The sharpened mind - with care - takes aim
- at university, we play ruthless games.
Where pencils scratch, their graphite gray,
and scholarly answers take the day.

I've finished midterms!
It was like one of those TV shows, ‘survivor’ or something.

Enzyme kinetics, metabolic pathways, protein structures and functions be ****** - no, be double ******.

I’d been working problems raw in dreams, waking up tired.

Sunday, I was so stressed I'd felt calm, like I’d accepted my fate.
I can tell you that now - now that I survived.

“I was strazzled but controlled - there's a difference in how
I struggle internally - and what I let show.” I told Leong.
“Is that why you were yelling at everyone?” she replied.

“Now that midterms are over, I feel luminary,” I informed Leong, “am I glowing?”
She looked up and said, “No.” Communists aren’t sentimental.
Of course I meant luminary in both achievement and radiance.

My Uncle Remy used to tell me:
“Little one, don’t worry about being a failure,
that’s your parent’s job.”

I Love you Uncle Remy.

the far edge of your love
rushes into me
like small increments of sugar
stirred into my coffee cup

it is the edge of things
i most desire

golden and violet clouds
settling just above the sea at sunset

the dive into the deep
green sea
and then the slow rise to sun

the far edge of your love rushes to me
like smoldering embers
waiting to be the fire once more

it is the edge of you i most desire
like the end of a ridge looking down
into the clouds below

the far edge of your love
rushes into me
and it is the edge of your love i desire
the perfume of pale blue flowers
the elusive summer captured in your smile
and l'appel du vide

i was watching
Shane's funeral

beautiful
and deservingly so

and i wondered
who would come to my funeral???

(debt collectors
police
2 x-wives
DEA)
(surely
i'm heading to purgatory)

perhaps she'll come
the woman who wants to be a mortician
i meant her at the liquor store

i answered her ad
in the A.P. press,
it read, as follows:

Female, a young 60
likes UFO stories
and exorcisms
loves to watch autopsies,
has a potato chip
that looks like D. Trump!
(not for sale)
will be in front of BY-WAY Liquor store
7 a.m. Tuesday. Gladys.

and one thing
led to another
SO,
here i am
and the the smoke
from the camp
fire's
burning my eyes
i'm on my 18th can
of miller light
Gladys and me
are looking for
UFO s

there's something beautiful
about tall buildings
and a dark street,
the vacant restaurants and stores

the drive-throughs
on their way to work
don't see it
don't feel you
don't hear your voice of desperation
or the screech from the garbage trucks
brakes

there's something beautiful
on the corner
of Dewitt and Springwood Ave

where there were dances
at the bingo hall,
the fist fights outside

and angels
with their eyes
whispered,
come hither,
and giggled softly

and with voices
like rain
and with a touch of regret
sang all the sad songs

I hear

the ghosts of Springwood and Dewitt
wailing
in search of hope or a prayer

or perhaps it's just the police
or an ambulance

there's something beautiful
about you,
dark avenue
of crossroads
where the hanged men are dump

and shotgun in my hands
i'm going to run down
that avenue of dead dreams

the revolution is at hand

wounded blackbird on a telephone wire
in a bright and hollow sky
searched for the lost cord.
his heart has betrayed him
and no longer will he fly.