Who gets the blame?

My fortune cookie read:

“No snowflake in an avalanche

ever feels responsible,”

a wise saying at a tough time

as the wind blows troubles

in my direction,

and evil things stir

in warm places

I always thought safe,

An my uncle

Who was a carpenter

Told his own fortunes

Those days I worked

At his side

“If someone hits you

in the head with a hammer,

don’t blame the hammer.”

Birthday

Today it was her birthday

Her friends gave her a card

Wet ink on the cool background
still oozing of life’s regard

Her hair curled behind her head

Her smile sweetens hate

Her life began in the shadow of doubt

About whatever would be her fate

A lady drenched in secrets

She keeps locked inside her heart

No lover ever has the key to it

Only the shards of it blown apart

Who can say what happiness is?

Who will guide her hand?

Who will be behind her?

Who will be her man?

She smiles at the open card

She laughs and even sings

The rage for the moment vanquished

and do not mean a thing

So sing your song of happiness

Of the rise and fall of the sea

Today it was your birthday

A momentary glee

Washington Square

Some it comes to this again

Smiling faces in concrete

Listless souls forever prisoners

To this all might wheel,

Circling like pathetic moons

Chained to it by invisible links

Harder than steel to break

Each of us like tiny silver balls

In an insane game of roulette

Always putting our money down

On the wrong numbers

Me, sitting at the north end

At zero zero,

I am tin man whose heart

Has stopped ticking,

Thinking of those other times

I sat here,

Sometimes the brainless

Scarecrow,

Most often,

The cowardly lion,

Dorothy long gone

To wander this less

Than emerald city

Clicking her heals

Washing water over

Every witch she sees

Singing her songs

To the wind

I write in this notebook

Out of context

Out of mind

These words like all words

Too weak to lift the burden

I need them to lift,

Even Atlas could not

Bear this burden long,

Calling to Pluto or Apollo,

Throwing his chips

On this wheel,

The way I do mine,

Waiting for the little silver

Ball to stop,

Waiting for everybody

To stop orbiting this circle,

Waiting for me to sit

Anywhere else

But zero zero.

I read the words

I read the words

Because I’m not allowed anything else

Nor deserve them,

I read them aloud to squeeze

The juice out of them

Even when sometimes

They drip down onto me

Like acid

A self-torture

Well-deserved

Full of painful parodies

I alone can see

I read the words

Because they stay true

Even I can’t

Their meaning filling me up

Like a beggar’s cup

Coins for that last sip

Before the night seeps in

Rattling around inside my head

All night – keeping me warm

Even the bad ones

The truest ones

The ones I have to shout out

To even say them

As if someone else is

The echoes of some distant

Downtown stranger

Screaming at me

To understand

I read them all,

Again and again,

Gritting my teeth

Over those words

That grind on me most,

Until I can’t tell

Whose voice I hear

Inside my head

I read words

Because they tell how it was

And is,

Even when it hurts.

Time is on my side?

I stand at the end of the pier

The old Rolling Stones song

Stuck in my head

Snatched from tuning the radio

Passed nostalgic stations

I can no longer stand

My mother’s madness

Clinging to me

Like the shroud of Turin

A death mask overlaying

Even the most peaceful scenes

This deep river full of silence

Even as the helicopters buzz

And the ferries churn up

Dark water into a mean white broth

Slippery fish slithering out

Between a fishman’s fingers

Hard to catch, even with both hands

A struggle of not gripping too tight

Or holding on tight enough

Hooks always out of the question

Full of agony even when you need

To toss the fish back

And standing here

Searching the surface

For what was lost

Fishermen seeking things

No longer possible

Hoping for a glimpse

Of silver in the churn of ferries

Knowing how completely

The old song was wrong.

Time isn’t.

Last hour before midnight

You borrow from peter to pay paul,
The hours of each day ticking passed

But not in seconds, minutes or hours

But remembrances,

left in the wake

Of your passing,

Drifting in a sea of sand

One even Lawrence of Arabia

Could not navigate

So far out of memory

By the time you reach

The peak of the next wave

And you lost, too,

That genie already out of the bottle

Cheating you of all your wishes

The savvy sailor who defied sea sickness

Only to succumb to love,

Loose changes rattled in your pockets

Instead of gold,

That one magic moment gone

In a whirlwind

Time ticking on,

One hour bumping into the next

Until you reach that hour when

You realize you can never catch up,

And rub the bottle over and over

With a vain last wish

For the genie to come back,

For someone to fill that one missing hour

Before the clock strikes midnight

And you turn back to what you were

Al Sullivan's webpage