Tax Breaks and A Day Off

Did You Know General Electric Pays No Taxes?

"I Wish I'd Thought to Say"

When Jorge` told me, "You're white. You're supposed to have money,"

I wish I said, "That's just it, George. That's what they want you to think, that white people have all the money - just like Mexicans are taking our jobs, gays are destroying marriage, Muslims are sinisterly infiltrating our country, unions are greedy. It's the distractions they create and present as your scapegoat for your problems. This way we argue at each other, rather than keeping an eye on them fat cats. In reality, well, they don't need "Casual Friday," because they can still afford their business suits.

Poem from back sometime

Laid That Love

It rushes back.

You remember how sweet she is;

you recall smiling

through mid-evenings cooking;

late nights sipping wine and painting

before taking off your splattered clothes

to lay down for bed,

her nose on your neck,

her breath down your chest

*        *               *

you forget

and wonder

Why am I doing this?

Her lips – 

you long to comfort with a kiss –

will never forgive you.

Her eyes,

pricked by tears,

search yours to discover why,

but you have no reason why.

Those words slip off –

wine becomes vinegar

                             Rakes the cheeks,

                             burns in the throat.

*        *               *

What, then, can be said

of what is laid to rest?

How can one ever forget

quivering lips and a heaving breast;

the watering eyes beneath furrowed brows

when he laid that love to rest?

*        *               *

She goes to her closet,

returns to her seat,

hands you that cherished paper bag

of wine corks and keepsakes.

Question 1

If you could lose once sense,
which would you choose?

His Labors

I cut bamboo and the leaves slipped through my skin. Cedar branches
grabbed and raked red lines
through my arms.

Thorns pierced my wrists and hands. I burned, hauling brush across the lawn, 

torn by vines, and licked

by poison ivy.

Dirt crouched under my fingernails and blisters formed on my palms. My hands
were chewed by stones, then sweat
dripped from my nose.

I shoveled clay and carried rocks. My blisters opened. Blood smeared
on my tools. The open wounds filled
with grit.

My eyes cried saw dust. Mosquitoes fed on me. Gnats stuck to my flesh
by the Texas Summer-drawn sweat. My
bones ached, ground, and snapped.

By day's end, my wounds stung, my skin pulled taut. I cooled in the shower,
dried on the balcony, then slept
on the wooden floor.

Favorites, pt. 2

Artist: Egon Schiele

Writer: Jack Kerouac

Did I tell you about meeting the Armenian couple in Amsterdam?

During an hours-long stroll through the wonky city, I came to a large plaza area where a man with headset and a big circus ball gathered a large audience. At a corner of this plaza stood a bank, beside one wall of which stooped a thin man playing accordion. He wore tan pants, a heavy coat, and a scarf. His narrow face stood from his collar with a knit beanie holding his head.

From a distance he looked young and I slowed my pace to get a better hear of his music, Armenian traditionals. I hesitated to pass as he finished a song and a girl went up to give him change and chat, about what I will never know. I approached as she walked away.


We talked about where he is from and his wife appeared from nowhere. We talked and he and she spoke to only each other at one point in a language I had never heard. They disagreed, I only imagined about her invitation for me to join them with my guitar. During their subtle exchange, he lifted one pant leg to reveal bright red cotton pants underneath with yellow, pink, blue and white polka dots. "Do you think he would understand this?" I imagined the man saying.

"Do you want coffee?" the woman asked me.

"Sure, I would love some," for the day kept very cold and gray.

She gestured for me to follow. We rounded the corner of the bank and through the doors. On the far side of the only clerk and several customers, a coffee machine sat on a counter. The clerk watched the Armenian woman and me approach the sign claiming "Coffee for customers only" and us ignoring it. The woman ignored also the sign that said "Out of order". The clerk ignored her customer and kept her eyes on us, my leader working to get a coffee to realize it doesn't work.

"It doesn't work," she told me and we walked back out without looking at the clerk. The woman gave a flippant flick of her hand as she led me back outside, as if to say, "It's that simple."

We stood a distance from her husband playing from his spot. She encouraged me to return with my guitar and I went off.

Today's Thought

"Did you know Exxon pays no taxes?"

we're vetted against each other as if we're not in this together.
we're all hoping for that shining end of the tunnel, aren't we?
we work.
we labor.
we cold-call.
we fold clothes.
we door-to-door.
we answer phones.
we categorize, organize, clean, and design.
yet, we have been distracted by brilliant politics telling us to concern ourselves with
who gets married
who dies
who fights
who has weapons
who we're going after
who's more loyal
who's the bigger patriot.
we are distracted by this swarm of gnats, missing the hawk attacking our vulnerability.
we all love, don't we?
we all die.
we're all fighting something.
we're all prepared for disaster, as best we can be.
i don't see any benedict arnold's where i roam.
and patriotism is pointless
when what we're proud of is not working for us who work.

violent polar snow dunes

accidental birth certified.
demonic eyes fell ghastly hosts,
interrupting juvenile kisses;
lamenting moments not offered passively,
quietly rewarded;
systematically traumatized
under vehement, watchful, xenophobic, yelling
zastrugas.

favorites

Favorites of all Time:


Song: Visions of Johanna, Bob Dylan

Painting: The Old Guitarist, Pablo Picasso

Architecture: The Chrysler Building

high and dry

a massive wreck, cars scattered throughout the highway, and I approached peering through a box-hole. swerving left, i corrected right, over a lane, watching the cars grow bigger in my way and pass through a box hole. my foot never lightened on the gas, i jerked left, and wrecked. the squad car hit sand bags, tail-end upraised, then fell. the hood popped open and i got out.
are you okay?
i'm frustrated. i'm usually great at dealing with stuff like this. i looked around. passengers wandered between cars with flats, busted radiators, banged and bruised bumpers, accordion fronts.
i moseyed away from my car and carnage leaving it behind and unresolved.