Million Dollar Baby

No more whistling Dixie,
Trixie, the buck stops here--

No more tinsel,
No more razzmatazz,
No more Wall Street
Whizz-kids, no more jazz--

When Eastwood kicks the bucket,
No escape from Alcatraz.

Slaking Our Thirst for Fame

--for John Levy

For the sake of disambiguation,

However we
Lick the flames

Of the fire
Of our vanity,

Red Bull remains
The name of the game.

Rash Crash Diet

Poor plump dead cat-mangled
Mouse down in my orchard, you

Sure fell hard for sweet fallen apples--
Should have been mousse instead.

RECENTLY RECEIVED: Ron Silliman and yours truly both received a copy of John Levy's remarkable new book of poetry, Oblivion, Tyrants, Crumbs just out from First Intensity Books. John's been a friend for over thirty-five years (!) and has been writing finely-honed poetry even longer. He also wrote a book about the two years he spent in Meligalas with his fiancee (now wife, mother of two, and a painter) Leslie Buchanan, titled We Don't Kill Snakes Where We Come From: Two Years in a Greek Village published by Querencia Books in 1994. He's also our son's godfather, so I'm gonna make you an offer you can't refuse--buy da books!

Mind Field in America

Clearly, a song
Of dead

Reckoning.

*

Mind you

These dudes were done for
Before they knew what hit them.

*

Like that sheen under

Mining the surface
Of superficial things?

*

Better let duds determine
What land minds mean

I mean

*

They figure

No prosthetic devices
To carry

Their numbers over.

*

In addition to body
And fender

Men, we see ambulances dance,
Romance languages languish

In agony, white Anglo-Saxon
Whores ply spare

Automotive body parts.

Genetically Modified Root Cellar

Rats! Ma and Pa,
You ain't been listening--

This is what's in
Store for us

And plenty darn more
Where that jolly

Ho, ho, ho's
Coming from

I done told you before--
That humungous green

Horny transmogrified hermaphrodite
Bean sprout's sprouting corn balls again,

Stalking our cellar floor!

If Poems Were Dwelling Places

--for William Michaelian

Quite simply,

We would all live well
Beyond our means.