She ran the dead’s carpeting
throughout the office supply stacks.
She wanted a toy, not pencils nor tacks.
She was bright, shiny cuteness
in an Office Depot®,
or was it an OfficeMax®?
You know,
wherever the corporate types go
for overpriced ink and free heart attacks…
(At Staples in South San Francisco, California, February 2016. See my other work here and here.)
At a small laundromat in Tokyo
I loitered outside to see how people go.
They were slow.
It was November and they were slow.
But in Tokyo slow is much faster
than what seems fast anywhere else you go…
(Nakano 5-chome, Tokyo, November 2015. See my other work here and here.)
Tonight the moon was less than full but more than willing,
the kind of moon that inspires killing
lovers, hearts, and alcohol,
this versatile moon can do it all.
And if the moon isn’t worthy, it’s still better than you.
It never killed for a temple or pew.
So sleep your dreams, and dream of sleep.
The moon is never ours to keep…
(Brisbane, California, February 2018. See my other work here and here.)
Here, take a minute to look at these photographs of a textbook case of dog. Her name is Allie Anne and she belongs to a friend of mine here in Brisbane, California.
There, isn’t that better? This is cheering you up a bit, isn’t it?
I thought so.
Seriously, looking at these photos has got to be better than whatever dismal and infuriating news reports you were reading about the fucking moron in the White House who is systematically tearing our country down and apart with his stupidity, ignorance, and racism.
Yeah, I know. It’s continually depressing and hard to summon either courage or hope.
Hey, I know, I’ll look at the dog with you. Let’s be calm for a few minutes and just sit here together and look at the happy dog.
(Brisbane, California, January 2018. See my other work here and here.)
Before my face scraped the road,
I saw a shop that glowed.
I couldn’t get inside,
So the tender ghost without me died.
This freed me to further travel,
And continue to unravel
Secrets that I sought.
Truths that can’t be bought
In illuminated shops,
Found at bus stops,
Or drunk in bars of great divinity.
My secrets aren’t within onyx superstructures of great art,
Or in the meat sack we call the human heart.
So resting overnight I watched the shop glow.
By morning the sun rose so fast
It seemed retrograde slow.
There were places I had to go,
People I had to be.
More ghosts I had to fetch,
And a love I longed to catch.
For decades this place was a bodega (the Coca Cola sign), then a retail shop (the India Rose sign), now apparently it’s a private residence.
(Brisbane, California, January 2018. See my other work here and here.)
Kill your television?
No, idiots.
Television’s thinking about killing you…
(Brisbane, California, January 2018. See my other work here and here.)
I wish I could say
the end of the year
will erase all your pain,
make disgraces and crimes disappear,
kill the hatred on sale two-for-one at Safeway,
flood the streets with winning lotto tickets,
give us the heart to be ourselves,
let us forego religion in favor of reason,
and install a second faucet
on everyone’s kitchen sink
from which flows on demand
the finest Belgian chocolate sauce.
But that’s not going to happen.
America won’t get fixed,
won’t be America,
won’t be great or even passable,
until people like these,
good people,
sweet people,
American people,
are no longer sleeping on
concrete pillows on the streets,
seeing bullets and unicorns in their soup,
and eating manic-depressive tacos
from the labyrinths inside flaming dumpsters.
(Little Tokyo, Los Angeles, California, December 2017. See my other work here and here.)
Lacking both the energy and ambition on Christmas Eve to present to you photographs and text covering my usual range of topics, I’ve decided to just show you some pictures of my cats. My insane, hyper-kinetic, fuzzy-beautiful fucking cats. I figure no matter where you are as a Scholars and Rogues reader on the American political spectrum, my 10-month-old cats will cause no offense and might even make you smile.
See, 2017 has been a rather shitty year for me. Two big reasons why are my wife was hospitalized in January, then we lost our beloved cat Indy on Valentine’s Day. Being the life-long cat ladies that we are, my wife and I intensely felt how empty both our lives and our house were after Indy. So even though we both felt emotionally that it was too soon after his death and the deep grief it caused to have new cats, we adopted two eight-week-old kittens on April 1st from some very nice folks up near Sacramento.
And these are they, Kuro and Mika, brothers from the same litter, furry brigands who chew on everything, routinely beat the shit out of each other, and haven’t a mean bone in their bodies even though the are ruthlessly lethal to the toy mice (with the rattling bits inside) that I keep finding under every goddamned piece of heavy furniture in our house. So it goes living with with the aggravating grace of the feline species…
Mika, on the left, has white feet and a distinctive crescent moon patch on his neck. Kuro, on the right, is entirely jet black. They’re thrilled to meet you, as you can see.
Mika also has white areas on his chest and belly. And he likes to leap over our bathroom door.
They both like boxes, but Kuro is particularly fond of them.
Kuro also likes to chew on shit, in this case my cigarette lighter.
Mika loves toys, but wasn’t fast enough to eviscerate this pink one when I dropped it for him.
This will be their first Christmas with us, or with anyone. They’re not entirely clear on that concept.
Merry holidays, kids. I hope you enjoyed this. See more of Kuro and Mika here. Photographed in Brisbane, California during November and December 2017. See my other work here and here. And stay fuzzy.