Poems Below The Line Read online

It’s time for a commercial break.

  The news-if you can call it news-will be right back.

  Poem for DW

  it takes the resolve of a salmon

  to board a train built for one

  decorate it with ornate art

  and lacquered head shots

  with the phrase

  KING OF THE WORLD!

  outlined in neon

  on the front engine

  then sit down and make the movies

  you know are perfect

  because you've dreamed them

  over and over

  until there's not a fluffed line

  or a shot-gone-wrong

  occasionally you stop the train

  when there's a famous director

  and you just know

  he or she will eventually see

  there's a way

  for you to be a perfect-fit tile

  in his/her cinema mosaic

  For Our Cat Sinead in Tustin Tonight

  you won't be there forever

  though you now believe otherwise

  Mama Valarie and Daddy Terry

  will be back in your life

  once you're removed from

  the feline recovery room

  and have your radiation levels checked

  so that you can make the long trip

  (I know how much you hate car rides)

  from the OC to the Westside

  and we won't be afraid of tears

  as you take only one more journey

  back to the home

  where you'll always belong

  I Didn’t Find It

  ONE

  In 1976, the message was everywhere in Texas.

  The words I FOUND IT!

  appeared in black letters on a yellow background

  on either billboards or bumper stickers.

  Commercials on AM radio

  featured an announcer with a reassuring voice

  telling the audience:

  “If you find it, you’ll know it!”

  TWO

  The commercials, the billboards and the bumper stickers

  were soft-sell recruiting tools

  for the Southern Baptist interpretation of Christianity—

  dramatizing the concept of a Search for Answers.

  In the Southern Baptist world,

  Jesus also played the role of Mister Manners:

  No smoking,

  No drinking,

  No dancing,

  No premarital sex,

  No to anything the church found “satanic.”

  I remember the First Baptist Church

  in downtown Wichita Falls, Texas.

  It was a very large building.

  I never went inside,

  but I was told the church had its own bowling alley.

  I pondered this question:

  Would Jesus want His followers

  to bowl only by themselves?

  So I never “found it.”

  And I don’t think Jesus will penalize me

  for not joining that particular search.

  Folk Music as Wooly Mammoth Preserved in Ice

  (inspired by the PBS fund-raising special

  JOHN SEBASTIAN'S FOLK MUSIC REWIND)

  Did you see old man John Sebastian

  on the Public Broadcasting System?

  He now looks a little like George Segal

  and sounds a lot like Peter Coyote.

  Did you see old man Barry McGuire

  singing EVE OF DESTRUCTION?

  He now looks like a retired WWE wrestler

  and wears NYPD patches on his black T-shirt.

  Did you watch this tribute to old folk music

  in the comfort of your home

  as people protest and die in far-off lands

  and American media propagandizes

  about the evils of WikiLeaks

  and the perfidy of Julian Assange

  (the timing of the latter is rather convenient)?

  Did you once gather for communal singing

  and peaceful demonstration

  until you "grew out of it"

  because too many people told you

  that standing up for the rights of others

  was passe and not likely to lead to good job offers?

  Of course you did.

  And I did too.

  Found Poem from Blurbs

  on Back of Brendan Constantine

  Poetry Book

  the jagged mountain

  exploded impeccably and

  cracked wide open,

  creating a beautiful view

  and now,

  we can see there is a brain

  that is incessantly inventive

  hotwired to a delicious mouth

  with lyrics caught between his teeth,

  on his tongue,

  lodged in his throat

  look how

  he opens his mouth

  to sing

  Poem for Scott Wannberg

  you were blessed

  with a light inside you

  that converted everywhere you traveled

  into a warm, inviting living room

  where we could gather

  and hear you in poem, story and song

  the cattle rustler,

  the snake oil salesman,

  the purveyors of matters trivial and supercilious,

  the holy pretenders who sold

  zircon-coated unthinking obedience as Truth--

  you let none of them disturb/distress you

  as you traveled through this life

  when it's time to pass into the Afterlife,

  I can't wait to see you in its living room,

  faithful, truth-loving canine companion Sparky by your side,

  with more poems, stories and songs

  about what was,

  what is,

  and what will be

  Extras on the Beach

  It was a summer night in 1990.

  We had just finished work

  on the feature film version

  of CAPTAIN AMERICA

  starring J.D. Salinger's son

  Matt the actor.

  (Guessing you haven't seen it either.)

  There were five of us.

  I was thirty-one.

  Two other men in attendance:

  one was older, the other younger.

  And two young women

  in their late teens.

  Nothing too scandalous to report.