Last Date

it's like trying to break up with someone    you still love
and you can't give it up
her hand
runs cold up your arm
like a vein    to your heart

still you object within yourself
how can you deny    those vacant eyes
eyes vacant with love
death    she loves you
your change will change her too

from Purgatorial (2004)

Instructions for Optimum Use

city limits to use a lifeline
you don certain conditions
listen:
  outside of las vegas
  visitors will be painted yellow or orange to facilitate
location
       weighted mesquite
       for diving
better?
certain other conditions:
  colorado river    is the state's resort community
  value line should be attached to the city's weighted belt
  equipment should be using the buddy system
  for more varieties of sufficient strength
got more?
still not sold?
         exercise river objects less
need more?
tell us
hire a specialist
you sell better
       you
       underwater
       buddy

from Purgatorial (2004)

Hearing the Last Roar

he's the bullet through to his stomach
got his barrel dropping down brain
empty    small    gun    to his ear
empty    to his    esophagus

the bullet    out    clanks    kicks
goes    into the    into the    out the
sidewalk    gutter    drainhole    ass
goes further    i am my own    i am my own         

    i am an island
    i am my own island
    i am my own    gut    feeling
    onto an island i would not destroy
    my own gut feeling    no one else's depths
    i would not destroy    i would not destroy either

from Purgatorial (2004)

Jericho

i dream that i would trumpet
i would trumpet a dream
from bed
into the world of dream

and when i woke
the walls
of the dream
would fall

and the dream
would be in the real world
all around me
the whole day

from Purgatorial (2004)

On the Carpet

on the last day of the electricity strike
i went christmas
i saw brown makeup
strained on pillows
but it was too expensive

at dawn here
where everybody's bored
you and your face glowed

where

bright where you

men smoke metal cigars
stand pot-bellied where only the boss
because the boss loves the aroma
aroma of thieves

smoke won't
last long enough
to putrefy

where you came out young

glowed
twist fake wood walls

you electric

they hazy
as they deserved

from Purgatorial (2004)

Grit Fat City

fat    wheels on the pavement
fat ass    in the bus seat beside me
fat chance    it'll cool off soon
fat city

grit    upon grit upon grit upon grit
grit teeth    twenty more stops to my bus stop
grit grit    under the wheels i can feel it
grit guts grit guts grit guts

    fat grit guts fat
    grit fat guts grit
    grit fat grit guts
    grit fat grit fat grit fat
    fat grit fat grit fat grit
    my mantra    my prayer

from Purgatorial (2004)

Evangelizing

i would like a tamed god
i could wear round my finger
that small
that hollow
and i would not take it off
and yell through it like a small megaphone
making the voice bigger
and more like mine

i would not do this
i promise

from Purgatorial (2004)

Toy Trains

why does my life go so slowly
and still screech on the rails?

why do i get so nauseated
when i look out the window when the train's moving?

what deal    did i make
with that seedy little guy
standing outside the rail station
on the day i hired on here?

   look    he said
   a roof    as big as the one over the landscape

and i thought he meant the sky
not this little thing
i see
when i huddle under my desk

from Purgatorial (2004)

Self Portrait

i would draw a self-portrait of my left hand
but i'd be using my right hand
to draw

i've seen right hands and left hands
all over town    i've seen them
alone and together and in groups
in photos and in paintings
even in movies   even moving
the controls on the camera

i've seen them on finance sheets
and somewhere    somewhat more alive
hands in love with each other or
maybe belonging to the same body
or bodies that are almost as close
that move even closer

so here is my right hand
worrying    that it doesn't know
what the left hand will be doing
but then it settles    down to draw
my left hand    which    after all
it has known all its life

Salamander Insert

follow this one:

   icicles in planets flame into being
   graze over a grey
   centipedes hatch front are basis my feet my arms
   the shards of planethood
   ball up    come down to the center of everything

   i love this planet
   i love this planet
   i love this planet
   i love this planet

   and back in the field that the earth cracks
   awareness each a higher time
   the doctor takes at points pictures disappear
   adding fire that runs through several religions
   and it's invisible as he takes it into his hands
   blowing cool insects into it

   i love this planet
   i love this planet
   i love this planet

deeper                       deeper:

   i love this planet
   i love this planet

from Purgatorial (2004)