poem of the day 05.25.12

humanity

sometimes

i want to love

humanity

get to know them

love thy neighbor

as thyself

but on the buses

the streets

in the stores

the bars

and cafes

we seem to fail

each other

with every breath

humanity

you are alien to me

as strange

but not as

wondrous

as a big-eyed

big-headed

sci-fi fabrication

and i am shallow enough

to know

that i cannot love

you

that which

is foreign to me

that which

i do not

could not

understand

given only this

lifetime

dedicated to research

and finding out

the cold truth.

poem of the day 05.21.12

it’ll never change

he comes in

and pats my belly

he comes in drunk

pats my belly

and raises an eyebrow

says grochalski?

like that he comes in

and he’s every other motherfucker

that has done that to me

because they felt that they could

the doctor who scolded me

for pop tarts

the friends who used cheap shots

during arguments

who still don’t know where

my hatred for them stems

the young girls and their laughter

at my unrequited crushes

he’s every motherfucker

who has done this to someone else

he comes in drunk

sets my thinking back a decade

and suddenly i’m that kid

fat and alone

and facing the noose

he comes in

and pats my belly

and i am rage unchecked

i’m breaking in my skin

yet unable to shed my mortal coil

think about breaking that hand

the one he used

on my belly

the one that patted the fat

in front of everyone

i think about breaking that hand

turning those bones to dust

then breaking his face

he comes in

he…you know the rest

he looks at me and raises an eyebrow

he laughs

because we’re such good buddies

and i think i could probably kill

this man

but i won’t

because i’m hitting forty

and this has to change

this childhood sadness

this chain that has always inhibited me

but it’ll never change

and i know that

i’m tethered to this ancient self

because he comes in

and pats my belly

he’ll come in again

or, quite frankly,

it could be someone else

like that prick at that party

years ago

the one with the pretty fiancé on his arm

who patted my belly

and raised his eyebrow

grabbed a handful of my fat

and said

yeah, you lost weight

but what does it really matter

if you’re still carrying this

around all of the time?

                       

poem of the day 05.18.12

waves of hubris and ego

one posts about the coming weekend

one stays fastened to the political soapbox

another one can’t stop posting about the job

while the poets have readings and books

that i’m never going to by

the poets seem to post on here five times an hour

surprising everyone that they even have a book to push

for how much time they spend

glued to this thing

one posts song lyrics by an old 1980s band

but the other one puts up the video

some of them are going to the concert this weekend

a few are closing the blinds and getting drunk

but not before they let everybody know

many of the them bomb this site

with photos of their flabby families

with photos of rash-faced babies

then write about how they can’t remember

their life before the little bundle of joy arrived

i read those posts with interest and humor

thinking, sure you don’t,

otherwise you’d probably kill yourself

but this one is always mourning the loss

of some obscure celebrity

and that one likes so many products

i wonder when they have time to breath

one of them is in london

one of them is in san francisco

and i think about robbing their unattended homes

just to teach them a lesson about privacy

several of them play games to kill the hours

giving up information for points

in a ridiculous quid pro quo

many bitch about their favorite sports teams

or push a local restaurant

some don’t post anything of value at all

just type out angry diatribes that seem random and dull

a couple of us push blogs

push our self-serving business down a long scroll

trying to get our own agendas noticed

amidst the rabble one-sided opinion and emoticons

of course, all of us are nothing but old pictures

a list of interests that aren’t very interesting at all

we’re waves of hubris and ego

familiar strangers raising the value

of this company’s IPO

with every like or dislike

christ, i wouldn’t know the bulk of you

if we passed each other in the street

and i’ll be damned if i can remember the last time

i sat across from anyone whom i wasn’t sleeping with

to hear what you had to say

in flesh in voice in blood.

                                               

poem of the day 05.09.12

the lancing

as a matter of course

i used to bite my toenails

instead of clipping them

would grab my feet like a monkey

and go to town

biting nails and spitting them on the floor

sometimes i’d bite too deep into the nail

get the flesh and bleed

untreated an infection would show up

and hurt like hell

there’d be pus and blood

a big white bulb on the side of my big toe

i got a perverse joy squeezing

all of that shit out of my foot

for some reason enjoyed the sharp pain

the ache of the swollen toe rubbing against

the leather of my shoe

my mother would catch me

hobbling around, wincing

she’d ask me what happened

if i was biting my toenails again

when i thought that i was being so stealth

let me look at it, she’d say

then when she saw it she’d frown

have me soak the toe in epsom salt and warm water

if it doesn’t get any better

we’re going to have to go to the doctor

to have that thing lanced, she’d tell me

we went through this

each and every single infection

always the threat of a lancing

i had no clue what a lancing was

didn’t want to know

my child’s brain imagined a lancing

like getting stabbed or pierced

because i related the word

to television and movie fantasy

to knights and horses

madmen fighting windmills

that goddamned doctor is going to stab me, i’d think

sitting there soaking in the epsom water

i vowed never to bite my toenails again

or my fingernails for that matter

i was always good

for a few weeks after the infection subsided

but could never stop myself

from doing as i pleased

i always went back to biting those toenails

like an addict

taking my chances

squeezing and squeezing at the pus and blood

if an infection came again

enjoying the pain alone in my room

reaching for the epsom salt

like a seasoned war veteran

for a good long soak in an old rusty pot

a lone knight without chainmail

the don quixote of my block

doing my part

to keep those doctors and their swift

shiny blades

at bay.

                                           

BoySlut Poems

too lazy to post lately....but thanks to Devlin de la Chopa i have poems
over at BoySlut.  please stop by this awesome online mag.

thanks
JG

EXTRA poem of the day 05.01.12

mayday may day

after all of these months

he’s still trying to figure out

the vast liberal conspiracy

like someone must be

funding these maggots, he says

they’re dirty and they got no job

yet they have blankets and food and everything else

still america keeps rolling on and on and on

the bloody same as it ever was

put them all in guantanamo, he says

let them occupy a cell down there

with those muslim motherfuckers

even better let them disappear for a while

but the government won’t do that

not with this hippy-dippy in the white house

if only bush was allowed a third term

the streets would be empty of their kind

and all of those liberal writers

and all of those hollywood know-it-alls

would have to find something better

to spend their money on

than a bunch of lazy sacks of shit

too good for an honest day’s work

jesus christ, he says

they have jackets and books

whatever their little hearts desire

but they wanna block my roads?

they wanna take over my bridge?

keep me from getting home

at a good goddamned hour?

let them choke on their protests

i hope the cops take them out

each and every one of them, he says

shoot those bastards in their knees

let them know what real pain feels like

may day?

what in the hell is may day

but some commie holiday.

they want may day, those motherfuckers?

this is the united states

we’ll give them may day until their blue in the face

and bloody to a pulp

still america keeps rolling on and on

                                                                        05.01.12

PoemS of the day 05.01.13

Happy Birthday to the talented Ms. Ally Malinenko


watching ally photograph
the clopton bridge

you’re as beautiful
as the river avon
standing there
and oh christ
you know
i’m not much for
sentimentality
but you look
amazing there
right there
next to that
old yellowing brick
you’ve taken the
cobwebs off of
this old town
my lady
you’ve shaken
elizabethan boots
and rattled
those haunted bones
resting seventeen feet
under ancient marble
you’ve made
the old new
and something
different over
and over again
sometimes i want
to see the world
through your eyes
and other times
i just want to
watch you photograph
the clopton bridge
after eating nothing all day
and drinking a pint
of real cask ale.

my love
don’t you know?
shakespearian sonnets
have nothing
on you.  



allyson

if it wasn’t
for you
i would be nothing.
you know this
and are thankfully
modest.