tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-57348783185622227902023-11-15T23:32:37.510-08:00Poetry per diemA heaping plate of poetry, one serving per day (which doesn't mean every day, just whenever I feel like it).Vanishing Pointhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09081552632629753038noreply@blogger.comBlogger50125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5734878318562222790.post-54605699567343253962011-10-16T20:34:00.000-07:002011-10-16T20:38:02.174-07:00CanteloupeIf you were here,<br />I would show you the canteloupe<br />that my grandmother never meant to grow.<br /><br />It just showed up by the rose bushes,<br />like a mistake, some bastard child<br />that sprouted like an insatiable seed<br />thrown in with the compost<br /><br />It took root,<br />and the canteloupe is no larger than a baseball,<br />the runt of the whole world's litter of fruit.<br /><br />I would give it to you,<br />pass it into your hands, the way I do<br />with everything else. My feeble, crusted offerings:<br />striving for sweetness.<br /><br />-Gillian SzeVanishing Pointhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09081552632629753038noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5734878318562222790.post-27276820499869045692011-01-09T20:13:00.001-08:002011-01-09T20:55:19.478-08:00Further Postulation on the Violent Works of the Marquis de Sade"My passions, concentrated on a single point, resemble the rays of a sun assembled by a magnifying glass: they immediately set fire to whatever object they find in their way."<br />-Marquis de Sade, <span style="font-style:italic;">Juliette</span><br /><br />It's true, I loathe what you would have me love<br />and, in my loathing, goad your glee the more.<br />Marquis, my heart, the heart you'd have me have<br /><br />takes pleasure from such crime there is no salve<br />to soothe it. Would you have me spell the gore?<br />It's true, I loathe what you would have me love.<br /><br />Perhaps you'd like to know that, though we've lived<br />in such different times, there is no end to terror,<br />Marquis. My heart, the heart you'd have me have<br /><br />erased, still quickens. Half the planet starves,<br />while half the planet fattens; we murder whores.<br />I can't help loathe what you would have me love:<br /><br />a vision of the world so dark I'd crave<br />to be beathen so as not to see the stars.<br />Marquis, my heart, the heart you'd have me have<br /><br />must never find its voice. We are not slaves<br />to vice as kindled wood is slave to fire.<br />Here is truth. I loathe what you would have me love,<br />Marquis. My heart can't be the heart you'd have me have. <br /><br />-Elizabeth BachinskyVanishing Pointhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09081552632629753038noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5734878318562222790.post-35692922905584253842010-12-11T00:36:00.000-08:002010-12-11T00:52:20.187-08:00Postulation on the Violent Works of the Marquis de Sade"I am said to have a hard heart, a very bad one<br />indeed; but is that fault really mine? or is it not<br />rather from Nature we have our vices as well as<br />our perfections?"<br />-Marquis de Sade, 120 Days of Sodom<br /><br />Marquis, right now, a woman in Toronto<br />is pushing a length of pipe into a man<br />who is paying her to hate him. It's a strange<br />appropriation to finance a woman's hatred,<br />but it's also hard work to put a pipe inside<br />a man. After he's left her bachelor apartment,<br />she'll roll her drop sheet back and hose it down<br />in the tub. She'll peel away her tall plastic<br />boots and rub her calves. Her shoulders<br />and her jaw will be sore. She'll take a bath<br />and, afterwards, she'll make a pot of soup<br />and eat it while she watches HBO.<br /><br />What's her transgression, or for that matter,<br />his? His torture's self-imposed; she'll spend time<br />in Venice for her holidays, get more time<br />off than a Safeway clerk will ever have.<br />It's too easy to call her a victim<br />and he her oppressor. His pleasure<br />and her commerce are entwined.<br />Perhaps it's preferable they marry<br />so she'll no longer require a paycheque,<br />but an allowance? This ain't the fifties,<br />man, though we've still got that atom bomb.<br />Imagine! That tool exists which, as you say,<br />"could so assail the sun to snatch it from <br />the universe and use that star to burn the world."<br /><br />My terror is terror's ubiquity.<br />War: it's not murder, it's industry<br />and a pretty swell career besides.<br />Think of those sitting on death row<br />who await appointments with machines,<br />their last sensation that of a needle's<br />prick in the vein or a hand to secure<br />their restraints. It's no sweet sexual game<br />for the inmate or for the soldier who<br />might never know their killer's face but who<br />can put death on their calendar like a<br />holiday. There is difference between<br />what is real and what is fantasy.<br /><br />Marquis, I see you in your cell;<br />it's cozy, despite the racket in the streets-<br />all around you, papers and books spread<br />open like mouths to mouth your fiction.<br />Outside, the revolution raves while you <br />have every comfort a man could desire<br />but freedom, yet there's more - even freedom<br />is a curse for you. Bourgeois, your own find<br />you reprehensible, and yet you are far<br />from a man of the people. Where does one <br />live when one fits nowhere but in fiction<br />and insanity? Even today<br />that's what we call our in-betweens: insane.<br />We give them lithium and bus passes and hope<br />they melt into the crowd. I think that, in my time,<br />you may have loved as you desired. That one<br />for whom your whip made passage through<br />the night? She lives, anticipates her agony<br />one blow at a time - and how she wears her stripes!<br />Such is the nature of our theatre, to paint<br />the coward's face with bravery, the bold pallid<br />with fear.<br /><br />-Elizabeth BachinskyVanishing Pointhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09081552632629753038noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5734878318562222790.post-87505557706384235692010-11-28T22:11:00.000-08:002010-11-28T22:15:53.857-08:00The SharkIn some quiet bay<br />or deserted inlet<br />he is waiting for me<br /><br />It is noon<br />there is a stillness on water and land<br />as if some primal god is about to speak;<br />in the sky<br />not a single bird is to be seen flying<br /><br />I shall swim out towards him<br />bringing him my incurable moral ache<br />and my cancered liver,<br />memories of women laughter Greek islands<br />griefs and humiliations I could find no words for<br /><br />I want him to be black, wholly black<br />I want him to be famished and solitary<br />I want him to be quietly ready for me<br />as if he were the angel of death<br /><br />The last thing I want my alive eyes<br />to behold before I close them forever<br />are his ripsaw teeth<br /><br />-Irving Layton, 1974Vanishing Pointhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09081552632629753038noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5734878318562222790.post-82978055372039115242010-10-04T22:02:00.000-07:002010-10-04T22:06:26.732-07:00The Horses of BonavistaThe horses of Bonavista pick their deliberate, delicate way<br />between sprawled stonepiles, graze between stone shelves.<br /><br />Scrawny, shaggy, still dazed by the thin spring sunshine,<br />they ignore the elaborate, massive icebergs passing offshore.<br /><br />The drifting crags, the lofted dazzle of antique ice, are common:<br />a great, green, summerspread maple might well spook them.<br /><br />-Richard OutramVanishing Pointhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09081552632629753038noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5734878318562222790.post-68806969894779282192010-08-18T18:40:00.000-07:002010-08-18T19:01:55.499-07:00The Ideal Site for the CrimeI<br /><br />To the child alive and well<br />caught up in her thoughts<br />obliquely<br />on this Monday with things to do<br />she heads toward the lot<br />where Sunday she'll be laid to rest<br /><br />There is an evil person<br />who loves you<br />don't look now<br />he's coming from far away<br />to meet up with you<br />he knows<br />you're not afraid of him<br /><br />His heart brand new<br />the brain eaten away<br />by twenty-five years of hatred<br />he's coming closer<br />a hero<br />for your calm youth<br /><br />In exactly two days<br />you'll be cut to pieces<br />by an heroic double-edged sword<br />this is a first move<br />a prelude to love<br /><br />a few little bites<br />in your life line and<br />the shattered membrane shocked<br />spurts forth<br />your thoughtful look<br />your joy no going back<br /><br />uninterrupted cascade<br />all your blood<br />welling to the surface<br /><br />II<br /><br />To Tuesday's student<br />massacred Wednesday<br />buried Thursday<br /><br />Don't stop to pick<br />the too red<br />December crocuses<br /><br />There is a young man who loves you<br />clothed in white terror<br />Don't rush to meet him<br />Don't tremble when he sees you<br /><br />He's only after dread<br />He has one desire only<br />to see pure terror<br />rise in your eyes<br /><br />This young man is a flame-thrower<br />he will reduce you to ashes<br />before the day is out<br /><br />He wants only<br />to catch your breath<br />between the pages of night<br />put it on the cross Friday<br />forget it Saturday<br />leafing through<br />the frozen specks of his<br />short memory<br /><br />meanwhile your brief life<br />oozes like childhood<br />around the edge of your dreams<br />which he will have taken from you<br />without asking<br /><br />III<br /><br />To the young woman of the morning<br />who will be mowed down<br />at five in the evening<br />her place is marked already<br />under snow that flies up<br />behind her muted step<br /><br />you will be carried to the earth<br />in a car like dark water<br />filed in thought<br />since the dawn of your meeting<br />among this scarlet week's<br />cut roses<br /><br />There is a jackal who loves you<br />dangerously<br />He wants to touch your heart<br />and today makes ready<br />to riddle it with bullets<br /><br />Yesterday he tried to close<br />the threshold of your flesh<br />with the iron padlock<br />of his iron love<br />and on your youthful body<br />like on an antique chest<br />he almost placed the seals<br /><br />You are his shadow<br />cast for all eternity<br />no matter what<br /><br />His fierce love<br />is phosphorescent<br />in the day's opaque light<br /><br />It's you or him<br />It's your life against his<br />It's your heart against his<br /><br />IV<br /><br />To the schoolgirl of late morning<br />quietly writing<br />who will die a violent death<br />that afternoon<br />reciting<br />her adultered history lesson<br /><br />Be careful<br />There is a boy who loves you<br />helplessly<br />You are in danger<br /><br />He is born of man without end<br />born of haunted night<br />determined to destroy you<br />since your very first day<br /><br />Your body <br />is the privileged portion of space<br />he chose<br />to annihilate<br />He gave himself the mission<br />to rid the species<br />of your tenacious existence<br /><br />You are in danger<br />in your classroom<br />as the setting sun glints<br />off your cheek<br /><br />He is the secret weapon<br />that bursts into the room<br />and before the blackboard<br />engineers<br />the fatal blow<br />the fall<br />for ever and ever<br /><br />He forbids you ever<br />to go through this door<br />the way your brother can,<br />the heart beating<br /><br />-Louky BersianikVanishing Pointhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09081552632629753038noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5734878318562222790.post-23282976649528786772010-08-03T18:20:00.000-07:002010-08-03T18:23:19.811-07:00Death WishBury me anywhere,<br />Somwhere near a tree<br />Some place where a horse will graze<br />and gallop over me.<br />Bury me<br />Somewhere near a stream,<br />When she floods her banks<br />I'll give her thanks<br />For reaching out to me<br />In my childhood scene;<br />But please -<br />don't bury me<br />In Golders Green.<br /><br />-Spike Milligan, Italy, 1944Vanishing Pointhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09081552632629753038noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5734878318562222790.post-68737919873627630852010-05-29T12:49:00.000-07:002010-05-29T12:50:25.575-07:00A Pot of Red Lentilssimmers on the kitchen stove.<br />All afternoon dense kernels<br />surrender to the fertile<br />juices, their tender bellies<br />swelling with delight.<br /><br />In the yard we plant<br />rhubarb, cauliflower, and artichokes,<br />cupping wet earth over tubers,<br />our labor the germ<br />of later sustenance and renewal.<br /><br />Across the field the sound of a baby crying<br />as we carry in the last carrots,<br />whorls of butter lettuce,<br />a basket of red potatoes.<br /><br />I want to remember us this way—<br />late September sun streaming through<br />the window, bread loaves and golden<br />bunches of grapes on the table,<br />spoonfuls of hot soup rising<br />to our lips, filling us<br />with what endures.<br /><br />-Peter PereiraVanishing Pointhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09081552632629753038noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5734878318562222790.post-12545746560057785252010-01-18T21:26:00.001-08:002010-01-18T21:26:59.506-08:00MoteWhen she turned her gaze upon me,<br />I was a mote of dust<br />caught in a beam of sunlight<br />I was huge and beautiful<br />and bright.<br /><br />I laughed and danced<br />and shone.<br /><br />And when she turned away,<br />a cloud moved across the sun<br />and I was extinguished. <br /><br />-Keith TrimVanishing Pointhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09081552632629753038noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5734878318562222790.post-15535735471940320022010-01-17T19:34:00.000-08:002010-01-17T19:35:15.416-08:00Who Are We?Into the past <br />I go like a stranger<br />to discover why at night<br />I lay alone as a child<br />waiting for the front door<br />to slam, my father gone<br />to night-shift work,<br />and my mother, Marie, to enter,<br />unable to sleep, and tell me<br />tales of childhood <br />war, pursued by those<br />who, as she spoke,<br />seemed to enter the room,<br />Gestapo men in leather coats<br />who ordered me to pack<br />and descend to a waiting truck,<br />for I am still going to Auschwitz<br />though a grown man in 1998<br />I am still boarding the freight,<br />crushed against numbed, frightened<br />Jews and Gypsies and Russian<br />soldiers and homosexuals<br />crossing frontiers to be gassed<br /><br />I am her, in my heart,<br />though I am six feet two<br />and two hundred and ten pounds<br />and have played college football<br />and served as a soldier<br />and have scars from fights<br />with knives and jagged<br />bottles smashed on bars<br /><br />I am still her, little girl,<br />hiding in chicken coops <br />and forests, asleep on dynamite<br />among partisans<br />I am still her, brushing teeth<br />with ashes<br />from the ruins of nations<br />gutted in war<br /><br />I am still her brown eyes<br />and black hair of persecution<br />foraging scraps of thistle soup,<br />a star-shaped patch<br />sewn to my shirt<br /><br />I am still my mother <br />every day in the streets<br />of New York or San Francisco,<br />the chimney skies glow and swirl<br />with soot like night above<br />a crematorium, or the Bronx<br />incinerator chute where I<br />threw out trash in a brick<br />darkness shooting sparks<br /><br />I am still her in the streets<br />of Berkeley, walking among<br />sparechangers, dyed-hair punkers,<br />gays in stud leather, Blacks,<br />Mexicans and Asians<br /><br />I am still her rounded up<br />among poets and thieves<br />and politically incorrect<br />social deviants<br />on sun-drenched sidewalks<br />in the Mission and the Haight,<br />Greenwich Village, the Lower<br />East Side, or anywhere the weird<br />congregate in tolerance<br /><br />And every day in this age<br />of intolerance,<br />in a mental ghetto<br />affirmed by the homeless,<br />I pass the dying <br />with the loud ring of my boots,<br />ashamed to think that perhaps<br />my heels are the last thing<br />they heard<br />Every day I am a <br />survivor of AIDS and poverty<br /><br />Every day I sit in cafes<br />watching tattoos turn to numbers<br />and I grow angry<br />I want America back<br />I want America to be<br />the home I never had<br /><br />And you, who are you<br />if you hear my voice?<br />Who are you, stranger<br />if you read these words?<br /><br />Who are we<br />who stand threatened <br />in these times of darkness?<br />Who are we, condemned to die,<br />who do not know ourselves<br />at all?<br /><br />-Alan KaufmanVanishing Pointhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09081552632629753038noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5734878318562222790.post-68793220560207108142010-01-11T21:04:00.000-08:002010-03-09T21:14:02.301-08:00another night has slid by me without sleeping a winkwell maybe i fell into the keyboard twice <br />but no more than that and for some reason <br />i'm still going to be fine - today <br /><br />so it is saturday and i've been <br />awake since thursday morning... <br /><br />and the crickets’ legs have fallen off <br />waiting on me to shut my eyes <br />and i toss them in fire <br />just a bit <br />crunchy and hot <br />and i like the way they ooze <br />upon my tongue. <br />and i saw parrots flying <br />in the middle of the city <br />of bridgeport <br />and i knew overlapping <br />was possible. <br /><br />and yesterday i did not think <br />i'd miss the night <br />but i did. <br />and here it is daybreak <br />and my eyes are just as tangoed <br />as the day before. <br /><br />and i wonder... <br />if the scientists are right -<br />we need to sleep to forget <br />in order to remember better <br />and i have too many little details <br />still stuck in seat cushions of synapses <br />and they are gluing up the pathways <br />and i can't remember the big things anymore... <br />like how not to fuck up a friendship. <br />like how not to abandon your guts <br />like how not to listen to your dick <br />when your head is flying straight <br />for a change.<br /><br />-Maggie ShurtleffVanishing Pointhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09081552632629753038noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5734878318562222790.post-46423344607766508432010-01-08T16:59:00.000-08:002010-01-08T17:01:10.682-08:00Since a girl and another centuryI've been waiting. I also exchange my innocence <br />for a profitable iris and two words. <br />I've a dress of color and a puppet of borrowed conscience. <br />I've sat down to graze sheep and I've walked alone <br />through the alleys of some neighboring town. <br />I've breathed the rain on the faces of the gargoyles, <br />its polished brilliance in the teeth of the shore. <br />I've gone where there's room and I've also <br />hoped from the pockets of passers-by. <br />I've dined at the port and slept <br />with the ghosts of those full of hope <br />and the colonels of war. <br />I've known the solitude, <br />the whale calf that sleeps <br />in the conquests of the wind. <br />Belive me: I've been waiting. I still don't know <br />what for, definitely. <br />Let autumn begin. <br />Let Penelope finish her shroud of love <br />an elegy of papier mache <br />a medieval dance piece <br />an arm that isn't mine <br />a cat for my sister <br />a bear's claw <br />a house on the hill <br />a forest <br />a heart<br /><br />-Anisley del Carmen Miraz LladosaVanishing Pointhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09081552632629753038noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5734878318562222790.post-89149799688034316332009-11-23T21:10:00.000-08:002009-11-23T21:11:11.076-08:00Death in MotionWe met there, <br />In a forest of others. <br />I closed my eyes and reached for a black stone submerged in the dark water; <br />Sometimes black is so delicately constructed. <br />But with my touch the explosion of gunfire flashed. <br />Then I could hear and smell more clearly the death and life of shotgunned ducks, <br />of the disgusting jubilance of destruction: when the hunter injects the heroin <br />of the not-being-prey. <br /><br />let them pretend but not us: <br />the animal trembling is all around us, <br />in between the air of each shared breath <br /><br />and no amount of canyon-yelling or <br />other-killing will quench it <br /><br />the dark forest world: <br />the rush of birds flushed out <br />just before the death-dive <br /><br />what is it like to be comfortable in flight <br />then to plunge half-dead where nothing is centered upon you <br />like leaping into the pavement <br />from 20 stories but when you hit it is nothing but ordinary; <br />cheers even erupt - it's a celebration <br /><br />and something beautiful has died in full motion:<br />nothing a photograph could hope to capture <br />but like a bird's beating heart, <br />slowly arcing downward to towards death. <br /><br />you are beautiful you are beautiful <br /><br />that is why they kill you <br />isn't it?<br /><br />-Thomas GossVanishing Pointhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09081552632629753038noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5734878318562222790.post-68460730089382307652009-11-17T16:40:00.000-08:002009-11-17T16:48:06.940-08:00Stones Speak of the Earthless SkyMemory hasn't a chord of what the family has lost.<br />For centuries village ancestors potlached salmon's<br />return so we could dance on the water like bugs.<br /><br />Today the stones quit asking not to betray<br />their ceremonies, our ears deaf to their winter<br />story of mountain, river, cormorant, red-flowering<br /><br />currant. Our car tracks trample their children<br />who vanish down the street like moonlight<br />into gutters, our abbreviated hours.<br /><br />Topaz stones brought us dream circles in order<br />to never forget where the earth's heart cracked,<br />our shadows became ant fodder; we laughed<br /><br />like flies and drank the blood from mirrors.<br />Flint raised his arm to the hummingbird's<br />fragrances, healing our eyes, spiky as sea urchins.<br /><br />We ground Flint to a machine that exploded<br />with roadkill floating in toxins.<br />From a cave, ancestor stones gave us the cells<br /><br />of trout, madrona, butterfly, eagle and grizzly,<br />gave us our birth song born of the sea,<br />gave us eagle feathers for the sunrise dance.<br /><br />We chose instead to shoot the spotted-owl<br />from its borderless clarity,<br />turn off life like a video, including ours.<br /><br />-Duane NiatumVanishing Pointhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09081552632629753038noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5734878318562222790.post-6798855917725015022009-10-28T23:40:00.000-07:002009-11-07T18:10:58.325-08:00you're too far awayDid I get to sleep today?<br />didn’t i?<br />Is there enough light?<br />I can’t see<br />i’m tired or i’ve misplaced my glasses<br /><br />I can’t sleep<br />it’s dark i think but<br />theres light inside my stomach<br />and it shines on the back of my eyelids<br />or else someones making noise<br />are you making noise?<br /><br />No, you’re too far away<br />and any noise you make is irrelevent<br />or strange when it reaches me<br />or at least<br />i couldnt dream of responding<br />its too tight or narrow<br />it wasn’t built with someone of my size in mind<br />how about my size? everythings changing and i cant tell a nickel from a dime<br />How should I remember what it looked like?<br /><br />You’re too far away and it feels like arrows<br />I’m not at home<br />I have no home.<br />Are you home?<br /><br />I met a nice woman with a nice ass<br />She winked at me and not too many people wink<br />my hands hurt they’re covered in splinters<br />wrapped in gauze cut bandages and packing tape?<br />no<br />some blisters and some bleeding only<br />but they feels like im not there for you<br /><br />where are you?<br />are you home? where should i put these beauty supplies?<br />you’re BEAUTIFUL<br />god damnit you’re so fucking BEAUTIFUL<br />theres no words i couldnt tell you<br />im slipping from the page<br />theres too much<br />i want to get fucked up and forget all about this but tomorrow these words will still be here<br /><br />I’m the most important thing in the world to you<br />and to my body<br />its too late<br />its personified<br />its eating me away im rotting like meat<br />im meat like rotting<br /><br />im too much concrete in too little space<br />and im starting to set<br /><br />my chemicals are punchlines and it hurts my feelings<br />my punchlines hurt me<br />ow<br />FUCK<br />SHIT<br />UP<br />i wish i was drunk i wish i was stoned i wish i was fucked up i wish i was trashed i wish i was wasted i wish i pissed myself<br />my stomach is full of piss and my bladder is full of lead<br />Help me!<br />Call a doctor!<br /><br />pens scratch itches<br />i have nothing to write down but<br />i think the sound of the pen against the paper is<br />keeping me from killing myself<br />so instead i use words<br />even though words and scratch pen noises<br />are entirely different things<br /><br />I don’t know if the average person could tell the difference<br />even if their life depended on it<br />like mine does<br /><br />I don’t want music<br />You’re too far away<br />I don’t want a cigarette<br />You’re too far away<br />I don’t want to eat fish<br />its flakey and it tastes like sedimentary rock<br />You’re too far away<br />I dont want to make toast<br />You’re too far away<br />I don’t want to put sandals on<br />You’re too far away<br />I don’t want to spend my money<br />I don’t want to save my money<br />You’re too far away<br />I don’t want to miss you<br />You’re too far away<br />I don’t want to do pull ups or shovel shit or split wood or drink coffee or smoke a cigarette or play guitar or laugh in your face<br />You’re too far away<br />I don’t want to have a cigarette<br />You’re too far away<br /><br />You live like me I think<br />in boxes and in between walls<br />we’re human being insulation<br />insulating human being bones<br />my bones will not give my body up<br />it comes off in strips like boy jerky<br />kid fabric<br />waste product<br /><br />metal is sick<br />the stainless steel is ill and<br />ceramic tiles are filled with disease when they get wet<br /><br />Are you sick?<br />I miss you<br />come back<br />im sorry<br />im sorry<br />i cant believe im doing this to you<br /><br />does this count as fabric? i still cant tell but<br />this time i still dont care<br />i mean<br />this time it seems like it might be glass<br />or plastic<br />or maybe it’s water or a cricket<br />or a stream or a peice of paper<br />loose leaf like autumn<br /><br />why am i doing this?<br />it makes me feel cold<br />its cold in here and its not worth it<br />you’re too far away<br /><br />When I read these words tomorrow<br />some of them will be good words<br />and some of them will be bad words<br />and none of them will be true<br />that’ll take years<br /><br />It’ll take a year and a half for you to live with me.<br /><br />in half a year it’ll take a year<br />and in a year it’ll take half a year<br />how many years is this going to take?<br />you’re too far away<br /><br />now I’m starting to feel as if<br />I’ve brushed my teeth and I’m heading for bed<br />you’re still too far away<br />but if you arent here today<br />you might be tomorrow<br />I can’t prove otherwise<br />I’m going to brush my teeth<br />and take off my pants for you<br />roll a cigarette for you<br />close my eyes for you<br />all it takes is eyelids and the years arent even there<br />the miles arent even there<br />and its not too dark to see<br />or too bright to think<br />the music turns off and the lights go out<br />the animals all stop<br />and you’re too far away<br />the lights all go out<br />and you’re too far away<br />I love you and<br />you’re too far away<br /><br />but at least you’re somewhere<br />i’m always losing important things<br />because i forget all about them<br />but i know where you are<br /><br />-garbage juiceVanishing Pointhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09081552632629753038noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5734878318562222790.post-86341513344482893772009-10-18T23:11:00.000-07:002009-10-18T23:23:06.696-07:00Havasupai Medicine SongThe land we were given<br />is right here,<br />right here.<br />Red rock<br />streaked with brown<br />shooting up high<br />all round our home.<br />Red rock<br />shooting up high<br />right here.<br />A spring will always be there<br />down at its foot.<br />From way back<br />it is ours.<br />Right down<br />the center of our land<br />a line moves,<br />bright blue-green.<br />This is what I'm thinking.<br />At the edge of the water<br />cattails appear,<br />bright blue-green,<br />all round the water.<br />This is what I'm thinking.<br />At the edge of the water<br />silt is being laid down<br />in ripples.<br />This is what I'm thinking.<br />Water skaters walk,<br />gliding, gliding.<br />This is what I'm thinking.<br />Water grasses growing,<br />bright blue-green<br />under the water,<br />waving, waving<br />This is what I'm thinking:<br />Under the water<br />tiny pebbles.<br />Flowing over them<br />the water we drink.<br />The water is gliding toward the north,<br />into the distance, beyond our sight.<br />This is what I'm thinking. <br />We have arrived here.<br />An illness.<br />I sit down,<br />I sing myself a song.<br />This is what I'm thinking:<br />A medicine spirit,<br />a healer,<br />I am the same.<br />An illness.<br />I sit down.<br />I sing myself a song.<br />The things I have named<br />I leave behind.<br />This is what I'm thinking.<br />We arrive there.<br />We are leaving the canyon.<br />Out on the rim<br />horses that are mine.<br />They roam there<br /> at the junipers,<br />where the junipers are straight,<br />and low.<br />They are right there,<br />horses that are mine<br />are gathered there.<br />This is what I'm thinking.<br />Here we arrive, then<br />we swing back down,<br />moving back down the rocks,<br />white rocks streaked with brown.<br />Down at the foot<br />a spring will always be there,<br />a spring that heals,<br />it is right there.<br />My horses drink the water<br />that is there.<br />White rock streaked with brown<br />shooting up high<br />is right there.<br />There is my horses trail,<br />zigzagging right down the center,<br />the color of dust.<br />It leads to <br />the source.<br />It is right here.<br />That is what I'm thinking.<br />And now we arrive<br />down in the canyon,<br />red rocks,<br />down in the canyon,<br />they are right here,<br />down in the canyon,<br />red rocks, low down,<br />they are right here.<br />Here I walk,<br />I go alone.<br />This is what I'm thinking.<br />Red rocks, streaked with brown,<br />shooting up high.<br />It is right here,<br />down at the foot,<br />red rocks, boulders<br />streaked with brown.<br />They are right here.<br />My illness is absorbed,<br />right here.<br />I will this to be.<br />I will this to be.Vanishing Pointhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09081552632629753038noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5734878318562222790.post-76638546964034552972009-10-16T22:58:00.001-07:002009-10-16T22:59:36.739-07:00CelebrationI want to fill my house with people <br />to drown out the silence and lonliness<br />to fill up the spaces and<br />ooze in the cracks<br />- pour food into their bodies<br />and fill their minds with loving music<br />and hug and laugh and cry<br />then sigh<br />when they leave<br /><br />-Denise ConeyVanishing Pointhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09081552632629753038noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5734878318562222790.post-7702244480460341822009-10-09T23:28:00.000-07:002009-10-09T23:29:26.393-07:00HypnotizedSo that's how you found me<br />Rain falling around me<br />Lookin down at a worm<br />With a long way to go<br />And the traffic was hissing by<br />And i was homesick<br />And i was high<br /><br />I was surrounded by a language<br />In which i could say only hello<br />And thank you very much<br />But you spoke so i could understand<br />And i drew a treasure map on your hand<br /><br />And you were no picnic<br />You were no prize<br />But you had just enough pathos<br />To keep me hypnotized<br />Hypnotized<br /><br />The map led to an island<br />In a sea of store-bought dreams<br />Where soulless singers sang<br />Over beats built by machines<br /><br />And lovely girls were hovering<br />Above my head like gulls<br />With their long slender necks<br />And their delicate skulls<br /><br />And i was no picnic<br />I was no prize<br />But i had just enough sweetness<br />To keep you hypnotized<br />Hypnotized<br /><br />So that's how you found me<br />Rain falling around me<br />Lookin down at a worm<br />With a long way to go<br /><br />-Ani DiFrancoVanishing Pointhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09081552632629753038noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5734878318562222790.post-20362580111111339582009-10-02T18:28:00.000-07:002009-10-02T18:29:44.588-07:00I believei believe misogyny and patriarchy are closet homo lovers<br />and they screw over their sisters cause they’re scared to screw each other.<br />i believe harriet tubman should be on the dollar bill<br />we’ve had our fill of white boy faces<br />time to change places.<br />i believe hilary, not bill, should have worn the crown<br />they could have learned from jack and jill<br />which one would break it and fall down.<br />i believe there are too many lonely lesbians looking for a lover<br />and if some would lift their cool masks maybe they would find each other.<br />i believe people and products both need less packaging<br />cause bullshit is still bullshit when you pull off all the wrapping.<br />i believe people are see-through <br />if you hold em up to the light<br />i believe people are enlightening <br />if you plug em in right.<br />i believe our system is a love affair between the up and upper classes<br />cause it’s easy to get screwed when you’re just raping all the masses<br />i believe diet coke is liquid steel<br />i believe too many women <br />drink their meal.<br />i believe in survival of the fittest-- <br />if you’re ranking members of a gym<br />but if you’re talking about the human club, you gotta let everybody in.<br />i believe you should learn more than one language <br />you should learn to talk in tongues and lips<br />i believe in nipples and skin and toes and hips.<br />i believe in noise from teeth and throats <br />and cunts<br />the noise of poetry, music, laughter, after screaming cunnilingus. <br />i believe women are sexy <br />without makeup or clothes<br />i believe women are sexy <br />when they’re reciting prose<br />i don’t believe in horoscopes, <br />fortune, fate, luck, or chance<br />i believe sometimes shit works out <br />just cause of circumstance.<br />so i believe if you call the wrong number <br />you should talk for a while<br />you might like em more than <br />who you meant to dial.<br />i believe small talk is for small people <br />who have nothing much to say<br />if you really think it’s so nice out, <br />shut up and go enjoy the fucking day <br />i believe wall street invented <br />the criminal mentality<br />the easter bunny laid <br />mandatory heterosexuality <br />i believe mutual masturbation makes a lot of sense<br />i don’t believe in a white picket fence<br />i believe in picking fights and picketing riot dykes<br />i believe in loving in groups, <br />i believe in loving alone.<br />i believe in hardship, in travelling <br />through hard shit<br />then i believe in coming home.<br />i believe some wives find their husbands boring<br />and they picture women naked <br />while those boys are snoring<br />i believe men need to revolutionize <br />themselves or they’ll see<br />all those wives kissing jill sobule and me.<br />i believe there are more buttons <br />and more clever bumper stickers every day<br />and less and less sticking <br />to what they have to say<br />more recycling of garbage, <br />more recycling of cash<br />it all ends up in the same bin -- <br />with all the white corporate trash.<br />i believe there are too many babies <br />and too many weddings and too many headings <br />that started with Monica<br />i believe post-gay is presumptious<br />just plain gay functions.<br />i don’t believe in ex-gay<br />i believe trent lott should be b.b. gun-shot<br />ex-punged from this term before <br />the thousand years he’s got left<br />i believe barbie should be used in anatomy class <br />as a perfect bag of bones<br />then taken to biogenetics <br />as an argument against clones.<br />i believe cell phone culture is ridiculous<br />imprisoning us in the cell of a social fetish<br />i believe baby dolls should have realistic clits.<br />so baby dykes can start getting used to it.<br />and i believed the guy i waited on today <br />who said i’m one hundred percent nice <br />i don’t bite<br />i said i believe you sir and i’ll take the beer<br />can you believe i’m one hundred percent queer<br />and i talk it and i teach it <br />and i poet and i preach it<br />and I hold it and I mold it <br />and I know it so I give it.<br />cause I’m sure that I believe<br />i’m still learning how to live it.<br /><br />-Alix OlsonVanishing Pointhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09081552632629753038noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5734878318562222790.post-8705503562681263302009-09-22T16:32:00.000-07:002009-09-22T16:33:39.308-07:00At Blackwater PondAt Blackwater Pond the tossed waters have<br />settled<br />after a night of rain.<br />I dip my cupped hands. I drink<br />a long time. It tastes<br />like stone, leaves, fire. It falls cold<br />into my body, waking the bones. I hear them<br />deep inside me, whispering<br />oh what is that beautiful thing<br />that just happened?<br /><br />-Mary OliverVanishing Pointhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09081552632629753038noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5734878318562222790.post-60928835344486421932009-09-21T10:41:00.000-07:002009-09-21T10:44:10.404-07:00HAVE YOU KILLED FOR YOUR MAN TODAYIn these hands, the cities; in my weather, the armies<br />Of better things than die<br />To the scaly music of war.<br /><br />The different men, who are dead,<br />Had cunning; they sought green lives<br />In a world blacker than your world;<br />But you have nourished the taste of sickness<br />Until all other tastes are dull in your mouths;<br />It is only we who stand outside the steaming tents<br />Of hypocrisy & murder<br />Who are "sick" --<br />This is the health you want.<br /><br />Yours is the health of the pig which roots up<br />The vines that would give him food;<br />Ours is the sickness of the deer which is shot<br />Because it is the activity of hunters to shoot him.<br /><br />In your hands, the cities, in my world, the marching<br />Of nobler feet than walk down a road<br />Deep with the corpses of every sane & beautiful thing.<br /><br />-Kenneth PatchenVanishing Pointhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09081552632629753038noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5734878318562222790.post-76911927978535799092009-09-16T15:37:00.000-07:002009-09-16T15:38:08.740-07:00the cat fluffs his fur<br />and tries to avoid the cold<br />of his own shadow<br /><br />-Perdita FinnVanishing Pointhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09081552632629753038noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5734878318562222790.post-45978895326225345742009-09-15T19:11:00.001-07:002009-09-15T19:15:58.369-07:0078%H2Owhen the joy had left your body<br />and you were locked in to your own thoughts<br />you used to love to sit by the water<br />and watch it lapping on the rocks<br />and every time you put your feet in<br />you'd cry out and you would pray<br />but it's all downhill from here baby<br />so naturally, i can't stay<br /><br />first you'll roll your eyes to heaven<br />say you never had love so divine<br />but it will go from<br />more than ever<br />to not enough<br />in no time<br />you will push and<br />you will push un-<br />til you push me away<br />i hear you cry out for your water<br />and i know you'll curse it someday<br /><br />i guess for me<br />there's been a few<br />who've walked up smiling<br />and drawn a line<br />between so far<br />and from now on<br />yes a big glowing<br />line in time<br />and i've been disappointed<br />i've been heartbroken<br />yes i too have<br />loved from afar<br />but we are 78% water<br />even our pumping hearts<br /><br />-Ani DiFrancoVanishing Pointhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09081552632629753038noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5734878318562222790.post-86445790720633316052009-09-10T19:58:00.000-07:002009-09-10T19:59:19.991-07:00Get it?Get beat up on TV squirming on the ground for driving irregular<br />Get bombed in Philadelphia by helicopters with your little babies<br />Get kicked in the street by Newark police and charged w/riot<br />Get assassinated by a jerk while FBI sleeps with itself<br />Get shot by a stringer for the CIA & blame it on Fair Play for Cuba Committee<br />Get bumped off by an errandboy for Cuban drug kingpins, friend of the Feds & Dallas cops<br />Get caught paying off Contras with coke money while Acting U.S. Drug War Czar<br />Get busted for overcharging Iranians on secret warplane sales<br />Get convicted of lying to Congress about off-the-shelf dirty wars in Central America<br />Get 12 billion dollars for a drug bureaucracy and double the number of addicts<br />Get a million people in prison in the land of the free<br />Get the electric chair & gas chamber for unpopular crimes<br />Organize Citizens for Decency Through Law rob your own phony bank several billion dollars get sent to jail<br /><br />-Allen Ginsberg <br />May 1992<br />New YorkVanishing Pointhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09081552632629753038noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5734878318562222790.post-39483921681799120312009-09-09T20:30:00.001-07:002009-09-09T20:30:48.332-07:00IncidentOnce riding in old Baltimore,<br />Heart-filled, head-filled with glee;<br />I saw a Baltimorean<br />Keep looking straight at me.<br /><br />Now I was eight and very small,<br />And he was no whit bigger,<br />And so I smiled, but he poked out<br />His tongue, and called me, "Nigger."<br /><br />I saw the whole of Baltimore<br />From May until December;<br />Of all the things that happened there<br />That's all that I remember.<br /><br />-Countee CullenVanishing Pointhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09081552632629753038noreply@blogger.com1