the helpless messiah

you:catholic
you taste of catholic.
what you have determined to be true.
or will the messiah step in front of the s-2 train to lichtenrade?

lines jan. 16

gentle centrism:the most radical
of positions.drowning in the dirt
of new words:treason(in the bones
of the state)mud,the paste
of the dead,smeared
on the face.something broke
in the seat of the soul:alarmism
becomes him & tragedy
has a nuclear face.

shouting in the mirror,words
scribbled on the glass
in lipstick the color of blood.

line, jan. 13

i'm a matchbox in the rain,but
the storm hates no one.
twine wrapped around 2
popsicle sticks:the beating
heart of the world snake.

dugin calls for young
fascists throwing time
bombs.my head
is a time bomb ticking
backward to explode
the boy i was.

here in the wild the dirt
is wet.

..........

guide me

guide me to your smooth soft breast.
feed me cake as i stare at the ceiling.
let me nibble that crumb
that one
from your fingertip.

trump world notes

handel:i hear
a lament.louder:mask
the rage-sonata inside
the tv.
music.music.save me.save
a fragile spirit.

this violin will play
as we are led away.


...................

i take issue with the hatred
in the hearts of men.



..................

i can't stop watching as the key
is handed to
(dear god)i can't
stop watching.

Glitz Wins

In the brilliant light of this perfect fall day in Berlin it makes more sense.  Two weeks ago I was explaining to a German friend why Hillary Clinton was assured a victory in our upcoming presidential election.  She was more qualified, she had a coalition that included all the groups Donald Trump had personally insulted, her email "scandal" was overblown and didn't resonate with a majority of Americans.  He listened politely, then said, "No, Trump will win.  He is a showman.  You know, the glitz.  That's what America is all about."

The sun right now out my window this morning after the election is as brilliant as a klieg light, and I realize that of course my German friend was correct.  To wit:

1. Reality TV is more fun than reality.  America votes for fun, every time.

2. Melania is glamorous. Bill looks terrible these days.

3. It's really tough for a party to win three terms in a row.  America's attention span is too short for that.

4. America remains proudly anti-intellectual.  Trump comfortably speaks that language of conspiracy theory and willful ignorance.

5. It's easier to drive home and make stick one "scandal" (emails) than 100 scandals.

6. Trump says he's a multi-billionaire.  Money is the final value that matters in America, now and forever, amen.

I was absolutely wrong about this election, partly because I couldn't see my own country and its values, or lack of values, as clearly as an outsider like my German friend could.

He added one more thought, after stating unequivocally that Donald Trump would be America's next president: "You won't have to worry about him.  Your country's system of checks and balances will keep him in line."

One hopes he's right on that one, too.

lines june 8

what is the reality of a poem?why
the long face,blue donkey,why
the balloons?we floated above the onion
dome & shouted to mayakovsky,to marx,
to danton on the other side of history.heads
rolled for the right to grieve.heads rolled
in the right direction,downward
on the map,tho you know,poem,& i,
the map is not the
it's not the

still,it caught the blood of royals,turned
to ink by divisions of diddlers penning
apologies for aristocracies washed
away,the tonnage ot text devoted
to the few thousand dead of the terrors,
scarcely a word for the millions
who came before,robbed & raped,
maltreated,murdered,mulched
beneath the ermine cloak of probity,
what is the reality of a poem

modern fascism has no ezra pound

saints must be poets for their memories
to last.myth-
                 making needs song/
modern fascists:you don't get this.
your ugliness of language
is your doom.


our best hope is our wit.

lit brut

the neobrutalism of the plastic
pistols on the graves,the siege
of mecca & the death of cowboys
in the snow,the anthem
of the marchers in the street &
pipelines bursting at the seams:we
stumbled into this,a clean,well-
lighted hell,& every plaint now ends
'we have a pill for that'.

for a friend & teacher dead now 30 years

still working out the act of making,the process,
gerald.remember when you taught me
how to carve a villanelle?form as curio &
artifact,like string quartets or rock
n roll,but now we have this pencil,all we have,
this scrap of hope that somehow something
from your teaching will return.maybe a dirge,
a memory of your face,a pale rider on a yellow
horse,remembering how pretty you were.your death
can't be contained inside a villanelle,or any poem.

here lies my friend,my teacher,whose last words
were a muffled laugh,a whimper of despair,
an ironic 'oh god' like a prayer.