Either peace or happiness,
let it enfold you
when I was a young man
I felt these things were
dumb, unsophisticated.
I had bad blood, a twisted
mind, a precarious
upbringing.
......
I wish you were here, dear,
I wish you were here.
I wish you sat on the sofa
and I sat near.
The handkerchief could be yours,
the tear could be mine, chin-bound.
Though it could be, of course,
the other way around.
I wish you were here, dear,
......
Ye in the age gone by,
Who ruled the world--a world how lovely then!--
And guided still the steps of happy men
In the light leading-strings of careless joy!
Ah, flourished then your service of delight!
How different, oh, how different, in the day
When thy sweet fanes with many a wreath were bright,
O Venus Amathusia!
Then, through a veil of dreams
......
I was hoping to be happy by seventeen.
School was a sharp check mark in the roll book,
An obnoxious tuba playing at noon because our team
Was going to win at night. The teachers were
Too close to dying to understand. The hallways
Stank of poor grades and unwashed hair. Thus,
A friend and I sat watching the water on Saturday,
Neither of us talking much, just warming ourselves
By hurling large rocks at the dusty ground
And feeling awful because San Francisco was a postcard
......
Cruising these residential Sunday
streets in dry August sunlight:
what offends us is
the sanities:
the houses in pedantic rows, the planted
sanitary trees, assert
levelness of surface like a rebuke
to the dent in our car door.
No shouting here, or
shatter of glass; nothing more abrupt
......
I was a classic 1957 Chevrolet Bel-Air, in mint condition, admiral and white.
My owner had other beautiful, classic cars, like stars sparkling into twilight.
My owner loved his old cars, saying 'they don't make them like they used to;'
And I enjoyed getting out upon the open road, to show him what I could do.
My fellow cars and I saw lots of sunny days, in bliss freedom of the flowers,
Traveling the length and breadth of this land, in the clasp of jeweled hours.
Flighty friends and I recalled 'good old days,' in rosy sunset times of finally,
......
I was bragging to my friend Hadleigh that I slept with a model
named Jesse. As I drove back home, the insurance
company called, telling me I was an uninsured motorist.
It didn’t surprise me, for I had pledged
to stop using insurance, believing it a scam designed
by Sam. Although, this was only the first in the series
of events that night. It was late October — the start of the World Series.
On the radio, Hendrick’s Autos flaunted their makes and models.
Dusk danced across the sky, decaying, as if it were a prismatic design
......
You've designed a new electric car and it's being built on the assembly line.
You've been pestering me to buy one but I never will, one of your cars will never be mine.
You want me to buy one but I'm going to pass.
Your car sucks and you can shove it up your ass.
It takes fourteen hours to charge it and it can only be driven for thirty minutes.
Your car is a joke and when it comes to one of them, you'll never see me in it.
If I couldn't design a better car than yours, I'd give up and quit.
I will never buy one of your cars because they are pieces of shit.
We are apart; the city grows quiet between us,
She hushes herself, for midnight makes heavy her eyes,
The tangle of traffic is ended, the cars are empty,
Five streets divide us, and on them the moonlight lies.
Oh are you asleep, or lying awake, my lover?
Open your dreams to my love and your heart to my words.
I send you my thoughts--the air between us is laden,
My thoughts fly in at your window, a flock of wild birds.
Fields beneath a quilt of snow
From which the rocks and stubble sleep,
And in the west a shy white star
That shivers as it wakes from deep.
The restless rumble of the train,
The drowsy people in the car,
Steel blue twilight in the world,
And in my heart a timid star.