Oozing

April 30, 2014

The chill rain covers my face like a cold sweat

As I struggle to make my way through the park

Named after the man who made the city of my birth,

Limbs just alive with buds ready to burst

Sagging overhead, the tip of each dripping

Bits of clear liquid and reflect some deep

Drip going on inside of me

This is always the best and worst of the year

For me, a time when change intrudes

And forces itself on me, consuming me

Making me ache inside and out,

Pressing itself against me, chest to chest

So that I breathe in what it breathes out

And so that we linger in a perpetual dance

Neither of us can escape, nor want to,

Regardless of how we penetrate each other,

My breath steaming by the time I reach

The gap at the other end, and my hips

Aching from the effort, leaving me

As if I have been stung by bees

That have yet not emerged for the season

With the stinger still deep inside

Of me – oozing.

Squeeze

I squeeze the bottom first

Before I push it in,

Forefinger and thumb

Feeling it go hard between

Something inside me screams

This thing, we touch,

We thought of as too much,

This tender, bulbous button

We feel grow moist.

And the more we push

The more yielding

It becomes.

A taste so sweet

April 13, 2014

It tastes sweet and warm

When I take it into my mouth

The tip of it like

A long lost memory

I never had,

The ache as deep in me

As my bones,

But a soft taste against

The tip of my tongue

And the ooze of it

As I squeeze

With both hands

Wrapped around each

As I move from one

To the other,

Greedy to take it all in,

Thinking one side

By taste different

Than the other side

When both taste

Just as sweet.

I’m no boy scout

April 10, 2014

This lip against that lip

This hip against that,

I’m like the boy scout

Who can’t stop rubbing

Things together

Hoping to make fire

This lip against that lip,

This hip against yours,

Drawing more from this

Pot of coal than I

Ever deserve,

This lip thick with

The taste of your

The hip dipped deep

Bound to strike flame

Or at least oil

This lip against that lip

This hip against that.

I’m building you a house

July 10, 1977

You want you want a house on the hill

With green, green grass and a field of dill

With dreams of past where children grow

And the day will last and the sky will show

I’m building you a house with a porch

And swing, and a hearth where a fire

Can burn until spring; I’m building you a dream

Until the sun goes down

Got no hammer in my hand

Got no reason to give in

Got these eyes that always stare

Like nails they piece the warm dry air

Making me want to give in

I’m building you a house

With a window on every side

Where the wind blow even

And the clouds collide

Where the sun won’t set

Upon the world outside

I’m building you a dream

Until the sun goes down

You way you want to live

In a hole in the ground

Where the stone is cold

And the steps lead down

With dreams of the past

Locked deep in the earth

And days that will last

For what it is worth,

But I’m building you house

Made of more than dirt

I’m building a dream

That is as big as the earth.

Fotomat

June 20, 1982

Chrome and steel

Shine in the sun

Bright pages

Of the photo album’s

Tender spots

I stand

The heat passing

Through me

The camera is my eye

Light

Confused

Defused

Transposed

This is a picture

For some future

Day when we

As elders

Look

Infused with memory

Lines squiggle

Baby on the lawn

Black & white

Always lines

Linear

Horizontal

Vertical

The pattern

Of this existence

Is beyond all words

I paint it

With camera

Letting the baby

Make the strokes

The sun hotter

As I crawl inside

This black box

And press myself

Upon the film

Shaping the liens

Like a sculptor

Easting away

The darkness

With light and illusion

There is no baby now

No Portland

Just this image

Which imagines me

The shutter swished

Like a guillotine

Slicing away reality

Like a slice of bread

In elder years

The illusion is strange

We forget the journey

The nail scrapings

On the walls of this box

The way out

We wee

The lines

That linger

On the reprint

Call Martin -- actor doing one of my monologues

Actors from time to time use some of my monologues. This one did a demo using one of them and sent me the link

Call Martin: Demo

Flowers and other pickable weeds

April 4, 1980

I am not the man I should be

I am not the song that echoes in the morning

With the rising sun, the settling dew

And crisp unfolding of pedaled flowers

Reaching for you

I am instead a weed, pickable on

This weary earth, but not especially grant

I am for you, if you’ll have me

I’m for me, when you’re gone

Yes, the Sunday chimes ring out

Preaching their own sad song

But mine is different

I am not the man I could be

I am only a heart beating, two eyes

Blinking, and a smile,

Simple and fine

Rising like a weed

For you