American Ghosts

They breathe the violet

Onto the flowers

Ride the tops

Of freight trains

Crossing the west

Yelling faintly

In the tunnels

American ghosts

The loneliness

Of choked creeks

And fallen hotels

They run endlessly

The green hedge mazes

Of steel titans

American ghosts

Look at us

Through the eyes

Of Washington Lincoln

Hamilton Jackson

Whisper old hymns

The names of racehorses

American ghosts

Ride the backs of bullets

They think this might

Deliver them

It does not

They must watch

New American ghosts

As they are made

 

COUNTDOWN

We stayed up late enough

To smell the bread on the wind

From the factory bakery

The president is hawking beans

From the White House

His smile looks like a star exploding

Men are walking into all night gas stations

And breathing onto candy bars

They’ll kill you if you say a word

Vauhxx Booker was chased into the Indiana Woods

By men of my “race” and they had

Tail pipe fire sparking in their eyes

Their voices were lava dust and diesel

Big bellies bouncing, threatening arms swinging

I didn’t think the fall would look like this

The same way the nation rose up

By threatening by killing

By lunging then leaping into death

Because dying is easier than living

And killing seems easier than loving

summer 2020

8 silent

      minutes  

44 silent

       seconds

to remember

       George Floyd

people seated on the street

downtown Chicago

     birds

             a breeze

                    a distant chopper

no words

8 silent

      minutes  

44 silent

       seconds

music and crushes

my whole life has been

music and crushes

hard to tell

which starts where

the elliott smith

line of notewords

that sparks like

a firefly

looping around

a pond

and someone

seen for sunlight

seconds walking

through a door

can’t break

them apart:

firefly/song/crush 

surging the same

in ‘78 or 2020

only the songs

are different

The National Prayer Breakfast, 2020

A boa constrictor zig zigs into the banquet hall, elevates its head and knocks over a pot of coffee.

The lights go out. A swarm of bats rush through a hole in a window and circle the giant chandelier. Their wings make a slapping sound and their whirring speed stokes a wind that elevates the combover of the president.

Thanatos in St. Paul?

Viewing the videos of the "Give Me Liberty and Give Me Death" protests, I don't get the impression that the folks rIding on Harleys and in minivans are not necessarily more financially desperate than the average Joe or Jess at this time. If it's not financial urgency, then what is driving this odd and shocking behavior -- behavior that Darwin tells us runs contrary to the basic instinct of all animals: the instinct to survive.

It could be that one reason Trumpists are so desperate to venture out into virus-threatened public spaces is because they lack an interior life. This culture tries to steer us away from the cultivation of a spiritual, creative and imaginative center. This is because so much of what constitutes the pursuit of an inner life is free or at least not terribly expensive and this culture is threatened by and terrified of that which cannot be sold. The isolation and the physical space limitations are challenging for all of us, but those of us who have passions that can be pursued alone and away from market culture have found some valuable moments of learning and contemplation during the quarantine. However, when one's self is so heavily identified with the the market economy, through one's purchases and favorite "brands" and through one's role as a worker in the economy, being faced starkly with one's self can be very unsettling.

For the lucky among us, an $8 used book can buy us days of reading and years of reflection and rereading. We can down $150 for a guitar and some money for lessons and have decades of exploration with the instrument. I fear that many of the Americans rallying to return with haste to a virus-haunted world may face a howling and barren valley when confronted with themselves.

And finally, let's say it: There may be a death drive at work here. I recall an interview Derrick Jensen did with poet and community activist Luis Rodriguez. When asked how youth could engage in such perilous behavior, Rodriguez explained how a lot of the gang kids he works with in East LA engage in such dangerous behavior because they cannot imagine a future for themselves. He said that their gang violence was an indirect way of seeking suicide.

Do people who cherish life, who cherish their own lives go bounding out into the streets, crowding together during a quarantine? I don't know. But these are questions worth asking.

Book Review: The Man Without a Face: The Unlikely Rise of Vladimir Putin, by Masha Gessen.

I'm listening to the audiobook of "The Man Without a Face: The Unlikely Rise of Vladimir Putin," (2012) by Masha Gessen. While I am enjoying the intrigue of the late 80s Soviet Union and all the remarkable shifting of pieces and the uncertainty and the boiling over of frustration into rebellion, I find myself only able to listen to 20 minutes at a time of the book. I only now figured out why: It is because Vladimir Putin, now and certainly then, is an extraordinarily boring man. The story of his life is like this: He wants to do this thing and then he does this thing. He must talk to this person, so he talks to this person. His ambition is that of the cockroach: plodding along trying to get some crumbs of bacon fallen to the floor. He is a man devoid of introspection. The effect of listening to an account of Putin's life is soporific: an effective identity for a KGB man and future dictator.