Santa Ana winds
angry fire maker
arsonist unbends
pizza oven baker.

I could've been at his deathbed. Maybe offered
      some solace and comfort and sent him off
      with a proper "God's speed"!
      I Declined an Invitation to My Father's Death.
      I might've played right into his hands and now
      guilt plagues me as I listen to sad songs and
      write sad poetry and hope I remember to call my son
      tomorrow so that maybe he'll be at my death bed.

they take our orders
  clean our tables after
  fractured smiles always
  with an eye on the clock
  coins left like charity
  count it fingers crossed
  feed the kids or keep
  them warm or buy a pint
  and dime bag to feel a
  little like a big shot.

Reuse old souls astride of graves.
Life begets death begets life without fail.
I found an available womb: Donovan.
William and Jean. 23 July 1948. Sail.

March 23, 1949. William John Donovan, jr.
Born against my will! Welcome to home.
Who are you people? I need familiar!
I hope to some God I won't die all alone.

Samuel Beckett -
“They give birth astride of a grave, the light
gleams an instant, then it's night once more.”

I misled you from the start.
I adored your kind heart
and your weaker knees
spread apart to please.
We made our Love baby
no if and or maybe.
25 years we downsize
sleep alone realize
these rooms don't fit
sleep in beds of regret.

When the bar lights blink off and on
  and last call announced half hour ago
  we calculate the odds as drunken sailors.
  The bar is full of sirens calling from shore.
  These beauties must've appeared recently
  cause I never saw them earlier. We take
  their measure and like dancers we choose
  partners and meet near the door and waltz
  away together into the night. We find our
  way to beds holding on to this life raft
  as desperate lovers often do. We love
  the best two drunk strangers can do.
  We wake in morning light blinking.
  We'll always do this dance again.

In the time it took me to leave you the
universe was born a billion years ago.
Heaven and hell woven by the very threads
of our existence. Complexity only God's
watchmaker could ever begin to envision.
In motion chaos has its way with order and
beauty is scarred and love is lost and you
and I drift apart in such ordinary ways.

I saw a dying brother bleed out.
I watched a madman **** his flock.
Parades celebrated the funerals.
Little boys masquerading as men
played war. Real men died for mud.
Loved ones prayed their rosaries.
No prayers were ever answered on
our street. Gold stars filled sad
windows. Widows cried in private.
They never wanted to dance again.

Each and everyone I knew
I'm blistered in my grave
cold earth warms my blue
lie dead wait to be saved.

I'm barely awake from a dream. I
    need to call home. 6 Alcott Lane
    Greenhills. Is my room still there?
    Is the Xavier pennant still nailed to
    the wall, and Christ on the cross?
    That room was my growing up womb.
    
    I found my *** in that room. I puked
    beer in that room. I played with my
    plastic super heroes in that room. I
    was sent to that room when I told my
    parents that Kathy and I were pregnant.
    There's no place like home they say.

The sky's so clear
  in the atmosphere
  stars perch on a tree
  caged birds set free
  my mind takes flight
  into the cold night
  an old lover beckons
  naked in the street
  I'll chase her heat
  I saw her in a window
  her curly hair in a bow
  when I just can't feel
  what's dream or real
  my dogs walk me home.
  I still dream alone.

We knew all along
we weren't happy but
neither had the will to
start over for another
bout another fight
sick of endless rounds
with no KO's just punch
drunk slurs and morning
shame and mute rituals.
Amazing how good we became,
amnesia and kiss off to work.
Who knows where the time goes?
Will either of us have a shred
of life left when the other finally
dies to lie naked with a stranger
just to sleep with your memory?

A drop of blood in rain
makes a watercolor,
as wine spilled on a letter
to a secret lover.
I paint with words.
You pose for these lines
heavy with lust, lost loves
over many lifetimes.

Laughter on fire starts.
I promise broken hearts.
Dance naked in the dark
******* in our Eden Park.
Acid tripped to Erie Lake
Wedding a pathetic fake.

At the edge of consequence
razor wire upon the fence
captured in our human cage
heartbeats full of rage
society inside will adjust
to fragile realms of trust
Attica was hearts of stone
Musketeers none left alone.
We swelled in riot as one
overpowered guards and won
a right to be heard on TV
passion play on bent knee.
Some died on both sides
the end was just abides.

At 3am we were drunk and ******.
My conscience called my phone.
My conscience said leave me alone!
We crawled back to a quiet womb
with black light in a tiny tomb
born in fierce sunlight at noon.

You have limited weeks
that are still available
small vacation peeks
your time unassailable.

Leave it clean so new
guests thoroughly enjoy
their pristine view
of this brand new toy.

I will forgive you
I hope you will
remember the dew
naked on the hill

If I had a heart I'd pray
  If I had a heart I'd stay
  If I had a heart I'd try
  If I had a heart I'd die
  If I had a heart I'd lie
  If I had a heart why?

Dawn Chorus by Thom York

Back up the cul-de-sac
Come on, do your worst
You've quit your job again
And your train of thought
If you could do it all again
A little fairy dust
Thousand tiny birds singing
If you must, you must
Please let me know
When you've had enough
Of the white light
Of the dawn chorus
If you could do it all again
You don't know how much
Pronto pronto, moshi mosh
Come on, chop chop
If you could do it all again
Yeah, without a second thought
I don't like leaving
The door shut
I think I missed something
But I'm not sure what
The middle of the vortex
The wind picked up
Shook up the soot
From the chimney ***
Into spiral patterns
Of you, my love
You take a little piece
Then we break it off
It's a ****** racket
It's the dawn chorus
If you could do it all again
Big deal, so what?
Please let me know
When you've had enough
It's the last chance

I love you beauties
   I fear your stings
   Scorpions in showers
   Snakes in G-Strings
   poison in my coffee
   Love always brings.

I want you all to be okay
    just quit dying day to day
    why the empty hourglass?
    count corpses as they pass.

There were leaves barking
  and dogs fluttering in the wind
  birds were swimming in deep water
  and fish were flying in the clouds.
  Communists defined their reality
  made the rules put us all in gulags
  wore big hats and lifts in their boots
  in mansions they killed us bit by bit.

I promised something last night.
  I was slightly askew. What was it?
  Remind me again. I was in my cups.
  Take ballroom dance lessons? Groupon?
  What the **** is that? I hate dancing.
  I have two left feet and an old man's
  aversion to new tricks. Spare me.
  Try me again tonight at happy hour.

I drink alone
in the attic room
of a boarding house
kind of furnished.
Lamp, chair, ashtray,
**** out the window.
I write my Collection
on paper with classical
music on a tinny radio
rejected each **** time.

Poets are rats in no man's land.
Death rotting on the bone is a
cratered field of dead poems.
We charge into the endlessness
set our words on fire and fall
onto them as sacrifice.

We worship on bar stools in smokey
  churches with neon gods and clergy
  behind the altar with the holy blood
  bottled in rows in front of mirrors.
  Our hymns play on a jukebox while
  we sway in harmony feeling the grace
  flowing between our souls as one.
  Our bible is the newspaper and we
  confess our sins to each other.
  At last call we're given absolution.

My old blue veins
are a map to a lover
bleeding past stains
still left to discover.
Tomorrow never comes.
I am yesterday's news.
We were the only ones.
I sing tomorrows blues.

2 coolios met at Rugby's and we
  crawled into each others heart.
  We died for 3 days and rose again
  into Southern light a fresh start.

Saturday night barn dance
banjos and fiddles romance
a forbidden hayloft chance
we birthed us in a trance.

We've all gone crazy lately.
I don't wear a tie or cut my hair.
I smoked some hash and lost my
mind a little bit. Save me from
a world I don't recognize anymore.
I dress like a clown and eat drugs
to keep me up and down and level.
Friends are straight or hippies each
seeking their very own Nirvana and
I walk a tightrope above madness.

I have a cat with one eye
can't control her eating
I can't tell you why
eats when heart's beating.
Leaves ***** art on floor
to clean it up seems cruel
she always leaves more
it turns into a puke duel.

I was conceived in the wrong womb.
  That's my life in a sentence.
  It was one I never wore well.
  Greenhills, OH. Suburbia ad nauseam.
  Lovely family and all but Bumpkinville
  so boring I took up smoking 8th grade.
  A swimming pool but I craved an ocean.
  I wanted a boardwalk and girls
  bold enough to kiss me like I needed
canyons of skyscrapers to explore,
  junkies and perverts and hookers
who knew the price of meat.
I wanted a library  with every book
to devour so I'd be smarter than my father
and teachers and the ******* Parish priests
who loved their altar boys more than the poor
sick needy masses of their church.

Dresden

Oh, ****. Here comes my rage again.
I thought the drugs kept it at bay.
My shrink promised it would but
said we might have to adjust dosage
and we'd talk next week. It scares
me near to death. Loose wire in rain
snaking itself wild full of death.
My kids barely shake in fear but
they do and it just spikes the rage.
I love you! I'd never hurt you!
******* it to hell!I'd never bomb
your cities to infernos like Dresden.
I'll tuck you in at night and battle
monsters under your beds.
I'll take you fishing.
I'll fix your flat tires.
I'll never burn you alive
from a great height God like.

What is the difference
between  rogue and hypocrite?
A rogue knows he's a rogue.
A hypocrite thinks he's God.

Cotton obsessed, ***** oppressed,
    Southern charm and whipping the help
    mint juleps in the oak tree's shade as
    Delta planters tamed this flooded jungle
    with a thousand slaves bought in kennels
    filled with a savage fear of lost orphans
    from lands beyond reach of our dreams.

    A noble savage we tried to free in Civil War.
    Free to live in squalor with **** schools and
    **** jobs and **** projects to call home.
    Don't fear these truths. Don't stare blind.
    Carry this prayer to your altars and pulpits
    and shout from pews demanding justice.
    Sing of misfortune and tomorrow's hope.

I work the streets at night
dressed for business in cars
I do my best to look pretty
makeup hides my scars

They always pay in cash
never kiss me goodnight
beats cleaning toilets
without the delight.

Bring me bent widgets,
midgets with no place.
Round in square holes
never fit in disgrace.
We're among you always.
We are broken freaks.
Our god will bless you.
Listen while It speaks.
I lied of my pedigree.
I'm not from royalty.
I hope you'll agree
let well enough be.

the dearth of death
is birth and breath
when a broken bed
betrays my stead
petulant reaper
becomes my keeper
when madness rules
this house of fools
I'll always pledge
this razor's edge
to my neck's vein
to spare you pain.

It's a beauty of a red rose.
  It's a watercolor on a bed sheet
  petals bloom from his wound.
  She'd had it and found a gun
  and courage and anger enough
  to put him out of her misery.

Mullets and discotheques,
gold chains, too much cologne,
lines of coke, smooth *****.
Dance the night into the day
back when everyone was gay
then the scourge had its way.
Really nothing left to say
but for my dead and dying
friends I ask bend your knees
listen to their rattled breath
inches from their death
and hold my hand to pray.

Jesus Christ promise me
  there's hope for us still
  that you'll drop from the
  sky and set things right
  keep the communists away
  and stop the lies and let
  me drink my wine in peace
  and write madness in poems
  while You do heavy lifting
  and we won't be so reckless.

My face betrays its youth
in cratered flesh and truth
trenches of war torn living
in need of your forgiving.
You need confession as well.
Pour cool tears into our hell.

Autumn turns nature more intense.
     Peasants harvest Burnt sienna and
     other shades of red while black crows
     crawl across the French blue sky.
     Leaves catch fire briefly falling
     into winters Payne's grey grave.
     I clutch hope in my lonely winter.
     Please visit soon, Lad. Love, Vincent.

I hope to God I don't become
a stalker of Stephen Dunn.
He's my touchstone and poet.
I read and learn and rein my
deaths in and focus on my days
walking dogs and cleaning a catbox.
I'm old and wrinkled and stubbornly
afraid to change my modus operandi.
My poetry may not be printed
but it's my most sacred diary.
Forget the confessional. I put
my sins in lines on the page
and think any God can see it.
Mr. Dunn, If you have a class
in my city I'll take a chance
and sign up and hope you help
me make better poems but please
don't burn my confessional down.

I'm your portal to eternity
      take my hand and dance with me
      whirl and curtsy you will see
      how wonderful to be so free
      unadorned with puppet strings
      no more irksome gravity
      no appointments to obey
      no monthly bills left to pay
      no more Hail Marys to pray
      my soul found its home today.

I put the tent
on hot cement
where we never went
Jesus moves hell scent
cools our sins spent
praise our pain's sweat.

I was driving a Uhaul filled
    with my meager life thus far
    with my latest burned out love
    beside me going to Nashville.
    I thought she'd stay behind.
    I couldn't break hearts clean
    like a good hanging neck snap;
    always death by a thousand cuts.

Every part of me recycled
into flies, maggots and dirt.
Give back all that made me
from my fathers lust squirt.

Mom's heavy lifting pregnant.
Her piles, puke and constipated
the zygotes don't know or care.
One day they'll be cremated.

More than her cat died that night.
  Childhood a decaying corpse as well.
  Nothing lasts forever or should it?
  Maybe our soul? Maybe heaven, hell?
  Prayers before bed on bent knees
  seem silly now. It is a mad world in
  which we pretend to know how to live.
  No instruction manual. Just a final breath.