Mi trash is your trash (1988-2020)

Like a listless marathoner too bored to do it again
The yellow New York trash laden Mobro22 barge drifted
After being refused, like it's predecessors,  by Southern Dump States
It too became a drifting stenchy Dutchman at sea
With the media at its heels

What to do with all this unregulated waste whilst
New York Dumps are filled to the brim and
Scrambling
As the egg yolks seep into the ocean

What to do when
the ocean turns smirchy brown as
Inexhumable
Particles untraceable filmy fragments
Razed unrecognizable polymers
That can't even stand for a comedy show
Multiply and prosper

Protoplasms descend the waters coating
Barnacles, seacows, sulfur worms, tires and Etruscan vases

"Le villain ordure est dégagé"
"Darf nicht traurig sein, es ist zu spät"
Sang a turquoise green mermaid

When the beach is marred with flotsam
And a running chicken has a dry cough
From rising methane
We shall click on an empathetic heart on twitter
Rip off the plastic from an organic food delivery and
Try to flush it down the toilet.



 

Mickey the Feuermeister

His name was Mickey the Feuermester

He was in charge of firing all the kilns

And he relished the gas firing when

He would get so close to the burners that

He'd almost torch his red 

English, tycoon, handlebar mustache.

Mickey was no-nonsense but

He had one favorite hobby

And that was to to to Natasha's

A unisex coiffeuse who

Knew how to do him just right.

Even during hot summer days

Mickey would take his time

Under the hairdryer he felt at peace

As if the machine could cool his hot temper

After all Natasha had pushed her warm body

Suited in a white smock with boots that laced to her knees

Against Micky and

Clipped and clipped and clipped

Snipping what evil spirits dangled from his head.

Tantisaluti and Corona or An Italian Corona Tale

They called him Tantisaluti or “Tantisa” because he used to wave to the customers with one hand while spinning the pizza dough with the other. Tantisaluti ran one of the best pizza joints in Empoli, a small town near Florence.
And then Covid19 arrived. Tantisa saw maybe 200 people a day. His restaurant was bustling, the brick pizza oven, the hot spot, was a squeeze to get by. There was human contact, sweaty contact, everyday. Some clients warned Tantisa about the virus, but he said, “as long as I keep spinning my pizzas, Corona will stay away”. And so he kept spinning his dough, even making pizza that he had delivered to the hospital staff for free.
Just last week Tantisa came down with a sore throat. The virus hit him hard and in one day he couldn’t move from his bed. Doctors were nowhere to be found in Italy and all the paracetamol in the pharmacies were gone. Matteo, a long time friend, said he had to do something. Tantisa’s nonna Kirstena, said she knew of a cure for the virus: she had heard that there was a homeless man, in Empoli, who had survived Covid19. If Matteo could find and him and get him to spit 3 times in a cup and bring it to her, it could save her grandson.
“Go find Jamesola, that’s what they call him” she said in her frail voice, giving him a silver cup from her childhood. “And get him to spit deep spit!”
But where to find him? Matteo ran around town in his red cap, high and low, but there was no sign of Jamesola.
He called the nonna: “Kirstena, I can’t find him, don’t you have a clue about this homeless misericordia?”
“He’s a desperate man. Use your head and think.” and at that she hung up the phone.
Desperate, desperate, Matteo walked around and around thinking, looking especially in places where the homeless lived.
No one had heard of a Jamesola, maybe he had another name, and with each step Matteo was getting more desperate. Suddenly, out of a dark alley, a regal character walked out wearing a 16th century sky blue outfit, with a tall blue hat that featured a golden plume from most likely a very rare bird.
He? She? Sang in a soft voice:
“ Desperado, why don't you come to your senses?
You been out ridin' fences for so long now Oh, you're a hard one
But I know that you got your reasons These things that are pleasin' you
Can hurt you somehow
Don't you draw the Queen of Lions, boy
She'll beat you if she's able
You know the Queen of Hearts is always your best bet”
Matteo was shocked and puzzled. He had never seen such a resplendent character in his life and at the same time, this song he loved from the Eagles, went “Queen of Diamonds” not “Lions”! Before the 16th century person got to say another word, Matteo jumped on his pony and raced to the

Fountain of Lions, where he saw a haggard man in a brown plaid hoodie and striped shorts crouched on the edge of the fountain. Except for a large swan flying by, it was stangely quiet.
Matteo jumped off his pony and shook the man by his head. “Jamesola! It’s you! I need you to spit 3 times into this cup!”
Jamesola didn’t move.
“Come on, now!!” insisted Matteo, his face getting as red as his cap.
“Che, che, che, wha, wha, what do ya want” replied Jamesola in a sleepy voice. It was 2 o’clock in the afternoon and the sky was clear except for a few white clouds.
“What the fuck are you after?” said a big, booming voice that made both Jamesola and Matteo jump. It was the voice of the Lion, who was looking down at them with very intent eyes.
“Signore Leone” said Matteo, “I need this man to spit..” and he went on to explain the story to the Lion and tried to finish it by saying that he would like the pizzas that Tantisaluti makes.
“I don’t like jokes about viruses” the lion said. And at that he roared a roar so loud that all the buildings around the piazza shook. And when he stopped, he roared again and then a 3rd time. Matteo was holding his ears and thinking he was in a Japanese Godzilla movie, what he didn’t notice is that with each roar, Jamesola spat into a cup, a convulsive spit that came from the bottom of his lungs.
The lion went back to its stone state and Matteo, seeing the cup almost full, grabbed it, not even thanking Jamesola and raced on his pony to see the nonna who taking the spit of 3 different bats, mixed it all together and instructed Matteo to have Tantisa drink it down in one gulp.
Although it was said that Tantisaluti recovered from the terrible Covid19, the truth will never be known for two reasons: the anonymous writer, he or she, got into a car accident that broke his or her hand so he or she couldn’t write anymore and original manuscript was also damaged because Matteo spilled Jamesola’s spit over the last paragraph rendering it illegible.

Italian Beach Balloon Seller

I get up early and arrange my gizmos

Floaters, tubes, baskets, watches, jewelry

faux Gucci faux fendi with real glitz


I gather these things with a number of  new Italiano

words picked up on the beach "Poco Caro, ti piace?"

I mouth the r's as I tie the balloons to my walking stick

"Signora, ti piace?" sometimes does the trick.


I walk on the sand

I walk on my heels

I walk like a warrior

Who has run out of appeals


Brazen, I carry my balloons full to the hilt

The breeze from the ocean agitates them like a virus

I am towering, visible like a lighthouse that weebles  in every direction

Yet invisible to thousands of beachgoers,  as if I had an infection.


I am aped

Made fun of

A child runs in front of me,  pretends to be Tarzan

So I show him my urban hero, a yellow-belted Batman.


The beach is my highway

Straight with no detours

It gives me time to think of my love, my home

And Amanpour's news tours.


I get home feeling toasted

And fall into a dream:

It's a modern Tarzan in the jungle with Jane

She's tweeting on her iPhone while swinging on a vine,

"Kowbunga dudettes, boy pumped up. New microwave,

gnarly programs and bell ding dong lol!"

And Tarzan while riding a rocky Rhino tweets:

"If Cheetah could say "I love u" that would be awesome."

They take the elevator tree whose cable is pulled by an elephant


But then I feel pressure on my neck and I am gasping for air

It is a hand holding my head

Pushing me under water, forcing me to swear.

"You must take Amazon Prime" says the hand

My arms flail like my balloons in the wind

"You must have Prime!" it shouts.

Then a lawyer appears holding a thumb in his hand

"You forgot this on the beach."

"I, I forgot.."

The thumb was full of sand but it was a thumb.

"Yes, and Viareggio Beach House is suing you because
the Marchese Santo Pallone found it and threw up her
entire shrimp salad."

Then, I wake up with a glorious Tarzan cry,

aaahuaaa uaaa uaaaaaaaaaaaa!

There it is:

The Amazon Prime Card on the floor.

Bee Bat or Mouse

Bee Bat or Mouse Poem

By James Lang

4 characters :Georges-Louis Leclerc de Buffon,naturalist, biologist and philosopher, Etienne de Condillac, philospher and author of Traité des Animaux, Sephen Jay Gould, evolutionary biologist, paleontologist and writer and Jacques Derida, philosopher.

Imagine Etienne de Condillac driving a white Cadillac convertible

With red leather seats

He is discussing Bees with

Buffon, who is taking in the Bellevue Streets

As the car radio reports on Colorado drug dogs on the dole

Buffon, chewing gum, has a problem with

The bees hexagon

“It’s automatic” he yelps, leaning over to Condillac,

And Condillac agrees but disagrees while watching an 

Electric scooter shoot up a sidewalk.

“Bees are craftsmen, they control the design

And they do it without God’s help.”

“And they do too…it without a soul” snickered Buffon.

Condillac hits the brakes at a pedestrian crossing.

Two men, one skinny and white haired, the other sporting

A moustache and a fleshy, bulbous nose, are traversing and discussing bats:

Derida: “A bat is an idealized creature, in China 5 bats is a blessing!”

“And in Europe they are vampires!” said Gouldin an omniscient demeanor. 

“But did you know their heartbeat can go from 20 beats per minute to

1300?”

“When they’re having sex?” (Derida)

“When they’re flying!” (voice dropping)

Buffon leans over and honks the horn. HOOOONK!

“Bougez, bougez!”

“You act like an ‘ani-mot’” shouted Derida

“And you are a soulless punk” said Condillac, his fingers playing with his beehive hair.

“Someone should put both of you in a mousetrap” sneered Gould

His hedgehog mustache looking more abrasive than ever.

“I forgot to write volume 37, entitled, “Natural Losers” sputtered Buffon, and at that Condillac stepped on the gas, and the Cadillac screeched off in the opposite direction of Webster University.

Grandma Iceland

Grandma Iceland

Siren Grandmother
Taken out to Sea in Icy Icelandic waters

A cuddly wave Embraced her
Pulling on her smile
Like a dentist doing his Art

The Grandmother's heart
Throbs with the waves
Crashing, her Telegenetic future

Is recorded digitally yet
It is not clear how out of
Control her Social Setting Are

Not on Private, not on Friends Only
Her family is mushed in a viral
Spotlight

Emblazoned with Wows and Likes
The dramatic Circus spectacle
Of Grandma Iceland She

Is called sitting on a carved Ice Throne
The dossier wonderfully translucent
A spectacle of

Whites and blues that
Matches Grandma's mouton hair
A seductive show where

Only Death looms hidden
To spring like a Tiger out of nowhere
Ready to catch that natural innocent smile

And freeze it for Eternity.

Straw Story

I was brought up on a farm in Oklahoma in the days when Pa drove his John Deere tractor without satellite or wifi to steer him down infinite plain pastures (he would steer a straighter line than any satellite, he would say), planting soy beans -mostly soy- as the rumble of the pop-popping motor could be hear over the plains and probably through his kidneys. I was brought up in the day when Mom and my brothers had to de-husk corn, clean the pig stalls and then do our homework. When we was done, Mom would make us an egg cream in a cold glass she kept in the fridge and when it was all done and settled, she would pop in a straw for each of us with her index finger. My brothers and I would race to drink 'em down but when I think of it now, years later, it was more of a sucking up contest, with the 4 of us sucking and sucking with such force that our cheeks touched just about on the insides of our mouths.

I was the youngest and never won. Bobby, the oldest, would challenge us like it was an arm wrestling contest: he would look down at you as he pulled on that one, lonely straw with such force it seemed like his nose got longer. You couldn't talk while doing it but I emitted a long "nnnnnnnn" sound from my nose, hoping maybe to distract Bobby and catch him short. Harper, the middle brother, would lodge spit balls into my straw and even if he didn't win he got a chug of giggles from watching me turn blue from sucking on my jammed straw. Mom got a kick of our challenges, often laughing to the point she had to readjust her apron. I often told her my losing was unfair 'cause since I was served last, I was served the thicker egg cream portion compared to my brothers. One day I remember my drink was so thick when I punched the straw through I yelled "ouch!". "Why don't you take one of my thimbles" was what mom suggested for me and all 3 brothers were laughing so hards they spilled and rolled down on the floor. 

When McDonald's opened down the street 20 years ago, we stopped lining up for Mom's egg creams. Pa had died from a heart attack in his tractor (his air-conditioning was broke and I suppose he wilted under the heat of the summer), and Ma took over the driving. The neighbours were critical of Ma's farming skills 'cause she always drove in circles. "Why you driving in circles, Marcy?" the neighbours would say, and she replied that for the simple reason that the watering was done in circles and that the corners were always left dry in traditional farming techniques. 

At McDonald's I didn't feel at home and I guess I felt like a soya bean left out in the corner of our farm patch. But regardless, we became regulars. Mom forbade us from eating the junk but we could get all the liquid shakes we wanted. The McDonald's shakes were almost as thick as mom's and when the machine broke they were even thicker. On a wet April day I once knocked over Harper's shake as we joked about turning all farms into bullseye tracks of land, and I prided myself 'cause I could righten the cup before even a drip of the chilly white fluid ebbed onto the tiled black and white floor. Harper, such a sucker, complained that his straw was tilted like the tower of Pisa and if I had a cow prod I woulda use it on him and maybe a few zaps would get the straw straight all by itself. 

When I got married, Constance, my wife, who drove a tractor better than my dad, tried to dissuade me from going to McDonald's. 
"It's out of the question sweetie pie". I worked in a turkey factory  and we were very proud 'cause we developed a new turkey claw skin product that we exported to China in large quantities. The Chinese had been eating chicken claw skins for years but they found the turkey even meatier and tastier.
Maybe it was trending but Constance also drove her tractor in circles and she threw out her GPS saying it got all confused so she opted for a compass to guide her. When I returned from the turkey factory circular fields as far as the eye could see were part of the landscape, and the soybeans were as lush as ever.

Maybe those concentric fields got me hypnotised 'cause I stared sucking down more and more shakes and as I drunk I thought I could see the fluid going down in spirals and when I sucked harder my nose got in the way of all that spinning. 

I got promoted and had to fly to China time to time to visit a turkey processing plant we set up there and all was going fine. Jet-lagged and tired from my return trip I shuffled into my McDonald's and ordered a "banana-vanilla special". "Extra thick" I chimed in, knowing that the machine's settings were pre-programmed. 

The counter person was new to me and she handed over my drink with a friendly smile. I peeked into my bag, rummaging to pick out the straw only to see that it was missing.
"You forgot my straw m'am, looking at her face that slightly revealed a wing of a bat on her neck. 
"Sorry sir, it's new McDonald's policy not to give out straws" she intoned in all seriousness. 
"Are you suggesting that after 22 years of sucking down your shakes I'm to cuddle it with a spoon?"
"Spoons will be phased out next, sir, all plastic cutlery is being eliminated at McDonald's."
My patience was ebbing. "If you're suggesting that I should eat this with my fingers may I tell you to go to my farm and drink this shake with my hogs."
"Sir, the straws are polluting the planet, Sir! Are you aware that there are over 30,000 square miles of floating straws in the oceans at any given time? And that's not counting styrofoam cups and other plastic detritus that breaks down very, very slowly, intoxicating all marine life?"
Her McDonald's cap slid down her eyebrows giving her a stern look. Her hand was pointing at me and she made a round sign to indicate the entire planet earth. She was offensive. Never in my life had someone tried to impede me from using a straw. I mimed sucking the straw, pulling in my well-exercised cheeks and staring at her with all the intensity I could muster.
"How disgusting" she cried, somewhat surprised. I was at a loss. She screamed, I jumped over the counter and with my hands around her neck I shouted, "I want a straw, give me a straw now!!!"
Her face was turning blue and I couldn't stop shaking her. A crowd had formed. No-one tried to pull me off her, people were just taking pictures or filming. 
"You ca-can't ha-ha-have ya fu-fucking straw!" her words were barely audible.