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“Bad Blood”
So much poetry
so much bad
I tell you I’ve lost
the urge to read to write to sing
(well maybe not to sing) to play
the music
that lingers in my soul our soul
soulitary confinement
But some proclivity in me
yanks at the chains and shackles
pries at the bars
beats out tin pan rhythms
and blues
forms keys from rings and pens
and paper clips and disgust
and mediocrity
fumbles at the lock
cursing and spitting and refusing
to rest in pieces
pining for the click and
spring
time
a-
gain
and again
“Last Night at Margarita Motel”
Last night at Margarita Motel,
Sifting your soul
Crossing the moat stone(d)
beneath walls and
drowned in truth
let fly, let be, let see
fast past the endless gloom of dream so
far to ride the magic stream endless daylights
brilliant dream
no doom of pattern striking
round the bend
over here can will has will be
(that’s you and me; roots to the sea)
1:00 A.M., trains grinding assault rhythms
blending with semis’ hums—Margarita Motel,
all packed up and no one to tell how you/I
feel felled (your note cutting like an axe—
“From wife . . . ‘Don’t check out tonight. Room
not ready. Will talk sometime.’”)
SOMETIME?! Hey baby, it’s sometimes
Use a calculator. We have square—
roots in rounded circles of oblong hypotenuses with
triangular discircumferences of reason and why
are we the sky and the man and the torch
(?) Well who can know who can tow the weight
of clashing times, end rimes in similar meter
parallel rhythms in adjunct museums—
--Left beyond the skies of treason or reason
So now is
the season love (illumination sans
frustration) to be
Sleep, rest, talk, caress, di(stress) come
free of charge—all that is and more
The holy nest won’t be choicened with seem
Don the vestige of our sacred dreams
CAN YOU HEAR ME? I AM COMING HOME
“Undergrounders”
I’m not ashamed
to hide my back in darkness
under the cover of shadowed shadows
Protection does not come cheaply (or easily)
and dark shields absorb but do not reflect location
There’s comfort in caverns, in the earthy
blackness of holes, or the shadowing
dark greeness of a thicket at noon.
Oh people of the light, ravage not your
dark cousins, or fear their wayward abodes
Disparage not the crabs and gophers and
possums and ground hogs and moles of the world,
for they move among you disguised
Let not the simmering light melt your eyes,
minds, hearts
“Poetic Interlude”
Let us not converse with the voices
that drag us down
below something other than now
Let us not to the marriage of life
be unfaithful, nor shirk the duties
born to fulfill
Let us not be afraid to board
the rackety rickety roller-coaster
of the unknown (destiny)—charging through
tear-blurred corners
Let us not forget to love
our lives, though hordes scream
the virtues of suffering, and
chaos rule the blinded hearts
of fire
Let us not suppress the laughter
(of sorrow, satisfaction, or joy)
And may we ride troubled waves
to the peaceful shores of contentment
“Babble On”
The babbling administrator clones
brag and bumble through litanies
of butt-kissing adventures, filling
this formerly sacred lounge with
emptiness of spirit
The tricks, techniques, methods,
Ass-kissing 101, How to climb
through shit to the top
of the shit pile
Like flies buzzing in ecstasy
they flit about, clueless
to their own barren pride,
bereft of substance
they’ll buzz through their
less-than lives
But their eggs, their slimy
writhing larvae
Ah the promise!
“Subjective Reflections”
or
“A series of abstract, koanish, semi-westernized, Haiku-like
images consisting of approximately 60% late pre and early post dream inspirations, 20% normal consciousness deviations, and 20+% of a nature not conducive to classification.”
Anything said
about it, how-
ever is a lie
or an understatement
Forget divisions Make revisions
We need you to turn
the thing off
The black trails of gold
Evil is something clings
that
when timidity kills hawks
and boldness sparrows
Hold the line please
I have a call for this number
The great advantage
of schizophrenia is being
able to follow separating
The way sleep uncoils
a tight-twined mind
Keep letting
go higher
Why is a woman
like a guitar string
I didn’t call
because I was dying
to talk
flies
Love is something that
Loss of self
leads there here
Neutral is the most useful
and difficult gear to engage
Fear is something beaten
without fighting
I don’t know why
but I know why not
Because
Happiness is coming
get out your nets and catcher’s mitts
A long-time resident of Cabazon, Matt Cofer teaches English
at two local community colleges (College of the Desert and Mt. San Jacinto College), writes poetry (published in Inside English, The Pacific Review, and Soltice), and writes and
performs original music with the band Killer Sheep.
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