I am the bean counter
who counts the beans!
-just as simple as it seems
still, there are many
different means
of the bean counter
who counts the beans.

weigh them out
now don't you fumble...
wrap them in
the perfect bundle!
take care and focus
on your dreams
while counting out
the coffee beans.

and if you find it
hard to sit
and feel time slip by
bit by bit,
then take care and focus
on the beans
while counting out
your lovely dreams.

well, everything lovely reminds me of you
and all things that are sad
make me wish you were here

even through spaces that feel too long
I get strength when I'm with you
I'm strong when you're gone

and even as you left me lonely
and even as it is so wrong
that look in your eyes tells me
something, and oh
how I know

that everything lovely reminds you of me
and all things that are bad
make you wish I was there

so it sits untouched in between us, my dear
what to do
with a love that still cares.

And all I can think about is the memos at school.
Apparently somebody lost a Nemo doll
but I was the only one who laughed out loud.

Right now I am in Louisiana visiting my Grandparents... Yay... We had one of our lovely family jam sessions and my Grandmother wanted me to sing Cry Me A River, and I did, oh and B-E-A-Utifully, but that is not quite my point. I don't know how well you know the song, but it's an old jazz standard consiting on two versus a bridge and last verse - pretty standard. ANyway, I always get those darn verses all mixed up so I typed myself some cues quickly. Just for the verses and just the main word or phrase in each line (only two lines per verse that change). I just happened to glance at it now out of context, a few hours later, and it struck me as it was. I mean it's not amazingly ingenuitive or poetic, just neat... to me anyway...

lonely
cry the whole night

sorry
so untrue

love me
prove you do

Just so's you know, here's the original:

Now you say you're lonely
You cry the whole night through
Well you can cry me a river
Cry me a river
I cried a river over you

So you say you're sorry
For being so untrue
Well you can cry me a river
Cry me a river
I cried a river over you

You drove me
Nearly drove me out of my head
While you never shed a tear
Remember
I remember all that you said
Told me love was too plebeian
Told me you were through with me and

NOW you say you love me
Well just to prove you do
Why don't you cry me a river
Cry me a river
I cried a river over you

yeah...

chaaa...!!! (with jazz hands)

sometimes i get a feeling
that im going to float away
up into the sky
like a forgotten balloon

and everyone will go "ooo..."
as I disapear into the clouds

don't think she said
that would be a mistake at this point
i think she added
wryly and began to putter about again.
she shifted the pots on the stove and brought out two
mismatched mugs two saucers two
spoons the sugar and
some cream and finally a plate of biscuits
purposefully and all this time not
looking in my direction.
she paused by the open window.
then decidedly she put down the dishrag
and gazed across at me,

oh child, she laughed when she saw my expression (though her lips never moved)
mercy girl, have mercy on your soul...
and she handed me the mug
with the alligator handle filled with a liquid sweet and hot
took her usual seat and held her hands peacefully
wrapped around her tea as if absorbing
it's ancient and magical properties first through her palms
a pre-drink... a taste
I could almost see the aromatic tentacles
that filled her nostrils and drifted across her lined and smiling face
(though her lips never moved)
she took a slow and deliberate slurp of a sip and then fixed me
with her piercing gaze,
Now, she said smacking her lips appreciatively
and again, now, as the corners of her mouth turned up to god.

now, what's all this?

I sighed deeply and perhaps a bit over-dramatically and showed her
my tangled mess of a mind and
sat quietly and mostly patiently while she poked around a little
occasionally remarking a hmm or an aha and sometimes err, umm... oh. I see.
when she re-emerged it was only briefly to reach into her handbag
and pull out a long and elegant silver feather duster, then silently
she went back to work and
long after I had finished my tea she once more took to her chair,

it's really not so bad, she told me impassively, hard to read
only, a tad disorganized yes?
I nodded stiffly and tried to swallow my annoyance
with her simplicity, as her eyes never moved but stayed solid
beckons of calm. a tortoise of a smile crept across her face
old and wise and
slow
I shifted my eyes instantly cursing myself, so hard to hold
that gaze... but
she read my disquiet and her look softened almost imperceptibly
shouldn't be much of a problem for you she added coyly, because you're really good at finding things.

I could feel it in my throat, a pressure and
behind my eyes and through the bridge of my nose and
in my chest and in the empty place just below my sternum which
was now swimming with something that was somewhere between
dying and coming back to life,
well, I always liked to sit on the fence.

I hid in the silence avoiding her eye and
chewing absent-mindedly on my thoughts
like stale gum.
(something to do but still, there's just no flavour...)

I had almost forgotten where I was and
when I finally glanced up at her she was looking me full in the face, a full dose
of that placid something... what was it? this moment
intrigue and this moment empathy fluid from one
to the next rolling into contemplation to concern
to pity but
then she came to rest in my eyes and there was
nothing there but herself.

everything has a point of balance.

I would have thought it was she who had said it had I not
been facing her at the time
(and her lips never moved)
the words I had uttered echoed around my existence bouncing off various
ideas and shattering conclusions
taking me back to a beach where I had once balanced large rocks
as a kid, one on top of the other;
taking me back to an english teacher trying desperately to explain the purpose
of refining one's work to a class of adolescents;
taking me back to the hand-stands I had attempted that
morning in my backyard;
oh, taking me back and forth between a number of things -perhaps everything-
that had all seemed unrelated up until that point;
and finally it took me
to my current state of affairs,
and that is where I stewed for sometime until
my fingers were like prunes and I could not retain any more.

everything has a point of balance.

I looked down at the old saffron coloured tablecloth and I reached
for my mug, the saucer, her mug then
the other saucer, the sugar, the cream and
the plate of biscuits and lastly two spoons at the top of the whole teetering miracle
and I looked at her around the structure I had built between us.

everything, I repeated.

she smiled then, not just with her eyes and
with some amount of pride I felt, although she stowed it carefully
away so as not to embarrass.
(but I did see her lips move) as
we both sat contemplating our model.

***

and time passed.
when I think about time I think about a moment -now-
spilt all over the floor.
and the past is a vacuum that sucks it all in and
the other end that circles around and spills it back out
is the future,
so that the whole thing is in constant
cyclical and self-perpetuationg motion.

this moment is uncontained, however briefly
now is unleashed onto the floor.
the moments
through the past and the future were once
now and will be again.
cycled and recycled time.

so I asked her what do you think about
when you think about time?
She took a few moments to consider me, then she said
when I think about time
I think of only time.

this seemed initially inadequate to me and had I thought
that I could extract
a different sort of response I would have tried.
however as I thought it over
it was something to be said that she remained perfectly in form.

her way is pure and simple, but she is no fool.
I know that she knew what I had meant and yet
she was trying to point something out to me.
don't get too ahead of yourself
don't fall behind. she was telling me to pay attention
maybe then you won't be so disorganized, she added
with a wink in my mind's eye.

But that was when it all came crashing down before me.

I jumped, shocked back into the moment and stared
across at her, my eye's wide in surprise.
for a second I felt a heavy sinking too strong to be caused by what it had been.
but she laughed loudly and appreciatively
at my spontaneous reaction,
and I likewise until we had settled ourselves enough
to pick up the pieces
of broken china and glass and to clean up the mess
of tea and sugar and cream and biscuits all over the table and
the floor.

everything has a point of balance, she said all smiles when we had finished and
I laughed and she showed me to the door even though
I knew the way, and she turned to me and said
just keep paying attention, balance does require some amount effort.
then she hugged me close and closer and closer
until she was part of me again
and I sighed.

balance does require some amount of effort.
it also requires something else, I said aloud
gazing through the window at the warm summer afternoon.

soon I was back to it in the yard, kicking my legs up behind me
above my head, finding just the right muscles
just the right arch,
just the right point of balance.
a few times I stayed up for more than a moment or two walking myself around
on my hands. just enough
to entice me to keep trying.
and that's what life does, she said from far off inside of me.

I was circling in on it now, as I kicked up and came down
kicked up and came down.
kicked up and came down.
kicked up and stayed up and stayed up and stayed up...

everything takes practice.
I told my hands and the ground just before toppling into them.
I lay there breathing heavily
not thinking just lying and breathing and lying and breathing and lying.
but after a while
there was nothing left to do.
I had to pick myself up and start over.

What the FUCK!!!!!!!!

Ten minutes before midnight in Mrs. Benson's living room hardly anything was amiss. This was not unusual. She was a very clean woman in a sort of way that makes one ever so slightly uncomfortable. She had a way of staring scrupulously into a person's face that made one feel as though, given the chance, she would very much like clean them too. Thoroughly.
On this particular evening all of the picture frames were exactly level to within an eighth of a centimeter, the area rug was centered meticulously, the drapes were ever so slightly ascue - but this was an unavoidable symptom of leaving the window cracked for air, as Iris had learned to accept through years of rigorous therapy. Really the only sign that anyone had been inside the place in the last fifty years other than to dust and polish the expensive and considerably tacky furniture and decor, was that Iris Benson herself was perched primly in a large squashy armchair that dwarfed her small -but sturdy looking- frame.
Her legs stuck over the edge nowhere near to the ground and she kept her ankles crossed with her hands folded neatly in her lap. She appeared stoic and slightly expectant, but was otherwise unreadable (except perhaps to the trained eye, which may have detected a slight twitch in the right corner of her mouth). on her legs rested, almost predictably somehow, a collection of tangled yarn and two knitting needles from which trailed what may or may not have been a rather large and mishapen tube sock.
Nine minutes before midnight in Mrs. Benson's living room and the picture frames were all still level to an eighth of a centimeter, the area rug was still in the area it should have been in, the trained eye may have noticed some yarn sticking out from under the armchair, and possibly the disappearence of Mrs. Benson and the sudden existance of a nonchalant and somewhat over-watered Begonia.

Glancing at my watch
The face disapearing from my memory

Elusively, piece by
Particle as I search
It in my mind
Escaping me just when I desperately
Try to hold on to

The curve of your smile
The oval of your eye
Now only seen out of the corner
Of mine

Your image is becoming periferal
But your essense is
Everywhere

A continuous reminder
Of what
I am forgetting

"In tales of Ancient Glory
every knight and maiden fair
shall be joined when the quest is over
and a kiss is the oath that they swear

and when the veil of dreams has lifted
and the fairy-tales have all been told
there's a kiss at the end of the rainbow
more precious than a pot of gold

my sweet, my dear, my darling
you're so far away from me
though an ocean of tears devides us
let the bridge of our love span the sea

and when the veil of dreams has lifted
and the fairy-tales have all been told
there's a kiss at the end of the rainbow
more precious than a pot of gold"

- Mitch and Mickey

She imagines love and
Round dreams grow,
Bubble for joy

And get sad
The music is slow.

Funny that
The night went by
Together

With the butterfly,
Flowering time;

That sun followed moon,
She who flew
Silently
For his sky.

do i really...?
Do I?
Do I really think i do...?
i dont really think i really think i do...
i dont really think i do...
i dont really think...
think...
do i?
do i really?
do i really really really??
i dont think i really do...
i dont really think i do...
because if i do then what is it?
if i do then what is it?
if i really do then really what is it?
i dont think i really do...
i dont really think i do...
i dont really think.

"got a good reason for taking the easy way out"
but i dont really think
i do

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crack that whip cried
the old
sleigh dog Gineva and Toni
at her back egging
them on and on and
on and she asks
herself:
what is this nonsense?
Does any of this make sense to you
or do you just write to make
them wonder at
your ramblings?
Or do you get some sick
satisfaction from
chewing up
paper pulp and spit
spit spitting it
all over everything
everywhere god damn
what a fucking mess.

OH my GOD just
wait just WAIT until Marnie
gets her hands on you,
why did you leave her anyway?
afraid of what she might uncover?
afraid of loving?
or just lazy that's what she said
or just the most selfish person in the world that's
what she said now
THAT IS what she said.

And Jylophone just pulled out a knife
and took it to his bellybutton
pulled it right up to his neck and spilled
his life all over that carpet that
Mckayda spent all week putting in the one
she picked out at home depot
impractically white and she swore she'd be so careful
well she didn't anticipate
it to be in all aspects of her life
you dig?
she'd never seen anything quite like it when his
organs slid from him but yuck
enough is enough
*SNAP*
goes that latex glove

meanwhile the hornets nest is about to
hit the fan some ways down the road
at cottage number thirteen and two tenths
Yolando is frying the butter beans and
looking whistfully
wantingly through his head for
some other form of
deliberation because he says
as far as he is concerned the current state
of affairs in his brilliant and terribly expensive
brain is not quite up to par with it's
extreme cleverness
no no, it will not do.
He must therefore concoct a new way to concoct
and even Yolando in all of his
wit, has not yet found a way to think up another way
to think. He finds, to much dismay and
aggrivation that each time he thinks he's got it
he realizes subsiquently that he is still very much thinking
in the old way and rather imagining a far off
sort of concept.
and so he stares in a sad sort of stupor with
a look of benign concentration on his plain face and
passes the hours frying and eating butter beans
while waiting for the stroke of genious as
the stroke of midnight chimes over again
counting down
his minutes and hours left.
he looks at it reproachfully
to him it is a prompt
a push
a "hey hurry up and get that idea" voice
that torments him litterally around
the clock.
Hot damn where is that Ericaya when you need him?
by jove he always new how to have a good time
and it's been ages hasn't it?

hasn't it?

time looks thick and filmy
spread out before me
a vast expanse across which I will
travel and meet you on the other side
of this puddle
sticky and slippery time
that will pass
in it's own
I reach down to drop my hand
to the liquid,
cleansing yet
hard to swallow.
I swim through it
and it
tastes
like
soap.

and Mickey said
to hell with it
saddled up his redemption claim and
made to pack it in, headed home
alone on the same
old trail ignoring the cold
and wispy doubts
curling smoke-like around
his apotheosized head, grasping
mournfully at his face
pulling at his hair,
no matter, he sighs
as he brushes them aside
no matter, I reckon
but he knows it's a lie
for there is always matter, isn't there?

frittered by his miscommunications and
generally antagonized
by a guilt that is neither here
nor there, which
incidentally
is why it proves so elusive.
poor Mickey, I say
let him have a good day
and he does but it's still just
a drop in the spitoon
and he hardly lets himself notice
these days.

oh how those words echo
through his disquiet
these days... croons
the lady with the macromanic pleasure
he keeps his drink tipped
to his lips, partly
to drown in his own sycophancy and
then to hide his face
from the sacrament of the bar
bellowing in his ears
and moving tightly around his body, he stands
closing his eyes to feel
the movement, a wave of inhibition
flowing through the people dancing, writhing
loving, people just like him
waiting like double-dutch to jump
into the moment.

Mickey, Mickey you're here. she murmers
into his chest
her voice is thick, dripping
with redolence
her hands pushing underneath
his shirt up his back.
but Mickey,
I thought you'd already arrived... lets slip
a soft laugh then
pushes kisses on his neck she
moans a little into his hair, his ear
pulling his face to hers
with one look and a hand
behind his head, breathes the intensity
then lets go
and she is whipped away
into the throng.
she is gone.

open your eyes
closing time, and still at least
the day's distance half again.
she'd pulled him into an open doorway
smelled of sweetness and sweat and drink
and when they were done she'd said
I need a smoke and buckled up, got up
to go, turned back:
really, Mickey... she laughed
before leaving in his shirt.

Snow billowing about his negligible form
he reconciled himself to his loss
after all, the garment
had seen better days
but he knew it was not this
to which his mind refered.
No matter, no matter
the road blurry before him
in a final effort to wake up, hurling himself
into a drift.
someone's dropping acid behind that tree
whispers a whisperer as
Mickey lights his reefer
go on take another hit as he dozes
off to retribution.

everyone wants Mr. Toad's wild ride...

*crickets*

Off to the Bruce... Another day, another adventure.

Sure is fucking early though.

I turned my face upwards and
bathed in your nakedness,
wishing that I could be as dauntless.
You've always been an
exhibitionist, covering and uncovering
in a steady suduction, slowly revealing more
of yourself until one night
there you are, nude, elegant and proud
just how you are.

I sat there for a long time
smoking and thinking; thinking and smoking
and finally when I thought I'd thought enough
I asked of you a favour-
show me how to be like you, I said, show me
how to be unashamed of being.
The round honest face that gazed back: impartial
and full of devotion
you laughed without laughing and
made as though to gather me up, as though
to pull me close into you so
that I could see what it is
to be
it is so easy, you seemed to say,
so easy that you don't even realise
when you're doing it, and that
that's the trick.

You said that you watched my phoenix heart
when it burst into flames,
then as it rose up from its ashes new
and reborn
I cried without crying
silently and
through great aching heaves
shuddering under the pressure that ran through
my veins, until the walls around me crumbled
with the fury
of countless tears, each one a victim of oppression
storming the gate.

When I looked up again, I showed
no fear and looked you in the eye
the air between us full
of magic for a moment, then:
you were just
the moon.
and I,
just a child in your light.

I guess I am not as tenacious as my heartlessness would suggest.
who am I and when the fuck did I become capable of this shit?
I suppose it was when you stopped taking responsibility for your actions, hm?
I suppose so.
I am the living dead.
I am a shell of what I was, lying beside the explosion I created.
I pulled out my own pin.
I don't know anything anymore.
Like going from the top of the school in grade 8 to being a niner. Or something like that.
Possibly a little worse, and involving less greasy pizza.

Who the fuck am I these days???
but nobody knows because I am a fuck up.
(hey I just answered my question)

cheers to the beers.