Something About Soul (for Alice Coltrane)

It hangs^
The way they spoke of her hair
some 20 odd years long,
still not yet stale.

I heard she was a mad woman
in that cool, blue-thang kinda way.

I've heard of her husband...
She does not care

Or would not, I don't know her.

Oh, and I heard she was from Detroit.
Now that I believe

... Woodward in the low, fickle winter sun
Not ash,
Or burgundy,
smoke from burning houses where the help don't come
or chartreuse-

In harmony with all that jive,
but funny She don't sound like It.

They told me she played church music,
Reel religiouslike
simple understanding,
"grace"

Tran(sc)e-ndence

But the explanation,
where words fail to
form tones of celestial divinity
bound by cycle-
hangs.

I heard
She was gifted in her own right.
Found a way to-
give off light,
I cried to myself
choking down coffee and cold hashbrowns.

... And believed again,
the idea that

the Prodigal son had a mother.

And of-
warm blacktop daze
in our cars
in church parkinglots-

... And not quite 20 years ago I was put back into that cold water.
And didn't they know that I thought that was weird?!

.

..

....
..........
..................

-... .- .--. - .. ... -- / .. ... / .-- . .. .-. -..


 ...?

.

They don't really care what I think either.
~ That's what they tell me anyway,

I heard she was crazy.

911 Wealthy

The taste of water,
or,
the color behind
when eyes closed

The scent of a
cluttered home
A place we rent quiet

Emotional traumas,
or,
lived-in fabrications of
Love

A locked box
with contents known
of angles and tones

Slap back ping pong,
or,
earth life indoors
tended as a ruler

Burned as sage
in the ceremony
in vulgar pottery

Drunk; 31 + 1 (Handwriting is important)

I know you won't come to the door
-when
-when I'm frum
-when I'm fumbl for my keys
                fumbelin
               (fumbeling)
            (losing sight of)

If you're hung over

("Be my little Baby")
              -the Ronettes













I don't mind.
Sleep n as long as you like

I
   will make you mashed potateoes

And not think too much about it

And cry because I'm happy


-and the snow plow outside
grinding deep


The investments I made in myself
-payin' off

It's embarrassingly hard to cope with
   Knowing you with


Tears on my Grandfather's shirt                
                                           shirt
                                       sweater

Intune with the Bar

The godless find Salvation
     in community outside of dogma
In things they put faith in
and take for granted
-find time to leave
create New Years Resolutions 'round
and borrow pens and napkins for
Intimate books in a tome
understood the same way
as Holy.

Summer Dust #2

Slow glow-ed, Summer dust, heavy loads
on the horizon;
Shaky
I sat in tall field grass, dry dry heat in blades,
in a season-worn, stomp-flattened church park;
Lutheran.
Thinking on heat and sin, sub-suburban housing developments where sad girls play ugly music and wonder about sex.

Golden, Black, Blue-green and iridescent insects hum,
zzzzzseeeether and ClicK in open cycle- harmony, dis, and back-
eat and fuck and don't think too much about either.

Smelling phantom spring, long'go baked- Slow
cooked with potatoes, cabbage, garlic, rosemary and petrichor.

"... and how distant the past feels," I felt.
".... how mythical the inventions,"
"..... how unrivaled the events, how beautiful the snow flake formations," fleeting.


and I sat, Shaking, ready to vomit,
in the church park.
Feeling cheated and grateful,
feeling like a child.
Breathing hot air, I Threw my shoes as far as I could
and thought of the worse word I could speak,
Then I grew up.

Seney

The ____ ____ is coming!
(buzz)-(buzz)-(buzz)-ing-
in a lane, off the highway-
a shotgun blast,
slowed down and stretched out.
Bone-shaking, death rattle,
making Big Gus proud.
Slicing through timber (
with the timbre of the
twentieth century)
in one long,
slow,
moan...
sending its howl to the sky,
circling the vultures;
a pale horse,
on a pale horizon
whose sword is
the after-thought of fire...
sending its growl
mind-bending distances.
Never stopping, never stopping (
growing thin, but still persisting)
, dispersing like smoke from a joint
in a grey/white landscape
now stained with red.

Teenage Smog

I know you
like every raindrop on my street
like state lines I've ne'er breached
like a careless suburban childhood
where the sun always goes down too early
and night brings the heavy weight of maturity and crickets
carefully sanctioned by back yard camping trips
basking in the light from a neighbor's kitchen window
Like something too big to be seen
like how a bat finds a moth
by manipulating dimensions,
something I've yet to learn.