I want something important
to come out of my mouth
every time I sit down.
I scattered pages off of my desk.
I tore lines
and lines
and lines
out of notebooks with thin, stringy binding,
that has aged cheaply.
I rubbed and stroked and coaxed
words out of my head with frustrated
hard palms crushing my temples
like a scene out of a mobster flick.
And the products are still
no better than what I might stroke
from a dog's dick.
I walk and circle the block twice
then three
and I realize the thing that I saw in my dream
is receding with every inch of time surrendered.
I want something important
to come out of my mouth
every time I sit down.
I want to know that there is
an idea there worth scribbling.
An idea that is worth more
than the same idea
I had five years ago.
Or was it six. The five settling in
for comfort
in its roundness in the mouth
where more pointed things
more difficult things
once lived.
Sitting legs tucked
and untucked
and sidelong
and wide
and feet up
and feet down,
however oriented
the blood does not keep
within the housing that needs it most.
Out of doors again
and I walked, feet dragging,
then tripping, then dragging,
and walked to find
a certain something
I lost before the sun came
to heckle the waste
and the wasted.
I stumbled to a halt
two dozen feet up the street
and sat to a stoop
that was not my home
because I heard and I knew
the footsteps
that stirred the leaves behind me
were the same
and I was not
dreaming.
Every time I sit down
and open my mouth
I know him above and beyond all doubt.
And can capture so little of the feel.
