It must have been the summer of seventh grade
when I saw my first Zefirelli film.
I dreamt of the day
that I would finally be thirteen
and able to die for the love
of that smoking hot Leonard Whiting,
scorning all the Don Johnson wannabees
back to their camaros.
The thought still haunts me,
even as youth fades
and I relish the saltiness of time.
But Romeos eventually turn to Benedicks,
who finally know how to use
their tongues to win a woman.
From Howl by Allen Ginsberg
“Holy! Holy! Holy! Holy! Holy! Holy! Holy! Holy! Holy!
Holy! Holy! Holy! Holy! Holy! Holy!
The world is holy! The soul is holy! The skin is holy!
The nose is holy! The tongue and cock and hand
and asshole holy!
Everything is holy! everybody’s holy! everywhere is
holy! everyday is in eternity! Everyman’s an
angel!
The bum’s as holy as the seraphim! the madman is
holy as you my soul are holy!
The typewriter is holy the poem is holy the voice is
holy the hearers are holy the ecstasy is holy!
Holy Peter holy Allen holy Solomon holy Lucien holy
Kerouac holy Huncke holy Burroughs holy Cas-
sady holy the unknown buggered and suffering
beggars holy the hideous human angels!
Holy my mother in the insane asylum! Holy the cocks
of the grandfathers of Kansas!
Holy the groaning saxophone! Holy the bop
apocalypse! Holy the jazzbands marijuana
hipsters peace & junk & drums!
Holy the solitudes of skyscrapers and pavements! Holy
the cafeterias filled with the millions! Holy the
mysterious rivers of tears under the streets!
Holy the lone juggernaut! Holy the vast lamb of the
middle class! Holy the crazy shepherds of rebell-
ion! Who digs Los Angeles IS Los Angeles!
Holy New York Holy San Francisco Holy Peoria &
Seattle Holy Paris Holy Tangiers Holy Moscow
Holy Istanbul!
Holy time in eternity holy eternity in time holy the
clocks in space holy the fourth dimension holy
the fifth International holy the Angel in Moloch!
Holy the sea holy the desert holy the railroad holy the
locomotive holy the visions holy the hallucina-
tions holy the miracles holy the eyeball holy the
abyss!
Holy forgiveness! mercy! charity! faith! Holy! Ours!
bodies! suffering! magnanimity!
Holy the supernatural extra brilliant intelligent
kindness of the soul!”
Why should we write, anyway?
The world isn’t listening
to discourse about anything
that makes people rise up
out of their home theaters
and scratch their heads
or open their minds,
snapping them out of the
media anesthesia where there are skins
burning off of children in Syria
but so and so was a first round draft pick
and there’s a sale at Target
on the beer that everyone likes
because bravery is forged
behind auto glass and a horn
when people go too slow
on the commute to that safe suburb
where the brown people are moving in,
but they’re not like the Indians in the call
center because they have money enough
to buy the stucco palace
with the manicured lawn
that looks just like all the others.
a sea of spanish tile
and satellite dishes. Camelot.
And it’s only good to get angry
at the tv and the people
on it because talking about
anything except what’s out on netflix
might mean there would need to be
an expense of actual energy
or understanding of how this entire world works
or even, goddess forbid,
some idea of what has happened before
from the lore tellers of history
and literature.
Ignored, unprioritized,
turning to ashes in the libraries.
So what’s the point of writing?
Is it now reduced to the ceaseless optimism,
like the Arecibo message,
hoping that another being
with at least one small urge to fight
the culture of rampant, ignorant
consumerism and try to
make one thing better for someone?
someone we might never meet?
Or should I just toss the journals in the landfill
on my way to the sale
at Target for the next
Hallmark Holiday?
no wonder ghosts are most often female
we are agitated so easily,
up in the night, wondering if there is enough
lunch in the fridge for the next school day,
are the favorite shorts washed,
could I have said that such-and-such
a different way?
Foreshadowing my own death,
I could see my neurosis
willing me from beyond the grave
to tell my daughter to brush her teeth
or it was the loose handrail
that killed me.
And to fix it already.
The pursuit of love seems too often
mistakenly centered on the earthly connections:
the endless catalogs of posed candid shots
in online dating apps,
even the earthly sensations of
gripping flesh, the smell of fresh hair,
the humid wind of your lover’s breath,
melting the hairs on your neck.
Perhaps earthly bodies forget
the magic involved
unless they recall wishing on a star
to make the right match.
Love can be a physical reaction,
detected from the senses,
and truly, quite delicious.
It’s deepest ocean, however, is
the hidden intimacy,
which only exists
in an other-worldly plane,
a dreamtime,
a place
where even shadows are
celebrated,
illuminated,
and the beautiful
truth of togetherness
binds us closer
than even touch
can.
why live in regret,
stewing in the juices
emitted by your
past lives, rotten
on the ground,
when you can just
draft a new ending,
you dumb, stuck writer?
It’s really all we can do
to affect this
backwards, heartbroken planet.
But writing will change things,
so write we must.
to finally get the ending
we all deserve.
much of the energy
spent later in life
has been to eliminate
the presence of other people
in my day
all together.
Since I was a child,
I’ve dovoured stories of
great men who leave
the world behind to
achieve enlightenment in a
Himalayan cave,
or maybe I would just rest for a bit,
exhausted from all this contact
with other humans.
The trouble with disconnection,
though, is
that no matter how tightly
the shades are drawn
in home, in life,
no matter how aggressively
the actions to remove
oneself from the chaos of
people,
there is one truth that
transcends everything.
We are all still connected.
through the curtains
across enemy lines
to those children jumping
on the restaurant tables.
We are all connected.
From the earth as
our solid foundation,
to the trees that
whisper into our lungs,
to the stars
that show the paths,
the dots we can travel
to arrive at one another.
