ain't no business

but the business of getting by

and that business

ain't nobody's business

but mine. 

He waited for the mask to drop off, but at the same time he did not question her right to wear it.
-- Fitzgerald

Jesus.

I Was With Her Long Enough To Change Brands Of Cigarettes


We had a bottle of wine and a pint of rum
before we went into the fair.
It started with a kiss on the ferris wheel.
I didn't know that actually happened until then.
One of my favorite days of all time...

Six months later
I gave her money she referred to as "fetus money."
We were long over as a romantic couple.
That day she listed why she hated me.

I had told her I was sorry and said so again
but those words can't take away a clumsy fuck.

The way she talked to me
it sounded like her mistakes
never hurt anyone but herself.
My mistakes have bad aim
and always seem to hit those near me.

She looked so young
I felt so old
I had driven another away
or she'd changed
or vice versa
whatever it was
it was done
and I was tired of looking.


-- Bucky Sinister
from The Outlaw Bible Of American Poetry

and then Carrie spoke and I did that half-grin. And then laughed, once, shortly. There they are behind my eyes and nose, an hour of sobbing self-knowledge blunt and honest and completely useless as I will do nothing with it and continue to reminisce about cigarettes and coffee as an acceptable substitute for diet and exercise. And and and. Two little girls.

The voice of the last cricket
across the first frost
is one kind of good-by.
It is so thin a splinter of singing.

--Carl Sandburg

In honor of Bertrand Russell, whom I am ignoring to watch The Italian Job:

Two Lines
      thirty-two two-line poems




I fell at the party.
I'm still at the party.





Coasting downhill
requires austerity.





Standing and walking
are two of my favorites.





We'll team up
and dance.





Temporary artist.
Permanent issues.





The police have come
in their little toy.





Choose me,
little shoe.





A grown man
has tiny aggressions.





Marty come back,
the hole is bigger.





Serious pedestrians
counting their coins.





The picture of baby
smells like a baby.





I knew Spanish
before it was cool.





Bring me the bloody head
of your last boyfriend.





The lake needs friends
who can live in the lake.





An empty car
full of cheerleaders.





Now we have more time
and fewer friends.





Believe me.
I'm healthy.





Walk downstairs singing
and stay there.





In relative calm
we find chores.





Precise and diminutive,
at least it's your stroller.





Go home
to your cocker spaniel.





Storming the fortress
the children start singing.





Once while spying on my neighbor
I solved for x.





Needless to say,
I haven't been calling.





When the tiger is in the mountain
the mountain will sleep.





2002. Still more trees than people,
and more water than trees.





The june bugs return
to your bonnet in quiet.





Beyond the distracted building
a very calm building.





Frantic prams.
Romantic oblivion.





He heard a crash
and blamed himself.





Nice hat.
Thanks.





The blue umbrella
walks alone.



Joshua Beckman & Matthew Rohrer
Nice Hat. Thanks.
Verse Press

You don't love me, you love New Jersey!

Why would you stop on the side of the highway just to tell me that you can't reverse? Talk and drive already whydontcha.

A Promise to D.H. Lawrence

Henceforth to gaze at little wild birds
and not feel pity when
they fall, frozen-dead from their boughs.

To be enamored with fish and the bending
of seaweed and the soft padded feet
of gazelle calves, quietly following their mothers.

Never to attend circuses.
To accept that science and mysticism
are the same, when they start

telling us why tigers are striped
or nightingales sing, naked and loud
on the edge of the branch.

To make each day a savage pilgrimage
into the graveyards of Man
and whales and elephants too, their ancient bones

unwrapped in the soil, the salty waves,
the gaps beneath icebergs.
To love from the gut and promise nothing.

To try and fail, then try again.
To build my ship of death,
for someday I will need it.

-- Michael Meyerhofer

Whatever, kid.
and Plath would take her brandy
and water to the hillside to watch the sighs
resound in the graveyard

Say you love me
We will never get the chance again
Say you love me
We will never get the chance again

When the night comes in
I hope I'm out of the rain

-- Matthew Good Band, Alabama Hotel Room