Hawaiian Shirts in the Electric Chair
to prove
that you are still free
Putting the Art
back in k-mart
when we were young
rocks
were the thing
to throw.
it taught me
a lot about
glass.
(sand and soda)
sometimes
the rocks
would sail through, nice
and clean, and only
a small
hole, the size
of a golf ball, or
baseball, was made, like
bullets spraying
across a stone
wall. other times
the glass
would shatter
off in
huge chunks, like
countries falling from
a map, and hit the floor -
it made the sound of
a wave crashing
on a
dirty beach.
i guess the more
chemicals, the shittier
the glass
car windows
were my favorite, especially
the windshield. we
dropped boulders from
trees, we
put rocks
into
potato guns,
we even
ran and cannonballed,
but the windshield
never broke
open, and
nothing
ever got through.
instead
these beautiful designs
formed, rings over water, a
thawing pond,
a map of the galaxy.
and after
we were
sweaty
and bleeding
we’d look at our abstraction.
turned a used car lot
into a modern art gallery
sometimes
we took pictures
in high school, they made
us take
art class. we
learned a lot
about
the old masters, and
they were good
but
there always seemed to be
some element
missing.
the mad flash
the knife or the canvas
it never got through.
THE ASSIGNMENT
was to be creative “you
can do anything
that inspires you”
so
we got canvas
and threw paint
and pissed
on it
dumped our burning cigarettes
someone even
jerked off on it
but
it was still lame
and nothing to be proud of
we took mushrooms
to get deeper, and
like mushrooms usually do,
we went out
into
the woods.
i only
remember spiderwebs,
big webs,
lactating
silk
like pure
fresh squeezed milk.
they were so lush
i wanted to eat them.
so i did
i woke up in a hospital two days later
with a fever,
delirious,
and covered in
huge
red bites.
no memory,
but they told me
i had said, “the
webs look
just like
broken glass”
my friends were inspired.
after they called
an ambulance they went
to smash a car
window, and bring the
windshield in
for our
“inspiration project”
but we weren’t
nine anymore-
too much taco bell
and cigarettes
will cut “fleeing the scene”
to “complying
with the law”
very quickly.
everyone who didn’t
go to the hospital that night
went to jail
our teacher was fired
the next monday. Her
replacement had
a psych degree and
we spent the
rest of the year
gluing
pasta together.
we were all safe after that
but none of us
went on
to make something
anybody would ever stop and look at
Stony Hill
the neighbors used to call the cops on us
at least
two times a week,
the other five
were the days
that we quit drinking.
I was only happy when I was with her
we only drank
when we were together
sometimes
I needed to work
sometimes
she needed to paint
I remember those days
sitting in the back of a white van
driving from Long Island City to Wall St.
-carrying ladders and curtains
down alleys
to service elevators,
watching for the sun
to do its’ revolution over the
Empire State building
drowning itself
in the Hudson
finally allowing
me
to drive turnpikes
and parkways
to get home
to her.
she’d wake up at five
or six,
from october to april
I don’t think she ever saw
the sun.
we stole cat food so we had money for weed
we didn’t eat because of the cocaine
but I kept working
and she kept sleeping
my parents wanted to know why she didn’t get a job?
how could I explain the obvious?
she was too beautiful for work
for orders
for discipline.
and for a girl who knows this
there’s no such thing as enough
my back hurt all the time from the grind
my face hurt all the time from her fists
I’ll never live with a puerto rican again
when she got bored she left
when she got angry she hit
we fought hard
we’d make up hard
the neighbors called the law for both
each would leave me
bleeding
and bruised.
and when the cops showed up
it was hard to explain,
that I was actually having the best time of my life
From Here to LA
we drove from here to LA
in total silence
because Ace Enders,
said we should.
of course he talked
for hours,
actually he just screamed
and he did it for hours,
into a cell phone
as he paced around the trailer
in the parking lot of every gas station
from here to LA
he wrote his best songs at his worst.
after the phone calls
with his soul mate,
the women never understand
the artist,
but if she didn’t tear him apart
he never would’ve written those songs
and I wouldn’t have fallen asleep e
ach night
listening to him pick the guitar strings
and singing about the love he would see
when we finally sold enough merch
to fly her
from there to LA
his hair grew long
(he was the converse wearing allstar)
he grew out his beard
(mad whiskers on a mad dog)
somewhere between Wind Gap and Winnemucca
we became a tribe,
and Ace
wore the feathered headdress.
it was never spoken of,
never decided,
but he was the man for that place
and time,
and the other bands knew it too.
we weren’t the headliners
and we didn’t draw the biggest crowds,
but the other bands hushed
when Ace walked into the room,
we all knew we were treading
with a real songwriter.
but HE DIDN’T KNOW IT,
would never accept it,
and I watched him go mad
trying to write
The Book of Love,
and recite it every night
to the girl on the cell phone.
in every parking lot
every gas station
every motel
from here to LA
half the band watched
the karate kid on repeat,
the rest of us read road novels
and listened to Wilco,
but not Ace!
he just stared
and occasionally would jump up and scream
until his face got hot and red
and then he’d quiet down
and start staring again.
in portland
Ace and I jockeyed across the city
to find a post office.
the mental institution had just run our of funds
and all the crazies were living on the streets,
one grabbed Ace’s shirt
and like a zoo animal does when you catch it staring at you,
he looked right into Ace’s soul,
and said, “I know what you did.”
I knew
that he knew
whatever it was,
no matter how nuts the bum was,
that he really knew
what Ace had done,
even if I didn’t know Ace had ever done anything.
Ace asked me if I thought the bum knew?
I didn’t ask what he had done, but said that the bum probably did,
but Ace liked attention,
and asked everyone this question
from there to LA
they called him a mad genius
they called him a crazy artist
they called him a possessed songwriter
I’m not really sure of any of those things,
because it took a woman to make him crazy
and a country to drive him insane,
but on monday most people still have to get up and
go to work.
I do know that all it takes to make a beautiful brain crumble,
is a woman
pushing the ‘ignore’ button
on the other end of the cell phone.
and it can happen in less time
then it takes,
to drive from here to LA
a girl from
Greenwich village
it’s about
time
i came over,
before the plane
disappeared
and the bombs
dropped
and the dog parks
emptied with
fresh coats
falling over soiled snow.
everyone
following single
file over
the cliff.
but we
don’t have
to.
you’ve
got the book of
love now, i
left
it
on your
coffee table
blank of
opinion. there’s
a pen
on the floor
use it,
i won’t walk away.
use it,
while the thought
of me
still exorcises
the loneliness in you.
fill those pages
now,
you will
when
the yellow birds
fly away,
but i want you to remember me
like this,
carrying you over
the garbage piles
on thompson st
frozen
over
like igloos
for
the
rats
it’s about time
i
came over,
for coffee at
midnight
for
sunrise bedtime.
remember me
spilling
wine
ducking pigeons
on your stoop.
you’ve
got the pen,
use it,
you saved
me from
that place
i go all
the time
but barely
mention.
i thought it would
be a book deal,
or a better job
or a good song.
but
it never is.
just a look
from
the girl
who was
never broken by the world.
a runny nose
and an underserved smile
was all it took
to escape the firing squad
of my mind
Mick and Keith pt. I
i hated gallery openings.
there
were usually a few
girls, sure,
but they were
“artists
waiting
for inspiration”
so,
while
waiting for whatever
divine intervention
comes
to paint people’s canvases
for them,
the girls brought
the cocaine
and they lay
on their
backs
pretty easy.
she came to me
once, my first
gallery opening
and said, “i know
you’re going
to break
my heart”.
she
hadn’t
cut her bangs
yet (though she would)
and she hadn’t
shed her winter fat
(though she would)
but i kissed her anyway
because
i’m easy
and i understand
why women leave
bars with men
who look
like
they were
born old
and never been boys
in love.
it’s the same reason
i kissed her,
she gave me
something.
i just needed
to feel that i mattered
that night
and i knew
i mattered
to her
it felt
like
high school.
they were all
against us
and we
were winning.
she’d make m
e write.
her desk was
filled with ashtrays
and coke lines
and photography
books.
i’d write
a paragraph
and she would shriek
and the dog would jump
on its back legs
and they would dance
around me.
it was never morning.
she could spin
the moon so
the night
lasted forever.
an entire winter
of cocaine
and a spanish beauty
and a dog.
i never had
any money
but she didn’t care.
she kept cooking
kept supplying
and i kept promising
that
someday when
i made it
all the dedications
would be hers.
the artists all
loved her.
no one had any
money
and we all
needed
booze
and drugs
and love
and she gave it,
never
asked for any in return.
the spoils
were mainly for
me
and i’d promise her
things
but never stopped taking.
and one night
she cried and
begged me
to
never leave her alone.
and of course,
i said
ok.
but we never
robbed
the bank
together.
and we didn’t
steal the car
and drive
to california.
she needed
a life
that was hers.
it was the first time
i saw
fear in her
eyes.
our scene couldn’t operate
without her
but the world
could
live
without
our scene
i’d tell
her someday
the readers would
know what
she did.
at our worst
she held us
like the mother
most were
missing.
and then
one
day
i left
and i
didn’t think
much of
what her life
would be
without me
because
i never thought
much
of myself.
now it’s
all i
think
about.
what
a promise
means. she
made the world
a better place,
maybe two
people
in history
could
say that.
and
there’s the
last night,
when i
said, “fuck you”
and left.
there’s still
a lot of night
still dogs
still blow
but
air and water signs
they’ve
never been
so
separate.
it doesn’t
feel like
high school
now.
they’re still
against us
but
that’s
no
victory
anymore.
i watched
her
dance the
fado
and drink
the sad wine.
but people
can’t just
let go
and
that was something
we were
worse at.
we fixed our
hearts
but they
broke
just as
easy,
left in poems
and pictures
for our
children
to think
we lived happy
lives.
i