then i go deaf from this

fucking head trip thing i got
my grandfather, he was also
super deaf/super duper hearing-
aide deaf

now

Now i can’t hear the numbers
people’s kids are all shot up in
the desert
they only dream this empty sand
trap
and
say the names

and there i was

alone

in my head

going deaf

afraid

i wouldn’t be able to hit the notes
and

i would forget the numbers
and

all these people were dying

all shot up

my lover asleep

ready to let me slip away

across the ocean

all pilled up

i got so lucky

i even got kinda

religious about it

Blitzed

all

numb

My God

Ok, Wow

OK, Wow

i allow myself the invitation,
i surround the door,
ill at ease,
maybe—but draped—still
foolishly,
eh
i have a wiry shape…

his
my grandfather’s
and possibly wolves i dunno age…

things growing…

backaches
and oh wow
ow
“that hurts”

but
“this feels fine”

certainly
well, “doesn’t it

always
something?”

all these things match
the way
i have to always wear a watch
because
it’s right to enjoy the race
morning turning day
for someday
we will meet inside the gates
because
there is nothing left to do
but not be late
and
we all learn from our mistakes
like it or not
ugh,
ouch
and
well,
ok, w o w

I Am Standing on This Beach

I Am Standing on This Beach

i am on this fucking beach.

noisy noisy waves…blast, blast in my face
so loud—
pigeons,
sea spray,
the second crash comes after the first
like a wave—it binds though, so binds
itself to the rot of the beach; a “fuckoff”

almost to the tide… washing garbage on dirty sand-like-sand,
colors—electric blue, with candy wrappers and condoms
and shells/plus some breeze that comes,
goes, comes, goes, oblivious to tempo or
nature even
a beach, on the fucking endless beach
where
that goddamn sun
rises and falls like
a loud boss; like a
nightmare; restart
machine-ball hot
like a nuclear stop
watch

….i watch it.

watch it…….

break into the fall of lines sized for angels and ancient gods or
mountains
—born there,
and…

no matter how it sounds,
crass and underhanded,
inside any man,
fought off or not,
it’s just
it’s just this…

a woman can be a junk ship, wooden,
patched red sail here and there like
flying over singapore thru that fog
ever there—hiding it…..her/us/me/it
her/me/us/it/fog—
fog—like singapore fog
we are hiding.

sad
sad
sad
(always—then—
like magic—whammo—descend and out the window—there it
is—
beautiful and
not in any time—not decade-era fixed—
“totally” non-american—past/present—

all functioning at once—…………………..

with harbors—junk ships—and my, my
god, my god….

all lit with skyscraper xmas lights—
lit peaks and nighttime valleyhouses
a fortress of woven wooden trunks
of trees—blinded by mad mad mad
beauty)…..

mad beauty…..

and a man is a tug, mechanical and
plastic; hard-lining sunken; work’d
manhands broken nails chalked palms
boxer-sized
bed-ready—
the kind that fix ropes round boxes
if they had to
with an elephant cargo—before they
were even a child—past sails, deaths, things drunk……ugh,,,,,,,
drunken…worse—beyond youth more
“curse of youth”

all that shit