Rant número UNO.1

Jonathan Lethem is a fucking cunt. Wade Davis could be David Simon
with dilated pupils and wanderlust. Billy Woods needs to drop another
damn solo joint already. Scribblenauts will win over your
girlfriend. Everybody needs to read more Jamie Delano shit.

First and foremost I think I'm just fucking done with Lethem. Rewind,
FF, shuffle, delete: started off with Motherless Brooklyn on a friend's
recommend, more or less blown away by the verve with which he smacked
around the deteck-noir genre. Note to self at the time: watch the
kid. Later I 5fing his Gun, With Occasional Music. Again i'm floored
and impressed. By now he's in the zone; but I forget about him. Peep
Men and Cartoons, for good money this time, lovely, but some shorts
fare better than others. All gravy.

Then I pick up The Fortress of Solitude.

Rewind again: sitting in a snazzy lil auditorium at SUNY Albany, a
lanky gentlemen with costello frames and a humble attitude reads
selections from the book in question. He pronounces the voices of the
brooklyn brats playing chess on the stoop, getting some laughs from
the students forced to listen by yawning English profs who lounge in
seats somewhat nearby; lionesses fed and aware of their cubs. I think
to myself, this'll be a good'un. And yeah I get my copy of MB signed,
to boot.

I crack the book years and a life later. What starts strong
degenerates into a fucking mess. Violence, death, cruelty and pop
culture reconfigured with a fulla shit protag you want to repeatedly
smack in the eye. It's Grandmaster Forrest Gump somewhat. Lethem's well-touted ability for memory itches, or the often beautiful sentence structure helps the medicine go down - I have to make this admission for the worst of his books. The fond recall of old Brooklyn is nice but fuck
it, that's child's play and well trodden; besides, been there, done
that in a sense. The second half doesn't crumble as much as it
collapses upon itself, like the dying t-1000 - sub nerd shame for the
liquid nitro. There's also the presence of an arguable mystical negro figure, which I'm sure we all agree is what his books were lacking.

Staying away from the man's work at this point. We cop an autograph
at the Brooklyn book fest, after his talk with Eggers who I'm
embarassed to say I haven't read yet. The staged convo was nice, as
we approach for our ink I barely recognize the guy from 3 years ago.
I see a chubby satisfied unkempt slightly douchy public defense
lawyer. I attempt to start some conversation about Omega The Unknown,
a rumor at the time. He flutters his hand and dismisses the talking
point: "i'm not really involved, it's more a writing credit thing.".
He impatiently stares at the next man behind me waiting with a copy of MB,
I savor the possibility that this vision dismays him, like Burgess
working his whole life on the follow up hit that never came. Then,
realizing I am now wishing ill on the man, I take a hint from myself and move on.
Fucker. So glad you can take little bullshit profit projects, riding
on the inelegent syllables of your surname to move units on a title you don't even care enough about to discuss. Bravo.

Oh, then I buy an advance proof of Chronic City for a buck on a sidewalk table of used books. What a load of utter shit. Pothead
politicking and labored prose. Some pretty moments, but overall like a
bollywood version of DeLillo's untouchable opus Underworld (I mean that in the bad way but the truth is this actually sounds like a fun idea). Also, the unveiling of Protagonist You Want To Smack In The Eye Part Deux...except this time I think he's doing it on purpose?

He is officially now writing beyond his means. Gone from having fun with experimental genre work, he now attempts epics to make people giggle at how clever he is. Like so, I'm done with him.

(P.S. Girl in Landscape was also pretty good)

End first mobile transmission, to the sounds of the new Raekwon joint.

the golem

It was a lonely morning, close to midnight, when facets of the house I
had been living in began to reveal themselves. contracts signed and
promises handed lock stock and barrel, the lease was a snake, teeth
were time-bombed and the particulars glossed over. i may have been
thinking about going to sleep, when the sounds of settling began to
curl like a somber echo, from front window to living room.
it was a moment of loss. my name fell into a thick hole like the plot
of a murakami novel, and to recall it i had to stumble through the
objects not yet removed from boxes, searching for tax forms or old
childhood drawings or schoolbooks from youth. when i found a name i
stared it at for a long while, accepting its textured syllables. in
my own self-ruin i considered those pre-used texts purchased from
dusty caves of bookstores, with other names, with notations from old
classrooms, pages transformed by previous readers, the death of hope.
it has been several hours this morning, sitting in the stillness of a
new apartment. a coma in an eyeblink, stranger in my own skin.
stranger to think of what defines us as the material we think we
command. someone else has owned all these objects. the very feel of
them is a distinct violation. to remember and not to remember.
as a child I remember my house on fire, smoke inhalation, a small
lifetime of objects destroyed in ten mad minutes. every now and then
the recall of something lost for years to follow, the return of that
loss, a splintering misunderstanding, lessons of permanence. not sure
if I only owned something in dreams, no relics or fossils of its hold.
realizing the clothes on my back were the only pieces of fabric that
still held my smell, mixed in with the cancer of burning new york.
i could rent the space where all those ashes went, put my little world
back together. we stand in front of the house on fire, what's taken
for granted winks at us as it consumes itself. it's cold in front of
the fire and our coats are lost. the next morning as we sift through
the damage we exchange hope for quick comfort, salvaging humble bits
of lifetimes. some mornings i try to find it all.

broke but the bills paid

you edit and re edit and read it and
walk shuffling in clusters down meltslick snow covered
curbs next to the chattering masses who

holding ipods like candles in the darkness hum
and meander to top 20s in their top 20s at the peak

of their age daydream of their homepage

.

and sometimes there is genuine joy
and on occasion i can't bury the odd love i have for the new york anonymity
it throbs when we bump at the stairwell and trade awkward gestures or
speak solidarity in secret glances around the loud
couple on the D train

.

and the pawnshawps close with the lilylivered hustling from
fordham road seated next to me
midget buildings huddle in the twilight and i
try to articulate the hierarchy of cellphone buskers crackling static at
single
-moms
in
the
street

b & e

these are all broken objects
images of unsorted sentiment
flesh to flesh or skin
frozen to streetlight on bad
night of plenty
horn player stood in the west
4th tunnel under the
basketball court i returned to late each night from
work to his broken pawnshop sounds echoing on
tile
worked so long at that restaurant I felt the sole witness to the
sax player improving

memory of spending a week's wages on
shoes not for any other reason than to have
a solid memento but even shoes
break and fade or get left in
old homes disintegrate on cheese grater
sidewalks

broken objects that scatter helplessly
points of total recall
long e kisses in the sleeping fountain
at midnight we awaken soaked from
our only night of puppy love

sometimes i think a lot of wet dreams and nightmares
paid for per gram or dose shiver through all aspects
of the self

frogs lilypadding
cross pond mirrors
articulating each
detail in the drifting moss of
time measured in
slow growth
maybe i chose shelf-
space among the broken
objects and memories
found placement
for self-space
box-within-a-box conundrum and
when i find myself carelessly
frolicking in old habits i'm really
bringing in
the shards
of the past for a big
bloody hug

broken objects like
old friend's habits
years later still
creak the door
to instigate the
rotten shit
i did or
merely to
rationalize
when i overstay my
welcome

hip injury

we walk past warehouses whose old must smelling of nouveau riche
motionsense lights flicker past the BQE on the way to a bar with
tequila in a bag leapfrogs hands in the dark excusing through ironic
t-shirt parade stagger change directions meander through ballfields looking
for the last tagger

light tipper for 7 buck beers
yell a complicated conversation in the magma of neon noise give my girl
cheekkisses and point out jukesong
the unknown band was 7 bucks and we chuckled even
the no-cover band was awkard as we angled to
the door leaving

playing arcades i haven't practiced
bad investments last night we were here (not LAST night ya dig) high on PKs talking PKD
to the filmmaker from spain and the west coast producer
drinking homebrew stout, bullshit and jameson
pocketing glossy flyer cards like the promises we made to make
our way out

quiet outside in the snow but it's
actually the first warm night of spring
stumbling boots trace mandalas into the park grass

linda belle

newspaper intones her name, stabbed and robbed like a ghost caught clumsy in the fucked gears. i find myself drifting to the horror and unspeakable stupidity of this cinematic instance, flimsier in newsprint but somehow peculiarly real (like a bad dream of goodtime moments that made you wake up afraid). the K line is probably like many others, crafted of palmgrease and architects, set to hang carefully in the lumbering growth, delicate machinery swaying with the swinging movements of its kin, then frozen and stiff from disuse. Franz rides it like a scuttling insect down arteries of pocked cinder and garish paint schemes, a phantom train whipping scrambled wind into commuter faces - they stretch inches past the yellow edge searching the echoes for the culprit, then disappointed, leaning their weight back to the heels.

they say she was dead-ended by locked turnstiles then jumped by antlions in the dark. stabbed and robbed, or one word stabbedandrobbed, stabdenrobd, strobbed. newspaper abracadabra.
-------------------------------------------------------------
linda belle, patron saint* of new yorker fuckups:
born by real-estate barons
and otherwise by the
reckless decisions of distracted imaginations.
-------------------------------------------------------------




*papers don't say if she's dead

lease

you walk by the old men lullabying aches-n-pains in patient spanish. past the 2.99 ham-and-cheese heros, and the tuxedo cat who sometimes eyed you from the empty storefront now skittering into the truck yard, sometimes steps out for a head scratch, skritch, and back into the splinters and darkness. past the poster of the naked swimsuit model faded by years of barbershop slang, layers of magazine pulp scraped down by long looks. you walk past a garden of bargain store bric-a-brac, the LEDs and mechanical ticks a weird language that sometimes keeps time with your steps. you walk past boxes of alley cat kibble behind bodega plexiglass, and plump seductive waitresses in the dark diner. the old timer sells underwear and gloves year-round, umbrellas in time with the weathermen. you hear the cars tempt red lights through your headphones and stay one step ahead. the cafe you've been to twice even when you thought it would become your favorite spot. the beatnik bar always mysteriously empty; too early for drinks after work, these days you sweat in your office chair in a broth of old impulses simmering. you stopped reaching for the beer at night, the bass guitar you borrowed mockingly silent in its desperado case. youth is an angry womb, emerge a docile consumer. at last at least you know the best pizza in the neighborhood. at last at least the roof is there and paid for now you signed the lease. at last at least you hum to the washing of dishes. maybe you've arrived you sleep in peace and read and go to galleries and learned to shake off the lonely nights. at last at least you always dream on slow walks home.