To Avram and his Ping Pong Balls

Like eating an olive
He pinched
The way one throws

salt

on

eggs
This wisdom to me:

The room
After music has left
You’re empty
Like pairing
Pears or
Pairs of wool
Socks to feet to salve
senses worn under
Pumice put to skin reminds me of shears
to wool.
Wool-like putting on a sock
In winter.
Like the world needs to hide its raw
Skin. Truth toga’d itself
up-draped and covered. Blankets shawled and shucked over a banister’s shoulder

Avram,
He said religion is delusion,
And he said listen:
The world rhythm in a highway guitar
The hum of every prayer we never get to see
The sun apricoting
Juiced and
Squeezed into sundown: a peach fisted until pop
Rotting its way down
Rotting our way down
Like we’re on our way down

Foot

into

sock.

He said
don’tyouseeImeanhear
Those bells in the distance
Aren’t so much bells
As creaks in wood
Flooring. The sound from our feet
Is closer to our mind than we think.
And that is why I have been treading lightly recently.
And you should as well when you

F Train

Those nicotine heads

The ones lilting

Standing together at the subway

Congregating in pews, banquet

halls of sunflowers.

And Avram he dropped

               his wallet

At the foot of his rolling chair
like he dropped

his gaze

So violently it was almost gentle in its deliberate attempt not to be.

But Avram please stop
Pinching my forehead
Like an olive
Javelined by toothpick
Or a stop sign. This is the sign
To stop:
You’re hurting. Examine:

There are other things
I assure you, Avram, to think about
I miss my mother far too much
For you to pick me up like this

Avram I offer to you a solution:

Life is just one long game

Of dramatic irony

A gourd burst somewhere
And someone's head with it

Like taking the F train’

Those days I wore so many coats

           Kept naked truth

           Clothed

I was carried more by the weather

than by any other force

when I couldn’t throw myself out of seats

Like empty hallways drawn out in yawns

those empty trains on yarns

And I’m back on wool

Those jazz players in smoky clubs
The ones my dentist goes to.
Their bodies sucked into and through their chello
Like they know its name
The red sun warbling in vibrato time with Randy Newman
And I’m a new man, I tell Avram
Once I have realized it
It’s only a matter of time before application

That’s just some jazz shit, Avram,
Dentist jazz like electric sliding
A foot into sock or me
into new skin
Like Avram,
I will never be as brave
As my teeth because they could chew
Until I died.

And it comes down to me just talking to myself, Avram
Don’t you see
The bigger picture Avram: it’s huge.
Don’t focus on one goose, focus on their formation.
Aren’t we all just trying to blow someone's mind?
So stop being a disturbance
To yourself

Like that gourd I shot with the shotgun

Like the pumpkin I threw into the field of sunflowers

Like the ping pong balls and verbs I scattered among the subways of New York,

        Like the bells that ring in change

And I hope, Avram, you use this as a map in times of trouble

Because sometimes you need to lose everything

So that looking for things again is a place to start

And Avram please
stop looking
So hard so harsh
In the mirror
Like self
Scrubscrubscrubbed under pumice
That weight you told me  about Avram,
It’s gonna crack it—the mirror I mean
And then you’re gonna crack in
When you should just crack on
New things are important, too, Avram, don’t forget

Those ping pong balls you told me about, Avram
The ones you carried
For years in your pocket,
Four years in your pocket,
Well I’m thinking about them, Avram
And I’m thinking if you scattered them.
Like heaven lost all its marbles

Avram I’m thinking those ping pong balls mom gave to you
I’m thinking that if I took those ping pong balls from you, Avram
Maybe, Avram, your mother would have felt it as well. Because you can’t hold
Onto things for too long. And maybe. They would be gone for good for good.