Comedy in those days was a sizzle reel of zingers
on a hot California night cruising through the lost
streets of Silverlake I picked you up we laughed
through a lethargic performance of the heart
and gave ourselves to the smog-filled stars above
(originally published in The Piker Press, Winter 2023)
los angeles
25th
I wore a gray-black striped shirt. You made
me a cookie dough ice cream cake. We drank
Rebel IPAs that ended with a stabbing pain
in your stomach. You asked, are you mad I can’t
sleep with you? We drew a storm with cigarettes,
exchanged darkened clouds in our back alley.
And yes, we smelted iron before we slept,
and through this photo, I remember.
(originally published in Setu, Fall 2024)
Actor-Dreamers
Michael says actors are delusional–
the ones who star in poorly-scripted
films, over and over. How can they
live as soft-boiled eggs? I want to believe
in excellence, too. That love of craft–
steering ships– can navigate
to where one needs to go,
even when relentlessly punched
in the ring.
I, too, am weak, having
said the words of Winkler
for free
just to get on screen.
And the cost was
stock-video explosions
that were copyright
violations.
But to live a dream
(and dream
I do)
one must wake up
and say the words
to anyone who listens.
(originally published in Rind: An Online Literary Magazine, Summer 2024)
If California’s the Dream, Keep Dreaming
I arrived a grown child, thinking
this the place where everyone was
a star or– at least– a surfer.
I am neither. Every year
I look back and say my god! I’ve stayed
the same. For example: four billion years ago
I was a molecule in primordial soup,
spinning and swirling. Four billion years later,
I am a clerk at a convenience store, stocking lube and smiling.
Now? I am on the couch watching BoJack Horseman,
eating canned tuna and wondering if I am him.
Or– wait. I am in my car, stuck in traffic, honking
at a red light. Hell, I am driving a lemon,
barefoot in smog. This may be
a dream, but I feel cheated these days,
even if the sun shines– and it does– too brightly.
(originally published in Sunhous Review, Fall 2024)
Jesse and Andrew
were two good friends in Los Angeles,
and in last night’s dream, Andrew announces
he quit acting, though we knew him as a screenwriter,
because he found success in Ohio, and thinking back,
in reality, we were journeying toward the same adolescent
dream, green stars, and we pursued when we were heartbroken,
worn-out, reckless, and last I saw Andrew he stuffed quarters
into the jukebox at gold-lit Birds, repeating Sussudio, commenting
on every woman at the bar, and I didn’t speak up. And Jesse had
returned that day from Thailand. He was sad and I was in love.
I had a chance to see him again– last fall, New York– but he has
a kid now and I could not muster a bus, or to revisit reminiscing
the dreams we shared, what we had to wake up from
during our long, separate searches for meaning.
(originally published in Ink Pantry, Fall 2024)
Shoppers
At Westside Pavilion, I watch shoppers
walk slowly to their Jubilees, carrying plastic
bags of silk and thread to the thrum of Monday.
I shop enough inside my hungry flesh, living
in my Ford, booking tiny television gigs to
replace my shoes. Sometimes, I am able to
watch myself in the lens of a softer society–
playing voyeur to my temporary belonging.
(originally published in Communicators League, Fall 2021)
O
lost contact walking
in circles around franklin
village you wanted to be alone
at the festival of rockets
you paid for everything
we met at the coffeepot
concert steamer summers
spent in a young galaxy
where we both loved
desert guitars
the avenue droughts
and cold
basements
(originally published in Rabid Oak, Spring 2022)
What Else
On a towel eating Lays
at the shore of Lake Erie’s
ocean-simulation but I just want
to piss in sand
singing memories of Los Angeles.
Sorry, the masses I abandoned.
What song of salt on tongue.
What rustic swampland.
Nothing
about the tide I claim
to understand. Water’s not even
clear. Only unexplainable shifts
of the heart coming
and coming at me relentlessly
like I never settled when it mattered.
Now I prefer deepwoods drugs.
Life’s a slow death
and I just need to get to the end.
(go)
What else do you want / what else
do you want / what else do you want? To do?
go
go
go
go
go
(originally published in Spotlong Review, Winter 2023)
A Poetry of Place
Because Tony once said he knew
Columbus and Los Angeles the way I do–
I have not yet developed a poetry of
place for Pittsburgh. Three years in and
still the surprise hills, the way I always
feel– still– an outsider wending my way
through confusing streets. I’ve worked with
Kailee’s dad longer than I lived with Paige
and still we haven’t had a deep conversation.
Everywhere I go there remains a sense of some
thing deep that needs explored. The way
I walked Los Angeles streets at night–
the endless sprawl– must be the same,
but Pittsburgh’s smaller, the graffiti
more familiar, how it’s all a sketch of home.
(originally published in Vilas Avenue, Winter 2023)
The Parking Garage Beneath Westside Pavilion
I slept beneath the mall for some time
to avoid the burden of capitalism ha!
if I could that would be glorious to
avoid the landlord hey look I am in
the parking garage what garbage
all these ads for movies I do and
do not want to see but I would
not know I did not want to see it
until seeing that is the predicament
I do not have the cash nor the time
to spend paying for rent give me
gunmetal cement walls six floors
beneath the surface where I drive
to where not even bugs venture
there I am unbound
I fly in my dreams
(originally published in Train: a poetry journal, Fall 2022)