perpetual jam!!!!!!!!!

[the mingo]

love/hate with Henry M.
like this - he makes me work
that I got to fight thru thick paragraphs
to get to those shining passages of his
where it's like myself talking to myself -
those passages are like a steel rod
driven right thru the center of your brain - those i love
and Jack? - no matter all the crap that has
gathered around him over the years
I am drawn to his writings -
I know there were others involved in the thing
but
for me he was the whole Beat
the entire shebang
wrapped up in a single skin
and glowing - he highlighted something
about america in a way all his own
a singular voice
crimson & clover on a run thru the jungle
yeah ...

[the mingo]

this day began with coffee
then I ran into a woman of Tibet
a photo of her really
smoke swirling around her head
and I was off
my teeth ringing like tiny bells
my balls spinning like
prayer wheels in the wind
not to put too fine
a point on it
damn if it don't ever stop ...
hell yeah, Mongolia
i don't give two shits about peace either
as long as the women are stuck here with us
it's fine with me
now I got to get in
some two-wheel time
take my totally useless jam to the coffee shop
have a breakfast biscuit
sit outside in the autumn sun
watch the traffic goin' up & down 1st Street
& consider about
women in tents

[WIREMAN]

Reading my thing
These daze
When i'm off, that is
Cruise daily
50 miles @ 445 am.
Back to frederick at 6
Up on 6th floor now
Stay all day
No time to come down
Legs don't want nothing to do with
them stairs and ladders
Pushing the slabs
A pour a day
Action jamming supreme
Espanol all day
Counting the months (16)
Till i break away
Ifn i do
Never get ahead moneywise working
anyway
Jamming
Laid out
Wash done
Nola closed
Coulda done another show last night
Didn't
Too tired
Always saying someday
It'll be all wire and words
Feativals on the weekends
Just need a little dinero
Pay for the studio
Health insurance (obamacare)
Credit cards
Enuff i say
A man's gotta live a little
At least i finally get paid to be poet
And taxed for the effort (1099-independent contractor)
Bend over poet
Govt. gonna get u somehow, someway
Jammin
Never slammin
Mind visions
On the stage
On the page
Jammin!

[the mingo]

paid & taxed to be a poet?
Ha! i'll be damned - the thought
never occurred to me -
screamtime dreamtime - it always surprises me and
i never cease to be amazed -
(1099-independent contractor) ?
wow I just never thought about it - cracked me up
yeah bend over - ain't it the truth
Nola closed? for the time being or
forever?
you do what you can do
and what falls to you to do
all the rest can be logged
under miscellaneous
my bike is still out in the yard
I tell myself I'm going out
and lock her up for the night
but 'tween you & me
what's gonna happen is
I'm goin' for a ride first
then do the locking up
& call it a day - jam closed.
tomorrow will bring it 'round again

[WIREMAN]

Nola off the radar for a day
Yeah, my bum musician friends
escaped that one
The 1099 i mean
Still after all these years
doin it for free it feels
good to get paid
Well we did it today
Success, me and the crew
Everyone smiling and happy
at the end of the day
Sometimes i wonder why i even care
But ......i love a challenge
The impossible a month ago
becomes reality with a little
Organization, or i meant a whole lot of it
Thankless task though it do be
It's a long long way from Oklahoma city to Dallas
That was the talk on the way home
Till i decided to snooze
Yet there wasn't any choice on my part
Yet i come home and write
And jam
For it is my true religion.

[the mingo]

yeah I hear that
have had more time with it here
than anywhere else
i just get to messing with the words
scattering them or gathering 'em together
always lookin' for some new way
some new language
or a new way to stack the thing
sometimes straight up
other times caught in the goof of it all
the rain is doin' its own jam out there tonight
doin' jam satisfies something
or excites somethin'
maybe both at the the same time
ain't figured it out
and if i'm lucky
i never will

[WIREMAN]

Banner showed
My collage
Damn, surprise-surprise
A detail of a red devil transfer
Liquid lifting technique
20 some years ago
My how time's flown
Had a home in the burbs
Beautiful wife and daughter
And a station wagon
I tried
I failed
I'll never say never though
Things happen
Love's a funny thing
No matter what age
Things click and next thing ya know
yer headed for the courthouse
Damn near 40 years since i 1st took
the plunge
Orange chicken
Think i'll stay in and save money tonight
Write and jam and read
Octopus in save the bay auction tonight
Floating out there in the free world

[the mingo]

love's a funny thing you got that straight
not anything else i can say about it either
the autumn days always put me in mind
of the women i have known
or maybe those who have known me
i can see into the forests i ride by
on the bike these days
thru the gaps left by the falling leaves
i suspect that's exactly how i look
into my memories of things
thru gaps ...
yeah 40 yrs & a bit for me too
the church we were married in
is now a home for the old & the indigent
all the bungled
who have traded their social security
for a warm place to be among their peers
i ride by it and see them all out front
smoking their cigarettes
even in the cold
all hail that octopus, Wireman
may it float free forever

[WIREMAN]

Think i'll make another
incarnation of that
Octopus
Take it to Rachel's
new cafe in Harpers Ferry WV.
Really need to put the pliers to the wires
Lotsa holiday shows coming
Workin on some authors
Burroughs, Ginzy, maybe Jack
Tom Robbins too
Although i wouldn't put him up there
with the others
Hunter S. yes
Henry Miller of course
Gautama and Gary Snyder too
The Dalai Lama although i feel
he's a bit more bad than is thought
Some civil war general's would be cool
Crazy Horse and Geronimo
Uncle Albert, he always sells
And of course busts of Goddesses
Love to tweak them breasts
Cool evening
Took the train home for a change
Fall in the air
Monocacy River real deep and muddy
Slow ride, bomb scare in Silver Spring, MD.
Well the govt. workers are back
So's the traffic
The leaves turning
Chris's jeep churning down the hwy. @ 5am.
Wore out from the week
Need to clean this studio
Play some music
and relax for 2 daze
Of course I will Jam
Thanks for the back n forth Mingo

[the mingo]

scattered here
just watching the autumn go by
ain't read much lately
sounds like you're doing enough
for the both of us
riding most days it don't rain
online realtime chess 'til
all hours of the night
seem to be without direction at the moment
but I'm sure I'm going somewhere
and the back & forth
been a pleasure for me too

[WIREMAN]

Abstract jam
Awestruck jam
Aw-shux jam
Reading my high these daze
Rarely novels
Limited attention span
More interviews & letters
Jack, allen, Gary, tom waits, Neal, Carolyn.....
Check out Beatdom.com
Some good articles there
ST where r u
Doreen keeps in touch on FB
Litkicks has action poetry site now
Still not as interactive as in old daze
How fast they become old
Maybe it's with age
Ten years for me,
a halfa life for a twenty year old
Duh, ugh, all that shit
My last cd came out 7 years ago...ugh
Carole jean gone almost 4....ugh
Social security 16 months away
Maybe time to get a bike
Ride round the country like Bronson
Wanna go to Boulder and Big Sur
Up and down the Appalacians
Ride along the blue ridge....free!

[the mingo]

that ride thru the Appalachian mts
hell that opened my eyes this mornin'!
Ha !
man you're talkin' 'bout being
a two wheel nomad!
rises in the land
long grades
and climbs that go a mile or more
killer ascents -
and humping shit too
tools - spare tires - clothes
Holy Jesus Chrysler!
o but the descents - that would be as wild
as angels fallin' from the skies!
shit! - now my coffee seems dull
next to the visions stampeding my mind's eye

[the mingo]

...and riding the west coast
on the highway 1 - the coast highway
say from somewhere north of LA
up thru the central coast
passing thru Big Sur
up to 'Frisco
thru that - & into the wilder
wider coast country of northern cali -
oregon
washington
lands of the coast tribes & big trees
the coast redwoods
where they once told stories
of the trickster Raven -
take you all summer & a bit
and you'd never forget it
the whole thing burnin' itself
into the interior of the brain
& the depths of the heart

[the mingo]

I got given a bike yesterday
an old huffy - a women's model
10 speeds and the front fork
is pink - yeah & so
been hanging in someone's garage
since 1992 -
i hauled it home in the jeep
pumped up the tires
checked nuts & bolts
eyeballed the brakes
checked the shifter cables
the tires held air and I shoved off
ha - everything worked
needs attention sure - new cables
brake pads - new tires just due to age
& a good cleaning - but the ol' girl wheeled down the road
pretty up & walkin' good -
I'll get her jammin' to her best
& if Nancy don't want it
maybe donate it
maybe keep it
and add it to the jam

[the mingo]

sound of traffic
trucks from the big farms
hauling hauling
poets should work the same way
planting the seeds
helping the growth
doing the weeding
watching the skies
hopping at harvest
& getting it on the road
day by day
by the truckload
as a matter of course
man the founding documents of
our nation should have been poems
should have been jam
a whole republic
birthed from the word