Telling the Truth

About Stuff That's Beautiful

Cool

Tina

Sometime Christmas Eve, I began
throwing up and did so straight through
Christmas Morning. Christmas day
I laid in bed, sat on the couch
and watched TV. That night
I slept for hours and today
my body is still sore. My neck muscles
are pure neck muscle.
Now you want to tell me to change
my jeans. That's just bullshit. It's total crap.

So This Is Christmas

That should probably read "light saber" instead of "white saber," though I suppose you can't know for sure. That pile of black sticks is actually a pile of black light sabers, all crossed together.

Good Thought

New! Lamination Colony!

There's the new Lamination Colony which has poems from
me and lots of other people who I think are terrific.
You can read my poems by clicking on the word in this sentence
that looks a little goofy.

Opening a Bad Can

The semester is almost over.
My life is pointed in a certain direction.
Also, I have a cramping calve. I have been
limping all day.
I feel vague and separated.
I do not feel as if I own the universe inside my skull.
I have a sense of doom.
It's a good thing I'm not the starting Quarterback
for an NFL franchise. I would be horrible.
My goopy blood-oil would be spilling all over.
It would be depressing.
So, I try hard not to think about the NFL.
The dreams of junior high only live on
because everything always exists.
I shall meet you in the great beyond, dummy sky bird.
Yes, as if shaking hands, will shall
wiggle the skinny shiny walk together!

Things to Learn from This Photograph

1. My wife and her sisters have always been beautiful.
2. Try tying your scarf on the outside of your coat.
3. Snowmen are always snowmen.
4. My wife's parents' garage used to be somewhere else.
5. The world is always in a state of perfection.
6. More.

The Most Useful Thing I've Written Lately

On the fourth stair, moving from my basement toward
the first floor, I have written:

PETER, THE LAUNDRY!

This is evidence of a serious philosophical pursuit.

How I Notice Hopelessness

I had intentions of writing something
here that mattered a great deal and somehow
made me more equal, universe-wise,
but of course it's the same not. You,
patient nobody, are very gracious.
Of course, I hate myself for all of my activities.
Still, I dislike myself for other reasons.
It's a sort of sponge you use for soaking.
Suck.

I Love My Friends

I'm only a so-so friend.
I do the best I can.
But I'm very selfish
and self-centered.

Bad Shit about Poetry

What is important in life is nothing
you want to try and write about.
You people, with your lives
and your other stuff.
Forget all that, Scooter!
Your Motorbike ain't got no
juice here unless you include the
chipmunks it runs over.
Or the Ace of Spades.
Speaking of which, a human like myself
has brothers.
What is beautiful in life is exactly
things like my brothers, and
what they do, and who they
were when I was in fifth or seventh or
eleventh grade.
Everything seems pretty shiny when
you sort of feel it, but, also,
everything is sort of true too.

Stuff on My Desk

To him, these are notes and messages. He is leaving clues. He says to me, "Dad, I've been working on a book." He is correct. I have been working on something like a book too. Also, everyone is an artist. Even when you look down into your skull, what you see there is a smart thing.

Proof, of Something

The following if from my friend, Tom:

In the current new yorker briefly noted book reviews they review a book about Hitler's private library (he read a book a day, they say). They don't think the book adds much to our knoweldge of Hitler, but the review concludes with:

"...but Hitler's reading yields few new insights, and some of what Ryback dredges up is merely peculiar: between the pages of an early acquisition, a guidebook to Berlin, is 'a wiry inch-long black hair that appears to be from a moustache.'"