FASCISM

 

It's like there's some people
for whom swimming in a lake
on a sunny day
isn't enough
seeing a fiddler crab
slide into a tidal pool
isn't enough
hearing a blues band
at the corner bar
ascend into a spiraling
bliss state
of release
isn't enough
the perfect burrito
where you drizzle hot sauce
onto each bite
isn't enough
the perfect falafel sandwich
isn't enough
butterflies in the meadow
someone says I love you
accordion at the farmers market
salsa dance lessons
are not enough
so they go on looking
for something
The Great Thing
that isn't there
that never arrives
and leaves ashes
where it
was
sought

BOOK GROUP

 

WHY COULDN'T YOU MONETIZE YOUR TALENT?

 

(poem found in forgotten files)

I was mowing the grass on a golf course fairway
400 yards of dragon scale green glinting dumbly in the sun
When the sky turned purple in the west
The sound of a building beginning to collapse
The collapse sound accelerating
Clouds that looked like nickels flattened on train rails
Issued a lightning bolt that withered the tree
I was standing beneath
The way Jesus withered the fig tree
That did not bear him fruit out of season
My hair was singed
My teeth felt like electric crystal
I ran down the dragon scale green fairway
In the strobe light of the storm
It began to hail and it sounded like
I was inside of the popcorn machine at the movie theater
Pop! Pop! Pop!
I screamed and a hailstone entered my mouth
Pelting the back of my throat and damaging my larynx
And I could no longer sing a without feeling like a baby dragon
Was hatching in its egg inside of the kettle

American Fascism

 

Sci-fi in America

he watches a show
about outposts of humans
fighting off
hordes of spore people
north america
wrapped in dread
the stumbling fungal
masses
appear from behind
mountains
from inside derelict
buildings
the hero
rides a horse to a chalet
in a blizzard
he has rescued
a woman
and now she must
kill him
inside the walled city
they hold off the
hungry undead
with exploding barrels
of kerosene
and sharp shooters
perched on ramparts
¡eso!
he yells
¡no lo mates!
he yells
next day
target parking lot
he is grabbed
and sent
with planeloads of men
to a fortress
within a different
walled city
men who traveled up
the umbilical cord
of the americas
seven countries
in seven years
working in car washes
bakeries
brake shops
hair salons
rushed in the night
into a zone
beyond landscape
and time
where their minds
will sprout
nightmares
of chase
and vampiric bites
that merge the victim
with the mycelium world

(Photo by Yael Martinez, from 2024 Day of the Dead show, National Museum of Mexican Art, Chicago)

The trump project is BARBARISM

 

Silver Crucifixes

target parking lot
7 a.m.
grabbed
and sent
with men
who climbed
the spine
of the americas
seven countries
in seven years
working
car washes
bakeries
brake shops
hair salons
delivered
to a city of stone
and metal
outside of time
and there are
people at podiums
with silver crucifixes
swinging over
their chests
demanding
to make it
their final
destination

Ghosts Are Intervening

 

ghosts are intervening

they overcome the sentry in your head
ghosts are intervening

they are playing the piano in your mind
ghosts descend upon the streets
ride the wires of the trolley into town
curl up inside the batteries of the electric bikes
ghosts are intervening
radio the forestry service
the trees are falling down
radio the oceanic institute
the starfish are meteoring
back up into the sky
ghosts are intervening
you've got no license to be sane
they say
the simple geometry of a snowflake
eludes you
they say
what is it that you want
they say

(If I remember correctly, the title and opening line are from a spoken word piece by Marcos Frommer from 1987)

(image: Rainbow Beach, Chicago, March 2025)

Dreams of the Elon

 

Flashlight shine through a tunnel
Of rebar and fallen timber
Ketamine breakdown
On the outskirts of Eden
X marks the spot
On the forehead of the enslaved
Link hands around the fountain flowing
The blood of the coal mine canaries
Seven oceans of the real have I sailed
Seven ship logs have I burned
In the furnace of my mind
To find myself beached upon the locks
Of the Panama Canal
Bridge my broken teeth with the locks
Of the Panama Canal
Ring the oceans with white daisies
Laced with ketamine and strychnine
Sound the trumpets
And bang the drums
Break out the hero's baton
Because I'm going down

Born Catholic

"Christ died
for your sins"
I never asked
for that
I never wanted
that

debt

Chicago Paraiso de Guitarristas

 

April 5 on the Tren (y No De "Aragua," Güey)

 

We need more memoirs
About failure
O que não deu certo
Lo que no salió bien
The road more taken
But not wanted
Still
On the Blue Line
Route to a protest
Trumpets of a banda ballad
From an iphone speaker
Graffiti in 6-foot letters
Says: TWO ORGASMS
Then a building:
Headstone Monuments
Factory Direct
312-481-78?7
(shaky tren)
The Picasso perched over
Daley Plaza
Exoskeleton augur
Of something light
Or dark
I can’t say
Which

Something Other Than Truth

 

It's something other than truth

When they talk

Something other than truth

Won't let them hear

Something other than truth

Must rise like a cobra

In a basket

And sway and strike

"My check isn't coming

I can't pay my bills

My doctor is gone

I am dying"

Something other than truth says

"You are not dying

Because you are not real

There are owners of emerald mines

There are those meant

to work and die

In the pale green light

Of the narrowing tunnels"

Something other than truth

Like an esophagus shot through

With a Johannesburg diamond

Like a crane metallic-ripping

The land that forms an island

In the middle of a lake

Digging and removing

Disappearing land

To finally falter

And topple

And vanish

Itself