P and Body on the Freeway

I

P looks at a piece of dried pizza in a paper towel, sitting on the
Curb, legs out in the street. The crust is white, still powdery with flour from the bread ta
Ble. The bottom is black, from the oven temperature. The tomato sauce is
Ink, red ink and the pepperoni says, "You need some exercise:"

"You need an exercise plan," a way to move to the ...the flavor of the crust is
Woody, an oak wood taste. Up on his feet P sees a bright light up Fourth
Street, illuminating the entire skyline behind the water court, "ok, singles
Night has come," carrying the pizza and eating while walking, sliding feet

In heel-less shoes: standing and leaning against a wall, then walking another four feet
Another two feet, shuffling up the hill (the escalator is off and blocked from
Entry). Two eyes float down the stairs. floating above a shirt pocket. Stuck at the park
Ing meter at Hill and 4th; a meter, "Hey! I'm an x-ray spectrometer."

P stops and listens again, "You know your bones are crinkly?" What finger is this? P
Steps over a board with nails: unnoticed by the eyes, or at most, unknowing
Ly seen, "Do you see the fly next to your ears?" (the meter bends several
Inches toward the street) P continues to walk up 4th, seeing only one truck go

By... dark, what is a stone thrown from a passing car's speed? P thinks nine, but he's not sure
If it's in miles or seconds per inch or... voice from down the street asks, "Is it
Impression or effect, or is it reason cast into unreason or the
Affliction of reasoning against reasoning?" ...That drives the truck down to Broadway.

P and the Dead Fruit Fly

II

...Feelings to surface and be heard? A grander scale forming under
An ostinato of one note. The one that threatens to overwhelm: open speech,
And no fear (the fear of no fear causes rust to form and metal
To give way) gives way, a network of incised lines and teeth
Marks. P sighs and looks to his right - dinner is
finished - no breakfast tomorrow,

No breakfast the next day. Walking over the concrete, broken and lifted by
Maturing ficus trees - down to third. E relaxes in the shade - no tan just
Resting and smoking a cigarette; "The comet is pink against the lower handle."
Treeman awakes and stares: no realizations, just urgency. The feeling of itching
Feet and ants, flies, cockroach (thumbnail size as opposed to the real
Ones). T decides it's easier to walk than endure the itching - the smell of
Coffee: P stops at the law library, his shadow on the sidewalk falls off the

Curb bending and changing as each car passes. Sitting on the curb
At Temple and Broadway, no memory, no thought. A rock stares up
At the P face, "Your beard has grown this year." P says, "It doesn't grow,
My face is shrinking." The rock says, "Well, you have to think about the
Opposite at some time," the rock looks like a rotting ficus nut.
The library opens as a smell of death rolls onto the sidewalk
Around P's legs - "You have five minutes to leave, sir."

P and the Dead Fruit Fly
 
I

The fruit fly is dead. The alcohol reverie rips away the internal or
Gans. Burning the motor up, extending the saw blade farther than is required
To completely cut the vines away from winding around legs and arms of fu
Ture trees: internal and against the lower duodenum: cabbage, purple and red

Spring lettuce sucked into the atmosphere and held unconscious. Some of the sha
Dows are half; making a pine tree come up and out of, ahead, finished in split
Beams. It is the transition from air compressor noise to nail gun punctures. One puncture
beaten in by a nail from an air compressor - blowing, "some
Say, 'do you remember when to get up?' that's what." Harsher

Contrast - built in by a limit of twenty two to twenty to twenty one
Drops in procedure. 21, 20, 22 concurrent variations in syllables counted
By taking the body into the refrigerator and slicing the webbing between
The fingers: it's cold and therefore less blood and pain. But, this is not
How the earliest ancestors guessed - artificial forms overlaid by
Devotion and perspective detail, "Forget the pain, smoke screen it,"
The question is asked, "How are you feeling," and the answer is, "No, no
More coffee for me." Take direct observation on blank paper: arranging each
Object in line with five points. The sun comes into the room from the left

And leaves through the door. "I'll be back," not a forgotten person, not a battle
With armor or flags and songs: "I'll be back in springtime, I'll be back at
Noon, I'll be back." Flowers are blowing out in the yard by the
Door. Treeman wakes up - off the top of the bus stop and back down the
Tree onto the sidewalk - will it be: getting entangled or getting the implausible...

P Walks The West Side Of LA Ave.

P walks the West side of LA
Ave. Next to ivy and "The buses and methane smells
like Elmer's glue." Three parrots
Fly over, talking about the sun going down and how

The gas gets trapped between buildings
And never escapes and those that walk there are re
Constituted into a
New "breathing" world, "¿que?" you mean four times today the buses

Stopped and five times they didn't, this
Isn't freedom in constituting, this is being
And, "but, don't walk there," don't
Walk there; make it a decision and walk over there, walk

Over away from the gas, into
The building and, "Now an asbestos shower, now a
Rain of sixty cycle light,"
Fluorescent creations, one word means a response will not

Be a response. A statement, a word
A constitution by numbers. Choice becomes, and is
A memory; one locked in
Either cell or membrane and large liver spots from the el

Bow to the hand: internal and per
Sonal, dumping into a distressed thought, thinking
Of viewing the stucco as
A mirror and creating images of the patterns re

Flected by the parking lot lights shin
Ing against the glass of the building across the street,
"No big words, put together,
One after another," P sips a cup of coffee, once.

No big words, put together one af
Ter the other: walking on the East side of LA
Ave., P creates the West side
And creates the East side, but the North side is still cover

Ed in a methane cloud, "Discuss the
Causes that are usually emphasized, the
Responsibility be
Longs down the street in a tube under a shirt; a choice.

F & 1st Street

II

A head comes up out of the trash can be
Tween  1st & 2nd  on Los Angeles street.
The food is portioned in three areas of
The Styrofoam container: kappa maki roll, a
Covered bowl of miso soup, French fries, wa

Sabi, and a plastic fork - "on, deadpan
Comedy," ...kicking again and once more, as
If the wall had been pulled from the motorized
Plug, moving from the... comedy, dragging pearls
Along the floor: singing, 'going where the

Wind don't blow," tap dance that metaphor, tap
It true.  F feels dizzy.  Shuffling on
The sidewalk.  Indignant and the Corporal 
Says, "off that experience!"  I throw you in the air and take pictures - Oh oh oh - like sex.

Confused, annata the doctrine: smoke
Screens the wall again, only hazy gray.  Tap
The foot, bounce the ball, swing the legs, raise the arms, push
Out the pelvis, tap the foot, bounce the ball, raise the
Arms, swing the leg: metaphor dance tapping.

F & 1st Street

I

A head comes up out of the trash can, and,
He looks right down L.A. Street (three leaf blowers).
The Styrofoam carton has bread and 
Pasta, a piece of chicken, red
And underdone, done like blood.

F saw it; a subduction zone: one more
Thing, prone to breaking & falling - skin shrinks it
Self. The new moon at 5am, up over
2nd Street .  Over, no exception
And, "Oh that igneous for

Mation," pressure on Venus to extend
The moon's point: F comes up out of the trash
Can.  A camera is fixed on his face,
On his face.  FLASH! Chicken, blood red,
A zone moving into one

Two or three fragments/splinters that raise
The rash around F's eyelids; a slap against
The face and over the tumble weed.
"Would you look at me," F asks, "No
One remembers the three days."

Vignes Street Prayer

III

...And reappears across the street
The water came up over the curbs
Yesterday, the water, too much
For, "Poor Ophelia."
Do you call this resonance?
Hands on the grocery cart
Pushing, one leg back
One leg forward, "Drown'd"
Ah, chanting Marvin Gaye
'Mercy Mercy Me'

Wide range of R values
Just a capital R.
Power rating.
1/10 of a watt - this
Current (voltage) maximum
Power wasted and burned
It's one watt or less.
Bands of colored R values
High is less, ohms.
Insulation, bricks against
A corner; broken pieces lay
Around. Several thousand
Ohms. The building appears
Now, one address up, 25 to 26.
Vignes connects to Temple,
Or "If you want" to First St.
Electricity, bend the distressed
Elements placed on windowsills,
Doorways - doorways that
That hide clothes and shoes and
Household items. Manganin to
Chromium to iron. The street
Shines with cobalt
Blue. And disappears...

Vignes Street Prayer

II

No collar shirt, long
Sleeves two pockets
Hang out and drape
Down. An incessant
Search for the end of
The street. Standing
Surrounded by plastic
Bags, eyes focused on
Nothing, muttering, "Conscience
And cowards, us all, us all
Cowards, cowards
Consciousness, us all."
Is this extension? Is it force?
Faculty, influence?
It's the incompetence, a
Single moment lost. A
Mouth comes out of the
Sky, "Resolution and
Death, where acting stops
And the scene is landscape
Imagery of stock
Photos."

The building across the
Street shimmers and
Disappears.

Vignes Street Prayer

I

Creators, puppet plays within
A story. And a long prose
Poem about counting
Using the left hand fingers.

The coffee service is offered
Up, "What fingers am I holding
Up?" Ah, the City's best,
The ones counting on Vignes.
The audience as entertainment.
The one's asleep, many
Ghosts among them, they that
(Are) is, that watch the shadows
rise. "Is it still prose?"

A step onto a wooden platform
Before sixteen or so empty
Seats.

Commercial St.

III

"Oh, radiant east, early
Morning, dumb, exposed,"
D stands on one foot,
Stance ascetic both
Shoes off. A car
Drives by.  It's shadow
Passes across her 
Raised leg. The
Car stops and backs up.
The window rolls down.
A large yellow llama
Looks at D, big brown
Eyes, "From where I'm
Sitting you appear
To be holding the bridge,"
Blinks, soundless. D,
An open mouth and head
Bent forward:  The
Chain link fence comes off
The supporting poles, two step
Three step to a samba
One, uh eh, uh
Uh eh, uh...

The car folds back out
Into an altar with 
Grilling hamburgers, fried
Grease molecules floating.
Drift down to surround the llama
And D, "All shiny and bright in
The oily air," Sun disperses it,
A tea in scalding water, brown.
D's foot drops. Taps?
And she pulls the blanket over her head (closer).