And then I waited for what I
wanted to know
And when I did not receive what
I felt was my due
I simply just did that which I could
I created it.

Now I know what this means.

Thank you.

I have restored a poem which I had removed last year (or perhaps the year before). It is about four years old now. Unfortunately, it is a true story.

A prose poem I wrote several weeks ago has surfaced at Fickle Muses, my friend’s online poetry publication.

On a whim, I decided to map out my current social network. It illustrates the chain of circumstances responsible for my current relationships.

As you can see, this is all Jodi’s fault.

Click on the image for the full view.

Hmm, too many depressing posts on one page! Time to liven it up a bit! Tonight saw the kick off of the National Poetry Slam here in Albuquerque. I attended this kickin’ party at the National Hispanic Cultural Center and found myself awash in beautiful creative types. The wonderful thing about a throng of poets is the atmosphere of camaraderie, total strangers carrying on like lifelong friends. I’m sure the free drinks helped things along quite a bit.
Carlos talked me into buying a Slam t-shirt, which I proudly wore the rest of the night. This one has the proper web address on it: www.abqslams.org. Danny forgot to renew the old address and now it leads to a page on penile enhancement. “A marketing ploy,” Don explains.
Anyhow, I’ve set aside the next few days to devote my attention to all the slam activities going on around town. And I’ll be up late updating the web site with the latest scores. Go team ABQ!

Voting is now open at the Slam Idol website. You can listen to each of the six poets and then vote for them all on a ten point scale. Also, there is an interview Simon Toon did with me.

Click here to visit the Slam Idol website.

Here’s a poem I recently reworked and tightened up a bit.

Photos
v.2

I spent five years filling up a photo album with a house, a car, a dog, a set of tools, a nice dining room set, and you.
And you in your wedding dress
And you smiling by the SOLD sign
And you raking the leaves
And you looking at me like I was forever.
I was an amateur photographer, to be sure
Shooting from the hip
Sending up a prayer that when the camera winked
Something would develop:
Be they happy accidents
The smeared blur of a smile
You on a camel, framed by a pyramid
The montage of a child’s face, my eyes, your nose
Or the sepia toned hope of you and me wrinkling in a sunset forty years away
But now I wonder
Did someone else borrow my camera for the last five years?
In the economy of betrayal
One word is worth a thousand pictures
“I do” bought two thousand moments
“Divorce” took half of them back
It’s an expensive word
It cost a house, a car, a dog, a set of tools, a nice dining room set, and you.
And you packing up your wedding dress
And you putting up a FOR SALE sign
And you leaving the rake
And you looking at me like I never meant anything
And it cost you me.
All those photos, just gone
As though I had spent the last five years taking pictures of the sun.

This morning I was interviewed by Simon Toon of the Slam Idol podcast. I think the last time I was interviewed was for my high school yearbook. I found it quite enjoyable talking to someone in England via Skype. He’ll edit out all the boring bits and publish the interview as a podcast (so I hope!). Hope it turns out well.

I can be heard performing my poem “My Girlfriend is so Fat” on the Slam Idol podcast.

It’s like a poetry slam that happens online. You listen to each performer and then vote for the one you like the best.

The airplane is the epitome of safety, order and restraint.
Everything designed to induce calm and minimize contact.
Other passengers apologize for touching me, ashamed of the slightest nudge that briefly bridges a gap.
But I want to be jostled; I want their fingerprints on me.
I look out the window and all the clouds are fucking.
Couples glomming together,
Threesomes tumbling through the atmosphere,
Some of them on dragons.
And I want out of the capsule.
I want to go where it is wet and uncertain.
Inside the window, we are rows of silent worlds, arranged like eggs.
We acknowledge each other like the blurred faces in the periphery of dreams.
We are in transition.
We are being taken.
No one mentions our mutual fate, as though words would cause the worlds to crack and burst, blending together like the clouds outside.
We have nothing to hold but our breath.

I am gripped by a spiritual shuddering, caught inside my own wake.
If I would resist less, make my soul an aetheric arrow, flow upstream,
I would find Me.
A Me surfing the crest of Time.
A Me moving so fast it strips the paint off stars.
A Me that is already There because it itself is the destination.
A Me with liquid, hungry boundaries.
I would embrace that Me, pull its lips to my ear and finally hear what I’ve been trying to say all this time.
But right now I am a pail of water in a steel box:
Passenger 10C on a carefully prescribed arc,
Moving faster than I ever have while sitting completely still.
Three buttons give me the power to summon
A tiny sun, a tiny wind, or a tiny repose.
To see, to feel and to dream with the seatbelt securely fastened, small and safe.

Hidden somewhere ahead of me is a
Flickering matrix of dials, maintaining my fate.
They taught me that complex machines were required to yoke destiny.
Without buttons and dials the plane could land in Xanadu, missiles could land on the Civil War, and I could become anyone.
The gauges were necessary to measure progress.
So I bought into the buttons and the dials.
And I bought them with my blood.
An umbilical snapped, memory faded and I unlearned that ultimate potential, life in all directions, chaos, is easy.
Anywhere and Anywhen slide loose behind a thin amniotic membrane where my body used to breathe water and my soul used to breathe…used to breathe…
Where my soul just used to Breathe.

Outside the window, the clouds form the angular logos of their new corporate sponsors.
The people flying the plane weren’t just taking us,
They were taking everything.
Frantically, I reach out and press a fourth button I hadn’t noticed before and I summon a tiny point of contact.
A woman arrives and asks “Can I help you?”
I say “You can do more than that: You can get your hands dirty with me. Get me under your fingernails. You can stop lying and expecting me to lie back. You can drink my tongue and every other part of me and I will do the same for you. We can walk naked and give everything we see a new name. And don’t apologize if you end up killing me; I was made to explode and make a mess and stick to everything.
“Barring that, you can show me where they’ve hidden my sun, my wind and my dreams. I’ve checked way too much baggage onto this flight, so I know they can’t be here. While you’re at it, you can take back all the dials because I’m not measuring up, I’m going Up.
“Barring that I’ll proceed to one of the four exits (the nearest of which may be behind me) and get off the fucking plane.”
MAYDAY EJECT EJECT MAYDAY EJECT EJECT
…
She sits down next to me.
Her hair is not red – Somehow that’s okay.
She pulls out a dog-eared copy of The Little Prince.
I know what pages she has marked.
“First time flowing?” she asks.
“Yes, yes it is.”
She holds my hand and my heart although they both stain her.
“We’re going to slide up and through the plane now,” she says.
I nod.
There is a splash.
I stop holding on to my breath.