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Halloween, 1998
Shaved head,
mascara,
black eyeliner &
black lipstick,
wearing my
Shadow Project
t-shirt,
the one with
Rozz holding a
large knife above
a naked girl behind
swirling veiled
curtains
i cut myself
the blood runs
deep and ruby
covering my arm
it
congeals
in lumps
while some drips off
people walk widely
around me as i go
into a bookstore
and buy
Soldier of Fortune
then on to
Tower
to get two new
My Dying Bride
CDs and then
on for Japanese
i might go see
London After Midnight
at Coven 13 tonight
i might sit at home
and write lousy poems
i might play with my
cat and then go
trick people to death
it's a
freeze
frame
happenstance
reality
of sickness
and i pop
3
Xanax
and fight back
the urge to go
out and
murder the
bitch sitting
in the bank's
parking lot
beside me
[From my book, The Napalmed Soul]
Thoughts of Now
Nights
I spent
in a world
far more
disturbing
than this
the screaming
the checkups
the asshole guards.
I would walk out
and Art would
be pacing,
planning new
things for his
former city.
Textbook
Recently retired
widower. Losing it.
He wanted our morning
group meetings run like
"real" professional
meetings and got
red-faced pissed when
he didn't get the minutes
of the previous meeting.
We all lined up at the
window for our little
cups of pills and the
accompanying water,
just like in the movies,
some wearing nothing
but sheets, most
several sheets gone
to the wind.
They gave me a
killer
sleeping pill
that knocked me on
my ass for a few
hours at least,
so I wouldn't have
to hear the god
awful screaming.
In the
"real"
world,
I might have looked
down
on the help; now I
wondered how they
looked at me. I think
we were mostly zoo
animals to them -
feed 'em, keep 'em
in line, give 'em their
pills, knock 'em on
their collective asses,
get 'em to classes and
bed.
I'm tired and my blood
boils and there's nothing
I can do. There was
another life, and it seemed
so long ago, and I try
to
reconstruct
images, events, people,
all dreams, tethered to
the knife in my soul.
I do remember
the better days,
those days spent
publishing broadsides,
writing frenzied, grading
papers, Lisa and me
frolicking on the bed,
and then
gradual
haze,
intensifying hatred,
personified,
paranoia,
mean streaks getting
meaner,
the final crash,
like back in '90.
This is my cross,
my dagger, my
napalm, my dance
of the dead....
I Gotcha Back
When we had finally been
processed
through after 14 hours,
we were assigned to various
cell blocks. I got 5E in the
East Wing of L.A's Twin
Towers. There were 16
bunks and nearly 65 of us.
I found a square of
concrete and deposited
my blanky. I then looked
for the biggest mother
fucker in the place,
walked up to his table,
sat down, and started
shooting the shit.
Didn't work with the
first one, but did with
the second, so I had
him in my back
pocket. Also had one
of the guys I came in
with watching my back.
He was black, so he
kept me up with the
blacks and I kept him
up with the few whites
there. Things worked out
and I eventually got the
hell out of there, ass
unscathed, hell bent
for goodness.
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