Gulp response

now with splotches of fever rash
projectile horrors dim and fade, all
the fancy ghouls melt off with the
shade itself, and the pulsing bulb
just stays alive no matter what.

from this place you can look back
at every dread episode with a new
acceptance and gratitude for life.
For example once when an angry
man triggered your gulp response.



Tom
"I must be a hundred and nine."

Kathmandu cloudburst

 by Tom

Everyone who crawls

They have green skyscrapers coated in thick soft padding that's easily gripped and climbed. There's a field that gravitizes workers to the surface-- no one falls, but everyone who crawls to their office has a better chance of success due to the life-balancing effects of exercise. 

Boxers and thongs

gol i'm sensitive to sounds
and lights
i'm sensitive to everything
because i just exist
i have no foci
like that thing where people nod their head yes while they're speaking
that's new we didn't used to do that maybe 20 years ago
it's been 20 years of nodding yes while you speak
or starting every conversation, answering every question with "so"
as if you are carrying on an endless monologue or speech
about ten years on that one
or the way music keeps getting worse and worse
at the grocery the speakers are right there above you in every other aisle
a canyon of loud bad pop and cereals, rice cakes honey and tea
stretching out as far as you can see
in front and back behind you
then sometimes when i'm driving
cap'm will come and try to take the wheel
shut up and move the hell over i'm comandeering this vehicle
that's when problems start to happen
it's his fault i now
have to wear sweatpants and a hoodie half the year around the house
instead of boxers and thongs


Hoolie

weirdness in sense of time

latest symptoms:
weirdness in sense of time
a shape jumping in periphery
racing feeling
seems like I haven't walked the dog for weeks
but i just did it yesterday
then it takes all night to fill the gas tank
even the post-decimals linger
it takes a high framing speed
to provide the illusion of true movement,
but these moments present as unilateral,
asynchronous attacks on consciousness
i thought i cut my nails days ago... now look

Donna T.
Released from control subject program due to hysterical infectious psychopathy.
"The nature of embeddedness is that the lines blur."
Journal of the Meta-Cognitive Talk Therapy Apologist Movement

I Miss the Fuck-Those-Motherfuckers Days

They helped us be united in our hatred and to keep it pointed outward.
We started rehearsing smack talk and imagining apocalyptic solutions.
Now, they only fight us within each of our minds and prevent reunion.

We did not experience it as an archetypal situation, primeval reaction
But rather a stand of boar being circled hungrily by laughing hyenas.
It's chilling to watch their backs hunch with that compulsive retching.

Would I trade that again for now is somewhat missing the main point:
Now is nothing if not that all over again without a chance of winning.
Erasing archives, all temples and likenesses, is the only way forward.

Child State

a) Meadows and ghettos are funny because they are disparate.
b) A strong leader is necessary to keep apart warring factions.
c) I must keep focus on paying bills and buying groceries now.


salvaged from "Personality Quiz," burned at the hands of Dr. Donna Thong during a brief coup of the Metacognitive Talk Therapy Apologist Movement at Chalk Chank Clinic, Dubbaberra.

Feeling Racing

When you're accelerating, you feel it; then when you get to a speed and coast, you don't feel it. If you never stop accelerating, you will always feel it.


from "Feeling Racing"
Hoolie, age 10

child hippy

he seemed in tune
and braces wires
would guide him
or the bone drag
rubber band pain
it was for us, not
him: carefreeness.
strode through the
space foam at NA-
SA play day in fl-
ared purple cords,
brought pot to all
the church retreats.
felt sisterhood w/
a. davis and a. d
-workin, then be-
gan junior high.



Peg
"For Hoolie"

i've already worked it out on the dance floor (in progress)

poison arrow
desert claw for water
rappelling
surf's up in a vortex
James Brown slide-lunge & mod contraction
eyeware stem in corner of the mouth stroll
hitchhiker shake
literal hip hop
slippy sliding on ice and/or broken glass
smack-and-sway fist hip
stir the pot
heavy burden shoulder rope drag
pulling a lifeline endlessly toward you
knee bend reaching fingers far behind you left, right
stripper overhead forearm swivel at the elbow
back-against-wall dip
ball shuffle change SLAM (into wall) repeat
shimmy in place with penguin go-go fists
Patty Duke wrist flap foot hop change hop
pogo pero como lo de isadora dun-can
hair-sweat fling lunges
Twiggy hands opening to-sky awakening knee bend
hypnotic National Geographic chinny boob-cup bead hop
soul backup stepping
acid hippy freakout trip birthing from universe
erotic struggle behind, with and against invisible bars
handcuffed vertical worm-like writhing
faux Thai hand-finger ocean waves
fingertip popcorn pop get down
heated hammer go-go
shoulder-to-knuckle full-swing go-go race riot
pirouettes in a mosh pit while spiked partner guards
one-handed cocktail Ipanema shuffle twist
that with no drink punching left right at the waist swivel
driving and anything else
seeking, seeking everywhere with hand over brow
hip rock left right back front back left front right
doing anything while doing that
slippery surface endless fall with a smoke in lips
hair tearing, eye gouge, reaching at heavens bop
natural gyroscope
Afro-diaphragm knee pull trance to drums
lounge lizard slow shoe cigarette mash
anything else you can do at the same time
standing and hugging self, appear as two from behind
squirm doing that
inflated tutu on the open sea arms ankle pump
that to any music with harp in it
shopping bag at feet slow coat slide down the back
whip the effing floor with the B-ass coat, whip
stomp dance around not on coat
low-spinning coat-as-cape thigh pump
gravity-defying slo-mo rock poses
and marching out of a muddy swamp backwards
hard shaking hips, throwing out trash behind left, right
and looking L/R neck pop with hair strung across face


Jan Jansdadd
Jan'z Danztudio
Oslo

People are insane

i have to remember that around
my family
i can take comfort not in
complaining whining
or scapegoating or even calling
them
just that they are they and i
can be myself
assuming that stays within certain
bounds.


by Jan

bananas

exercise as mimesis

I welcome the opportunity to get exercise while accomplishing my necessary daily tasks. Walking to work would be an example. Taking the stairs. Not exercise as a mimetic act. This is like chasing after game. That is like lifting a child. This is like kicking an assassin. Over and over. For that I would have to become a secret agent or movie actor. For it to fit my category of exercise I'm willing to do.


Ken
"Thinking about it alone can create positive changes in my body."

Great Lakes Region

captive seas in bladders
rocky enough to be salt
game, blustery survival

entire cities, camera shy
the elderly retain a chill
wood houses, blue water

lily pads, ice flows, red
and yellow birds, church
deep black water, snow



Phyllis
"It's what I imagine."

Busting a nut will make your eye sockets fill in

Busting a nut will make your eye sockets fill in:
extra buffer against the skeleton
when existentialism seems odd.

Three choices for a snarling alley dog:
psych-or-literal prison,
love and care, euthanasia.

Don't leave the preference up to him:
during this phase, he'll opt out,
over the hump, down for the count.



by Ken

65/35

It is my misfortune
to be right so often
at times in waves of
dawning probability.
now is against, 70/30
yesterday was 65/35.
tomorrow we marvel
at willing co-citizens
who go on, bend over,
at their radioactivity,
the ground they cover
as a mole, unthinking
will claw at his home
kick walls behind him
pause, still burning,
and eagerly consume
a nib of bait in the dirt.



Donna [Dr. Donna Thong, Reinstatement Imminent]
Poetry Table, Activity Hour
Meta-cognitive Talk Therapy Cohort Study [embedded control subject]
The Journal of the Meta-Cognitive Talk Therapy Apologist Movement

peggy

promise

don't ever stop

weightless due to sudden lack of momentum
the lull annexed by a mass so big just that it's
there can suck you in like a tractor beam, but
nature unforced, size, density have this property

we liked ripping packages open with our hands
being really either together or alone, there, here,
to hold self-medicating non-commercial powers
depended upon in a life-or-death importance by

our country which meant everyone of all colors
it was on the way up here we didn't stop but
passed through what we've always wanted: a
moment you can only wait to spin back around?



by Ken
"I got my bell-bottoms for seven dollars."

Vehicle of delivery

When everything is broken or buried
or a scheme for immediate pleasure
or both, is indicated a vehicle of
delivery. Who will defend this

household? you can bake cookies to
sell a house, not a family. But who's
home? At among screens within
screens or the moment between.

Inside that glance is a sea-legged
focus dilation, perhaps a micro-
sleep or brief wakefulness. Or
a real-time racing windshield.



Peg [before she knew]
"Connie, please come home girl."