hiatus time

hello all

WineDrunk SideWalk will be on hiatus from 03/31/16-04/18/16
so i can get in a little R&R from poems and novel writing.

JG

poem of the day 03.30.16

wednesday morning anywhere

edward hopper scenes

from across the periwinkle street

sad, slouching sacks of flesh

illuminated in amber windows

small mechanized moments

between sips on coffee and the morning news

d.j.’s with no wit selling air

the hours that are never ours

even when we have them at our fingertips

barking dogs and booming bass

car horns and boat horns

scalding showers and unsatisfactory breakfasts

conversations that pass

into blandness or accusations

a dead cockroach that needs to be flushed

while searching for the hangover cure

another mass this, another mass that

politicians hanging freedoms like nooses

around that old poplar tree

blood on the leaves

that latest infotainment rag

glorious hollywood tits, glorious new york ass

all sewn up and bought and sold

rollicking commerce sailing down the river

echoing merrily, merrily, merrily

life is but the american dream.

                                                            

poem of the day 03.29.16

the trumpeter

there is too much death

the evening

under this milky blue sky

watching the walking carcasses

on fort hamilton parkway

slices of pizza on paper plates in the wind

a bag full of plastic junk

from the ninety-nine cent store

american flags billowing their counterfeit freedom

we do so much

in the march toward our own mortality

as the garbage swirls infinite

the trumpeter

he blows an off-key taps

in commemoration to all this dying

out of tune

he sits on a metal bench

potato sacked in a dirty hoodie

and ripped khakis

his brown mouth enwrapped

in a musical maelstrom of nonsense

as people walk by quickly

dropping copper into a twirling olive hat

caught up in the mendacity of living

a half-talent, the trumpeter

plays like a god to himself

as the dirt gets caught in our eyes

at forever red stoplights

cars honking orange angry faces full of disease

going home

always going home to die by the blue tv light

or the computer screen

that coward cancerous sun

hidden behind gray-yellow clouds

waiting for a break in the music

to rip forth and shine hazy illuminations

on those secret, glorious places

caught in between

the violet shadows

and heavenly black shade.

                                               

poem of the day 03.28.16

easter sunday

walking seventy-fifth street

with my wife

in the kind of sunshine

samuel beckett and i both hate

baby carriage psychos

pushing moon-faced mutants

along the pavement

the church steps are full of people

in their dead men suits and whore heels

all love to god but little left for humanity

what sick dullards they are, i think

as roasted pig flesh permeates the air

oh, i have holes in my shoes on easter sunday

holes in my spirit that can’t be patched

by anyone’s savior

and four more hours to go

before i can forget them all

this holy artifice

by having that first glorious

and life affirming

drink.

                                               

poem of the day 03.25.16

the jaywalker

we’ve lived in the same building

going on eight years now

see each other in the hallway

the laundry room

in the basement when i’m throwing out

the cat litter, food scraps and booze bottles

on this long street we pass each other

maybe three or four times a day

going nowhere good

me to work or the liquor store or to the grocery

and he to go and sit

in the laundromat or citibank vestibule

and with each passing it’s the same thing

how’s it going?

have a good one

each time we meet in the apartment too

there are these customs we have

a head nod, a tip of the hat

i don’t know which one of us started it

eight years of these trite greetings

and no other conversation, thank god

well, yesterday i was coming down the street

coffee and a bagel and a wicked hangover this time

and he was coming up the street

we both looked steeled for the same old same old fate

when suddenly he broke between two parked cars

hustled his old ass across the street away from me

with angry people honking their angry horns

leaning their heads out windows to curse him out

on their way to church

not even a head nod my way

eight years broken in one bold move

and as he limped off toward wherever

i watched him

not angry

not sad at being shunned as such

but feeling happy and full of grace

that someone in this world

had finally taken the time to get to know me

and what i really wanted

after all of these silly

wasted years

on such hollow kindness.

poem of the day 03.24.16

johnny says

all i need

is for this moustache

to come in

get old enough to grow a beard

it’ll be lit

like maybe this summer

mad chicks all over me, bro

leather jacket and shit

expensive sneakers

maybe a chain

i’m talking mad bitches

like not them ugly ones

sitting over there

but like tits

like an ass, bro

you wait

chicks love moustaches

especially arab chicks

latina chicks

they dig beards too

mine is gonna be mad tight

i’ma trim that shit every day, yo

i got a job too

some ladies clothing store in queens

mad girls come in there

in shorts’n’shit

and you’ll see me

you’ll see me

chick on this arm

chick on that arm, bro

i’m tellin’ you

leather jacket

shades

tight beard

maybe a thin chain

you’ll see, bro

you’ll see

i’ll be up in so many bitches

this summer

i’ll have to grow

a second

dick.

                        

poem of the day 03.23.16

no chance

before the dust clears

on suicide bombs

the blood wiped off the tile

from this week’s horror show

the victims become talking points

for politicians and demagogues on fluff tv

for shitty poets with writer’s block

and short attention spans

their bloviating creating

enough pure energy

to make small nuclear bombs

that i’d love to have

shoved back into their mouths

before gently pushing

their inflated heads and egos

down deep under

the wine dark

quiet

sea

to burst

and pop

like fart bubbles in a dirty bathtub

                       

poem of the day 03.22.16

the ballet dancers

stand blocking

the N train door

a pack of four of them

hats backward

their ring leader is some hawk-nosed

smirking little shit

who runs the conversation

he says,

yeah, i could’ve had her, dude

totally could’ve had her

we went out like three times

she literally said to me, you know,

you can take me home if you want

but then she was like

you got a girlfriend don’t you?

so i was like yeah

and that was the end of it

but, yo, check it

i love my girl

i’ve been faithful all year

so what’s that? like three months, dudes

and how about that class today?

i mean what the fuck?

plie

plie

plie

is that like all there is to this? he says,

bending and pointing his legs and feet

as people struggle to get off and on the train around him

and my house, he says

my god

dude, you gotta see my house

my mom’s really

it’s been like rent controlled since way back

in 1996

the place is lit, yo!

big ceilings

big rooms

we only pay like eleven-hundred a month

when everyone else pays like four grand

and there’s like mad rich chicks

that live around there now

so hot, dude, so hot

i should’ve taken that girl back to my mom’s place

you know?

the one who wanted me

chick would’ve been on my dick

if she saw that place

but, like i said, dude

i love my girl

been faithful all year

three months without any other ass

just her

and that fucking class, dude

what the fucking fuck?

plie

plie

plie

until my fucking feet hurt

and i was so done.

                                               

poem of the day 03.21.16

the protester

how in the fuck

did i end up here?

i think as the cops

put up the barricades

on one end of the block

people call up the line of chanting thousands

that they’ve done so on the other end

how in the fuck?

thirty minutes before this

i was eating indian food on 46^th street

and talking about going to see some van gogh

now i’m breaking the law

blocking a city block

or rather the cops have broken the law for us

by caging us all in

what is your endgame officer friendly?

america, you and your corporate politics

you and your pseudo-populists

on both ends of the spectrum

america i never liked you

and your hateful kind anyway

i just want to live somewhere

where i can read a book

and have a drink in peace

i’m an isolationist by nature

but you insist on

nominating authoritarian lunatics

so here i am

my belly still full from lunch

not a goddamned van gogh in sight

just thousands of kids with picket signs

and old hippies with their arcane slogans

dull, stone-faced cops

lining the street by the hundreds

billy clubs and guns

extra strands of handcuffs on their belts

thuggish tools

for the whole corrupt system

always ready to turn on a dime

and hurt the people they protect and serve

my little wife and i in the middle of this shit

a couple of dumbs

who should’ve followed their lunch

with some frozen yogurt

or a black and white cookie

stayed out of this circus

avoid maybe being arrested

or pepper sprayed by pigs in the pale afternoon

because the wrong people

are always being pepper sprayed or worse

in this rotted out hollow beast carcass

everyone here still keeps calling

the united states of america.

                                    

poem of the day 03.18.16

03/17/16

sky swirls ashen

there is hail

there is rain

there is a thunderous reckoning coming

and the rumor

of a nor’easter for the beginning of spring

they killed caesar two days ago

and now they are sitting in bars

packed back to back with white pasty faces

decked in green

like colorful klan rallies

their racist, orange-faced demagogue bloviating

on fifty-two inch televisions

next to black men dunking on wide screens

they cheer and it sounds like murder

notre dame hoodies and shamrock tattoos

corned beef breath stinking up

the sidewalk as they sing danny boy

in between drags on stale smokes and metal vapes

their women dress like leprechaun whores

searching for their pot of gold

inside of some sap’s wallet

all their free jameson shots

in thick puddles on pavement

expelled cabbage lunches dancing in the rain

they go back inside

for round five or six or seven

green love beads and hollywood starlet shades

wearing little plastic hats

that look like penis tops

spray tan homicides wearing jeans

that show lacy whale’s tales

they all have the luck of the irish this afternoon

as i pass each tavern

each bar

all looking the same dull celebration

stopping at a red light

i cock a finger and thumb

invoke my second amendment rights

fire hot air at some flesh-stuffed joint

declaring itself a st. patty’s headquarters

then move the hell on.

                                               

poem of the day 03.17.16

$8,000 shoes

ammar wants me

to see the $8,000 shoes

search it up! search it up! he yells

as he barrels toward me

he tries to abscond my computer

they’re lit! he declares

lit means cool these days

although i know another

meaning for the word

i think about how i’ll be lit

in a few hours time

but for now ammar and i are staring

at a foot locker web site

at a pair of red sneakers

that cost, in fact, eight grand

ammar stares at them

like one would a beautiful woman

or a sunset on venice beach

to me, the shoes are plain and dull

they’re ugly to be honest

puffy like moon boots

i’d rather spent eight grand silence

yo! what do you think about those?

ammar asks

all i can think to say is

who would spend eight grand on a pair of shoes?

he says

if you’re black

and from the ghetto

and rolling in bling

which seems all kinds of ironic to me

a kind of rap fantasy they sell online

but i go along and nod

the shoes have been blessed

by this year’s hip-hop god

and it’s been decades since i was fifteen

me and ammar, we stare at those shoes

like we’re going to buy a car load of them

those shoes as red as a whirling alarm

red as a dwarf sun bursting in the cosmos

or do dwarf suns just bubble

and freeze out?

i should probably look that up online

too.                                                                

poem of the day 03.16.16

the scam artist

looking out my kitchen window

into the vodka night

she passes dressed in a hoodie

clutching a cell phone

clutching herself

sees stupid me in the window

stops and spins

turns doe-eyed and comes closer

she says, since you’re looking

out the window anyway

i was wondering if i could ask you something

shoot, i say

because i still know how to talk to the young

and doe-eyed female

she says, you know 74^th street

and shore drive, right

i nod

intimately, i say

well, she says, you see, my car….

i hold up my hand

and stop her right there

let me guess, i say

your car broke down and you need some money

she shakes her head

huddles into herself on a sixty degree night

for good measure

tilts her head and lifts those eyes

look, i tell her

i’ve heard this scam at least five times

in this neighborhood

it’s always some poor girl

clutching her dead phone at night

huddled into herself in any kind of weather

with a dead car just down the block.

sometimes they cry, i tell her

but have you heard it from me? she asks

silent

we stare at each other as the vodka night

starts to turn sober

i can’t help you, i finally say

she shrugs, gives me the finger

turns doe eyes and spins down the street

like it ain’t no thing

looking for the next idiot

around the next block

some money man who has yet to hear

her pitiful tale of woe

as i step away from the window

close the blinds on this side of humanity

and pour myself

another stiff one.

                                                                  

poem of the day 03.15.16

grace is gone

and the old hatreds

have risen up from under their rocks

where they’ve been hiding

taking a new form

they ooze like stale bile

flowing out of sewers

flooding the city and countryside

with their yellow muck

bubbling out of televisions and phones

there is so little to be said for it

it seems it’s always been there

like an old blanket suffocating us

from sea to shining sea

my how we’ve hoodwinked ourselves

into believing we’ve made a better world

but the battle lines have been redrawn

the violence seems so vain glorious

retrograde, we now stumble

for words of enlightenment

but there is only the ignorance and fear

that we’ve courted for years

a generation facing

a dark reckoning

or a cold, black end

to this idiotic myth

offering little left to save.

                                                            

poem of the day 03.14.16

health nut

you can never really

do anything good for yourself except die

shake off that mortal coil

as the original slick willy wrote

and take a final bow to this calamity

but here i am anyway

freezing in this beast winter

running four miles

after another fruitless morning playing artist

already three S.U.Vs have tried to hit me

and the dogs have jumped at my legs

their barks and snarls echoing

as i trot down another potholed block

i think to myself how crazy this is

the sweat and the labored breathing

the pains in the knees and shoulder

the feeling that any moment

i could have a heart attack and drop

life was much easier on the couch

drinking scotch by the bottle

and thinking fuck it i know it all already

but still there is another hill to climb

another stretch of sun-soaked desolate road

another tank-sized baby stroller to circumnavigate

in the distance

the kid wailing above my ipod music

the mother’s fat ass swaying the length of the sidewalk

in stretchy black pants that do her no justice

and as i do the fast math wondering how i’ll pass this

i trip over a rock

a crack in the pavement, whatever

and go flying feet in the air across the street

like a fat, white lawn dart

landing on both palms and rolling on my left side

to the chuckles of high school kids

dressed like gang members and street walkers alike

crossing the street against the speeding traffic

horns honking they spin and dance

like they’ll live forever

and ever

and then some more.

                                               

poem of the day 03.11.16

the populist

we don’t know

where this world

is going to go these days

all these madmen wanting to take us to the brink

it’s like a mahler symphony

so up and down, so full of bombast one minute

subtle and barely audible the next

no, it’s like a god awful soap opera

that’s reaching for ratings through bloodshed

and amal stands behind me cursing into his cell phone

he hold up an image of the populist

orange faced and combed over

a designer blue suit that still looks cheap

we watch him hitler salute a room full

of dead white relics hoisting american flags

he says, i hate this man

i hope someone knocks him out

i hope he falls down the stairs on national television

and breaks every bone in his body

i hope he….but amal doesn’t say it aloud

in this room full of mixed company and suspicion

he’s better than the men who want to run this country

he stands there all sweat and anger

he has known a kind of hatred in america

that i’ll never be able to describe

because i’ve been given a free pass with my skin

because i look like every man standing with the populist

the kind lone women still make wide ends around

when we’re coming home alone together in the dark

what is there to tell amal?

that he holds the future more than any of this?

this too shall pass…he shall fucking overcome?

but what if the molotov cocktails really fly

and the bodies hit the street with loud death rattling thuds

and we’re left with nothing but the will to watch it burn?

amal puts his phone down and storms out

he leaves a wake of frustration and fear

i want to get up and join him outside

where i can see him panting on the busy street

teach us both to breathe the same air again

before these demagogues suck it all out and away

but i’m stuck where i stand

which is nowhere good, i think

humming mahler in these waning weimar days.                                      

poem of the day 03.10.16

watching marshmallow

take a monstrous morning shit

in the barren flower bed outside my window

as his owner shouts into her phone

i think at least the two of them are consistent

unlike poetry or hot water in this place

they are like death and taxes

i never liked marshmallow, even as a pup

the kind of terrier mix you make big u-shapes around

with an insidious bark and that awful name

cooed at during periwinkle stretches

of the most ungodly of morning hours

the way his excrement stench wafts into the apartment

along with his owner’s cigarette smoke

along with the bleating, nasal pace

of her inane and desperate conversations

but still i stand there, hidden by navy blue curtains,

watching the dog do his business

like i’m viewing some sort of alien ritual

like an old man with nothing better on his agenda

than to spend his fleeting hours sitting in a laundromat

never understanding why i don’t get things done

as ms. owner stubs out another ciggie

suggests that someone on the other line bite her

the two of us mesmerized by marshmallow’s

big fat turd steaming in the march cold

fertilizing nothing by the frozen dirt and weeds

and the last line of another mediocre poem.

                                                                        03.07.16

poem of the day 03.09.16

the feminist

he says

yeah, man

she’s got a nice face’n’all

really pretty

those eyes

you know?

the kind of personality

i really dig

and she makes

some cash

too

but, man

the girl has no ass

i mean

NO

ass

like what am i gonna smack

when we get it on, right?

be like hittin’

bone

man

you know what i’m sayin?

bone.

                                    

poem of the day 03.08.16

we can’t go back

            --for kristofer collins

but it’s tuesday morning

sitting here over this coffee

another ceaseless brooklyn morning

shoulder pain and nose hairs

thinking but if i could go back

just once or a few times

maybe a weekday afternoon

with kris at the beehive

over those cappuccinos that

burned our hands each time

we took them up the steps

to that large room i remember

being bathed in gray light

from a sun that never quite

got caught in the pittsburgh sky

we’d sit somewhere where

we could both watch coeds and see that

oil painting of a southern preacher

the one who looked like george jefferson

and of course there’d be kerouac talk

conversation about girls and family and plans

to get out of pittsburgh for the summer

the ones that never materialized once

we received our first spring paychecks

and i’m not saying things were better back then

you see i’m done with that illusion

and i’ve somewhat accepted

the encroachment of time

maybe they were just different or

a touch less burdened or burdened

in a way that was suitable for the age

and i don’t go anywhere now where

i can kill hours like that

daydreaming away an afternoon

without thinking about the time i’ve lost

and most nights i can’t stay up

any later than ten on the dot

kris, we’ve talked kerouac to death

but, man, it’s been a long time

since i’ve had a cappuccino

bathed in that gray home city light

or really felt the sensation on

my chapped hands as i let them burn.                                                  

poem of the day 03.07.16

03/06/2016

the people

have perfected themselves

into a wondrous

monotony

thin scarves

and coffee cups

smoothie sucking

in the sun

mechanical jubilations

coming from out

of sports bars

dog walker methane blues

a weekend repetition

playing out

on every block

swinging the wine bottle

i serpentine

a row of american flags

pass diners in an english pantry

writing cell phone novels

over their cold food

look into the grocery store

at the conveyors

of junk food

for conspicuous consumption

watch the cashiers

bag flavored

potato chips

tubs of ice cream

soda by the case

stealing debit card numbers

from frowning fat customers

so that they too

can have a small slice

of this

plastic

suffocating

sunny

american

daydream

                                    

poem of the day 03.04.16

a poem for a guy like me

reading the poets lately

and so many of them have gone long winded

epics should’ve ended

with whitman weeping over manhattan

but i’ve got one poet

going on for six pages about her girlfriend’s vagina

another going on for ten about meth, for christ’s sake

it’s enough to make me

take up joke book and comic book reading again

most of the long winded poets are writing poems

about the poem too

it happens at times, i guess

a.d. winans has done it

so has jack micheline

saint bukowski has vomited more poems

about poetry than most

when he wasn’t writing about the race track

almost all the good and bad poets

end up writing poems about poetry

most poets are self-reflexive and deep down know

that no one out there really cares

about how the poem grabs you

but just once i like to see a poem about poetry

written for a guy like me

the kind who drinks too much vodka

and says stupid, drunken shit to his wife

hangs up on her co-workers when they call

and spends the night sleeping on the couch

a guy so anxious and stressed all the time

he gets pains in his arms and his chest

the eventual heart attack man

a man who says, i’ll take a whole bottle of pills

if he becomes president

a poem about beautiful poetry

for the guy who shoves vegetables down

like he’s eating kerosene

sucks buffalo wing sauce like it’s going out of style

a  blood red meat poem about blood red meat poetry

circling a group of scared vegans poets

and their thirty-six page odes to the written word

the two magnum bottles of red

half a bottle of extra strength aspirin poem

that can’t even get off the couch

because he’s so fucking hungover

i’d like to see one of these verbose word-slingers

write an epic poem about poetry

for the guy (or gal) who wonders why

that check still hasn’t cashed

who’s got the sixth day of the job tomorrow

and itchy balls all of the time

the people who get coughed on

on the train

and can’t find a quiet place for lunch

the poem about the poetry of killing the morning’s cockroach

before the first cup of coffee

a serene poem about the poetry of swimming alone

in a vast green-gray ocean

truth be told

maybe i should go ahead and write that poem

it’s been a while since i’ve written

a poem about the act of poetry itself

but i don’t know if this is it

it’s not even two pages long

truth be told i’ve had a bit of writer’s block lately

because people have gotten so violently banal

i’ve stopped paying attention and have run out of ideas

honestly i’m feeling a touch anxious about the country

writing this poem about poetry

and i might have to stop soon

pop two gas-ex and take a shit while reading the new york times

apply for a work visa and move to canada

where i’ll write poems about the poetry

of the barren landscape

or what a drag hockey and toronto are

one about the tenants of nationalized health care

poutine and snow

how much better the beer

and  maple syrup are up there.

                                                            

"best of" poem of the day 03.03.16

one from four years ago:

slogging through saturday streets

slogging through saturday streets

in march rain

nasal cough harpooning my chest

gray and hobbled on sore ankle

embarrassed amongst the pigeons

and dead rats

i seek refuge in the piss scented bus

open up your book of poems

find my cobwebbed name

mixed amidst your calliope words

and comet memories

thank the heavens for this timely shower.

                                    03.03.12

poem of the day 03.02.16

death at sea

this cockroach won’t die

he’s the donald trump of this apartment

pressed three times

with the clean end

of a shit-stained piece of toilet paper

there he is still crawling on it!

the insolent fuck!

but down

down you go

into the bowl with the rest

of this morning’s waste

paddling in the yellow water

reveling in the muck

i blow a trumpet with dirty fingers

declare this democracy dead

give a good hardy flush

send you the way of davy jones

dead as the american electorate

dead as the future seems

goodbye.

                       

poem of the day 03.01.16

saturday upshot ruinous planet sonata

a sewer line bursts

and i get me a saturday free from the job

we’re killing the planet

so it’s sixty degrees out in february too

this weekend brought to us

by failing infrastructure and climate change

but who can complain in this sun?

with everyone breaking out their spring wardrobes

i’m tired of complaining anyway

tired of whining about demagogues and the fall of america

about rivers of shit filling up basements

and flowers blooming without a leaf on a tree

it’s better to see art and eat delicious indian food with you

than go back and forth over what i can’t control

worry whether or not

we’ll end up in some internment camp come november

or whether we’ll be able to swim

once those sea levels rise infinite

seems to me the damage has been more than done

and with the way we drink

we might not live that long anyway

better to enjoy it now than squander it

this lovely day in union square

the death stench of democracy in the air

let’s make art

let’s dance

for christ’s sake i hear there’s the promise

of frozen yogurt somewhere on first avenue

and later copious amounts of cheap vodka on the couch

neil young songs and the ghost of david bowie

open windows to let us breathe in

the cool salt air of the estuary

as we watch our favorite tv show

is it too much to enjoy this day?

this saturday upshot ruinous planet sonata

passing all of the beautiful graffiti

the three-thousand homeless bodies lining these streets

saying to them isn’t the weather divine?

instead of dipping into our pockets

for another hard-earned dollar

and handing it over

that funny money honey, hon

that we were saving for a cold and rainy day

should another one ever come.