Imperative Papers: Pikthall

Showing posts with label Pikthall. Show all posts

PRETTY DAMN GOOD —

2 young females sit on
my right and talk in a
soft urgent tone,
probably about
their love life

to my left is a couple
who stare continually into
each other's eyes and
laugh about everything
and nothing at all

the Vietnamese cooks are behind
me chattering loudly

I don't speak Vietnamese
so I tune them right out
like the buzz of
electric lights

others are everywhere
talking about this, that
and the other thing

they are angry, happy,
sad, in the middle,
unsure, and together

in the seat directly across

from me sits no one

just a pair of ivory chopsticks

I know what must be done
and I dot it

THE WAY IT IS —

I understand nothing
except maybe

solitude
drunkenness
and loneliness

that looking
an angry man in the eyes
makes him more angry

that the factory men are
always better company

I am hardly real

and
there is no roof over
the mountains

THE CORONER —

tables typically turn
too late
too gone

the warmth of wrath
replaced by distance
the light roots
held before
the dark

a procedure precisely
lacking
in time

DEAD AT 46 —

an apparent suicide
but I wasn't there when
she drowned in the lake

and I wasn't there
before that either

Kate was 25 when we met
funny, strong and sometimes
lovely she was hard to handle

I slept next to her once
she was hot and cold all night

pain and beauty in her wake

a tenacious

strong swimmer

PLAYTIME —

Mama cow

baby cow

chicks to hens

baby cow

mama cow

spirals spin

around and

around again

beginning

to end

mama cow

baby cow

now

then

DINOSAUR —

Leaves are falling
Green, yellow, orange, red
Countenance out a third floor window

Cold innocence, cracked eggs

And terrible lizards

Abound

BARREL JUMPER —

Loops lead

to a nest

a lime

a sunflower

camels in deserts

spiders in webs

the barrel of the wave

GOD IS —

a force

a pounding

a hammer

a nail

a piercing

the surface

the substrate

symmetry

sprawling

no end

in sight

LIL —

I pass through the space
Upright and silent
Her mother
The wind on
My back

Hushed tones
Ripen and press

Our eyes and breath
Flutter together
Along the jetty

Throned and washed
Throughout by
Force

GOD IS A HAMMER —

Arguments of
white supremacy

are

arguments for
white supremacy

CONSERVATION —

Principles are
conservative

by nature
and

definition

YOU'RE A VICTIM —

caught in an
intersection
of braces
projected
over
atrophied
limbs and
core

ZERO GROUND —

there is nowhere left to go

no place to move on to
i have eaten
my family
or they have
disappeared

DESTRUCTION —

a
remedy
for
remembrance
age and
fallacy
connect callously
forming faith
in god
destruction or
deliverance

INFIRMED —

a terminal fatigue

seized in love letters
we're told she tried
to resesutate the
body for days

A CARNAL HYPOTHESIS —

confined to a leaky and sinking old boat
confined by change
by the aware yet archaic brain
by the thought
the emotions
by evolution
for or against

restricted by the lungs
neuro-plasticity
choice
fallacy
and function
constrained by rightness
and non-essential wisdom

confined to the limiting possibilities
limited by time
the four directions
Newtonian physics
metaphysics
quantum mechanics
oxygen
and ether

confined by imprecise language
by imprecise education
by certainty and uncertainty

encircled by the world-savers
the time-wasters, the paper-faced

ensnared by the black mosquito
or mile marker 146
or this time
or no time
or anything
less than
more than
or nowhere

confined by the lines in the road
by 29 miles to go

confined in ability
confined in unknown bias
unknown and known galaxies
known and unknown loves
confined by this poem
there or here
back and forth
or not back and forth

drowning in impotent ideas
morals, values, ethics
or lack thereof

confined by no judgment
or too much judgment
or just enough
or just right

deadened by politeness
by tambourines
by porcelain
or locomotives of faith
pounding on you like
broken piano keys

sedated by the rising concrete
and moreover, and therefore

forced under by too much
or not enough

forced under by rotted vegetables
or a burnt out headlight

confined by psychological voyeurism
peering in during the last
moments of solitude

or perhaps
confined by underwater warfare
by changing sides
and walking home afterward
shoes blow to smithereens

being set free by the breathtakingly plain
and ultimate conclusion
is as decent a thing
as anyone can know

MAGNOLIA PLAINSMAN —

Magnolias gesture in solitude, until morning
Over roped-roots, petals emerge in Spring
The sky still weeps against the passing
Fragile petals fill, shed their pretense
Fall easily to the ground
And underfoot are crushed
Into the soil

Magnolias remain impossibly, against their mourning
Submerged petals restore the flora of another Spring
Possibly the same blossoms, same roots
Resurrected anew in ecstatic absorption
Stronger than yesterday
Weaker than tomorrow

SUBSISTENT FORMS —

It is pure nonsense to believe
that the aliens can be conquered by
an eye gouge, a testicular squeeze
or a nipple twist. The tragic theorem
is awfully ugly, a paradox of ugly, universal
and unequivocal, paranormal and pathetic.
The mysterious “intruders” are not unknown.
Like in the movies, the mysterious intruders
are among us. So leave your heirlooms behind
for the looters. Bring your songbooks. Learn to
smile wide. After all, perhaps the aliens are under
obligation to intervene. Perhaps they are here to
free us from our program. Perhaps we
should pity them, sing along children.
Or perhaps we should gather our bayonets,
machetes, knives, scythes, cutthroat razors.
Perhaps we should prepare a place to disembowel and
incinerate them. Perhaps we should prepare ourselves
a place for disembowelment. AK-47s, blindfolds,
and pump-action shotguns may prove prudent.
Whatsoever the resources, weapons of
opportunity will be wielded. Improvise
child, you’re only limited by imagination
and the hour is certainly short, our
screams turning into specks of moonlight
as we are dragged away by our neighbors