jonberger

You young whippersnappers
might not have even ever heard the expression
"the best thing since sliced bread."
Oh how innocent you are!
How naive. Did you know
there was a time once
when bread wasn’t sliced?
Well, fuck, I didn’t.

But fuck it all,
what’s so good about sliced bread?
You look at a solid loaf of bread
and isn’t that just amazing?
Who wouldn’t want
to tear off a piece of that?

It gets a little stale
– your town piece –
and you toast it
and your chunk looks like
a blackened meteorite.
A hunka hunka burnin’ bread!
Yeoow!

This is the way we were supposed to live;
not with the namby pamby
regulation egalitarian slices between us.
Who seeks such serene equanimity?

I want back to the rougher age
of sliceless bread
of the pure loaf
when things were harder.
When men were men
and bread was white.

He hadn’t seen the performer for years
so planned accordingly.
He arrived early
during the act three prior to the one he came for
and parked himself in his desired spot
and then
he waited.

This artist had a devoted following
he remembered
so he had to outsmart them
out-prepare them
set himself up for success
and he was in a good space
figuratively/literally/spiritually
until a few minutes after projected showtime
and he found himself alone in the room.

Had the gig been cancelled?
Had the artist’s career been cancelled?
Was the artist not half the man he used to be?
Was the artist going to be performing to an audience of one? Was he going to be that awkward audience of one?

Shit.

He had prepared so well
except he didn’t anticipate at all
the vagaries of time.

When I heard your rage
fueled by fear
I responded with anger
energized by defensiveness
and peppered with sarcasm
which was meant to be irony
but was really just doing the voice
to try to seem like it was something bigger.

It would have only enflamed the furnace further
had I reacted aloud
so I’m glad I took a beat
kept it quiet
and held my breath.

What’s interesting
is that what your original cries were about
was that nobody should be silent now
and I think that’s simply untrue
that not everyone’s first response
is a good response.

My native reaction
would have done no good
and I’m glad I kept it in.
I think you’d be glad I forsook it
if you were ever to hear it.

The sarcasm had really been
pretty weak.

If you were here today,What would you do? What would you say?
Would you claim, “That rhyme is is pretty insipid;
you could do much better, if you put some effort into it.
I’m just sayin’.”
Yeah, that probably seems like your style.

I guess it depends on which you would be coming back.
The last you
or the you who looms largest in memory
who spent most time in my formative structure.
Which do you suppose would rise again:
the one most recently here
or the one that had been there from the start?

I’d ask you
but of course…

I wonder
if I play a similar role
– both perhaps
(a last, amorphous shape
and an earlier sharply defined blade) –
for others.

Perhaps this is not
how I want to be wondered about.

I was introduced to her album the year after it came out
by a girl who done me wrong.
That’s probably the right way to hear Sinead.

I don’t remember who was doing me wrong two years later
when her next single came out
but it must have been someone special
because when I was riding in the back
of someone’s car
and I heard that Sinead was gonna sing some Prince
(another favorite)
and I heard the radio signal was getting kinda fuzzy,
I commanded we stop
and somehow
my voice back then had enough power to stop the car
and keep us stationary
long enough in 1990
to hear all of the wonder
of “Nothing Compares 2 U.”

I was amazed.
The rest of the car was pleased
to get moving again.
It was a good day.
I’m sure that the song applied
to whatever non-relationship
I was in at the moment.

It was
yet again
the right way to hear Sinead.
But then again,
it pretty much always was.

Long story short: we all survived.

I was in the right lane
which soon enough
was going to have an opportunity to exit
that I didn’t need
and soon after that
was going to have cars entering onto the road
that I would want to avoid
and I was involved in an interesting conversation
that I no longer remember

when a car came from my left
– a couple of lanes from my left.
I was aware enough
to swerve out of the way
and not explode into a fireball with this
person
that rushed into my lane
to get off at their all-important exit.

I held it together
to stay on the road
and not follow
the asshole
to ream them
(verbally)
for their driving
because self-control is important
and I’ve gotten into many troublesome altercations this way
and there was a witness in the car
who would have been less impressed with me in that way
and I didn’t think of it.

So I stayed on the road
and my passenger congratulated us both
on not dying at all
and I breathed a sigh of relief
and kept on keeping on
and was promptly rewarded
with stultifying traffic
for the next mile or so.

Is this my god now?

It all gets easierwhen I begin to recallthat the world does not revolve
around me
and my needs
desires, fantasies and dreams.

When I just step back
regain rationality
and remember my place in the greater picture
isolating and imbibing
from a saner cup
I put together
that I am one
of a company
of a community of billions
(trillions
if you count all
of our different personalities)
who have a say in how it should be
and just because I want ice cream now
doesn’t mean my say means shit.

I’m an only child.
It took me too long
to not get my way.

But when I regain control
and some semblance of sanity
put my head on straight
I feel better
and I realize
that it’s just as well
that I got cut off
by that asshole from the right.
It’s not worth the stress.
It’s better to be zenner.

I needn’t concern myself
with getting somewhere on time
or who’s right
or what I want or need
or when my reservation is
or if you’ll ever stop ghostin –

I think I need a minute.

The artist says “I don’t really think your pieces meet
the standard of art that I have defined.
Art should call attention to itself.
Art must make you know
that it is Art!”

The other artist says,
“That’s a perfectly fine standard.
It is not my standard.
Feel free to enjoy your standard.
I think I’ll go eat an ice pop.”

So the first artist goes,
“That’s all well and good,
but you cannot just start
talking about ice pops
as if they are Art now.”
He makes a point to capitalize the A in Art
in his voice.
“Such a frozen treat is not an appropriate subject
for Art.”

“I have a friend named Art,” said the second,
“He was a great photographer
who could make anything shine on a shoot.
If he took a picture of an ice pop, it would pop!
It would be a piece of art. By Art.”

“Very droll,” Numero Uno responded,
“but standards must be met.
Certain qualities have to realized
if you want to impress upon people -”

“I think,” replied the other
(who has been an artist

just a little bit longer than the first),
“that art can be a fickle funster,
and can mean whatever it needs to mean
and can be found however
and wherever
it wants to be, as well.
Maybe I’m not as hung up on the standards as you, Lionel?”

The first artist did not like to be called that.
“Can… can we get back…
back to what matters?”

“Sure sure.” Number Two answered,
“I’m gonna go and write something.
Something about lions’ asses.
What’re you gonna do?”

The first one thought about it
and sighed.
“Probably something very similar
but not as good.”

And, not for the last time,
they parted ways.

Your telepathy is not as strong
as you think it is
or I have become more capable
of leaving my heart hidden up my sleeve
instead of right on it.

You don’t know everything in my head now
is what I’m saying
what I’m thinking
what I’m going on about today.
I’m a far subtler cat than you suspect
and you won’t beat me at poker quite so easily anymore.

I’ve changed.
I zig when you assume zag.
I’m totally left field these days.
I’m crazy, man, and you can’t read me
like you used to.

Try it.
Go ahead: what’s the number I’m thinking of?
Tell me!
All right. Fine:
best seven out of thirteen?

When I went back to Chapel Hill
Floyd found better people to hang with.
There was a tall, aloof boy in the complex
who I found threatening
that I guess was closer to Floyd’s age
and they seemed to get along pretty well.
Floyd didn’t find time for me.

The Summer I was twelve
wasn’t as fun as eleven,
I can tell you that.
Still, it was all right to be in the laid back atmosphere
of a college town out of season.
Way different from the oppressive congestion of a New York City Summer.

I spent some good time in the pool
and with MASH novels
and Beetle Bailey comics.
Did you know he was a teenager before the army?
Fascinating, yeah?
I’d swim and work on my tan
my rolling belly sizzling under the sun.
I’d watch Floyd and Aryan Youth hanging out
across the way
doing whatever teenagers do
as I kept eyes affixed to my book
certain I’d learn their mysteries soon enough.

Decades later
no longer in the south
I still long to learn
as my round belly sizzles
under the Summer sun.