They look at you, you look at them, they look at me, I look at you, you look at me, we look at them a few billion times. The world? I realize there’s nothing else like it: someone someone knows always somewhere unexpected, infinite varieties of bad poems and plant life. Inanimate subjects, subliminal as line breaks. One thing follows another. Me? I know sirens are especially bad news when they come for you. I know you can trade money for anything but money, but have you seen those flat screen digital televisions that cost more than a gold plated crack pipe? (I was going to say There will always be laughter, but then I’d have to explain.) I crawled out dumb as a rock and webbed like you. Wedded to catchphrases and conspiring factors. Mortal and fairly ugly sometimes, though sometimes not. But lately, Friend, when you and I are together, I feel more solitude than I do alone.

UPRIGHT BLUES

I. New Orleans Piano Genius

He knows the name of every street
in Vaudeville.
A brown boy’s legs
bend on the steps
of a red house like his fingers
on slats of light
& black keys. A thumbnail-
moon rests
on the flag. A crocodile
pulls out of the swamp:
suitcase of fire-
water & a train-
ticket to Birdland.
One of Ringo’s
henchmen will unscrew his eye.
From the wig of a live oak,
a star will shake free.
The anthem of New Orleans.
Napoleon’s sword
on a backdrop of blue feathers.
Stalks of sugar cane.
Pride black
as a preacher’s robe.
He is ready to sing
Sweet Chariot
in his father’s company.
White gloves,
the hands
covered wagons moving
into the valley.
Hump-backed,
crooked-letter vein.
He knows
sometimes evil can ransom
a good man.
He knows the name
of every street in Vaudeville.
His fingers
rest on the knob
of the door to a red house.
& the black star tattooed
on the white boy’s waist,
the flesh
of a halved moon opens
his mouth,
his fingers on slats of light,
black keys.

II. Gonzo’s Blue Dream

When these knuckles climbed
the keyboard’s edge to the moon,

they were my blues. I had a little song
for the departing day. I was a stray

rooster-throated, bellowing hole.
I was a slim penny-colored skin.

A bank of two-sided wounds
in phenomenal light. I had a little song

for the departing night. I transformed
& was transformed by pleasure.

I was damn near invisible
like ice cubes fading into light.

Friends, I want you
to never have a song for death.

Once in the arms of a stranger
at the hour the paperboy wakes,

I asked God to give me a different life.

III. Papa Was a Rascal

“You know my papa was a preacher, & a lover too . . .”

Mister Scripture, Mister 6ft,
Patent leather shoe.
Cuff-link, velvet robe,

& the booze
& the singed fingers,
Why can’t I be a rascal too?

Your Cadillac,
Your jubilant chorus,
Your ribs of polished pews.

& the strand of hair,
Soft as a silk rose,
& the stains