who knows where
love goes
when it disappears

maybe it just leaks out
of holes in people's
hearts and collects

perhaps somewhere
there is a Great Lake
of mingled lost loves

each missing
the lovers
who lost them

each hoping
to be found
and held close
again

   ~mce

i saw the Cobras
coming straight for us

thought of my parents
my brother and sister
back at home in the north
said a prayer to my ancestors
for protection

                     then

their rockets launched
and a moment later

i dissolved out of history
   ~mce

some chilly days
you feel like
one of Napoleon's
frozen soldiers
two hundred
           years later
still trudging
through an icy hell
  retreating from
           the cold
  simply longing
           for home
           for warmth

  ~mce

Meditate on something.
Meditate on nothing.
It doesn't much matter.
Nothing is going
               to happen
and that is exactly
               the point.

   ~mce

In war everyone
carries something
for good luck
and protection.

A rabbit's foot,
a piece of twine,
their girl friend's
*******.

I had a mantra.

It was simply,
**** me.

When the ****
got hot and thick
and the tracers
reached out
their lovely,
lethal fingers

I would chant:
**** me, **** me,
**** me, **** me,

perhaps thinking
god would hear

and say,

for christ's sake
**** him and
get it over with,

but god was AWOL
(as usual)

so it worked
and I lived.

  ~mce

I am a poet.

I love to say that
when smug oafs
ask what I do
and watch the look
of horror on their
faces, like they
just swallowed
the *** end of
a dead skunk,
maggots and all.

It's my job
to blurt out
the ugly truths
most folks won't
even think and try
to make them
beautiful,

to make flowers
blossom from the
***** of dead skunks.

Like a weather person,
I don't always succeed.

It's not a good job,
the pay is ******
and there are no benefits.

Sometimes, like April,
it can be a cruel job.

But it is a job
and it's my job.

Someone has to do it
so I keep on trying.

I am a poet.

   ~mce

"I'd strike the Heavens if they struck me!"* - Ahab

Dear god, just a few questions
(I know how busy you are):

Where were you when the stray bullet
found the skull of the little girl
in the sandbox at the playground
(another drug deal gone wrong)

-Were you smelling your flowers?-

or when the machetes flashed and
loped off the hands of the tribal others

-Were you admiring one of your sunsets?-

I know you have never ever visited
the Balkans where men were lined up
and forced to watch their mothers,
wives and daughters being gang *****

-Maybe you had a cold then.-

and I never caught a glimpse of you
in Viet Nam where the ****** fell
like your gentle rain on the innocents
and my partner was cut in half
by a burst from a 40 caliber machine gun

-Were you cutting a ribbon at a new cathedral?-

or later when I went mad and ended up
committed, in jail, alone, broken

-Temporary deafness?-

or when my brother was set up and busted
by a corrupt attorney general
and when my mother died a horrible
long slobbering death by Alzheimer's

-More busy days?-

so I guess I only really have one question:

exactly what good are you?

   ~mce

i am so tired
of being a poet
sentenced to a life
of memory and words
stuck in the solitary
confinement of
a relentless past
i just want to get
my parole and find
a job as a janitor
and never ever
have to think again
but sadly i just can't
surrender to silence
as much as i'd love to

   ~mce

i prefer them because

they hurt my brain less
consume less blood for ink
demand fewer memories
are easier on my readers
cost less in alcohol and despair

so i'll just stop this now
before it stretches too far

and loses itself in difficulty
and disappears in pain

   ~mce

Some days
I just want
to strangle
the world.

A bottle
of whiskey
and a well
of anger

        say:

Back off.

Today is one
of those days.

  ~mce

a knocking came at
my door this morning

i'm pretty sure
it was winter

as a pall of chill
froze the portal

no way was
I letting him in

i picked up my
knife and considered
slashing him into
frozen oblivion

but knives are not
proof against
ice and snow

so i just stood
and quietly listened
to his gusty breathing

hoping he
  would go away
for good
             and stay

fat chance

  ~mce

this morning
my lips
are blistered

too many bites
of hard life

i guess

  ~mce

the sound of a
helicopter above
a small
Pennsylvania
town in the
October dawn

time vanishes

once again
you swoop
above the
jungle in
terror

years pass
people die

your fears
cold and
sharp as

a knife

stick in you
forever

some wars
never end

  ~mce

To Carthage then I came.*

Deep down,
who doesn't want
to **** a saint,
to penetrate
the mystery
of holiness,
to enter
the enigma
of eternity.

Pile the wood
high as you like.

Oh sweet
  and lonely Joan,
I will follow
  you into
    that fire.

    ~mce

The unarmed
fleeing
  black man
    takes six
warning shots
  in the back.

Ain't that America.

Call it
the Law
   of Supply
     and The Man.

  ~mce

If you had ever
held a dying man
in your arms
and heard him
crying for
his wife,
his mother
or god
(none of whom
ever showed up),
you would know
that war is not
a video game,
not entertainment,
but a reality
you hold
in your arms
(your heart,
your mind)
until you too
die.

  ~mce

Obese women
in yoga pants
with garish
tattoos
sweating
like bovine
demons
while
screaming
at their
doomed
brats.

  ~mce

Be very wary.
Normal life
threatens to
engulf and
overwhelm you
at any moment.

  ~mce

My brothers and I
have a family saying
about getting drunk
or ******:
It's never too early
and it's never too late.

Although I have given
up power drinking
(age, hepatitis, liver, etc.),
I still, very occasionally,
enjoy getting drunk in the
middle of the day.

It is so warm, so soft,
so languorous.

And, of course, it is
frowned upon as weakness
by those of virtue.

But I have made a life out
of laughing at those frowns

and I hope I never stop.

  ~mce

You get up,
drink some coffee
and drive to work.

Taking the controls,
you blow up a wedding,
a birthday party
and a few possibly
safe houses along with
some collateral women
and children. If it's
a good day you may ****
a hundred people, perhaps
including a few bad guys.

Shift over, you drive home
to the safe suburbs,
light a cigarette, pour
some wine and cook dinner.

Solid job, good benefits,
a house, a bright future.

The wars are but rumors.

You are every inch
the brave soldier.

Why ask pesky questions?

Life is good.

   ~mce

The girl in the checkout line
ahead of me is dangerously gorgeous.
In the way of the very young,
she insouciantly wears next to nothing.

I imagine myself twenty-one.
I would finagle a way to meet her.
We would fall in love.
We would make love. We would make
even more love and so on.
I would buy her a house, appliances,
a minivan. We would have two
teenaged daughters who would loathe me.
I would take out a second mortgage
to pay for their braces, clothes,
educations and weddings and divorces.
They would move away and rarely see me.

I would come to rest in some
******* of a nursing home wondering
who I am and what the hell happened.

Then she turns and walks out of my life.

I pay for my frozen pizza and cigarettes
smiling about just how lucky I am.

  ~mce

Contempt is so easy.
Everyone who is not a saint
has their own laundry list.

Mine used to include:

bankers, generals, politicians,
voters, the smugly uneducated,
the greedy, loyal employees
and so on, World Without End.

I no longer have a list.

Not because I have
achieved compassionate
enlightenment,
but because
I realized that all of
the above suffer from
acute stupidity.

The only cure for
stupidity is death.

Now I am comfortable
in the knowledge that,
while not beneath contempt,
they will all vanish
beneath the earth.

Don't mean ******* nothing.

What a load off!

   ~mce

Ten years ago when
I got divorced, I
owned 6,000 books,
a riding mower,
a house on an acre
and enough other stuff
to supply a Syrian
family for a  year.

Now I live in a three
room shotgun apartment.

A year ago I embarked
on a minimalist frenzy.

Out went the LPs,
the vintage stereo
equipment and radios,
the remaining books
(a Kindle is a
minimalist's best
friend), most of the
furniture (no one visits
here), boxes of magazines,
all the clothes not
worn in the past year,
all of my gadgets
and, best of all, my
wretched teaching job.

I wanted to pare my life
down to the essentials
and see what remained.

Now I live on practically
nothing with practically
nothing. I give my
occupation (when asked)
as Poet. That gets
wonderfully baffled looks.

I am eccentric to the
extreme and love it.

The cat and I, an old
anarchist and mute feline,

make the perfect minimalist
family living out the dregs
of an obscure, minimal life.

We are what we are, free
from the tyranny of things,
content to quietly
careen into whatever bit
of future remains to us

enjoying the minutes,
ignoring the years.

   ~mce

I moved to this town
fifty-four years ago
to live in a house that
was a two and a half
bedroom half a double
with two parents and
six siblings in a
welter of tumultuous
chaos and disarray.

Being the oldest, I
hated the confused
congestion and constant
bickering and fled
at every opportunity
to the houses of
friends who had their
own rooms, enough to eat,
and even peace and quiet.

At seventeen, having
graduated from high school
(barely), I was out
the door in a heartbeat
and on to hippiedom,
Europe, the middle east
the draft, drugs, Vietnam,
marriage and my own life.

Now, forty-seven years
later, I live in a small
apartment in the other half
of that same double house
with only a cat.

My parents are departed.
Strangers own their half.

It is quiet and serene
and all mine.
                      Forty-seven
years of running to end up
a foot from where I began.

Even Odysseus couldn't
compete with that feat.

I enjoy living here now.

It is everything it
wasn't when I was a kid.

Still, the irony would
be apparent to an idiot.

Forty-seven years of
running in a circle.
Life, not so much a
journey as eternal return.

  ~mce

In Viet Nam
(if you lived)
it meant
365 days.

So wrong.

Coming home
began the real tour.

Each day an unseen mine,
a ****** sighting you in,
punji sticks along the trail,
choppers falling and burning.

All have their
civilian counterparts.

The worries of
the day to day
far exceed the
perils of war.

What they have
in common is
the ever present
possibility of
unseen death.

365 days was nothing.

Man, woman or child:
living your life is
the real Tour of Duty.

   ~mce

In the year
of our lord
865 CE,
at the council
of Agde
(after intense
debate)
the Bishops
decided that
women have souls.

In their silent
secret hearts,
many men
still question
that decision.

   ~mce

everything seems
normal

inside and warm
the illusion
of safety and
permanence

outside the
executioner
shivers and
sharpens

suddenly an icy
guillotine
pops our heads off
mid-sentence
through a
witty conversation

death is a pop quiz
you cannot prepare for

sooner or later
all our heads
will be tested

and only get
to fail once

   ~mce

One by one,
like poisoned mice,
the years
rot inside walls;
days and nights
leak into a bucket
from ceilings that
increasingly fail
as time passes.

Life departs
              in droplets.

We avoid the holes,
ignore the stench,
empty the pail
and pretend
that nothing changes.

As longs as it lasts,
we call this a life.

That life might fail
remains outside
our vocabulary,
allows us to
maintain the illusion
our crumbling
decrepit structure
is as normal
as waking up.

Until we don't.

  ~mce

Intro - by Warren Zevon (thanks Warren.)

"I don't want to grow old gracefully
I don't want to go 'til it's too late
I'll be some old man in the road somewhere
Kneeling down in the dust by the side of the Interstate

I am a renegade
I've been a rebel all my days
I am a renegade
I've been a rebel all my days"

/////

Resistance is not futile;
resistance is life.
Am I contrary?
Very well then,
I am contrary.
I am vast; I contain
multitudes
of contrariness.
I revel in it!
It is the heart
of all I am.

////

A nearly illiterate Black Zen Drill Sergeant told me when I was 19:

"You born wid a bullet wid yer name on it boy. We all is. You jest outrunit fo as long as you ken. Theys only two kinds a folks, the quick and the daid. You run fast an smart, mebbe you live a long long time."

/////

“I am not young enough to know everything.”  - Oscar Wilde

/////

The very young believe
that suicide must be better
than wrinkles, illness,
menopause and grey hair.

Of course, they are very young
and understand so very little.

Your life is the only thing
the Universe ever gives you.

Life is not a game to play,
but a war to be fought;
only a war of joy that
you are lucky to be chosen for.
Use the weapons you are given:
smile, fight hard, live long.

There is no shotgun to ****
or strychnine to swallow
waiting for me:

I will fall on the day
when that bullet
cast at birth
and engraved
with my name
finally catches up.

Besides, I love my stories
and can't miss next week's
episode of my life.

Who know? Maybe something
             miraculous
will happen yet.

/////

Thanks to everyone
who has loved me,
hated me, helped me,
hurt me, struck me,
held me, touched me,
kissed me or cursed me.

I am the vessel made
from the clay that
you molded and shaped.

Good or bad, without
your hugs and slugs
there would be no me.

/////

And a special shout out
to all the NVA soldiers
who were such bad shots.
Your lack of skill
made all this possible.

/////

This birthday,
nothing more
than a
temporary
placeholder
in the book
of eternity.

Each day,
a prophecy;
each day
a reward.

Each day,
I delight
in the
fragile wisdom
of things.

Each day,
I wonder
at the
incomprehensible
mystery
of people.

And thus
I will
continue
to marvel

at the near
that overcomes
the distant

until the end
of (my) days.

/////

"When the going gets weird, the weird turn professional."

However weird I may be
I am a professional human being;
And it's a job I plan to hold
for just as long as possible.

/////

Namaste...

    ~mce

the night of the day
   before tomorrow
      becomes today

he tries to imagine
   ways beyond that

but loses the path

mired in the boggy
   random darkness
      of his own muddy soul
   ~mce

only a moment
between breath
and death

in that blink
let us lie

eye to eye
moan to moan

so that
when
it ends
the instant
flown

we truly know

we were
not alone

   ~mce

At some point
hating becomes
just too tedious;
probably a good thing
(although many still
deserve hating).

Somewhere between
nearly old and old,
it's too much bother.

You have your
own worries,
for example
about dying tragically
forgotten (if not
too young).

So you give up hating.

You even get over
Richard Nixon.
(OK, maybe not
completely.)

You leave the
hate world knowing
plenty of others
will pick up
your slack.

Perhaps you had
a good career
as a hater;
perhaps you were
bush league
at best.

Doesn't matter now.
         Relax.
You aren't going back.

  ~mce

a day late and
a dollar short

cliché for sure

but the true
story
of a life

   ~mce

A Zen Drill Sergeant
once told me,

(screamed at me)

you always got to have
a fallback position, boy.

I asked what happens
if you don't.

He said, you don't
want to know that,
**** for brains.

The Buddha is
everywhere
at once.

Enlightenment
arrives from
strange mouths.
  - mce

frosty morning
  of new winter

wake up, shower,
make the bed,
go buy cigarettes;

the day's tasks done.

hunker down
in a warm room
with coffee,
   perhaps Mozart.

read
        write
                 dream...

doing the real work,
   the only work
              that matters.

  ~mce

Through a
thickly frosted
window of pain,

he watched
         bewildered
as Winter forced
its icy tongue
down Summer's
hot, *******.

Looks like
seasonal ****
to me.

Quick!

Call the
Spring police.
   ~mce

My day was spent Here
reading, writing,
meditating and practicing
kung fu forms,
quite content Here in my
aging baby boomer bubble.

I know that Somewhere

a surgeon struggles
to save the legs of a child
blown off by a landmine
from some forgotten war

and Somewhere

a startled soldier
who never knew what hit him
slowly burns to death
in his mangled humvee

and Somewhere

a shy small Muslim woman
trips the timer on
her suicide vest
and walks into
a marketplace prepared
to die for her god,

but I have lived those lives.

Here and now,
I am no longer a man
of this century
or even this
dying digital world;

no longer
in the Somewhere,
Now content to
play out my hand,

to just be
in the Here.

  ~mce

He stuffed
an imaginary cat
( along with
some other
imaginary stuff)
into an
imaginary box,
thought about it
and suddenly,
the seemingly
very small world
became vast with
potentialities.
  ~mce

Yesterday, the knockout girl
at the checkout counter -
who looked straight through me
as though I wasn't there -
handed me a Caffè Americano
instead of my ordered Latte.

I said nothing:
paid, took it and left.

After a certain age
you learn to expect what you get.
   ~mce

the days disappear
into winter
like leaves falling
from old trees
in your hometown
that you never noticed
until someone
cut them down

  ~mce

When my mother died
her head was empty
as a metropolitan museum
presenting a special
exhibition of nothingness.

I can only hope that
she enjoyed the final show.

I know I didn't.

   ~mce

When you come of age
among Camaros, Mustangs,
GTO's and Challengers,
it seems somehow sad
to hear the pussified sound
of a Prius go puttering by
like Death driving
something sensible.

  ~mce

Ah, cell-phones:

I know it dates me
and sounds crotchety
but oh how I miss
the old days
when talking
to yourself
in public
meant you were
crazy, probably
schizophrenic,
maybe dangerous
or possibly
a saint or mystic
with a direct
line to god.

Now it's just a
helicopter mom
calling her
daughter away
at college
for the third
time today
to reassure
herself the girl
can't exist
without the
eternally
present sound
of her voice
giving advice
the kid probably
won't follow
anyway.

Joan of Arc
was burned
at the stake
for listening
to the disembodied
voices that
assault us
wherever we go,
every day.

Doesn't Seem fair.

I wonder who
has that stake?

  ~mce

a high school friend
came home from war

(long before
I went)

and told me

you know Mike,
Canada has
a lot more
to offer
than Vietnam

had i listened,
i'd probably be
watching hockey
this very
instant, eh?

   ~mce

when i wear
a suit
i look like
exactly
the kind
of old man
who would
wear a suit,
the kind
of old man
i almost
was
but never
became.

   ~mce

odd, how an
ordinary evening
can turn
miraculous
when you've had
a bit too much
to drink
and your woman
is very beautiful
poised against
the unexpected snow
that makes
everything shine

   ~mce

he calls it that -
last,
      long,
            five
                 days
before pension payday

always an adventure:
will he, won't he,
how much is left?

this time 30 bucks
to last till Wednesday

piece of cake

money is a fickle *****
a goddess of tease

never let her force
you to despair

her only real power
is to make you wait

and being poor
in Amerika
you have already
mastered that skill

   ~mce

i know you are out there

waiting for me
to shift
your transmission
into desire

to release the brake
on your inhibitions

to ride you with
a deep throaty growl
all the way to ******,

Michigan.

    ~mce

politics = soiled
toilet paper
best flushed
and forgotten

parties, manifestos,
attack ads, slogans,
talking points, blather

don't put your faith
in other people's ****

robots stand in line
to vote imagining
they have a choice

same old arguments
among ghosts

only lonely resistance
is fit for a human

the silent blow
against the masters

even when it
makes no difference

especially then

   ~mce

for that girl at a concert in 1968*

she shed her clothes
in a moment's abandon
and danced naked
before the swaying crowd

she was young
she was beautiful
she was a vision
of possibility

she must be
approaching 70 now

she is someone's
grandmother

she spends her days
in sweats feeling her
knee replacement ache

were she to suddenly
dance naked in public
her children
would commit her

still, sometimes
in her secret heart
she imagines
doffing her clothes
and twirling
once again
within the music
of a more generous time
before her world
was damaged beyond
recovery

she imagines,
but she doesn't

   ~mce