Tuesday poem #574 : Nico Vassilakis : AFTERNOON GUY IN HADES

 

 

The 714 Quaalude and Beatlemania

How we negotiate space

The symphony dragged on
Three spotted horses along the fence

The past is not a competition it just adds up

Something about
telling you how I feel
so well that you recognize it
as your own response

Yes, up and down the hallway with its head leaking

Said, you’re blocking the sound I make with the sound I make

Some minor mischief
tucked away in advance of itself

No one chooses to live like this but we end up this way

Embarrassed by it

Unprepared to slip into nothingness like this awkward poem

*
Rosie, I didn’t know you were a flower when I first laid eyes on you
Then you fell from the trees gigantic and landed next to me right here on the couch

*
Eh,

Mouth riddler?

Down by the river

People collect words in predictable ways

When I listen
I know what you’re going to say

Down by the beach

A concentric circus of what’s Imminent
Critical
Important
Routine

*
This is how it ends up...
Anticipatory negativity

May the bird of paradise fly up your nose

That thing’s happening again where Orion’s Belt is hanging low at the end of our driveway

He mused about how to redonut the
entire idea

*
I am all the time

You don’t have to go home, but you can’t stay here

Take from the dormant pile

Imp
Imply

The museum of raised eyebrows

Once again
There I was
Randomly watching
A movie on an app
And the door opens
And there you are
And I’m like
What!
What the fuck dude!
There you are
Again
You
Again
On a screen

Hey! Captain’s hat!

A prize
inside the pencil

It’s just you
shadow boxing at noon

*
Was it a pasture, a field, a prairie, a forest, timber, a meadow

Somewhere on the timeline tinkers with trajectory

Gussied up with unimpressed thoughts
A revolution of outerwear

I’m here long enough to be here for a reason

All the subject matter has left me

 

 

Nico Vassilakis is a poet who writes and draws language on the visual unmooring of letters from their word position. He has published several books of poetry and text/art. Vassilakis co-edited The Last Vispo Anthology: Visual Poetry 1998-2008 (Fantagraphics Books) and has curated several international visual/concrete poetry exhibitions. He currently lives in Greenville, IL with his wife and animals.

the Tuesday poem is curated by rob mclennan