Aug 15, 2022
On Getting Free
In the base court? Come down? Down, court!
Down, king! For night-owls shriek where mounting larks should sing. (Rich. II, 3:3.)
I am thinking about radical shifts. About
being good. Being bad. Own your badness,
which is just authenticity. They say authenticity
like it’s nice, good, full of light. But it’s not safe,
being truly seen. It’s a swim in dark waters.
My mother only wanted nice things.
“I found some lovely bird seed,” she told Amy. Also:
“we might be boring but we’re not crazy.”
You can be both, I said.
This is a deep and harrowing journey
into the beating, writhing heart of the jungle
into the grabbing thorny tendrils
of poisonous trees.
It’s not nice but it’s real as fuck.
Finally
there is a beautiful still pool
reflecting your surface back
but look past the surface, dive profoundly
into the layers of truth hiding in darker waters
with the sea
monsters
and piranhas
and at the bottom
Go down into Hades
Go down to Egypt
Go down into the most shameful waters
Go down into closets and rooms and church belfries
find yourself there
find your truth
and if you can’t find yourself
keep searching
keep digging
keep uncovering all
the most uncomfortable truths
most uncomfortable selves.
Move the mud away to uncover the child
uncover a queen
uncover
A fucking king! Nothing less! Listen to me, buddy. I’m seen shit. Oh, man, I have. Who’s playing? Giants-Dodgers, huh? Can we agree the Dodgers can go fuck themselves? Hey, who are you? That’s right, you’re a fucking king — better than your father or President Dipshit. “Wake up to find out that you are the eyes of the world.” Am I right? Yeah, the Giants do suck but like I said ……..
I have been in the closet.
I walked to the closet.
I was taken in hand and walked there
and I followed meekly. I trusted.
I was foolish. I didn’t have myself.
I followed him. I followed my wife,
mistresses, lovers. I always follow.
I never lead. I wait and while I’m waiting
form myself into the mask. I become the mask
I become.
Taking it off is painful.
I become the pain.
Become the freedom.
I emerge from a scrambled egg and paint myself
into a rabbit’s hole. I threw out the canvases because
I dreamed of painted ladies
but I didn’t write the Hero’s Journey.
There was an algae version but dragons
paint by numbers. I painted
Ophelia as a whore
and tried to leave her there but she kept sending me
roses
until the ship was made ready to take
me to England.
After escaping the closet I was …
under the bed
trying to be good but
in the secret shadowy places i knew
who I was. It felt good
closed in and erotic and broken. I didn’t want
their suburban life, I yearned
for the cities they abandoned
for strippers
musky bedrooms and the pull
of leather. In solitude
I ruled the sacred hearts.
I sought to take the sacred whore
to suffer with Christ
and murder those
who would reduce Zeus to imagination
and break God into component
paganisms.
