Nowadays, no walking is needed. Plastic numbers will send tame ones Around the globe at a click. Try it. Think of someone in need, first.
Potted, wrapped, still dripping of dew. Carded and be-ribboned, only idiots And madmen sidestep such efficiency Or walk somewhere.
I thought all of this before yesterday, When… on a hillside I knelt as though The world were a cathedral. And knew That I can only enjoy this, by staying.
We would all meet at Tony Jaro’s and someone would start it. The talking, the topic, the joke, and never a dull moment, Elapsed. The time I most remember is one I cannot forget.
We were sitting there and as I reached across three shoulders To grab a fresh Samuel Adams from Gordie it seemed as though Even that wretched Billy Joel song clamped itself shut and...
It was always burning since the world's been turning. We didn't start the fire No We didn't light it but we tried to fight it.
And David said, “You know, nothing has been the same since We learned to talk,” and instantly I was dizzy with a feeling Neanderthal and prophetic. And I recalled how goddamn...
1953 Joseph Stalin, Malenkov, Nasser and Prokofiev Rockefeller, Campanella, Communist Bloc. 1954 Roy Cohn Juan Peron, Toscanini, Dacron…
How goddamn difficult, how difficult it was to tie this tie Around my neck tonight, before I came here. Before. Long Before I met with my friends.
when I was a kid it would rain and earthworms would come from somewhere and be everywhere. by the thousands at the drains, my sister and I would run as the rainbow came out to the curbs and gather them, worms for the helpless taking.
in our hands, a living spaghetti of fun would coil and fret, as we laughed, kneeling. no conquering knight proud of plunder ever rejoiced as we did after a thunder. and I wonder, I will tell you what it is I wonder. I ask where have the worms gone.
tonight I walked home in a downpour and I felt my entire childhood a farce, a false history. there are no worms in the curbs, drifting anywhere and no one running. sadder still, if worms in squiggly mountains squirmed, even I would keep walking.
For eighty feet or so we are together, mere seconds. She hobbles in, cute as a sheep, and I smile. Her gnarled finger illuminates the “L” on the panel. Our eyes meet, and “venerable” unbidden springs. I sip at my coffee, glancing at her silver slippers. …From here to the moon those feet have walked.
The door opens and a clink of keys breaks my reverie. Ahh! She is going to check her mail, a wink as we part. In that final descent to the parking garage, I move to Where she stood, and breathe in six distinct thoughts Of my own grandmother. Scenes, words, stories. As I walk to my car, several more arrive… memories. And three questions, as I drive to work bug me. What is that smell? What is that the smell of? What is that smell called?
