Archived Writing

Bed of down and gown of white makes

Brian Warshaw wonder why folks

bother coming here at all; this

hopsital looks too clean.

Fever reads a hundred-point-two

on baby's violating probe

thermometer; it's not so clean

in these white halls, now is it?

Waiting is my mortal foe; I'm

losing patience watching plumpish

doctor types walk past; in anger

Brian Warshaw's thoughts aren't white.

Two A.M.:doctor hasn't shown.

Brian Warshaw moans a mixture

born of boredom, born of spleen.

Like the bed I'm

Like the gown I'm

Like the halls I'm

Clean

Out of patience

I remember ginger ale: no brands, flavors; only

eager bubbles, glassy hearts of ice

in tree-bark pails, young linens, marble,

burbled gull call,

making love.

II

The Face that Saved a Thousand Ships

in crimson crown; down below

seems like God

hired a babysitter. Littered

at its feet: driftwood history in driftwood

shacks, mystery and birdwatching: grackle,

gull, jetsam and jetty: all loyal

subjects. The buzz and bore

of court.

We storm the base, slow,

stop, look skyward toward

spire's soaring summit.

III

Placard said the vessel

sunk; concrete hull had

proved unseaworthy; she lies

immersed in shallow grave.

No one injured but the dream.

We photograph her carcass,

ignorantly marveling; pretend

we aren't building ships

for sinking. You're cold.

We shake heads, fold arms;

charming little tale: remains

in history.

IV

Delicate whittled hull: no concrete

here. Rigging, isosceles patches

snatch breezes blown

down aisles in this tiny shop

where we two purchase souvenirs

of honey-moonery.

"Look at these glasses,"

you command,

while I trade lusty glances

with the lighthouse lens

at level of my eye.

Keep to the rhythm

That's there on the page.

now swing it

Play through the changes.

Remain in the mode.

blue notes

Structure's great

And all but it

Leaves no room for

bahda-dah-dah

the soul to taste the smoke and smell the low blue light and hear the beer-lumps come and swallow in the throats

now that's percussion

I walk in, sit down,

order an American beer

with an imported name, finger-scan

a dilapidated old menu, slobber

over a half-pound cheese steak

that I won't order; I shoot a killer's glare

at some raucous, drunk baboon

flying too far into my airspace;

I watch the tail-end of another

fourth-quarter collapse

by the New York Knickerbockers.

With the domestic-import

in hand, my eyes

back in their sockets,

and a renewed cynicism

in New York's finest

(New York's only),

I turn on my stool.

Looking through a picture window

past Highlands' skirt I see the Hook: vitality

in the dead of night: its shores are salivating

hungrily, though not, I'd guess,

for cheese steaks; a bonfire on the skin-beach

pulses in the sightless night: the pulmonary pumping

of the heart of the Hook; I imagine

I hear the apnoeic sleep-sigh of the surf.

I come to port here,

off the Hook, its shimmering

beach heads reflecting the Harvest Moon

like "Help Me" beacons on desert islands,

and this is ironic because I feel like

I am the one being rescued.

at his breast a tarnished fake

trinket that he shared

with a genuine woman

a fair girl who didn't

want much save his

love and his smile

and his honesty but life deserts

hope deferred until without

home hearth or health he

fades from this world

in a wisp

of dusty painted

gold

clutches shirt over heart,

parts with fake, tasteless

games; made human before my

eyes, he can only rise

in memory.

crosses the Date Line; tomorrow

comes a day early.

His legs drag ground, snare,

sink; suspended down

in dirt Pacific: the world revolves

without him.

I stand at the edge of life

As Death massages my back

Easing the weariness out of shoulders

Grown tired in the toil of existence;

Sapped of strength by feats

Forever unaccomplished, but forever tried.

I kneel at the edge of life

As Death lends a hand and a spade

To my fingers, digging toward a fair depth

For quiet rest in ears that ever have heard

The diminished harmonies

Of Failure's sweetest dirge.

I lay at the edge of life.

There is a man in here, somewhere

Beneath this muddled mess of

Boyish dreams and adolescent romance.

He seeks to grow the old, or sever

It from the new creation, the man

Inside the boy, inside the dream.

How is this just?

If living is the sleeping,

Then our love is the dream:

That far-but-near where

Our angels and demons sing in the same choir.

In summertime I'm often torn

Between the bright or gloom. The morn'

Is clear though dusk is drear on me.

Who am I?

On autumn days my countenance

Pleases those whom I meet; My dance,

A feat, is azure sweet to view.

Who am I?

The winter chill has tried and failed

To make me feel it's gloom. Assailed

With cloud I turn up brightly proud and clear.

Who am I?

Though spring, some say is room for joy

And celebrating life, a boy

Who's lost his mother can't be blue

As I, when under temperate sun,

Remain. Yet still man has his fun

At my expense.

And so I ask you, who am I?