Damn it.

I hate when this feels like an assignment to be carried out. But still, have to get the writing in.

"Presence"
There is nothing natural
about a mentos
lying on a brick path
or a pair
of brass knuckles.

But there is
so much beauty
to be had there.

From space
it is visible
what we have made
and
for all my pessimism

my "woe is me"
and anti-humanity behavior
I am glad

that our labor when trained in the right places
is one of the strongest forces you can find.
But anyway,
all politics aside,
perhaps the best example of my enjoyment of human creativity

is that
of a simple
fashion show.


"Imperial Rules"
Before his mother married him,
the boy's stepfather
used to stay up in the nights
getting drunk out of his mind
and would ramble
at him.

He'd say
all kinds
of weird shit.

And this kid
was in the tenth grade
and had barely seen
any of the world
so he would listen,
sitting on the couch,
pretending to read a book.

And the man,
Sean,
he'd say things like
"It's funny,
you know,
how lol and 1o1
look so very alike.

"Does anyone else notice
things like that?
Maybe
the only reason
that it ever occured to me
was because
those were the only classes
that I'd go to stoned
and still get Bs in.
So you know,
I associate them
with laughter."

Or
sometimes
he'd rant about his father

or his brother--
some scary New York
Neiman Marcus
suit of a man.

And this one time,
he said something
that the boy would recall
as far into the future
as his own wedding date--
actually told his wife about it,
that night in bed--
this guy said,

"Hey
I get it.
We aren't friends.
You know,
I think this is supposed to be
the hardest relationship
people ever have.
And you're never going to
really like me as a person or anything,
it's not Freudian distate
it's just we have no need for each other.

"And I understand,
but you know,
you just have to
deal with it,
because I'm sleeping with your mother
and I think I make her happy.
So

"rock'n'roll."


"pi"
numerology
has its appeal
even when you are taking
classes in statistics
and writing ugly poetry
to spite plato's
mathematical beauty

It's not hard
these days
when watching
a computer
spit out a never ending stream
of digits
from that neverending decimal

for the young man
who feels too much like an old man
to stroke his beard
and feel like Pythagoras.


"Reunion"
Sam talks to Brad
who's coming into town
for their 10 year
high school reunion
and she talks him into
staying in her house
while he's home

which is odd
because
they never really got along
back in the old days
or at least that's what
he remembers--
a girl who absolutely hated him

and beat him up
pulled his hair,
embarrassed him--
they went to school together
for something like
13 years
and he could not think of one good thing that she had ever said about him.

Sociologists look for patterns
and they try to distinguish things like gender
but science should be a self-destroying mechanism
because just as every action has an equal and opposite reaction
so does every theory have a counterexample.
Here's one--
the tomboy that never really let herself know that she liked you.