I’m going to cut the fat

Off the bacon

Before I eat it, from now on

No I’m not

I’m going to order

One fewer pancake

With my breakfast

And pour less maple syrup on it

No I’m not

I’m going to stop drinking

That good coffee altogether

And have fewer refills

No I’m not

I’m going to stop eating desserts

One day and drink more water regularly

No I’m not

I’m going to buy a hybrid car

And recycle everything in sight

Sooner or later

No I’m not

I’m going to stop

Writing poems talking about

How I’m going to finally

Do things differently

No I’m not.

The drive
To that town you said
Was “quaint”
Was a bust; trailer parks
A dry creek bed and a bar
Already doing business
At 8am in a suspicious house;
His voice on the demo tape
Sounded like a watered down
Robert Plant or a lesser version
Of Chris Whitley’s “Poison Girl”
I wouldn’t take it around
Or even replay one song—
It wasn’t your fault, exactly
Or mine
We were just trying to discern
Meaning in the humid weather
This—not somewhere in the south
But Central California;
Retirement communities; newly planted
Pinot noir—strange, how far
The tide went out, revealing
Metal groins from an old landing
And submerged engine blocks
I didn’t want to tell you
But I knew it would never work
Like the way you described
The business plan, as though
A more efficient fashion
To visit Mars—looking for water there
Or some other desperate sign of life
To prove we are not alone
In the universe
By my guess is
We are.

In a world
Where every third
Or fourth person
Is a poet of some sort
Words have lost their meaning
Their impact, their true
And special place by the hearth
In the home
Like a worker unable to find
A job in the marketplace
(And there are so many)
These words go looking
For employment, for purchase
For someone willing to sit down
And pay attention to them
And listen, giving each
Word a chance
To be understood
But in all honesty
That’s not likely
To happen.

What would be the point
Of getting everything you want—
That suit—that car
The shapely bod
Because then there would be
Nothing left to strive for, except
Perhaps the whole empire;
The position of a man or a woman
In charge who’d run it all
To glory or to ruin
Or simply to become obsessive
With wanting things
Differently than they are:
Beggar in the street, a fatter stub
Or lettered sign—maven
In an ivory tower
Swiveling in triumph
For all the world to see
Taking in bigger pieces
Of real estate every day;
All of these for the ashes
And for the hardy dust
To grow upon.

Magritte’s empty birdcage
With the door swung wide open
Whether by hand or by claw
And the singular, remaining feather
Tells nothing of the need
For escape from these confines
Suffered by some humans
The chalk marks of mathematical exactness;
The tattooed man
With the sack on his back
Heading north on the 101
Destination unknown;
A shooting star a kid saw last night
Made his wish
And then went home to put
A tooth under the pillow…
Yes—there’s always 25 cents left
In the morning, for the deserving
Or a dollar enough
For coffee, or at least
A refill if you bring in
Your own cup.

I am not willing to face
The smoky essence
Of another evening—rather
Welcome wood smoke at dawn
Crossing the canyon
In a gentle rain
A white cross to one side
Of the road, emblematic
Of someone
Who might’ve had
A different practice
Than my own; lights
Red and white and green
In psychedelic patterns
Off the wet street; a vestige
Of those who didn’t make it
Street lines like graphs
Arranged in reflection
Form there to here and back
These simple utopias
Across the mountain
Around the corner
Decades farther
Than you’d ever imagined
Time would take you—
The village has grown
The roads that lead there
Have not.

I accidentally saw
Shadow paintings on the wall—
The intricate pattern
Of a rooster with his crown
Then a cow
With her udders hanging down
Hardly the profile
Of anyone I knew, rather
Things seen in farmyards
And reduced to steaks
And other cuts of meat
On kitchen tables
Then—as if by coincidence
Two dogs barked in unison
And a crow cawed
Sounding for all the world
Like laughter of some kind;
Unabashed cackling laughter
At inevitability and at worry;
Laughter outside
From the “simple” creatures
At the absurdity
Of it all.

Versailles Restaurant
That Cuban place in Encino
Is surrounded by mirrors
And it looks, from here
Like the world is collapsing
In on itself from all sides
Earlier, we tried to give a car full
Of old books to the Good Will
But they flat out refused them—
What is happening to our culture
To no longer be interested
In traditional information?
So we threw the books out
Secretively, quickly—almost
With shame in a green dumpster
Hoping no one was looking
In an alley behind McDonald’s
While an angry yellow squirrel
Looked on—my friend kept
One book about the predictions
Of Nostradamus and I asked
“What are you keeping that for?”

So this is how
It’s going to end:
A few black coffee grounds
At the bottom of a cup
Some clouds passing over
One last time, tinged with pink
On their way west
Before sunset—
The clothes in the closet
We never wear
And the long overdue trip
To the people at the Salvation Army
Where someone may finally
Use them again
Separation anxiety;
Need for another sip
Or sunset, looking hard
For the “green flash”
Which some think
Doesn’t even exist—
This is how it’s going to end
A leaf on the ground
Never to return to its tree
Recycled Sunday papers
A number I simply
Forgot to call;
Like that.

Pablo’s at City Lights;

Ginzberg, Kerouac, Ferlinghetti &

Neal Cassidy were there too, once

But now they’re all gone–

Except maybe Lawrence–he may

In fact, be in a coffee bar

Aroung the corner, writing something

or other about the war, and how

They are never over;

There’s a girl looking at Pablo

As he reads Alden’s poems

Editing, editing, editing…

She’d rather be doing something else

Maybe even with Pablo, but she’s

Not sure–not sure of her role

In the Universe, not sure what

Pablo’s writing and working on

Not sure what Ginzburg meant in ’59

When he told Aunt Rose “the war

In Spain has ended long ago…”
But she intends to find out

And those

Are the footsteps Pablo hears

Approaching him, as the winter fog

Comes in, across the bay

As if on the same cat feet

Sandburg rode out on.