"the mind is a terrible thing"

fun in the night with Tattoo and Walker

she is taking back her breath today

out of her cloud bank of busy work

intoxicating words, phantom music

all the things she does to distract

herself from pain and boredom:

"the mind is a terrible thing"

we laughed about that when we

first met until we cried on the floor

but it turned out to be a metaphor

for the way we live

pushing the envelope into the night

until sunlight cracks the darkness

and we have to admit defeat again

that sleep is overtaking our bodies

and turning our brains to pale jelly

you in your room, me in mine

the electronic switching of mass

media 24/7 until two days later

I twirl a spinning yarn and you

write ten haiku for a massacre

why bother, you say, when no one

will read it and you chalk it up

to another process experiment

in which the two of us light each

other up like glittering bonfires

spitting out romantic-era music

and volumes of epic poems on death

we, the sole loners on a sinking ship

holding hands as we go under

my pain singing with your tinnitus

in the past few days I have chosen

to retract, refract the sparks that

come at me in light years 'til

i'm that blazing bush talking to

moses and you know it frightens me

brother, i've got to calm down the

neurons, drink plenty of water

and stop these dangerous floes

because the mind is a terrible thing

it can take you in the wrong direction

i'm going away for a spell to

that now unfathomable hinterland
taking with me a thing resembling

clockworks, discipline and sleep

re-integrating my action with inaction

i should have done this long ago

but it's not too late to give it a go

while you sit at your new hammond

walking bass notes with the left hand

chords with the right for the fun of it