poem of the day 08.31.15

the egyptian

the club

has interrogation white lights

a contrast to the sunset-red beach theme

that’s running through this place

young drunks kick beach balls

on another 1980s throwback night

i stand with steve

we talk about bad luck

pounding back coors pounders on special

he won’t stop talking about

the blow job he got the week before

the only action any of us

have seen in months

calvin is somewhere dancing

doing his old man shuffle-shit

with one of my cigarettes in his mouth

insuring he won’t get laid again this weekend

when i see her

blonde

straight-haired

thin

preppy

too well-dressed for this place

she’s walking like an egyptian with her friends

doing those familiar hand motions

laughing

such sweet innocence

i kill the beer and dip my head toward them

steve giving me one of those

you must be kidding me looks

but we go over anyway

just drunk enough to see if this’ll work

she stops dancing at my little love tap on her shoulder

i ask her where she learned to move

but i’m no dummy

bangles videos bangles videos that i watched

with such studiousness

until emblazoned in my masturbatory memory

but she demonstrates it for me anyway

hand extended out and then in

she seems real enough

talkative

and i’ve got steve talking to her friend

thinking the night is set

thinking the hell with calvin out there

somewhere in the red hell beach lights

i search for him

and when i look back she’s gone

it’s just steve standing there

shrugging, we head back toward the bar

for more pounders

more talk about blow jobs

i scan the club like i scan the horizon in summer

see her all the way over at the other end

sweet child o’mine

she’s doing a mean

axel rose.

                                  

poem of the day 08.28.15

holy saturday night #2

and i think

enough indie rock generation

generation x

for me

i want to be locked alone

in my bedroom with books

but how can i think this

vertical double fist beer canned

at the bloomfield bridge tavern

half in love

with the singer on stage

she stands there this holy saturday night

raven haired and pale

in white lace baby doll dress

her porcelain hands enveloping the mic

angelic in soft purple stage lights

this pub pittsburgh pub polish pub

even the pope smiles down on the scene

from a glossy photo

enough indie rock generation to last a lifetime

i’m not indie rock

i’ve usurped this scene

and somewhere out there in shiver-shit pittsburgh

calvin and steve are casing east carson street’s

blood smear of bars and clubs

with rap tapes and r&b

and i’ve left the table here

where kris and angie were holding hands underneath

a third wheel for sure

stuck between two worlds

a two-twenty five bud in one hand

a two-dollar import special in the other

courtesy of jesse trbovich

who says he owes me

owes me for what?

because money don’t matter tonight

not here when none of us have any

not this holy saturday night

with jesse running around the bar

like the chairman of the board indie-rock host

in his green-white golf shirt

beatle haircut and buddy holly specs

knowing everyone in the bar

kris said he should’ve had a martini in his hand

kris said the world would be better off apolitical

but, ah, after all

he’s only a man of letters now

and these beers don’t mesh

but i drink them anyway

i fall deeper in love with the singer on stage

i fall in love all the time

with hope’s voice calling from washington

the red-haired girl in art class

the blonde the forever blonde

and jesse says i wallow too much in my maleness

and kris says i’m becoming a masochist

but one kiss from this singer

one dedicated ballad could change that

but i’ve had enough

of this indie rock school house rock scene

only jesse is somewhere in the bbt

shouting passages from ulysses

and calvin and steve

are still out in pittsburgh

trying to get their rocks off

paying for it if it comes down to it

and i’m not there

and i’m not here so

oh, i know the night is cold

i know i should be locked somewhere

behind closed doors with books

i should be making pittsburgh a memory

but here i am

double fisted double canned double vision

i nod toward these friends

head out in the cold pittsburgh night

walk liberty avenue like a shroud

maybe too drunk to drive home

but ah

but oh

a car pulls up next to me

drunk smirks and idles

i get in the passenger seat

and we go wherever

the night prays for next.

                                               

poem of the day 08.27.15

three dollars

we stumbledrunk
out of the cricket lounge
dive bar strip club
belly full of whiskey
and over-priced beer
stumblerun across baum boulevard
nearly hit by ghost-car headlights
tonight we don’t care
about girlfriends or ex-girlfriends
or the beautiful girls at work
who won’t date us won’t kiss us
won’t come near us simply won’t
we racedrunk up south millvale avenue
talking about the strippers
about the one who showed her cunt
to everyone in the bar
the one who kissed steve’s glasses last week
with her hot pink smear of lipstick
who took a liking to you that night
you shout woo-hoos into the pittsburgh pink-black sky
while i shake the cathedral of learning distance
that looms like a shroud over this little universe
the sweat of this july night
makes me feel alive
we run but run don’t know why we run
to piss in lonely alleyways across from bum bars
where we’ll nightcap the night
as you tell anyone who will listen
look, man, i gave her three dollars
three dollars backed by the gold standard
man, she shoulda done a little bit more for me
then shake her wondrous ass
and say a placid thank you to my wallet bulge.

 

                                   

poem of the day 08.26.15

i’m a genius writer

twenty-six years old

alto girl

head to toe in black

black skirt and black nylons

short red hair dancing

under purple smoke lights

of the metropol

hip chick, at least she thinks

beatnik chick

tells me

that i’m too young to be dancing

to 1984 throwback music

but i’m on two 40s of budweiser

some shots

a couple buck-fifty special yuengling bottles

so i’ll dance the dance

because i don’t care

even if she takes the brand new cigarette

out of my mouth

smokes it to toward the last drag

while we stand there

glistened in club sweat

she thinking me too young and she thinking she’s too old

waiting for whatever the night brings

and i can hear

calvin and steve hoot-call throughout the club

their fruitless cattle call

when she finally says,

i love the 80s

like it’s a grand statement

i think to tell her nostalgia is a hole

but she laughs

throws my smoke on the ground

crushes it with black heels

rolls her eyes at me

just another failed male on a saturday night

turns back to find her friends

leaving me

screaming to her shimming back

but i’m a genius writer

inhaling dry ice on the comedown

instead of that camel light.

                                   

poem of the day 08.25.15

portrait of the artist at twenty one

the so-called writer

(at least that’s what he’s telling everyone)

sits outside in the cold

of a february night

while inside his mother

berates his old man

for drinking too much beer

and spilling coffee on everyone

including the tablecloth

twenty-one
he’s writing immortal poems in a blue notebook

left hand chapped and shaking

cigarette on the end of the stoop

with a bottle of

oh-my-god

four dollar mogen david wine at his side

complaining to the gods

that he can’t even get drunk on it

doesn’t know anything about drunk

just drink vomit repeat like a rock star

he thinks the stars and planets at night

are distant souls

he’s thinking about the blonde

who kissed him months ago

but never returned for another round

he’s thinking about the red-head in art class

he needs three beers at the panther hollow inn

to go and talk to

the multitude of women

on that regrettable college campus

the writer sits shivering

tipping the bottle of gloried grape juice

into the porch light

as muffled voices bitch from behind him

mister-everything-is-beautiful-everything-is-holy

doing victory laps around his half-formed life

the next jack kerouac

with chattering teeth

an unread copy of visions of cody

freezing at his thighs

haiku notebooks and dream journals

on his purchasing horizon

and of course all of his friends are saints

they’re walking pieces of art

stalking the pittsburgh city streets

the streetlights behind them making halos

he doesn’t know it yet

but the world doesn’t need another

dumb romantic writer

taking up space

recycling the same old same old

an empty vessel

a silly useless cliché

at such a ripe young age

i think we’ll stop here

and let him rest.

                                   

poem of the day 08.24.15

charlie watts

she had me

sweating bullets

she had me

not wanting to hear her voice

i swear to christ

she was trying to drown me

in her petty jealousies

but she was right about everything

i was out there looking

for her replacement

day after day

night after night

but i found no takers

other than the hip line

of a tanned stripper’s g-string

our dinner money

our movie money

going against that sweet flesh curve

she had me

on the line for a week

without calling

going mad

getting mad

drunk joyous at the thought that we were over

every time the phone rang

jumping at my own shadow

she had me

finally

on the other line

giggling and laughing like a schoolgirl

like nothing happened

the way we’d left it

and all she wanted to know

was the name of the rolling stones drummer

for her mother’s

fucking crossword puzzle.

                                    

Breaking Radio Silence

in January i posted poems written concerning my wife's breast cancer.
this is a non-fiction piece she wrote on it. right HERE

see u on monday.

jg

Hiatus time

hello all

tired worn-out hot stressed bored etc
i'm taking a break. gonna spend the next week + sleeping
in until at least the sun rises.  so i'll see u all again monday, august 25th

jg

poem of the day 08.12.15

the old college try

i thought i’d quit

everything there was to quit

until i tried out for the college newspaper

the editors huddled all of us around cubicles

under bad florescent lights

in a room that looked more like

it was made for cold sales calls

rather than cultivating the collegiate facts of the day

and the news kids

talked about responsibility and deadlines

about their readership

which was mostly bored students like me

they talked about circulation

even though you could find their rag

free and almost anywhere on campus

usually in bathroom stalls or garbage cans

they gave me an assignment

to interview a lacrosse player

and, i thought great, not even a real athlete

but i gave it a go

interviewed some floppy haired twink

who was a teaching assistant too

and acted like the professor’s office was his

he was boastful and nauseating

but i sat down under the hard fluorescents

and did my best to pound out a story

for the three people on campus

who wanted to read about lacrosse

the sports editor came in while i was typing

he leaned over my shoulder with his bad breath

and immediately said, no, no, no and no

i stopped typing and we looked at the screen together

he said, look at those paragraphs

i mean, look, man, at how long those paragraphs are

he said, man, kids in college can’t read paragraphs that long

three sentences tops

the paragraph bare minimum, man

then he walked away

to go and give the hockey writer some shit

i sat there for a few more minutes

thinking about the money i was wasting

and all of the debt that i’d have

before i grabbed my shit and left the newsroom

my moby dick of an article

on a fucking lacrosse player of all things

still on the computer with the cursor flashing

decided maybe i’d go out

for the radio station next semester

but only if they let this white boy

play some old soul or rap

or maybe i’d do nothing

which always worked so well for me.

                        

poem of the day 08.11.15

meeting at fort hamilton avenue

and bay ridge parkway

and

then chung

says

remember

hey, remember last week

when you look back again

because you see me

and i see you

and i wave

and you wave

hey, remember we see each other

at fort hamilton avenue

at bay ridge parkway

we see each other

chung says

so happily

yes

yes we did

i say

because i don’t have the heart

to tell him

that i only

looked back again

because i thought

i saw

that B4 bus

coming up

behind his hysterically

waving hands

the bus that never seems to show up

on time

that huffing chariot of hell

that hardly ever shows up

at

all.

                                    

poem of the day 08.10.15

wiffleball

i wasn’t much

of anything back then

i was sitcoms and loneliness

third helpings of dinners

twinkies and bags of potato chips

i was shopping

in the over-sized men’s clothing stores downtown

my pants specially tailored for my girth

but i could play wiffleball

i could smash plastic on plastic

and drive that ball for yards

whirling into trees, down gutters and over fences

into the yards of neighbors

who didn’t understand concrete glory

who wouldn’t let us walk on their lawns to retrieve our ball

i was a hero in those moments

i felt untouchable and on top of the world

slow-trotting around the cul-de-sac

like willie stargell or a young bobby bonilla

in my head i was strong and muscular

a sports god touching stone bases with the hammer of thor

the biggest grin on my face

the pain of my small world on hold

as i met the high fives of teammates

thin neighborhood kids

with snuff cans in their back pockets

who were allowed to like girls

without all of the angst and humiliation

who had neighborhood girls who liked them back

boys who returned to calling me fat ass

as soon as the game was over

laughing, putting me back in my place

my paltry legend having already dissipated

into the thick air of humid summer days

before the sweat had dried on my brow.

                                     

poem of the day 08.07.15

dante never did this

we swelter

we sweat

the a/c has been busted

since last year

a building full of people

fanning themselves in eighty-five degrees

because they have nowhere to go

the poor

the homeless

latchkey kids

wlbur is at the printer like always

making the printer sweat

he prints hundreds of pages

with money given to him

from someone who works hard to keep him away

sucks from a two-liter of diet sprite

no one knows what he prints

no cares

because it feels like we’re dying in here

the aged

the pregnant

kids running around like we’re in a meat locker

impervious to the heat

wilbur has this thing

where he has to tell everyone to

have a great one!

you can hear the printer moan

as another one-hundred pages come slowly out

have a great one, wilbur says to the poor

have a great one, wilbur says to the homeless

the latchkey kids who are scared of him

the aged, too

have a great one, he says to the pregnant women

wilbur sucks from his

two-liter of diet sprite

the slurps are enough to make you go mad

in this kind of warmth

we are most likely dying in this

even though the morning d.j. said,

it’s another beautiful day out

the mini-skirted weather chick said, enjoy

wilbur is dressed all in black like always

like lou reed

like johnny cash

only with a rip up the ass of his jeans

that shows enough yellow, crusted underwear

for the thirteen year old girls to laugh and point

i don’t know how he can

stand it in the sun

i can hear him behind me

slurp

slurp

slurp

have a great one, he says to an arab father

who pulls his sons away

the printer sounds like it’s dying too

it’s going into its death throes

looking for an escape from this place

i touch the running sweat

coming down my forehead

try to maintain

think four or five ice cold vodkas on the couch

get up to stagger to the bathroom

the staff kitchen

for another cup of ice

passing wilbur the printer finally kicks

he shouts

sir

sir

sir

okay, have a great one

but i don’t listen

closing the door

into the silent stale cool of the basement

almost alone

i hear him tell my co-worker

boy, it’s sure is hot in here today.

                                                           

poem of the day 08.06.15

bruised fruit

some men have

that swagger

i never did

romeo

the grocery store god

he has two female cashiers

on his dick

this fine saturday afternoon

while i stand there

waiting to get my items rung up

the world makes it too easy

to hate tattooed, bulky

doe-eyed jack-offs like this

romeo’s got the new latina cashier

with her cute freckled face

just about ready to come

in her panties

with his wink

and the chubby asian girl

who always smashes my fruit

is doing everything to get his attention

but hurl herself naked

across the soda aisle

she’s the reason i’m in romeo’s line in the first place

because i can’t suffer

another bruised peach

but romeo

he’s too good to ring up my strawberries

the vegetable cans

the club soda and toilet paper

he’s talking to the girls

about his boys

his homies

his vacuous plans for this saturday night

finally he starts

checking-out my stuff slowly

like he’s doing my a favor

while the latina giggles at one his stories

a finger in her mouth

as he details his twilight tall tales

his bad-ass

b-boy

bullshit

while the asian girl tries to best her

saying, paulo

oh let me bag those groceries for you

flinging herself

from one register to the next

grabbing my bananas

throwing them into

a plastic bag

before slamming it

right on the metal counter

with her

world famous

patented pulpy

fucking

thud.

                                   

poem of the day 08.05.15

wrapped in the ugly arms

of another saturday night

there is some shit song playing loudly

adele or some other faux-soul crap

anyway it reminds me why i stopped

going into bars this year

bad loud music

bad loud televisions

bad loud people

take your pick

and of course there’s one of them alone

grooving to the adele music

there are only three of us in the place

wrapped in the ugly arms

of another saturday night

i didn’t even want to be in here

i wanted to be in the other bar

that had slightly better music

but there were no seats

except one that was occupied by the husband

of someone who looked like wavy gravy

so i’m here

my wife is not

and i’ll leave it at that

the adele fan turns to me

with teeth that glow in this amber darkness

she says, they play the best music here

have the best drinks

she says, i work with children

and every fall we have them paint the windows

of the businesses up and down 3^rd avenue

with halloween decorations

i tell her children need to be taught early

which ones are the bad artists and which ones have talent

i tell her, there’s no point in encouraging them

we can’t all be picasso, you know

but she doesn’t hear me

doesn’t understand art

just smiles and starts shaking her ass to the adele song

so i kill my beer and head back outside

bay ridge packed with people in the humid air

watch a group of bros

all in plaid shorts and polo shirts

bar crawl into the other bar

where wavy gravy and her man

are still holding court window-side

do that slouchy drunk walk the several blocks home

where my wife is walking slowly

up the block

sad and forlorn under the florescent streetlight

that shines through our bedroom window

like an anemic sun

looking just for me.

                                   

poem of the day 08.04.15

car wreck at 5 a.m. outside my window

sun rising

sorta

you hear the engine accelerating

a few minutes before impact

shake off last night’s vodka lull

think it’s just another new york douche bag

speeding from one thing to another like always

for some reason

you picture a fat italian asshole

weighed down in gold chains

someone named, sal, who does club promotion

as the sound of the car gets closer

it doesn’t sound right

sounds like the car is bracing for liftoff

like it’s coming straight toward your

shit-hole apartment

hear tires squeal

hear tires skid

think, watch this fucker come right through the wall

and kill me

you don’t even get proper obits

in this city

unless you’re pulling in a million a year

and what a cheap way to go too

maybe you’d have frank o’hara beat

but the car spins and hits

another parked car

a few feet between you and annihilation

metal and glass and plastic

meet making beautiful bombs in the periwinkle light

you race to the window

your wife too

both still alive

to see car on car like sick porn

you wonder

before you even wonder

if sal

or whatever people inside are alive

if the car they hit

belongs to that asshole

whose alarm keeps going off

or is it someone else

who’s going to be on the horn with the cops

raining sirens and whatnot

down upon this quiet street

while you stand there gawking

whatever poem you were going to write

forgotten

the first cup of coffee

somewhere in the sudden-still apartment

getting

colder and colder

by the

minute.

                                               

poem of the day 08.03.15

greetings and solicitations

from new york, new york

there is no friendly way to be

when you’ve worked six days straight

one day off and then another four on

with no air conditioning in the place

sweating where you stand

answering the questions and concerns

of the public at large

yelling at children

making sure the local pederasts aren’t jacking it in the john

there is only peace and patience

a willingness and desire to pass through the day

untethered to conversation

and the problems of every other man

but living this way would require staying forever indoors

the lights off and the a/c blasting

foil on the windows like a poor man’s elvis presley

besides i’m hungry for northwestern chinese noodles

hand pulled covered in cumin and red chili sauce

there is no other way for me to be

except here with you right now

slurping noodles fumbling with chopsticks

my big bulk on a small wooden stool

principally made for twelve year old chinese girls to sit on

forgetting that we work for a living anyway

the skies the limit, this day being ours instead of theirs

we’ve already seen great cinema

so who knows what lies ahead?

and that’s why when he saddles up next me

pink slips of paper in his hand

asking if we want to donate some cash for his hoops squad

i have no other kindnesses to give

there is nothing else for me to do

except stay silent smile mouth full of noodles

the next round dangling dubiously on my chopsticks

shake my head no to the solicitation

like a man who only wants to live his life

like waves drifting back into still water in the vast green ocean

at him saying, aw, man, i hope y’all get food poisoning

before stomping out into the heat of st. mark’s place

lanky head-of-hair whooshing little wandering

capitalist, fascist, opportunist satan that he is

hell bent on chasing down the next poor fool

to try making him beg for his solace too.