Son of the Fly

A man walked past a wall covered in sunlight.
He swatted at a fly that rested there.
Why should a fly get to enjoy the sunny day?

The fly didn't go far, it found a leaf
on a new spring flower. It held its wings
shining back light.

The man went into a tall building
and reappeared a minute later
trapped behind a window.

Annotated 'Son of the Fly':
This is my Drive-In movie idea
written two days ago on the first
sunny day we've had in a long time.
koan: which one is son of the fly?

movie time

Time to watch a good movie:
Fellini's Nights of Cabiria (1957)

1968 Fairbanks

Today I mailed off the corrected proofs

for the Kenneth Patchen Letters book to
Larry Smith of Bottom Dog Press. I told him
all night long Patchen kept appearing in my
dreams. Just before the alarm clock woke me,
he was driving me around in a blue 1968
Fairbanks (?) a car he was quite proud of.

This is Larry Smith's response:

Larry Smith responded:

"Miriam may have enlarged on the facts at times,
but she says Henry Miller really couldn't drive
a stick shift...in 1940s...or any car I guess, and
Kenneth took him out and taught him to drive,
but they were both quite concerned for Miller's life
when he took off...and ultimately wrote
The Air Conditioned Nightmare...about U.S.

He drove a 1948 Fairbanks, I think."

(You can sense the long Paul Harvey
pause before the last sentence. Of
course there is no '68 Fairbanks car,
at least not in this dimension.)

Kenneth Patchen Cover

This is the cover artwork
(from a letter Kenneth Patchen wrote)
for the Selected Correspondence book
due next month in April 2012
available from Bottom Dog Press.
333 pages.

a week of rain

The Wonderful Wednesday

That’s Thursday For You

Fly Away Friday

Saturday Submarine

Sunday Morning Radio

Monday Turned Green With Scales and Wings

Finding Sun Above Tuesday

Wednesday Again

The Wonderful Wednesday

I woke up to the little bird who lives

in the coffee can beside my bed.

After I stood in warm water

washing off good dreams

I made a breakfast from

the spaghetti we ate last night.

That’s Thursday For You

You’ve got to be very quiet

step on no twigs looking for them.

Somewhere there are sand dollars

hiding in this morning.

I myself was reading a book

and forgot to look.

Fly Away Friday

With feet of sparkling flying fish

see how they move her and hover

at puddles in the rain. It’s obvious

there’s no need to ask how she

floats on the air.

Saturday Submarine

Oh, that’s not rain

there’s a watering can

above the house.

Come outside, look

you can see the tree is

holding the handle.

Sunday Morning Radio

Featuring the chickadees

the pat of rain on leaves

and below are soft footsteps

my boots in mud

Monday Turned Green

With Scales and Wings

All night the dragon

flapped up and down

the street, perching on

a rooftop now and then

to blast out wind while

every fang toothed fir tree

snaps at the sky

Finding Sun Above Tuesday

By now we’re used to it

We live in it like goldfish

When I go to work at dawn

I use the rain as stairs

walking up them through doors

down hallways and up more stairs

and someday I’ll just keep going

Wednesday Again

A week of rain

the ground as soft as

clouds to walk upon

Kenneth Patchen Letters Release

Since last summer, Larry Smith and I
have been working on a new collection,
Selected Correspondence of Kenneth Patchen
which will have its book release in Ohio
at the Lakewood Public Library near Cleveland
on April 26th. I'll try to be there too.

A Couple Life Movies

A Couple Hundred Years Ago

Our first failed Capitalist venture occurred one summer night

when we went to the parking lot of the Shop N Save

and tried to sell bright red t-shirts with smiling devil faces.

Goat-headed, the evil one leered at the shoppers

as they pushed their carts full of groceries back to cars.

A couple hundred years ago they would have burned us

at the stake, but now they ignored us and kept us

trying to laugh, always on the edge of giving up.

Life Is a Movie Always

Waiting to Come True

Like something I would do, my friend

fell in love with the deaf girl who bagged groceries

at Shop N Save. He kept trying to tell her in words

what she couldn’t hear, and finally he decided to

write her a note. He bought some cheap cans

of chili and green beans and when she paused

to put them in paper, he passed her the letter.

Of course she was scared by what he spelled

the sudden words dropped out of the blue.

Who wouldn’t be taken aback and need time

to figure out the mystery of you?

He had to go hide under the trees

the branches tied to the ceiling in his room

pale and sad with broken heart records hurting

when you take everything to heart and believe

life is a movie always waiting to come true

These two stories appear in my
second book Bowl of Water
(Bottom Dog Press, 2004)
They feature my friend who also
stars in 'The Jellyfish Movie'
(see two posts ago)