Infinity Blues Read online

  and particles

  a particle machine spitting clouds

  and ash

  cussing up flags and money slots

  bickering

  shitty and mad

  swollen and green

  from not using myself like i ought to

  or being clean

  i am though

  just something

  like a tiny thing

  inside the breathing monster

  i am a part of the insides

  made out of oceans

  like one of its dreams

  I REFUSE

  I refuse to edit*

  I am but a single life

  I refuse to edit

  look away

  if you choose

  but these bulbs

  will burn in cycles

  if forever

  was a single night

  *Editor’s Note: This poem was originally 32 pages long. —JT

  Alit Daffodil

  oh,

  wasn’t your lover from here, alit daffodil?

  hmmm

  i eat his food

  they serve me and smile

  i compliment the chef

  for i cannot help myself

  not born

  into the coin

  myself

  i was born into a love of things

  with the lights on

  gunfire came later

  mashed potato

  when i say a thing is good

  a mouth

  someone’s

  it just opens up

  and the teeth come out as the lips resurface

  without the knowing

  for the lighting of the grin

  of a truth

  blinding its way in,

  doll-face

  –you call it charm

  –i call that being warm

  and i agree to disagree

  still

  you are a plastic

  invisible menace

  and mean

  as snakes

  mean as snakes pissed on

  on fire

  oh,

  and HIM

  “a writer” you say with a smirk and a grin

  that tells me where he’s been

  he worked, what?

  8 hours a day

  and saved himself for you

  for two years

  and he’s FRENCH …

  ha ha ha

  that’s funny

  i bet he did

  S U R E

  because

  you loved loved loved his lashings

  and like a shark

  you were helpless in his arms

  because you must never stop moving

  and once the blur of gray

  went into fins

  and madness

  you could both reach full potential

  as losers together

  causing mutual sadness

  upper-class voodoo

  what money does to bright children

  with bad names

  plucked up from novels

  two shelves up

  up a fucking ladder

  bathing in the glow of a room of air

  poor people would breathe in

  hungry

  with hungry stares

  if only they could eat you

  in the alpines

  where all was fair

  so

  I buy a book then

  (of course not his–

  he couldn’t publish

  if his mother sold the house

  and bought xerox

  held his hand in front of a pillar of blank white paper

  and begged

  words do not come from eggs

  asshole)

  nobody coughing over their shoulder

  making a sound like a cough

  if it went HA CC KKKK

  spoiled first he was self-served

  THEN became a brat

  (one must allow ample time at university for that)

  oh, and plenty of hip-hop

  white people on porches memorizing rap

  about setting themselves free

  from your fucking parents’ money trap

  and corporations companies

  and

  however many fucking people

  they could summon with fire truck hoses and baseball bats

  i wish they could punch your ancestors

  in the face

  for every noose

  because you created a class system

  when you were born

  your parents’ lawyers advising them

  if you want to pretend to be human

  you’ll need evidence

  (somebody grab the aftermints)

  him

  get a typewriter before his fingers go flat

  and his mother’s suit’s damp

  not wet

  it’s the upper east side, for god’s sake

  and they have words for that

  for what i am

  and then

  and after the wedding

  which “just came up”

  with entire villas reserved

  plus

  master-planning

  my payment of your airline ticket

  notwithstanding

  don’t forget

  to bring the photos of the orgy

  and reminisce

  it will be good for the book,

  he says

  that one he never writes

  for writing

  is written

  so

  so i buy the bad ones close enough

  in the clearance bin

  one for every hundred push pins

  i find words he would use

  and i stick them in

  i imagine his eyes

  and

  what adorns that face

  and dream a swarm of hornets

  hovering with pulsing stems

  of unicorns unstoppable

  with fangs

  trampling his bones

  crushing his limbs

  and pirates

  named Jephry

  dressed as businessmen idle and unbusy

  with friends with names like Hank and Lou

  marrying your daughters

  your mouth’s agape

  as they off them to the suburbs

  where

  track housing and television dreams

  eventually bury them

  except their souls

  which they suffer through their children

  your legacy

  your second generation

  for

  every wasted word

  i demand a shift

  when i light the candle

  i make a wish

  black

  black as a fucking hole

  in the universe

  in the walls

  of the house of the damned

  and i smile

  perfect timing

  perfect pitch

  on note over coffee

  not even trying

  half smoking a cigarette

  and

  i saturate this place with my scent

  like a tiger let loose

  on the wronged

  and i am screaming mad and covered in sweat

  devouring every moment

  you lied

  like i was starving and blind

  for love

  which i was

  thumbing the wall for anything

  anything that felt alive

  or like a switch

  i needed a light

  you gave me a church burning

  with eyes of amethyst

  but get this,

  get this,

  when the bottom comes up, if this ship is intact

  on its side

  you will salute a ruin maybe

  a revenge, not likely

  done unto a thing


  because

  i am alone

  in my lost

  and

  in this fire

  we do not burn together

  us,

  separated only by the lines

  of mistrust

  waiting on the roller-coaster rides

  in that endless ring

  of unneeded desires

  broken

  for how hard you hit it

  the last time it rang

  now it’s rung

  a rich person’s problem

  up comes another museum

  because

  i was just a fantasy fuck

  a cinemax

  and i will always be better

  and so much more

  than that

  your mother’s daughter, you certainly are not

  but also

  they will know that

  for genius always “outs”

  and if nothing else

  coin-born book of skin

  any old whore can be something great

  but to be a knower of a home

  and refuse

  to be better banged

  with a later coming eventually and steady

  down the midnight shift of the telephone

  that was mine

  is surely just another slut with wheels

  waiting for another to be trapped

  and caught under your horrid tasteless heels

  those get-away sticks

  with trashy give-aways

  stuck on the bottom

  matching

  in tweed and twit

  so

  from his home country

  in my labored rest

  i say fuck you

  assholes

  you deserve it all

  and

  all the best

  i hope you are happy

  and ready

  for the balance is so strong

  and steady

  even it penetrates through

  the houses of the printers

  of the slavery you call money

  honeybee

  so thanks

  it’s like i got out of jail for free

  with a silent

  golden pardon

  now if you will excuse me,

  back to my book

  my perfect omelette

  Baltic Sea

  Baltic Sea

  that was her

  at night with the striped socks, legs exposed

  under the quilt

  watching t.v.

  Baltic Sea,

  whatever, ok, whatever

  she would say

  over and over

  over and over

  eating ice cream

  straight from the container

  uninterested in conspiracy

  or

  laughter

  or

  fucking

  even

  i can remember pictures though

  fucking some man in a villa

  at a goddamn wedding

  much like the one you know

  she was attending

  while i walked the coast-lit lined beaches

  of Amsterdam

  furious

  bloodletting

  into myself

  Baltic Sea

  so confused of the night

  i am a tugboat

  hauling with me terrors and sight

  empty of horizons

  the sway only of the waves

  and the endless crossings

  of oceans

  in efforts to elaborate my plays

  so where were you that night

  if not in that picture

  with that man

  Baltic Sea

  heart like a fire engine on fire

  in the snow

  awful lover stuttering bedroom talker

  and slow

  huh Baltic Sea

  “i don’t know anymore,” she says, “i dunno.”

  ha ha ha

  for a nickel

  and a laugh

  we

  we got touched by a ghost

  in the ghost house

  ha ha ha

  it cost

  like, a nickel

  but you pay later

  because

  well, you know why cause

  after you walk out the back

  and that place

  it looks like the back of any place

  the back parking lot like

  you know,

  where the Real ghosts are

  well

  you know you done it now

  and

  ain’t no use pretending now

  just get in

  get in the car

  and when

  when she drives you home

  you go in

  and now,

  now this is your world

  not hers

  that is haunted

  and you

  you

  that’s fucked

  for a night of peace

  for a nickel and a laugh

  ha ha ha

  i can see you still

  oh my mouth won’t say your name

  it says ( )

  like treasures

  in a chest

  so many

  a sea could digest

  and i

  i am the drag of the pulley

  at the end of the sea

  and the pier

  tied with shift-ships

  sailing into port

  i am still

  i see those birds

  those seagulls

  pesty critters

  picking at the popcorn

  while you and i

  you and i, we ride the rides

  at that place

  where the subway ends

  or used to

  on that line

  lines after avenue

  X, Y, Z, and Q

  i think of you now

  as i imagine all of it is

  your face, so many

  stars

  i feel the ships pulling in fast

  and then slow,

  you know

  too aware of a dock

  to collide

  and make them feel the water inside

  new eyes

  like when you and i were young

  younger

  and from the well

  we drank each drop

  like it grew up

  each bone

  you kicked your leg against the gravel

  outside the restaurant

  me

  across the street on the telephone

  now i sleep all bad

  and dream of being at sea

  at one with an ocean

  like so many treasures

  like

  how i think of you as i write this

  your face,

  so many

  stars

  At a Distance

  At a distance it moves

  this thing in me

  that growls at my gut

  it plays strange games

  with cards

  and sneers at me

  from the shadows

  it stays SUPER busy

  when i escape

  i am lucky

  if only for an instant

  At a distance I can see myself

  a grown man aged 33

  but none at all in years

  if those years mean

  each one

  like a fallen wall not a built thing

  a piece of mortar maybe

  missing from the bright

  morning-side wonder

  thrown through a window

  by a child

  because

  becausewhy

  maybe then, yes i can see myself

  but at a distance

  at a distance from myself

  from you

  from e
veryone

  safe enough

  that you might never get through

  i know that i do not know

  and that neither do you

  not your gods

  nor your books

  not your analyst

  not your family of crooks

  because

  like all things

  they too

  they too will pass us by, as we pass

  and fade into the dry-mouth

  of history

  barely a stain

  on a rug of electricity

  floating in space

  so,

  pardon me if i grow up already

  i see

  something shiny

  beautiful maybe

  over that way again

  at a distance

  but my feet will never give

  not even if they were but a bone

  stuck bone through

  a tennis shoe

  i was there

  i was standing in front of you

  my hands were out

  i held a heart the size of a question

  up to you

  with marvelous affection

  star-struck from heaven

  like an ocean made of everything

  a love has ever given

  but

  not too close

  at a distance

  i felt the spit

  and that

  that is that

  i guess.

  Babydoll

  let’s just take three hands

  one free

  and make a machine

  that sweats

  on summertime beds

  pour a glass

  of sweet tea

  over our heads

  ok,

  or

  instead,

  let’s build bridges from here to Leningrad

  with lights attached

  that fade

  into the hyper-lit orange sun parade

  because

  we

  us folks

  don’t talk about our feelings

  no

  not us

  of course, unless it is too late

  and

  the night is at the door

  rapping away

  on the metal handle

  wood shaking

  our endless ceilings

  babydoll

  i

  i am not your feelings.

  A New Party of One

  goddamn heavy strings of shiny purple

  shoelaces

  with cherry print

  tied

  in a bow

  go

  on top of a box

  with pages

  –this thing i make from words

  to be given

  at once, suddenly

  to her

  and be forgot

  or

  swallowed and drowned

  with sugar on top

  also

  from a spoon

  is the nectar in my lungs

  suffocated like a scream

  round my tooth

  for the only girl i knew

  who