I figured
a briefer note
than a poem,
and after
wanted to live on a train
shuttling all over the country,
just sitting there in a seat
and staring at nothing
letting my head recover songs from past times
where I had this tenuous relationship
to thoughts of High Art.

The old drawings came out of me today
after I had to call the police to break up a fight
and they left saying
"Well, they must have woken up on the wrong side of the bed."
What wasn't so funny
was the amount of violence
and me left amid it
and new theft
and goddamn this.

I wanted I think
as a child
to live somewhere where it wasn't polluted
and to capture my dreams with the nib of a pen,
and to clarify
I should say the stuff that happens after dark
and not those stultifying wishes for such and such job
or such and such life.

There was this early dream
where I was escaping a train
coming down the tracks
and all these terrifying oil pumping machines
were walking in horrible turquoise,
and I feel the essence of escape
from that motif in my life
would make me saner,
like hey,
here is a pet bird on a leash that I can impress people with
instead of using money and compliments,

wouldn't that all be nicer
than asking to work at some IT firm
or needing a new car
or having thoughts of some mystery person
coming into your life
to try and love
what we don't even know ourselves?