Well its the day after the day, the big day of big eating and big laying around, of families coming together and being big and noisey, new little additions trying out their fawny legs, rumbling around issuing loud procolmations from their newly toothed yaps, while everyone looks at them in wonder and delight. the slightest change in their expression illicits a response of varying degrees from everyone in the room. its actually really funny watching how we (i use this term lightly in my case) adults respond to the children. twins, a boy and a girl (sure i mentioned thembefore) 14 months old. i taught nick how to stick his tounge out to be funny. i would stick mine out and he would try and grab it, so then he would do the same. it was quite a game for a while. then there was uh oh, apparently its an age old game that even i played. he would push the sippy cup off the table, and i would pick it up, then he would do it again. well that lasted all of two uh ohs. yeah i was not that enthusiastic about that one. Wednesday nite was an interesting nite. started by spreading some holiday cheer around during happy hour at bullfeathers. met some friends i have not seen in a while. actually they met me as i was eating and reading quietly in the far corner, well that ended when they rolled in like a pack of thirsty sailors. after happy hour went home to eat dinner with the parents and then take a nap in preperation to what i thought would be a nite of ranging around downtown and running into people i have not seen since the Clinton years. Well that didn't happen. just basically found out highschool friends don't understand that people change, are different, and that there is really nothing to gain by tolerating each other anymore. Its sad really. but that is just the way it goes. Taxied from the burbs to Elmwood where we caught the tail end of the biggest party nite of the year. it was fizziling out quite rapidly. as was my desire to continue the celebration. Its SNoWing! I know I still live in NY, but it somehow seems colder this year, and the cold has been someting i have always enjoyed. Plans for this evening are slowly coming together. The LoW concert, and then off to a party. fantastic. should be good. holiday cheer. though with that is that ennui that seems to attack me yearly. I really hoped that jana would have made this trip with me. holidays are the best time to be in a relationship, well not that any other time of the year isn't. just there is something about coming home, especially living away from family and friends, you come into town, wrapped up in wools and cottons, packages in colorful papers and bags, smells of wood burning in cold late autumn early winter crystal clear nite skies, warm wooden bars reflecting neons and laughter, slaps on the back from friends, great big hugs and smiles to match, cold drafts of fall and winter brews warming the frosty ears and limbering up vocal chords, families gathered in frosty windowpaned houses that rumble and move to the riotous laughter and evervescent love. in quiet moments a squeeze of the hand, walking out side stealing warm soft kisses inbetween wintery breaths, long drives home through bear tree stubbled mountains, along cold tired slowing rivers and creeks where tressel bridges stretch their legs to cross the cold waters, afraid of their toes getting wet, coming upon the great city, christmas's city of lites of diamonds sparkling in towers of nite highs, great christmas tree lites compete, superscede the majesty of these towering magnificies scraping the sky of which santa will wisk in his sleigh on that fateful nite in snowy childrens books decembers. when lovers look on each other with eyes of holly and ivy, soft, lusty eyes of flannel sheets, cold floors and warm feet exchanging gifts in pure nakedness wrapped in not swaddling cloths, but bed linens throwing shadows in mulberry candle lite. maybe the reason that love is so intense, magnified in the autumn, winter months is becaus
e everything is dormant, the trees, the grass, the sky, all have a bleak, deathlike quality to them. love, affection, passion, all include the promise of life, future, prosperity of the flesh, of the heart, of the mind.

home for the holiday, the drive up from New York was actually not that bad. that probably is because i left around 430 in the morning. it was a beautiful drive, the city all lit up and little traffic, well i guess that is relative to what i am really used to. while in my last post i was really looking forward to coming back to buffalo for a few days, now that i am here, i don't know how i feel about it really. there is so much sprawl out where my parents live. everything is so damn far apart. don't get me wrong i love space. it is a great thing to grow up with, but i think right now i much prefer a busy hectic setting. I am however looking forward to seeing the LOw on Friday nite. really psyched. catching up with a few people whom i have not seen in a while will also be nice. the holiday party schedule is already being scratched out, and it seems as though this year will be a doozy. I am really going to be taking advantage of that. i really am out of things to say, well not really, just that everything is whirrrrring about in my head so quickly that i need to slow it down, maybe a few pints of black and tan, we'll see. dee, hope to see you when you are in town.

contemplating my next move. yeah i can understand how the place you are can make you happy, content, excited, stimulate you, capture your heart, break it, but still want to be at home. weighing the pros and the cons. the rent i pay here a month could be a mortgage payment on a nice house at home, my parents are there, but i would be missing out on the cornicpoia of people that pour out onto the table that is this city. went to a party in astoria last weekend and it was very interesting. 99 percent of the people were Kerry men and women, they most all worked on the campaign, me excluded. my buddy who went was outed as a bush man, the whole crowd went quiet. it was as if the needle was dragged across the record. one guy asked me if he could use some of my material, because he though it was a bit, and he was a stand up. i was flattered. the party was really stuffy. too much politiking, and not enough fun for all, well i had my own little audience, so it was fine with me. one guy tried was like the ringleader of the pols, and he had a really magnetic personality, but he was intent on trying to prove his vast library of knowledge, and he starts blathering on about socrates, plato, and then moved on into poetry and other lit topics. he was quite suprised to know that i have read some "highbrow" items. so he right away wanted to be my new friend, and to know a basic list of what i have read. then my buddy announces that i had done readings of my poetry in brooklyn, so they were like say something. it was cool on one hand, on the other....eh...i have been writing a lot again lately. i wonder if misery, well not misery, but heartache is really the best muse. god i hope not. actually i know its not, but it does make for some dark writing. at times i feel like a junior highschool kid writing love poems that will never hit their mark. its like a closing argument and the jury does not need to deliberate. oh yeah for halloween i was wheres waldo! it was great. walking down the street people yelling at me, random people asking to have their picture taken with me. and i made it! reading subteranneans right now by kerouac, yeah probably spelled it wrong, its great. its a love story about kerouac and some black woman. not sure what her real name is, in the book its mardou. his is leo percepied. its the genisis of his love for her, and apparently the destruction of it. you know whats funny about falling in love with someone is all of the things you talk about doing, the little things that draw you to thoughts of them, act as burs in your heart.

it is in vain i try to paint,
draw your beauty with these simple words,
plain letters on this canvas of mine

i cannot wait to go home, yes that does sound defeatest, or as if i am running. i think everyone runs in their own way. can't wait to be home in Buffalo!

Great movie.....what is that saying life imitates art? or is it art imitating life? im not sure at times why things work the way they do. Saturday nite i had a bizarre not bizzare in an earthshattering realm, but just because it started with shameless flirting that always happens, and then got serious for a saturday nite. the conversation with one of my friends, who happens to be a girl, not young, actually older than myself. 34 or so i think. she is a teacher, and a great one at that, anyways the conversation. it was a discussion about music and sex, we were doing the normal harmless flirting that we always engage in and the question came up what do you listen to while gettin down and dirty. now not saying that this is for everyone, but i proposed the idea that in certain instances playing ones favorite cd's might not be appropriate due to the fact that we tend to attach memories to certain songs, and even scents. and this is just a little conclusion i came to after having that "trial run" relationship that can play out in anywhere from a little over a month to lets just say under half a year. then it just kinda fades out. comparable to a summer fling, you start seeing the person, and then you get comfortable, then for one reason or another it fades, the interest wanes, and bam you either don't give a rats ass, or you are down for a bit. well then if you do care and did have the misfortune of having attached the sounds and scents you shared together to the significant other of the then since expired relationship, you have to deal with that. it was a notion that we had not thought about really to any real extent, and it is ironic that high fedility is on right now. also karma played a bug part of the discussion. something i talked with my roomates girlfriend one evening at length while he watched the presidential debates. i heard the book, which the movie is based on takes place in london. another odd little jab at my karma as i am no longer seeing the brit girl who i had asked for meniu suggestions in late july. bob dylan, gotta love bob dylan.

Class was canceled, the workshop class that is. It was an huge let down. I was really looking forward to monday nites. Now all i have is the publishing seminar. oh well must make due. Last weekend was Irish Day in Long Beach. What a party. I guess the irish population in Long beach figured that St patricks day was not enough so every year the first weekend in october, they have a huge parade, and then wild partying ensues, well actually it begins most times before the parade even steps off. It was one of those days, where you are in bed at 8, sleep a few hours, then get back on your feet and go until close. Work is lousy, really lousy, and slow. Trying to find a halloween costume, though i am not really big on dressing up, there are a few parties that require costumes. Sitting here typing this, i am looking at my beautiful typewriter. Its a black glossy Underwood Noiseless Portable. Just got it back from the typewriter repair man. he had to tweek the space bar, clean all of the mechanisims, put new roller rubber on it, and a new ribbon. the guy does a great job. He worked on a desk top Royal that i have. That is a monster of a machine. The Underwood though, whew, its gorgeous. Sounds odd speaking that way about a typewriter, but anyone who has come into the apt, sees it and is impressed. It was manufactured in 1938, if i remember correctly, it came up from Greensboro NC as a gift, and i have been using it often since getting it back. Enough of that, sat in on a texas hold em poker game last nite, well actually i was like the bartender. Took place at one of the bars we hang out at, and after close, the tourny happened upstairs. It amazes me the amount of gambling that goes on down here in long island. Not to say that there isn't a fair share of that going on at home, in buffalo, it just seems more prolific down here. Everywhere you go, my friends are like, who do you like on the games today, or i took these teams and the under, you wanna play hold em tonite? the bet on darts, flips of a coin, just really insane. One of my friends ended up in the whole BIG, i mean really big, and every week, the book would send one of the guys to come pick up, almost like in a movie. shake of a hand and the money passes. For me i don't see the allure of it. I want to feel tangible results if i am going to spend money, food, drink, something that i can taste touch feel. I guess they do it for the high they get. Its funny how different things give different people highs. Just last nite, a simple phone call saying hi made my nite a lot better. The voice on the other end, that alone can change my day. it doesn't have to be that only though, something you write, a movie, shit like that, a sports game (though the NHL has royally fucked up) and i never understood how betting on a team made the game more exciting, i think they are mixing something being exciting, causing excitment, with something causing anxiety. i am going now, there is an fall arts festival in Huntington on the north shore, going with some friends from the city. should be good. talk to you all later.

Well what do you know, i got a little tech crazy and uploaded a pic for my user pic. Its a shot from my buddy tim's front porch. in the background you can see the ocean. its not a bad spot where he lives, one of our favorite watering holes, aptly named the Saloon is on the corner of W Beech and Indiana, and then at the other end of the street is the ocean. pretty good i'd say. Just got done watching a show, the Question of God; Sigmund Freud and C.S. Lewis. It was really very interesting. i have jumped into it before, the show that is, but never watched from the beginning or in its entirety. God, or the existance of god, well i believe in god, and that i guess you could say was reinforced this past weekend when i went to Allentown for my godaughter Emily, and her twin brother Nicholas's first birthday. they are so cute. growing so fast. it seems like you can see them developing right before your eyes. last i saw the two rugrats was end of july, and now they are both getting up and trying to stumble on their own, unsuccessfully of course. but its amazing to watch them. their development is so quick as we watch from a distance, i have to wonder if our development continues on that same rapid pace, or does it invert and become a kind of decline, well obviously it does i mean, we reach a lets say terminal velocity on our physcial growth and then however many years we are able to maintain a homeostasis then on to decline and death, but what i wonder is that can others see from a distance in relation to time passed the speed of the rate of decline? the speed at which we race towards death?Also another thought, how active is god in bringing people to your for relationiships. not to sound like he runs match.com, or is a personal personals shopper, but its just something i have been wondering a lot about lately. sometimes i find that the wheels have too much time to turn, and all of the smoke clouds my ability to reign in my imagination, conscious, and it becomes a runaway train. jumping the tracks and killing the cows. ego, super ego, id, talk amongst yourselfs. I signed up for a class at NYU, its a poetry workshop. seems like it will be very interesting. You have your work critiqued and there are guest speakers who come in and read, also help with your work, and how to get published. that class is every monday nite, i also have a saturday class that is about careers in publishing. something that i have been trying to break into unsuccsessfully. More so that i would like to start an independent press. i am really looking forward to this class. hopefully it will motivate me another option i have been contemplating is an MLS, masters in library science, its required by all of the museums, seems like you need that even to get a look forthe most basic job at any of those sort of institutions. dee i will be home for thanksgiving, so hopefully we will be able to get together for a drink or two. the run the next morning, eh, doesn't sound so appealing. goin to read and then sackout. gnite all

Its odd when you realize what is happening in your life, when you really don't see it happening. It kinda feels like watching that movie where the deer, or any "helpless" little animal is standing alone in the woods, and the wolf, or coyote, or lion slinks up to its quary, and BAM, the little guy fuckin gets it. The difference is, in this instance I am completely alright with getting it. I am almost hoping that it is happening the way I think it is. Though I have had to make some tough decisions in order for this to happen, some of which have not been an issue for me in oh, i would say close to7 years. trying to make the right beach mtv call, knowing that whatever way you go is going to influence the rest of your life in one way or another. I mean in all reality, the reason I am in this current situation is in direct relation to the last time I was faced with a choice. It seems at the time i made the right pick, and then it seemed as if i had been foolish. Now however , perhaps, it is what i was supposed to do looking back . It reminds me a little of that cusack movie serendipity. yeah i watched part of that between catching some winks the other nite, though i missed the ending. i don't know, i have been thinking about fate and choices, and moving, and reunions, and where i am, and where others are. I have come to the conclusion i really don't give a fuck where i am in realation to others, i am happy where i am right now, and would like to move up, and when i say move up, i mean better myself, not really move up the tax brackets. there is a lot of things that i would like to have happen with this new relationship, (thats the thing stalking its prey) all in a good context of course, seriously.something that is difficult for me to think about at times, as i don't want to jump the gun, but also i don't want to be so aloof due to the past that there is the perceived lack of effort/interest/passion reciprocated. history, repeating itself. the irony of things that happen in everyones, in my everyday life.

Fell asleep to whitman's serenade
!oh democracy! lovers and friends
freedom, mornings dew upon your loins

rocking side to side along the rails in a rainy august nite remembering the first time i could remember, consciously remember a bittersweet realith of past happenings, hopenings the reason one or all remember is for the feeling, the sensation involved with the action the sensation of loss that begins in your stomach as if an ember was placed gently, quietly inside of you for the purpose of irritation to be quenched at your favorite watering hole or through the sweat of lust. the empire state building comes into view as the lumbering sliver in the nite rain train whisked along to its final destitnation, or was that the a momentary stop along its own rememberance of the tracks Penn Station Manhattan last and final stop for the westbound train filied with young dewy cunt eyes and old withered pricks waiting to stick out in the rainy nite glow electric like the magnificent Empire State, looking around i see everyone quiet with their mouths yapping noiseless yawns of blabber that do not interest me specifically but the din that rises from the motion of the lips and tounges and vocal chords while briefly interrupted by the swallow of bottle beer concealed foolishly in wrinkly brown paper, or not hidden at all.

written june 5th 2004


and so it was today, of june
two halves of an acorn did fall,
soon to blossom, an oak
in fields of southern suns