It Goes Without Saying

it’s the new year I feel like falling upside down
conversing with whirlybirds 
how funny i’ve gone this far in life without reading
Valley of the Dolls
though i did read Stoner
quite recently and learned a lot about the corruption
of academia which came as no surprise
what surprised me was the honesty
i believe that feeling can be expanded
to include my fingers
as i wait for the sun to rise in the east
i’m going to take a deep breath now and inflate
an empire of otherworldly beings
reality is mostly ice
an angel told me that
and whatever this is
because it’s words
everything you experience
is a fuchsia
 
when consciousness becomes words it
becomes a shape
and glows in a grill
charcoal plays tricks
it takes stamina
to flutter your patterns
like semaphores
of fire
they will ignite your brain
and this is called heat
the sanctity of trance
smells of romance
maybe I just need to eat more
read more
books about the transformative ores of metaphors
and the golden faucets of Venice
Vivaldi’s violins
the canals of Venice are drying up
thanks to the miasmic suck
of commerce and tourists
people say get real
I say get unreal
climb into your body
without making a sound 
 
I offer this substitute
of emotional quirkiness
because it’s sublime to feel this way
what a mess to wake up to every day
this is how the search for consciousness
is nothing more
nothing less
than a lobster wiggling its antennae
at the local aquarium
 
entanglements
happen all the time
some things are said
which have no basis
in what Kant meant
they just get said
i’m not going to argue with you
that’s not how i do things
i like to thump my chest
and swing through the jungle
releasing an ululating yodel
if space and time are the framework
within which the mind is constrained
to construct its experience of reality
who can explain the presence of gargoyles
I always know when Baudelaire is around
I smell hashish
you need music
mud can’t play a harp 
but the wind can

if this were a Vermeer
it would look like Idaho
busy doing nothing
because the brush is delicate
i take this to heart
it’s a curious medium
especially when it meanders
sounds become tangible
old brown shoes
with a whiff
of abstraction
each bristle
sparkles when it curves
into feathers and hunts
for a way into heaven
and for that i need a pair of eyes
so i can scratch my thoughts
on the sky 

Existence is a precarious business. Sinuous, convoluted, Daedalean. An old man on the English moor shaking his fist at the howling winds. Humility comes later, after the tragedies and storms. And to each individual comes a moment when the air snaps into words and starts a smorgasbord of ideas. I like ideas. And imaginary solutions, like the art of fermentation. They say we know less about the ocean than we do the other planets and stars in the universe. The same could be said about consciousness, which is maddeningly elusive, like the weight of the air on a G string, and tastes like infinity. I feel better now. Consciousness bubbles along with sturgeon and catfish in its currents and some coastline in its dreams of sweet oblivion. I’m like that French kid, Rimbaud, who drifted down the Meuse on a barge in a drunken state. Except I’m much older, and drive a hard bargain when it comes to methods of overstimulation. I’m more like that other guy, Jarry, who bicycled around Paris on a stripped-down, fixed-gear Clément Luxe bicycle, often without brakes, and using pistols to clear the paths. Except I drive a Plymouth Barracuda and exercise a certain magisterial air in traffic jams, much of it involving my middle finger. Life in the 21^st century is hard. Mortality craves wisdom. But I’ll never understand money.  

My comprehension of the world has turned ugly. I see dead trees. Dark dreary days. It’s not even a matter of hope anymore, it’s a question of atmosphere. Hard to explain. I find it difficult to describe coleslaw, much less postmodernism. Since the riverbed is marshy, the afterlife is filled with a cosmic haze. It feels hospitable, and glows like a son of a bitch. I've been talking about this a lot lately. People nod sagely, then order a piroshki. Somewhere on the outer edge of a hot dog, there are moments that offer something broader to our understanding than nothing at all. Horizons, for example, which aren’t actual things, but seem like things. They’re hyperobjects, like the U.S. postal service, or Netflix. Death is a hyperobject. And so is capitalism. So are oil spills. Antibiotics. Artificial Intelligence. Murderous government thugs on slippery ice. Or the sum of all Styrofoam. Words strung together like a ball of contentious lettuce. If there are hyperobjects, might there also be miniobjects? The sound of rain clanking between your teeth. Gravity trapped in a jar of stars. It has a kind of romance to it. And a strange kind of dentistry. I just want you to know that I can feel your presence. And I’m glad you’re here. 

my anguish is sulfur
my shirt is a fine silken teal
you can do what you want
but stay off of my blue suede shoes
look how interesting a sound can be
and screams
and sirens and vowels 
i can hear a chestnut fall
and hit a car two blocks away
the haunting rhythms
of Zuni gourd rattles
allow me the pleasure
of stepping into the void
nobody owns time
nobody owns space
each sound is an atmosphere
of freely espoused implications
folds of air
so engorged with spirit
garden gnomes
hop around on pogo sticks