"You might lose
your way one
day
but you'll never
lose me
I'm your desire
to get better
As long as you
have me
you'll keep
going."
that's what he wrote on the
back of his daughter's photo
Today makes a full year since her death
he put the photo under the front cover
of his first published book
and went back to writing what would
soon be the second
them too
It's that simple
Just sit down with it and don't
do anything else
It works
It's the way to write
and you'll do it
once you understand
that it's
distractions
and not the so called
writer's block that's holding you back
you can't get
rid of writer's block by
force
but you can get rid of distractions
by force
Just do it.
Kill them.
Kill them all so
you can be happy.
And then get rid
of distractions too.
this time monster
It robs us of a lot of things,
this time monster
Robs us of youth
of life
of pleasure
of sleep
of high
of being drunk
or being sober
having a full stomach
freedom
love
patience
health
peace
and we're ok with it
ok with it all
except for one thing
we can never forgive this time monster
for robbing us of our dreams
it is the one unforgivable offense
but it does so to take revenge,
this time monster
he kills our dreams only when we kill it
and this battle happens so much that
we came up with a word for it
I think it's procrastination
as if to speak aloud is to draw the anger of the gods upon you
evolution is when you no longer
write about money and sex
and booze and violence and
change the subject to
cats and leaves and the passage of time
and the waiting, the great waiting
for death
evolution is when you
no longer talk about it to others
except yourself
you do it and you shut your mouth
about it
if there's something you have to say
you say it through the writing, not through
the spoken word
you must cast the spoken word out
of your system
as if to speak aloud is to
draw the anger of the gods upon you
that's commitment
and you need commitment if
you are to evolve
Keep That Spark
You
Yes
You
you know what I mean
if you have trouble falling asleep
you must know what I mean
and if you have even greater
trouble waking up and
leaving your bed, joining the cold
world with its cold air and stares
And if you either can't stop eating
or can't stand the thought of food,
if you drink too much and drink alone,
if you have no passion for anything
and the things you once enjoyed feel
pointless and empty and you feel
trapped in a void, forever floating
empty
what you need is not a friend
A friend
many friends
won't fill the void
What you need is a spark
and just enough desire to
keep it from dying
just keep it alive
Someone wise once said
the spark either dies out
or lives long enough to burn down
a whole forest.
I'm convinced he was right
To convince yourself as well
keep that spark alive
just one more day
Keep it alive.
a turtle born on the wrong side of its shell
He had a big belly
but he wasn't a fat man
he wished he was a fat man
his daughter was four
and she told him that he
looked like a
turtle
born
on the wrong side of
its shell
and mother laughed.
He didn't.
Surely he would have if the
swelling wasn't a terminal
disease
a type of cancer of the
stomach and guts whose
name he struggled very
hard to
forget
but the regular visits to
the doctor kept reminding him
his wife kept laughing
she said that laughing
is the key
the best healing
Laughter and love
lots and lots of love
Love
but the other night when
he tucked the little girl
in bed and kissed her forehead and
said "I love you."
she poked her tongue at him
and said "I don't! You ugly and weird.
I love mommy and puppy Bran. Good
night." And she put her
head on the pillow and
closed her eyes.
It was I who went to the shelter
and brought puppy Bran home, he though
as he closed the door, tears
blurring his vision
He didn't go into the
bedroom where his wife
was probably asleep
he went into the bathroom
vomited
washed his face
rinsed his mouth
went into the kitchen
and grabbed the leash
went outside
and took puppy Bran
for a walk
the moon lighted their path
and the shadow of his
big, swollen belly
covered all of puppy Bran
the children in the streets and the sewers and the laboring camps and the foster homes agreed with me
What do you want to
become when you
grow up?
was their most asked
question
And silence was my
most given answer
Might as well ask
How do you wanna die?
I didn't.
I didn't wanna grow up
but God, nature, the universe
put me through it anyway
And I told God, nature, the universe
that I would give up all the
possibilities for my future, all
the things that I could become
if only God, nature, the universe
would answer me this one question:
WHY DO I HAVE TO GROW UP
IN THE FIRST PLACE?
And a deal has been made
and God, nature, the universe said:
WHY, IT'S QUITE SIMPLE. YOU HAVE
TO GROW UP BECAUSE YOUR
GUARDIANS ARE GROWING OLD.
AND YOU WOULDN'T WANNA BE YOUNG
IN A WORLD WHERE NO ONE TAKES
CARE OF YOU, WOULD YOU?
God, nature, the universe was right
And I said it was right
and the children in the streets
and the sewers and the laboring camps
and the foster homes agreed with me
We have to grow up
And because of the deal I struck with
God, nature, the universe
I am now unable to become any of
the things I could've become
I can only imagine
those things
and write about
them
and that's
what I
do.
they don’t know him for an artist
the law forbids him
to walk the streets with the
label of that bottle exposed
but he does anyway
and there's no one to care
enough to report him
he's just another drunkard
getting his fix
also homeless
he wears baggy jeans with lots of
unruly strings around the hems
and the belt
a few holes at the knees
a hole in the shirt
dirt, sweat, something that looks
like blood splotches, something
that's probably just mustard
just another drunkard getting
his fix
but they don't know him for an artist
in the breast pocket of his shirt he holds
two long yellow pencils
and he uses them to make music
for the crows in the park and for the pigeons,
though the pigeons are less impressed by his
performance
he empties the bottle and finds a park
bench and pulls out the long yellow
pencils and starts
drumming into the wood
of the back rest
and the crows gather round to listen
and sometimes the dogs join as well
and sometimes the snails after the rain
but never the people
telephone poles can’t pet dogs
when I was a kid I'd always ask
myself how would
life be if I were a
telephone pole
or a spirit trapped inside
a telephone pole
sitting there day and night,
winter and summer
and autumn and spring
just sitting
and watching
and perhaps hearing the
conversations of people
over the telephone, because their
words pass through me
and I communicate with the other
telephone poles and have our
network where we share
stuff we hear and see
while remaining totally indifferent
to emergency calls and people's
drama and tragedy and all of life
that's how life would be if
I were a telephone pole
pretty damn nice
with no school or work to do
and no people to deal with
So when I was a kid I wished
I were a telephone pole
but then I remembered...
If I'm a telephone pole I
can't pet dogs anymore
it's not worth it
The Boy Who Ate Flowers
He ate flowers.
this mentally challenged boy
from the countryside
I used to watch him
in the fields
when I visited my grandparents
as a kid
He was like an exotic thing
a wild beast chasing
static pray
They had no chance,
the flowers
he would assault them
with a killer's smile, frothing,
and would grab
and tear and rip them from
the stem and
would eat them
Nobody knew why
and the only explanation given
was that he was insane
then the men and women
who saw him would
scream at him
to stop and he would raise
his head and watch them
like a deer surprised by
headlights
Then he would spit the colorful
froth from his big mouth
and would run home
hopping and leaping like a horse
through the tall grass
He was mostly inoffensive,
this flower eating boy
but they all told me to stay away
from him and would
always chase him away when
he got too close
Time passed and I moved to the
city and went to school there
and stopped visiting the
countryside and its wonders
I got busy
and my busy life drove away the
magic and mystery of childhood
The flower eating boy is now but
a memory
neither good
nor bad
just strange, interesting
He doesn't eat flowers anymore
because he doesn't live in the
countryside anymore
No, from what I've heard
he's in some mental facility and it was
his last flowery meal that sent him there
I don't know,
maybe if they hanged signs with
"Don't wear flowers in your hair!"
around the village and the fields
that little girl would've been saved
and the village would still have its
magic beast.
Daydreaming as a profession 