expectations as agenda and the minute is hijacked and que sera is on the wave missed and the miss is as good as a mile expectations as attitude is high alert is better be's is stick up the ass and adjustable&responsive is not part of the vocabulary expectation is competition is contest is fool's gold and les jeux sont faits and you lose and justthesame it was a highcalifornia sunny with telltale hot inland ambient ocean air aloft drive along route1 and rimming tomales bay we saw standing at nest attention a golden eagle daang we certainly didn't expect that

it's all a matter of who and what you know redux

so what she had asked is a shit eating grin daang like a true princess asked I couldn't help but think admittedly it taking one to know one...well after a shitwad of enquiry&inquiry we not so humbly proffer&posit that
a)the shit eating grin is a grin that says I don't believe I just did that whereas b)the cheshire cat grin says you don't believe I just did that

Test: What kind of grin did judi have today when she flipped off a restaurant full of people?

it is what it is and by default ain't what it ain't and I ain't no cando pimp or whore for that matter but it ain't about that is the thing though it has a great ring cause fact is I am a cando whore but I will not be pandered is the deal bought or sold which still by default is neither good or bad it's the pretense that the baffle damn me if I ain't back again to what if there's nothing to hide

it's the freedom of imperfection
the wealth of if I please
over and out

sitting meet and greet at the door I'm reminded of class of upstairs downstairs relegation of selfimportance of falling flat on your face ahyes there it is
sitting meet and greet at the door I'm reminded of how our hospital our sfgh town couldn't wouldn't doesn't work without the aggregate and conglomerate did not start out as a dirty word
sitting meet and greet at the door with the rest of the weary and wounded I think hell if it weren't for us the rest of youall wouldn't have a damn thing to do none of them being allowed in

a time of change
one of those well worn epithets flung with the same bantering insouciance as hi how are you but we are talking transformation not california white light beatific new age not neonationalistic johnnygetyourgun rallyaround fervor happening to some flung far them or yourcummy neighbor best friend sister for that matter this is falling on my face don't you get it yet change this is my dog died my cat died change this is moving to the desert change this is packing up and moving west change
this is what if there is no place to hide change

asif
there's no time to waste as if the next wave won't doesn't wait as if the wind could blow backwards as if I won't is can't as if godly gets you off the hook as if father knows best as if might is right as if I would if I could as if this hurts me more than it hurts you as if there were another way as if when it rains it pours as if clothes make the man thingis it's a matter of style the glass halfempty the house burned down now I can see the moon

the shower
we went unpredicably but thereitwas a gathering of kith&kin and all the water underthebridge no twain nevermet yourspot &yourmother's was empty though indelibly you were present and therewas daphne who i recognized and andrew&hismother and brian&carmen who i feltlike i knew and the ohsofamiliar neighbors and ken who asif knowingly looked me over and UncleLou&AuntCira and stan&jason whoall look the same and john who looks worried & jake about to be an uncle and papajeff in his glory flanked by brock and sam themothertobe

andif we're true to form bythetime we see everyone again their daugher will be 10

falling flat on my face was prelude to the memory of place of possibility of unfolding of surprises of holes in the ground of bumps in the road and she the oh so presbyterian nodded knowingly just the same when I said asking for the time off would have been much easier and still I tend toward making it all so complicated organizing it fussing with it rearranging it as if it were the furniture in my house as if it were some travel itinerary as if my intervention were divine as if the going weren't part of getting there

ahh not waiting for revisited for the sun behind the fog the perfect wave the perfect love better times vacation lunch you inspiration which is not translated as settling for or no idea or no backbone or substance
it's the freedom of just the same of anyway of inexorable the compare&contrast of wishing I would have if only the one that got away
without hesitation she said when I asked her if she was happy yes! I'm too old not to be the others feeling they still had to time to wrestle with imperfections as if only and waiting for

funny how we I get stuck having planned how something will should go how I will manage something asif it were a thing inert no wind no air to be managed leaving out whimsy and weathermen thunder and laughter as if it were just about me and my vision as if I were a lady as if I knew best as if that was the way it had to be as if I were right and didn't know enough to just let it be or had no imagination as if possibility and between the lines were a minefield
too silly

she was an earnest young woman as if a stern older sister of a houseful of children well loved & well dressed but a houseful nevertheless her long hair sitting just above the gray collar of her uniform in a bun she was courteous and of few words answering questions only as they were asked aware justthesame of the underlying complexities she warmed as the day went on and magic working both ways it was only when she began talking about going salsa dancing that I saw the ring in her tongue and the glimmering of a heart at full tilt

it's the whole thing of being jerked around and getting up into it mad and righteous thing is just like a wave no matter how full of fury on the way in looking like the realdeal slip sliding back down the slope on the way out it's a whole other gig takes on a whole new set of mysteries sometimes the damn things just disappear tricks or gumption traps full of promise and victory and nothing important ah yes the illusion of importance makes a big splash and the principle of it is still just a stick up my ass

funny how editing puts a cramp in changes the shape of the soul it's definitely a different pair of shoes so I've been out of step sitting down to write and of course nothing came out right rite I can see there is a resetting of a mark happening here no matter how many metaphors have been put to the task and for all of the clatter the day in day out laundry paying bills feeding the cats watering the garden work being in relation to goes on with grace but goddamn it there's still some thing I'm missing hear

so the racket bangson the litany the perseverative the cudchewing the snippets the rattle of non compensatory not industrial as in the my fall was not industrial oh way industrial it was but I wasn't on the clock and it wasn't hospital property anyway I looked at it it came out wanting for common sense wanting for the this happening to common people and over my shoulder in the flats the orange moon full in a dark blue sky caught up with me and took me the distance to sunrise an unabashed red disc coming up over the bay, glorious

amos surf D & madonna

for years amos mcduff named his boards after ladies same as any good storm but came that time he was drunk on his ass in bed with some hot dame and stuporously thinking he was on a big ass wave he started talking like he did when he rode the nose and the broad whose name was not madonna got fundamentally bent out of shape and broke his one and only cup sending it through the church window hitting surf D minister of transportation who was not happy but undeniably thought it was seriously funny and brayed

clearing
gray fog gray hot inland fog gray not serious just dallying but clearing from the west ah yes mark twain and the coldest winter he ever spent having been summer in san francisco

thing is editing is about perspective about distance looking for more than magic more than intent it's testing structural integrity looking at core samples it's aloof at its best and whimsical just the same at the other end fact is it's another chapter another verse it's standing on the line making decisions properly done it's digging deep gouging yet another set of wounds

a necessary debriding

I'm going home foravisit no funny wordhabit not home at all but home to my parents not that I ever lived in that house not that my father is able to parent not that my mother is the same parent she was more than parent now she is matriarch & on her way 82 years old notwithstanding to finland lapland & then to israel politics notwithstanding saying in response to my admonition not to be kidnapped I don't stand on chairs anymore but life's other risks don't bother me & if I die I want you to know I've had a good life

it's quiet and I hear the bells first on the side then round to the front ringing in the wind the fish with single clappers the bigger greek church bell the thai temple bell then the chimes follow the wind as it curls around to the front of the house each set telling a story of a time and a place of a memory of an occasion of another place
we're good to go bags packed
there's no good time to leave it's like breaking the damn suction in your booties--it's in the thumb you know it's in the thumb

winnipeg one
it was a good visit though I still get that visceral feeling in my stomach that better disappear feeling that feeling of hanging around can only lead to being eaten up though in all fairness fact is she's so full of full enough of herself these days that she doesn't (need to) snack on me at all and fact is I didn't disappear at all
it was a good visit we celebrated her 82nd birthday and read poetry and roared around visiting her friends many of whom could be my best friends just as well
happy bday ma

not falling far from the tree I had to laugh coming upstairs one morning to see maman lying flat on her back bare-assed legs spread doing her morning back exercises there at the top of the stairs facing the front door wide open without a second thought
my mother who takes sharing to its penultimate level which is what she said about our father who (ain't yetin heaven who) took the communist credo ofhaving of sharing to include cups of coffee or wives & to this day in spite of his notknowing whichexactwife I might be shares his coffee with me

twenty years later I went back to St Boniface to the unit I opened to look around for the hell of it and twenty years later walking in with only my name the woman sitting at the nurse's station who had started working there long after I'd left said hmm judi goldberg you were the first head nurse here weren't you got to say it tickled my ass on the one hand and scared me just like being captured in photographs sometimes does
ten years ago people there who'd never met me laughed knowingly when I kicked my shoes off

so we'd hoped to see the fireflies but got a prairie thunderstorm instead luck of the draw or simply the magic of the moment or the mystery of the moment and the big sky big space unfolding drama of gradients of differences of slopes
like the shadow theatre of our father who inhabits who populates the nether region on the other side of the wind and as if this time there were to be some sensible answer she asks what did he say how was he today waiting imagining hoping just like any miracle junkie for a promise a sign

freedom
our father long since dead yet for the first time alive the body immaterial as it had been for most of his life inconvenient or worse a lie our father relegated to straight lines empiric evidence & a catholic demeanor inspite of himself now travels to places he never could imagine
looking for a father looking for a husband looking for someone we knew we look with wrong eyes and come away empty handed and heavy hearted while
he is fine and busy as all hell fact is he always believed you died when you were ready and he ain't

the inside of my head is quiet
no hits no runs no errors no poems

readers go whither they want even led by the hand on the other hand I've been known to set people down the wrong path or start them at the wrong end of the course it was an interlude well it was but the point was and dang I even said but the point was the breathcatch of beholden to I'll start over telling the story of beholden to so my lovestarved readers won't be looking for sex with the towtruck shmuck but for the feeling

so what of the shape of things to come the denouement the struggle
funny how last reading I was so through with excuse the hell out of me the earlier work and now not even two months later I'm bored wrong sense but not moved by tired of perhaps in the sense of familiarity with the later pieces, I've put together a reading of in-relation to pieces starting from tumor times
and sweet how now eventhough he still doesn't want to stand out as grist for my pages he can't fathom not being on them as part of my life

so she finding it arrogant to have gathered all those people to celebrate her birthday orchestrated it in her mind as if they were coming to hear poetry and I having found it arrogant to have all those people gathered to hear my poetry reframed it as of course her birthday party and fact is it was as these things are mostly a tribute to life and friendship and community but goddamnit if people come together to buy tupperware what the hell is the big deal of getting together for an evening of fine food fine friends and fine poetry

the irony of course is that we neither of us grew up with birthday parties so muchas with evenings of poetry or music or the theatre of secularized (wow blasphemous it says–if they only knew) holiday ritual and beyond that come to think of it why wouldn't one share poetry I mean given all the things we share tongues dresses needles condoms hats gloves lollypops secrets beds mothers time elevators napkins why the hell wouldn't we share poetry

of course it still feels a little like play us a little tune dear but I'm getting over it with some practice

there's no perfect way to lose someone same problems as falling in love you know too soon too late too old too young too hard ohmygod I think he, the he we call dad not that we ever called him dad, has been dead for years but the ritual is still alive the metaphor the shell the spot is still occupied though not busy I mean someone's home but not him on the other hand should he actually get the hair up his ass and do the dying thing well that would be a whole other story I'm not ready

so do you suppose, we were talking after the reading a gathering of writers, you one I can be a good writer without being full of your my oneself an easy enough question but like getting poetry or understanding art one gets hung twisted and otherwise lost in operationalizing the social incorrectness of full of oneself and already the apologizing starts I wanted to scream full of oneself is not inherently bad you stupid fucks ack but they got my poetry, toofunny
gottosay like writing there's a certain honesty to reading

& ain't I just misswritingthing two readings inside ten days

so in the common sense not very common department it took Them a month asin the whole damn month to get that my industrial fall was Industrial and that walking in front of the hospital to start work was infact being on hospital property for the express purpose of work(ing) as opposed to with malicious intent driving 70 miles to the city so that I could fall on my face and bilk the citycounty treasury of thousands of dollars in medical bills

talk about pissy prissy & otherwise without class it definitely was behaviour unbecoming of health care(sic) providers