Photograph by Diane Arbus

A deepest skin deep beauty. Skin bleeds ink bleeds skin, a voodoo do or dye. Bright colors mean poison, says National Geographic. Weak or meek, freak of the week, he is spatial special. He combats sameness tooth and nail. Independent claws.

December 25, 1997

The purple, joie de vivre sky looked sick, and true,
if you were watching Agent J like I was,
you might think the sky had just spit him up.
I remember I was wearing a sweater,
which is probably what made it so cold
that day.

So there was Agent J, basking in the jazz hands
and backflips of the street lights,
jumping 10 feet 8 inches off the ground,
landing in a split next to the sandwich board men
who know that the world is ending
and UFOs are real.

UFOs are real. Agent J is a spaceman. That’s how come I know.

A chorus line of SDFs and bums sang the colors
of the rainbow, and supernovas,
and black holes, and J the spaceman,
ground control to Major J,
kept dancing down those Wednesday streets,
Agent J phone home.

The smell of dirt and sweat
And 20-20 hindsight crescendoed to a deafening
volume, louder than those whispers
you know are about you. But Agent J
just kicked and smiled
and twirled the little girls
lined up one by one.

It was at this point that Agent J,
the J-man,
dove off the Brooklyn Bridge
into the shiny star water below.
I think if I were upside-down
he would have been flying straight up,
into a moon made of purple joie de vivre

and cheese.

Perhaps it is wiser to live in the moment.
Do you ever think about the future?
she asked me.
There was a moment
I thought of quasars and phasers and phasars
(whatever they are)
beaming up, Scotty (Scottie?), Sulu,
flying cars, hovercraft,
laser guns, electric eyes--
electric laser eyes!
I do not think this is what she meant
so I just said
Not really.

Bad News

The front page,
special edition,
ex-tray ex-tray read all about it
Sunday paper blows down city streets,
pummeled by merciless windy fists.

Car tires make a blind perusal,
breaking its spine
again and again.
It ducks and weaves like a boxer,
wobbles and weaves like a drunk,
ends up in a puddle of grease
and muddy water,
halfway soaked through.

The front page,
special edition Sunday paper
looks into the hearts
of passersby,
x-ray x-ray read all about it,
reading inner thoughts,
secret thoughts,
nasty thoughts.

Newsprint passes
silent judgment,
adding its own breaking news
commentary with its last
two unsullied words:
Violence Continues.
The rest is obscured.

Skippin' Rope


I talked to the spaceman
And the spaceman did say
Hey man,
S'all goin' down today.

I looked at the spaceman
And he looked back
Hey man,
World's a have a heart attack.

I saw the spaceman true,
And the spaceman, he free
Hey man,
Whyn't you fly away with me?

(But I think I kinda liked it.)

I do not know anything
about love,
except that it is gross
and that I am Too Young anyhow
and would rather be playing Power Rangers

I do not know anything
about love,
but when the green and pink
Power Rangers make goo-goo
eyes at each other
it is gross,

and when Laura Jones chases
me around the playground
trying to kiss me,
that is also gross.

And that one time,
when me and Betty Fisher
were sitting out in the field
watching the photo flashes of lightning,
hearing daddy's work boots
stomping in the thunder,
smelling it,
tasting it,
feeling as charged with electricity
as those angry clouds?

Well that was gross too.

Photograph by Bill Brandt

sand witch
haunted by the ghost
of Lincoln Logs
and sizzling bacon

she once played her role model
helpless but to make a scene
when she found out
all the world's staged

supper time
quittin' time
a time for action
and who has time for all of this

they work hard for the money
but they are spent
lost in loathsome limbo
come join me baby in my endless sleep