some poems, a few anthems, and a song of repair
11 poems - 2007 to 2011
all this fiddle
an army of poems marched out my door
set out to conquer something
i guess
those poor soldiers never followed
orders anyway
loose words wearing their
poem-masks
flimsy and gorilla brained
all dressed up in duct tape
i threw a dozen pencils out the window
brand new, freshly sharpened
free to roam
to find the lost words, lost
worlds
or whatever pencils desire most
let them fly like arrows into ultimate
awareness
perhaps the pencils will meet up with the poems
in unexpected places
drainage ditched
amateur chess matches and hotdog
stands
perhaps complete each other
and make love in parked cars
connect in ways i could never imagine
maybe they’ll send me postcards
road trip
we can travel together
kick
back in the lap of a classic chevy ragtop
engine
block roaring bold existence
soaring
down huckleberry highways
the
eyes of god spinning
and
every loose strand of your ponytail
painting
the desert blonde
we’ll hunt down all the blind spots
eyes
too wide to have corners, we’ll make up names
for the
stuff maps leave behind, trash-heap landmarks
lost
truckstop civilizations, the grand madness of utah
we’ll decorate the dashboard like noah’s ark
with
your collection of plastic pez dispensers
mickey
mouse and donald duck and whatever
that
frog-looking thing is suppose to be
i’ll
laugh at your cheap toys, you’ll make fun of my ugly hat
we can bum rush a million sideroads
or
linger too long in time traveling roadside restaurants
jukebox
juiced, shuffling dozens of yesterdays
eat
hotdogs and watermelon in a winnemucca parking lot
pour
bottled water over a broken radiator
in arizona
heat waves
you can make a map
of
cloud formations, i’ll navigate the radio
we can
kill the static with philosophical gibberish
or sing
along with hillbilly fiddles
scratching
out lazy love songs
we’ll take shelter
in each
other, and motel showers too small for two
take
epic naps and ruin most of our clothes
in a
piece of crap laundromat
we can witness the heartbeats of alien cities
i’ll
admit I’m lost, and you can lead me
thru
santa fe streets, explore the festival of summer
mingle
in the heat of human nature, make totem poles
out of
strangers, drink the local wine and tell true-ish tales
of
exodus and diaspora
we’ll pose like stray dogs
in
tourist trap photographs, you all ragdoll beautiful
me in my ugly hat
we’ll merge in and out of uhaul caravans
in
grapes of wrath formation
across
the four dimensions of america
black
and white and asphalt gray
and you
can crash in the backseat, paint your toenails
whatever
color you want
we can vanish into blue mountains
the way
all good expeditions do
a
gospel of impulse
nothing
but myth
and a
trail of sunflower seeds
2009
bowl of soup
first, the rice goes into the soup
then the fish
carrots, mushrooms, leeks
the poet stirs it with a stick
and the song that he sings, wordless and off key, goes into
the soup
and the smoke of the fire, bits of drifting ash
whatever the wind brings along
remnants
of rain
grains of earth and herb from a thousand plowed fields
mountains crumble in the poet’s mind
become loose boulders rolling
become round and smooth and wise
some grind down to dust and wait for the next mountain to
rise
some
travel the valley
seventeen perfect pebbles roll within reach
go into the soup
the last drops of saki and a tread from his shirt, into the
soup
he adds the vanishing memory of youth
all the leftover laughter of summer festival
drunk
friends
all the footsteps that stumble
dew
drops
nightingales
lonely
cricket
into the soup and stirred with a stick
the spirits of scarecrow and firefly, into the soup
the stars and the moon above, tangled in the gravity of soup
crash into the soup
soup becomes universe
alive
the poet sits, symmetrical in silence
(night - highway - fire - soup)
he holds the bowl with both hands and takes little sips
the
soup is hot
2010
“clear view
In the soup kettle…
The milky way”
Kobayashi issa (priest “cup-of-tea” of haiku temple)
the aneurysm (inspired by “the thinker” by auguste rodin)
"the thinkin' dude" by ziggy zagmyer
he had an aneurysm
right there on the steps of the
museum
a crash landing of sorts
between greek myth and nuclear physics
i heard a sharp pop, like a small caliber gunshot
witnesses were concerned
and then not concerned
some say his heart was made of styrofoam
others say a pearl, all clammed up
some say he’s a fake, imitation of humanity
hired by some egg-head committee
to pose superior, ponder a footstep
pretend a few heartbeats
just a hollow shell, knock but no one answers
sometimes magpies perch on his shoulder
whisper in his ear
secrets are safe here
only gods and fools and small ugly birds talk to rocks
as a boy i would sit on his knee
he would flex his muscles and make
a fist
punch himself in the face
trying to dislodge all those dark
thoughts
but dark thoughts are like miller moths
in a windowsill
kill one
and two more appear
we sang sex pistol songs in rain shelters
waiting for the bus
we shared a sandwich and a migraine
watched lithe and determined women float by
imagined them dazzled and
bewildered and naked
in the arms of our dangerous poems
he’s not drunk, just socially awkward
and a little homesick
for secret islands of nowhere
somewhere
between stonehenge and silicon
valley
his name is lorenzo, a pisces and a winter
a governor of renaissance, a
generation x stacker
philosopher and ice cream vender, inventor of wagon wheels
patron saint of farris wheels
old wounded warrior
veteran of multi-colored revolution, feet scarred mile
markers
his mind tattooed in blue lightning
and i was there when it flashed
the aneurysm, right there on that pedestal
witnesses will tell you, i tried to
save him
but i couldn’t wake him
perhaps these ugly birds can breathe life back into him
fill
him up with earth-babble-dream-nectar
the
nonsense of life
the
wonder
2009
"the thinking dude"
copyright ziggy zagmyer
pretty waitress perfect of fools
she’s a lovely cold sculpture, marble nude with her head cut
off
a sexartwar reality keeps the rattle snake that bit her
in a peanut butter jar, like voodoo
she’s a painting of a painting, a revlon reproduction
venus on the half-shell, phosphorus and effervescent, arms
wide like
happy hour and everybody’s glow in the dark expectations
coming true
she wears a uniform of fingerprints, her angels in aprons
overshadowed
by dogs playing poker, howling her attention
she cleans up and collects whatever beerbelly heroes leave
behind
nickels quarter dimes, her rent money jingles
she’s a time-traveling daydream, her mind leaping thru
wormholes
body serving smiles here, head swimming in future grace
on long bus rides she rearranges mental furniture (symbolic
sofas
in relation to symbolic windows, grand pianos on top of
glass coffee tables
on top of brass buddha candle holders)
acrobats and ballet daredevils
she stuffs her soul into shoes too small, stretches her body
into double shifts
overtime in underground nightclubs, basements full of
hey-dudes
and hey-bros in hey-ho-lets-roll rattlesnake bliss
licking each syllable- hey girl
you-wanna-git-wit-thissssssssssssssssssssss?
she’s twenty-seven now, still standing in a doorway,
evolving
revolving in and out of fear and doubt and circles of dead
inception (sex-
art-war-sex-art-war-sex-art-war-sex-art-war-sex-
art
war)
see her scrubbing tables? see her bleaching her reflection?
scratching thru the surface the varnish comes unglued, see
her
wash away? the moment splits in two, a small voice becomes
urgent like
some twisted edvard munch screaming
screwthissceneiwantout!
put the wardrobe back on the mannequin
pose it in the kitchen, the display window
back up on the pastry tray
slip out of her mona lisa cage
where the black earth washes her feet
removing miles of bad road
turning stone back to flesh
winter-thawed and summer-bound
aprilish
singing reunited gaia-heart
(i am universe
i am
universe
i am
uni
verse)
see her holding the moon in her hands?
perfect
of poets and fools
2007
cycle of the moth
so this moth sits on the back of my hand, examining my
substance
and the circumference of all things
human,
and with or without comprehension
of the odd shaped man-contraption, will drop dead
living but a single day
weeds grow in the fields below cool shades of sky
and worms play with ideas of immortality
(mortally wounded flied dangle from spider webs
like spider snacks in spider traps in a way that only dead
flies can)
the mortally wounded chevy nova sits flat against the gravity
of dirt road, uncertain of motion
suspended
in summer
wandering
in thought
becky and mick in the backseat talking, i am in the front
stevie ray plays little wing on some distant frequency
she crushes out a cigarette and lights another
then opens her mouth to let her confusions flutter:
how come
violets and blue, and not violet?
How come
the ocean is blue, but rain is gray?
if the
eye in the sky sees everything, can it see itself?
is
everything watching everything?
when dogs dream, do sleeping cats
awaken
screaming with
nightmares?
and
we’ve been waiting here for hours
if the
tow truck never comes for us, does it still exist?
we
consider this
and suddenly hear the sound of one
hand clapping
blam!
as i slap another bug crawling across the dashboard
(it all comes back to me, the primordial memories
like buzzing swarms of bees, or bees that swarm buzzingly
swarming memories of primordial buzzing that comes back to
me
like hot kilowatts of bees)
it all comes back to this moth, a dusty paper god
who
lives but a single day, and spends it
banging
against the windshield
2009
credo quia absurdum
(the hoax)
so these scientists these crazy what’s wrong with you
scientists
put an ancient vase on a record
player, applied a laser
and some super science, digital scanners, noise filters and
crossed fingers
(f.m. – frequency modulation –
funky magic)
set up wine glasses and crockpots with little cocktail
weenies
and held the world’s greatest strangest séance
they made sculpture giggle
imagine
their surprise
six-thousand-year-old young girls laughing so loud they
leave grooves
not
gods
not wizards, just girls, children of clay, born of flesh,
translated to breath
expelled from happy lips and pressed back into clay on a potter’s
wheel
i want to believe
because it’s so absurd
because i want to know laughter is eternal
in
the fossils and footprints of my ancestors
in the homemade toys i slingshot into the future
i want
to believe in that grace
and i want to dance with the shy blond girl
in the white
dress, in the frieze of life
feet
splashing
in a garden of green paint, laughter thick as plaster
and
spin her till her dress falls off
and i should rescue this princess bohkara
reclaim it from this cold thrift store
too
precious to leave on the floor
listen close and hear mothers teaching daughters eternal
knots
this will be my blanket, and i will sleep and dream
in the
footprints of elephants
and i can stare hours and hours
into
vinny’s whirling stars, big wind fist
punching
the moon
my eyes go all rapid cycle dream-optic oscillation
all those brushstrokes screaming blueblueblueblueblueblue!
i want to live in a museum
i
want to lick all the art
i want to eat their hearts
convinced
they’re made of cinnamon rolls and raspberry jelly
porkchops
and cheesecake
and the
psychic breathmint of eucharist
and i want someone to drink this poem, taste my fever
my tire
fire, my words wide open leaping into
frequency
modulation
imagine
space and time never forgetting a single note of music,
every echo
endless
ocean in a seashell
highway in a
hubcap
giggling
girls
in
a cookie jar
imagine
somewhere in a distant future, deep in the long-gone of mankind
travelers
from a more flexible universe
bubble-headed paleoacousticologists on safari
some
crazy what’s wrong with you alien race
finding
our remains
finding this world a dead relic, a lazarus bowl, soul jar
bursting with ghosts
point a record player needle at this mess of human milieu
and discover
the
human voice:
rose is
a rose is a rose is a rose
and
e pluribus unum
and
today is a good day to die
and i’ll
have a blue, blue-blue-blue-blue christmas
and
mr watson come here
and
this puke stinks like beer
and the poets lie too much
and
frog leaps – sound of – splashing
and i
want to fuck you like an animal
and a pocket full of poems, ashes, ashes, we all write poems
(and remember, this is just a hoax)
and
everything was beautiful
nothing hurt
2011
various haiku
just little ripples
in mother’s wake
we tie our ponies
and pick chokecherries
the peach trees blossom
only butterflies
smiling, she blushes
purple as the plums
in her basket
robert frost reduced to haiku and tickled to death
with zen madness
purple as the plums
in her basket
in a yellow wood
diverging roads make
no difference
diverging roads make
no difference
mothership
bless’d are the graffiti artists
canary kids tasting the atmosphere
illegal artists caught in the gleaming glory of police spotlights
recording history in black and purple block letters
every word a bruise
bless’d are the jackhammers, bulldozers, traffic cones
urban madness blocking all the sidewalks
bless’d are the dreamers who dream upside down
who dangle from the thinnest of wires, whispering at the world
(hello fate, my name is bait)
orphans in the aftermath of billionaire bubble-math
long shaking limbs, bones with beards, creeping out of their caves
like wolfs, or werewolves, or insane haiku masters:
(hello friend
running for president
need campaign funds)
philiosophers of practical jalopyism, bless’d are all things that
don’t know how to die, and the junkyards where jalopy’s dream
of a mothership
bless’d is the hole in the dashboard where the stereo used to be
and the grace of a skilled thief who can jimmy a lock without smashing a window
bless’d are the pawnshops that don’t ask
thru coffee-stained windows, profound or profane
frame by frame and thing by thing
and receive our blessings
of a seventy-four story corporate headquarters
i shall not fear
because
graffiti gardens glow in the dark, aerosol nightlights painted in combustible colors
knowable only to those who speak the language of drums, fists, heartbeats
only those who speak the language of falling apart
putting it back together, pretending no broken or missing or stolen parts
for they shall inherit these walls
2011
secret door on the back of a photograph
too much factory district, too much winter bus stop
too
much rent and paper-thin paycheck
too many scrap metal scars
too much heart in my chest pinching lungs in half
too much gray landscape on the surface of my eyes
too
many holes in my jeans
too much is too much and she comes to me
like
something out of a jukebox
a renaissance
and i wash away in headsong
her arms
are long
like rope, so i climb up to her atmosphere, copasetic blue
a million cartoon parachutes
her face
is calm
always april, shelter from angry storms, and i fall asleep
on her cheek
her heart
feels solved
like a vase, open ended vessel
woman
shaped wishing well
her thoughts
are
time machines, rosary beads, wind hitting a wind chime
with accidental pleasure
and she says to me
if the world is an actor, then the actor is a villain, and
the strings of this machine need
oil and ambition, and the stage is a mirror for the hero in
our heads, complicated symbols
flashlights for weapons, trick coins
and sharp pencils, if the world is an actor
then
the actor is a villain
she says
go deep
if it
soothes
smooths
sink to the bottom of real
unaware
one eye flashing hazard lights, one eye filled with shadow
fish
exhale
and evolve
love will remember your name, skip stones across the water
trails
to lead you back home
somewhere
pastries fall off the back of a bakery truck
and the
ravens dive in
somewhere, a mangy black dog enjoys a brown leather shoe
somewhere, a photograph unfolds
faded
fingers tracing the silver shapes, and jukebox prophecy
rings
loader than a bus driver’s battle cry
hey
you getting on or what?
guitar in a pawnshop
a gibson guitar more sunburnt than sunburst with a pawnshop glow, twisted neck
dead frets, hanging horse thief from a hook in a room made of dust and i wonder
if fingers remember
how to lick steel
bend spoons
scream
fingers cluster up and chunk-a chunk-a chunk-a, fingers grinding needles, fingers
pinching nerve cords (chunk-a chunk-a chunk-a) making minor god noise
dropping harps from heaven
throwing bricks at butterflies
fingers tighten and intensify
twang-twang-twang-twist-twirl-chunk-a chunk-a-squeal
a weasel in a bear trap, pipe wrench on a pipe bomb, fingers invert
the in goes out, the out comes in, fingers wrap around the neck
make this machine fight for breath
so hot, red hot radiator caps
plucking individual moments pictures scars collisions, measuring so careful
a lullaby with a smoker’s cough
decompose and unsing a symphony backwards thru a blender, scrape metal
motherfucker
fingers fly, speed of light fly, fingers lift-rise-soar-scream-roar and
fly
fingers know the reasons, know what i long to be
sound
pure sound
no fingers, no strings, no magicians up my sleeve
just sound
high frequency blue sensation (waaaaaaaaaaaaah)
then fast elegant riffs descending down, riff down down down
dwindling down into rumbling fog thunder, into pitch black amplified
afterglow
2008
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