jonberger

The DJ does not get his way.
He entreats.
He enjoins.
He embodies entreaties to elevate the mood
getting the music pumped
getting everyone on the floor
but no one is on the floor.
No one is dancing.
The room is dead.

He puts on the hits
the deep cuts
the secret songs only he knows
the ones that pump up the crowd
if the crowd is there
to be pumped.
No luck.
No dice.
No good deed unpunished.

Maybe it’s the promoter’s fault
or Security’s
or maybe polio is making a comeback
– just not in Poland.
Maybe the few people here
all came from a funeral.
Maybe there is somebody else
somewhere to blame
for this atrocity of an evening
but he doesn’t know that.

What he does know
is that he is the DJ
here at the club
which is dead
as he tries desperately
to get everybody to dance.

I can tell by your look
what you want to say.
But before you say it
take a closer look.
Look deep.
Just take in
what you see before you.
This is maybe
the most expensive cybernetic shark-slash-sewing machine on the market
– and I got it for a great price.

I know you think we can’t afford it
but honey
you’re gonna have to trust me:
this will change our lives.
We’ve never really had the chance
to sew with sharks before
– you know you want to –
and this is the just best opportunity.
Believe me: it was a really good buy.
So good
I couldn’t turn it down.
If you ever see an opportunity like this
you just have to take it.
Well, I did.
It was almost a biological requirement.

And don’t worry.
With resale,
we’ll get most of the kids’ college fund back.
That is
if we ever give up this astounding addition
to our household.

I get it.
You’re on the fence.
Take some time.
Think if over.
Consider the options
and I’m sure you’ll see
how this will change you and me
forever.

What? Oh.

Goodbye.

When the going gets tough,
the tough get going
far away
along with the rough, the buff,
the fluff
and them that just can’t get enough.

When the going gets tough,
the brave scuff their floors
heading for their respective doors.
They stampede like wild boars,
do the courageous.
They become cowardly,
come tough-going days.

When the going gets tough,
reticence rears its ugly head.
Positive folk just stay in bed
west coast types fear the walking dead
Beatles fans won’t listen what the man said
but will get back up a long and winding road
all across the universe
just to escape.

When the going gets tough
good men flee
bad men go free
weak men wee
and children and aged get weak in the knee.

But
when the going gets tough,
when big men get snuffed,
when braggarts leave in a huff,
when cons get uncuffed,
when there’s simply too much stuff to do,
women do it.

Please stop bitching
about your boyfriend
when you’re with me.
I get that you’re unhappy
and need to vent sometimes
and it’s true we’ve always shared everything
for ever
but keep your negative opinions about your lover
away from my ears.

I don’t need you spewing venom
on the one who spews upon you.
I don’t need any more ammo against him
nor do I need to be convinced
that you two needn’t be.
So please
please let it be.

Find another outlet for your frustration.
We can chat about other topics
but if I hear any more
about how he does you wrong
like some old scratchy song
from some once upon,
I’ll either scream
or beat him
or kiss you
or
something possibly more appropriate.

It’s just
I could do without certain ideas
creeping in my head
like what happened last Thursday
after the Spingarn show.
Things have been different since then
and maybe they shouldn’t be.

So
keep your opinions about your fellow
to yourself
or maybe your therapist.
Do not
let me get my hopes up.

The big man’s dancing
with the blonde swimmer
while the pretender looks on
eventually joining in.
They are good chums, all,
for the moment.
Even the pretender
(sometimes a lawyer)
is feeling kind of neighborly,
while noting the big man
is getting pretty close
to his swimmer girlfriend.
He allows it
since Mr. Big is tight with the boss.

They are getting along so well,
these three,
toasting together while toasted,
acting chummy,
honoring each other,
swearing oaths of fealty and camaraderie
that could never be broken.

It won’t last.
Soon
the jealous lawyer will no longer love the blonde.
Soon
she will find herself beaten down
by the pretender
and seek a doctor for blackened eyes.
Soon
the big man will accept a call from the boss
and cease hanging out
with these chums.
Soon
all any of them will hear from the others
will be memories,
echoes of prior promises
of eternal companionship

When he fell from the sky,
barely born,
no known family
– merely minor memories
of the corpses he crashed with –
did you see the potential
within him?

Did you believe
at that first sight
of that strange child
in this stranger’s land
that he would have so many adventures
before you,
and that you would know him
for so long
and so belovedly?

Did you imagine
during that first day
at the crash site
amongst the fire and carnage
that this child could become yours
and that this man would become the world’s?

Did you know
what the fates had in store
when you first met he
who would be your son?

I know what you think, but don’t care what you say
things haven’t been the same since the good old days
when Mould wasn’t queer and women were grrrls
and all was right with the world.

We played in these clubs on the Lower East Side.
God! Those days were a crazy wild ride.
We all had no jobs and nothing to do.
Our music was wild and new.

We sang songs on the street and we stayed out past dawn,
far away from our teens, drunk on Levittown lawns.
We lived lives completely, full out in the city.
But these days? It’s such a pity.

The kids in the clubs aren’t anything like
we had in the past when we went to the mics
down on Ludlow and over on Sixth Street and A.
Today those same clubs lost their way.

The streets have changed. The Sidewalk’s changed.
Now that Hightower’s left, the scene’s gone deranged.
The clubs are all sold, or at least they’ve sold out.
The East Village lost all its clout.

Now I’m not saying kids today are the worst
but they ain’t cool like we were in two thousand and first
after Jesus. Back then, we knew what was what!
But these newbies just never shut up.

They keep talking about how things now seem so cool.
If they knew what they missed, then they’d feel like a fool,
collected in one, just embarrassed and numb.
What I’m saying is that they’re real dumb.

They can’t live in our history, and more’s the shame
that they’re lost in their own awful modern day game
of the uselessly dull who can’t carry a tune
– not like how we all used to do.

But we know the truth: it was better back then.
These days just suck, but I recall when
Loisaida sang with a glory untold.
Goddamnit, I feel old.

Baby Jupiter’s gone. The Sidewalk has ended.
The future looks bleak, it’s potential descended
beneath hellish depths, abandoned by hope.
I gotta stop smoking all this dope.

(Mimi and Rick)
When he left
he left her with nothing
but her solitude.
And anger,
along with countless charge card payments
and a crippling anxiety about growing old alone
as well as a certain fear of pathogens.

He left her with an embarrassing attraction
to hairy shoulder blades
and a vast technical knowledge
of free scat porn.
He left her frustrated
and furious
and with no ride out of the Berkshires.

What else?
Let’s see:
he left her broke
bummed, buried in debt
broken down and beat upon.
He left her alone
– which should have been obvious from the start –
and he left her lonely.

But with him gone,
she soon realized,
he’d left her
with another thing,
but that item
she could thank him for
were he ever to show his wretched head again.
He left her free.

Slow down.
The good times can’t last forever.
Yours is not a replenishable resource.
Eventually you’ll have said everything
you have to say,
written all the words you know
in every possible combination
that you’re capable of combining.
If you keep up
at this pace
you’ll have run out of good ideas
three weeks ago.

If you’re constantly spitting out
you never have the opportunity
to soak anything in.
So sit. Ponder.
Consider new thoughts.
Learn new ideas.
Give yourself time
to find yourself
some perspective.

It’s possible
with conservation
you can keep the good times going
a little while longer,
at least.
Maybe you can dig
and discover new depths within you
or maybe
you’ll just get better.

I knotted a noose
around the neck of the last
of the plastic rubber chickens I’d ordered
from the Remainder Store
at the start of the summer.
I hung the hardened creature in my window
as some sort of humiliated cry
to the public.
It was September
and you and I would not meet
for another three weeks.

I’d become older
wiser
but still inexperienced in the ways of the heart.
My tongue
had gained some slight sense of practice
at the end of last year
and would find a little bit more
with a great friend
in the days to follow
but I would save myself
in my way
for your eventual touch.

Perhaps that is why
I thought the world needed a display
of my plastic fowl
held in a hangman’s knot
next to my bed.
Everyone who passed
could see
that in my room
I was choking the chicken.
Everyone would understand
the truth of my solitary activities
until I came to know you.