NEW POEMS BOOK ONE

if it doesn’t come bursting out of you

in spite of everything,

don’t do it.

unless it comes unasked out of your

heart and your mind and your mouth

and your gut,

don’t do it.

if you have to sit for hours

staring at your computer screen

or hunched over your

typewriter

searching for words,

don’t do it.

if you’re doing it for money or

fame,

don’t do it.

if you’re doing it because you want

women in your bed,

don’t do it.

if you have to sit there and

rewrite it again and again,

don’t do it.

if it’s hard work just thinking about doing it,

don’t do it.

if you’re trying to write like somebody

else,

forget about it.

if you have to wait for it to roar out of

you,

then wait patiently.

if it never does roar out of you,

do something else.

if you first have to read it to your wife

or your girlfriend or your boyfriend

or your parents or to anybody at all,

you’re not ready.

don’t be like so many writers,

don’t be like so many thousands of

people who call themselves writers,

don’t be dull and boring and

pretentious, don’t be consumed with self-

love.

the libraries of the world have

yawned themselves to

sleep

over your kind.

don’t add to that.

don’t do it.

unless it comes out of

your soul like a rocket,

unless being still would

drive you to madness or

suicide or murder,

don’t do it.

unless the sun inside you is

burning your gut,

don’t do it.

when it is truly time,

and if you have been chosen,

it will do it by

itself and it will keep on doing it

until you die or it dies in

you.

there is no other way.

and there never was.

as a child

I suppose

I was not quite

normal.

my happiest times were

when

I was left alone in

the house on a

Saturday.

there was a large

old-fashioned

stand-up

Victrola

in the front

room.

you wound it

up with a

handle on the

right-hand

side.

my favorite time

of the day

was late

afternoon.

it was shady then,

it was

quiet.

I’d take out all the

phonograph records

and spread them

out on the floor

around the

room.

I preferred the

ones with the dark

purple

label.

I only played

those.

but I didn’t really like

the

music

very

much.

I’d hold my finger

against the spinning

record

and slow down the

sound.

I liked that

better.

I played all the

records with the

purple label

over and over,

slowing down the

sound.

as I slowed the

music down,

interesting things

happened in my

head

but they were

momentary:

I would see a

waterfall, then it

would quickly

vanish.

or I would see

my father putting

on his leather

slippers in the

morning

or a

tiger killing

something.

I kept seeing

brief glimpses

of many things

before they

vanished

but sometimes

I’d see

nothing unusual,

just the purple

label

revolving

revolving

and I’d attempt to

read the print

as the record

turned.

finally I would put

all the records

carefully

away

and I would

rewind the

machine

and watch the

turntable

spin.

it was covered

with green

felt

and I would

alter the speed

of the turntable

by holding my

finger against

it.

after that,

I would go to

the front window

and peek through the

drapes at the lady

across the street.

she sat on the

front steps

of her house

most of the day,

her legs crossed

as she smoked

her cigarettes.

she spoke to our

neighbors as they

walked by and

she had long silken

legs.

she laughed often

and seemed

happy:

she was not

at all

like my

mother.

I’d watch her for

a long

time.

I’d watch her

until she went

back into her

house.

next was the

clock on the

mantel.

it had a large

sweeping

second

hand.

then the contest

would

begin:

me against the

second

hand.

I would position

myself on the

floor

so that I could

watch

the second

hand.

I would wait until

it touched the

twelve,

then I would

hold my

breath.

I would hold

it as long as

possible,

timing

myself.

then I would

begin

again,

holding my

breath

in an attempt

to hold it

longer than

I was able to

the last

time.

I would note the

time that had passed,

then I would

begin once again

in an

attempt to

better that

time.

each time

I would

be able to hold

my breath

a little

longer.

but it became

more and more

difficult.

I’d hear an

excited announcer’s

voice:

“THIS TIME, LADIES

AND GENTLEMEN,

THERE WILL SURELY BE A

NEW WORLD’S

RECORD!”

it got hard,

it got very hard,

holding my breath,

but the world

record was

important.

I could no longer

just lie there

holding it

in,

I had to clench

my fists

and roll about on

the rug.

I’d close my eyes

while

flashes of light

exploded inside

my head,

explosions of color,

red, blue,

purple!

at last,

I’d breathe

in and

look at the

clock:

I HAD SET A NEW

WORLD’S RECORD

15 SECONDS LONGER

THAN THE OLD

ONE!

then I’d get

up,

go into the

kitchen and drink

a glass of

water.

I always drank a

glass of water,

then.

I don’t know

why.

soon after that

my parents would

come home,

first my mother,

then my

father.

my mother wouldn’t

say much,

she’d be busy in

the kitchen,

but my father

always had something

to say

and it was always

the

same:

“well, Henry, what

have you been doing

all day?”

“nothing.”

“nothing? what the

hell kind of answer is

that?”

I wouldn’t reply,

not to him,

he would never

know,

I’d die before I

would tell him

anything,

he could kill me

before I’d tell

him.

him and his shoes,

him and his ears,

him and his hairy

arms.

whatever it was

I had

done,

it belonged only to

me.

to avoid the inexplicable had always been

a necessity for me.

and so this day in 1942

I was 21 years old

sitting on a park bench

with and like the

other bums

when the war chariots

rolled by

soldiers on their way

to war

and the soldiers saw

me

hated me

began yelling and cursing

at me

asking me what the hell I

thought I was doing there!

I was the only young bum

in the park.

the soldiers wanted me to be going

with them.

the whole column of them

screamed and cursed at

me

as they drove

by.

then the column was

gone and the old bum

next to me

asked, “how come you

ain’t in the Service,

son?”

I got up and walked

down to the library.

I went inside

found a book and

sat down

at a table.

I began to read

the book.

the meaning was

too deep

for me

then.

so I put it

back on the shelf

walked back outside

and waited.

I used to drive those trucks so hard

and for so long that

my right foot would

go dead from pushing down on the

accelerator.

delivery after delivery,

14 hours at a time

for $1.10 per hour

under the table,

up one-way alleys in the worst parts of

town.

at midnight or at high noon,

racing between tall buildings

always with the stink of something

dying or about to die

in the freight elevator

at your destination,

a self-operated elevator,

opening into a large bright room,

uncomfortably so

under unshielded lights

over the heads of many women

each bent mute over a machine,

crucified alive

on piecework,

to hand the package then

to a fat son of a bitch in red

suspenders.

he signs, ripping through the cheap

paper

with his ballpoint pen,

that’s power,

that’s America at work.

you think of killing him

on the spot

but discard that thought and

leave,

down into the urine-stinking

elevator,

they have you crucified too,

America at work,

where they rip out your intestines

and your brain and your

will and your spirit.

they suck you dry, then throw

you away.

the capitalist system.

the work ethic.

the profit motive.

the memory of your father’s words,

“work hard and you’ll be

appreciated.”

of course, only if you make

much more for them than they pay

you.

Out of the alley and into the

sunlight again,

into heavy traffic,

planning the route to your next stop,

the best way, the time-

saver,

you knowing none of the tricks

and to actually think about

all the deliveries that still lie ahead

would lead to

madness.

it’s one at a time,

easing in and out of traffic

between other work-driven drivers

also with no concept of danger,

reality, flow or

compassion.

you can feel the despair

escaping from their

machines,

their lives as hopeless and

as numbed as yours.

you break through the cluster

of them

on your way to the next

stop,

driving through teeming downtown

Los Angeles in 1952,

stinking and hungover,

no time for lunch,

no time for coffee,

you’re on route #10,

a new man,

give the new man the

ball-busting route,

see if he can swallow the

whale.

you look down and the

needle is on

red.

almost no gas left.

too fucking bad.

you gun it,

lighting a crushed cigarette with

one hand from a soiled pack of

matches.

shit on the world.