Posts for June 2, 2018 (page 8)

They ain’t gotta
Make me outta plastic
My cells are synthetic
And I bleed like you do

My supernatural abilities
My subferal proclivities
My cognitive metaphysicality

1. confuse coffee grounds with the instant
2. cook the rice extra dry
3. commit to too many extracurriculars
4. move out in the fall and tell you
    you made it easy

you are my question
and I am yours

the two of us 
on some quest

together without a map
as you lay dying

ask me why
I believe in god

and I bend close
ask why you don’t

(The first two lines are from Elie Wiesel.)

I had a chance to meet you in person, Mr. Gillespie
It was at the Village Gate
I was with a group of people I had organized to hear your group.

That night, your were with band members Ben Brown on bass, Rodney Jones on guitar and Mickey Roker on drums
You announced to the audience that you were going to introduce the members of the band
You introduced them—to each other
We laughed.

You also featured special guests trumpeter Jon Faddis and Mike Longo, my piano teacher at the time
Jon Faddis played a bent trumpet just like yours
During one tune, he played some notes higher than the ones you played
You said to the audience, “But I wrote it”—or something like that
We laughed.

After your concert, you were surrounded by fans waiting to get your autograph
I thought, I’ll wait for another time to meet you
Sadly, it never happened.

Your autobiography is called To Be or Not to Bop
It has some funny stories in it
I read it, and I laughed.

We hold in common
a memory of graduating
forty-five years ago,
laughing at the antics
we lived through.
Never bringing
to the surface
what we all know
about each other,
our struggles
against life’s raging
river of adolescence.
Now that we’re on
the other side, we laugh.

books burn slowly
fred smock purports
can’t say i’ve ever tried
though i’ve come close
that’s sure, like the time
we vowed to burn algebra one
workbooks at an end-of-the-year
bonfire in high school

though the class was inane
(the teacher more so)
i’m glad we refrained
setting fire to texts—even
poorly-written, poorly-researched
even completely (politically) incorrect
books—it could be a slippery slope

not that we’d want to read, teach
such tomes earnestly, not that we’d
dare value idiocracy but
we can’t forget stupidity
lest it repeat itself

so while i’d like to immolate
the art of the deal
surviving at the top
the art of the comeback
the america we deserve
the best golf advice i ever received
why we want you to be rich
how to build a fortune
trump 101 (a trump university text)
never give up
think like a champion
time to get tough
midas touch
trump tower, and
crippled america

i’ll conserve resources
treat them as another kind of fuel
to get my blood boiling, popping
splattering onto the page
who needs ghostwriters
when you have white phosphorus
rolling through your veins