Oh lord, he's not going to try his hand at poetry, is he?

Yes, he is. I'm going to try my hand -- as usual -- at something the skill for which I don't necessarily possess. There will be something funny later. Dick jokes or something, I promise.

*****
11:47pm

You're going to have to give me a second (be)cause
William Burroughs and WWII are
too
much
on a Thursday night with a stomach full of beer and bad pizza.

While I dip my feet in Mister Clean Antibacterial Multi Surface I notice
it's always raining on Yonge Street;
the cleanest parts are the streetlights and even they're a muddy orange
that leave the pavement looking kind of oily.

Dust blows off my standing fan and I guess that's what I'm smelling:
sort of a burning scent like you left your pan-bread to roast just a little too long.

If you don't mind I'd like to collect my thoughts
because right now it's all heroin and opera.

And at some point it will be necessary to
go to market, I know,

but I'm much happier smelling pan-bread and rain
while I deal with complex phrasing and avoid
what you tell me is fundamentally necessary.

*****

and, a little something from the archives, just to prove I used to do this a lot:

*****
untitled (may '08)

there’s something restless in
the fine dust of butterfly creases and that
day-to-day dust we all breathe:
smoke and ashes without a filter, no
distance, no difference
and absolutely no holding back
not anymore.

filament-fine like optic wire
threads that read like spiderwebs
strung silent at sunset,
catching dust-mites and lightning bugs
that shimmer and burn and expire
while the sun slinks and winks and slips away.

monarchs’ powder; like day-to-day
breathing falls light like snow;
papery postulations written in dust on
blades of grass and stems of
dandelion heads.

restless; trembling in
swan-song reverie
shakes the shade and the long shadows:
dust-mites eat the words, kicking up
devils that spin and swirl and sway.

they settle, slowly, words digested, patterns
splayed like spilled ash, now here, now that way.

at dusk the butterfly will fold its wings and pass
into dust.