Thursday night. Thursday night. Thursday

night.

“come on, let’s find something to do…”

no return address

I am perishable and that’s the best

part

as the snail crawls slowly under

the leaf,

as the lady in the cafe

laughs an ugly laugh,

as France burns in purple

twilight.

I am perishable

and good for that

as the horse kicks a slat out of the

barn,

as we hurry toward

paradise,

I am perishable enough.

place the empty shoes beneath the

bed

side by side.

as the dog howls

the last frog puffs and

jumps.

yes sirree!

all our neighbors think that

we are

weird.

and we think that they

are.

and we’re all

on

target.

snapshot(1985)

flailing away at infinity

the tiny winged night bug

on its back

under the desk lamp

kicks and struggles with

thread legs

under the heat of the

light

as in the corner of the

room

my fat yellow cat

lifts his left leg

high

and licks his precious

parts

as in the harbor now

a boat suddenly looses

a horn sound

the cat stiffens, stops

licking

the bug becomes

motionless

then,

both at once,

they return to their

former

divertissements.

finished?

the critics now have me

drinking champagne and

driving a BMW

and also married to a

socialite from

Philadelphia’s Main Line

which of course

is going to prevent me

from writing my earthy

and grubby stuff.

and they might be

right,

I could be getting to be

more like them,

and that’s as close to

death as you can

get.

we’ll see.

but don’t bury me yet.

don’t worry if I drink with

Sean Penn.

just measure the poems

as they come off the

keyboard.

listen only to them.

after this long fight

I have no intention of

quitting short.

or late.

or satisfied.

the voice of Chinaski

modern composers are writing pieces using

the voice of the whale—

working it into

music.

the whale has a feeding ground of twenty

square miles

which he patrols and uses

alone

until the time comes when he starts

calling for his

mate—

then this voice is sent trumpeting through the

water

those waters of used tires and inner

tubes, old blankets and piano wire

discarded test tubes and burnt-out Spanish

bullfighters.

get lonely get

horny.

we’re all caught

the same:

goldfish

dove

dog

tiger.

sometimes even mountains

move

boil out in

flame.

you have me

and the nuns and the monks have

God.

quotable

she is an old woman

now

still quite beautiful

she has known many

famous

men.

we are sitting in a Mexican cafe

and she tells me,

“Hemingway was an amazing

man, he’d sit and

make these off-hand remarks,

one after another, these

astonishing truthful statements…”

I like that.

but I have nothing to

say.

well, I do.

I tell her: “the red

sauce in the little bowl

is very hot so

don’t use it unless you

like that sort of