jonberger

Don’t make me upset.
You won’t like me
when I get upset.
My face gets all red
and puffy
like I’m about to cry
and then I do begin to cry,
heaving, gulping,
snorting back tears
snot dripping
then spurting
all over anything that’s near me.

You’ll want to flee
but my desperate grip
will stop you cold
as I seek comfort
protection from whatever
dared offend me
in the first.
You will have to offer
compassion and empathy
and who could have empathy
for a creature like that?

I sometimes lose control of my bladder
and my bowels
as I stew ashamedly
in my own juices
screaming again
about what got me so worked up
in the first place.
As I gulp in air
and assail with insipid questions
you will fear for your own safety
and wonder if you’ll ever be free.

You will not.
I will cry forever
or it will feel like that
and you will be lost
simply because you didn’t have enough control
to keep me from getting upset.

Did I mention the vomiting?

A lot of things can happen
in five minutes.
Flips can be switched
actions reversed
decisions rescinded
or reiterated
or forgotten completely – if you’re old
or senile
or
at the very least
Alzheimer’s’ed.

History sometimes relies
on those minute changes
made in five minute increments.
History
and lovers
and doctors
and heroes and villains.

Everyone waits for those five minutes
to recognize
what fate would have of us.
Everyone wonders
how it will end.

The future knows
and so will you
in five
four
three
two –

If you keep writing
all the time
you will
on some occasion
produce crap.

The more you try to produce
the more waste will result.
That is simply
part of the process.

Keep that in mind
and remember the steps
and do not get discouraged
and also
find another editor.

All the spikes on your jacket
cap and earrings
seem like the must hurt.
Your ripped shorts
and tights beneath
seem to offer scant protection
from any of the elements.

You look good
– you know you look good –
but
is it worth it?

Your pointy boots
and painted face
and jacket
all seem to cost you
quite a bit.

They look at you with disdain
as an enemy of their estate.
You’ve become a damaged rebel
who suffers
for a point
I don’t understand.

How far will you go
what parts must you endanger
in the name of fashion?

In my latest effort to live forever
I am transforming all of my trenchant thoughts
opinions and plans
into zeroes and ones
so they can be downloaded
then disseminated to the world
after I’m gone.

My poems
my essays
my stories and songs
all have been easily included
in the open maw
that’s absorbing my history.
All that data
with one place to go:
into my digital soul.

I am including other forms, too.
Handwriting samples
speech spoken for sonic affect
sketches and dance routines
piteously sucked up
so the future will know me better
than I know myself.

Other people’s opinions
will offer a 360 view.
And I am beginning to codify
my idealogies
as well as my realities.

Compiled are my hypocrisies
and my lies
and my truths
and my anecdotes
and the context of my decisions.
I am providing everything to the machine
so the machine can provide
your descendants
a glimpse
into me.

The process
has been enlightening
for me
and
I think
will also serve later generations
if they can still read the files.

I’ve been reading.
I’ve been riding.
I’ve been writing.
I’ve been wringing out the old
and ringing in the new,
wryly assessing the entire situation.
I think it’s getting better.
It’s getting better all the time.

I’m a negative soul
suspicious of the finer things
the faithful
the foolish
who seem to will their way
into a better life
but
it seems to work for them.
It seems to be working
for me.

I have decided to see improvements
and because of it
there are improvements
everywhere.
Life is getting easier
lovers kinder
my mind is producing great results.
It’s all good.

And
I’m not even upset
it’s taken me this long
to choose this path
of self-hypnosis
and -actualization.
I am becoming who I could never be before
simply by deciding it.
I couldn’t have done this at a younger age.
I can barely do it now!

In fact
as I think about it
I realize just how stupid it was
to believe that the world could get better
at any time.
I was dumb.
This is dumb…

In the morning
I was alone.
Last night
I was in heaven
with a beautiful girl in my arms
on my lips
in the bathroom of the bar…
it was exquisite.
It was unrivaled
it was uncalled for
but I hoped she would call me
and we could do it again
but
as I woke up
alone
in the bathtub
with my wallet emptied
and my intestines unattached
I suspected
I might not see her again
unless it was in court.
Still,
the wicked smile
the sinister gleam
the sarcastic sense,
if I could see her again
I would.

If there was a chance
I could wake up
with her
I would take it.

He’s gonna die:
bloated
red-faced
inebriated.
He’s gonna fall
in the night
on his bike
bat-shit blind faced.
He’s gonna live fast
die young
leave a kidney-rotted corpse.

His is not a long path
but it will blaze
with imbibement
embarrassment
and expectations dashed.
He will experience much
in the bars and alleys
he already knows extremely well.

He can’t last long

– how could he?
But his legend will outlive him
at least until the next hoodrat hero comes along.

She keeps talking about the rape
like there’s nothing else to talk about,
to think about,
like that horrible act
she experienced TWO YEARS back
should be the focus of all our conversations now
like other incidents haven’t occupied anyone’s attention
just a little bit
since then.

She keeps focusing on the rape
and what she could have done differently
like taking a different martial art
or wearing looser clothes
or spending time with another kind of guy.
She asks herself
– and sometimes me –
if the whole thing could have been avoided.

She tortures herself about it.
I beg her not to
to let it drop
that it’s long past
buried deep
and if she’d just stop talking about it
she could stop thinking about it
like I have.

She won’t leave it alone
continuing to beg my forgiveness
even after all this time.
I keep explaining
how there’s no need
any longer.
I’ve forgiven
what she did to me.
It is buried deep
and I’d practically forgotten it.

You should be here
You really should.
It’s raining
in the park
that you used to love.

You would smile so brightly
in the rain
in the park
and that would make everything else
change.
It wouldn’t make the sun appear
but
it wouldn’t matter.
That smile was enough.

But
the sun’s gone
and the smile’s gone
because you’re gone
and there’s not much left here
that’s worth noting.

I wish you were here.
I wish you’d come back
if only for a visit.