poem of the day 10.30.15

human resources

i can’t help it i’m hungover on no sleep

upright in this hard wooden chair human

resources department lady telling me all

about my benefits i think what benefits?

last night was sunday night it might as well

have been friday night holy saturday night

for all of the drinking piss alley carousing i did

and now here i am stuck here for forty hours

a week because the student loan people

have come calling to collect on four years

of heartbreak and misery and missed chances

fourteen thousand dollars a year to shuck books

check out books return books give library cards

listen to old ladies tell me they pay my salary

not even enough to move out on my own

get a car get anything when i took the job

my old man said, well, at least you’re

gainfully employed gainfully? what does

that even mean? i can feel my eyes closing

here want to sleep maybe vomit should’ve

eaten something this morning maybe not

this HR woman’s voice drones on and on

tells me by thirty i’m going to have to opt

in for the pension or they’ll garnish my wages

thirty? what’s that? pension? bad dreams the

both of them i tell her mmm hmmm my

eyes lead weights i know they’re gonna close.

                                               

poem of the day 10.29.15

the grand inquisitor

marilyn

likes to ask a lot of questions

she soaking the essence out of me

on our first date

but maybe i don’t mind

since it’s taken us two months to get here

do you like michael chabon? she asks

what about matthew sweet?

what’s it like to be done with college?

she walks me around oakland and schenley park

weaving the streets

then all of these wooded paths

twenty-two years in this city

and i don’t even know where in the hell we are

do you like living here?

what’s it like working in a library?

so is it poetry or fiction that you write?

hell, i don’t know, marilyn

we finally sit down on flagstaff hill

pitt campus pittsburgh oakland

limestone and neon meshing in the night

marilyn is quiet

we’ve run out of things to say already

i haven’t asked her anything

i mean where to start?

i think this was all exciting back in april

but here in june i wonder what i was waiting for

let’s just sit here for a while, she says

soon the homeless take over the hill

you can hear them grunting in restless sleep

marilyn sits there like we’re having a little picnic

not smack dab in the middle of some hooverville

she’s showing her small town

i bet she’d meander through iraq

as the sun sets and shadows in the distance fade to black

she asks me what i think about tonight’ moon

anticlimactic, i say

to the turn of bottles burps

and vagrant farts in the humid night

anticlimactic? she says sharply

and though i can’t i can still see the look on her face

yes yes, i say

because i can’t find the secret romance in any of this.

                                                                                               

poem of the day 10.28.15

well fuck you too i guess

the article tells me

29% of americans don’t read the daily news

that’s 29% who are ill-informed

and another 71% who are most likely being lied to

it’s easy to see why things

are so fucked up here in the land of liberty

why those pasty-faced leeches

are getting away with murder down in d.c.

and the ones running for president

stack up the crazy shit they say by the pound

to the hoots and hollers of the hoi polloi

god bless america, somehow we’ve lost the plot

and have let the salivating wolves in to guide us

we may have never had it to begin with

so another black girl gets dragged across a classroom

to a dozen videos showing another brute cop

three cell phone camera angles like they were shooting a film

and countless memes and angry tweets later

ask 29% of americans what’s going to happen next

because i’m sure most of them are consulting god

instead of taking it to the streets

after all, religion is the last refuge of the coward

no, wait, i think that’s patriotism

if you ask me i’ll tell you ain’t shit going to happen

like shit never happens here in freedomland

i mean i didn’t just cross the rio grande, you know

it’s easy to go ahead and get disgruntled

even i want to jump ship most of the time

but, damn, there’s too much salt water floating around

a world melting like an ice cream cone in july

or maybe we should batten down the hatches

get ready for the next hurricane or super storm

a surge of all the bile we’ve managed to kick up

get ready for another black kid to get dragged across the linoleum

shot dead or suffocated or whatever these pigs in a blanket

call law and order here

i don’t have a cell phone so i won’t be there for the photo op

i’ll just grab a coke and stream the genocide online

and to the kid who told me to go and fuck myself

well, those might’ve been the kindest words

that i’ve heard in a long while

you got it right first time out the box, son

here’s to honesty, man, in a nation that so sorely needs it

oh….and the same goes for you.                                                           

poem of the day 10.27.15

doppelganger

she looks like

bridget fonda

calvin tells me

and of course she does

has that short red hair

that upturned nose of celluloid legacy

fair skinned

and of course calvin is in love with her

he brings them around

keeps bringing them around

never learns

she sips a cranberry and vodka

perfect girl drink

calvin sips cranberry and vodka

because its suddenly his new favorite drink

one more in a long line of women

that calvin will have stolen from him by somebody else

but i’m not in the mood to play thief tonight

i’m lovesick

i’m dwindling finances

in a go nowhere job

i’m a week of quarter draft nights ahead of everyone

and these holy saturday nights

are losing their luster

bridget she leans into me

perfume and cranberry and vodka all mixed

says, i have a new tattoo on the small of my back

a tramp stamp

someone said in a bar last week

as we drunk watched a parade of women

with the same discernable mark

wanna see it? she leans forward

has me pull up her maroon soft blouse

cream white back one little mole

i can’t make out what the tattoo is

celtic symbol

or something else that won’t mean a thing to her

when she hits forty

excusing myself i head toward bathroom

as calvin sucks down his drink smiling

checking myself in the mirror

i think that guy on the other side

looks like a crook after all

i’m sure i know he’s me.                                              

poem of the day 10.26.15

friday afternoon at froth’s tavern

american flags

in every corner of the joint

tv on full blast

to the dr. oz show

bar full of dead people

on a dead afternoon

where nothing is getting done

maybe this place

was full of life once

but now it’s like a morgue in here

short drafts sitting like statues

as we kill the hours

the hours we claim

we want so badly

while dying at jobs

and here they are spread out

these little gifts of time

as amber pitchers go untouched

as lovers play on their phones

heads down and alienated

as dr. oz shares a recipe

that will keep us living forever

while the jukebox sits dead

like some relic from a civilization

who once had the secret

on how to really live.

                                    

poem of the day 10.23.15

at least we’re not talking about guns

he says

maybe trump’ll make you all get hair

like his

imagine tha’?

a whole country of people

with tha’ monstrous hair stacked up on yer heads

millions of you

and what about his plans to build a wall?

i mean is he serious?

i don’t know, i say

i watch the other tourists looking confused

at finding themselves suddenly off grafton street

i’m not really interested in being

the spokesman for america

….but here we go again

he says

does he even realize

how much a wall like tha’ would cost?

i don’t think he cares, i say

that’s obvious, he says

i know he’s got millions in his bank but…

yeh see, the problem

with you americans

is that you still believe in your politicians

he says

here in ireland

we know they’re all arsehols

so we treat them like the arseholes they are

and then go off for a piss

in the local boozer

americans only drink on the weekends, i tell him

looking up at a portrait of saintly drunk brendan behan

they vote sober, i add

good christ, he says

well that explains everything

then we’re silent for a while

as the guinness settles for a second pull

then he laughs

it would still be funny though, he says

a whole country of yeh

walking around this lil’ world

with all tha’ fookin’ hair.

                      

poem of the day 10.22.15

julio

comes in sometimes in his pajamas

when he still has his hospital wrist bands on

i know the night could go either way

he loves to chase the girls

the twelve and thirteen year olds

who are maybe just learning how to flirt

who could’ve winked at julio once or twice

before they knew the deal

now they run from him

squeal and hide in the bathrooms

have their moms come and give me shit about julio

but i have no idea who takes care of him

other people move their seats

because julio stands over them

sometimes he shouts about rape and murder

he pulls at those hospital wrist bands

while they’re trying to read the newspaper

yesterday his hair was blue now it’s the color of rust

i’m told i have to call the cops

when julio gets too out of hand

but i hate dealing with cops

so i’ll save those bastards for when he

tries to rip the women’s room door off of its hinges

or when he sits with a table of girls

giggling and slobbering on himself

ready to take it out and go to self-pleasure town again

the good nights are the ones like tonight

when julio comes in dressed normally

waves hello and just falls asleep at one of the tables

sometimes he snores too loudly

and it bothers the newspaper reading people

when they come and complain to me

i swear i listen to them and feign my concern

but on a peaceful night like this

i find it hard not to smile

laugh at them right to their faces

tell them about the shit that went down

only just last night

when julio screamed bloody murder

in the bathroom for fifteen minutes

and then came out smiling

like the newly anointed king of brookyn

to a kingdom of frozen and terrified subjects.                                                    

poem of the day 10.21.15

before sunrise

cat diarrhea

on the bath matt

my wife runs around

the apartment cleaning

cat vomit cat shit

off the carpet too

while i write letters

to oscar in spain

instead of poems or fiction

the bank account

has been hijacked

$300 to some camera company in manhattan

$200 to some online bonanza 

some poor disgruntled fuck

who put card scanners on the ATM

on the grocery credit slot

they can read your credit card through your pants now

someone who hates their boss

hates their job

decided it was worthwhile

to take it out on us

the bank says don’t worry don’t worry

but the charges have gone through

oh i hear my wife gagging

from within the confines of this little hell

we have going on

but i can do nothing

except shout

i got it i got it fucking cat shit

beg oscar in emails

to tell me something good

as the cat prances around the apartment

deaf

blind

ancient

waiting to spew out of both ends again

like a roman

while i

dunderheaded gobmack fucked

sit shaky fingered

on the trigger of another day

thinking….damn

and the ugly sun

still has yet to rise.                                             

poem of the day 10.20.15

pretty chinese girls at st. stephen’s green

the pretty chinese girls

are at st. stephen’s green

they’re standing in front of the iconic arch

taking as many selfies as humanly possible

they are forming karma sutra positions

one pretty chinese girl climbing over

another pretty chinese girl wrapped beneath

another pretty chinese girl

positioning themselves any way they can

to get that perfect shot

none of the pretty chinese girls

are even looking at the arch

i wonder if they even know they are in dublin

pretty chinese girls can be anywhere in the world

taking photos and complicated selfies

i’ll bet there are pretty chinese girls in manhattan right now

doing the same thing in times square

or i’ll bet they’re in egypt

taking acrobatic pictures in front of the pyramids

smiling in front of muslim brotherhood members

being carted off to die

honesty i don’t mind the pretty chinese girls

they’re young and cute and most everyone i know is old

and has something arbitrary to bitch about

i just wish they’d get out of the way

so that the wife and i could get a picture of the st. stephen’s arch

our own albeit less energetic selfie

so we can go into the park and then head to the pub

where i haven’t seen a pretty chinese girl

hoist a guinness all week

when my wife has had enough of the pretty chinese girls

she starts to wave at them to move

but the pretty chinese girls don’t understand

instead they think my wife wants a picture of them

in all of their asian beauty

so they line up like fashion models in front of the arch

waiting for the click and glamor of our outdated camera

my wife shouts at them, no, no, the arch, the arch

and the pretty chinese girls look back

at the stone structure like they’ve never seen it before

move but an inch out of the way

so my wife can get our long sought after picture

just as some asshole twink in a pink cardigan

walks right into the frame.                                             

poem of the day 10.16.15

the boys

the mets

have won something

not everything

but to fandom they’ve won

and this morning

i think about the boys in rooney’s pub

their frayed mets caps

drunk shouting at another loss on the tv

beer bellies in orange and blue t-shirts

the diehards the lovable losers

in the city that never sleeps

the second class kids

whose women were fucking their friends

behind their backs

using pocket change for another short beer

because they’d been stool-side since nine in the morning

screaming at the poor

unfortunate soul on the mound

in classic and current games

spilling whiskey

fist raised at a 52-inch

giving legends mex and darling the business

romancing 1986 mookie and buckner

that cocky team that used to menace my pirates

back in pittsburgh

benny and ivan talking 1969

like it would never get that good again

carter and straw and doc and the not-so-new kid wright

clendenon and hodges and seaver

and tug and piazza and koosman

a mix of history and names over the decades

golden ghosts over the dusty bar

giving hope to the hopeless sports fan

and this morning

now they have it

those old drunks from long-gone rooney’s pub

waking into hangover bliss

a new strut in their liquid steps

to wherever you’re hanging your sorrows

now my boys

for the millionaire kids playing upon your memories

here today

please lift your aching heads.                                        

poem of the day 10.15.15

the kind racist

catches me and the wife

making a cardinal traveling no-no

pressed against a building

map open wide in the wind

he comes across the street

with his bike helmet and bike

asks us what he already knows

are you lost?

not really but street names in dublin

change on a dime

he says i’ll walk you there

the big kilmainham gaol

where ireland was born

in the puddles of revolutionary blood

we don’t really need him

but oh what a kind old man

and that irish accent that gets you every time

of course he asks about the guns in america

it always comes down to the guns

he hopes donald trump wins the presidency

trump is going to build a wall to keep the mexicans out

the idea makes his irish eyes smile

our little leprechaun guide says it’s the pakis here

and he points out a couple of young arabs kissing

the pakis and the blacks

nigerians littering st. stephen’s blessed green

the darkest person you used

to see around here, he says, was a bloody italian

yes, he hopes trump will win for us kids in the states

he’ll make america great again

maybe ireland too

and the mexicans and the pakis and the blacks

will disappear in a puff of magic smoke

like we and they never happened to each other at all

when we get to the gaol

i try to give him two euro for his trouble

for a pint or to add to his pot of gold

but he waves me off

points to my wife and says

buy the lady a cup of coffee

a true irish gentleman if ever there was one

biking off  down south circular road

and hopefully turning the bend

into the dustbins of history.                                                        

poem of the day 10.14.15

coming soon to a town near you

half-drunk

beer belly beached

in a dublin hotel room

where handel once played

his blessed messiah

the proper english newscaster

tells me there’s been

another mass shooting in america

at least nine dead in oregon

something in some way

i’ll have to explain

to any bartender, waiter, cabbie, etc

tomorrow in this fair old literary city

the custom of representing my people in europe

is not a burden i wear well

that is to say….this has all happened before

but they’ll be looking for answers

to this kind of nonsense

and on the tv my countrymen (and women)

are already lining up with pro-gun banners

crudely written poster boards

that are slaughtering the english language

one vowel at a time

bloated jesus fury crackers

the scions of generations who have raped and pillaged this land

drowning in a sea of waving flags

they are telling the president

to go back to kenya

a blonde grandmother cries into the camera

she says, the president is going to come here

to take away her guns

we need more and more ammo, she moans

we need to kill lest we be killed

if only those kids had been armed…

half-drunk in a dublin hotel room

where handel wrote love songs to god

i shut the tv off

because i’ve heard it all before

sip slow from my glass

thinking empathy is the way here

or there is no way

then i turn to my wife and ask her

hey, where do you think

it’ll happen next?                                   

poem of the day 10.13.15

a sort of disappointment

there’s some ruckus

in one of the rooms in o’neill’s pub

some drunk old broad

interrupting people watching the united states

get their asses handed to them

in the rugby world cup

the bartender calls the cops in

one cop instead of the riot squads

that descend on minor disruptions in the states

and he’s ruddy-faced

looks like he was somewhere getting pissed

before this happened to his evening

he gets her out of the room

this horrible yellow-toothed beast

who looks like she digested the whole of ireland

and is itching to fart it back out

she’s belligerent too and won’t go

he’s begging with her

says, look for the last time

you simply got to leave the bar

she spins and throws her heft into him

curly howard style

knocking his hat sideways

screams, you leave the fookin’ bar

as my wife and i sit there and wait for it

her pushed to the ground

flat on her fat belly

his gun out

knee to the back of her neck

choking out her sulfuric essence

as he calls for back-up

but all the cop does is grab her by the arm

and haul her drunken ass away

as people go back to the match

as the south african team scores

on america again

and i go back to my aspall suffolk cider

feeling strange

somewhat disappointed

                                                

poem of the day 10.12.15

party time

steve says

emphatically

no negative

married chicks, dudes?

seriously?

but calvin and i go anyway

and it’s as bad as steve thought

claire isn’t even talking to me

because we’re around her friends

her husband’s friends

their big house in the suburbs

with woods with a wooden deck

everything glossy and lacquered

photos on the mantelpiece

husband squeezing claire on mt. washington

at niagara falls with all that water behind them

i tell calvin,

look how big this motherfucker is

and he’s huge

could put me through a wall

and pull me back again

here we’ve been drinking his crown royal all night

like we’ve come for his kingdom and crown

here i told calvin in the car

i think i can get myself home

if anything happens between me and claire

but i don’t think they’ll be any after party for me

no merciful break from this sex drought

nary a tall-tale about the married one in bed

all those things i learned

calvin pours us more of hubby’s crown

as the door flies open

man, he’s even bigger in person

takes up the whole frame

as joyous cheers ring throughout the house

as claire comes into the room screaming

you’re here! you’re really here!

jumping into his popeye arms

he carries her off somewhere in the house

muffled laughter of the guests

turns into awkward banter

clockwatching blues

thirty minutes later

and they still haven’t come back.                                             

Hiatus until 10/10/15

poem of the day 10.02.15

the coed

calvin just said

that they were older

but i’m trying to gauge the brunette

think maybe she’s thrity

or near thirty not above thirty

this shouldn’t matter anyway

because they’re both married

calvin and the way he picks women

he should just apply for an arranged marriage

get a russian who needs america

but she keeps looking at me

the way she keeps that straw in her mouth

no ring on her finger

christ, and here we are in a downtown bar

with no other action

save a pack of business bros

getting drunk on pitchers of beer

she says, well, what do you do? to me

what’s her name again, claire?

all of these c-names

carnie finally quit calling me

when she went back to school

autumn on pitt’s campus and i’m working

full-time at the library

still looking girls up on the database

still ducking cassandra behind the circ desk

still casing the campus like i belong

walking forbes and fifth with kris like we’re zombies

i tell claire i’m just trying to figure it all out

she says her husband drives trucks

he’s hardly ever home

and when he is i’m usually at school so…..

her ginger friends looks at her like

what-the-fuck-are-you-doing?

takes claire to the bathroom

a couple of middle school girls

while calvin and i sit there

nursing whiskey drinks we don’t usually drink

another shit-eating grin on his face

two nowhere men playing sophisticated

two nowhere women playing single

in this sad bar on a weeknight

he says, so. ski, man tell me

what do you really think  our chances are tonight?                                  

poem of the day 10.01.15

trigger warning

julie

jumps on tom’s back

rides him like a horse

says, i can’t believe i know

a fucking cop now

because tom’s a cop now

julie

fair-skinned

bob-cut red head

red top black skirt

black nylons bucking tom’s ribs

she laughs giggles

googly eyes

reminds me of mary

these women should come with warning labels

a surgeon general’s warning

like on the back of a pack of smokes

cigarettes julie steals from me

in tom’s car with a wink

but she’s meeting someone else tonight

some over-aged beach bum

who looks like peter tork from the monkees

who she just met this afternoon

officer tom says into his beer

julie’s just like that

she’s got a two year old, you know

twenty-one with a kid

i watch this scene

her hands in his hair

hands on her black nylon thighs

she looks at me and winks

what does she want?

julie and her wink wink winks

her two year old

actually two and a half, officer tom says

after we drop her off

bob cut red head

red shirt black skirt

shaking her ass up the stairs

another one of my cigarettes in her mouth

her phone number written in lipstick

in heaven

my god.