Talking by her car

Talking by her car — that night

our intuition brought us together —

I never wanted to leave.

My Goldfinch in flight

Chainlink memory

In the dream state of night

Unshackled reality

Through a window of light

Which pours like rain

And puddles my sight

Until ripples reflect

My Goldfinch in flight

How do I write a good book?

“How do I write a good book?” He asks.

“Read a lot of books.” I tell him. “And…

“And what?” He presses.

“Remove the word good from your vocabulary.”

Shrugging, he digs, “and replace it with what?”

“Whatever’s wrong with the world, my friend.”

“I’m listening…”

And upon waving him farewell.

“A book worth reading isn’t always easy

but it’s worth the effort.”

When Butterflies Were Band-aids

Look me in my heartache

And tell me there’s a cure

When butterflies were band-aids

Where fact and fiction blur

Speak to me in virtues

The one’s I’m pickled for

When only field’s were diamonds

And playgrounds left you sore

Hold me in your sorrow

With hands so soft and pure

When bedtime meant tomorrow

Was absolutely sure

Hear me as the willows

Send shivers down your spine

When fluff was just for pillows

Where wonder’s in the pine

Sense me in my mourning

For those yet to be fed

When fear meant it was pouring

Where Rover was still red

Send prayers if you still got em

Though mine have long since fled

This well’s filled from the bottom

Where sailboats are led

My fragile mind

It’s hard sometimes to go outside

So I wear this hat, it makes me feel cool

It’s hard sometimes to pass the time

So I write these prose inside my fragile mind

No they’re not for you

No they’re not for you

No they’re not for you

They’re for me

Like an eggshell cracks so do I

What spills out is just membrane and time

I know we’re all the same, you and I

This was just another from my fragile mind

No they’re not for you

No they’re not for you

No they’re not for you

They’re for me

My work it shall begin

We are safe because we want to feel safe

And afraid because we allow ourselves to fear

All throughout the life I’ve know I’ve accepted what was

Hardly ever asking myself the real question, that is

What exactly do you want to be

Do you want to be loved? Feared? Saved?

Am I making myself clear?

Like standing by the railing of a ferry boat adrift

Looking out into the fog of early mornings spent

Nervous though I was, a child full of dread

Patiently awaiting the comfort darkness fed

Full of all my longings, too scared to make a sound

Reeling for the guidance, waiting to be found

But it wasn’t until I spoke the words

Which have placed me here today

And I wouldn’t place the blame where there is nothing left to blame

I could have got out long before that house we knew burnt down

I could have run away, what’s more

I could have made a sound

Though fear and faith are binding

For a child guilt is hard

And safety commonly looks like

A smile from afar

But now I’m counting crows, who’ve eaten all the crumbs

And as for beanstalks stalking, I’ve cut down every one

To grandma’s house goes Red, she no longer has to run

The piglets in their cabin, I hear they’re having fun

Released into the willows are fairytales Grimm

Now safe my inner child’s sound

My work it shall begin

Seated in the summer sun

Seated in the summer sun

drenched in heat

reading a novel, alone

how sweet.

With memories of you

drenched in heat,

feet stretched out

along the beach.

Where in the summer sun

you’d sit and read

a novel too, my mother

sweet.

While you’d watch us kids

the swimming sea,

and how you read

effortlessly,

I never wondered then

like I do now,

how a quiet lesson

could teach me how.

I turn each page

my mind at rest,

my mother’s sun

warm on my chest.

Through the air vents of my room

I’ve known a many artist in my day, say

Today old friend you come to mind

And how for a short time, your voice divine

Scratchy and old, though, you and I know

Age is just a number and it’s you who’d show

Me this: Dear, Gavin Heron Vante

Who needed a place to rest his weary head

For the night I offered you some bread

Where that night you had said, Ah man!

I haven’t seen this show in years, mind if I watch

Married with Children, Amen! Amen!

Then later I’d record you playing all the chords

I always had wish I could, watching your fingers

Slide and swoop through Sloop John B

I tried to sing harmonies but who was I kidding

Aloof in my eagerness to know everything and all

You had to offer and more, more, more I cried

Singing, drinking in the night like two old friends

Because we were in fact just two ageless nobodies

In the effortless night of somebodies

Giving me your time, cradling my wine

Looking through old photo’s now

I can still feel your spirit sing softly through

The air vents of my room

The next morning of course, saying farewell

Dropping you at Austin’s Coffee

Collecting your bicycle and taking the trash out for a buck

Needing my fix of early morning talkie

That I’m sure no one ever really gave a hoot about —

Now I hear you’re out of the Coma

That took you too soon like a phantom in the night

You were right when you told me

To take it easy man, oh man, Gavin Heron Van

Where there is no plan there in lies the plan

I now know the meaning of that age old saying

Those were the days, good sir, I give my praise

Sincerely,

Dave

P.S. There’s a place for you here, always

Manhattan’s in the Village

You know what they say, don’t yuh?

Can’t live with em, can’t live without em

But don’t get me twisted, I’m not talking about women

though the skin beneath my tongue’s still sore

my heart’s still heavy and well

there’s nothing quite like seeing her smile come morning

but anyway like I was saying to this jug of doom

in the evening gloom where I choose not one but two

and then two more to boot because, well, hell

who am I kidding? Nobody but the moon this evening

cause it’s this bitter sweet feeling

the kind you feel deep down in the rumbling, stumbling night

where it all gets so far gone, where nothing meaningful is born

where it all makes some sort of convoluted sense

and alas, once again I am but the floorboards dull creak

where I am like the riverbed flowing calmly and discrete

where life is but a dream and I am dreaming once again

of you dear friend, rustling like the leaves at my front door.

Oh dear friend, how I long to walk the beach again.

How I long to hear your sick, silly, sweet voice again

like those long ago up all Friday nights of old

all those Brooklyn winter blue’s and yellow streetlights

guiding us home, or at least to Crown Fried Chicken where

like two youthful bums we’d scavenge our pockets for change

enough to buy a couple chicken wings, coke, and pint

enough to settle the bone, cold, sidewalk snow till home

where we’d fall arm and arm up stairs

to that old wood, smoke filled, railroad apartment you’d call Grove.

And though I don’t often pray, in my own little way

I do for you now as I did then, driving back to my Long Island apartment.

I pray this little song of self, this little song of you, this small token of my appreciation

for your boundless soul and effortless style and class.

I ate too much cheese, I’d shout while holding a kitchen knife to my throat!

Where in a Polaroid our youth is kept,

where so many nights while you slept I wept,

where you’d give me your bed for a smile,

where I’d talk with Forest about everything and nothing for a while,

long enough not to feel alone in that maddening, crazy New York glow.

So I write this little poem, not enough but enough to show you

I’m still listening through the terror behind the walls.

Dear friend,

How are you?

I can’t live with you, but hell, I can’t live without you.

Manhattan’s in the Village

God knows we never had the scratch, aligned

I feel inclined to take this time and offer you my best

impression not impressed?

CALL ME SPIDER! CALL ME SPIDER!

I just had to get these salami’s off my back.

I just had to sing this short praise of you Mac.

Everyone I know’s the titles

Everyone I know’s the titles

They just don’t read the words

Writing’s an endless cycle

I start to feel the burn

Sunlight it is healing

Too much can make it worse

Moonlight is revealing

My answer’s questioned first

But who am I to argue

The writing’s on the wall

No pages left to sift through

Like dominoes they fall

Everyone I know’s the titles

They just don’t read the words

This feeling’s infantile

I know not which is worse