poem

(after reading “of being numerous” w/ friends on top of a parking garage)

we want to say
“common sense”
and cannot
the door torn off
the mouth
hanging
out a car parked
& booted a bankrupt
shopkeeper the very
tongue he preaches
parched & barking
the accident
the poem in me
i believe
til i see it
& then want myself
which is someplace
else        thomas paine
recanted nothing
on his deathbed
in a house later
demolished
which today
is a piano bar
called marie's crisis
on grove street
marked w/ a plaque:
citizen of the world
you don't know what
you see
so you love
then break
reaching like a bridge
that cannot be finished
that is not invented
god – this place
doesn’t exist
my friend said of paris
the big empty talk
of museumed people
fifteen-dollar beer
behind red-roped
sidewalk & michael
jackson died the next
day from passing cars
billy jean is not my lover
all day & all night
the mosquitoes eating us up
for the words to say
the buildings
so we could be them
and walk thru our lives
traveling is not
vacationing
in my book
one does not vacate
in my book
opened flat
my father lying
on the floor
counting the churchbells
every hour to the wall
that won’t let him up
as if the final words
we live by were not
already vacating us
fuck the job it’s perfect
you’ll find another one
i’ll write w/ this pen
w/ your name on it
til the ink runs out
then throw it away
& rise to make a toast:

you can have a seat

you can have a drink

you can have a woman

you can have a job

you can have this whole
society that does not
want to move
this cult of final word
this thing that grew
into my heart & died
i get up & walk around it
punt it down the street
then mug somebody for it
eat her flowers, wipe my
ass, flush & close the lid
is that closure?
no, but i’m retired
i’ll be retired my whole life
from you stupid assholes
who believe in jobs
you don’t know what work is
til you wake up
on the ceiling
as shadows of leaves
clawing for tree stumps
lumped in the throat
you thought was yours
it’s a forest for a tongue
from bedrooms i used
to wake up in
it’s a forest for a tongue
to pave a life
up & down
as chewed gum gets
tarred into it here &
there     final words
flattened
as they should be
so the wind can be revolution
which is all it is
a street made
of people railed
w/ eyes emptied
of windows, opened
& closed     so inside one
i dust the pollen off
my tv w/ an old che
guevara tee shirt
though i have no channels
& almost never watch
movies i can look up
& see myself
on the screen
in black & white
writing this poem
to somebody
& swear i hear
my neighbor’s tv
downstairs tonight
though it can’t be
b/c she’s out of town
i have this note
says i’ll be away
til next friday
fyi (if you see the light)
i have a light
on a timer