Play the Piano Drunk Like a Percussion Instrument Until the Fingers Begin to Bleed a Bit Read Free Page A

cigarettes
    and stare at the walls
    and I am given credit for the life and death of
    poetic careers.
    at least I’m given credit for the
    death part.
     
 
    actually these boys are dying off without my
    help. The sun has gone behind the cloud.
    I have nothing to do with the workings.
    I smoke Prince Albert, drink Schlitz
    and copulate whenever possible. believe in my
    innocence and I might consider
    yours.
     

the ladies of summer
     
     
    the ladies of summer will die like the rose
    and the lie
     
 
    the ladies of summer will love
    so long as the price is not
    forever
     
 
    the ladies of summer
    might love anybody;
    they might even love you
    as long as summer
    lasts
     
 
    yet winter will come to them
    too
     
 
    white snow and
    a cold freezing
    and faces so ugly
    that even death
    will turn away—
    wince—
    before taking
    them.
     

I’m in love
     
     
    she’s young, she said,
    but look at me,
    I have pretty ankles,
    and look at my wrists, I have pretty
    wrists
    o my god,
    I thought it was all working,
    and now it’s her again,
    every time she phones you go crazy,
    you told me it was over
    you told me it was finished,
    listen, I’ve lived long enough to become a
    good woman,
    why do you need a bad woman?
    you need to be tortured, don’t you?
    you think life is rotten if somebody treats you
    rotten it all fits,
    doesn’t it?
    tell me, is that it? do you want to be treated like a
    piece of shit?
    and my son, my son was going to meet you.
    I told my son
    and I dropped all my lovers.
    I stood up in a cafe and screamed
    I’M IN LOVE,
    and now you’ve made a fool of me…
     
 
    I’m sorry, I said, I’m really sorry.
     
 
    hold me, she said, will you please hold me?
     
 
    I’ve never been in one of these things before, I said,
    these triangles…
     
 
    she got up and lit a cigarette, she was trembling all
    over. she paced up and down, wild and crazy. she had
    a small body. her arms were thin, very thin and when
    she screamed and started beating me I held her
    wrists and then I got it through the eyes: hatred,
    centuries deep and true. I was wrong and graceless and
    sick. all the things I had learned had been wasted.
    there was no living creature as foul as I
    and all my poems were
    false.
     

the apple
     
     
    this is not just an apple
    this is an experience
    red green yellow
    with underlying pits of white
    wet with cold water
    I bite into it
    christ, a white doorway…
     
 
    another bite
    chewing
    while thinking of an old witch
    choking to death on an apple skin—
    a childhood story.
     
 
    I bite deeply
    chew and swallow
     
 
    there is a feeling of waterfalls
    and endlessness
     
 
    there is a mixture of electricity and
    hope.
     
 
    yet now
    halfway through the apple
    some depressive feelings begin
     
 
    it’s ending
    I’m working toward the core
    afraid of seeds and stems
     
 
    there’s a funeral march beginning in Venice,
    a dark old man has died after a lifetime of pain
     
 
    I throw away the apple early
    as a girl in a white dress walks by my window
    followed by a boy half her size
    in blue pants and striped
    shirt
     
 
    I leave off a small belch
    and stare at a dirty
    ashtray.
     

the violin player
     
     
    he was in the upper grandstand
    at the end
    where they made their stretch moves
    after coming off the curve.
     
 
    he was a small man
    pink, bald, fat
    in his 60’s.
     
 
    he was playing a violin
    he was playing classical music on
    his violin
    and the horseplayers ignored him.
     
 
    Banker Agent won the first race
    and he played his violin.
     
 
    Can Fly won the 3rd race and
    he continued to play his violin.
     
 
    I went to get a coffee and when I came back
    he was still playing, and he was still playing
    after Boomerang won the 4th.
     
 
    nobody stopped him
    nobody asked him what he was doing
    nobody applauded.
     
 
    after Pawee won the 5th
    he continued
    the music falling over the edge of the
    grandstand and into the
    wind and sun.
     
 
    Stars and