Finding the Right Dick

"You know why these kids have jobs?  Because they suck the right dick or bend over for the right dick."

Just one of the truth bombs dropped upon me by the balls-naked 56 year-old-man in the locker room of my local gym.  Well, it used to be my local gym until I moved.  Now it's my 20-minutes-on-the-2-train gym.  Like I didn't have a hard enough time finding motivation to get there.

Regardless, one of the interesting things about the crappy economy is that it allows strangers to get into conversations about how bad they have it with one another.  I don't pretend to be well traveled, so I don't know how it is in your hoods, but in New York City, people only speak to each other to ask for directions or money..sometimes sex,  but mostly money.


I forget what the context was but this dude and I start talking and while I'm speaking of my plight, (working a part time, freelancing, and scraping whatever I can from unemployment...impressed, ladies?) he strips down bare-assed and proceeds to simply hold the towel in his hand while talking to me.  Why wouldn't you wrap that around your waist, if for no other reason than to free up your hands?

Anyway, while looking up and to the left the whole time I did hear enough to understand the guy's situation. Three degrees, former writer for a local paper which tanked, and miffed about going on job interviews where kids old enough to be his "judge him."

And that's when he blew Confucius out of the water and told me that the reason people have jobs is because of their luck concerning fellatio and/or sodomy.  I see his point...I mean, I work (part time) at a place where nepotism and cronyism is so widely practiced and accepted that it's become a long-running joke.   One day one of my co-workers spun around in her chair and casually asked, "so who did you know to get this job?"  After I heard that I blacked out a little and came to with four people trying to pry my fingers from her neck.

I don't have that much pride..I don't mind people "judging me" in an interview, but I'm afraid I do have a rather over-active gag reflex.  So I'm thinking it'll be some time before I find the dick that's right for me.  In the meantime gotta keep working hard on the things and for the people that you care about.  Money's fun and it'll come eventually, but it's not all that important.  I like living in my studio, it's comfy and I only got one ass, which can only sit down in one room anyway.

We all do stuff we're not particularly proud of while we wait for the world to shine it's love down upon us.  Hell, check this out.  That's right, kiddos.  That's young Trent Reznor on keyboards for some new age horseshit on AM Cleveland.  The guy had to eat while writing Pretty Hate Machine so he took the job when it was offered.  Do I think he was taking dick working with Slam Bamboo (ironic name for a conversation about taking dick)?  No, he was working hard.  If it's good enough for 2 time Grammy and newly crowned Golden Globe winner Trent Reznor, you aren't above doing what you have to to get by.  PS..Reznor also worked as the janitor for the studio he used.

I saw an old interview with Leona Helmsley, for those of you who don't know her she was a raging twat that had enough money to buy the moon, prided herself on being a horrid employer, and went away for tax evasion, saying "only little people pay taxes."  Sure, maybe her dick never wanted for mouth or ass, but not one person on the planet stepped up to be her character witness during her trial.  When she told John Tesh that she had never been happy in a 1993 interview, I believed it.

Anyway, that's all I got for now.  Poems will be posted every Friday until I run out of them. Till next time, keep your head up and towel around your waist.

How hard can it be?

"So, where are my poems?" 


I don't think I've heard that phrase since my godawful creative writing classes in college.  You know, those classes where everyone's a little genius and you're obligated to peer review their writing while they politely ignore everything you say because they're amazed you can manage walk upright and shit indoors...let alone have the audacity to imply that the garbage they scribbled down in a drunken haze at 4AM doesn't quite stack up to Dylan Thomas.  Ah, Dylan Thomas.  Now there was a mofo that could drink and write.

Anyway,Chris, my boss at Inkbot (I call him "my boss" to make it sound like I have a legit job as a writer, just play along) suggested I contribute a little extra to the site by starting a blog.  I don't know how great of an idea that is, without a story to keep my thoughts penned in, I tend to spiral into a bunch of random thoughts and run-on sentences.  That and I don't want to come right out the box ranting and raving like a crazy person.  Seeing as how the audience at Inkbot have only heard my voice through the characters of Revolvers, American Ambition, and "K," I may need to ease them in to my less err...fantastical writing.

 So I'm setting on a few poems that I wrote back before I started doing prose full time, so I figured I'd share them with the Inkbot audience...or the five or so of you that sticks around to read text without the art to spice it up. 

One of the lessons my favorite poet taught me was to never explain what your poems are about...figured that'd be a bitch when it comes to writing a blog entry so I'll just rant and rave about unrelated stuff before I post them.

PS- I know that I'm using a standardized template, in the interest of full disclosure, I confess I know jack-fuck-all about making things look nice...I have an artist for that.

The Contra Waltz

My mother lets out a sympathetic sigh

Because she thinks I’m homesick

“No” I tell her.

“I’m home, sick.” 

As in, I have a fever

In the apartment I consider my home.

Even though I’ll never afford to keep it

Because I don’t make enough money

because no one will give me a decent job

because of any number of excuses.

I mean reasons.

And I’m missing the work I can’t afford to miss

and I feel like gravity is working over time

and there’s something heavy

and angry behind my eyes

and I can’t get out of bed

and I wish I hadn’t picked up the phone.

I drop the phone and it talks

about how you never get my calls.

How we all talked about it

and we think you’re depressed

again.

How your sister is worried.

If you’ve called the doctor yet.

No, the other doctor.

How you’d have more money

if you didn’t drink so much.

About why you haven’t called

the corporate recruiter back

for the hundredth time

if you left a message

if you’re sure.

About if you’re on the line.

Are you there?

Hello?

I wonder

if my temperature gets

high enough,

will l explode inside out

like a popcorn kernel?

Much to the chagrin

of New York City’s

forensic pathologists

and one of its landlords.

I could be reborn

as a fat chick’s naval ring

for never going to church.

Her pitiable shoe heel will snap

she’ll land gut first on the sidewalk.

I’ll roll down a vent

and live on the subway tracks

until an earthquake splits the ground

and I fall somewhere deep

and hot.

I’d be melted down

into a schizo’s molar filling

that picks up satellite transmissions

and keep them a secret between he and I.

He’ll get tired of having to find

new jobs and

trying new medications.

A nine millimeter slug will burst

from under his chin,

dislodge me,

force me up through

his tinfoil hat,

his ceiling

to the heavens.

Where that satellite lives

in cold isolation

keeping people connected

as it practices a frozen waltz

in an infinite ballroom

Until it gets lonely

and collides with something

and breaks apart

and enjoys the warm friction of the atmosphere

and lands somewhere tropical

and quiet

and enjoys retirement by the sea.

And picks up waves of salsa music

and misses the rhythmic spin of orbit

and wishes it had legs to learn

the contra waltz.

And that’s why I never got your calls

and I’m doing just swell, all things considered.

And thanks for asking.