POEMS (Continued)
by
Reinhard A. Palovcik
Edited by Tom Miller
© 1995, 1996
Reinhard A. Palovcik
and FREDInk Records
Revealing dimensions
some touching
some bizarre
from the mind of the author
Only Once
We are here only once
As time passes by, inexorably
These wasted moments
Composing poetry
Could have been better spent
Fucking some beautiful woman
It was only my lack of success
In the latter endeavor
That drove the speech for this verse
For who
when given an opportunity
of ecstatic fulfillment
Would waste their time with such hollow
symbols of ambiguous
questionable meaning
Rot My Brain
Dig me a hole, stuff me with stuffing
Bury me in a grave of hot earth
to roast in agony for my sins
Fry me on a skillet of moralized judgment
Purge me of all pleasure and lust
Autoclave my heart
to kill all those eating germs of desire
Rot my brain with scientific and intellectual crap
that generates equations for the mass killing of souls
Liberate me from the life force and drive me to spiritual
abstraction
Until I am become a ghost
Able only to observe
but not feel
those ever-quickening pattern of destruction
that drive mankind to extinction
Evil Midgets
These evil midgets
hoard their gold
In grubby
dwarf armpits
In smelly crotches
Skin
all scabby and raw
Mining uranium in caves
They pile profit
upon profit
In negligent abandon
Sucking the desire of uncounted millions
Draining dollars to feed their mildewed lust
While generating a heat that consumes
bodies
souls
Destroying those values of love and devotion
that we scattered few still cherish in the sun
Money
Money is money is money
My money, your money
Coins, paper money
Plastic money, digital money
A poor man's money
procured with great suffering and effort
is spent, each penny, with specific purpose
buying food, clothes, medicine
The loss of a hundred dollars may bring
ruin, devastation, starvation
A rich man's money grows on trees
As he sits, idle, by his pool
No awareness of pennies or dollars
Amounts are counted in the thousands and millions
A rich man's money buys
Limousines, mansions, yachts
The loss of ten thousand may barely bring a frown
Which is more just?
To tax a poor man
depriving him of food
Or to tax a rich man
depriving him of fun?
Rare
That rarefied moment of :
YES, I LOVE you, FUCK my brains out
Occurs only in the imagination
When
in a brief instant in time
inhibitions are expunged
to a distant site of awareness
And the infinity of our world
becomes discretely focused on
the shape of a nose
the trace of an elbow
the curve of a thigh
or the gently converging crescent of a crotch
War
The roar of jet engines overhead increasing in pitch
as they approach
Cluster bombs released descend in groups
Fall and wobble gracefully
as to the tune of a symphony
Descending relentlessly
unstoppable
they approach
their human targets
Those few
who are unaware
gaze upward
to see the descending horror
Screaming
try to run
but where?
As they strike their targets
throwing multiple fragments of doom
in all directions
They strip skin from flesh
flesh from muscle
muscle from bone
Blood gushes forth, freely, released from its captive state
of nourishing thoughts, memories, loves
After various stages of writhing in pain
several find solace in death
Others linger in a twilight of suffering and remorse
Why me?
This was never my war
Destruction is total
and very democratic
Good and bad
virtuous and vile
holy and blasphemous
are destroyed in equal measure
Alcoholic
Staring into the bottle
I see only a few drops left
I won't give up yet
As I tip the bottle
these few remaining drops disperse
and wet the sides
A vague fragrance of whiskey
wafts from the bottle
breathing it won't help
To extract those few remaining drops
I fill the bottle with a small amount of water
shake
drink it
But it's not enough
Not enough to stave off the craving
Not enough to fight the pain of a rotting liver
Not enough to tranquilize my failure at life
Not enough to lose
the suffering of total disappointment in love
Not enough to stave off the upcoming seizures
Not enough to look for
and find
the next bottle
Lost
So hard to form these words
these sentences
I hadn't thought about you for a long time
but once the spark was lit
it all came cascading back
I had already spent hours, days, years
thinking of you
You weren't the most beautiful
or the most intelligent
But you had, within me
awakened some strangely perfect feelings
Moments filled with boredom
turned to moments of anticipation
Colors brightened
my ears buzzed to every mention of your name
As I focused these desires and intents
a lush, unearthly presence begged for release
At first, I missed opportunities
not knowing how to feel or what to say
Afterwards, I tried too hard to demonstrate my love
and realized too late
you didn't love me
And so
I floated in a languid sea of numbing pain
restlessly drifting from one terror
to the next
I imagined, with vividness and fervor
what it would feel like to have you near me
to hear you speak, see you move
and feel your love
And imagined too
What you felt
As you flitted
From one liaison to the next
Not caring for love
But only an occasional caress and release
I couldn't reconcile these desires with my feelings
nor neither with reality
And so felt as if I were a naked corpse
in a wilderness of shame
Finally, I built the suspense
into a mortal tragedy
I gave you the ultimate choice
either love me or I will destroy myself
But I didn't really want to die
Not for you nor any other causes or beliefs
And so I found other reasons to live
many of them
Now only one thought still rings true
I will never love
anyone but you
And this barely beating heart
that still nourishes an aging brain
Soon
it too
will stop
And gone will be these memories
And gone
will be
my love
for you
Purest
How strange, in this illusion of life on earth
the purest love goes unfulfilled
Jellyfish
Jesus most loves the jellyfish
Soft, squishy, mellow things
Floating gently on a shimmering sea
Undulating slowly in the waves
No sex, no sin
each complete in its hermaphroditic wholeness
Not needing to copulate to continue its kind
Each already in a heaven of simple-minded nothingness
Floating, together
with others of its species
In shapes of crosses
and other arcane Christian symbols
Reminiscence
At night, under starry sky, walking a now familiar path
My thoughts wandered back
to feelings of youthful exuberance
When the whole world lay at my feet
I was free to take any direction
So many paths
each with its own splendor and shining jewels
Desiring riches
fame
and love
I wanted them all
Realizing only now, in the last few moments of life
Billions of souls, billions of paths
Each with its own special, secret pleasures
Each with suffering and terror
Now
just before death
none more important than any other
Insight
Most of the greatest insights
are but the briefest flashes
Pulled from an expanded, collective awareness
And, if not held open through a gate in time
by constant
conscious
vigilance
they vanish instantly
never to again be retrieved
Collapsing quickly
into a void
Made all the more empty
by the sudden absence
of the once
powerful pulse
Stream of Tears
A plain cup of bitter black coffee
sits at the coffee bar, untouched
Two cigarettes lie crushed in the ashtray
one lipstick stained, the other filterless
Outside
rain driving down at angles
generates small rivers of tears
that run along the curb
She, standing in the rain
eyes swollen with tears
looks at him
searching
He, holding umbrella
breathes eavenly
looking distracted
She, hands shaking, pulls out another cigarette
lights it
inhales deeply
Smoke, collecting slowly under the umbrella
escapes in streams along the edge
only to be captured and driven down by rain
As they walk slowly together down the street
The patter of rain and noise of traffic
fail to penetrate her private ocean of pain
While he, oblivious of mud slung by passing tires,
Sheds but a single tear that disappears quickly in the rain
From now on they will follow separate paths
Each
by choice
crying into separate streams
Ego
The self which resides within this moving shell of flesh
slides between spaces of words
To hear itself breathe and ponder
yet another night alone
Lost in a wilderness of dreams
from which friendly demons
tickle and taunt a confused ego
with ironic supplication
A fatal battle between altruistic superego
spirals inward to annihilate with a self indulgent id
Leaving only light
shed on
leaf
stem
and trunk
Simple
I could remain forever young
Never letting tracks of tragedy
traverse my face
Discarding sadness of past failure
Retaining only cherished memories
Dying at the end of every day
How simple such a life would be
Ferret
He was aghast at the ferret droppings on his rug
scattered about in random fashion
Picking up the ferret and raising it to his lips
he sucks in a large load of droppings
Then shoots them out in perfect geometric patterns
It was the regularity
the all-importance of reason that counted
No tolerance for asymmetry or disorder
As long as he generated and perceived order
he had fulfilled his function
and felt contented and relaxed
Eat Shit
Eat my shit, motherfucker
Feel the vomit rise in your throat
Chew and swallow the bitter waste
And when it enters your blood
to secrete a poison of death
Feel your muscles convulse and wrench in agony
So that I may lose all trace of humanity
to writhe with the maggots
that will devour your rotting flesh
