Thursday, August 19, 2010

Your Own Personal Version Of A Nightcap

and so you're just standing on your back porch grilling away happy as a clam not exactly sure
what the hell that means with your wife having taken off at dusk for a little downtime at the local library hearing the mother next door going through her daily routine and ritual of hollering at her
monsters who told me she put them in catholic school cause both her and her husband had had
really good experiences jim morrison crooning trailing off through the screen window you forgot
to turn off in your son's bedroom the minister's daughter in love with a snake...while you just
stand there with your pitchfork full of marinade in the air and for some strange reason satisfied and
contented in don't know how long and look up for the first time and the first season losing yourself
in the great big massive deep dense oak just beginning to bend to grow laden with acorns and then
just like everything else in this perverse puzzling and perfectly delicate universe just like the fireflies
and tree frogs just like the crickets and cicadas just like the howling catholic school mother just like
jim morrison it all dies down and start to think is it at all possible you might just be starting to get it
all but know you're in a heck of a lot of trouble once you start thinking that way and know too that is
an absolutely absurd notion and has to be false and there could be nothing further from the truth cause there's really no truth or false to begin with in the first place or even for that matter to fathom or imagine and from a zen-buddhist perspective as well in this empty and hollow and lonesome world there's
absolutely nothing to get at all

the chicken tasted good though...

Wednesday, August 18, 2010

A Contemporary Social & Cultural Hx Of America

1. A Time More Innocent

when they seemed to just take you hostage on a runway somewhere in the vicinity of north africa
with the names of countries you never heard of and the worst that you could say was that they just
put a nice scare into you as this terrorist showed a scared people peeking and poking their heads
from the portholes of planes and hollering such outrageous claims like--"i told you i didn't want any
sauce on my souvlaki!" okay maybe not but it all just seemed so histrionic and symbolic and vague
almost like some passion play or scene from pacino's dog day afternoon and road runner explosions
and threats and ultimatums that never ever seemed to come to fruition and then the eyewitness
action-news team would show up with their exclusive round the clock coverage on the standoff
of a bunch of panicky palestians just trying to take off on foot across the runway like some
lame loosey-goosey game of ringo leevio and the worst was that it just proved to be a bit
inconvenient like some pink panther version starring the irrepressible peter sellers playing
himself and vice versa and the dictators looked like a bunch of big handsome sleazy macho
gigolos in shiny polyester shirts maybe with the sunglasses and hairy chest and disco afros
like they were getting ready to party and get coked up at studio 54 and try to score with all
the girls in a time when things just seemed more innocent and more to hope and dream of

henry kissinger showing up...




2. The New & Improved Actions & Adventures Of Jesse James

i mean isn't it all so surreal or peculiar and odd these days this guy who goes by the name of jesse
james cheating on his blessed wife some say one of the sweetest and 'most well-liked actresses in america' fooling around with this cartoon character with blown-up bosoms and tattoos of swatzikas
he got for a steal in a response to an ad over his computer and now just freshly-divorced as though
he has paid his dues in court and been through the interview circuit of course oprah and katie couric
and confessed his sins and abused as a kid shedding crocodile tears over prime-time television now
appears all healed and absolved and forgiven and ready to move on as evidenced by the american
online headline "jesse james out with a reality star" i mean you know some people just got the life



3. The Source Of Satire

and it's all so funny but not really yet a little funny when you think about it as the war in iraq or "the battle
for baghdad" has taken on the exact same traits and characteristics as the "police-action" in vietnam and it all got started for the exact same false-alarm reasons with the supposed attack on the gulf of tonkin and domino theory and hussein's involvement in 9-11 and weapons of mass-destruction all proven in a parallel
comparison to never have happened and the french warned us to not get involved as had been fighting there for several years before as was the exact same case with the russians in afghanistan and their natives and citizens for good reason naturally fighting back and providing a good whipping for telling them how to run
their culture and country with an old ancient religious fanatical philosophy and history of fighting till the last man standing and then us absurdly claiming when we will be ready to withdraw and pull out and have their troops properly trained and country ready and stable in a better place deep-down inside knowing they're
in such a worse and more fucked-up place from everything we started like a bunch of missionary bullies

the only difference now we got more flags flying and not throwing eggs
and always trying to say the right thing and not showing anything on t.v.

Tuesday, August 17, 2010

Escaping Shangrila

Escaping Shangrila to release Tuesday September 7, 2010.
It will be available at:
www.punkinbooks.com
www.amazon.com and
www.ebay.com

Want to see this book in stores? Contactus@punkinhousepress.org

my top 21 ablums awe time kinda in no poticular aughta

doors l.a. woman
grateful dead american beauty/workingman's dead/europe 72 (pick 'em)
pink floyd dark side of the moon
beatles white album
stones exile on main street
carol king tapestry
joni mitchell hejiera
janis joplin cheap thrills
coltrane favorite things
miles davis sketches of spain
marvin gaye what's going on?
the who quadrophenia
bob dylan blonde on blonde/highway 61 revisited/blood on the tracks (pick 'em)
the clash give 'em enough rope/london calling/sandinista (pick 'em)
meat loaf bat out of hell
smashing pumpkins melancholy and the infinite sadness
nirvana nevermind
pearl jam ten
the smiths
david bowie honky dory/the man who sold the world (pick 'em)
tom waits rain dogs

For Warhol: what i got off the morning internet

medical marijuana how to save one million medical marijuana how to save one million medical marijuana
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A Flat Right Off The Hudson In Sleepy Hollow

all we used to do was
fuck and fuck and fuck and fuck
and fuck and fuck and fuck and fuck

some times some days all we'd do
was fuck and fuck and fuck and fuck
and spend the whole weekend fucking

fucking in her flat in sleeping hollow
fucking away everything all that was painful
all that was phony and suffering and sorrow

all that was bad and wrong in the world
fucking away overbearing impossible
mothers and fathers fucking away

bad marriages fucking away suicide and life
and breakdowns and betrayals and you know
it was the happiest time of our lives something

i always go back to
and then the foghorns
would come some time

around dusk and felt
they were just right outside
our window and they were

whose groans and blasts
just swept everything else up
and whose anonymous shady

geometric shapes creeping and crawling
like a mischievous thief took you in and spit
you out right into the amorphous ethereal unknown

like an old newspaper
like a ghost tumbling down old ancient
curbs and corners of dusty cobblestone

you know
all we did was
fuck and you know...

random

drinking coffee
in the morning
already drained

by fishbowl
in the kitchen
& thunder & finally

finally alas
the rain
creatures

creep in
from out
the forest

when bruce was bruce, grew up on darkness & born to & greetings...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bzS2Vug-esA

On The Subject Of Wind & Fog & Rain

1.

this morning i walked my kid
to his summer school bus
and he asked me daddy

why is it foggy
and i thought
about it a little

and told him i did
not know why
it was foggy

see that
is the great
thing about fog


2.

ways in which
to measure wind
keep front door open

while nursing cups
of coffee in your foyer
watching it flap back and forth

shutting your eyes
and pressing ear up
against screen window

hearing it rush and ripple
through the crabapples distant
trees all the world all the universe


3.

drinking coffee
in the morning
already drained

beside red fish
in blue fishbowl
in the kitchen

and from
behind curtain
of the wilderness

comes the sudden
clap of thunder and
finally alas the rain

turning the lichen & lake
& lagoon brighter
verdant, vibrant

creatures creep
in from out of
the forest

everything
evens out
in the end


4.

always loved
the sound
of thunder

its rumbles
bringing me
straight back

to childhood
communicating
to me while i was

camped out
holed up inside
the movie theater


5.

literally coming out
dazed, delicate
to the mist

sweeping
& feathering
the puddles

of the parking lot
almost an extension
to what you just saw


6.

hong kong gardens
& bowl-a-rama & the bones
of a newly-crashed helicopter

lying in a mangled smoky
heap on the side of the road
returning to your paint-by-number home

stroked in sun
and soaked
by the black

& white
silverscreen
light of slums.

On Not Contemplating On A Bowl Of Fruit #6

and so it is my candid belief that everyone eventually
somewhere at some point or time in their life is just
trying to get back to the ripe womb and that this
is an instinctive spiritual dynamic subconscious
psychodynamic and whether inherent or simply
just weary and wasted suddenly develop some
kind of natural inclination whether out of want or need
or simply some necessary sort of manifest destiny
and instinctively head towards the heat down south
yet some only make it as far as the carolinas some
in between north and south some even choose believe it
or not cause they want to save and live more economically
mississippi and alabama some to savannah, georgia
hot l'anta and if they get real lucky make it all the way
to the promised land they always dreamed of the sunshine
state of florida preferably ft. lauderdale or boca with a nice
warm safe and secure condo and rules and regulations and
earlybird specials with other old folks and screened in porches
and perfect manicured views planted right over the third and fourth
holes so what was it i had said before about returning to the womb?

On Not Contemplating On A Bowl Of Fruit #5

and think in casually searching for homes today
out there over the superhighway in the lonestar
state seeing one described as–“beyond perfect”
in a country club like environment, located directly
on the golf course (think it might have even said
something like with–“your own private pristine view
of the third hole”) from all appearances, it seems to me
that every true-blooded american’s dream is to one day live
in a country club community (maybe even gated) directly on the
golf course, i suppose their own personal and private panaromic version
vision of heaven, and don’t know, i guess, can you really blame them? you
will when you find out who your neighbors are going to be for the rest of eternity!

i even got things a little confused and thought it may have
said something like–“calculate your mortality payments”

On Not Contemplating On A Bowl Of Fruit #4

today i decided to go on map quest
and put in from hell to heaven as
this is the way i've been feeling
as of recent and the directions
said just go with your instincts
the dream within the nightmare
feeling like a weary cowboy at
day's end needing a mixed drink
like mrs. robinson trying to seduce
felix unger in central park after his
wife dumps him for winston churchill
simply smoking his cigar all alone
at the yalta conference slogging into
my wrinkled and ripped origami boat
taking it back through rough papercut
seas to see what went wrong in my
self-destructive troubled childhood
through subterranean labyrinths
shortcuts and tunnels ripping
off stores and transfixed
and turned on studying
mathematical proofs
and formulas with
the window open
just slightly ajar
hearing the birds
and babbling brook
smelling formaldehyde
and fried chicken through
screen doors of summer
the crazy brothers next
door always beating
each other up
showing up
on top of
their porch
like a bunch of
cowboy casanova studs
hollering--"what's up!"
in their ten-gallons
pushing in the
popsicle stick
doors not so sure
i understand now the whole point
of the marriage game i mean when
does that whole holy matrimony thing begin
damn if my wife doesn't touch me soon i think...

On Not Contemplating On A Bowl Of Fruit #3

on the food channel you fall in love
with this beautiful doe-eyed voluptuous
mexican woman in her turquoise blouse
in a retro contemporary ktichen and brilliant
panaramic view of downtown los angelas looking
like a cross between j. lo and gloria estafan stuffing
a bird with stuffing and rosemary and parsley shoving
her hand in and out of the cavity rubbing some pesto rub
all over the top then pouring on the chicken broth all like some
kind of surgeon with those big brown eyes smooth olive skin pouting
lips beautiful pear-shaped bosoms all eager and enthusiastic under that
turquoise blouse with the great panaromic view of downtown los angelas.

On Not Contemplating On A Bowl Of Fruit #2

and so this whole thing gets so obsessive
and silly almost developing a high school
mentality suppose without all the hurt and
pain and humiliation and suffering from the
safety and security of your computer
screen all for the sake of curiosity
maybe even trying to redeem
or get closure or insanely start
things up again looking up old
girlfriends just for the fun of it
or more accurate cause i got
nothing better to do with my
downtime or existence but to
check on the status of old girlfriends
while for example found this once vicious
bee-otch i used to go out with now works
for colgate-palmolive out in california with
a great big gleaming smile and two perfect
blond daughters hanging off her, looks exactly
like she did back then, only twenty years later
a bit more pale and pasty without the seductive
powers, some might even say more mature, beaten
and battered, a ghost of her former self, shrink-wrapped
laminated, not quite as good looking or attractive as i remember
but remember the manipulation and her girlfriends, how she made
breaking hearts, laughing and whispering, going back on her word
going back and forth playing with emotions and promises and thoughts
a rare and timeless art, complacent and nonchalant, art of ridicule that
broke all rules and bore absolutely no resemblance, borders, boundaries
to basic human rights and decency, then when they become these mothers
with their new and improved souls and roles, suddenly all of a sudden all
holy and sacred, prim and proper, pimps for prophet, vixens of virtue
upstanding citizens of the community, yet if you only really knew
the things they pulled in their past, how they took advantage
took minds, hearts, and souls for hostage (matter of fact
took the whole damn body and anatomy) interesting
how things don't actually seem to change a whole hell
of a lot, disproportionately proportionate to unfortunate
character and behavior, see-through and predictable
from the past to the present to the here and now
future, now the heads of boards and organizations
to preserve names and reputations (even bestowing
on each other awards and citations) whole resumes and
grocery lists of anacronyms, how exclusive still feels a bit
absurd and abusive, how life just seems to get a bit phonier
without the humor, riddles without build-ups to the punchline
or passionate implication of innuendoes and rumors, survival
of the fittest, the life cycle, growth and development (men still a bunch
of suckers and idiots) of the very emotional and whimsical female gender.

On Not Contemplating On A Bowl Of Fruit #1

i try to look up old flames on facebook
my editor set me up and now addicted
but don't know any of their last names
guess that's the way i wanted it back
then summer flings and winter flings
suppose in retrospect that's the way it
should be (keeping and holding onto old
memories) as when i really stop to think..

a demented sort of children's story: for king kong

o it's fine
every so often
to just fall asleep
in your kid's butter
cream rocking chair
by the window in the
corner and there's
a ceiling fan and
after you're good
and rested to let
out a nice big yawn
and then just stand
under that ceiling fan
like a skyscraper
on a smoggy
sticky day
wrapped in
whipping
wind

Wake Up Call: getting through time

pulling up morning blinds with the smell of chicken and rice
from the night before perfumed garden streaming through
geranium window and muted commercial left up on the tv
having something to do with a weed whacker or maybe
some sort of rice boiler really not sure of course always
for that famous price of $19.95 and can get 2 for 1 or
a whole other 1 for free if you just pick up the phone
within 15 mintues and think hey ain't this the whole
damn hx of america and feel confused and comforted
yet strangely enough ya know really don't mind at all

Random

this morning a massive owl just sat perched on top of our tree house, bulging, muted, contemplative
looking down into the high grass of the deep swamp as though communicating with all the universe.
you still remain the stranger trying to conceptualize and realize it all through the screen door
of your porch. it seems like so many of your friends you grew up with in new york moved out to
pennsylvania and not sure why but they all seem to really love it and wish them all the best of luck.

Three Stanzas On Morning

1

Murmurs

in the morning
rooster crows
through fog

outside window
wilderness has
begun to flutter



2

Wake Up Call: getting through time

pulling up morning blinds with the smell of chicken and rice
from the night before perfumed garden streaming through
geranium window and muted commercial left up on the tv
having something to do with a weed whacker or maybe
some sort of rice boiler really not sure of course always
for that famous price of $19.95 and can get 2 for 1 or
a whole other 1 for free if you just pick up the phone
within 15 minutes and think hey ain't this the whole
damn hx of america and feel confused and comforted
yet strangely enough ya know really don't mind at all



3

Crawling Through Time

this morning a massive owl just sat perched on top of our tree house, bulging, muted, contemplative
looking down into the high grass of the deep swamp as though communicating with all the universe.
you still remain the stranger trying to conceptualize and realize it all through the screen door of your
porch. it seems like so many of your friends you grew up with in new york just picked up and moved
out to pennsylvania and not sure why but they all seem to really like it and wish them all the best of luck

you're still looking over your shoulder...

Strange Reunion

having a wild time
play pillow fighting with my kid
triggers the image of that blissful
ice cream stand just shut down
and abandoned in the woods

across from the institution
right when the leaves
started to change color
heading to the berkshires

somewhere on top that mountain in that pasture
called sky farm where that family all with
the very high-pitched voices sold crisp
apples which you soon were gonna
dip into a warm kettle of caramel

leading to your final destination
when there were final destinations
stagecoach inn with the roaring fireplace
and great lopsided pumpkin pine floors
where revolutionary war heroes really
did go to warm up their weather worn
bones right below the foot of some
chilly drizzly dusk silhouetted
blazing autumn mountain

splintered haunted keyholed rooms
which all felt like knotholes portholes
bread and butter golden glow to the holy
hidden scarred heart and soul all bundled
snug as a bug in a rug behind flickering lace
curtain shadows the phantoms behind latches
and bouncing radiators and babbling brook you
could faintly hear murmuring through the flutter
of shutters over a rattling kitchen which kept
your steak and sangria and warm biscuit
dream buzz going up to all hours...

Random

jesus and vin diesel
keep on coming up
for my recommended
pages on facebook...

A Time More Innocent

when they seemed to just take you hostage on a runway somewhere in the vicinity of north africa with the names of countries you never heard of and the worst that you could say was that they just put a nice scare into you as they'd show them peeking and poking their heads from the portholes of planes and hollering outrageous claims "like i told you i didn't want any sauce on my souvlaki!" and the road runner explosions and threats and ultimateums that never seemed to work and then the action eyewitness news team would show up with their exclusive round the clock coverage of the standoff of a bunch of panicky palestians just trying to take off on foot across the runway like some lame loosey goosey game of ringo leevio and the worst
was that it just proved to be a bit inconvenient like some pink panther version starring the irrepressable
peter sellers playing himself and vice versa and the dictators looked like a bunch of big handsome
sleazy macho gigolos in shiny polyester shirts maybe with the sunglasses and hairy chest and
disco afros like they were getting ready to party and get coked up at studio 54 and try to score
with all the girls in a time when things seemed more innocent and more to hope and dream of

Saturday, July 24, 2010

Top 5 Places to Have A Second Home

Turkey, Nice, Prince Edward Island, Cefalu in Sicily, Antiqua





Definition of Eclectic Writer!

You can read Joseph's work just about Anywhere!

Joseph has had works which have appeared or forthcoming in such literary journals as, "Poesy," "Dispatch Detroit," "Falling Star," "Color Wheel," "Bareback," "And Then," "Grafitti Rag," "Main Street Rag," "Bouillabaisse," "Decanto," "Rogue's Scholar," "Poetry Motel," "The Beat," "The Potomac," "Poetry Super Highway," "Panic Brixton Poetry," "Istanbul Literature Review," "The Taj Mahal Review," "Stirring," "Sugar Mule," "Juked," "No Record," "Inscribed," "Glass: A Poetry Review," "CC & D," "Down In The Dirt," "Ascent Aspirations," "Right Hand Pointing," "Why Vandalism?" "The Cerebral Catalyst," "Cause & Effect," "Subtle Tea," "Yippie," "ESC! Magasine," "The Oak Bend Review," "Opium," "Problem Child," "Sein Und Werden," "Denver Syntax," "Paradigm," "Paradigm Shift," "Mad Swirl," "Houston Literary Review," "Words-Myth," "Literary Mary," "Side Of Grits," "Gloom Cupboard," "Motel 58," "Cherry Bleeds," "Poet Works," "Jukebox," "Neonbeam," "Burning River," "Third Wednesday," "The Philosophical Society Of England," "Gold Dust," "The Battered Suitcase," "The Iguana Review," "Spot Literary Journal," "Breadcrumb Scabs, "Semaphore," "The Delinquent," "SALit," "The Wichita Falls Literature & Arts Review," "42 Magazine," "Ottawa Arts Review," "Mirrors Magazine," "Puffin Circus," "The Shout," "Going Down Swinging," "Scawy Munstur," "River Poet's Journal," "The Hudson View," "Shoots And Vines," "The American Drivel Review" "Muton" "Suison Valley Review," "The Stray Branch Literary Magazine," "Unfeigned Coffee Fiend," "Grey Sparrow Press," "A Brilliant Record Magazine," "Beggars & Cheeseburgers," "Viola Beadleton's Compendium," "Low Fidelity," "Blinking Cursor," "Nibble," "Wilderness House Literary Review," "Haggard & Halloo," "Verse Wisconsin," "Audience," "Work Literary Journal" "Gutter Eloquence," "Midwest Literary Magazine," "Front Range Review," "The View From Here," "Kerouac's Dog," "Lowestoft Chronicle," "A Handful Of Stones," "Disingenuous Twaddle," "Black Words On White Paper," "The Plebian Rag," "The Other Herald,"
"Oranges & Sardines," Artists & Writers," "Zocalo Press"' "Brick Road Press" ...

And Also:
“If I Told You To Jump Off The Brooklyn Bridge (Flutter Press), "A Different Sort Of Distance" (Skive Magazine Press), "The Derivation Of Cowboys & Indians" (Poet Works Press), "Escaping Shangrila” (Punkin House Press), "Pain Diary: Working Methadone & The Life & Times Of The Man Sawed In Half" (Brick Road Literary Press) "Obscure Aphorisms Written On A Fine Overcast Day" (Lummox Press)