the last of the bums-

the last of the bums,

they come at 4 am at 5 am at any am crying you from sleep. they come tugging their blankets, soiled and hungry. they the youth being dragged by the wild animals that grow in the heart, the animals of adventure and discovery and once we were them. now we are sore from the work, sore from the mountains of letters and endless hard fought miles to keep the lights on.
we the grey hairing, we the worn sunday slacks hard sighing when we squat in the pew to serious our intentions to the orthodox christ while they giggle draw and stomp their feet. we the love makers heavy flesh crashing like waves into the hard beach line of wrinkled sheets and worn thin pillows.we lay gasping for air in the raven black winter night as they call out as they stumble across darkened flooring tears falling paining under the labor of teeth eruption.
where once there was the rush of downtown where everything was wet lips rudded cheeks flushed and all sentences had the passion of an exclamation point.
'who was that!?' she would say.
'immortal lee county killers!'
'yeah!'
'yeah!'
there was fire outside doug fir where we gasped these things. where we paced, she in her white puff jacket, where we smoked cigarettes rubbed our fingers together drooling slightly from the sides of our lips hungry for sex for next for something something something!
you must learn patience for the youth. the youth do need that. you must learn you can't get red wine drunk singing outside until three in the morning. you must learn that chasing your now wife through music clubs or the art museums can't happen anymore. the youth need that. the freedom for that.
i try these things. i get hungry still. i chase still.
these the new legions of champions have little to no time for your ornaments of nostalgia and they shouldn't. if we always looked back think of the pot holes we stumble upon, twist our ankles, hair smashed flat from falling down. onward i say, burn your bridges the future is out there not behind you.
i can tell them these things. for me, i am overgrown with the roots of mine mind. i spend hours watching the light change on the pavement or ceiling in a trance of remembrance.
why remember the time i rushed across country hearing j.r. and thinking we'd be received as conquering heroes. why remember when we (dear j.r.) stopped in new mexico and slept on the blood stained sheets? remember the fear of the scorpion? shackleton and his rattling thin bones of madness? the quick steps of sundar chasing us kids down?
there are fiction machines there are philosophical machines there are theological machines there are the dream machines.
i the dream machine, the reflection machine lost in the fog of war tracing shells and corpses ready to report when asked, 'what happened?'
remember nick your rude joke we teased you about?
remember josh the double mac?
brian's fisting?
i do.
i go back to three years older than my son, that is how long this machine has been on. it was idaho, it was early fall before all the birds had flown. young over stuffed tired from peddling it was time to relax and reflect (think of those things that machine had to dream upon!). while watching the transformation of cloud to baby, from cloud to two headed hell hound, to green lantern there came a tugging at my shoe. my gaze descended to find myself surrounded by a group of local toughs, three ducks had settled on either side and one at my feet. the one a green to grey white collard joe tugged playfully at my toe as if to say remember now is the time to focus on what's going on here.
i watch the fumbles, the stumbles bonks bumps and bruises. i watch the crazy dance move, the terrible cry fests and listen to goobles and shouts. i watch and record and wonder upon him as he drfeams is it of fantasy, is it of the day or is it of the vast endless universe that he rushes to embrace thrusting his tiny hands and legs straight in the night air to anxious to begin for covers. go forth, rush on don't fret for these memories, my boy, i will collect, record and remember these things.

2
the honeycomb
clung to his beard
causing the hair to mat
while the fish oil
weakened the scab
an the blood flowed

3

there is no holy testament to the drunk anymore. there is no prophet of the booze anymore. the tabernacle of the blessed pub sing alone. i, man, cling to the hunger for drink drunk that rattles through my rib cage and knocks into my head.
a glorious drunk we sang, watched and danced to those that moved through the night. glorious in our wine stained button shirts meaty stomachs pressing stretching the buttons while rubber lips flap and bounced against each other calling out to perfume and rouge.
oh wifey, you know as well that we would never have made it without red wine. with your father flushed angry bald head and silence. he did not take our laughter well. how they sat as we babbled on about the future, how i came and talked for two hours straight about my failures in life. oh the joy when your full of magic, love and merlot.
do you remember hood river and the thing we broke?
do you remember your mother calling?
the threat of the orphan close?
now we sneak drinks. from nine to nine-thirty. we huddle on the couch and talk through hand signs in case we wake them. how can there be joy when there is no guffaw, no belly laugh no loud fast conversations of whats to come?
they say farmers make the best parents because their only interests are in how to make things grow. i was raised among faith healers and the latch key orphans. it was not bad parents, it was idaho where everyone learned from the fields that you leave it alone, that you let it go. they believed that in the womb of the soiled earth their fortune did grow.
i wonder if texans are the same?
could you imagine? out in kansas corn fields they can point out the window, 'look see there it grows!' out in the dairy land, 'look see they grow!' to the idaho farm land, 'look see have faith it grows!'
the ease of the faith in christ must be born from the memories of the blank idaho potato fields where a man could sit on seemingly blank soil wipe his brow and dream of a spring time treasure.
it means i pace, it means i get uncomfortable watching my children unfold. it means i understand why my father went vacant and my mother held a job. it means that with most things i want to cover them up and return later for the harvest. it means it is unnerving to watch and see children take actions that cause damage or embarrassment. it means that you get worn thin when you have to stifle your orgasm and must limit yourself to, at most, two glasses of wine or booze. it means i see the miles of mail thirty five years worth, still to come! it means i am scared that when the harvest comes there will be no potatoes just empty soil.
it means faith is not the absence of fear but that your still farming even when your terrified and consumed by the hopelessness of it all.

4

i
like
the pigeon
bob my head
in agreement
to my son's
toddler babbles
while my lips are wet
cause they kissed my wife
an yet
hunger for more.

5

it's 6:30 in the morning. i begin with the trisagion prayer, the prayer of repentance, the prayer of a parent for their children and finally the marriage prayer. it is december and good orthodox christians are fasting. while i normally fast for lent and rarely eat red meat i do eat dairy, eggs and fish with backbone. i have made my peace with the fact that walking the mail six days a week and starving do not, necessarily, go hand in hand no matter the piousness. once i held all orthodox fast, for the entire year of wedensday, friday the nativity fast, lent etc etc and almost killed a neighbors cat to satisfy the anger and poison of a body on strike.
these things, they are not fixed, they are liquid and sand running through your hand. these things that we practice. they are warm and feel important.
i can't listen to the television or the talk radio anymore. i can't listen to the opinions anymore. they are tilts towards a demographic and extremes.
we are littered with icons. the sit on the table, they sit on the walls and all are staring out, all are waiting to be received, greeted and kissed. i use to circle like an embarrassed dog stealing a kiss or finger rub. i use to walk by oblivious to their thin yearning faces, i use to walk by them and curse for the added work of this new religion.
it was my wife, syrian, long black now auburn highlighted hair, strong lean legs of a colt thin hour glass body, deep pools of innocence and fire in her brown eyes and a smile that is genuine. she is honest and tough always true. she has a great beauty and a sharp mind that required me to come out of the wilderness. my wife led me to the church, would not get married unless i converted.
i was not an easy dog to train. i curse under my breath while they prayed. i had pornographic thoughts while the priest gave liturgy and always came hung over. while they prostrated themselves i sweated and watched the lights swing. while they crossed, while they spoke the creed i rubbed my damp forehead and pinched my excess fat.
i spent my time finding holes in the cause. i spent my time making jokes about 13 men and a hooker out in the desert. i spent my time vomiting forth all sorts of nonsense about a hatred towards something i never knew i had.
faith is a thin blanket. you can see the troubles, you can feel the wind and you can hear the pleas but your warmer than before. faith is a constant exercise in embarrassment. one must kiss those wooden pictures of orthodox saints as if you mean it. one must be reverent towards a man in obnoxious robes, bow before him, kiss his hand. one must breath in incense and think of those that have passed on, say the prayer for the departed and recite names over lit candles.
i came from a man that thought faith of anything more than yourself was a waste. the faith of the dreamer is to configure a want then push the universe around until it rewards you. faith in the holy trinity is that you walk this path and god's will be done.
i came from a philanderer and an adulterer. i came from a singer and a hotel runner. i came from a lumber barron and a moonshine runner. i came from dutch blue blood and a indian chief. i came from across the ocean and from this soil. all the way back my blood must have been baptized how many times? then lost to wander foothills and war grounds now back again. i see my son and wonder at where the future will take us.
the last bums
we waggle our fingers in the air
never good at roots
we tumble
through gutters
garbage cans
and women's arms
to find a nest
with permanent address
but still
we watch
the horizon line
an wonder if we meant
to tumble
a little more
further

6

our lord
jesus christ
son of god
have mercy upon me
a sinner.

7

this morning broke with my son tugging my arm. we sit and watch curious george as the work hour creeps near, as the breakfast hour creeps near. he is young so i'll hold him without embarrassment, so i will tussle his hair and pinch his toes. so i will have to wait until the night. wait until he sleeps, until his sister sleeps, until his mother is off to phone call or magazine articles to try and write again.
the sacrifice is worth the reward.
amen.

8

oh abraham why did you not fight for your son? oh abraham to abandon him and his mother to the mountains. where is the obligation of man, holy man, first man back bone of a nation man? i dream as i parse parcels and letters to ebony faces, auburn faces, dirt stained white faces, bloat face, stuck in wheel chair faces, the bloat faces of the infirm in ghetto homes pregnant with the stink of cat shit and bacon.
oh where would we be without abraham and the first act of the first free trade system? i take this over that. is that not the stain of the entirety of the book? the golden calf and the choice of the martyr?
i watch three year old mexican boys wander in dirty diaper. they lean and lurch weighed down by rotund stomachs gripping bottle full of soda. i see negro girls click clack their beaded braids together as snot run down their nose smiling through half plywood great windows.
the dogs are loud, aggressive in the yards of the ghetto. protective, i wonder of what? all the junk and garbage, who would steal?
there is desperation that seeps through the rust over eldorado to the high wheeled impala. there is desperation that bonds neighbors to each other. when you got nothing you have to rely on kindness.
oh abraham what different would be your choices if you were in the ghetto. what different if your pockets were empty and the utility man cometh wrench in hand to take your water away. what different your choice if you could feel the neighbor eye prying.
the god of the desert has no space on the city street to work it's mysteries.
the god of the desert has no space to move amidst concrete towers.
the god of the desert called the jews out of the city where the buildings huddled close. come out away where it's just you an me, where no one can see and judge if it's right or wrong.
the god of the desert is always making deals.
what does that mean?
i watch the parents in the ghetto in the slums supported by social security and hud. i listen to their booming voices calling their children out of the places where mystery could happen. i listen to their booming voices chiding them out of walking alone.
'now, listen, you don't ever go anywhere without your sister. you don't go anywhere without your brother, you hear?'
the american church is a testament to the crowd.
abraham would not have withstood the gossip. would not have gotten away with no child support. would have made a different decision.
i am baptized orthodox. my church is the church of the crowd. it is uncomfortable there, amongst the faithful, rubbing shoulders, whispering about so and so's new hair cut or pending divorce. the god of the desert, the god of vast empty spaces, the god of jagged rough faced mountains is not around.
i am that i am.
i watch these crowds of humanity move through school halls, through bar halls, through shopping malls. i am apart, i am lonely and most invisible. growing up the youngest, in the empty plains of boise idaho peddling my bike through vacant streets space enough to day dream.
the mailman ghosting across miles of sidewalk and yard. invisible. listening to the chatter and witnessing the glories of the people before company arrives and their face is put on. the answer the door in robes, they answer in dirty yard work clothes. they answer unwashed and unbrushed. some don't answer at all. these people, when i arrive and make my call.
i hear the wail of babes and drift on ishmael. abandoned by his father by the god of secret whispered promises. i hear the wail of babes and drift on my own children a sickness forms in the pit of stomach that i am not there for what tears the day may bring.
we all got some promise we act on faith.
the job faith
the marriage faith
the daycare faith
that buoys us as we abandon our children for the holy dreams of the workday hours.
it is the faith that in our seed is a great nation to come. that is the faith of escape that powers the people in the great dying molded tenements. one day their seed will find it's way to purer soil.
i don't know, but i pray everyday anyway.

9

this is about anger, mac. this is about the stress of it all. there are days that they scream until you want to wreck the car. there are days where you step in mud holes in front of the first mail box and have eight hours of drenched feet. there are days near the river when you see the piles of garbage bobbing like fisherman on tide waves.
we spend most days alone, you see. we spend most days apart. we spend most days on the phone talking about what we lost out on because of economics or lack of baby sitter.
there will be no time off.
sunday we watch, we polish ourselves and watch a man in 20000 dollar robes swing incense in a golden ball. watch amongst the other suits and loafers, while he holds his golden and ruby cross and ask for thousands of dollars to paint icons on the wall.
it's about anger.
i am losing myself in a sea of clothes that used to fit. i am losing myself to the silence of no company where the mind dreams up passions and frustrations. i am losing myself to impotence of inaction, to the impotence of talking but not doing.
to feed to insure to roof to cloth to love these things cost. these arms are heading into my pockets leaving my penniless and exhausted. abandoning me to the abandonment of friends and their calls.
'hey, let's so and so get the kids together?'
'ah, i am only available sunday from 3- 4:15.'
'okay'
then there is no rest. then there is the pacing back and forth. then there is thinking, 'i have to be at work tomorrow. i have to be up at 6:30 to pray, stretch, eat, shit and write.' then i think of the gutters to clean, of the leaves to rake, of the car to gas, of the clothes to wash and food to buy etc. etc.
it burns slow.
there is my wife. there are the phone calls begging for a day off. there are the bills that stand in the way. there is my wife moaning the lament of the promises that fell flat. there is the grandma that has to go back to work, to eighteen hour days, there is the threat of failure all around the darkness of the void.
what if i twist my knee and can't work for a week?
there goes the mortgage.
the cycle is endless. always something to complain on...
enough!
this is about anger.
a man of full health, mind and ability can't change this? it's on you.
dream of the blind, dream of the infirmed, dream of the neighbors blown to half pieces in the war.
there are children in the streets of afghanistan orphaned whipped by shrapnel and driven to terrible acts from starvation.
there are children here, down the street, same diaper for days no food beaten by drug addicts.
if, even then, in the worst of it the heart beats and the mind dreams isn't it about hope?
i watch my son and hold him. i lay and stare at the ceiling. i can feel our hearts beat together and fuck it. life is about hoping and going for the thing you will be happy dying to reach.
if it's about anger. then it's about anger as the fuel to get you out 'the hole that he's in.'
let's us pray.

10

so we talk of death. so she runs her fingers through early morning hair. so we keep up with the jones' and the skeletons in their closet. so our son plays and dances to the twinkle of the christmas tree lights.
she talks like a woman. she talks while criss crossing her legs deep kind eyes gaze towards the ceiling and even now, without shower or makeup she is gorgeous. she of the heaving chest and quick tears when a child bumps it's head or i trip. she of the great deep belly laugh, she of deep wells of passion that erupt at a moments notice. there is love there.
the death of a partner, i watch her hands stab the air while she talks of the self imposed nunnery. while she talks of a life of abstinence. while she erupts, leaps and waves her hands over her heart.
'god forbid!' she says.
'dead is dead. what do i care if you screw some body on my dead body?' says i.
'god forbid!', she says.
'listen, forever is a long time alone. you should allow yourself...' say i.
'well your a man,' she interrupts, 'men can't be alone.'
'i'll just hire prostitutes,' i laugh.
'like that's better,' she hisses.
her lips purse and she stomps her feet like. there is a tenderness, a warming of the heart when you can see through the grown up and catch images of them as a child. i can see her now defiant against the world one shoe untied eight years old and ready for a fight.
i take time to engrave these things. these piles of innocents. it's after the storms when the world is clean and rainbows trace the path to buried treasures. it's the crisp fresh morning waiting for the fifth grade bus and going flush in the cheeks from limitless possibilities. it's the security of the promise to be true and honest at the altar of marriage.
'life is about the effort. when your dead your dead. do not bother yourself with such things dear,' say i.
my son runs an excited finger against the dark grain of our cheap coffee table. my son goes arms upstretched into a squeal and circle. my son collapses to his chair and takes in his shows. my daughter is sleeping in her crib tender fresh lips slightly parted in a blow. my wife walks towards the kitchen, she stops kisses my forehead.
'i'll wait for six months...', she flashes a smile, 'then i'll join a nunnery.' she is before the christmas tree the slow twinkle light highlighting the honest unblinking auburn eyes, highlighting the raven and ash highlight in her hair, highlighing her trim lean long athletic frame. 'i'll be laying right next to you, god willing, i WILL be laying next to you,' she says as if a threat to the universe.
god forbid.
she begins to pump her milk. my daughter stirs. the morning light brightens. life is good.

11

there are children
there
out lost to laughter and asphalt
wearing deep blue
or black
or polka dotted hats
waggling their arms
in
seasonal joy
of winter break
of the mystery of wrapping paper
the rain slicked
the grass
and roads to a shimmer
though
it's the puddles that cause one
to stop
and wonder
if that's reflection
or another universe
i seen the sky in the water
and realized we're all upside down
and none of this existed
save but in the heart
of a warm blooded
innocent
dream writing about love
for
the comfort of arms
or lips
or telephone calls
that you remember
i spent the moments
after we made love
thinking of soldiers
with their guns and santa hats
in the streets of a muslim city
i love
i hope
i dream
that we all make it home
someday
to enjoy the holiday
amen

12

it's the cold. that is when i grow this beard. scruff wild with an island of gray. it is christmas, or the morning after, it is the tens of slices of pie left to consume. it is all the noise of the electric children learning toys. it is the predawn dark of the rumble work trucks heading to paycheck alley. it is the construction of a new duplex down the street casting a black grim shadow over the neighbors house. standing as a slap in the face to humble house in front. it is the 92 year old neighbor suffering slight madness and walking in circles through the back yard snow white head twisting to the sound of a grandchild's laugh. it is the evicted cat family, cat father hat in hand mewing to be allowed entrance to the cellar, mewing that they 'most certainly won't make noise or knock apart furnace pipes this time.' it is the balancing act of my three month old daughter as she demands to stand. it is my father bringing roasted chicken and pie in his dirty pajama bottoms. it is the energy of my brother as an uncle squishing, tossing and rough housing the children into submission.
there are open shops. there is the mad woman having an argument with her split personality. 'one pack, we get one pack, no one pack, stop it, okay, sirsirsirsir, can we get two packs...is this the right chang...oh wait your right two packs. thaaats one for me and one for you, twotwotowopacks.' there is the loose eyes of the man behind me, whose presence felt seven feet tall an eight feet wide. 'i got me here some winners,' to pile of tickets.
so christ was born in spring. so what?
there is this beard and a wife's new haircut sexy though an attack on confidence. there is the morning and there are ideas to be tried. the redbook has spoken. time is up!

13

faith along the way. i take pictures of discoveries, of loosed twigs or branches that have fallen onto the ground to form a cross. i take pictures of children laughing as they slide. pictures of old timers that still lean into each other for healthy kisses. pictures of the things that first blush cause you to go warm. there is space on empty intersections when the weather is cold and the sun light fills. there is space between men on bar. there is a fullness an airdustrial (vitally invisible) quality to it all.
i hear garbage trucks to collect our christmas discards. does it strike a chord of joy or melancholy? do we focus on the smiles from the gifts in the boxes or on the smushed torn paper taking with it another season to the recycle pits?
i am heavy. my body aches in the morning. emits loud grunts or blasts when i bend or twist. i have to stretch in the morning now. i have to bend with my knees to pick up mail bins or my kids now. there is a feeling of marriage, safety, peace and union in our love making now.
gone to pasture the savage hunger of youth. gone savage the idea that makes your head damp and emit steam as you power up and down dirty city asphalt. gone to pasture not blinking but staring deep into fresh new women at the bars or poetry readings.
i have no patience but live on the cheap which is all patience. the patience to save for things. the patience to not eat the whole box of chips or every apple. where at first it was ah youth the consumption machine to ah father the patience machine rub their head and cheer them onto the discovery themselves.
where at first i would abandon and rush about saying,
i got me
some here fire
in the gut
and i am looking
for love
or lust
or blank fresh skin
to moan my poem
upon
an don't mean nothing to
nobody or
leave no instruction
behind
so let's us just
drink
an scream
an fuck
let's us just
drive fast
with the windows down
in the winter
to honor the dead
let's us just
spend all our money
an wake spent from it all
bathing in new sunlight

to:

son
you got's to
do it
use your pole
find your fish
dream over the
mountains
an if somebody says
can't
leave them behind
to kiss with tongue mother
i had a hard day at work
an our anniversary is too
far away
to be strong
daughter
men will come
the great destroyers
thieves in the temple
take your pole
find your own fish
an never give away
what you aren't willing
to lose
or be stuck to

i see the emptiness of my fridge. i see the sad exhausted face of my clothes hang limp and dirty from their hanger. i see the hair on the floor. i see the frozen dishes. i see my wife exhausted and leaning into the couch as the children coo and rush from mound of toy to mound to toy. there is music in the air.
we the family. we are exposed on the toilet by the son now.
there is something full mysterious and wonderful laying across us now. our burdens filled with purpose. our patience tested and grown by the farmer hands of babes.
the christmas tree dies naked on the porch. the ornaments and toys are put to slumber. the morning sun is cresting and my son is going to sit on the toilet for the first time.

14

my father wanders his cold rental thinking about failure. he holds a drum stick and apple pie, both home made. he says 'no names' full puff nose and forest of eyebrow hair dancing as he speaks. my father rub's his stomach and says 25 more lbs. his holiday in stained pajama an abandoned thing, uncared for lost to madness his voice a low grizzly growl as he rocks his grand daughter to sleep.
there is the smell of age about him. there is the threat of impending doom. there is my personal pride for all he has accomplished and overcome battling the failure's witnessed as he grew. we grow to better understand it was only the best effort that they gave and nothing was intended or malicious.
i look about, at his family in ruins. all scattered to the wind. my mother lost to the ocean waves, my sister to the LA skyline, brother to the big business bank machine and i to the circle of city blocks i trot mailing about. we are the family of the spread hand. all connected but distant from the others.
my father the outlaw.
they don't retire from the life. he drives with no license. he drives with no insurance. he carries all his money in a cash knot in his pocket. he leaves with no notice. he is the wild dog chasing dinner in the blood sun set desert sky.
i admire him.
we follow not out of loyalty but after years of instruction. i see know, with my son, how it must be. every day there is instruction. every instruction carries with it a choice, once rewarded and the other with consequence.
we are the memory machines. what you chose to study to remember to create skill is the reward generator. i the medicine memory man produce more rewards than the door knob memory man who produce more rewards than the hamburger check out man who produce more reward than the can collection and return man.
i remember him. as he liquidates his assets and burns his roots off. i remember idaho and the beard sharks. i remember the karate pajamas and freethrows with our eyes closed. the outlaw. the last of the bums. on his way to mexico to find his graveyard. as my son stirs and i can hear my wife's magazine pages i can feel the sunset on our backs as we wander fields to find the rock to pay our respects to.
i love him.

the end.