waking dream again

a vague flash of love
lost
from the deep past
a rushing heart
a girl's face through flowing black hair
a laughing smile running
a concert
a car
turgid youth
clean white skin
like a dream
or a scene from a song
or a poem
20 years later
an old man fades
and the paper flutters to the floor

The Dumpstelele

A friend once described to me the "Dumpstelele" [pronounced 'dumpstelele'] - a fabled Tom Waits invention. This was a few years ago. To date, I have not been able to corroborate.
"Ok, Its a steel dumpster, right? He welds the lid(s) shut and then cuts a big, irregularly shaped hole in one side.
Then he welds some pegs on either side of the hole and strings piano strings over it - big ones. Several of them.
The instrument is played by using a silver dollar as a plectrum and a wine bottle as a slide."
Just think about the sound this thing would make...then imagine Tom Waits all drunk playing it and singing some song about being a dinosaur and eating broken glass in New Orleans.
Thats right.
------------

down in a hole

so here
are the last of these years?
to spend shuffling around
peeking out the little jail window
safe behind the steel
but wanting someone
anyone
to come in.
the night is solid out there
but for a half-sphere lit
by the halogen porch light
a little defender
a domestic sentry that says
"somebody lives here still"

i don't want to sleep.
im not done with today
something didn't happen
again
a whole day gone
and the chances are all gone
the doors closed
and im left here
to carry this brain around
as it grows ever more tired
trudging along
towards heat death

yes, i'll grow old here.
not in this space
but in this place
because i've stopped climbing.
the bottom of this well is wretched.
but i know it
like i know myself.

in the dying of the heart
there is a lifting
of responsibility
of feeling
a fleeing of the self
a letting go
like bowels voided
when the body dies.