clearance drinking song

drunk on your, what?
in my bed under
the covers, singing
"push came to shove!"
fingers said, "glove,
isn't an obvious fit
enough, must we
wait for signs above?"
so we took a long trip together,
all around the department store,
a sterile commerce smell led
us away from cosmetics to the
clearance-rack alternate futures
appropriate for any budget,
but, i'm
drunk on stale beer
in my basement, we're
connected and seeing
HD and maybe never clear
one and two dear
see them graze the back
yard at a safe distance
for one or four years


could we sudden auctioneers
willing volunteers
callous racketeers
steadfast pioneers
be sick with what we engineered?
nausea-bounce stomachs, we
pound the pavement,
increasingly cavalier
convincingly sincere
could i just talk
with my lips for a second?
no -- wait, maybe, see,
what did i mean by that?
do you know what
i know you know?
come over
make this stanza twenty-three lines long

power

tonight it feels as though our recourse
may have thinned. tonight it feels as if
ugly distance has shortened. tonight
all metaphors wobble as flimsy tin
warble tin. tonight backed time up and
reminded me it isn't supposed to feel
like this. tonight was a feeling afraid.
tonight i am a coil electric and racing
and connected unexpectedly to ports
i picked on a map. clear skies tonight.
good sailing weather. nautical themes -
ugh. but no other way to catch turmoil of
tonight i want to leave someone for good.
tonight i know why. tonight. tonight
i almost picked up my cell phone and
called why. tonight and wide awake. i
mentored a heartache assertively,
said 'things are better when they're
backwards anyway,' said 'which of
these arrows points backwards?'
>-----------------0--------------------<
said 'whichever one points the way
you've never, ever been!' said 'you
have never been daring, always
conservative, always relegating
your verse to neat little columns
and adhering to the safest of old
patterns and motifs -- mature fence
boy is not safe from the judgmental
brigade. prepare yourself.' tonight
i almost picked up the house phone and
called gertrude stein. tonight i raged on
an incredibly anxious insomniac daze
that knows exactly what to do and
is doctoring circumstances and is
being dishonest with me and you and
is putting her and her and others at risk
and all for more ell oh vee eee that i
might not understand one bit anyway
TONIGHT TONIGHT OHHHH BABY
tonight i am prone to sudden outbursts
such as these. tonight i withheld deep
emotional lashing-outs not once, not
twice, but three times; sign me up for
the competitions, i can slug it out with
the best of them! said 'are you listening
in class? who cares about your lousy
feelings? banal angst of a mind-whore.
elicit some sympathy!' why the fuck can't
i fall asleep? i would much rather sleep.
i don't even want to write this poem.
i don't even want to write this poem.
said 'what did we just tell you?' said
'we thought you heard your professor
say not to repeat lines like that.' but
it will be a repeat line whether it is
appreciated or not. the results will be
different next time. the interpretation
will be different by another reader (what
would she have said if i called her?
'darryl i need to sleep, i have work in
the morning.' it's ok. i understand.) said
'ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha
ha ha ha ha' tonight i nearly said the
lot of it but tomorrow might be better.
the sun is coming up.
i should have called -
i don't think you'd have minded, and
we should really chat more at six a.m.
we should no longer be afraid of the daytime

perspective

split 'til you run out of seam and
see tension is real godliness
be spiritual anxiety forever
no one can take this away from me
or you. i see it in you
it is aurora borealis in twos
an itch and an itch when
alone, an old, tired bruise.
it is an apple that will never fall from its tree
rotting in safety
a child who hates to eat
shriveling hungry
an artist afraid to dream
selling groceries
we must scratch this until it bleeds
and dab it with a map of grotesque America decaying
until She thrives as one with the diamond matter
we'll generously have shared with her (it is important
that we allow our work to the world, though it is tempting to shield it)
at night we'll try uncurling the corners. the red spot will dry
between Frisco and Monterey, crowded by fancied hipsters
slovenly and unambitious
existing as they'll dream themselves
but we won't see them
we will be alone. the dust of California One
bellows across north Jersey light pollution,
a choking, timber voice
seeking companionship. i hear:
there is no one here
now is your chance
you were born too late
and you will die too soon
Jack is among the redwoods --
he is cirrhosis and love
and the passenger's seat
of a '49 Hudson, from which
this ancient invitation's fabric was culled:
these who are people who are not fit for truth
only guesswork
do not come to cabin-dwell or vanish into clubs
but to build, to
wonder aloud or pierce plaster or each other in moments of
creeping, insectile doubt
to raggedly trip on singularity and zen and utter time-death
on prism segues of being.
now, dutiful; though we abandon this one
there will be many more
while we are on the way

shadow man, OR the worst poem ever written (super-rough draft)

OK, so, if you're here, you can help me. I have posted the same poem with two different endings. Mind leaving a comment and telling me which formatting decision you agree with, or if there's another more graceful route out of this poem? Thanks!


shadow man parks his
mars-red benz, looking
fresh, salivating at
my best friends.
so we start bangin' our
sticks and stones
on the trees and roads,
songs singin' praise
of the snake-skin
smile of the shiny-goat-man
then prada frown rolls the
window down, lights a
smoke, sticks around,
and we stand our ground
& he starts making promises.
& we start thinking less of him.
& he starts up his car and
pistons pump and he is
thrusting, oh,
"i've been watching you
hatch, dear friends, you,
vigorous-claw and leather
walls, you know what's
good. i smell maple
bacon cookin', i can taste
all that sweet fat. so
you boys call me up
when you are
done fuckin' around.
i will fly you
outta this one-horse
town - on my jet plane."
he's got that jet plane!
i always wanted to
fly across the world on
my very own jet plane
in a real-gone-haze
those over-thing days
five young men on
a shadow island; but
none of them ever
did sit down and get
through lord of the flies

shadow man stops at
the video store on
his way back home to
his old bat-cave,
but they did not have
the ones with expensive
cars, or the ones with
silver girls girls
being fucked
righteously
ruthlessly
and then the white-hot explosions
no, the clerk said,
we are all cleaned out
of the movies that explode
all he could find were
these arduous, trite indies
where the underdog gets the girl,
where the big guy gets what's coming,
where nothing blows to smoldering smithereens,
where his worst karmanightmares play loud on his sound system
and his high-definition TV,
you know, the altar at which
he learned
everything
he knows

___

shadow man parks his
mars-red benz, looking
fresh, salivating at
my best friends.
so we start bangin' our
sticks and stones
on the trees and roads,
songs singin' praise
of the snake-skin
smile of the shiny-goat-man
then prada frown rolls the
window down, lights a
smoke, sticks around,
and we stand our ground
& he starts making promises.
& we start thinking less of him.
& he starts up his car and
pistons pump and he is
thrusting, oh,
"i've been watching you
hatch, dear friends, you,
vigorous-claw and leather
walls, you know what's
good. i smell maple
bacon cookin', i can taste
all that sweet fat. so
you boys call me up
when you are
done fuckin' around.
i will fly you
outta this one-horse
town - on my jet plane."
he's got that jet plane!
i always wanted to
fly across the world on
my very own jet plane
in a real-gone-haze
those over-thing days
five young men on
a shadow island; but
none of them ever
did sit down and get
through lord of the flies

shadow man stops at
the video store on
his way back home to
his old bat-cave,
but they did not have
the ones with expensive
cars, or the ones with
silver girls girls
being fucked
righteously
ruthlessly
and then the white-hot explosions
no, the clerk said,
we are all cleaned out
of the movies that explode
all he could find were
these arduous, trite indies
where the underdog gets the girl,
where the big guy gets what's coming,
where nothing blows to smoldering smithereens,
where his worst karmanightmares play loud on his sound system
and his high-definition TV; you know, the altar at which he learned everything he knows.

(^^^ That last line is meant to only be one line, but it wraps because I am too stupid to format my blog correctly. D'oh! Anyway, the line length is supposed to crescendo at the poem's conclusion. In contrast, the first version tapers off after the four lines beginning with "where," and I'm not sure which effect is better!)

as-of-yet-untitled

the shrink must've said,
"affirm your self
with this anger,"
an invitation into
that suburban sense
of inflated seen-it-all
with nuclear assertiveness:
know i'm in the right
seated at the left
hand of green,
unnatural virtue.
he sides with her,
dispersing wisdom
with the frantic
act-first impulse of
a caffeine headache.
his plan for the future:
ramshackle am-dream
control-freaking, a
recovering red bull
addict
shaking,
saving money,
wasting love
on M-m_M-Marlboro
Menthols, and,
making sure
that we know
he's always right
we're always left.

introduction

Hello. For now, I am doing my best to hide this blog from the living world. If you're reading this, that means you've found me. Welcome. I'd love to know how you arrived here if I didn't send you myself, so, please leave a comment below!

This is a blog where I will be posting the things I write. Technically, the work is "on display," as it is all published... I do this to motivate myself to revise it. In the back of my mind, I'll be thinking, "Goodness! What if some road-scholar shows up and thinks I'm a talentless hack with no future?" and by extension, I will obsess over everything I post. This can only be good for me in the long-run.

Primarily, I'm a lyricist, and I turn musical tricks with four of my good friends here in northern New Jersey. By day, I am a student, and there's something about sobriety and sunshine and thinking -- I don't know; all of a sudden I think it's this great big idea to try and become the next great American poet. "Wow," you're thinking, "good luck, kid." I appreciate that. Aside from writing poems, I've played around with vignettes, formless anecdotal nonsense, and longer short-stories that are mostly observe-and-tell (I do like the Beats, it's not just a namesake). I'll post it all here, if so inclined.

I hope that, if you take the time to read what's posted here, you'll A) enjoy it, and B) not be bashful about replying with thoughts, suggestions, non sequiturs, flames, or funny cat pictures. Also, send money.

Love,
D

that little piece which allows you to dream

what would i
ever do with
all of you
anyway?
all try-hard lace,
perfume taste
unpleasant when
too close. away
grows a one--
bass and middle
notes subtle, single
floral, unpretentious,
a mood set and
no, not nauseous --
but, it's
urgent we keep
bare, sweating
summer backs
'gainst the
will of wisdom
we still lack.
at home festers
a growing mass
of frankie's old
rat pack fury.
shoulder-chip bags
a red salvia trip
from which
i gathered nothing,
utterly central in
her unfulfilling,
always-judging,
maddening--
cat-converter,
fuel injector,
black mold
in the tub again.
indebted,
inactive,
she thinks of
others' money.

lowh

i am being a man
in the twenty-first century
right?
mull it in a house that isn't mine
drive it in the four-door
that i didn't pay for
grayscale friends
all they got is
to work so hard
it's a paranoid feeling
waste not
want not
it's a horrible feeling
want that
earn that
go to the hopeless place
i hear "this too shall pass"
i hear my mom and dad,
the vanishing middle-class,
anti-bourgeois strongholds that
never had a chance.
hail all the christ-like men,
how they put us on the fast-track
keeping us honest
with the grace of god
and this precious protestant humility!
it's a paranoid feeling,
pray not,
want not,
and i've been praying lately.
schadenfreude; pleas
of the proud agnostic,
honeyed despair of a
maybe-atheist!
they say not to put all your eggs in one basket,
you know?
so, i say,
"faith was spurned yesterday
and today it can't be with us,
not in a world stuffed with free,
awful information,
overgrown by true-grass,
infested with parasitic
sure-shots. there are no
jokes so cruel as
these ones that money-humans play
on human-humans.
which of these
were made
in your image?
are you
the jokes?
they've been saying that
dreams are self-absorbed,
then,
they dream of
lazy men
who never work
all hedonistic whores
anti-happiness bores
chucking stones out their
windows at a world of
peace and
honest chores.
do you fancy me
the ugly hater
who skulks in comment boxes,
screenplays,
--!!!i saw the best minds of my--
loud songs and
cackling flash-fiction,
nose turned up at the
world of the mature?
if you're out there,
i hope you'll let me know
that i am still a whole,
that i'm still free to go."
am i being a man in the twenty-first century?
or does it not begin
until i play the board game
accumulate
or
expatriate
we could forever spend
the sound of god's money,
if it were backed by gold.
instead
we must suck
the great gray dick of
the cynical mother-fuckers
who made the world this way!
and forget this...
this is just old teenage hate
with a twenty-something weight.
(who were ashamed of late nights
lying awake, salty with
wicked desire and
unfair gaps between-
who would wield proudly this lightning
if they be more
than still; would they
only keep it moving)