|
| poetry :: home |
pawing through my pockets - the receipts, the bus schedules, the matchbook phone numbers, the urgent napkin poems - all of which laundering has rendered pulpy and strange - Ani DiFranco
late night different house
medium thoughts annoying pencil noises
hot coffee, cold air, torn bits of paper conversation
similar locals, different locale
crazy girl sits across from me amusing herself with her own individuality
-Waffle House napkin - 7/2/96
what the hell is a political poem?
a poem about abortion or women's rights?
a poem about struggle and confrontation?
oppression of one group, domination by another
-plain napkin - no date
Random Chili
I was walking down the street the other day and I forgot my name, so I looked up to the sky and asked the sky man, "Hey sky god, what's my name?"
And, he said, "Hey man, I don't know. Go ask your mother."
-Chili's napkin - 8/16/95, 9pm
Listening make me think
Other's words call my own
Guilt overtakes me as I stop my attention to the others
If I continue to listen, I'll continue to think, but I'll forget to take notice of my surroundings
-plain napkin - no date
Classbeat
I took notes on my own mortality, realizing the difference between me and my cat. What's bizzare is that the guru assumed spontaneity,
but let it go to his head. Now that he knows what he is, he expects the three big ones to still be around. Sometimes he's never as central,
but has become an oddity of interviews. He says what he needs to say for the occasion, wired all the time, legend in his own mind. It would be
interesting to see what he has to say now. The older generations, usually associated with youth, kill off what they did ealier. She doesn't allow
herself to philosophize or walk across India without self-consciousness. I know it all, whispering in youth, they'll buy what I write, though
it's garbage.
-plain napkin - 11/21/96, 2:30ish
I'm sitting here in this crowded house thinking of all the things I could say to you. I'll let my mind talk to yours if you will listen, but my lips will never move. I can't help but to stare in your direction. Pardon me for the intursion. I only wanted to say.....
Ride the devil's freeway. It's a route you've taken before. This time, though, there's an end -- called HELL! Every other time you ended up in someone else's arms. The road signs pointed in other directions, but your kept your course, heeded your own methodology.
I caught a wiff of your perfume
Let me tell you, the memories came
flooding back making me nervous as hell.
I caught a glimpse of your eyes
and I realized I wasn't doing either
of us any good.
I caught a hint of your voice
wishing that it had said something it
would have said a few weeks ago.
Cut the order and ridiculous
repetition, what kind of point was I
trying to make anyways?
I'd drop off the face of the earth if
I thought it would make everything
better, but I don't think there's
anything I could do that would make
anything any better.
Sorry for any inconvenience I may
have caused you, but I just couldn't
stay away.
Love always, MAIZE
-plain napkin - 3/28/96, 9:00-9:50pm
Submarino
Beneath the sauce of the ocean where the touch of coral is as poisonous as yours, I live without breathing, trying to remain calm.
Walking through my head, leaving this place where you and they suffer from comfortable existence knowing safety in this and other revelations.
I'll wander north away from my past and end up in mine or someone else's, future playing charades with the children.
I'm getting scared of mountains without a protector; a god would do...
I'm nervous about fucking up my script of prepared knowledge written in my palm...
Can I? Will I? Appearances lie about confidence and truth of soul...
I'll wish for you in your mile high city, to help me learn the scene...
-plain napkin - 02/04, pm
Glance
Yentas and their knights, lesbians, witches and frat boys
all drinking the same beer
here for the same duo, playin' their 6-strings with
more soul than my left shoe
Lovin' life more with the circles and you
makin' my head spin and my exes seem inconsequential
This coffee sucks and the ambiance isn't much better
'cept for that cute girl who occasionally stops by here
pretending to be working, but hopefully flirting
going nowhere tryin' hard to catch a glimpse
she's got soul-searchin' eyes that make me want to
look away, but keep me locked in a hard stare
Haven't written a napkin poem since North Carolina
didn't have much to say, but for some reason, there
are words tonight that seem to think they should
hit the paper and stick
Maybe this isn't a poem but only a reflection of the
moment or a reaction to the day stuffed into
26 letters and various arrangements of sounds and
syllables strung together hap-hazardly with purpose
Back to the present, away from this mindless ranting
There are people milling around who remind me of the
past few years with chain wallets, collars, funny colored
hair and holes where they don't belong, but that
may have been a different time if not a different place
which means that I can't talk to them unless I change my
clothes and fix my hair to conform to their standards
of non-conformity that the managers 'round here can't
handle (Someone should import a Waffle House)
I could ramble on about such things and others,
but I don't know if they fit my life "style" anymore
now that I'm NORMAL IN A NUTSHELL to say the
least and get the most for my money as a writer
and poet extrordinaire since I can't make a buck
with a pic whether it's a nude one or not
Not a nude of me, the "artist" but one of a truly
beautiful woman like the one whose eye I was trying
to catch at the beginning of this poem before I got
distracted with politics.
So now I try to get the guts to make her a proposition
(NOT SEX) for her time so I can get a good dose
of those eyes that intrigue me and frighten me
to the point of being shy in a situation where I
might have otherwise been fearless, but not this
time, not with this one; with her I'm all me
full of fear and desire for something more than a glance.
-plain napkin, 06/27/98, 12:47am
Back to Top