Coming Soon!

Kate Greenstreet and Janet Holmes.

Certain Photographs You Look At

Stella looking at her cousin, Dylan. She has thoughts and so does he. There are worlds outside of the world. In those worlds, words are swirling but they don't land in the correct order. They represent, like, entropy. A sort of crumbling of reality.

I'm So Glad You Found Me

It occurs to me that you're looking to buy a book of poetry about Hitler's Mustache. Perhaps you're like, Yeah, I'm looking for a book of poetry about Hitler's Mustache. In this case, you have found your blog. I have a book to offer you. You can buy it here and here. I know this is pretty selfish of me, but I hope you'll understand. I assume you're selfish too. But in a good way. Buying the book may seem like a waste of money, but I don't think that's true. Of course, I'm biased, but I'll say here that I think I'm being objective. I could include quotations regarding what a terrific book it is, but I feel better just alluding to them and leaving it at that.

The New Explanation

There are things that I want in the world.

Including rock-n-roll.

But really it's my children, who make

faces and laugh a lot.

There is no reason to think otherwise.

I think of myself as articulate because

I never say anything that seems just right.

This sense of failure

encourages my delusions.

I find myself sobbing for hours but

really I'm watching TV

and talking on the phone.

I'm no busy body, but the neighborhood

concerns me.

Even my lies about the afternoon

can fill a smallish vase.

Other things, like my best assessment of the situation

are alluded to, but left under blankets.

Oh, and This...

All week long my poems have been up at No Tell Motel. You should check it out. I don't know why I didn't mention it earlier, but I do a lot of stuff I don't understand.

How It's All A Little Silly But Important

Being interested in poetry is like being
interested in show cattle.
Being interested in show cattle is like being
interested in birds. People,
it's all the same bag that we pick from.
I know of people who believe in ideas
of supremacy.
But I love show cattle without knowing
anything about them.
I had a student who wrote a paper
about them once and it was great. I gave
her an A.
Poetry is a sort of 4-H.
Do you have interests? It's likely
they're a sort of 4-H too.

Something Positive, You Know, Grateful

When my folks were here this summer, my dad went to the Delaware County Fair with Max and me on a few nights. One night we watched stock car races, short track and figure 8 racing. One night we watched the high school marching band competition. Max liked the slide when it came to the rides. One night we couldn't leave when we wanted because there was a bomb scare and the police were checking out a suspicious package--right by our car! The cop leaned down from his horse and whispered in my dad's ear. The morning my parents left we all had breakfast at I- Hop. Afterward, I came home and went to sleep and Jenny and the kids went to Target. When I woke this note was in the door with 20 bucks. (Notice that it includes the date and time.) Now, seriously. You are born in this world with parents. What can you hope that they are?

Trying to Reach Real Conclusions about Something

If you feel that things are ending it is possible
they are just beginning. It is a fog horn
you can hear in the distance.
You wait by the telephone, looking over
the harbour. All night long you keep
dreaming this song that begins
with an E chord but ends tweezing your
eardrums from your ear holes.
You wonder what sort of doctor
is alive down here.
You can see images of people who have
embarrassed you and drift into the sea.
The floating takes the place
of a brainwave and the combination
is safe. I don't know about you
but I can't stand losing.
My whole life I've been a dick about it.

Better Than Everything Else

That's Stella, my nephews Jake and Dylan, and Max. Is someone saying "Do something funny with your mouth"? Is someone saying, "Be perfect! It's needed"? No. Nobody is saying these things. Instead there is one of millions and billions and billions of moments, which are strung together as a sort of necklace or choke hold, and it is paralyzed that way. And yet you find one. And you say, "I don't care about the other stuff....I don't even care." And it's a perfect moment, like every moment, even if Liam Rector has killed himself.

The Expolsive Bow Tie

One fantasy is being a country music songwriter
and writing about pandemics, but also
my kids who would look terrific in
country music videos.
I also think about wearing bow ties, sometimes,
if I'm lonely.
But I'm not lonely so I'm not thinking of that.
I'm thinking about Merle Haggard,
but I'm not.
Sorry about the songs I keep singing.
You are no doubt sick of this shower.
If only we could get cleaner.
Then, like a mean meat machine, I might
make a real bomb and blow this.

Not Mentioning The Title or the Band Name

There are words, things to watch on TV,
in laws, children, high voices, certain sounds,
people from Italy, people from other places,
different chairs, forms of sexuality, repulsions,
teeth biting things, other watermelons, the third person,
the dear tears, smirky thoughts, anxiety like
fountains, pulled pork sandwiches....

Our Moral Responsibility

I'm trying to balance my sense of who I am

with my sense of the dead bat my son and I found in the front yard

today. And then, we found another dead bat on the road

just down from our house! Are you kidding me?

I can't remember the last time I found a dead bat.

It's like Dead Bats Everywhere Day.

Still, there's my job, and the college students who seem

to be filling the town, and the two guys who were

crushing cans by the trash cans.

My son was, like, "What are those guys doing?"

And, "They looked like they were crushing cans."

In the moment that you think you are comprehending

the moment, instead you hear words from war experts

that make really tragic sense.

Sorting Through Various Artistic Experiances

What I've heard from some is that the new Short Hand CD, Toward Orange,
sounds different from the previous Short Hand CD, Good Enough.
In many cases this difference is seen as a positive, as I understand it.
It is also seen as a negative.
I am never sure of anything that I understand.
I understand that things change, that people don't make sense,
that what appears to be a bird can sometimes simply be a refrigerator.
Even the most basic forms of mistaken identity are interesting.
For instance, I was crawling through a furnace,
and there, in the inside of my ear,
I heard a siren wail and an ambulance coming.
So, I don't have any excuses. Still, what I see
in front of me is a super goofy car wreck.

The Capacity

If you have this capacity to continue to read words
then it is possible you are reading this now.

I am as well, though I am writing this--and this word,
which is word, and which is word.

It is so stupid that you wonder to what extent
you are inbred and made of a type of dough
that continues to rise, despite the limitations of regular dough.

Instead, you don't acknowledge the normal order
of things
and seek to disturb the universe by making things up.

It is not the way to feel terrific or become happier.
It is like a loose louse.

I mean the bullshit in these letters.
I mean all these letters.

The Bad Times

It's horrible to be a human sometimes.

I don't even like writing about it.

I wouldn't say anything at all but I don't know what else to do.

Maybe I should do nothing.

Nothing seems to be the most common condition.

Instead, the things in my head hurt.

What about your head?

Not that it matters. Yet,
it really matters.

Especially in this world there is disappointment.

I think of things and then I keeping thinking.

You are, like, fixing a belt on a small motor.

It just keeps going off.

What I Say Sometimes, But Then Stop Myself

I'm not planning on being
a person forever.

But for now, my daughter sleeps upstairs
and my memories of early 80's punk rock
are clarified by a recent documentary.

This is sorta haunting my skull
in a way that is grating.

In another way, I find the time I spend
doing something that doesn't make sense is really

something.
Seriously, can you imagine the dementia?

I am a person jumping from roof to roof.

I Think about Pictures Too

I think about things other than words, but then here I am again
meaning to go beyond something without
knowing what beyond is.

Yuck is only one of many words.
Other words include different sounds, articulated through manipulating the mouth
and whatnot, the tongue.

What's most interesting is that my lips never move.

I have seen you speak and your lips don't move either.

It is a most unusual Kung Fu movie.
Or, it is a most usual Kung Fu Movie.

Of course, there is no Kung Fu movie. I wish I could say that there was.
Instead, there are dry sounds that all hover around
with the other sounds.

It's like a symphony without any of the grandeur or worth or unworth.
Instead, it's payday.

The Way It Wraps Around You

It's easy to get distracted.
We zoomed across the water on a speed boat.

Then the older kid used my kid's new spongebob fishing reel
and broke it
and my son came walking super fast down the dock
trying to hold in his tears but he was quivering. He's four.

I was all like, "It's cool, no big deal. It'll be fine."
It really hurt though.
Even now, it makes me sick.

You May Notice the Links (Notice them in the Future Too)

I'm trying to update this blog with new links and etc and wanting,
in a complete separate level of thought, to not
slip into boring loserville. I am only addressing the state of my psyche.

Of course, you people reading this know that
I will not
ever reach a place that feels like a safe turtle to me. The turtle I will reach
won't feel safe. It will feel awful.

I will say, "You are an awful feeling turtle."
I will also say, "Your awful turtleness is repulsive."
I will say, "Revolting turtle."
In a good way.