Death in Hampden

Death in Hampden

I want to be impaled by a pink flamingo.
I want to crawl on the midday concrete
With a festival swirling around me,
Suffocating in vomit-rot air
Dying here in Hampden.

I want to lurk in dark bars,
Swilling beer in plastic cups. I want to be surrounded
By ladies with bouffants. I want to
Stifle under piles of velvet Elvises,
Plastic lawn furniture, paper cones.
Buried alive in Hampden.

Dying here
I will die of thirst, reaching out
one last hand, drowning in a saltwater sea
Of beer, sun burning my ears.

Confused, enraged, I will run
Through heated streets, a mad bull,
Transfixed by plastic straws.
A pink flamingo, falling from the sky,
My coup de gras.

Death in Hampden
Uncurls in front of me, along the street,
In the crowds, plays with dogs and small children,
Stumbles gracelessly, stares at glass-fronted
Two dollar stores, dances in dive bars,
Counting the hours.

I have always been dying in Hampden.

Zombie Kittens

Zombie Kittens

Zombie kittens prowl,
All in a row,
On your paper towels.

At night they crawl
Off the rolls and hunt
Your kitchen for
Ghost mice. Sniff
Delicately along the walls,
Pounce on shadows.

Creeping up your bolster
They will curl on your pillow
To purr in your sleeping ears,
They hoarsely whisper "We are
Sorry," or "All your dead are here."

Open Mic

Open Mic

Every Tuesday night was open mic
At the hippie, veggie, coffee shop
A few short blocks from where I
Lived when I was sixteen, in
Sun-drenched, red-bricked,
Tennessee. When I was sixteen,
In quiet, southern, Chattanooga
Tennessee, I played guitar outside
So many downtown coffee joints. But
This, my first night ever, my friend
Brought his bass guitar and I brought
My Gibson. I knew two songs, four chords.
When they asked me to play, I said,
"Where's the mike?" Every one of those
Lowdown, hairy, friendly, veggie, stinkin'
Hippies laughed at me. I came back every
Week. Summer of my senior year, they
Closed.
I want to see that chalkboard with the
Beany, veggie daily specials again.
I want to play Sex Pistols on an
Acoustic guitar, write free-form
Poetry denouncing Mickey Mouse and
McDonalds and the rest of our
Used-up, dried out, tired consumer culture.
Maybe tomorrow I'll walk down a side street downtown
And hear "Closer to Fine,"
And inside there will be a circle,
A six-string Gibson swinging, hairy,
Veggie, hippies drinking coffee from
Ceramic mugs, in that muggy, starry,
Close and friendly, Chattanooga,
Tennessee of my dreams.

Ursa Major

Ursa Major

His arms are my father's arms.
Thick, covered with hair, they
Hold the paper gently as he reads.

They were always around me,
Around my shoulders from
Above, that massive sun-
Warmed strength.

Driving to OC

Driving to OC

Driving to Ocean City to
Visit my parents, I
Remember each turn
Of the road, looking
For the sub shop sign,
Roadside custard, gas
Station, bridge, liquor
Store. Each mile is
Backwards, living and
Reading and playing
There every summer,
Four till fourteen.

Afterwards I
Speed back to
Baltimore, rocket
Into work, cook dinner,
Go out with friends,
Driving home I think
Through the next week,
Trying on my life again,
Brushing off the sand.

Failure

Failure

Over and over I stumble on the ice.
This is not skating; it's a refusal
To fall backwards. Staggering on
Hands and knees and back again, I
Can only see the next step-

that day I disappointed everybody

that day I disappointed everybody

I've been staring straight ahead for hours.
I no longer understand language, I hear tones,
Low howls, I speak the tongues of machines
And beasts. I know this is my punishment, or
At least how it begins - to wonder how
Or what has happened to me since I woke up.