Friend or Foe? (For James Michael Shepard) Blank page friend or foe? Typewriter keys friend or foe? Intellect friend or foe? “I'm nothing but a stranger in this world.” I watched him perform “Astral Weeks.” I watched him turn heavy feelings into brave clouds. Ego friend or foe? Principles friend or foe? Intellectual property friend or foe? I’ll never forget those railroad tracks on Maynard Avenue. How at first they kept me up all night. Then after a couple of days I couldn’t fall asleep without the clicking and clacking. Inspiration friend or foe? Creativity friend or foe? Desire friend or foe? He lived like a defrocked monk or damaged soldier. He picked through the wreckage with a diddley-bow-sonic-screwdriver. He identified with the Passion Play because he had nailed himself to his own “American Face” long before Forced Exposure shined a lightbulb on his swollen appetite. Time friend or foe? Madness friend or foe? Life and death a necessary evil or just another guiltless pleasure? Charles Cicirella 8/22/15

Fresco page is wet words are the vehicle for the pigment to merge with the paper artists cannot hear you they’re busy pushing the limits of their life to the breaking point they’re busy pushing and pulling themselves in and out of the lion’s den I know you’re feeling around for cracks and crevices to you the blemishes scream imperfection while to me the imperfections prove this is not only a work of art, but a work of death defying sacrifices as the acrobats demonstrate there are many Christs and a crucified God does not automatically make a religion tenable or worthy of a Sunday matinee I’m on a writing jag, but that doesn’t necessarily mean I have anything meaningful to say or that the words I’m spilling onto the soaking wet page don’t need a touch up or some better GPS coordinates to get them to that secret jumping off place for me it’s not about control or completely extinguishing every wildfire that jumps the freeway because I know my passions will ultimately consume everything in their path when I heard a friend recently say if he had been such a good friend then why didn’t he see the signs before Jimbo took his own life and all I could think was obviously you were not paying close enough attention because all of the signs were right there in plain view page is wet with sweat and swearwords and with the setting of the sun, the painting becomes an integral part of the landscape I listen to my lion with every fiber of my being and sometimes I feel I almost get it right while other times I know I’ve failed miserably, but once you’re pushed and prodded from the womb there are no more do overs I know you’re feeling around for a light switch in the blemishes of our maker’s face on the seventh day the Lord rested and had someone fetch them a Frappuccino from the Starbucks on the corner this is not only a work of dire consequences, but a work that defies logic and leaves you wishing for more than exists in your grandmother’s favorite candy dish there are many saviors and a crucified Christ does not always mean you’ll get what you’ve earned once the stone is rolled away the fresco will never completely dry nor will the grease stains on our hands ever be entirely pounded away Charles Cicirella 8/26/15

Unconditional Heartache (For Juliet) I reach out to her. She reaches inside of me. Last time I saw her she was wearing gold pants. Somehow she pulled them off like only she can pull off the unconventional and unfashionable heartbreaks of man. I like her friend Darryl quite a bit. Even though I don’t think he knows what to make of me. Especially with the history that he knows exists between me and Juliet. Darryl doesn’t have to worry though because I’m no one’s Romeo especially when it comes to high balconies and suffering vertigo or even worse the fate of another blow to my stained glass ego. There was a time when I was seeking an accomplice to join me on my insane exploits and weak attempts at Gonzo Journalism, but I have learned by now my soulmate is either long dead or doing their best to stay hidden because they know I would consume them with my overtaxed personality and bad habit of always needing to be heard over the din of love and the clamoring of an insufferable mob of idiot savants inside my head. I haven’t a clue if Juliet ever really got me, but I do know that at one time she dug my Root Cellar growl and the way I had of appearing ten feet tall on a stage when I’m only 5’2 or maybe 5’3 on a really excellent day. We sped up each other’s hearts for a while until I became way too clingy for anyone’s mental health and started pulling out my hair and giving myself black eyes because I didn’t believe she was listening to what I had to say. I would tell you it’s my artistic temperament that gets the best of me, but I know that would be a lie and would not be fair to those artists who don’t possess the tools to stay on the straight and narrow and are instead swallowed by the darkness like another slab of ruined meat. I have the most difficult time listening to another person’s point of view especially when I am dead set on making a connection before it is too late and I am once again alone with my cruel thoughts and unsmiling nature. I think I have suffered abandonment issues since long before I took public transportation out of the womb and landed smack dab in front of a typewriter or word processor trying to set the record straight. I’m not actually a wounded animal even though I play one on TV. I’m also not exactly a tragic figure even though I gravitate toward this way of non-living because I have always struggled with taking responsibility and making good on the promise that I would help change the world before I was shot down or shot full of everlasting grief. Charles Cicirella 8/28/15

Word-Ghosts in the Ether The words are here. Right here. Then they’re gone. Just like that. I could feel them Taste them. See them and reflect upon them in my mind’s eye. Now they won’t even look at me and refuse to respond to the simplest of requests. You wouldn’t understand. You are not a wordsmith. Just another hired gun. Just another word-whore whose only purpose is to win blue ribbons like some prized cow at the county fair. I thought we were the same. I thought we were in it to do the work and make an honest to God lasting impression. I never quite understood that not everyone is inspired and that too many people are just in it to polish the chrome of their absurd egos. I had a friend who was an action-painting-super-hero who did his art like he only had six months to live. He got it as he bled for his chamber-music-requiems and for all the braveclouds that will never have their very own silver lining because of budget cuts and because the beautiful people have sucked all of the oxygen out of the room. The words are somewhere over there. I tried to pick through the wreckage, but became stuck in the thickets and the awkward silences. Now I’m gone. Just like that I’m gone and there are no more songs. And everything is in the rearview like the distant memories of your first junior high dance and first real kiss. Charles Cicirella 9/1/15

Rubbing excrement all over my body like a crazed prophet. I’ve never written poetry. Not really. The words I write are not mere words. There is prophecy in what I’m going after and if I could explain that better I would, but there’s no time left. The first poem I ever wrote was about the moon. I’ve said that already in several poems. Now I must go passed the moon and do my best to enter other spaces so when I reenter Earth’s atmosphere I’m not only a better man, but a better communicator. Planetary travel versus the internal trappings of one’s universal mind and body electric. Pushing beyond the outer limits and accepting the twilight of one’s soul as key if we’re ever going to file down the totality of our sins. I’ve never written poetry. No not really. When I press down the keys or hold a pen or pencil in my hand I am holding onto the past, doing my best to move through the present and embarking upon a future written in super flues and pandemics. Florence Nightingale was Jesus Christ and if you don’t understand that then there is very little that you will ever truly comprehend. There is no more messing about you’re either in or you’re out and if you are not a believer then you’re already dead. Cries of silence permeating every molecule of our chemical makeup. Your soulmate a petri dish. Now the question is are we willing and able to look through the microscope to see the truth laid out before us like a reading of tarot cards? The tarot readers are scientists and your best bet is to stop believing so doggedly in any God. I stood in the town square and rubbed excrement all over my body. I didn’t do it to prove a point. In fact I’ve never felt the need to prove anything to anyone and that includes this very second, when we’re on the precipice of monumental calamities and the crushing deathblow of humankind being forced to its knees. Charles Cicirella 9/2/15

Get Out of the Bag I’m in (For Fred & Howard) Dust mites attack from all directions. Blueprints no longer doing the trick. I’m at a loss for words. I’m at a loss for master strokes. Being a visionary is not as easy or as effortless as it may appear to those who have never had an original thought. To raise the roof you must first have burned down plenty of barns. And if you’re not barnstorming then what’s even the point of your existence? Word gymnastics are blasé and only work in slam competitions. If you strive to work and write in the trenches and not simply type yourself out of another personal crisis then you must first learn to sacrifice like Christ and his 13 Apostles did. Yes I am including Mary Magdalene in that rather audacious and somewhat labor intensive comparison. Let’s make something out of nothing. Once you’ve successfully done that don’t forget to make it your own with your sweat and blood poured into the grooves of your next number one record. Uncloud your head. Your soul must be fed. Uncloud your heart. Your psyche mustn’t go dark. I’m as liberal as they come until someone argues with me about taking away their guns. I may just have to point my typewriter at their open mouths and shoot some poison darts down their slip, slide and away gullets. We trespass on perfect strangers without even giving it a second thought. This social networking is for the angry birds. I’m dumbfounded by your inability to recognize what I’m capable of. Is it vanity or mere stupidity getting in the way of your understanding how far we could go if you’d only allow me in and stop pretending your kingdom is the only game in town? I remember the first time I was pigeonholed and how it felt to have my feathers plucked out one by one from my pink, tender skin. I didn’t like it one bit when you reminded me this was all my fault on account of not being able to hold my tongue and for striking back against my oppressors without a practical stratagem. I was hiding out trying to regain focus when everything became blurred and I couldn’t remember my own name or who the President of the United States was. I’m sure there’s a lesson to be learned as I grow my fingernails and toenails as long as the Mississippi River and try to unburden myself from the deceitfulness of my flowing subconscious. Charles Cicirella 9/12/15

Chamber Music for Flamingos Guitars must scream and the drums must drum. He was tired of rock and roll and told me he wanted to write chamber music. I don’t even know what that is exactly and I still thought it was very cool. Sat up there in his room. The room he nearly burned down one night because he was drunk and left a candle burning too close to the curtains. Typing one poem after another high on Philip K. Dick short stories and Cocoa Frosted Flakes. I am realizing more and more every day just how little I find myself being able to relate to most people. I used to think it was me, but am starting to gather the intelligence that most people are just not all that intelligent and that I do not suffer fools gladly or without holding something against them. I know my friend Juliet would say I’m judgmental, but I am starting to get that in her own stealth manner she’s just as careful when it comes to the stones she chooses to keep and the stones she chooses to throw away. The music must both sneak up on me and rip off my head like his music repeatedly did and still does to this very day. He taught me it wasn’t about the audience and that you must do your art like you have six months to live. He said just that on one of the many cassettes he sent me. His personal cassettes followed me from town to town because he was good at doing mail and making packages that would blow up your mind and make you smile all at the same time. The flamingos aren’t impressed, but they’ll soon get over that because when you’re a flamingo it’s understandable being wowed is not as easy as just strolling through the park after dark. John Waters can suck my dick and while he’s getting busy I’ll turn down his next script and ask him why he doesn’t get Iggy to play another idiot. We spend far too much time going through the motions of putting out one fire after the next when what we should be concentrating on is burning this shithouse down to the ground. If you don’t believe a person can spontaneously combust just watch as I go up in flames right before your Blue Danube eyes. Charles Cicirella 9/22/15

Specimen under the Microscope I lie to myself each and every moment of each and every day. I do it because it’s easier than telling the truth. Of course that could just be another lie. I was watching TV and I heard the word cogitate. I liked the sound of it even though I didn’t know what it meant. I looked it up and then I carefully pondered why that word so strongly resonates for me. We were once chimpanzees. It strikes me as rather odd that there are so many people that refuse to even entertain the notion that this might be true. I also find it ironic that the people who are having such a difficult time with the theory of evolution are the very same people who are in desperate need of evolving. Just opened another poetry rejection email. I had to fight myself from responding and telling these idiots just how wrong they are. I know I can write and that I most definitely have something to say it just becomes increasingly frustrating when too few people actually want to read or hear my words. I lie to myself with alarming frequency. I believe it has something to do with denial feeling so damn good. In fact I am starting to think not coming clean has become my favorite pastime. I was watching TV. Actually it was Netflix, but what’s really the bloody difference these days? It’s one of the few ways I find myself able to switch off my mind and take a much needed break from all of these thoughts racing around my jailhouse brain. I was a bank robber and when we met you were a teller and liked the note I had written telling you this was a bank robbery. We’re all specimens under the microscope some of us just find the petri dish more comfortable than others. Charles Cicirella 9/22/15

Caterpillar Astronaut Headphones on. “Tiger in My Tank.” I’m restless. Reservations prod me toward the edge of another Tomorrowland cliff. You write poetry like its disco and it sickens me to my very core. Squeeze the words out of your brain-tube and paint as thick as Vincent did when the muse was going down on him, but refused to let him finish. I’m catatonic. Patron saints like Walt Disney animals exist all around me speaking in their squeaky voices trying to get me to do things that wouldn’t be good for anyone. I say let them build the Mosque next to the DQ / Orange Julius, next to the Elks Lodge, next to the Temple behind the car wash. You’d think people who were religious would be the most tolerant when exactly the opposite proves to be the case. Except for the temper tantrum Christ had over the money changers when he cleansed the Temple he appears to have been all about love and mercy and yet too many zealots are killing in his esteemed name. I want to go the distance, but before I pledge allegiance to another flag draped in blood I want you to reassure me the Children’s Crusades are a thing of the past and you will not be aborting another fetus merely for sport. Headphones on. The Albino is making my ears bleed. I’m sonorous and afraid you’re much too shallow for my erroneous tastes. I will never forget that day at the roller skating rink when I thought it would be funny to hide Brenda Marcus’s wallet and all hell broke loose when it actually came up missing. We’re all caterpillar astronauts in search of tang and freeze dried ice-cream to keep us happy and somewhat pacified. He was a demon, but not a bad demon. In fact when it came to his demon exploits he only did good like so many civil rights leaders and Hells Angels profess doing. Now grab hold of my horns because I am going to take you for the ride of your multifaceted lives and when we’re through running through the streets of Pamplona I promise to return you back to your sedentary and solitary life of Springsteen concerts and kale salads. I’m just another mover and shaker stuck in the suburbs who has no one to blame but himself. And when you are through wringing out another filthy white or blue collar come join me on the upper deck before this Titanic ship starts to sink and the band begins to play “Autumn.” Charles Cicirella 9/22/15

6:25 PM Listen with an open heart. Don’t focus on what you think your ears are hearing because that is often misconstrued. If your heart is smart it will differentiate from that which is important and that which is just more gossip and angry words. I was so tired I was ready to sleep right on this killing floor. Sometimes I feel like I was a planned abortion and if you get where I’m coming from perhaps we can do it to each other in a foreign tongue behind the dumpster of the nearest A&P. Look I don’t mean to offend you or intend to make you uncomfortable with the words I throw against the wall like a mural or meerkat Last Supper. I’m surprised Word does not recognize the word meerkat. What that says about mongooses in general I don’t really know. Speak with an open hand. Don’t clench your fists and think that will get you to a better place. Dictators are for the birds and I still do not trust the Castro brothers no matter how many Holiday Inns or Ramada Inns go up 110 miles from Florida’s shores. I have a hankering for a tin of Willie’s Reserve. Some idiot on FB who clearly didn’t understand the thought process behind this product asked if there’d be a prize at the bottom like Crackerjacks. All I could think was the THC fog you’ll soon find yourself enveloped in will be prize enough you simpering fool. Sometimes I feel like a motherless child while other times I know there must be more than meets the eye to this whole to do over the Madonna and Child and how rested and chiseled they appear in their Roman digs at the cultural epicenter of the world. Look I don’t mean to distend or render your beliefs hopeless or hapless in any way, shape or form. It’s just that this toxic environment is doing us more harm than good as another pro-lifer runs for President and another pro-choice advocate runs for cover. That’s what’s leaving me feeling more and more like what’s the point and why are we allowing so much intolerance to go unchecked and underestimated in the political arena. Charles Cicirella 9/22/15

“Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.” Hebrews 11:1 King James Version Close your eyes. Tell me what you don’t see. It will be okay or it won’t. That’s not for us to say. When is the last time you fell to your knees and prayed? Do you remember the first time you asked for forgiveness and were washed clean of your sins? There’s no more time for monkeying around. You’re either in or you’re out. That’s it. Game over. We flaunt our excesses in plain view of God not caring that we’re repeat offenders and should be thankful for the life we’ve been given. The Golden Calf’s got nothing on Jesus Christ Almighty and trust me when I say to you Noah was more than just some old Jew with a penchant for animals. We must lift ourselves up from the muck and the mayhem and the wrecking ball nightmares that have kept us from peaceful slumber for most of our dilapidated and regifted lives. Open your heart. Tell me what you feel once you squeegee the tears and the blood from your rose tinted windshield. It will be okay or it won’t. Who the fuck knows or cares when you’re down and out and nobody loves you and only God is willing to accept you into His House. Charles Cicirella 9/28/15

“Slip Away” (For Lou) Should I eat the other Snickers in the frig? Never met you, but I wish we had worked together. Your original wrapper was black leather. I’d like to think mine is flannel, but it’s probably more like chicken feathers. You were the original Rock 'n' Roll Animal. The one Andy wanted to score and maybe he did when you were in need of something more than grotesque guidance or ripped to shreds inspiration. I’ll never forget the Charlie Rose interview with you, Laurie and her dog. I was so moved by how you spoke of your working relationship with Drella. It made sense to me like so little else does. We spin like a top or fizzle out like an egg cream. Either way we can fight the riptide as much as we like, but when our time is up there’s no arguing with the umpire. You seemed able to withstand anything including electroshock therapy and whatever demons hunted you down and fucked you in the mouth when you were blonde and heroin was just another means to tempt fate and leave a young, but battered and weathered corpse in your stead. The joke was on you as the Sword of Damocles hung above your head toward the end and the fog of wars fought underground became one more Coney Island memory. I wanted you to hit me with a flower just one time but that was simply not to be. It’s truly vicious how we never say what we feel. Thank God you never suffered from that sickness and always told it exactly how it is no matter the fallout or shit storm that followed. I want to slip away. I want to “take the blue mask down from my face” and look you squarely in the eye without hesitation. I want to lay with you in a field of poppies and fall asleep like Romeo and Juliette did when they were young and time was still on their side. Charles Cicirella 9/30/15

Knee Deep Knee deep in shit. Knee deep in your shit. And trust me I have plenty of my own. I am a rodeo clown. I am a broken toy from the Island of Misfit Toys. I don’t trust Caitlyn Jenner. You know what they say about too many poets in the kitchen. The water never boils and Chicken Soup for the Soul is just another poor excuse to self-medicate and then blame someone else for your troubles and woes. I heard that lonesome whistle blow then I got on that train because moving is always better than standing still especially when you have nothing left to say. Knee deep in callus reminders of you and your intolerance toward people who wear white after Labor Day. I’m so pissed off, but I guess that’s better than being pissed on. Golden showers have never made any sense to me. I mean it’s bad enough when you soil yourself. Why would you want someone else to soil you? Makes perfect sense that Adolf liked Eva to shit on his chest. He deserved to be treated like a toilet and deep down in his Black Forest heart he knew it. Charles Cicirella 10/1/15

I need a bidet. I very much need to shoot some water straight up my anus. There’s been some scratching going on that toilet paper is only intensifying. My asshole needs some special attention right about now and I believe a bidet is just what the doctor would prescribe if I had the nerve to go see a proctologist. The strength of my resolve is waning as my belief in myself finds itself on the ropes. Some people read my poetry and say it’s hardly poetry at all. To that I have to ask what makes you or anyone a poetry expert and what exactly is poetry anyhow? I sit here and allow streams of consciousness to flow and sometimes the flow is quite intensified while other times only minute fissures of unrestrained conjecture find themselves hitting the page like droplets of HIV-positive blood. Somebody help me as I stand at the rail watching a man I’ll probably never meet face to face as he pours himself onto the stage like a midsummer rain. He’s never drizzling as he battens down the hatches and heads toward the Caribbean or some other exotic locale where he can disappear into a crowd and forget for a little while how important he’s supposed to be. He sacrificed his anonymity as so many artists do believing they want fame and fortune when all they ever really desired was for someone to listen to their latest song and to smile and say good work. The proof is always in the pudding even when the one selling the pudding turns out to be one more wolf in sheep’s clothing. I very much need to take a break and wrap my arms around a pinup model like Veronika Lake. I’ll never forget the first time I witnessed her on film. It was only then I understood what was meant by film noir and how we can be left completely breathless by a femme fatale. I’m not one of those people who needs to have a bucket of popcorn and a soda when watching a film. For me food just distracts from what is happening on the big screen. My anus is tired of sitting here waiting for the scratching to subside and no amount of itching seems to be doing the trick as I become all too familiar with my rectum and what it means to give oneself a rectal examination. Charles Cicirella 10/5/15

“Pussy on the Chain Wax” (For Michael & Casey) “Pussy on the chain wax.” That’s what she said. I heard it with my own two ears. Then she asked me to explain it to her so I did because I don’t believe in backing down from a challenge, including when we were in the Rally’s drive-thru and she screamed “Pussy on the chain wax” when the cashier rudely answered ‘No’ when asked if they took EBT. She upped the ante when she got out of the van and grinded against the concrete wall. “Pussy on the chain wax.” Sometimes the road dog bites you and sometimes you bite the road dog. I’m cloaked in the fog of his Easy Rider charisma when he decrees his whacky, tuned in and entirely kindred-sermons on the wretchedness and hilarity of surviving one more day on menthols, photographic chemicals and the occasional roll in the imaginary hay. He kicks me into overdrive when he steps out of the movie-screen-womb and takes me on a “Magic Carpet Ride.” “Pussy on the chain wax.” Charles Cicirella 10/7/2015

“Blood Lions” You’re not breeding lions. You’re breeding ghosts. You’re not hunting the king of the jungle. You’re chasing your own mortality. You prove ignorance is bliss without even loading your rifle. You prove pure evil can and does exist. Blood Lions. They cut off baby’s heads, now their crucifying Christ over and over again. Blood Lions. Maybe we should start hunting these fuckers. Make these losers feel some actual fear and terror as they run for their worthless and pathetic lives. You’re not breeding lions. You’ve created a new species of scapegoats. Charles Cicirella 10/7/2015

“When your mother sends back all your invitations.” My friend says he fears death. I believe he fears life. Creativity can brand you. Make you its little bitch and before you know it you’re breathing fire and rolling two hundred miles per hour through the decades like a dervish or horse whisperer. What happens when forty nine years later the words are not flowing like they once did? What happens when “how does it feel” no longer resonates and the Shadows In The Dark are making you question what you once believed was written in “Rocks And Gravel?” What happens when "The Dark End of the Street" and a dark night of the soul unite and no one is able to reach you? What happens when the bubble you’ve existed in for so long appears ready to burst and you’re afraid to seek heavenly aid because you don’t want to be that poor little boy who cried wolf? My friend says you fear death. I believe you fear life and all the simple contradictions going along with it. You turned music and the culture inside out then you got out of Dodge and almost died seeking shelter beneath a Nashville Skyline New Morning. There’s Blood On The Tracks as you paint Another Self Portrait of a man you once met in a crowded room of faceless strangers. He wasn’t Mr. Jones or Dr. Filth. No, he was actually you in a different kind of guise and no one was the wiser when you pulled the plug and a “Brave New World” went completely dark. Charles Cicirella 10/9/15

I Took a Piss I drained my snapdragon. And it felt good. And I even felt somewhat righteous standing there like an adjunct professor. Don’t remind me of the time when I carried your books to and from school. Or when I bought you unfiltered Camels because you were too high minded to walk into that carryout on 5th. Avenue and pretend you were just like everybody else. I remember penetrating you on that swivel chair as I pinned back your butterfly wings and called you my little Crêpe Suzette. Some journeys last a lifetime while others are over in the blink of an eye. I used to be so uncomfortable with the remorse and regret I felt after an orgasm. Now those feelings are the best part of the trip because the French are correct an orgasm is "the little death" and I love feeling my mortality covering my hands like Super Glue. I’m reminded every single day that the choices I’m making are the wrong ones and that’s okay because I’m not here to win any popularity contests. I just want to succeed or fail on my own terms. Take a piss or shit on my own terms. Experience love and loss on my own terms. So there. Charles Cicirella 10/11/15