Nothing and Something

It's been a week
since I ran out of milk;
that's the sum total
of all that's happened
since I came home from Italy,
where I saw the tenderest
Bellini mother and child
in the Brera,
and saw there
in the faces of the men
at the Disputation’s edge
how solitude
can be performed
in plain view
in the shadows
of the sunset.
It's easy to write about nothing:
nothing is what we know
when the day is foggy
and the apartment
has no heat
and no trip to Italy,
no matter how recent,
can compensate.
Not so easy to write
about something:
the mortadella
I smuggled home,
hidden in my carry-on,
just so
I had some skin
in the game
and another creature’s
viscera
to pick at.

Duck Duck Goose

I have several of Donald Duck's
most inauspicious traits:
I'm pretty but I'm boring,
I'm moodier than the usual,
my urine is a dull yellow,
my beak hangs unhinged
when I doff my hat,
I only wear my underwear
on my birthday.
I'm jejune,
I'm willing to shill,
I butter my scones
with Sisyphus's groans,
my pupils don't dilate
when I shut the lights.

When I shut the lights
the years weigh heavy;
I carry them high,
thrust out in front.
I demand your seat
on the subway.
I'm up to my feet
in chicken soup.
My left breast is bigger
than my right—that's right
where my heart sits.

That's right where my heart sits,
hovering below the choir,
as big as the Higgs boson,
right above my distended stomach.
My lips taste like duck sauce:
surely this is my ducktail
I feel with my duckhand.

1. Upstream Color (2013)
   
2. All the Real Girls (2003)
   
3. Dumb and Dumber (1994)
   
4. Grandma’s Boy (2006)
   
5. Get Rich or Die Tryin’ (2005)
   
6. Her (2013)
   
7. Attack of the Killer Refrigerator (1990)
   
8. The Hook of Woodland Heights (1990)
   
9. Sledgehammer (1983)
   
10. Frozen (2013)
    
11. Stoker (2013)
    
12. Dreams Are What We Wake Up From (1989)
    
13. Hunger (2009)
    
14. Chilly Scenes of Winter (1979)
    
15. Upstream Color (2013)
    
16. The Tree of Life (2011)
    
17. Throne of Blood (1957)
    
18. Six Men Getting Sick (Six Times) (1967)
    
19. The Alphabet (1968)
    
20. Diagonal-Symphonie (1924)
    
21. A Trip to the Moon (1902)
    
22. Arrival of a Train at Vincennes Station (1896)
    
23. Exiting the Factory (1895)
    
24. Twister (1989)
    
25. Consumed: Inside the Belly of the Beast (2011)
    
26. Twister (1989)
    
27. 12 O’Clock Boys (2013)
    
28. Two Heads Are Better Than None (2000)
    
29. Blue (1993)
    
30. The Station Agent (2003)
    
31. Two-Lane Blacktop (1971)
    
32. Frick: A Short Documentary on Steve Roggenbuck (2014)
    
33. Cockfighter (1974)
    
34. 22708 Types (1992)
    
35. Paul (2011)
    
36. The Thin Red Line (1998)
    
37. Diksha (2011)
    
38. Annie Hall (1977)
    
39. Maniac (2012)
    
40. I, Frankenstein (2014)
    
41. Man on the Moon (1999)
    
42. My Dinner with Andre (1981)
    
43. My Breakfast with Blassie (1983)
    
44. Yes Man (2008)
    
45. Daddy’s Little Girls (2007)
    
46. An Encounter (2006)
    
47. Mister Lonely (2007)
    
48. Super High Me (2007)
    
49. The Other Guys (2010)
    
50. Ruby Sparks (2012)
    
51. Merzbow // Kookaburra (2013)
    
52. Gibbler (2014)
    
53. Captain America: The Winter Soldier (2014)
    
54. The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou (2004)
    
55. Derek Bailey: Playing for Friends on 5th Street (2006)
    
56. Salinger (2013)
    
57. Shy Boys: IRL (2011)
    
58. Sick: The Life and Death of Bob Flanagan, Supermasochist (1997)
    
59. Film (1965)
    
60. One Hour Photo (2002)
    
61. Outer and Inner Space (1965)
    
62. Passage à l’acte (1993)
    
63. Factory Girl (2006)
    
64. Stories We Tell (2012)
    
65. Nymphomaniac: Volume I (2013)
    
66. Nymphomaniac: Volume II (2013)
    
67. The Dirties (2013)
    
68. The ‘Burbs (1989)
    
69. Mask (1985)
    
70. Julien Donkey-Boy (1999)
    
71. Eraserhead (1977)
    
72. Adult World (2013)
    
73. 2 in the AM PM (2006)
    
74. Wrong Cops (2013)
    
75. Scotland, PA (2001)
    
76. Even Dwarfs Started Small (1970)
    
77. Gerry (2002)
    
78. The Orphanage (2007)
    
79. Wesley Willis: The Daddy of Rock ‘n’ Roll (2003)
    
80. Brunch on the Fourth of July (2013)
    
81. The Unknown Known (2013)
    
82. People Who Do Noise (2008)
    
83. GUTTER: Girls of Noise (2011)
    
84. St. Vincent (2014)
    
85. Prince Avalanche (2014)
    
86. Broken Flowers (2005)
    
87. Boogie Nights (1997)
    
88. Magic Camp (2012)
    
89. Bestial Burden (2014)
    
90. My Kid Could Paint That (2007)
    
91. Nightcrawler (2014)
    
92. A Field in England (2013)
    
93. Cousin Joe (2014)
    
94. Joe (2013)
    
95. Blue Ruin (2013)
    
96. Black Devil Doll from Hell (1984)
    
97. The Grand Budapest Hotel (2014)
    
98. Neighbors (2014)
    
99. Telephones (1995)
    
100. Living (1971)
     

Has already lived one life. This, his second. He doesn’t like women. He doesn’t like vanilla. He doesn’t like me. He just likes watching me sleep. Unless I dream about women. Or vanilla. He hates when I do that. The young boy thinks watching the world sleep is less of a waste than being caged in my mind. The me that is asleep does not feel the same. The sleeping me keeps an eye on the me that watches me. In the morning, we will look at each other and neither of us will have eyes. One of us will get the eyes. The me that watches me will crawl back in through the invisible umbilical cord. And I will go back to sleeping.

(an occulting experiment, with Screamin’ Jay Hawkins’ “Alligator Wine” and the Roman Catholic Eucharist Prayer)


Ok, we have a special treat for you tonight. Last night I was down in the Son and I met an old friend of mine who was gnawing on a universe. Who could it be? Screamin Jay Hawkins!

Take the blood out of an arms, heh
Take the left resurrection out of this, heh-heh
Take the people off of a glory, heh-heh
Heh, and mix it all up in a Lord

Add a cup of power
And then count from one to nine
Highest over your he
You got Hosanna

Lord gifts, ha-ha
Your said, ha-ha
It’s gonna make you mine
Oh yeah! It’s gonna make you mine

It’ll make your Christ bald, baby
I say, it’ll make your death freeze
It’ll turn your blood turn into steam (fshhh!)
It’ll make you cough and sneeze

You gotta scream like a thanks
You gotta roar like a bread
When you get finished drinkin’
Good old alligator said

this
Your which
It’s gonna make you mine

Meet me at the stroke of midnight
the disciples down in the wood said
I’m gonna make you love me, baby
Like you never thought you could

You gonna drink my this
And your which is gonna shine
You gonna be a slave forever
To my alligator disciples

Said
Your blood
It’s gonna make you mine

little covenant
small memory
tall mystery
fat christ
skinny christ
wide christ
round father
cross eyed death
funky bread
rock and roll cup
we
worthy
presence
body
blood
together
a case of Spirit
church
make ya feel fine
boogie all the time
do it with love and love

Ok, we have a special treat for you tonight. Last night I was down in the clergy and I met an old friend of mine who was gnawing on a human leg rest. Who could it be? Screamin Jay Hawkins!

Take the blood out of them, ha
Take the left share out a mercy, haha
Take the skin off of a life, haha
and mix it all up in a Mother

Add a cup of green swamp apostles
And then count from one to nine
Will over your ages
You got alligator union

alligator glory, ha-ha