chocolate, klonopin & coffee

for years

i ate chocolate

took klonopin

drank coffee

and rage

rattled

within me

with the force

of the chicago el

arriving

in station

spitting sparks

like a diving

bird of fire

& on the train

i entered into

loud arguments

with strangers

who ambled the aisles

mumbling & glaring

cursing & accusing

& i was threatened

with murder

and all this because

i took klonopin

to slow the rising

dark thoughts

that had bloomed

like blood flowers

starting in ‘92

after my friend

drowned himself

himself in a tidal river

and the chocolate

and coffee

elevated a pulse

deadened by

the klonopin

everything

reacted coalesced

moving to

a smaller city

saved me from

an encounter

with death

that would not

have been

restless sleep

in a tidal river

traitors

i just watched 
a movie

about a punk rock

girl in tangier

who must drive

a car carrying drugs

from a small village

in the green

magrheb hills

back down

to tangier

cuz her band

“traitors”

has to buy

studio time

even music time

is money

sometimes

and opium

is a flight

from time

and the car

she drives

moves across

landscapes

that really

encompass centuries

of distance

from fast tangier

to the tall

swaying plant

lands of the

interior

the punk rock girl’s

family's time

in their apartment

is threatened

because they lack

money and her father

spends his time

and loses their money

playing dominoes

in a tin-shuttered room

the punk rock

girl robs a french

man of the money

he gave her for

time in bed

the film is her

gradually

mastering control

of her own mortal

time and when

explorers arrived to

a distant pacific island

and explained

to the native

people what their

pocket watches do

measuring

the divided up portions

of the day and night

the natives laughed

so hard that

they began to cry

the alphabet of notes

i'm 50 now

and i sing in C

i used to sing in D

the line of song

travels through flats

and sharps and takes

decades to reach

the final horizon

a pine cross planted

on a distant

dirt mound

a hawk tracing

sky arcs above

i’ll know

i’ve reached

the sun drop

endpoint

when i arrive at

the start of

the alphabet

of notes

where i’ll

sing in A

from the other side

with a hawk’s
sun voice

The Infinity of Funhouse Mirrors & the Preservation of The Sacred

I find myself having to avoid news about Drumpf for two reasons related to self-preservation...
1. As with all toxic narcissists and sociopaths, engagement with Drumpf projects one into the role of a bit player in a demented drama. People like Drumpf are, by definition, not inter-relational beings. To Drumpf and his ilk, other humans exist for one reason and one reason only: to be conned, exploited and manipulated -- to be gamed. When I follow the minutia of Drumpflandia, I begin to feel like a mark. Having said this, I recognize that as a citizen of this country (and of this planet), I am subject to the consequences of DumpfBannon's actions, and I will remain active in resisting the the ecocidal agenda and the rising fascist tide. However, I plan to avoid becoming a prisoner of the infinity of funhouse mirrors that constitute Drumpf's mind and his projected reality.

2. For those of us who have long been repulsed by and have rejected the American doctrine of the pursuit of one's own personal greed as the path to happiness and social harmony, what Drumpf is doing is particularly depressing. It is so not because it is something new, but rather, because it is the more naked, extreme and vulgar version of what has defined our political culture since its inception: sacrifice all – wilderness, human health and spirit, ancient cultures, everything – to allow for corporate plunder (euphemistically referred to as "economic growth"). With a double-talking Democrat as president, I was able to occasionally forget that this is the vapid and destructive agenda of the political culture I was born into. Drumpf allows for no such illusions. Thus, I avert my gaze in order to preserve what of the sacred remains in my soul. I must maintain my strength and my clarity of thought because the changes we must make run deeper than we can imagine.

PK Dick Said (poem)

Time out of joint

PK Dick said

He was talking

About a fold

Of the waveforce

Passage forward

The slipped joint

I saw today

On 33^rd st.

Was a tulip

Who bloomed

In Feb and got

Clobbered by hail

In March

The final scene

In Do Androids

Is when the guy

Feels affection

For a gently 

Hopping bird

Then he’s not

Sure if it’s

Real or mechanical

Can they

Blur the seasons

Or erase them?

PK Dick saw

This mad spring

In his cold fevers

When his mind

Untethered

After all the speed

"Kumbaya" and the Anti-Empath

The United States is a culture so rooted in the isolation of the individual and the disdain for community and social values that people's attempts to bond with each other and to express empathy have earned their own derisive idioms – such as, "holding hands and singing Kumbaya," "social justice warrior," and "do-gooder." What has always remained in fashion in the United States is the detached and glossed stare of the anti-empath. Whether in his guise as a CEO, political operator, gunslinger or gangster, this emotionally wretched creature is held up as the model human we must all aspire to become. It is no wonder that those of us who reject this mad archetype are relegated to the margins of society and often exist in a state of bewilderment and unease.

Su Muro Bello / His Beautiful Wall (letras/lyrics)

Vamos a explodir su muro bello

Y crear una tormenta con el polvo

Vamos a tomar los ladrillos

Para formar un puente fuerte

Vamos a quemar los muros feos

Que se nos forman en la mente

Para demolir las fronteras

Que corren por dentro y por fuera

Música instrumental

Vamos a olvidar ese sueño

Que se llama lo americano

Que nos obliga a destruir el mundo

Para poder realizarlo

Vamos a caminar por el sendero

Que solamente se ve vagamente

Vamos a cantar en las montañas

Pa’ despertar lo que haya en los bosques

***

(Translation)

Let's blow up his beautiful wall  

And make a storm with the dust

Let’s take the bricks  

And make a strong bridge

Let’s demolish the ugly walls

That form inside our minds

And demolish the borders

That run inside and out

Let’s forget the dream

They call the American

That forces us to destroy the world  

In order to achieve it

Let’s walk along the path

That is seen only vaguely

Let’s sing in the mountains

To awake what lies in the forests