrance
Of short-sighted solutions
For the human condition
Appeased temporarily
By sex and violence
Ceasing to be
And becoming
Giving birth to all
That we ourselves
Hoped to escape
Do you see
These same things
That I see
Anymore
Simple as sure
No more words
Than three
To a line
Are needed
To describe
Something
So simple as sure
That I wonder
If you see
Anymore
Walking swiftly
You must have
Somewhere to be
Whither where
You might ask me
Don’t you see
Where I’m going
Pointing somewhere
Far away
I nod my head
And bow
To pick at the grass blades
Beneath my bare feet
An older lady
Crossing the crosswalk
Runs behind her dog
Holding the leash
Trying to keep up
Arm outstretched
Until she can’t
And let’s go
As the leash falls
And the dog is free
To sprint full speed
To meet a friend
—A man outside
Of the coffee shop
Holds out his arms
For the dog
To jump up
And say hello
At the beach
With my friends
I went away
On my own
Over to the cove
And found
A little laying spot
And so I laid
Until I got caught
In a thinking hole
Then I came back
For my friends
To help me find
My lost mind
Go with what you’ve got
Getting after all or not
Not needing much
To muddle with mundane
So much sometimes
Bordering on the insane
Inane enough to notice
Not twice but thrice
That you were off your rocker
Off indeed and down stream
Drowning at times
If not for the nine cat lives
Keeping you above the surface
Or at least quickly erasing
Your memories of death
Like the lives we live waking
Returning from dreams
Which we’re certain, are not real
Unless something uncanny
Recurs into your reality
Forcing you to remember
When that had happened
Like deja vu, or a past life
Unsure of which and why
You cannot tie or trace
The beginning and end
Of an endless race together
Knowing only that you must run
And never stop
For as long as you are breathing
Heaving after, lurching
Lunging for what you see
Or to stay ahead of others
Everyone has their reasons
Expect for those who stop
And even turn around
Causing perplexion
On the faces of those passing
Who will still not turn themselves
As long as there are still more going
In their direction
Like a school of fish in a current
We are all just passing by
Idle my sigh not for me
No not for me
For I enjoy this race
And run with pleasure
Until my lungs burst
They’ll all find some day
Found things lost time ago
Take a cycle to repeat
Trending up and down
Rearing their headed crest
Above the horizon
So the mainstream can see
And all behind is hidden
When the surfers swam out
Far enough beyond
The crest headed wave
Will have the ocean
Dark blue and deep sky
All to themselves
Until that wave crest crashes
Where the mainstream can see
And a few more will venture out
I wonder
About long lines
If those within
Are more eager
To get to the end
Than they are satisfied
Just to be in line
With others waiting
Across the street
A crowd stands
Huddled together
On a stoop
In the rain
Everyone
Is the same
Seeking dryness
on a stool at the coffee shop
sharing a wooden table
with an older man
next to me
drumming my fingers
and bobbing my head to music
he glances sideways
disapprovingly
he cannot take away
my energy
other than
by my becoming
him someday
You start to say things like surely more sure of yourself with the unspoken seal of certainty granted to those that have grown older or for some other reason regarded by society as being more sure of themselves like a child regards her parents
there is a feedback loop
between what you say about me
and what i want you to say
so i adjust my internal switches and levers
to get you to say
and when it is not
what i would prefer
i will twist a dial
and pull a lever
then look back out through
my windshield eyes
and listen
going back to adjusting
until what you say
is what i’d like to hear said about me
and then i stay
mostly the same
until someone says something else
(sometimes myself)
that i don’t like to hear
i’m in the system
more so
than i’ve been before
standing still
sitting here
taking orders
jockeyed
with a horse
on either side
and one behind
so all that’s left
is forward
and fast
i rung here
a chord that
resounded
ringing
my ears
out clean
hoping to glean
at least some
satisfaction
from a choir
of voices
but quickly
found myself
one of many
and so
went back
to singing shrill
all alone
a transient sits
on a brick bench
elbows on his knees
leaned forward
rocking
back and forth
with a hat held
by the brim
in both hands
upturned
shaking it
for money
a young man
downtown
in the morning
leaned against
a fire hydrant
curbside
with feet
on the street
and right hand
holding left forearm
and left forearm
holding a cigarette
chewing gum
looking up
at the building tops
sitting in the car
thinking
of my own problems
realizing
the driver
is patting his knee
and must also
have things to do
other than drive
and another rider
gets in
out of breath
and must have
been rushed
this morning
soothing
to think of others
and take a break
from myself
all these people
waiting in line
for their $5
cup of coffee
when down the street
a half block
is a deli
that will sell you
a cup of coffee
for 50%
of the price
albeit 80%
of the quality;
but math is hard
in the morning,
i understand
i talk in twos
making it simple
as if this
is not that
and that’s the end
only ours
and other
without parsing
the other
just not ours
easier to see
binary
and easier
to decide
but really
many more
than just two
most often
turn up
the trance
in my AirPods
to drown out
the radio
that plays
in the car
i share
with strangers
that could be
nice people;
i’ll never know
an argument
to exist,
to take up space,
to even be there
for you to read;
and numbers
and other symbols
like on a clock
or the brand names
on clothing
or equipment
constantly telling you
what is what
and this is that;
people
have them too
on placards
outside
their office door,
not to mention
their names
and the acronyms after
all this information
looking around
which is why
i think i like
so much
to be in nature
where nothing is named
except
the occasional trailhead
i know
there are others
i wish
i could meet them
browsing
my options
perusing
the aisles
like a grocery store
going
to my section
and having
four shelves
ten across
and twenty deep
to choose from
people
like paper boxes
with labels
listing
their ingredients
and health facts
i was doing all this
to appear
to be
one of these
and at some point
ended up
becoming one
you’re not only working for yourself; you’re working for your clients, your team, your boss, and your future family. these people depend on you the same way that you depend on others. you have a responsibility to contribute as much as you can. you have your possessions, abilities, and life itself because of what others have given you—both from your nature and the atoms that were not yours until your soul enlivened your body, and from the nurturing that you received from your family, teachers, mentors, and peers. give back to this system with all that you have been given.
i love someone
stifling
a smile
trying not
to laugh out loud
inappropriate
in a public place
covering their mouth
and shrugging their shoulders
turning away
from the crowd
to have a private joy
with a merry thought
that popped up
unexpected
sometimes we say
about ourselves
what others once
said about us
thinking we
are now
as they say
a steady stream
of honey
from the bottle
held
unnecessarily high
above the plate
forming at first
globbed tiers
like stalagmites
holding their form
only briefly
before melting
into an undistinguished
larger glob
making sense to me
as an individual
at first unique
then born into
a uniform mass
even one person
propped up
isn’t the one
with so many
to support him
the same many
who in idle hours
taking short breaks
from supporting
wish to be
the one
they support
tip toe tag along
prancing praying
you don’t get caught
doing exactly what
everyone else does
a man holding a sign walking down broadway in santa monica past tourists and shoppers reciting bible verses into a megaphone and the sign says something about how there is a god and a man on the other side of the street shouts, get a life!
drunk a little
left in line
waiting for
i’m not sure
what just
comfortable
to stand here
otherwise
inappropriately
drunk, but
here in line
perfectly
in place
you’re not really living
left to the devices of systems
that move without you or not
and take your humanity
and cram it into inanimate processes
of production and eventually calcify
your joints to move in certain
mechanical ways you get out
and stretch and remember
what a human can do with
some open space and time
and now on the weekend wishing this
would remain and the week
and its system wouldn’t come again
keep with what exists already
wanting after not so many other
derivatives and replicas and slight variations
that may seem to please marginally for a second
but really just bleed a strong self into boundless life
either of which works well enough
unless you planned to do something by way of “I”
and risk forgetting you are part
of everything like a colony ant
while having a higher chance
of accolades for being something like a lion king
the only thing keeping you from being happy is the belief that you are alone. you are a part of everything.
some would say the good steak is what melts like butter in your mouth, but i like the tough stuff that you can chew like bubble gum and savor the fat; they say it’s for peasants, but bah, what good is a steak that melts and is gone? what other luxuries do we misinterpret?
they say the good cheese stinks and the good wine tastes like metal, but bah, i want a cheese i can eat and a wine i can drink.
they say the good life is sitting around doing nothing all day, but bah, i’d be bored in the first second. give me the yolk; let me work up an appetite.
they say the rich sit way up high, but bah, put me in the dirt where i came from.