100 Goldfish

I went to the pet store
& bought 100 goldfish
one fish for every reason why I miss you

I took the fish home in a five-gallon bucket
& dumped it into the bathtub

they were beautiful
each fish was moving its lips
silently saying our names

I took off my clothes & carefully climbed into the tub
this is the sensation I miss
that feeling
of fish
flapping their fins
all over my body like eyelashes
this is what love feels like

I close my eyes
& recall your laughter
the taste of your kiss
the rope of your braid

my body has memorized
the orbit of your moons
your bells on my tongue
the sweetness of your grouchy face

my world has become so rich
& full
& orange
& blue
& glittering.


Casey Kwang

Flesh

I've been drinking with my worst friends
for so long
that happiness
& sadness
are like a matching pair of tube socks

slouching in the corner
of a corner booth
of a tit bar
on the edge of town
hunched over a low-ball
fingering
a deflated pack of cigarettes over my heart
I catch a glimpse of myself
in the mirror
past the fluorescent teeth
& the air-humping hips on stage

my eyes are milked over
my skin looks dead
& my hair
strangely looks
the best it's ever been.


Casey Kwang

Cotton

when her dress hits the floor
& she steps out
with her panties
clinging to her
in the shape of a foreign country
it makes my chest ache like a hammered thumb

it's like an island
or a birthmark
or a dream
imprinted in cotton
& it kills me
it makes me ache
like there's a cricket in each testicle

my heart swells into a bullfrog
my stomach dissolves into tadpoles
if you sliced me open
i would bleed reptiles because it aches so beautifully
it's like falling and never hitting the ground
it hits me like
rabbit punches from a kangaroo
it aches like
hugging a watermelon with a pulse

it's like
when the wheels
of a chariot
rotate
& the spokes start spinning backwards
it's like that
it's like
when you blow the flame
off a piece of paper
& a tiny red lightning bolt
eats the edge.


Casey Kwang

195th Chorus

The songs that erupt
Are gist of the poesy,
Come by themselves, hark,
Stark as prisoners in a cave
Let out to sunlight, ragged
And beautiful when you look close
And see underneath the beards
the holy blue eyes of humanity
And brown.

The stars on high sing
songs of their own, in motion
that doesnt move, real,
Unreal, singsong, spheres: -

But human poetries
With God as their design
Sing with another law
Of spheres and ensigns
And rip me a blues,
Son blow me a bop,
Let me hear 'bout heaven
In a Brass Flugelmop


Jack Kerouac

113th Chorus

Got up and dressed up
and went out & got laid
Then died and got buried
in a coffin in the grave,
Man -
Yet everything is perfect,
Because it is empty,
Because it is perfect
with emptiness,
Because it's not even happening.

Everything
Is Ignorant of its own emptiness -
Anger
Doesnt like to be reminded of fits -

You start with the Teaching
Inscrutable of the Diamond
And end with it, your goal
is your startingplace,
No race was run, no walk of prophetic toenails
Across Arabies of hot
meaning - you just
numbly dont get there


Jack Kerouac

23rd Chorus

CHORUS NO. 1 of
Blues in Bill's Pad

CHORUS NO. 23 of
San Francisco Blues

FOURTEEN CHORUSES
of Blue City Blues

Fifteen O Choruses
of Genu wine blues

Sing you a blues song
sing you a tune
Sing you eight bars
of Strike Up the band

Eight of Indiana, eight
of Israel,
Eight of Chubby's Chubby,
eight of old Wardell

Yes, baby Count Blue
Basie's fat old Chock
Wallopin Fat Rushing
Was a wow old saloon man.


Jack Kerouac

13Th Chorus

I caught a cold
From the sun
When they tore my heart out
At the top of the pyramid

O the ruttle tooty blooty
windowpoopies
of Fellah Ack Ack
Town that russet noon
when priests dared
to lick their lips
over my thumping meat
heart-
the Sacrilegious beasts
Ate me 10,000 million
Times and I came back
Spitting Pulque
in Borracho
Ork
Saloons
of old Sour Azteca

Askin for more
I popped outa Popocatapetl's
Hungry mouth


Jack Kerouac