Tom Obrzut, Gypsy Scientist bektom@aol.com tom o is the editor of arbella magazine and has coordinated numerous poetry series, usually as a satellite of proletkult poetry circus. tom o has been published in the following magazines: long shot, big hammer, the paterson literary review, home planet news, and others. he is a social worker in staten island. BEFORE TIME Before you there wasn’t anything A couple of sticks A rock Before you no music Only grunts and burps Before you no hair Before you there wasn’t happiness Everyone cried all the time but they didn’t know why Before you no roads No hitchhikers Everyone walked to far away places without shoes Before you no sun Only a black peach pit and desperation Before you no waves Only vast deep oceans that were cold and had no fish Now that you’re here There are gardens People tell plenty of jokes And there’s laughter Now that you’re here Children say nice things They’re mischievous and they play games Now that you’re here Nothing is dismal Shopping centers sell useful products And lovers gather together constantly Problems all have solutions No one gets too worried When things look bad People think about you and everything is easy That’s why you’re magical You might not even know how you do it You walked into the world Fairy tales came true Impossibles revealed themselves Every day you do it again CITY POEM “I can’t even imagine a blade of grass unless I know there’s a subway handy…” Frank O’Hara I can’t tell what I love or don’t love I sit in a dark room listening To a dominoes game Dominicans are a loud people But so are Italians and Pollacks too Cars rush by with tires squealing All my musing turns to Fall when everything happens There are a million citizens here But none within my reach I try to touch one On the cheek, where it won’t hurt I’m convinced there’s too much privacy Not enough touching Someone crowd us Make us stand together closely Like in a parade Penn Station at rush hour Appears empty to me I could love you better If I wasn’t so selfish It’s true even if you told me The city is a kaleidoscope A silly plant with bizarre flowers Taxicabs make me tranquil I haven’t had a disturbing thought in almost two hours Is it crazy to love being a commuter? I sit in the train and no one talks to me I read if I want Or sleep That’s the city: A cup of coffee Your rent controlled apartment Can you hear me? I think I’m saying I Love You I’ve said it before But that doesn’t make it untrue I read my Tarot cards You weren’t in them The witch said I was addicted to sex And loud noises And the city Most people don’t like the city They want a quiet place like Oklahoma Or the Black Forest or the Siberian Steppe This yearning can become unbearable And when it does Those people invent the suburbs I think it’s because they’re afraid to die That they had to make a place That kills you so efficiently But this isn’t the love poem I wanted You said I should enumerate your beauties Let the world know about your significance But you are like a city to me I don’t know why I love you I just do LIES Lies we tell sometimes Will comfort in a 4am empty room Or maybe they turn down the block to hunt us among cars of brokedown misery Or we whisper them around a fire, the way our dead ancestors did Hoping they come to life Lies we tell sometimes Are dreams That might have happened or maybe did not But we speak the words as though ingredients To some secret recipe Lies, as a child Were adventures concocted on the playground Later became shades of night Pursued in bus stations Places with names that we made up Nogales, Little Rock, Cleveland, Jacksonville Seeing them in the synapse between what really happened and what was told History is a lie our fathers made to glorify stupidities and impress our mothers who were reluctant and beautiful in their hesitancy The city is a lie laid out in false colors and inhabited by fictions that pray in strange byzantine churches. The river is a lie traveling in a swift current to oceanic falsehoods of fish, plankton, and drowning. Lies are a puzzle pieced together with arthritic fingers and held with a clear glue of truth. The truth is a rough approximation of lies engineered through faith and working in a darkness louder than pain. Pain is a truth that starts with a holler and bears a name that few can pronounce. Love is a truth, the only truth. It stumbles down stairs, it reels drunkenly into our other selves. It steps on our toes and touches our cheeks. LAST FART last fart sewer pipe the rats (a)void next to the me-in alley where my apart and self-soled shoes wept for my sorrows. they were dirty. and holy. the shadows so deep the creep smell and darkness where my bed laid oh head unmade with vodka oh bed in the midst of midnight and voices from the street wet voices dank street. MORNING BEFORE WORK In silent early aftersleep, I raise my crown of head from a bed Not warm, but at least soft. The winter moves itself Coming to greet from a 7am river. Off in the ocean somewhere a bell clanks on a buoy. On the street a car honks honks again Then a 3rd time loud and long. I’m listening and finally I shout: “SHUT UUUUUUUP!” But the Chevy can’t hear me And goes on for one long bleat Then finally stops. Before coffee, a lonesome cockroach comes out to say, “Morning!” And I squash it With a coffee cup clang on an iron stove top. One more sentient being destroyed. I am reminded of my own shortness. So I make a religious sign And wipe the carcass into the grave can with coffee grounds and other refuse from the war. The tv morning author wrote another story tells me. The weather person throws a net of comprehension to the airwave crowded sky. The seriocomic newsman reads the translation of a worldview. The hell clock makes its way towards nine. LOST Don’t know what happened to my toe fell off into the rug when I was enjoying myself of course, then my mind fell out of the sky it’s okay the reception was bad. i don’t know what happened it seems i lost control of my self i had a talk with my appendages to prevent further damage. i turned on the tv and became a citizen again. but then, my eyebrow fell off as if to expel any pride i was feeling at my new control over my body. those are the only casualties so far, one toe and an eyebrow. i don’t even count the mind. the toe is gone forever, but i replaced the eyebrow with one of those fake eyebrows they advertise on tv. it seems to work just fine. IF I HAD WINGS I could fly over the traffic Leave behind my car trap Avoid the numbing pain of the fuming wait The drumming noise of insane radio This nonmovement a gridlock with no key Bewinged I’d be free Float above cars Watch baseball from clouds Avoid people I’d rise Be someone to look up to “There’s the guy with wings!” they’d say Instead of “There’s that drunk” Or “Watch out! He’ll probably try to tell a joke” But no wings, no hope I am sitting in the longest traffic jam ever My voice is hoarse from screaming obscenities at the idiots And I have no wings I am earthbound Gravity grounded, ozone imbued I am an idiot myself Another mental defective Waiting to go nowhere Don nothing and be no one with Millions of other loyal morons “We could be angels!” I want to shout to my brother/sister drivers “We could pilot our bodies instead of these brute machines” But no one can hear me They’ve rolled up their windows They’re tapping their fingers to the drone of classic rock. I GAVE UP ON MEDITATION I gave up on meditation became more nervous Tried prayer, but lacked faith Contemplated fears endlessly like a rat on cocaine The door to door salesman tried to give me mental health I said I’d pay with war pestilence shopping circulars and dirt He said no thanks Almost moved a couple times Could feel it like a spasm in my right toe I fought against the impulse First thing they get you moving Then they try to enlist you in some war Or put you to work in a toy factory I’m not going for it They must think I’m a fool Maybe I’ll meditate on LARRY KING LIVE I hear Dan Quayle was coming on Want to try to spell some words He’s starting with PRESIDENT I’m on his side A mind is a terrible thing to waste. RECORD COMPANY EXECUTIVE Lisa keeps saying she’s old Thirty and not famous yet We go to a bar that we know The sky’s clear overhead The doorman says he doesn’t need our id’s It’s dark inside There’s a band onstage We get drunk It’s nothing new We drink more Finally look around “We’re the oldest motherfuckers in this goddamned place,” Lisa says. “You might be old,” I say “But you sure curse a lot” “You might be old,” she says “But you’re stupid” I don’t argue What good would it do? We keep on drinking It’s nothing new We start looking around Getting bored with each other I feel a hand on my back It’s the guitar player from the last band “I heard you were coming,” he says “You were great,” says Lisa “You were fabulous” “You got a card?” And he does He gives it to her She says, “We’ll call” The kid looks happy “Let’s get the fuck out,” Lisa says to me then After we leave I say, “What was that?” “Couldn’t you tell?” “I mean with that kid” The sky was still clear overhead “He thought we were record company execs,” says Lisa “He was cute anyway,” she adds I’m hanging out with an exec In the middle of the night I’m drunk But I’m feeling all right “You’re 30 and not famous,” I say to Lisa But you just made the deal of your life You just made the deal of your life WORK i love the bathroom fixtures the way they shine and the sound of pipes: water moving through metal urethras. i‘m the nobody taking a break before his doom i'm the poet in his gloom i'm the sneaky pete in a dark room. i'm no rock star with a rocket locked door don’t knock i won’t answer jerked off at work today the truth isn’t tragic friday's can be slow don’t come in i'm busy jerked off at work today so what? another dumb brute routine come to a halt the smell of pipes the weekend loomed who needs details i don’t want an excuse jerked off at work today it’s new but it’s not news. SILLY It would be silly To live in a tree No tv Sky above It might be silly To watch grass It might be chilly If it was winter and snow The grass underneath Wouldn’t know I’d call in to work sick We could sit on a couch I wouldn’t need to do anything much I’d probably slouch Two pillows behind my head Silly, I’d like to try. SUBURBIA My father goes into the back yard. He’s tired of hearing that goddamn dog. It’s midnight in the suburban sprawl. My father’s going to kill that dog. My father’ got a thousand guns. He takes them out to have some fun. He drank too much vodka in front of the tv. The cops bring him in for “disturbing the peace.” There’s a carcass in our back yard. It’s a dead dog whose name was Spot. His ghost floats about and tries to bark. But dead dogs can’t yap in the suburban dark. We sleep better now with Spot gone. My father still shoots at a cardboard cutout dog. He uses different weapons and practices hard. His aim’s getting better in the back yard. The neighbors hate the noise of a thousand guns. But when Dad’s drinking he likes his fun. They complain to the police, but they should be forewarned. Dad’s new cutout has a human form. IN THE MADWOMAN’S BEDROOM She won’t let me sleep Wants to make me cry I tell her I can’t and she won’t believe me she snips at my hair with secret clippers Looking for ways to do magic I tell her about dreams She talks about the moon Angels knock on the windows speaking Armenian Clocks too slow or too fast Glow faintly Sometimes resounding With a strange radio station They serve no purpose They blink and hiss But time is a lie The lady tells me In her closet of wonder I find capes Clown noses Old lovers Watermelon Sometimes she offers the knife to my throat Sometimes Lily of the Valley I’ve grown older here than I’ve ever been I’ve seen more in a water glass Than I could pull from my pen There’ve been kisses and caresses too Subtle to mention On a far away shelf lay amazing interventions I’m stripped of the sense that I treasure I’m sprawled begging for mercy But I’ve become accustomed I’ve become converted I was a pagan now I’m a monk I’m a hobo looking through junk for a clue She’s got plans, I know Madwoman I’m mad too Mad woman I’m in love with you. HOPE POEM 1992: 11:59 P.M. FAT TUESDAY It is the last hot reminder of my old self. The butt-end becomes a snuffed and screeching halt in a plastic grave. It is the penultimate drink finished. As I reached for its doomed brother. End scion of an extinguished line. Down the hatch to nowhere Not to be followed by others. I give it up! My habits become wrinkled snakeskin, Shed as midnight approaches. My depravities offered as a sacrificial pig, Fat for the Holocaust to the stony sky. It is the desert wander, Refusing the Devil’s deal As old Satan grips with cool steel. But finally, finally cannot touch. It is the force of refusal The Holy Defusal of my desire In the days that jumble together. It is the lottery of time. And I am its millionaire. My prize is abstention, profuse elimination. I renounce the old mysteries and put on new underwear, clean sox and a pair of Guaranteed shoes. I face the world cleared of sins. A tabula rasa clean-slated for the chalkings of God. I walk with the priest down celibate street to pressed and virgin sheets. Beelzebub my friend! Beelzebub you fool! Get thee behind me! Go to the pigs of the dead end! The sodden rooms of our sodom vows are empty now. Sins you gave me as gifts are grime. I will wash them in the rain that comes, As midnight brings a downpour. I hoist my vows aloft to God. I write them on paper and cross them off As each is accomplished and I am diminished. I am starting afresh. I am relinquishing sin I lighten the load Filled with desire Made glowing with fire. My wants leave their home they seek solid ground. I become ghosty and as I look around There is nothing left to have or to be. I am a spook I am a sheet thrown over nothing And nothing can touch me. My body is a present I give it to the worms And time’s slow turning. My hunger is a memory I have lost it for now It calls for me faintly Like the moos of a cow. TRUE STORY Running around A mad panic attack Anxiety Packed like a gun My trigger finger itchy The chirping birds Beseeching me To do something Anything I am hungry But no food And I’m Sleepy But no bed Inside my head A dream so horrible If I could sleep I’d wake up Screaming For a moment I notice it’s a lovely day Yes a lovely, lovely Day It’s warm for November Romantics walk arm in arm Some kiss And I say to myself “All this is no good” “No good at all” And I hurry on I hurry, hurry on. HEARD THE BAD NEWS Sorry Joe Smith told me about it Tragedy that you’re experiencing Maybe if you drink more that will help Martinis are in season Don’t do anything rash Or explosive Or embarrassing Terrible Probably deserved it Too much of a good Bad for it There’s a lot of it going around Think about the positive The door didn’t slam on your face The rats didn’t chew on your toes The glass broke when you threw Up against The back that you thought you had The last card you didn’t draw People say Well, they say a lot That’s no reason to believe Always another day In the morning Let the cat out of the bag Let the dog out of the hat You’re looking well considering Good excuse for a haircut Or a new dress Get that credit card feeling Pay up in thirty days Whenever it gets worse Smiles are free It’s the laughs that cost That gripping sensation in the stomach What belly? That’s just your jelly shaking First days are hardest Keep a stiff upper Watch your lowers People who should know, do Think of it as a learning experience. © Tom Obrzut 2002