jonberger

And there came a time
when I reached the store
and I had to pay full price for my oatmeal.
I was at the wholesale store
buying in bulk,
but still.
I did not like the feeling I experienced
at all.

I decided that if I saw a coupon for oatmeal
I would buy it then
even if I didn’t desire oatmeal at that moment.
I would not be held hostage
by my immediate needs.

Since that day
I have had many oatmeal coupons cross my hands.
I have seen many oatmeal boxes enter my home.
My empire of oatmeal has achieved decadence
upon my shelves
but I cannot go back to my olden ways.
I have achieved something important.

I have arrived upon heights of hegemony
seen oatmealic horizons undreamt of by others.
I have unheralded flavors, grains galore!
This is peak porridge in my apartment
I would never have approached in my previous past.
I would have missed it entirely
and now
now
I got some oatmeal eatin’ to experience.

The person who has the Autistic Integrity website
hasn’t added anything
in seven years which is a real shame
because anyone who actually has Autistic Integrity
shouldn’t squander it like that.

Yeah, that’s all I’ve got.

When I wrote that piece
about all of that shit
I didn’t mention why John
was at my house in the first place.
He was looking for materials
to take off my hands
so he could sell them
to more interested people.
I had a lot of shit back then
(I still do,
but I’ve cleaned out
quite a bit of the shit
from then, and I live leaner now).

He took some crap off my hands,
John did,
and I walked him back to the train station.
I’m not sure why.
Maybe because my neighborhood is rough?
He got up there all right on his own.
Was he scared to leave alone?
In the piece I said it was the middle of the day
so he couldn’t have been scared of the dark.

I just ran into John the other day;
the first time in years.
I told him I’d referenced him
in some piece of poop I was working on.
I didn’t ask why we walked together to the train station.
I guess that is just another thing I didn’t say.

You can only keep stealing ideas
from better artists for so long
but I figure it’s two,
maybe three lifetimes
and I hardly expect to live out this one
so I think it’ll work out.

Maybe admissions like this
will find me out
but haven’t better artists
already admitted to being thieves
and gotten away with it?
So: this’ll probably eke through, too.

Privilege of the shameless
does have its perks.

When you eat nothing but sugar
and sleep nothing but minutes
and dream nothing but scant scat porn
and this interminable act will not get off stage
it is difficult
to develop an inspiring
– and sincere –
compliment to offer
at the end of the evening.

My creativity has been leeched out
by the circumstances of the situation
or vice versa.
Did I mention I haven’t been drinking enough?
Dehydration may well
be part of the equation.

I cannot generate a single kind remark to provide
that proves I’ve been paying attention
and like what he’s been doing.
Should I dare honesty?
What artist wants to hear that?

I’ll have to come up with something.
Luckily, at this rate,
I’ll have an eternity
to come up with some word
so no rush.

The dog didn’t eat my homework
because I am not a child
but the dog ate my book from the library
– or so I told them at the Greenpoint Library.

“The dog ate the book.
Really destroyed it.
How much do I owe?”

I don’t carry a wallet
because I am not a salaryman
but I pulled at my stack of bills
to show I was serious about paying my dues
– and also that I’m loaded
(if only with singles).

The librarian shook her head.
“We don’t really do that here.”

“The book isn’t much of a book anymore,” I said,
“you’re out a book. It’s my fault.” I didn’t rat out the dog.
“How do you get the book back?
Should I buy it for you?”

“You can make a donation,” responded the librarian,
“or return the book and let us assess the damage.
If you don’t return it, you may have to pay for it!”

I smiled. They did away with fines a few years back.
This really ain’t your auntie’s library anymore.

“Things have really changed at the library
since I was a kid, ma’am.”
“I’m actually in the process of transitioning,”
said the librarian,
“I prefer to be identified as Master.”
“Master?”
“I’m transitioning to the one percent.”
“From a librarian?” I asked, “that must be quite a surgery.”
“I’ll be able to afford it once I’m in the one percent.
I figure it’s the surest way out of this poem,” zey said.

It did seem like the poem itself had transitioned away from its origins
into something somewhat different
for I am not a one-trick pony
but a two-trick pony
who can switch things up occasionally
and show how growth in the Brooklyn library system
can be reflected as growth
in other systems entirely.

Does the analogy make me
in fact
a one-trick pony again?
At least I’m not a child salaryman
who had to pay
to replace a book
at the Greenpoint Library.

So I see you got a husband now.
I thought someone would tell me if you’d ever do that.
I guess you got to keep all of the friends when our soda went flat.
It’s not like we were ever anything more than a third-rate romance.
I just suppose I hoped in the end we’d be the last two at the dance.

Anyway…
If you could see your way clear to be someone like the picture that I’ve held in my arms
then I think I could be the jolly rancher who could finally buy the farm
and I could sell to your folks all the pieces that they never really hoped to get
and finally you and me could become free of all our old bindings and tourniquets

and
not everything comes together in the end. I see that. I always knew.
But it’s taken this latest download of info from you, the brand-new paper you threw
to inform me that the end of the world isn’t waitin’. It’s here now. It’s what I’ve got
and if you ever talked to me again, well then, the big light will have taken its shot

so you know that
days will come when I’ll no longer think of you.
Until then
these days aren’t through.

I guess it makes sense
that my only male cousin
would be the one who would introduce me
into the wonderful magical world of Moorcock.

Michael Moorcock is a fantasy author
and my older cousin Dan
told me all about his stories
with twisted characters like Elric and Corum
and Jerry Cornelius and the Eternal Champion and Jesus.
Dan also showed me strobe lights and Elton John.
It was the early eighties; a wild time.

I looked up to the guy
and I learned a lot
without understanding much of anything.
I appreciated the high fantasies
about the cosmic balance
and the ever-reincarnating hero
always returning with a thousand faces
to forever fight
if not constantly for good.

The themes stuck with me.
The literature fed me.
The music, eventually, too.

I even got a strobe light.

Thank you, Dan,
for showing me all about Moorcock.
I had to find Phil Dick
altogether on my own.

The mirror shows the best version of myself
I’ve seen in twenty years
since some woman tore me me up
and brought my weight down
quite substantially.

After that, of course, my weight rose
substantially squared
and eventually I was heavier
than ever before.

It took fifteen years to get a handle on it
and only through speed
but now
the mirror shows a me
about the same as the me
at the start of the story
which, granted, was also the present tense me
so they should both look exactly the same anyhow.
I am he
as he be me
and we be altogether us?
Something like that.

We’re looking all right, though.
Trust me on that.

If he lived it probably would make no difference
for the continuing adventures of the Fab Four
who’d remain out-Bested in no time
and retreat from German lands
to turn Cuban heel back to Liverpool
and all that that might signify.

Life would resolve just the same way
in the same eight days
with no additional help
from the artistic addition of Sir Sutcliffe.
He’d still jump ship.
He’d still call it quits.
He’d still desist.

So no one need be maybe amazed
at the sound unsung by that Fab Five.
They were never to be.
That had already been fate’s decree
even if Sutcliffe kept vitality.

Stu’s date was due.
Oooooo!