truth is a beatnik/snapping/that these tortured days are/nothing more/than training for/growing up - cheyenne gallion

AT THE EDGE OF HISTORY

I am not really here nor
will I be,

but nonetheless

a bum arrives out of
the thin rain

pushing a shopping cart
jammed with abandoned treasures,

old newspapers, broken idols,
the pale, upturned faces of empties,

and when I lay down
in the afternoon,

suffering from an unspecified
heartache,

I can feel through the floor
of all fifty states

the sobbing of an orphan engine.

- howie good

(added 05.15.08)

Into the night

Waking up from a contortionist sleep
I find myself hanging.
Grime is tucked into the crevices,
folds in my brain and I cannot run.
See, sleep is when they come at me most
supposedly a time for healing,
it is vulnerable and dark.
Into my bed crawl a knapsack of memories,
some I still can't take out during daylight.
Waking up over and over,
I swim toward the light
only to find I am treading under a frozen pond.
Drowning and pleading
water fills my mouth to silence me.
Rising, my palms meet the underbelly of ice.
It is cloudy translucent
clear enough to see freedom
too thick to break on my own
fists flailing -- I need air.
A huge gulp of freshness to pour oxygen into capillaries
resuscitate me...pound on my chest...wake me up
break these thick layers.
Like a tree's rings, I count the big circular timetable
until they blur, overlapping.
Dribbling the last bubbles of air
they rise to the solidity above and float along it's slickness,
looking for their own escape.
This knapsack is heavy weight,
I wear it like a second skin
or maybe it is the skeleton I was built on.

- jasper stone

(added 05.14.08)

the iron worker

leaning against his truck
smoking a cigarette
waiting on material
for the new office space
one building over

as two stories above
i drink coffee
mixed with crown
and work my way
through schopenhauer's
madness.

the secret of blue collar work
few realize
and even fewer appreciate
is that your body might be
subjugated to machine
but you get to keep your
mind:

your hands might be
torquing a four-headed cap press
but upstairs
you're trying to figure
how in the hell karl marx
got socialism
from hegel

or

you might be on a hog farm
sitting backwards on a sow
draining a packet of boar semen into her cunt
while trying to
wrap your mind around
a priori knowledge.

i learned the hard way
white collar work
is nothing but
whoring out your mind
to insipidly pedantic
crossword puzzles

which

if you have more
than a lemming-compass
and base-ten blueprints
for a mind
is the equivalent
of daily bone-grafts
without anesthesia.

problem is
most of these blue collar guys
don't take advantage:

they work logic
and tiddlywinks polemics
off a handful of
crackhead premises

most of them
glass-eyed shriners
turning lifetimes
of zero-g figure eights.

this guy's cellphone
hanging from a
dale junior lanyard
and the set of
bright orange plastic testicles
dangling from the back bumper of his truck
tell me all i need to know
about which slope of the bell curve
he's nailed to.

- justin hyde

please support justin
& buy his new book...

(added 05.11.08)

mule-sheep obedient

There is no wall
That can't be assaulted
With a few maneuvers
We can rule this world
But not with emperinated tyrannies
No one man shoe with all those
Clubs for rich men
With so much money
No on even thinks they could exist
There they are right in front of you
Telling you what they are doing
Right then
Right at that moment

The Sherriff's of Nottingham
The Bif character's in Back to The Future
The Mr. [greedy] Geko
In that matter of fact Wall Street
They keep telling us how it is
We keep refusing to listen

This isn't about the politics you cling too
The church that you pay holy roller admittance at
This is about trading roles
Where once you were a leopard
Without the need to kill
Now you're a mule-sheep
You got it pretty bad
Having to carry that heavy load

All of this shit that keeps being hurled at you
All the eternal bliss
You think you will be awarded with
For your obedience
Your disobedience
Is nothing compared to this reality…

:you could in fact be free right now
:you just don't fuckin' want too

mule-sheep obedient

another…

god-damn shame...

- glen still

(added 05.10.08)

Black Angus Sushi

Ow yeah, that Black Angus Sushi bar's
Opening up down on Main Street.
Got some opening day discount coupons.
Yum, they gotta have good stuff
With a name like that and
New in town and all.
Ain't had no new eatin' place
Since the Colonel came and caused the
Two-block-long line just to get in
And get some fried chicken butt.
Yessiree, looka that menu in the window.
Fresh raw carp chunks in beef intestines.
Catfish head stuffed with herbivore tongue.
Herbivore? Must be a salad.
Bluegill fillet wrapped in skinned ear.
Mmmmm, sounds yummie.
Sounds yummie if you're a hyena.
Somehow I think I lost my appetite.
Well, I don't care if cousin Earl
And the pals he met in the asylum
Are runnin' the place.
I got my standards.
Or, is that limits?
Shoot, I'm for headin' over to Lucille's
And having some of her special
Kosher Bar-B-Q'd pork.
Earl's probably plannin' on
Lockin' the doors and
Settin' the place on fire anyway.

- daniel s. irwin

(added 05.10.08)

10 Years

You back away from me,
You sidestep me,
Turn the other cheek
Away from me,
Before I have had a chance
To speak.
Why? Because there’s
A bit too much padding
On my stomach or on my hips?
Just quit, I’m tired of it.
Through my mind flows words,
The likes of which you will never hear
From the blonde bimbos
And surgically enhanced clones that
You so continuously lust after,
And follow after,
And close your eyes and pretend
Your hand is.
10 years ago you were at my feet
Wherever they chose to tread,
When my size zero hips swayed by you
Your feet fell into step.
When I was shy, and young,
And covered my words in makeup,
Tight clothes, and your cologne.
When I didn’t know that
How you treated me corresponded
With how much you respected me,
And I didn’t see that while your eyes
And attention were open and searching
Me up and down,
Your ears and mind were closed to me.
And now, 10 years later,
10 years of learning and growing,
And birthing and yearning,
And climbing and falling,
And laughing and hurting,
And choosing:
Choosing to live by my words and mind
Not just my eyes and thighs.
Allowing my thoughts to dictate
What people think of me,
Not just the size and cut of that pair of jeans.
This is the time when you choose
To try and step back into my life?
As you stumble along your
Societal dictated path
You stutter and hesitate,
Not sure how best to take in
This me that you can’t even
Recognize.
You try to say that it’s not the right time,
That it’s better to wait.
But, wait for what?
It’s not the weight that turns you off,
Nor is it my lack of fashion sense
For fads and sexual glances,
It’s intimidation.
You don’t know what to do
With a woman
Who is secure?
With a woman
Who has something to say,
Speaks her mind,
And doesn’t back down?
You choose to run,
Heels to ass
Just as fast as your legs
Will give you flight,
Because you realize
That a woman like this
Might just possess
More balls than you
Could ever have.

- poetecho (mary mclaughlin)

(added 05.04.08)

What Gets Me

my throat is itchy
friday's drinks may have
gotten me

my throat is itchy
sunday's drinks may have
gotten me

my throat is itchy
all that talk
to get her to come home with me
may have gotten me

- ra! gabriel

(added 04.29.08)