PERKOFF
This
afternoon, I again spent
my time reading
the poems of
Stuart Z Perkoff
and once again
they, as they
have always done,
hit me
heavy with truth
and
spiritual insight
of this
life, his and
ours,
he was singing and
swinging with
words
that sting relevant
some
4 decades later:
he was
widely published
at
the time, many
chapbooks
and work in the
magazines
and literary
publications
and anthologies :
I’ve just ordered
‘Voices Of The
Lady’
his collected
poems:
I can’t wait to
hold and turn the
pages of his
breathing in my
hands,
it feels just like
making
a brand new
best friend.
HOBO
WITH VISIONS
I
awoke at 05:30, swallowed
codeine and
diazepam and
awoke 3 hours
later:
drank some tea and
smoked
a joint: mowed the
lawns
and trimmed the
hedges:
our daughter and
grandchildren
visited: I
had drawn pictures
for
all of them and
waved
and blew kisses to
them
from inside of the
house
as they smiled and
danced from the
garden:
I took some more
prescription
drugs,
worked-out with my
nunchaku and then
opened a bottle of
wine
and with my
notebook
was hoping to
write
a poem and I wrote
down the words of
Doug Draime:
‘A hobo with
visons,
a bum with dreams,
a man of sincere
foolishness,
marking
my time and my
life here on paper
once again’
the right way to
end
a day,
every day.
(Quote from Doug
Draime’s poem ‘Pulling Out Of The Race for the Sake of Winning’ permission
from © Carol Draime, with many
thanks)
READING,
REMEMBERING
In
the bar, following the
college-poetry-reading,
she came up to me
and
offered a drink:
I accepted:
she told me that
she had
enjoyed my words
and
had never thought
that
poetry could be so
raw
and exciting:
she was plain,
short,
rotund with big
breasts:
later, in her
bedsit, she
asked to hold my
hands,
the poet’s hands:
I agreed:
she took hold of
my
hands and gently
massaged and
sensuously slid
her
fingers and coiled
her
hands around mine:
I asked if these
poet’s
hands could caress
and
love her beautiful
breasts:
she nodded her
head and
smiled:
then we were
naked,
laughing and
fooling
around and
afterwards
she asked me to
recite
one of my poems
and I was fucked
if I
could remember a
fucking word.
JAMES
DEAN & I
‘Who
is this?’ she asked
picking a
fridge-magnet
off the freezer
door:
‘Who do you think
it
is? I asked my
four
year old
granddaughter:
she looked at the
portrait
of James Dean and
said
‘It’s you
grandpa!’
I nodded my head,
smiled and felt
good:
‘I’m going to show
nanny this’ she
said:
I heard my wife
laughing a few
moments
later and then my
granddaughter
returned:
‘It’s not you
Grandpa!’
she cried;
‘Let me look at it
again,
oh, that’s not me,
that’s
James Dean’
‘Oh’ she said ‘Is
he a
friend of yours?’
she asked.
THE
LONG SLUG
His
relief and excitement were
one, as he
embraced me,
urging me to sit
back down in
the public bus
shelter after I
had provoked and
challenged
the asshole who
thought he
was a tough guy
and would
have for sure
beaten my ass:
I sat down,
relaxed and
relieved:
the tough guy
looked over
at me looking
tough and I
couldn’t resist
and winked
at him: he began
laughing and
shaking his
head, he took a
long slug
from the bottle
and then
made a show of
offering
it to me as the
other bums
looked on at the
young
new-comer treading
on
their toes and
drinking
their share.
