Can you really judge a book by its cover?

Whoever said you can't judge a book by its cover definitely missed these gems.

1. When Your Phone Doesn't Ring, It'll Be Me
2. If You Can't Live Without Me, Why Aren't You Dead Yet?!
3. Even God Is Single, So Stop Giving Me A Hard Time
4. Babies and Other Hazards of Sex: How to Make a Tiny Person in Only 9 Months, with Tools You Probably Have around the Home
5. English as a Second F*cking Language
6. Women Are from Venus, Men Are from Hell
7. Are Women Human? And Other International Dialogues
8. Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About Human Intelligence but Were Too Dumb to Ask
9. The Joy of Sex: Pocket Edition
10. American Bottom Archaeology
11. Re-using Old Graves
12. The Joy of Chickens
13. Highlights in the History of Concrete
14. Greek Rural Postmen and Their Cancellation Numbers
15. The Big Book of Lesbian Horse Stories
16. People Who Don't Know They're Dead: How They Attach Themselves to Unsuspecting Bystanders and What to Do About It
17. The Stray Shopping Carts of Eastern North America: A Guide to Field Identification
18. High Performance Stiffened Structures
19. Living with Crazy Buttocks
20. How to Avoid Huge Ships
21. Oral Sadism and The Vegetarian Personality
22. The Theory of Lengthwise Rolling
23. How to Shit in the Woods
24. I Was Tortured By the Pygmy Love Queen
25. Cheese Problems Solved
26. How to Write A How To Write Book
27. People Who Mattered in Southend and Beyond: From King Canute to Dr Feelgood.
28. Drawing and Painting the Undead.
29. Squid Recruitment Dynamics
30. Glory Remembered: Wooden Headgear of Alaska Sea Hunters

The Passage for Clouds

Not good today
clouds are talking
and they mean business
My soul is the conduit
the passage for clouds
a storm front, a cage
a silent scream
I am frightened, lost
alone
running circles
on the rat's wheel
spinning blindly
out of control

I dislike sharp angles
and irony after midnight
False smiles I do not trust
nor the colour of gun metal
and wide open spaces
I must be small
inconspicuous, hidden
within the fabric
of shadows

No time left, my thoughts
are trouble: a dark rage
I am not me today, only
misinterpretation, nothing
but self infliction
My blood flows backwards
in defiance, my heart turns
rebelliously black
I will not submit, I will not
succumb. I am the answer
I am the razor, I am
the wrist

Strip Joint John

Ode to the piss and poetry
that litter these paint peeled walls.

The language of tile scum talking
its dirty dirt, and dark mysterious grout
gashing the straight slash
that underlines the scribbly smut.

The curly dark hairs like guitar-string
clippings laid out in hieroglyphic fashion
along with the black & brown bruises
that anguish an ancient bowl, and sink
the unsinkable sink.

The fracture of mirror, its vagueness
perpetuated by neglect, reflecting more
the filth it wears than the face it bares.

And the faucets, those tapity-tap taps
that dripity-drip drip with their barking
assault and marking of territory: Piss, rust,
weak & jaundice.

Let us bow to this delivery room,
this place of worship and redemption,
on our hands and knees; lets us pray
to the gods of acceptance and salvation,
and hold tightly the truth of our oneness
in this subterranean Hell.

For my friends, when all is said
and done (and often all is said & done)
we must stare down into that reflection
of loneliness and forfeit everything
we pretend to be true yet know to be false.

So together & alone lets grab
the crusted-black porcelain puppy
and rejoice in that familiar whirlpool; that big white
collection plate that’s seen every which way
this room can spin; that confession
booth with ears wide open
waiting for us to spill our guts.

‘Cause face it, boys & girls, in the end
we all could use a little forgiveness
from time to time, a little love
to keep us going is what I’m talking about.

Sing out loud, let your voice be heard, repeat
after me:

THIS IS THE REAL THING, MAN:
I AM HERE AND THIS IS NOW
AND ANYTHING OUTSIDE OF THIS
IS JUST WINDOW DRESSING FOR THAT.

Now say it twice…just in case.

And let me tell you, my friends, it matters, it all
matters, every bloody detail: this shitty poem
and the dirt under your fingernails;
the rotation of the earth & sun and the base beat
pounding from the dance floor above; and even
the stench of Boilermakers on your breath
and that damn cockroach
crawling up the inside of your pant leg.

Asamatteroffact, especially
that damn cockroach
crawling up the inside of your pant leg.

Newton's Law

They quarantined gravity today.
Wrestled it to the ground
isolating it
within a sealed vacuum.

Big government secret
the report said, and warned that
the law of gravity will be amended,
and a new tax is to be expected,
as if we’d expect anything less.

I’m sure it’s no lie,
I read it in the Enquirer
(expiring minds and all)
right under the Hitler Cloned
article. And you know they tell
only the truest
of truths.

And no,
asamatteroffact,
it wasn’t my paper. Wouldn’t
catch one under my arm.
And I can say with all honesty
I’d have missed it completely
if it hadn’t floated by.

Thoughts from Inside My Mouth

They’s changing things in my mouth
and charging me a bunch for the privilege
Not sure what really They poke and stick me
here and there good Charge extra for the xrays

I got no money Used to have a bunch
to throw at my friends
booze, drugs, partys every night,
but it’s all gone now, history

Mister Jackass say I been late
too many days Say he got no jobs
that start at 9:30 am, only 8:00 am
Say he better start seeing
some changes.

You’re fucking lucky I make it by 9:30
I told him that on the phone
when I quit

Don’t mind being poor though Except
the dentist he don’t care about it none
Only worry to him is whether I got enough
to help keep his kids in private school
and his wife in Andrew Lloyd Webber tickets

Can’t say I’d think any different
if I was him

But I’m not and I don’t

Sometimes the facts of life
aren’t nearly as poetic as they should be

Joey’s coming over, he cashed in
some empties

Pool Hall opens in 20 minutes

There's one last pint in the fridge
think I’ll drink it

Living the High LIfe

1. MILK
2. BREAD
3. EGGS
4. SWANSON’S HUNGRY-MAN DINNER X 5
5. JACK DANIELS
6. U.S. STAMPS
7. KRAFT DINNER X 5
8. KETCHUP
9. CARTON OF PLAYERS
10. PICKLED BEETS
11. CHEDDAR CHEESE
12. PRUNES
13. CAPTAIN CRUNCH
14. .45 CALIBER AMMO
15. HUGGY’S DIAPERS
16. COORS LITE X 6
17. EXLAX
18. TOILET PAPER
19. PLAYBOY
20. OREO COOKIES
21. FOOT POWDER
22. POTATOES

Cracked

tuesday 1:15pm @ the coffee time
queen & broadview
welfare cheque in hand
planning some
short-term future:

1. too-for of X port
2. 26er of JD
3. dime-bag of crack from a guy named Elvis Star
4. & a peperony pizza (double cheeze) for tomorrow afternoons breakfast

theres 24 hours worth so far

lifes not hard
but ya gotta plan ahead