Joe Dimino Poetry

Joefiles 130

2011-07-18T11:32:00.002-06:00

alienap

2011-05-04T09:31:00.001-06:00

a nap
is the name
of a little
alien
i once knew
and now i
never see it anymore.

sometimes it
slivers into the room
secretly,
watching me cook,
play with my youngest,
cutting the grass,
toiling about the studio,
throwing a shirt in the dryer
or cleaning a bit
around the toilet
and when it
is a bit loud,
i flop my head in it's direction
to see the slithering silhouette
gone.

i used to spend a lot of
time with my alien nap pal,
and now i have forgotten
what his
green countenance looks like.

hope he has
enough gas to
ufo back to
his
sleep filled universe.

latest rejection & ustream feed ..

2011-03-30T10:02:00.003-06:00

"I like the voice in these poems, but they’re a bit too glib. I think they need more work."

Dear Joe,
Thank you for sending your submission to us. We've decided not to publish your work at this time. But please try us again.

The Editor, Evening Street Review online at www.eveningstreetpress.com

**

USTREAM FEED LINK - JOE DIMINO SPOKEN WORD

12-22-12

2011-02-16T12:31:00.001-06:00

everyone is
acting quite calm
about the fact that
we have under 2 years
left to live it
up here on
the big blue ball
in the perched skies.

with both Cherokee
and Mayan
ghosts laughing
in unison high
above our hairy scalps,
i find myself lookin'
around at odd times
lately to see if maybe
there will be that
one crazy human with
deteriorated nails,
wild eye brows,
twitchy bottom lip
mulling incessantly
how it's going
to shake down
on the inevitable
dip
of
12-21-12,
but i see nothing.

i look at all the birds
minced with both military
and commercial aircrafts ripping
through the skies
in a hurry to see if they
have any more information
than a few bubbles emitting
from a lava lake in
the bowels of Yellowstone.

other times,
i look at a dead pigeon in
the road
wondering if thousands more are
lined on either side of
me in some destructive
orchestra of
used time
telling me that
time is the only real enemy.

then,
i wonder how useless
it will be to worry about
how much money i have in the
bank account and how i
should maximize every cell
around me to scream into a
cacophony of sound
celebrating how little
left we have down here.

then,
the movie ends,
i go to sleep,
wake
and remember that
all of it was a dream
if i didn't already have a dream
that i had one last thing to do ..

my wife and i need to find
several grocery stores during
the blocks of free time we don't have
to spend with each other to
find all the products we can in
the grocery store with the
expiration dates of 12-21-12
and sell them all as a set on
e-bay for hundreds of thousands
of dollars so that
we can use
it for
a fuck load of
a celebration
beginning on
the morning of
12-22-12
and
right on into the
damned sunset
for
the
rest of our
apocalyptic
echo of lives ..

joefiles 129 (click the image to download)

2010-12-17T14:14:00.002-06:00

128

2010-11-22T10:58:00.004-06:00

reunion housewarming

2010-08-11T12:23:00.000-06:00

hello the fluff
of the
written world,
mr. poetry.

you walked out the door
and forgot to hide the
lock key.

now inside,
i find the innards of used sweat,
bad contractors,
older kids,
blood from forgotten scabs,
the detris of beauty,
and my
foggy reflection in
the mirror.

as i traverse floor to
floor of
my
wonderful
abode of mr. poetry,
i forget
myself,
then remember myself
in lighter versions
of deja vu.

and as i ready to
rifle straight into
the spokes of
light
out of
the light of mr. poetry,
i hold up
short.

stop.

turn around
and come straight
back into
the
heartbeat tornado
to squeeze a little more
from the used lemon
rhine
because
that's how
we
fix
things
around
this
house.

the polite rejection (a good break-up)

2010-07-21T14:56:00.001-06:00

Joe,

Thank you for allowing us the opportunity to read your work. We enjoyed your poetry, found them very amusing. Unfortunately, we only consider prose poetry. If you have any, we encourage you to submit it for consideration.

Thank you again and best of luck.

Ian Golding, Editor
The Interrobang
www.theinterrobang.org

PresentMagazine.com

2010-04-16T08:05:00.002-06:00

Poetry/Haiku - Call for Entries, April - National Poetry Month

Write and Send Us a Poem/Haiku

PresentMagazine.com

Published: Wednesday, April 14, 2010

Joe Dimino is a local artist.

fictional healing

I like
to call
the creamy,
yet clear
medical ointment that
is everyone's pal
in healing endeavors
Neil Sporren
instead of neosporin.

Makes me think
that this miracle tube of
healing salve is a person
like Neil Armstrong
traversing
the moon crater
of my scrapes and cuts.

last night,
a bit past one in the morning,
my wife slipped into bed,
i held her
and she asked just before
we were gonna dream,
'what are boobs
like for boys?'

i said,
'balls.'

she didn't say anything
as night
settled us on the tram
into the next sleepy moment.

life today

if twitter tries to kill poetry
i'm gonna arm a hefty arsenal of haiku
to go in and start shredding
the tweets into bits.

music today

2010-04-15T12:03:00.002-06:00

every time
 i see
 a splay of  tattered  
old  cassette  tapes  
lopping around 
on the side our
 american highways
 i find it the most  apt 
way to summarize
 the failed music industry
 of today 
as they hold onto  tatters of the past 
while the now and future 
blaze along with  digital precision
 at the 
speed of a sonic 
boom 
that woke all of  us years 
back while  the big record execs
 sit in their posh 
high rises with  thick headphones on  trying to hear
 the next note on another
 album that won't  hit 
a 
sales 
quota.

pissclampoetryaward

2010-04-05T12:07:00.001-06:00

Joefiles Cover to Cover: 1994 - 2010

2010-01-25T15:08:00.002-06:00

First Screenplay Circa 1994

2010-01-19T14:09:00.002-06:00

"In Search of the Sky King" - Click here to view.

one of my best returns ..

2010-01-08T10:07:00.002-06:00

Why Poetry Makes Sense to Me ...

2010-01-05T10:03:00.002-06:00

first edition: ipod ditigized notetweets

2009-10-28T12:19:00.003-06:00

Click here to view.

new audio pods of old journal musings/poems

2009-08-27T13:37:00.002-06:00

click here to listen ..

Maria has left the building.

2009-08-14T10:07:00.001-06:00

fuck.

christ,

she was only 40.

maria showed me
new york city in fashion,
introduced me to bukowski,
parlayed interesting stories of
heroin and cocaine in NYC 80's,
jukes full of joan jett,
sushi in greenwich village,
all the smokes on the top of the
london double decker,
and the piano in the basement apartment
she held in her parents home.

i remember every talk,
all the exchange of poems and
the musing of where god is hiding and
how everything was going to end up.

then,
several sundays back the music faded.

my brother said that maria
mimicked her hero,
elvis,
and indeed left the building
for the final fucking time.

and as the shock of her early
dismissal sinks in,
i hear the distant din of
our family's once distant relative,
billy joel,
crooning that only the good
die young.

and it's then that the
notion and reality of
the best leaving early,
sets in a new sting
that i'll never get a shine
from her coolness again.

maria is gone.

fuck.

christ.

new 125 volume

2009-08-14T09:53:00.002-06:00

check out volume 125 - click here

gems from the coffeehouse days circa mid-90's

2009-05-12T09:03:00.001-06:00

2001 interview

2009-03-27T08:43:00.001-06:00

Name: Joe Dimino
Age: 28
School: None
Interests: Interesting Shit

1. How did I get into writing?
I think it started when I was 3-4 years old. My folks were pushing me hard to get my A-B-C’s and 1-2-3’s onto paper. After that, I really took to the process. In all honesty, I started fighting with our 26 English characters when I was about 20-21. I got into it simply because it made sense. Some build boats, some grow bananas, some build computers and others do many things well. This is a craft that I see eye-to-eye with. The words laugh and poke at me while I smoke and paint the billboard a new color just to throw off the passing motorists.

2. Some of my favorite authors
John Steinbeck, Charles Buokowski, Franz Kafka & Fyodor Dostoevsky

3. What I am currently reading
Native Son by Richard Wright

4. My three wishes and why
One .. For Bob Ross to come back and live on earth forever. For obvious reasons .. though, he had an amazing afro for a white man .. he could put anyone to sleep with a soft coo even as you writhed inside about him continuing with a painting when you felt he was done with it .. & he could make the hardest motherfucker out there laugh with pure abandon ..

Two .. Turn the moon into an enormous, dripping, (still spherical) dill pickle and to be transported up there yearly for a two week vacation .. My reason .. I just fucking love the pickle that much!!!

Three .. To own and wear one of Winston Churchill’s hat’s .. The reason .. he was one with it, cool ass cat .. he had style .. grace .. could quote anyone into the ground and was one of the few that could silence the Queen with drunken wit ..

5. What inspires me to write
Listening to my lover brush her teeth nude in the other room as I lay in bed .. watching someone leaping into the air just for the fuck of it .. Seeing a man two stories below my window digging through the trash for that one score that will make the evening whole .. having a solid conversation with a stranger without having one word about the weather or other flailing subjects of abject bullshit .. Bottom line .. the tick .. the movement .. your desires .. the stranger out there I will never meet but know through 7 degrees of separation ..

6. Connection between existentialism and spaghetti
You know Kate, I think you’re on to something with this question. I do believe their absolutely is a cosmic connection between spaghetti and existentialism. More so, I think there is a deeper connection between any pasta and Jazz. Listen to M. Davis’ “Kind of Blue” over a heaping, hot fucking bowl of pasta and you’ll know where I’m coming from.

To get back to your connection .. I believe the mother and father of Existentialism .. Ayn Rand and Jean-Paul Sarte had many bowls of this delicious Italian dish through their formative years of refining the individual experience .. thus, they were responsible for choosing spaghetti instead of Mexican, Greek or Mediterranean food .. so, the connection is assuredly ripe with the authors of this lifestyle .. It works for me .. I know when I dive into a steamy bowl of pasta that they have to be smiling somewhere as my path diverges into the woods, so to speak ..

7. A bowl is sitting on the table and I will describe it as fit as a nail on a thumb

First of all, bowl, you have to stop looking at me like that so I can accurately describe you to Kate.

What? You can’t avert your eyes from me?

Stop .. stop .. you have maybe one eye. If we count the opening in the top of your top. Now, it’s looking straight towards the ceiling and me. So, close it off so I can get this description down for Kate.

Huh? You refuse. Well, should I come back another time and describe to her the fact that you are glued together and may have 10-15 new eyes between the shards that were hastily glued together? You wouldn’t want that now would you little fella?

Oh you would huh? Look man, can I call you man?

Sorry, you’re right. Look bowl, Kate has a deadline here and I have itchy fingers. So, close the eye and let me get on with the description of you. Look, I will fork over the description to you before I submit it to her so as to not inaccurately describe you dips, divets and drooping.

END

*Edidtor’s note. I apologize Kate for going over the 10 line limit. This bowl didn’t cooperate. After I’m done with all your questions, I shall fetch me a newer and more cooperative bowl to describe to you. But for now, the day’s of people lopping food into this bowl’s one eye is over. The birds are going to have to laugh over it’s scattered remains in some landfill East of here.

8. Where would I like to go with my work
Simply put .. To the people ..

9. What came first .. the chicken or the egg
Good question. I don’t think there was a chicken or an egg. I think there was a murky pond and a monkey. How they got here you wonder? Through one of the genie’s three wishes another person used in a different manner than me.

10. A pivotal writing experience or breakthrough personally
I will always look favorably on my folks pushing me as hard as they did to hammer out my A-B-C’s and 1-2-3’s. That was a real leap for me. Especially at my age and the point I was at in my early childhood development.

Seriously, I think it was when I started printing and distributing my poems into chapbooks and placing them in random spots around the city for people to read. Such as you. The chap-collection you picked-up was my 5th in about three years of placing my stuff out for the people to see. When I decided it was better to let many strangers read my work rather than friends and a dusty bookshelf, it bode well for me and others out there that get some kind of charge from reading my printed word.

the biggest joke and triumph

2009-01-15T10:17:00.001-06:00

the biggest joke and triumph
i
feel
at
the
end
of
each
day
is
that
we are
all
simultaneously
the
biggest
joke
as
we
survive
day
to
fucking
day
down
here
on
this
hurtling
rock
of
infinite possibilities
and
manage
to
stay
alive
as
long
as
we
damned
well
do
like
tiny
slips
of
miracle
making
jesus
survive
so strongly
and buddha
smile so heartily
in an
atheists’
forgotten dream.

absolutely forever

2008-11-23T14:07:00.001-06:00

after
i had began
really
sinking my
brain's
teeth into the
notion
that my recently
deceased father
is gone
forever,
i remember
an old
wise man
from india
at the liquor
store up
the way
that
said one
night
that
you
will
start
feeling old
when you begin
losing your parents
and
nothing truer
was spoken
to me
lately
cause
right now
i
feel
older
than i ever
thought
i
would
at
the
tender
young
age
of
36.

Celebrity Handbook

2008-11-12T10:41:00.002-06:00

Should you run into a celebrity by chance .. here's a little book that may come in handy .. click here to view and enjoy ..

papa joe hawkin’

2008-10-15T08:28:00.001-06:00

every time
i see
a big
hawk
soaring
with large wings,
lopping like
a lost piece of
paper let into the wind,
i think my dad is
in that bird somewhere
looking down on
a planet he
had a short time
to figure out.

only gone for about
a month now,
he loved the
birds.

and now
i’m sure he has
used his well honed
sales skills
to barter a deal
to soar with the eagles
and peck with
the pelicans.

if this is only
a fragmented piece
of fiction in my
head,
i still find
more meaning
in his
enduring bird image
than anything else
these days.

so,
as the wings of
the latest bird leaves my periphery,
i soar into
my longing
to
talk
once more
to my dad
with his head full of
dreams
and pockets full
of wisdom dust
left behind
to forever change
the course of
everything
this planet will
ever do
from
here
on
out.

steop

2008-08-22T05:56:00.000-06:00

i'm sure
once
a lot
of poets
get into
a
room
together
and
start
spouting
that it's
too much
and that's
backwards,
which is
why the word
poets backwards
is steop!

hello poetry,

2008-08-07T10:16:00.002-06:00

it's me again.

here to wade over
your
dream catcher
and set to
get stuck like
a bug in your
sappy web.

i delve into your
moneyless waters
once again knowing
that i will never
make money off
such a craft as this.

and again i realize
it's a relationship
fueled by zinging red hearts
cause there is nothing
more than
this spate
where i pull my
archer's arrow high
and try to
hit the center
of the center dot
once again.

you will sit there
with a penniless
mouth
reminding me of
a world void of money
and humans without
genitals.

you give me notions
of how to capture ideas
like how we may
all be chewing into
more meat with bits
of bone and bread
with hard crunchies
cause there are honing devices
being put into our
food by the friendly
government pals
we put into power.

then you come back to
remind me how
i can understand the origins
of this malady down here
if i just listen
to the breath of my
son in silence
as he roars through dreams
his wordless tongue
will not be able to
speak to me.

and you always
offer me a used
and empty wallet
that makes me smile.

you are the one thing
that requires no money,
and spends none,
and makes me none.

and if the day comes
that you begin changing
your selfless ways,
many more will find this
missive and i may be
sorry that you
innocent cloak has been
exposed.

oh my
dear friend poetry.

run and hide ..

.. for i would never want them
to catch you this way
with wandering dollar signs
and
selfish sweat socks.

billions of prior people

2008-07-16T06:55:00.001-06:00

when we all
have odd
fears,
intriguing
fetishes,
slappy pleasures,
unknown terrors,
magical ecstasies,
we have
to realize
that our
vessels
of mind and soul
are the
wavering entirety
of every human
that came before
us.
as we carry
the torch of
humanity forward
just a blink
more
into the future
beyond,
it's easy to get
lost in the
small bubble
of our immediate family
we know.
but we also had generations
of family that led to ours
and
was
hugely before ours.
then mince
in all the friend’s
acquaintances,
work fellows,
memorable stingers
and we are
armed
with enough
human ancestry of
memory to make us
become a mixed
bag
of quixotic eccentricies.
and when we realize
that the human remains of
centuries of folks
are the basis of the oil
we wage wars over
you can
begin to come full circle
in understanding how
intricately entwined
in this reality
with all our fellow
humans
we
truly
are.

i woke up in the suburbs again

2008-07-02T09:28:00.001-06:00

and the
sun
was soft
on my skin
as my boy
sat at
the kitchen
island counter
in a rare
moment of
silence
as i reached down
through
the
screams of
light to
grab the
world’s headlines
as i looked
around
at the
quiet
neighboring
homes and
felt
as though
i was
nowhere
at
all
and it
was a delight
to
know
that
i
could
have
been in
a
smog
infested city
center
or
in
the
middle
of oblivion
of rural
america
as
i pressed
the
garage door
closed
and
saw my son
angle
towards
my
gaze
as
though
we
had seen
each other
for
the
first time
in
weeks.

I feel like i live in area 51

2008-06-11T14:46:00.001-06:00

shoved back
in the lurching quadrants
of rural missouri,
no one goes outside,
i never see kids in pools,
never see children playing on
elaborately built swing sets,
never see adults cooking on
huge propane grillers,
never see people just sitting
out front,
never hear the cocophony
of human noises i used
to hear in the throb of
midtown.

now,
i imagine the invisible,
secret toilings of
living beings that constantly
stay indoors,
even during california weather.

are they building top secret
alien structures?

are they the spawn of
something that should be hidden
from the rest of us all?

are these people real?

do they like to be alive?

the loneliness of
the burbs is the
full admission that
this is where people come
to escape everything
and this seems
to be
the best thing
these people are good at.

vanishing,
quiet,
solitude,
cease,
like
nearly being dead
with a heart full of
blood ready
to squirt into
all the
awaiting
extremities
ready to
burst into a big
bang
of
action.

each simple moment that passes

2008-06-05T06:35:00.000-06:00

there are millions
of
tiny warm
arms
reaching up
into the
enormous
sky of sun
for
a bit
of
recognition
from
god
and
as
we
tumble
into our next mysterious
moment wondering
if
god
understands our
secrets hidden
within our
charlatan
requests,
i see
the sky smile
in
a
long cloud
parting
as
we
wait
to
find out
if
there
really
is
some
kind of
truth
to all
theses plants
growing
and
astronauts
going
insane.

slippery trail

2008-05-22T08:08:00.000-06:00

one morning
i was tailing a
big trash truck
tossing
bits of slips
from it's large,
open mouth
as the blaring sun
turned a hotter yellow
and
the
unknown of what
was or wasn't written
on this
non-stop trail
of paper slips
flopping up,
and out into
the
pang of
sky
that
is
going
to
never
leave
my
mind
as
the
story
has
written,
and the song
sung,
while
the
trash truck
makes a left,
and i
continue
straight,
foot on pedal harder,
as the world
begins going quicker
in
a flurry
of
almost forgettable
notes.

Earth Vs. Fantasy

2008-05-09T14:38:00.001-06:00

Can You Stop Thinking?

2008-04-30T12:45:00.001-06:00

Gravy All Over Everything - Video Poem

2008-04-21T13:45:00.001-06:00

empty

2008-04-15T07:48:00.001-06:00

32 oz. cans
of malt liquor
squib,
and squabble
back and fro
as the storm brews.
cries from
a single apartment
building ratchet down
towards the dirtied
sidewalks
as the storm eye
intensifies.
a bullet crests the
upper ridge
and blows through
the invisible
stop signs
as the approaching
storm comes
closer to the ground.
another birth,
more beer,
the drug dealer sneezes,
as a new election
tries to capture that
one audience.
and if nothing happens,
the storm will
ruin all of our futures.
the malt liquor has
run out as
the umbrella unfurls
and we all
hope that
there's an ear
that my receive
our blueprint
prayer waiting to race
skyward.

I Keep Losing My Place in the Story

2008-04-01T13:52:00.001-06:00

‘boss for a day’

2008-03-26T12:43:00.002-06:00

an indinan
man at
the
conoco
next to my
work
always
calls
me
'boss'
when i but
a
juice
or
corn nut
bag at
his shop.

each time,
i smile
stronger,
wider
and
say
'yes'
as
he
goes
on to take
my money.

as i leave
the
boss,
i know he's
the real
boss
and
his
verbal play
time will
always keep
me coming
back so
that
i
can
pretend in
brief moments
of blowing
money
that i am
the boss
in my
juicy world
full
of
fucking
corn nuts.

New Book Title

2008-03-17T08:29:00.001-06:00

'Editing

Dreams'

- How

you

do that?

i wonder all the time

2008-03-14T09:02:00.001-06:00

not simply
wondering,
but i wonder
about wonder.

and the wonderful
wonder that is
around us.

just the notion of
wonder,
and the slight
glimmers of
occasional topics
that flit into my
radar view.

but mainly,
i love the act of
tending to 'wonder'
as the world of
wonder suffers to
really be embraced.

for what could be
duller than not wondering
about anything or ever
wondering about wonder.

lest i waste anymore
of your wondering time,
i'm off to become a
hero of wonder
and to save
the plot of wonder
for my kids,
my wife
and anyone else
wondering what this
poem is really
supposed to mean.

good yawners

2008-03-07T14:53:00.001-06:00

make you feel
the warmth of
a bed.

their lazy,
comical roar forward
is usually a clumsy
act that is about
as natural as a human could get.

but it's those that
elongate their faces just so,
the longevity of the
sign of tired,
and the intensity of
their watered eyes.

and it's at this moment
of veering in,
and not feeling too tired
that i get into their
brains and feel how good a
bed can feel at any moment
of a day when
sleep is just another
unattainable thing
your biology
lets out in a triumphant
guttural blast.

all the cold cigarette smokers

2008-02-01T12:35:00.000-06:00

loiter
out in front of
brick buildings
like outcasts
waiting for a
hollywood call up,
or inmates
cowering away from
the warden for a moment,
or child support evaders
hoping everyone will look
at their smoke versus their faces,
or they are the lost gods
that will become the future
idols of utter witchcraft,
or they are the children of
the lost that will keep showing you
their courage against mortality,
they are the people running your life
and your life is only a cold cigarette
in the blistering cold
as the last of
their wafting nicotine habit
goes hurtling upwards
towards a finality of invisibility.

‘ink message’

2008-01-23T15:03:00.000-06:00

a little squat bottle
of speedball india ink
sits next to my
wandering fingertips
with a tightly shut
black lid
and a tiny inanimate glare.

even when i move it to the other
side of this old desk,
i look over and see that
its lines,
and words are forming in a
meaner glare
at my modern machine of
writing.

luckily there is not
a sharp quill feather in
the room,
otherwise i may fear for my
life as the bottle
is now out of sight.

i haven't touched it and
as i turn slowly to
see if it may have fallen,
i notice a dark, wet stain
on the tan carpet in the
shape of a large winged bird
full of
antique writing instruments
ready to
kill
my
words.

‘survivalist restaurant’

2008-01-18T15:37:00.000-06:00

after all the
bombs
fall,
disease rips
over the
entirety of earth,
every heart gone,
no human left,
all insects gone,
trees a memory,
only ground and
sky,
there will
be but one
human invention
that will
withstand everything
and that
thing will
be the
glorious
god damned
waffle house.

all waiting
there with
a stubborn
fuck you
kind
of
brimming
love.

an orange aisan beetle,

2008-01-07T14:55:00.000-06:00

which looks a lot
like a lady bug
crawls over our
white window frame towards
another fallen
beetle
long dead from
the early winter
cold.

miraculously,
this one beetle
is crawling with vigor
from the rarely
opened
winter window
on an unusually warm
day towards
some unknown destination.

i heard these
are stubborn bugs
that don't die
easily and can overtake
a home and this little
beetle has proved that
darwin is alive and pumping
above all of
this midwestern political
rhetoric
of creationism
and fiction.

Relative Poem

2007-12-19T10:20:00.000-06:00

young faces of relatives

hang on our walls

and black iron shelves

as reminders

that if we are lucky,

or unlucky enough,

we will lose our youth

and have

the photos of our fancy to relive

the days when our organs liked each other.

all of the dashing glances,

vigorous smiles,

new hair,

non-sagging parts,

clean skin,

crisp clothes,

dapper smiles

have all given way to the future

and the

fact that our bodies

don't like

what happens

next and the past doesn't like us

in the present.

i believe

the might of the picture

to immortalize

us in ways that will help

our eroding brain remember

that the only thing mightier that the past,

present

or future

is the love we create

and cultvate on this

ever advancing existence

that blares forward

with all the voracity of time

as we once

used to remember.

New Joefiles 114 is Out

2007-12-04T10:29:00.000-06:00

The new volume - curly queued daydreams - is available by clicking here - a sample poem below:

gaining gusto in aging

within
the last
several
months
i have taken
a moment extra
to look
at the obituary section
of the local paper.
maybe an old friend,
or someone i used to work
with will show up in these
back pages
and i'll have that
one moment of shock
to rescue me from
the taste of coffee
and work

and responsibility
to reflect on
what this life is all about.
the potential end
displayed in ink,
giving all us obituary
readers that
brief moment
to refocus our day on
what should
really be in focus.
and when
i close that paper flap
and know that
it was full
of loving strangers
that will no longer
co-habitate
earth with me
anymore,
i wonder
who from my past i may run into today.

Brief Poetry Food Art

2007-11-29T10:28:00.001-06:00

Mailbox Truism

2007-11-19T15:45:00.001-06:00

subdued war beaten

2007-11-14T13:25:00.000-06:00

all of the faces
sauntering at the
downtown veteran's day
parade
looked weary,
beaten by the
constant lying
we have had
to endure for
way too long.

still cloaked
in small town adoration
and ready to give
us the shirts
off their backs to
support a
war without reason,
these patriots
believe
in the way of america,
but they hide
their contempt.

instead,
they bleed this
fatigue
through their
tiny waving flags,
red flowers,
and popped corn,
telling everyone
that they
don't even believe
in freedom
anymore.

instead,
they believe
in each other
and our motives
to stand in
that cold missouri
wind at ten AM
on a new, sunny morning
to tell
those that
almost died
that we are glad
they are here
in their 57 chevy's
waving at our
kids
careening
towards the
gray ground
to pick up
their bright
stack of
discharged
candy.

The 113th Volume

2007-11-02T07:15:00.000-06:00

The newest Joefiles 113 - "a mission to understand our sky' - click here to view .. - a sample poem below:

FORGOTTEN MONDAYS
each monday
morning
i have a freshly
wrapped
summation
of our world's news
in a thin
plastic bag,
i delight in
this accidental
delivery
from a hung-over
paper delivery
dude that
forgot that
Sunday ended
and everyone
was reluctantly
going into yet
another
week that
makes us
long for one
more Sunday
night
drink.

REAL OCCUPATIONAL TALENT

2007-10-23T06:48:00.000-06:00

i have
always
had
a talent
to get myself
either fired
or
in permanent
exile from
corporate jobs.

my best
quick jab
at getting
myself in
the shit bucket
was with
my
last job
and
a boss named ed.

he rehired me
years after
he had 'downsized'
me like a
fast food order
at a drive up stand.

it all started
with a talk
on a business trip
towards phoenix
on the tarmac
about the upcoming
presidential elections.

he asked me what
the country would
remember as george bush's
legacy if he was
to be re-elected.

my response was this,
'HE AND THE ELECTION WILL
BE REMEMBERED AS THE MOST
BRILLIANTLY DECEPTIVE
PLOY TO FOOL THE AMERICAN
PUBLIC INTO BELIEVING
ONE OF THE MOST ROTTEN
PRESIDENTS THAT UNFORTUNATELY
STOLE THE 2000 ELECTION
AND CONTINUTED HIS ROMP
TO RUIN OUR COUNTRY.'

at this,
he gave his
corporate smirk
with his splotchy full beard
and leaned back in his chair.

the transformation had
taken place
and his vapid look into
my eyes was far off
and gone.

he never talked
what political affiliation
he was,
but i knew that this
would root him out
of his hole of
corporate ambiguity
and help him make
a tough decision.

it was that day
that his pal was
verbally trashed and
he tossed me
into that bucket
as a long goner.

he proceeded to
humiliate me
over and over
again after that
trip
and it took months
for me
to put the
two and two
together.

and now that i
have counted past four
and on up towards
the thousands,
i know that
my comment in
that thick cabin air
may have been my
best business
decision
ever.

SACK OF TRAPS

2007-10-16T14:47:00.000-06:00

when i think
i'm in the clear
and i'm just going
to dawdle through
a handful of days
without any
tragedy,
nasty self-reflections,
parenting traps
and the like,
i start seeing
the signs appearing
in my rear view mirror.

first,
there is some poor hipster
in a camry with one headlight
blaring into
my mirror.

then,
another car with one headlight
appears in the side window.

several others now
flash like
torches in my
rear view.

a big rig in comes
in the opposite lane
before me with one
Cyclops headlight.

and i get a bit
of the sweat in my pits,
blinking hard,
wiping my brow,
i look up into the mirror
for more one headlighters
and it's gone
as the rig finally swishes by.

all headlights
have turned to two
around me.

in my moment of
relief,
the phone in my pocket
begins to ring
as a shooting star
in the sky is really
a descending fire pit of
a plane tumbling towards
earth.

at this,
i jam on the
gas pedal,
hear my alarm wake me
and
rise to see what kind
of
headlights are going to
hit my
under dilated
eye balls
of morning.

Joefiles 112 Is Out ..

2007-10-09T12:28:00.000-06:00

I have posted a new volume of poems called: 'Joefiles 112 - Brief Definitions of Moments' (click here to view) and I posted a poem from this new volume below .. cheers ..

my dad and the outer world

as much as i avoid it,
i'm turning more
and more into my
old man as i grow old.

like him,
i sincerely believe that most
people that waddle about
on this planet are truly selfish beings
that resist evolution and intelligence
for the path of easy resistance.

even friends get rooted
out for the way that they really
are and when the ugliness gets exposed,
you begin avoiding public spots
and anywhere that there may be
strangers abound.

this morning,
i had to leave a restaurant to get
some wet wipes for my son's sugar disaster
at the breakfast table
and on the way out
there was a massive man holding the door
open for a long line of people walking in and out.
as folks streamed by,
he kept saying:
'YOU'RE WELCOME,
SURE NO SWEAT,
COME AGAIN.'

all of this was in some nasty tone because
not everyone was thanking him for
his tireless effort to avoid being nice.

and as i said,
'thanks' to his vapid face,
i descended into the raining parking lot
and really wanted to turn right around and say:
'LOOK HERE BOZO THE BIG HUNGRY BOY,
TAKE YOUR UNHEALTHY, FAT HAND
OFF THAT DOOR AND WADDLE UP TO
THE PODIUM TO GET YOUR NAME ON
THE BIG LIST TO EAT A MASSIVE
BREAKFAST YOUR HEART IS GOING
TO AGAIN LOATHE YOU FOR
AND DO EVERYONE THAT HAS
UNFORTUNATELY HAD TO BE SUBJECTED
TO YOUR EXISTENCE A FAVOR
AND APOLOGE FOR MAKING
THE CHOICE TO HOLD THE DOOR FOR US
AND THEN VERBALLY PISS INTO OUR
EARS BECUASE YOU WEREN'T VALIDATE
FOR SOMETHING NONE OF US FUCKERS
ASKED YOU TO DO.'

instead,
i put my wife and son ahead of
that fleeting desire to
dip further into my father's psyche
and just get the wet naps
to wash way all the thick stickiness
that inevitably slips through
no matter how hard you try to be
clean and untainted.

Joefiles 111 Posted

2007-10-04T09:23:00.001-06:00

A new PDF volume is ready for consumption .. it's called: Harlequin Heart Chambers In Every Thought I Eventually Forgot - click here to read - a sample below:

how many thoughts a day do you think?
seriously think about it ..
can you even begin to
put your finger on a
single number
that would narrow down
how much you really think.
the criteria is simple.
just pinpoint how many
things may have gone through
your brain.
whether you did
anything about the thought or
it was just something that
gave your synapses a reason
to flow,
let's find a number.
is it a thousand.
a million.
maybe a billion.
maybe so many that
this question
is illogical and painful.
maybe so little that you
cannot believe
you have made it this
far
through this oratory of
poetic poem rambling.
or maybe there is
no reason to count
the number of thoughts
going on because
quality is much
more key than quantity
as
i come down to this point of
telling
you
at 2:27 p.m. on this saturday
afternoon,
i am bearing down on
my 4,579th thought.

difference between men and women

2007-10-02T12:35:00.000-06:00

i get to know my wife
in our shared relationship
the best when we
get a bit hopped up on
some drink
and start reading
the news headlines online.

last night,
i pointed at a headline that said:
'WOMEN WORRY MORE THAN MEN, STUDY SAYS'

while my wife opened a story that said:
'BRAIN EATING AMOEBA KILLS SIXTH PERSON IN A WEEK'

and it's in these small moments of life
when we choose what aspects of life
we want to explore more
that i realize why i love
her and she ultimately
loves me
in all our
worry over alien amoebas
floating about this dangerous
world of ours.

the death of radio is here

2007-09-28T07:54:00.000-06:00

as satellites
and radio personalities
named slim fast
slobber all over
the commercial addled
airwaves that blip
over the car speakers
like coins
hitting the
bottom of a
coke machine before
making that commercial a reality.

and this dying scenario
of radio is hard to explain
to my kids because i don't
listen to radio and
the speared brittney ranking
over the proverbial airwaves
in some torrent of over produced
trash that is produced to make
you buy the compact for your wife.

it's picking the right
music for your music player
or burning the right mix
because you are running away
from the inevitable death of
something that used to actually
provide hours and hours
of needed enjoyment.

now,
it's the dormant land of
screaming voices,
audio billboards
and musicians that
cashed in their slight talent
for an overproduced cover shot
to mask that fact that
their music may actually
make rats commit suicide.

and one day i'm going
to take my kids through
some odd thrift shop that smells
real good and explain
to them what radio used to be
like when they point towards
that one display that has
an old RCA radio sitting all silent,
yet strong
like the corpse of a hero
in the casket during a wake.

Another Volume - #110

2007-09-19T06:32:00.000-06:00

Had a nice solid weekend with the words and have another volume that is posted for your viewing pleasure .. it's Joefiles 110: Self-Proclaimed Jack of All Legs Excerpts from the ‘’One Heaven Tear on Hell’s Windshield” Anthology - a preview of this volume is below in the form of a poem ..

BURNING WORLD

many
early morning
sunrises
lately
look
as though
the morning
headlines
are dead right
as the bright
sun ball
comes peaking over
some cold clamor
of trees
to expose
the chaos
of burning
going on the
other side
of this great
big world
of ours.

DENIED = Progress!

2007-09-13T09:45:00.000-06:00

Dear Joe Dimino
We like your poetry, but this submission misses the very special niche we try to maintain for The NVN. Should you, in future, have more timely/topical work related to the news of the day, do try us again.
Best,
James

Joefiles 109 Book is Posted

2007-09-10T10:55:00.000-06:00

In honor of the fact that poets get paid nothing for thier craft, I bring you my newest 61 page volume of poems - the title is 'FOLLOWING THE BIG BANG THEORY ONTO THE STAGE' click here to view the PDF - or, click here to view all my poem books for free - below is a piece from this new volume .. enjoy ..

a haunted ride

on a drive through the
path less taken to southern missouri,
i saw the real settings
for every horror movie
i ever watched growing up
as a kid and even recently.

abandoned campgrounds,
boarded up motels,
rotting restaurants,
old trailers littered with
untold numbers of debris
and huge quantities of woods teaming
with wayward shadows and lost leaves.

and at the end of this drive through
lost hollywood,
i saw a big black dog

on the top of a well groomed hill
with an old gal holding him

by the leash as he was lying
a slow,
comfortable shit
on the green sod
as she looked down
with a pained,
horrified look
as though these woods may
be more than haunted.

rocker popper empty rant

2007-09-07T07:26:00.000-06:00

used to be
that rock and rollers
would bend cultural assumptions
and fight for the common
folks that would be
their discs
or watch their shows.

they would stand up against
governments,
wars,
uselessness,
idiocy
and diseases that
rampage our planet.

en masse
these mangled brood
of musicians
would dance across
the color TV screens
with messages of hope
and willful rebellion
to get the TV dinner crowd
to think
and maybe get up
to do some of that
good old fighting.

but now,
our musicians have
decided to fight for
their own careers,
more endorsements,
spots on TV shows to
raise the stakes of their bank accounts.

most of the more famous sorts
speak like subnormals about trite
events that make up their
public life.

clueless to the cause
in the culture,
they spend their stacks of one's
without caring who
plucked it over into their
world.

not only are we subjected
to the typical american laziness
with these rocker/popper music sorts,
we are raped by their lack of
musicianship and the continuing
sinking of the proverbial music tanker.

so, turn off your radio kids
and let your imagination
float where the rockers have
retired and left for
a more
safe,
rich land of
vapidness.

the drifters

2007-08-31T07:09:00.001-06:00

that flit about
the skits of the
suburbs
always get me
on an alert
that the
worst of the city
bums could never do.

the suburbanite
drunks dirty with
cardboard sign
or hitchhike thumb
on interstate roadway
always have that look
that they didn't quite
get all the blood out
of the carpet and there
might be some specs of red
on their shirt sleeves.

the narrowed eyes,
smiling mouths,
the stench of oppression
blinding your reproach,
and they amble as though
the gun could be exposed
at any moment as the switch blade
accidentally tumbles out of
their back pocket.

when you look back to see
if the rag tag man
fetched his knife off the
ground,
there is a massive fire
blazing where he used to stand
as the blaring sound of sirens
start instantly
and you notice
that the man begins
appearing in your rear view mirror
flipping you off with a huge
grin in his eyes
as the mysterious knife
lies in your front
seat
and you are suddenly not sure
if you should drive
any further
down the creepy road
of suburbia.

restless fonts

2007-08-28T16:01:00.000-06:00

if i
was a
wiggly font,
i would
put on
tiny yellow
boots,
splash them with
loud colors
and jump all
over this page
you are reading
with such veracity
that you will
never believe
you read
anything as insane
as a dancing
font with
rubbers on
splashing paint everywhere.

More Ink Progress ..

2007-08-20T13:08:00.000-06:00

Joe Dimino,
I am sorry to say I'm turning your submission down. Thank you for submitting to Fickle Muses. Good luck!

Sari Krosinsky, Editor

internal externals

2007-08-17T07:17:00.000-06:00

i used to
stop
at night
on long,
lingering drives
and peer
deep into the silvery
flashes of light
high above on
dark poles
that winked
at me.

i used to yearn
to know
morse code
and deduce
what they were saying
to my life
as i just sat there
counting the intervals
of blinking
exultation
riding over my
eye brows,
whispering
small
forgotten
phrases over
my
unmoving
ear drums.

Poetry Progress

2007-08-15T14:49:00.000-06:00

Dear Joe,
Thank you for your poetry submissions. However, I am sorry that I cannot publish your poems, as they are not right for the journal.

Still, I greatly appreciate your interest in The Cherry Blossom Review. Best wishes for your poetry.

Sincerely, Jennifer LeBlanc

when the weight of bills,

2007-08-09T12:16:00.000-06:00

chores,
no time,
autism spectrums,
the expense of
everything
come colliding into
my quickly beating heart
at odd intervals
in the spaced day,
i quickly retreat
to a spot in my brain
that is hidden like
bags of gold in a forest
under a stack of sticks
to visions of my loverly wife
and i blaring down some sun ruined road
in our old age behind the
over-sized wheel of a
sussed out RV
with cigars in our mouths,
singing to yo la tengo and
wondering why the years didn't
move as fast as our
parents always
predicted.

gravity confusion

2007-08-03T07:33:00.000-06:00

what
if
the
sky
really
was
the
ground
and
the
ground
was
the
sky
and
we
could
all
finally
come
to
the
consensus
that
we
as
a
human
race
are
really
upside
down.

A Published Poem

2007-07-09T14:11:00.001-06:00

I would like to publish " KANSAS CITY MOBY". The fine print:

The Externalist purchases First North American Serial or Reprint Rights as well as Electronic Rights for a period of six months, after which time all rights return to you. At this time, there is no payment for publication in The Externalist; however, contributors may request a link to an upcoming or published book within one year of publication in The Externalist. That link will appear on our web site for six months.

Dreaming of Buddha

2007-06-27T19:41:00.000-06:00

i had a dream last night
that i donated my
red, fake ivory Buddha
statue to some locale
and lost my way completely.

when i got the
statuette in a
small korean market,
they warned that i
could never bring it back for a refund.

it was bad luck
and they flashed a grave
countenance that bespoke of
fire skies and blood lakes.

so,
i tossed away the receipt and
huddled it next to my computer
monitor for all these 10 years of so
i have pounded through these years
of words trickling like a palatable
matrix i forget continually.

and it was that one small dream
with the big man statue
leaving my grasp for another location.

i don't even know where
to get it back in my dreamland
when i fall back asleep.

but the beauty of this,
is that i'm awake
and he sits to my left with his
relaxed fingers,
full grin and another dreamless day
to watch everything pass
with his closed eyes
and lightly strewn gown.

angling towards the mid-life breakdown

2007-06-22T07:11:00.000-06:00

as we amble through our teens,
really find our genitals in our early 20's,
learn how to use our rock shoes in the mid 20's,
contemplate good thought talk during the late 20's,
figure our family life in our 30's,
and wonder what the fuck towards 40,
the reality is that we are all just
pretending to prepare
for our big, fat mid life crisis
that will have no definitive day,
but it is always spelled out in the last
drop of whiskey that
lands on your young,
pink 30 something tongue that will have
to account for all the missed words,
botched birthdays,
forgotten events and
tiny missed issues that will
barrel towards all of your bowling pins
like something so accurate,
that olnly god could concoct.

perfect human stories

2007-06-20T08:33:00.000-06:00

if i was ever able to stumble
in the right chunks of time,
i would wander the halls
of assisted living compounds
and retirement villages to

concoct a thousand vibrant
characters under hundreds
of seasoned themes to
sell millions of books.

each of these shriveled,
aged,
pained,
pill addled bodies
have souls flourishing with the
victorious accomplishment
of cheating death for so long
and each of them have enough
adventure and intrigue
to have the best of their lives
strung together into a handful
of amazingly rich stories about human triumph.

and if i ever get the time,
i don't want you to steal
this notion of mine
or tell anyone else that is
mired in writer's block
or sell this off to oprah's underground book club
or tell me later that you are sorry
but it was such a good idea.

i simply want you to just drift
along this theoretical train ride
with your eyes slightly closed
and to conjure up the best of all of us
into one,
humanly perfect life
that would make
yours small enough
to understand
the enormity of our
human whole.

custard explosion

2007-06-19T07:28:00.000-06:00

there used to
be an old custard shop
up the street across from
a big church.

it didn't last long.

it was always smoky and hot
inside and the cakes and cones
were rather bland.

odd for sweets because
there is few ways to
make sugar sour.

the oddest thing about
this short lived outfit
was the sign out front.

i could never figure out
exactly what it was.
it looked like a heart
exploded in the middle
of a loaf of bread or
a still picture of an
ahnnilated penis before
it's shaped into a vagina
for a happy transvestite.

some brave hero soul
took the sign down recently,
but the months and days of
peering into that creepy
sign is sitting in my brain
like a beating heart
in the chest of a newly
formed woman.

john con

2007-06-14T13:13:00.000-06:00

saw an old con man
that i used to work with
and loosely know in my days at
the YMCA.

he stole slabs of meat ribs
from our freezer that was
to benefit kids who needed a facility
to come to.

he also stole equipment and cameras
that the kids used all the time.

and after he was exposed,
he was quickly torn out of our script.

it had been over 4 years since i saw
this 'john' dude,
if that was his name,
and he was walking up a dirty street
on the east side of town.
he looked worn,
lost,
ghost like,
broken,
falsely happy,
riddled with human debt
and oblivious to the mechanics of good living.

as i gripped the wheel a bit tighter,
i peered into my rear view mirror
to see him recede into my past
yet again
as my tiny boy
glowed like river treasure
in his seat
as my past and futures
quickly swam over that small
sliver of mirror.

REMEMBERING THE UNFORGETTABLE

2007-06-13T07:37:00.000-06:00

each time i see that
'9-11-01 : WE WILL NEVER FORGET'
sticker streaming from the
back of broken american car
i want to follow these drivers,
get out and tell them that
i cannot forget this day
because these stickers remind
me why this country is on such
a reckless course to Armageddon,
so in reality,
i would never had to have a bumper
sticker that cost the slight fraction
of an actual bomb that is falling over
Iraq as all the dummy Americans Trollope
around reminding each other of something
that none of us will ever forget
and no bumper sticker of any cost,
size or color could be enough to
unremind or remind me of such a
day as 9/11 as the
poor old car with the pearl harbor
sticker kills its engine behind me
as a small kid walking into
the dollar general asks his dad
what kind of pearl is in the harbor
and why would we ever forget to call
911 when there is an emergency.

the priest up the street

2007-06-12T08:12:00.000-06:00

is passed out
on wine at 4 in
the afternoon
as the rumor
of no god finally
vice gripped
his brain
along with the
putrid morning
headlines
as his eyes
begin to rise
again with the
thought of
christ sneezing
and he knows
that he can have
one more
cup of
blood red wine
if god will
only
tell him the secret
to yesterday.

exiting the cold grade school womb

2007-06-11T08:40:00.000-06:00

the closest i ever came to the
melding of pure innocent excitement
and the moment my first blast of
light hit me as a living human out
of the womb was one
winter day in grade school.

it was one of those patent
snowy, cold days
that should have been called
by the superintendent,
but wasn't.

all us jittery kids
were merely biding our time
and dreaming of sleds or warm mugs of sugary brown.

and it was decided that us
kids could go to recess and tear
through the drifts of bright white
icing all around us in the
back of willy wonka's hidden room outside.

as we all left our home room
mummified in multiple layers of warmth,
a door down the hallway opened
and all i could see was
bright sun and the purest
white puncturing through that
tiny rectangle on the horizon.

at this,
all of us kids started running
faster and harder towards the
frozen miracle mirage before us.

as the rectangle grew into a big bright square,
then a perfect door opening,
i could feel the cold of birth
happening all over again
as i exited through that doorframe
and forgot everything
else that happened
before that very moment..

Poem is to be Published

2007-06-09T11:13:00.000-06:00

Hello Mr. Dimino,

Thank you for your submissions. I'm going to publish "THE GATES OF LIBRARY HEAVEN" in our 2008 Winter/Spring edition, which starts in December.

Liz Fortini
Editor

http://www.languageandculture.net/

in the year 2020

2007-06-08T07:25:00.001-06:00

my plastic coffee lid
will have finally decomposed and
become a part of our organic planet.

only a mere fourteen years
as the days ooze by like
small drops of coffee satiating
our short term memories.

i'm gonna mark 12.16.20 on the
calendar as the day
that my lid will finally
be legal organic tender on this planet.

and what a day that will be
as all the other lids wait
in line to be the
bag of coffee grounds
dumped into my
grateful plastic trash liner
this
miraculous morning
that has no biodegradable,
breakdown
shelf life.

Apple Valley Review - Rejection Letter

2007-06-07T10:48:00.000-06:00

Thank you for your submission to the Apple Valley Review. I'm sorry to let you know that your poems--"Leaf Blowing King," "Last of 2006," "Kansas City Moby," "1st Thought," and "The Gates of Library Heaven"--were not accepted for publication. (For what it's worth, "Last of 2006" and "The Gates of Library Heaven" were my favorite pieces from this set.)

Although the poems aren't a fit here, this is a particularly subjective business, and I wish you luck in placing them elsewhere. Thanks again for thinking of us.

Best wishes, Leah

movie censors

2007-06-06T14:08:00.000-06:00

i used to think
that custodians or
trash throwers
had the worst sort of jobs
on the planet.

that ended recently when
i watched 'pulp fiction'
on commercial cable and
was assailed with
unclever ways to mask
the original cussing
the actors so eloquently
tossed in a
cult masterpiece
it is.

it's the job of the
network censor that
takes the prize as the
worst job on the planet.

akin to the muzak corporation,
how could you take the fuck
from john travolta's mouth and
make it a 'fudge'?

what makes it right to take
the 'shit' word from eric stoltz
and make it a 'shoot'?

what evil man or woman
has done this to the voices
that ring pure profane verbosity
that is the hallmark of classic
movie language?

do they admit these acts of
hollywood treason to their friends?

do they sleep at night?

do they cuss?

what would posses a human mind
to aspire to such a shameful
adult job to cover the original
script of a hollywood film?

fuck.

shit.

damn.

and no one will cover these
words as long as i'm breathing

on this planet.

NYC DREAMERS

2007-06-05T12:43:00.000-06:00

i believe that folks who finally
Pack up their midwestern lives
and move to new york city
have more balls than anyone i
will ever meet.

sure,
i've had friends go to
arizona,
california,
new mexico
vegas,
florida and the like,
but the heat of new york city
is enough to snuff out any dream
city across this american land plane.

there is one such loose acquaintance
that i know who recently went
up there to do some art work
and it fell through.

they have since left,
and that is just fine.

the attempt at a town like
new york is the point.
as the huddled teams of
building cram through my
wondering brain,
i imagine that i live there
for a night and sip in the morning before
i awake to another kansas city morning
with my own slivers of new york
in the paint on my typer keys,
the plaque in my boy's teeth,
and the girl smell in my wife's hair
as the dissipation of dream
becomes the emulsification
of my shoe soles sucking in another
patch of middle western ground.

buckle up for lauren

2007-06-01T13:34:00.000-06:00

i saw
a buckle up
for lauren
bumper sticker
on the back
of an aging
jeep weeks back
and looked down
at that
tiny slit that
holds me
tidy inside
my fast cruising
vehicle
blaring to
my next destination
as visions of
who this lauren
girl really was when
an accident
took her from
future plans of
school,
family,
child birth,
homes,
vacations
and all the
decent memory
makers of earth living
gave me one more pause
to look back
at my tiny son
even more snug
in his belted seat
as the quick pace
of our moving metal
was too much for
my crammed brain
to shrug off.

Dreaming Head

2007-05-31T11:58:00.001-06:00

i have a head
full of indispensable dreams
and that's just enough
for me on this human romp
until i try to
quantify those dreams
on some metric scale
no one knows about
and wouldn't even know how to
if there was enough
to take
my impossible task
any further than a dream
and this
slinking poem
going into
it's magical
corner right now.

convoy's of truck driving cowboy's

2007-05-30T11:06:00.001-06:00

always pass me by
on the highway
with a tall mug of
steam swirled coffee,
an empty bottle of jack
on the passenger side floor,
the smell of pine in the air,
a girl with tussled hair
that flies up like a
pop goes the weasel game
wiping the side of her mouth
as the trucker fixes his
content gaze further on down
the road of our lives
laughing at the tiny throne
we sit on in our small
cars darting around
like substandard battery powered
bikes heading towards
our luke warm water
and simple sex lives.

Baby Breath

2007-05-29T08:09:00.000-06:00

of all
the wondrous
movements
and instincts
of a baby,
the coolest
thing
has to be
the fact that
they
don't get
bad breath.

shielded by
the mystery of
nature and
evolution,
you can lie
next to their
face in
a pure trance
and not
smell anything
but the
scent of fresh
skin
and the
new
skeleton
of many,
many
tomorrows.

Cardboard Buffet

2007-05-24T13:58:00.000-06:00

when someone tells me what
they are eating tastes like cardboard,
i nod and wonder.

i imagine them sitting
down to some elaborate
dinner table with
every assorted type of
cardboard awaiting their
hungry chops.

mashed cardboard,
grilled cardboard,
steamed cardboard,
roasted cardboard,
cold cardboard,
soupy cardboard.

and watch them tuck
that cloud white napkin
into the top ring of their
shirts,
then start shoving cardboard down their mouths.

as their eyes water,
they comment to their guests,
'MAN, THIS REALLY TASTES LIKE
CARDBOARD, EH?'

at this,
i can accept someone telling
me that their food tastes
like something they
have never eaten,
except in my day dreams.

night .. night.

truth behind kid sleep

2007-05-22T08:17:00.000-06:00

the greatest thing about kids
is that they really don't sleep
at night.

they just rest their eye lids
as we adult kinds
sleep and melt down
into a dark slip of
oblivion full of failed dreams
and new tasks.

the kids continue to
rage about their landscape
with a thousand strings of
innocence flying the world's
kites and waiting for the
next ground breaking electrical
surge to meet a key as that
same rain storm soaks our
adult dreams with
worries of umbrellas and
leaking basement foundations
while the morning alarm
SCREAMS IN LOUD R.E.M.
for us to
wake our
restful
eye lids.

people are praying for the wrong things

2007-05-21T07:08:00.000-06:00

people are praying for the wrong things
as the wheel of evangelical
abdication of war and
veiled hate flies through
the wasted newsprint wods
coming down our windy street.

folks are praying,
but do they know what they should
be asking for
as the portly face of
another preacher on a
channel in the 200's promise
viewers solace and financial freedom
if they just call one small number.

the squeezed eyes of another graying
christian preacher
blurs through the faded screen
as he holds the hand of his
terrified wife asking for
things like an end to world hunger
and the terrorists to perish.

while all i hope for is that
on one errant swipe through the
television channel guide
or side streets of america,
that the supposed christian audience
will finally ask their creator
to help them understand
love and patience as the grail of jesus
gracefully ages another day.

Welcome to the New JD Poetry Portal

2007-05-18T07:53:00.000-06:00

welcome to the initial installment of my new poetry portal .. my plan is to at least update this blog with a new poem every couple of days and keep you abreast on all poetry developments .. this is also a resource for finding poetry volumes, spoken word, video poems, rejection letters and the triumphant acceptances .. enjoy .. and a poem is below:

NATIONAL BANKS
we always see the shiny fronts
of the first nation banks,
but what about all the second
and third national banks.

i think i would like to put my money
in institutions that have a
second, third or fourth in their names.

it's not so far in the clouds
and steeped in piles of gold i could never count.

it has that blue collar ring that makes
me feel like i'm the poor guy that i really am.

maybe i should start the third national and
give everyone a free tootsie pop

and a shot of whiskey to join.