Dango

Riding in Circles

There was a time when the highest form
of enjoyment I knew was riding in circles
in the elementary playground, yeah just
balancing and feeling the sense of movement
and relative speed was enough;
I could do it for hours

Riding a bike back from Roppongi I realized that
is no longer enough, 30 is a ripe old age
to discover that riding on earth
that has been asphaltized for the benefit
of wheels and other insentient devices,
is not enough

but the three girls dancing
more than dared me to do it, against the
restraints of my one true girlfriend
sleeping in the tatami room,
yes three honeys were the dessert
and one deep kiss had me
riding in circles.

Insurgents

what does it mean 30 insurgents were killed,
were they killed in a house, with their family,
on a farm? were they killed man to man or
by bomb, like a dealer with the upper hand,
was anyone left to mourn?

Cold Eyes

he saw himself as a thwarted artist
basically ammoral

bent to create a new race, profound on
a wing of fate to paradise

fed speed by his personal physician
in mammoth quantities

yeah, no wonder the world had not seen
his like, and still wonders--

he subjected the world to his own private
drug trip, basically ammoral

how could he? blood and blood
of innocents seeping out I saw him
in a dream

cold and aloof like any war-bred opa
yet something so cold and cutting,
the eyes of the suicidal maniac
clever enough to get what he wants,
mass graves.

they meet and sweat in shades

You should have been around last night, yeah I wish
I could speak English, man I was just... you know
I played you those tapes, cough cough I am pissed
and you are putting on like this mask, all this
latent agressiveness coming through in quips

hey Bobby, dont try that voice,
you hipster go-getter, can`t fool me,
have you heard, everyone is interested
in that woman, Big Mama, she`s so heavy
singing with the fluid lines that Bill lays on
the piano with a certain sadness, tell me
we haven`t missed all the good times.

swaying between the poles

It`s time to admit, without inspiration
there is only that which
I`m trying to muddle through
here on the outer edges of
bachelorhood and wedded bliss
swaying between the poles

though I know I should help myself to what I already have
there is plenty for a feast, yet I have my eyes
on another, another and have done things which
should they reach the light of day, well
a thousand James Bond fans would applaud
and a thousand housewives would put
their feet down and kick my sorry ass out.

Christmas cake

Crashing an after-party of
Christmas festive and pressed-suit
english conversation teachers
the old stereotypes hold true

Here a gaggle of slightly overweight
blonde females, voices slightly raw
and dismissive, not mixing

Here, there, mixing and more
an array of predatory, drunk mid-20`s
americans chatting up one, two
hell, make it three or four

japanese students, most female
dressed up and open to the possibility
of a christmas boyfriend
and more

roppongi kicks

What is it about the Tokyo night life
late night delerium of Roppongi
which despite its obvious pitfalls attracts
massage girls and african hustlers
passing and wheedling passerbys without
a smile or acknowledgement, twin worlds
collide and intersect imperfectly, dolled up
late 20`s Japanese thrill seekers, looking for what?
sleazy sex and promised american underworld thrills
without the danger of Big City New York,
American hayseed soldiers getting drunk and drunker
shouting their straightforward small town inanities
to the money intoxicated night
the flash of club owners, cars passing, Mercedes and BMW
Inebriated, I dance in the overcrowded afterhours disco
feeling up a half brazilian beauty who looks straight direct
her black sillhouette, feeling undeniably attracted to the
soft curves of her body, a moth going for its last flame

Shifting Sands

Had a dream I was a soldier in some vast desert
of ever shifting sands, bone dry valleys ribbed
with hard dead trees, caught between two pincers

Orders from above, enemies like mosquitoes
darting in and drawing blood without leader
or set pattern, killing us one by one.

The sky was deep red and a sort of resignation
entered my soul, a feeling that perhaps

suppose one of those phantoms pierced my armor
and sucked out my soul in the name of allah
or his grandfathers left eye

there would be no light,
nothing to guide me through a faithless night.

paunchy sex tourist

The woods that in their hours
the man who in his moods
grows dark and breezy
rilled with changes, weather
oft succeed in hurtling forward past their time
standing stiff and tall in foreign clime
to face the shimmer and shock of patterns
that break all implicit mold
and alter that from which unfold
expressive looks from last chance lasses
cursory displays of faux-affection
and a fond remembrance of days that pounded by
in dull-tide desperation.

Mr. Peterson`s Gift

It was easy enough to see they loved eachother, they had their arms around eachother half the day, always murmuring sweet nothings and baby names, to be silently rejected with a little shake of the head, or put on the block for further thought with a little smile. It was easy enough to see she loved him, cooking as usual, sometimes with her sister though her stomach churned and she fought the urge to sit down or vomit. It was clear from the way they sat across from eachother at the table, touching knees. And the little presents he sometimes bought her, flowers, even baby toys. Oh yes, they loved eachother. And one day he took her fishing.