Independence Day 2011

Vision of a future past

He was gripped by a sense of dizziness before the rocket even impacted. Before the flash or the shock of the shredded cell – before his final transformation into charred shard.  In the last blind beat before the cut fills with wet, at the final stroke of carnival innocence between the box-sprung lid and its shrieking clowny jack face – there settled upon him a shifting, accelerated instant in sickly pine sap trapped and congealed.    He perceived the vertiginous tilt of gravity toward the afterlife – death’s chilly breath as premonition to impending pounce – he heard the stretching reel of an audio track – a shrilly choir of helium voices.  Perhaps someone in the next room was watching the Wizard of Oz? 

Day of Rage

Play List Iraq?

A list of the music that I've downloaded (in chronological order): 


1. Air - Le soleil est près de moi (from Premiers symptômes)
2. Random Rab - aRose - (Album)
3. The Black Keys - Brothers (Album - Deluxe)
4. Band of Horses - various songs
5. Cee Lo Green - The Lady Killer (Album - The Deluxe Edition)
6. Ween - Chocolate Town - Quebec
7. Peter Gabriel - Passion: Music the Last Temptation of Christ (Album)
8. David Guetta - Memories (feat. Kid Kudi)
9. Flying Lotus - Reset EP (Album)

Then my iTunes jammed up, I had to write support and then we continue:

10. My Bloody Valentine - Loveless (Whole Album)  

My son flying to visit my father

Claudia and Andres were walking through the airport in Atlanta, while I was here online in Iraq - a page opened on my computer to a map of the airport and another to a map of the MARTA transit with each route and stop expanded into its own map. I had a page open to the Georgia Aquarium all the while on Google chat guiding Claudia through the airport  

"Ok, what do you see?" 

"Duty Free shop."

Ok, then turn left, and go down the escalator, take the tram, go to Terminal D, get out, go up the escalator, turn right - what do you guys want to eat? 

Ok - there's a place that sells soup next to the MARTA station. You are going to need $5.25 round trip - get the pass, it says here that it's cheaper. Take the gold line 8 stops north to Peachtree Center Stop, turn on Baker St...the aquarium opens at 9:00 - says here it's the largest aquarium in the world and that it's also in the Guinness Book of World's Records. It opens today at 9 - 6 - Adult entrance - $24.95 Child (age 3-12) - $18.95...and meanwhile she's snapping pictures with her Blackberry and uploading them onto Facebook so I am actually seeing what the soup looks  - and the weather out the window of train on the MARTA and a snapshot of a hammer-head shark floating in the blue water overhead... 

There was an article I read where Egyptians were ordering pizza online to be delivered to people protesting in Wisconsin. 

http://nymag.com/daily/intel/2011/02/someone_in_egypt_ordered_a_piz.html

and another where someone in Egypt named his daughter "facebook" -  

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/02/21/baby-named-facebook-egypt_n_825934.html

and it dawns on me that we are in fact living in the future.     

Col Oleg

I'm just finishing the fist book in the Chalmers Johnson trilogy that you sent, and it is eye-opening for sure. Particularly considering my current position. I just now came back from a get-together with NATO and met COL Oleg, a Ukrainian officer who is out here doing combat training with the Iraqis. So I joked with him that I hope these guys don't turn on him and use his training against him (or me for that matter)... and he gives this look like (brother, you have NO IDEA) and then starts telling his story of how, as a Second Lt. in the Soviet army he was sent to fight in Afghanistan in 84? at the head of a battalion of soldiers against basically the (US funded) Afghani mujahadeen (Bin Laden). He couldn't even find the words in English to explain it. That basically his men were all but completely wiped out and then the Soviet Union collapses and fast-forward 20 years and he finds himself back in Afghanistan, this time on a NATO mission training some of the very same guys that he had been killing and who had slaughtered his men 20 years earlier - a complete mind-fuck. He was talking about the cycles of history and that was a double cycle - like how we were allies in WWII with Russia, then the cold war and now what the fuck are we all doing here at a party in Iraq? and then we extended that to the US - Iraqi situation which is a triple cycle where the US funds Saddam during the Iran-Iraq war (both sides in fact) - and you can Google an image of Donald Rumsfield shaking hands with Saddam back in those days, then we go to war with the guy, and now here we are funding and training these same people again. Total mind fuck. In the end we all agreed that in the future we should leave all this fighting to our politicians while the human beings that these assholes are supposed to represent are left alone to hang out together and drink beer and be friends.

A raise / Clearance / and grounded

email about teacher training course.
Im already doing that
I'm volunteered for the teacher training job
i decline it and in turn
i get a raise for the job im already doing and dont have to move at all

It's been raiing like hell and my free internet went down
im hesitant to go and rat myself out - thinking it may come back
I go into the MWR - now I remember why I stopped going in there
I'm at the computer terminal and overhear the publicized indecencies
There have been so many classic moments in that internet cafe - there's no way that I could make this up
it's really unbelievable.the conversations that go on right out in front of god and everyone there - absolutely shameless...I open a new email just to document some of the unbelievable interaction...
at the next terminal I hear someone snickering - and I can't tell whether it's a man or woman
at first it;s in the background - and I focus on some other cadet trying to outwit some unloving soon-to-be-another-ex-girlfriend on the other side of the world - but the giggling gradually gets louder and more silly
I look up and see Lt. Col Willy sitting there in front of a computer monitor- giggling at some panty dancing perversion on Skype He is busted but unflustered and casually disconnects from his skype buddy that he has to go goes on duct-taping twinkies between her tits
Rutland.. Lt. Col seems slowly reminded of something important and comes back to an unaffected reality
Sir?
I'm glad I caught you. All English classes are cancelled - you may not go to work tomorrow...
why? -
Do you have your clearance yet?
no
Administrative issues.
The entire country is having an "Administrative issue?"
Yes - I sent you an email.
My internet is out in my CHU - I minimize the eavesdropping email open on the desktop and notice for the first time that I have several unread emails. Willy...willy...yes...I open the email.
ALL English classes are cancelled until further notice for all sites.
The mail is addressed to all Site Leads...CTS has no site lead - I rather, I'm the site lead
there's no one else. Did I mention I just got a raise?
I scan down the letter...
It says here that Tikrit is having classes as usual
Lt. Col Willie has started shutting down his station.
They've resolved their administrative issues.
I close the email. I notice the next one from the DynCorps office.
INTERIM CLEARANCE APPROVED.
Sir...look, my clearance is approved. So tell me, what's the real deal with these classes?
Is there some threat against English teachers or what?
You can't even ask me that question.
willy leans in and squints at the email....and no you don't have clearance
What? It says right here that it's approved.
Not until you sign the CR791 Form
Where do I get that form
No idea.
Wait - look - one is attached to the email
Then I guess you should print it.
I print it and sign it.
immediately upon signing it
ok - now you have clearance
So what's the deal with the classes?

Iraqi Fruit Bowl

And then my cellphone vibrates. As a general rule, I don't check text messages in class. Sets a bad example for the students. Out here in Baghdad though, text messages are not casually sent or serve in most cases as the predecessor to a real (or otherwise imagined - but in either case unpleasant) urgency. Either that or a coveted invite to infamous pizza party at the Italian embassy.

"OK class. You have five minutes to finish this activity. If you are already finished, please check your answers with a partner." Group work offers teacher adequate subterfuge for a quick check of the cell phone. A message from Valentina. Signs point to pizza party. Let's see..

---------------------------

Hello Wells! I'm 

looking for a 

volunteer to

come this 

evening to ili

and help install

the language

lab. Let me

know. 

---------------------------

Dammit. Not a pizza party. And I'm not terribly interested in volunteering for anything at the moment - particularly for language or lab or installation. My entire life stinks of NGO, except, of course that I'm getting paid around $10K by a certain Federal GO.  The ili bit is short-hand for Iraqi language institute, that much I know, but where ili is exactly, I'm not sure. .could this mean a road trip?.

"Class, please continue working on the next activity! Gentlemen! No Arabic in the classroom, please!" I still haven't figured out this Nokia yet. I respond.  

----------------------------------------

"Ok... When?"

----------------------------------------

The reply is instantaneous. There is no attempt to conceal the phone at this point. 

----------------------------------------

"Meet at dfac

with install 

team at 1900.

Will be taking ice cream 

truck, so bring vest."

----------------------------------------

Ice cream truck is an armored transport service for travel throughout the IZ and beyond. And true to name it resembles an ice cream truck. Vest means kevlar and kevlar means one thing...road trip!    

        

Babylon

In the cradle of

Mesopotamia Babylon to Baghdad

Ancient ruins between rivers
flows the Tigris and Euphrates
all you've heard

your whole life stirred by Hades

but to see it here now

with your own eyes

for the first time

at the banks of
a distant history
filling the footsteps
of an ancient future

authoring by my own hand
passages of a living encyclopedia.

Home on the Range

In honor of today's repeal of the don't ask, don't tell law, Special Forces scheduled some trigger time at the gun range. Here is the picture - a dozen US Special Forces soldier, Green Berets - trained in non-conventional warfare, survival techniques,  interrogation, and four Iraqi Generals - one of them a 3-star who served previously under the regime of Saddam Hussein and then there's me wearing a suit and tie - all standing in a line firing automatic M-16s, M-4s, MP-6 sub-machine guns, Beretas Glok-9s, 12-gauges, all united by the universal urge to do some "man shit".... 

So lunch time comes and I have to get back to class - so we left together - 3 of us in an armored Suburban and head out...and on the way there was this unusual checkpoint - and so we pull up - and this Iraqi military orders us to stop - so we stop - then he tells us to open the doors - the driver (SF Sargent - the lowest man on the totem pole) says NO - there are maybe 100 Iraqi guys all over the place - some with automatic weapons - several humvees mounted with machine guns...the guy motions again for us to open the door and be searched...the driver says NO - the Iraqi calls over more guys - the guys come over and they start ordering us out of the car...the driver refuses...they grab onto the outside door handle and try to open it...the drivers presses the gas and advances forward. The Iraqi guys come jumping in the way and draw their weapons so the driver stops...and picks up his cell phone...just then another SUV pulls up behind us and stops. There is some commotion and then everyone lowers their weapons. The SUV pulls up beside us and there sits the 3-star general riding shot-gun. We salute him, he salutes us back, he motions for us to move forward, the soldiers move to the side, and we continue on our way. 

just another day in Baghdad....         

LT COL ABBAS

Lt. Colonel Abbas unfolds his wire-framed glasses from their tiny case and sets them lightly upon the bridge of his nose. With the addition of this simple accessory he feels himself quite suddenly transformed into a college lecturer. He is a large, monolithic man, and patrols the classroom with broad, heavy paces. As if one of the pillars of Stonehenge had sprouted mighty legs and simply walked off. He keeps his hands clasped behind him, locked at the fingers and with each step his towering torso catapults forward into an exaggerated bow, hips hinged, head dipping forward,  like a mechanical bobbing bird. With each step the torso bobs forward dragged by the ballast of a mighty forehead. He pauses, reflects, adjusts his glasses, and looking down his nose he pauses over a savory bit of knowledge which none in his classroom could ever hope to divine. He was all capital letters. 

MWR FOB Union III

It's Hip-hop dancing in the Rec Center 18:00 - 20:00  followed by Karaoke from 20:00 - 23:00. 

I'm not much of a dancer, but I have, on occasion,  been overcome by an urge to shake a leg - particularly when urged on by a cocktail or two and for the general purpose of getting girls. 

In the flashing, intimate dance-space of a night club, compelled by the spell of a proper beat, when groove and gregarious moods merge I have known my conscious-self to become seduced and recede and for a moment my unconscious self is allowed its escape - the flesh fades to reveal unchained soul - then every so often, and suddenly in the midst of this magical moment, my thoughts ever-overcast by the self-conscious cloud - I imagine in my mind's eye that suddenly the music mutes, bright lights glare on, the walls are whisked away and I grin to myself on these awkward imagined moments at the vision of the frenetic flesh bodies in noon's naked light writhing together in silly silence. 

That fleeting moment of self-consciousness is the closest I can come to explaining to you what Hip-hop dancing looks like at the MWR this Friday night. Fifteen days no cigarettes or alcohol. A mere two weeks have never felt so long. Of the original 14 contractors that arrived 14 days ago at Ft. Benning like newborns the morning after Thanksgiving, the final six of us language specialists who survived received permanent placement today. The final exodus. Rendezvous tomorrow at 15:00 - a pair of Black Hawks are taking 3 to the airforce academy in Taji and from there 2 more continue on to Sadaam's hometown of Tikrit. After tomorrow I alone will remain in the IZ - an army of one - something in my file had caught the Colonel's eye and I was selected for a special assignment - to shadow an Iraqi / US combined Special Ops, Anti-Terrorist Task Force and teach them the language of "taking out bad guys". Colonel's orders. I will be issued an armored escort through the red zone back and forth to where these guys are stationed.  

Hip- hop hour is over and the mood in the Rec Room is shifting now. From here in the basement of the former Ba'ath party headquarters a line of US soldiers in camouflage line up to sing Karaoke. Somehow, if only for tonight, this all makes perfect sense.

The Suits

It's been an incredible two days...while the rest of my crew got shipped off to parts unknown, I was assigned to the CTS (Counter Terrorist Service) under the protection of the Joint Iraqi / US Special Forces (SF)...basically the only guys out here who are still running missions, kicking down doors and arresting bad guys. So they are mentoring their Iraqi counterparts on Intelligence gathering techniques and how to piece together cases and kick ass and interrogate and whatnot. And my function (long awaited and long overdue) is get the Iraqi side where they can better communicate with the US counterparts. 

Yesterday was my first day out of the super protected Union III base - so my SF contact shows up to bring me out to where they are and this guy is a dead ringer for Nicolas Cage - kind of lethargic and dead-pan - and as we are leaving he turns back and asks my direct DynCorp (civilian contracting agency) manager - "oh yeah..what is his clearance?" "He has no clearance." He's going to need clearance." "Why does he need clearance?" (coming from my direct supervisor who has no clearance) "If he's coming to work with us in Special Forces, he needs clearance." "What level of clearance?" "SECRET clearance." (the second best after TOP SECRET). "OK listen, we are going to need some authorization for that." "Fine, I'll have Colonel Makey call that in." "OK" - then the guy tosses in - "Oh yeah, and he needs a permit for a weapon too" "As per our policy, our teachers don't carry weapons" Ignoring the last comment the guy says "What does it say on his LOA (Letter of Authorization from the Department of Defense)?" "Well, his LOA authorizes him to carry a weapon..but..." "Then we're going to need you to start processing that right away as well. Thanks."

On the way to the up-armored suburban...
"Ever use an M-4?" "Seen one. I'm familiar with the M-16 and the AK. (check my facebook BABY!!!)" "Ok it's simple - if something happens to me, rock this back, flick this lever to the FIRE position and squeeze down on this thing - try to make sure you are pointing this end toward the bad guy. OK?" "seems clear enough" "Good, let's roll."

Outside of the claustrophobic FOB Union III for the first time - and on a scenic tour of Baghdad...more of that later. 

We arrive at the CTS headquarters and there are about 15 guys in a room no larger than the guest suite in the Delaney house. On the monitors are pictures and maps and arrows and people are printing up dossiers on bad guys with grids and addresses and records and known associates - clearly this is the shit that i am not supposed to see. - and at the end of the room is Col Makey - Full Col Makey looks like Dwayne "the Rock" Johnson. "Wells, we've been waiting for you. Where have you been?" "Just got in a few days ago." "Yes..he says, "so you did. Col Fiola promised us a teacher by Dec 01. I'm looking forward to discussing this issue at lunch tomorrow with Col Fiola."  Nicholas Cage leans in, "DynCorp needs a confirmation on clearance and weapon" - "Get them on the phone for me" "Nicholas patches in the call. Col Makey looks at me - where you from?" All over - born in West Virgina, lived in Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Florida, New Mexico, Chile, Istanbul and I currently reside on FOB Union III." "Good deal...Hello? Colonel Mackey speaking. yes...got Mr. Rutland here - he's gonna need to be cleared at SECRET level...ok I'll be look for that. And he needs a weapon if he's going to work out here..." "Of course he can handle a weapon - he's a southern man. Do you not have his file?" (that's all in your file. right?) (I nod) "It's on file. I'll be waiting on that as well....OK...THANKS" Welcome on board Wells.... (more on that later)

My allotted internet time is limited - but today was ever more bazaar.  Met with the Iraqi-born English teachers that I am supposed to train - most of them former military - and I will be shadowing them and training them and collectively we will be training the Iraqi special forces. Our meeting runs over...so we had out a little late for lunch and I see all the American Special Forces pulling out of the parking lot in their Suburbans...and I'm thinking...oh fuck...and the Iraqi guys tell me...oh..were you going somewhere for lunch...and I said..well..i think I was supposed to go back to the Union III D-FAC (Dining Facility) for lunch. So these 3 ex-military shiny suitwearing, mustache sporting, cigarette puffing Iraqis tell me...come with us. We invite you for lunch. So I'm walking down the street with these guys thinking...now this isn't good...and we turn down one street and past some guys in a tank and then up another street and into an alley way and then past another guard and into a little courtyard where there is a diner with a 100% Iraqi clientele. So I'm thinking...this really isn't good now..." And these guys are greeting their friends there in Arabic and we go inside passed a lot of guys eating in military garb and then to the buffet and they serve up this plate of Arabic food stuff...and everyone is staring at me...and then we go into this other room where all of the guys are wearing shiny polyester suits...and we sit down. And they start eating with their hands and so I do the same. So I ask...who are these guys...and they tell me in English...this is the officers' room....and I ask..."so what is that over there?" and they say "that is the enlisted soldiers' dining room." So I ask my teachers - are you guys both officers...and one of them says..."Yes..we are both Lt. Colonels - but he is civilian." and then suddenly this guy walks into the Officer's room wearing a uniform but it looks different than the other guys...and immediately everyone in the officers' part restaurant stands up - so of course i also stand up...and this guy comes and sits at our table across from me...and everyone sits down and this guy takes off a burgundy colored beret and brushes his hair to the side and he sits down. This guy looked like a rounder version of Robert Voitier but with a heavy mustache and bright shining eyes like a school boy.  And he's smiling and eating and just listens as we talk. And I'm wondering who the fuck is this guy and he has some kind of eagle or a bird on his sleeve with 3 stars on it...and he has this bright smiling face and we are all eating baked chicken breast with our fingers and rice and lentils from off a metal tray with 7-up and a banana for dessert. And at the end of the conversation when everyone is done, this guy says something in Arabic to one of my entourage and the guy turns to me and says, "The General asks if you need anything for your apartment...TV? Coffee maker? Microwave?" I said..."Please tell the General that I am very humbled by his offer and that I would like to thank him very much for his generosity and great hospitality towards me...but I'm still in temporary housing at the moment and at the moment I have everything I need." So one of my teachers - one of the colonels translates this to the general...and the general is smiling like hell and then says something in Arabic and my teacher translates it for me and he says "The general says that anything you need - ANYTHING - only tell him and you will have it. So I said....You know there is something that i could use...um when I was packing to come here I didn't have much space, and I had room only for one good dress shirt. I'm afraid that my students will become tired of looking at the same shirt every day." The guy turns to the General and translates...and the general starts smiling like hell again and says IN ENGLISH..."OK...Don't worry, I will have ready for you tomorrow shirts, very nice." 

about an hour later I'm back at the CTS office going over paperwork with the teachers, and in walks the General's own, personal tailor with measuring tape in hand. 

The International Zone, Baghdad

The Green Zone / International Zone is a portion of Baghdad which previously housed Saddam's palaces and government headquarters - the IZ is all of the land area inside of that space that is bordered by the Tigris River on the East and south, and a series of concrete walls and baracades to the north and west. Now the IZ is not some large, free, happy protected area either. The space inside the IZ has been walled off even further into smaller compounds on either side of the road. There are checkpoints going into each compound (which they calls FOBs - (Forward Operating Bases) and there are also random checkpoints on the actual road. The compounds on the highway are manned by Iraqi police / military and the entrances to the FOBs and other compounds are private security - principally Peruvians and Ugandans - US military vehicles are expected to pause at the checkpoints on the highway but EVERYONE has to stop, show ID's and be scanned for bombs coming into the FOBs - particularly the one in which I live which is the main headquarters and houses all of the main Generals....The US embassy - the largest and most expensive one in the world is off limits to everyone that is not on the list...your US Passport is not sufficient to get you into the US Embassy in Baghdad...if you think that is overkill...there is currently a half-a-million dollar bounty on the head of any American - and kidnappings within the IZ occur with some regularity. You can not just go for a walk out of your FOB - and you should not go alone - preferably with an up-armored Suburban full of Green Beret Special Forces. 

Rats

Special Forces headquarters had been infiltrated by a rat. A tell-tale hole was discovered in a package of coffee creamers and artificial sweeteners. Some time the night before the rodent had chewed its way through a full box of Splenda and its foot prints and little rat shits were left in the scattered grains the next morning. Likely it had sensed itself the luckiest little rat in Baghdad to have sniffed out such sweet treasure, but in truth it would seem the little rodent’s luck had just run out. Little did it realize that it had cut its ratty sweet-tooth on a gourmet Christmas care package from the wife back home, and henceforth for either side there was no turning back. Nothing to do with business, this was strictly personal. The hunt was on.

Lt. Col Ratburn took quick inventory of work space and soon fashioned a trap from a roll of chicken wire and a wooden cigar box. Let haters mock what they fail to comprehend. The Col was no stranger to prejudicial extermination of unwanted pests. We are counter-terrorism’s best and brightest after all. That night the trap was rigged up naughty with a packet of Spenda leaned lightly against the trip wire. What the trap lacked in sophistication it more than made up for in simplicity and overall effectiveness. Certainly all disparaging comments were put to rest when everyone showed up for work this morning. There was the rat trapped when we got to work this morning. It was missing an eye and had an unbelievable tail that was tangled up around the coiled spring wire. The Colonel drew water into a plastic waste bin and submerged the cage with its prisoner trapped inside. Special Forces team looked on sipping coffee and when the deal was done, we shared a moment of silence for our little rat brother.

CA$HING IN ON MISERY

I try to check in with CNN regularly to get an update on the outside world, and the last few days the website has been dedicated exclusively to the recent earthquake in Haiti. They estimate 200,000 dead and nearly 1.5 million homeless, which strikes me as one of life's typical tragedies. No one suffers more than the poor. You never hear of these death-toll figures coming out of Switzerland or the French Riviera.

One thing that catches my attention in particular is this Anderson Cooper, who seems mysteriously omnipresent for any global disaster - exceedingly manicured and empathetic, rendering the outrage of humanity in teary-eyed teasers that keep us tuned in through the next commercial break. The dead, dying, and dismembered bodies. Mass, unmarked graves. The starving, homeless survivers. Looting and riots. A tanned and well-toned Anderson Cooper sips at his venti caramel latte, name dropping catastrophies like a B-list actor at a Golden Globes after-party. A bit more than Katrina as I recall, not quite Indonisia 2004. Anderson Cooper, the sommelier of catastrophy. I recommend a pairing of Vin jaune with walnuts and Comte cheese. In all fairness I suppose homelessness and starvation are not necessarily the prerequisites for fair reporting on homelessness and starvation...

All this reminds me of when John and Marta came to Istanbul. We'd spent the last Saturday at the Grand Bazzar and in the evening caught the tram headed back through Sultanahmet and out of the Golden Horn to catch the ferry at Kabataş. So we jumped off the tram at the Blue Mosque to relax and enjoy a cocktail at the Sultan Pub. There we found this street kid, not more than 12 years old on the sidewalk selling tissues. So John sees this kid and pulls out his Canon. Marta buys a packet of tissues. John snaps off some quick shots from a distance and then the kid looks up. Happy kid, sees John and smiles. So John, having gotten the green light, comes in for a close up. I'm there standing off to the side watching the kid squatting on the sidewalk and John snapping pictures and people passing on the street staring at John Rutland the imperialist American, stealing the sorry soul of this poor lost street orphan. And before my very eyes my brother is transformed suddenly into bluejean Hitler. Indignant, the tourists pass the spectacle of John documenting the exploitation of adolescent labor- of John Rutland the perpetuator of child-hood slavery. John Rutland, a cloven-hooved Beezelbub in a burka tap dancing on the mutalated genital of female circumcision - for street ophans.

Waves of detatched pedestrians expressed their disgust, not by the dismissable banality of a street-kid peddling tissues, but by the spectacle of a tanned and well-toned westerner projecting said street urchin into the light of their undismissable consciousness. One couple in particular - a black man with short dreadlocks and his uber-albino, euro-trash girlfriend took a double-take, and later a triple-take at the scene, muttered and grimaced as they passed by. I was siezed by the impulse to defend my brother and tossed a quick comment into the path of their interrupted stroll "We are not in the earthquakes business - we are only here to document the aftermath."

bender bartender

Lady asked me last night

what I did for a living.

Told her i pour

liquid into glassware.

Then she tells me

she's a champagne flute.

Fancy the fruit cake

Never fails to be stirred

just bend her bartend her

like the tumbler she is

a prayer for the unloved

gone fishing
for the piece thats missing

in the ebb and tide of a love that hides
in decimals and percentages
that kills my highschool math skills

carry the one, a remainder of none
the contract expands and contracts

and I was just about to sign my name
ink pen poised like a drooling boner
but now youre gone, now im a goner

it's what it's about

it aint about
what you can get in this life
its about what you can keep.

it’s 9:51

A shuffle of days stacked like a deck of cards,
the ghostly animation of tight, flickering images.
you and me on a balcony ripe of sea and sunsets
the curling lip of tea a sip and cigarettes
you me and a submarine naked on the Bosphorus
a river churned by storm and relentless rain
the jeweled-water whipped by wind and wave.
Lightning erupts below the troubled surface
in a flash we have become unfamiliar
to the electrified depths of our green glowing guts

From a foggy future sudden silhouettes emerge
construction cranes upholding the horizon
in the distance a builder is building a building
Who is the... you is...the builder are you?
What kind of building is what are we building?
Was there a plan or was the spacecraft unmanned?
Were no blueprints on hand when we broke land ?
We cut ribbon and just ran, a blind flaming clown
into the un-built building we burned down.

In the night, the dark barks
a dog fogs and shadows creep
the tears falls the snow weeps,
for Mary had a little lamb
but then she fell asleep.