northern wolf

Lenin sits
banging on his old typewriter,
that 1961 model with
the sticky S key and
a missing question mark.
This goddamn great novel
will not be coaxed so easily
from its Platonic cave it seems.

Summer, 1979, 4th street.
It's like a scene from an American film,
curtains in the breeze of a summer day
while the smells of human endeavor drift
through the open windows.

Russia, the idea of
a Soviet worker's state,
just an image, a memory.
Only America now, and fuck it
there will be a great American novel
spilling from his worker's
stiff and callused fingers.
American because
the line between the haves
and the have-nots is deep,
flows down into the bedrock,
forms a crucial part of the foundation.

Yet this is old news and
there are other divisions
worth celebrating
and writing about.

From the apartment down below,
same time as every day,
the sounds of rock and roll.

happiness is an option

The Mongol Hordes besieged our city
during the heart of winter,
as a blizzard swept in like a shroud.
Visibility was measured in inches and
not even dogs would venture into the snow.

When our bullets ran out
the captains ordered their men
to load the catapults
with fallen soldiers
and fling
those broken, bloody bodies
at the invaders.

I tried to tell them
that I
was still breathing.

no regrets

Putting on the mask
is the last thing I do
before going to work.

It's showtime!

black ops

Bought special glasses
for viewing the eclipse,
went all the fucking way
to the island's western shore
to buy those special specs,
only to leave them sitting
on top of Sartre's "Being"
when the darkness rose.

And today of all days!
Monday's usual curious
shotgun mixture
of early-week hope
and casual despair.
Only the strongest coffee
can possibly shore up
my pierced defenses.

speed, speeding, sped

Pedal to the floor,
driving fast as hell,
sometimes the only chances
are the ones you take.
Lost highways, American horizons,
road maps used for beer spills,
the feeling of a gun
pointed at my head.

Those were
the old days,
the road days.

Now I'm middle-aged,
settled, pacific.

Not sure what's coming next
but I hope you're there
to see it.

naked stars

In the
Voyage of the Dawn Treader,
there's a great scene where
a boy repents his Wicked ways
and embraces the Good life.

His wickedness is in fact so wicked
that it changed him into a dragon,
not that bad a fate until you realize
that in the West, unlike the East,
men kill dragons for sport and treasure.

Well, in any case, the boy repented
and his scales began to fall off.
Aslan helped, his big furry paws
peeling off the scales to reveal
the human underneath.

It's a beautiful scene,
noble lion and naked boy
beneath the Christian stars.

**

(postscript)

"And immediately there fell from his eyes
as it had been scales:
and he received sight
forthwith, and arose,
and was baptized."

Acts 9:18
King James Edition

way of the samurai

Note posted on the 'fridge
this morning:
need party food.

But the messiah hasn't arrived
yet.

Underneath the kitchen chair,
the kitten sleeps,
curled up on her blanket.
Her whiskers twitch.

She knows.