Poem of the Day 03.31.23

prisoners

dear becky in 2M,

yes, i received the note that you left on my door
inquiring about why i continue to pound on my
ceiling i.e. your floor. call me crazy, becks, but
i’m just not a big fan of rap music blasting down
on me while i’m sitting in the quiet of my living
room contemplating all of this madness. my wife
and i simply aren’t fans of hearing THUMP, THUMP,
THUMP while we’re trying to have dinner or read,
as we continue to try and keep ourselves safe and alive.
we must seem dull to you, but the truth of the matter
is we’re all stuck here together. prisoners, for lack
of a better word. i don’t like it any more than you do.
there are art museums and a little japanese noodle place
that i miss on 4th street. instead i had to trade them
for masks and hand sanitizer and staring at walls.
it’s hard to stare at walls when someone is blasting
music down on you. maybe you’d understand if
you were older. apartments must be more like dorm
rooms when you’re only twenty-four and daddy is
paying the rent. it must be a real drag having some
fat old fuck pounding on your floor while you and
the boyfriend are trying to get your groove on. it’s
a real drag being a fat old fuck, too. especially one
who didn’t come from wealth or go to a private college
and has to pay his own debt. we do as we must, becky.
but, going forward, how about we make a deal?
you keep your music to your apartment and i won’t
sit down here stewing in vodka and anger until i
lash out in a rage. we’ll both keep trying to be
better neighbors. kinder and gentler to each other
and this collective trauma we’re all experiencing.
how does that sound, becky? does that sound fair?
because if it doesn’t, i just want to let you and that
cool boyfriend of yours know, that i’m up every
morning at 4:45 a.m. (a hazard of getting old) and
it would be a shame to have to grab that broom handle
and wake you two assholes up with me,
each and every single day.

yours truly,
john in 1M

03.15.21

Poem of the Day 03.30.23

nine innings

in between
the car ads

the erectile disfunction ones
and the ads

for colon cancer

two teams manage
to play nine innings

while i sit
on the couch

drinking vodka and beer

daydreaming
i’m a billionaire

at home

on a
sick day
from work.

09.20.21

Poem of the Day 03.22.23

the howling

a crazed man is howling
is the restroom
behind my office
the sound is guttural
like the dogs barking
outside my window
the man is howling
screaming
smacking his head off the wall
the thump
thump
thump
is rhythmic
i beat along to it
with my palms on my desk
the tribal noises
of mediocre white men
in full capitalist bloom
then comes the howling again
a lonely wolf leaning over a ravine

and i don’t know what brought him here
brought us together
he in his prison
and i in mine
our sickness covering both ends of the spectrum
but i know how this will end
with the cops
like it always does
making their cop faces
making their cop sounds
beating their authoritarian chests
as they drag the man out into the street
to join the car horns
and detritus of urban decay
and it will be quiet again
inside this prison
and i will go home
to the old couch
to the stale vodka in the fridge
to the few graspable hours remaining in the day
i will tap my toes to nothing
and the dogs
will bark again
tomorrow too. 

Poem of the Day 03.21.23

rites of spring

i sit here
hearing birds chirping

the rustle of trees

feel the soft air
coming from the ocean

bath in warm light

still see the sun at seven o’clock p.m.
like a fat ball of gas in the sky

reflecting off of windows
and the remnants of dirty snow

chase the tussle of winter
as it loosens its grip

think about rome
and young women in short skirts

hear the people outside
talk the dumb talk that keeps them alive

as i drink boatloads of vodka
to the sound of every fucking dog
barking its return

leaving their mounds
of incredible shit

outside
my living room
window.

Poem of the Day 03.20.23

broken oven, etc.

i think
my oven is left-leaning

lately, it refuses to work

and the fridge drips
from the freezer

in solidarity and protest

you can read about a lot of atrocities
from day to day

mass shootings and massive bombs

but you never read
about someone driven to the brink
by faulty plumbing

or the first whiff of a gas leak

america is hard enough
on a daily basis

without having to deal with another
broken appliance too

appliances should last forever here
it would balance always having to sift through the shit

dodging bullets at school and work
and people saying good morning on the street

but the oven is broken
and the fridge leaks
and the blinds in the kitchen
are falling down again

it is already 95-degrees in may

and somewhere
someone

is buying another automatic weapon
and walking into a school or your job

to cause more automatic death

so maybe fuck the broken oven
and maybe fuck america

too.

Poem of the Day 03.16.23

a wet night in brooklyn
smelling some asshole’s cigarette…again

he sits there on the stoop
in front of my bedroom window
like a bad statue, smoking

playing on his cell phone of course

i’ll admit it is raining, sprinkling really
and this is probably the only shelter for a block

but i’m drunk
and i don’t care

it may not have been the best opening salvo
to lean out my window and shout

hey asshole, you and your cigarette
get it the fuck out of here

but the consumption of alcohol
has never blessed me with tact

his response of, it’s a free country, shithead
didn’t surprise me

people find patriotism in the oddest of acts

maybe i shouldn’t have
followed him up with

shithead?
oh, you wanna step, motherfucker? let’s step

and then proceeded to put my shoes on
while calling him a dirty russian

blaming him for the election of 2016

especially since he was already up
and walking away down the street

but…again…patriotism

really
i’m glad my wife was there
to chase me down
just as i was opening the front door

she’s more sensible about these things

and she knows
that at my age

i’ve gone more
from the ass-kicker
to the ass-kicky

it’s just the simple fact of getting older

let’s just go to bed, she said
which seemed a reasonable request

and i kicked my shoes off
and i followed her back down the hallway

the scent of that bastard’s cigarette
still lingering in our room

as cars
and people
and dogs
and my wife’s snores
all permeated the streetlamp night

while i laid there
wide-awake, festering

consumed with violence
but ultimately wondering

was that asshole even russian?

Poem of the Day 03.15.23

the wind

go out in the wind
go out in the driving rain

do capitalism’s bidding

sit on stalled buses
with the angry faces of the damned

listen to horns blaring omnipotent in traffic

go out in the cold of winter
go out in the blazing heat of summer

kill the hours of the day

feel the suicide streets quake
beneath the worn soles of your feet

go out when you’re exhausted
go out when you feel sick

go out when you don’t care
if you live or die

serve
serve
serve

until you can barely breathe

go out in the snow
and brush off your car
with the rest of the fools

read the newspapers
full of tragedy and defeat

choke down your lunch

go out again
when it’s already dark

and the day has been swallowed
by stupidity

go out to the bars
with the rest of the sad drunks

go out to the chain restaurants
that shove bland food into bland mouths

speaking nothing but nonsense

go play the lottery
binge watch tv

go to bed with the sinking feeling
that your life has not been lived well
in a sea of lives that have not been lived well

try to fall asleep
as the world moans around you

and the wind beats
against the glass of your window

and the devil clock
bleeds red

promising you nothing
but that maybe you’ll get
another chance

to do it all again  
tomorrow

Poem of the Day 03.13.23

good job

at the end
of a merit-based society
it’s still just a headstone
or ash

i have never needed to be told
that i’ve done a good job

at least not at the ones that pay my bills

if you like a poem
a short story
or a novel i’ve written

i can sometimes accept that

although even that is faint praise in the end
when i’m faced with a new blank page

but never at a job

if a boss or co-worker says to me
good job

i stop and wonder what i’ve done wrong

i recalibrate my time
and fuck around for the rest of the day

make them think twice
about ever uttering that nonsense phrase my way again

i’ve worked jobs for nearly forty years
and i’ve railed against them
for almost just as long

something between me and capitalism never clicked

i can’t even fake it

good job
good job
it’s such bullshit

everyone looking for praise
in between the twines of the hangman’s noose

when we all should be
looking for a way out
with our souls and spirits intact

but i’ll keep blowing sunshine up your ass
and you’ll keep blowing it up mine

a ticking time bomb of

good job
good job
good job

exploding the precious moments we’ve been giving

ripping a huge hole through the fabric
of our one and only
short existence

headstones and ashes
our reward in the end.

Poem of the Day 03.09.23

this work email

today
i’m not going to answer
this work email

i may never answer it

i want the person who sent it
to wonder why i didn’t respond

to wonder if i never
got the email in the first place

fuck this person, i think

this blank administrative suit
this cretin who has nothing better to do

then sit in some office
creating busy work for others

sending them
a chipper goddamned email
expecting a man to be excited about it too

america is insane and insipid

i read articles about how
to be more productive at work

read them out of spite

i finish these creeds and wonder
what kind of an asshole gets inspired by this drivel

then i open up my work email
and go…oh…yeah…

so i’m not going to answer
this work email

 
i’m not going to write this shithead back
and pretend interest in their pilot program

give myself some task to do
that i didn’t want to do in the first place

let them sit there and stew
over the lack of communication

this dipshit with a six-figure salary

i’m going to let
this email sit in my inbox
and rot

like raw meat in the hot summer sun

like it’s the only
form of independence
that i truly have left.

Poem of the Day 03.07.23

e.j.’s bar & grille is defiant
in the face of the plague

the jazz man
stands outside
in the dull yellow light

drunk before the evening falls

trying to light his smoke
from the wrong end

you can hear the stones playing
from inside

the décor is a cross
between halloween and christmas

a sure sign we’re in that lull
that marks the middle of november

the bar is packed
only on one side

men drinking in flannels
and dusty ballcaps

sit close in the muted holidays lights
the white light of the television

they are a portrait
of a time before this time

a remembrance of things past

sitting here on 5th avenue
e.j’s bar & grille is defiant
in the face of the plague

stupid, maybe
a death wish waiting to come

but ain’t no one worrying about this year
ain’t no one caring about the next

there’s no hundreds of thousands
of dead bodies to count

just one beer down
another coming up

some empty stools down the other end

and one guy at the window looking outside
at the masked faces hustling home

or waiting on the jazz man
to get his head straight

figure this whole cigarette thing out.


11.19.20

Poem of the Day 03.02.23

ghosts of summer

give me back
the smack of wiffleball bat
on wiffleball

the home run kings of cul de sacs
surrounding duplex houses

playing 10-run rule

or until it was all decided
when the wiffleball went rolling down the sewer

give me back
playing nerf football in the shade
with concrete gods

making star wars action figure plots
right out of the humid, sweltering air

the sun-sick joy of evermore romance
that wouldn’t last a week

trading baseball cards on front porches
like sweaty stock brokers fearing a crash

those suburban kids
those suburban girls

those ghosts of summer
playing tag with the streetlights and fireflies

some of whom have died too young
some of whom have lived
to grow as gray as i

oh, give me back that freedom
of faux innocence and blissful indecision

you petrifying wretch of time.

Poem of the Day 03.01.23

bloody knuckles

bloody knuckles
and i am hungover again

sitting here
with my balls hanging out of
ripped boxer shorts

working on a headache
and a burning stomach

bloody knuckles
and i didn’t even get them
from something good

like a bar fight
or a fight with a neighbor over some triviality

got them making the bed
smacking my hand
off the old, weathered box spring

bloody knuckles
and all i can do
is drink wine and vodka on the couch
with band aids on

watch the hours pass
through a broken tv

until i can go to bed
and sleep the wretched restless sleep
of the damned

maybe dream that i’m some
big time prizefighter

instead of just a clumsy drunk

who can’t even properly make
his goddamned bed.

                                        10.08.19