Bill Hickok
Stats
Pastime trenz pruca
Hometown seattle, washington
job photographer
interests landscape, portrait, travel
Poem Titles
> LAMENTATIONS OF PINK ON BLUE
> WILD BILL THE 2ND GLASS OF WINE
> TO BE
> NO HELP WANTED
> DISCO 54
> THE EROS OF BASS FISHING
> FRIENDSHIP MANTRA
> The Hummingbirds of Gethsemane
> Digging for Earth Warms
> FAITH
> FAST FORWARD
> A backward poet writes inverse.
> The Royal Road
> CALIFORNIA DREAMS
> The Gift
> SUNFLOWER
> Trophy Wife
> CLOUD NINE
> Friendship Mantra
> I love English. Can you read these right the first time?
> You lovers of the English language might enjoy this . . .
> TOTEM
> Wee Noc ’n Noggin
> And friend
> Designer showcase
> How I Met My Wife
LAMENTATIONS OF PINK ON BLUE
Mary lost her baby.
Her baby was 26
with a baby of her own.
I’m in Teheran (the land of mosques).
I will call.
My sadness is fierce.
I don’t want to hear
her voice, her strangled
throat, her gasping breath,
her silence.
I’m a lion with kitten’s fur.
A tearless bog
of mind-stomach cramps.
Powerless, trying to put
analgesic salve on my angst
against the gods.
Upset intestines cannot
take the place of tears.
A stiff upper anything
will not assuage the madness
of heart.
I will call Mary tomorrow
and fight the night
with gin pink and blue on blue.
________________________________
WILD BILL
THE 2ND GLASS OF WINE
Filled with pretense
I smell the cork. Roll
the nectar on my tongue.
Open the palate to
Erasmus and Eros,
knowledge and full-
blown hunger.
Now come songs unsung,
heartbeats beyond
the drums of lust.
This is the moment
between attitude and
platitude. When Bacchus
replaces Apollo
the heart beats
at the exact longitude,
the brain at the exact latitude
of heaven, and
the green-brown eyes
across the table beckon
me to the fury of touch.
________________________________
To Be
Tryouts for the school play:
Miss Castle finally chose me and
three other talented preteen boys
to be elm trees.
Stand tall, raise your arms,
and sway back and forth.
I was the shortest elm tree in Ohio.
My dreams of football, white knighthood,
and a Fonz-like attraction to girls
faded in the quiet shade of the
elm's ego-sapping umbrella.
My sister, a real actor, who wore
makeup and talked to the last row,
said with passion: BE the tree!
Your skin will turn to bark, your sway
will match the rhythm of the winds.
You welcome birds and bees.
You ARE an elm.
Opening night we found anxiety
running high. The backdrop dropped,
the speakers sputtered,
and I fought the dark night against
an inexplicable desire to flip into
my soft maple tree mode.
Struggling against the bête noir
I prayed for the power
to be me: Ulmus americana.
After the performance we
took our bows, the house packed
with seventeen Italian relatives
would not stop clapping till
I came forward to genuflect.
The sap ran sweet
through my fevered boughs.
________________________________
NO HELP WANTED
This morning between
the honey dew and the Bartletts:
What can I do for you, young man?
At lunch between
the water and the silverware:
What can I do for you, young man?
At the gas pump between
Slide your card and remove nozzle:
What can I do for you, young man?
At the bank between
PIN number and ENTER:
What can I do for you, young man?
At dinner between a squeezed
Silent prayer and Pinot Noir:
What can I do for you, young man?
I am not young.
I sag like a bag of Great Northerns.
I’m not vigorous, although I once
ran the ball back for a touchdown.
My youth follows me
with the wisp of time. So here’s
what you can do for me, dear boy:
Know that your silly sarcasm
is not well taken and
shut the fuck up.
________________________________
DISCO 54
From the twirling ceiling ball
the kaleidoscope of shooting stars
stuns my pastoral brain.
The throbbing monosound
saddens my ear. Like
yesterday’s catch, I am frozen.
No breath to take, none to give.
The canyons of darkness still
the metronomic beat. I watch
the lithe bodies sway
like unchaffed wheat.
The smell of perfume and
sweat intensifies our dreams.
The Robot, Monkey, Hustle
propel bobbing heads.
The disc jockey—dream
manager of the night, velvets
us away to the land of
perfect pitch and
happy sorrows that only he
and the snow fairy can confer.
Booms of the synthesizer echo
some distant freedom
that was never there.
________________________________
THE EROS OF BASS FISHING
I present the jewel
with a silver splash.
She accepts. We are engaged.
We are in the moment.
After a ten-foot dive she rises
like a mermaid into the air.
Glistening and beautiful.
Large round lips, the sleekness
of a runway model.
Down again, shaking her head.
A vigorous “no” trying to break
our engagement.
Princess of Poseidon, provocateur
of the deep, come to me my
sensuous tornado. Let me eat
your flesh and lick your bones.
Suddenly my elation goes
slack. The spinnaker of darkness
overcomes me. I am breathing
without breath. I am thinking
without mind. I cry without tears.
My unrequited has vanished.
I can only dream again
and dream again
how her luscious lips caress the jewel.
I am without song.
________________________________
FRIENDSHIP MANTRA
Most all of my friends are Jewish, Buddhists,
gay, poets, or any combination of the above.
I don’t choose my friends, they choose me.
On Sundays I watch football and watch
my incredulous friends shaking their heads.
On Tuesdays I watch basketball
and watch their eyes roll. On Saturdays
I play golf and ask Berkowitz
if he wants me to turn on his lights.
This Wednesday I met two Buddhists
on the elevator. They clasped their hands
in reverence, bowed their heads,
and asked about my well-being.
“I’m drunk,” I reported.
“For now,” they said, and bowed again.
It takes many years for them to turn on the light.
Maybe they like hockey.
________________________________
The Hummingbirds of Gethsemane
There is no gate, only
an opening in the foliage.
The garden of omnieternity.
Hanging boughs, blossoms,
birds, and peace beyond silence.
The monotone hum challenges
to the ear. The zip of flight
forsakes the eye.
What is the message we can
barely hear and seldom see?
Do not look for peace
outside your bones.
It is not under a rock,
It is camouflaged by the quest,
but lies like a sisal rug
on your back stoop.
Hear the hum, feel the sylvan groove,
fight for soft repose.
Render to yourself the peace that is yours.
________________________________
Digging for Earth Warms
with apologies to Edgar Allan Poe
Who melts the ice caps,
God or the Humvee?
What hot poker of fate
makes all boats rise
on the tide of pestilence—
man or oil-soaked greed?
Does Hurricane Katrina’s younger,
stronger sister, Caitlin, answer
to man or Mammon?
When sandy beaches turn to
swamps of desolation
I can hear the screams
of Jacques Cousteau and
Rachel Carson, prophet of doom.
The water of truth splashes full force
against our gasping clouds of doubt.
When does the warmth become death?
When does the backyard barbeque
become the coffin of catastrophe?
Hark the raven nevermore.
The misogyny against Mother Earth
strikes hard against the beauty
of breath.
________________________________
FAST FORWARD
Jesus was the Prince of Peace
I wish he
were on this bus so I
could talk to him.
Where did the lambs go?
There’s nothing out there but lions.
Trains, planes, and exit signs—
get me out of here.
I’ll take my demons with me.
Didn’t pack— just left.
Goodbye to screaming
moaning, dying and not
enough of anything.
She can keep her cold nights
and the other side of the
mattress to herself.
.
First, I need quiet.
Next four fingers of Vodka
and then a head next to
mine so the pillow does not
become a playground of
wild and windswept dreams.
My best friend is denial.
I keep her next to my
heart: it never happened, man
so get over it.
This town looks as
good as any.
Let’s see if they can
use a real mechanic.
One that can understand
the Zen of
a carburetor.
________________________________
A backward poet writes inverse.
A man's home is his castle, in a manor of speaking.
Dijon vu - the same mustard as before.
Practice safe eating - always use condiments.
Shotgun wedding: A case of wife or death.
A man needs a mistress just to break the monogamy.
A hangover is the wrath of grapes.
Dancing cheek-to-cheek is really a form of floor play.
Sea captains don't like crew cuts.
Does the name Pavlov ring a bell?
Condoms should be used on every conceivable occasion.
Reading while sunbathing makes you well red.
When two egotists meet, it's an I for an I.
A bicycle can't stand on its own because it is two tired.
What's the definition of a will? (It's a dead giveaway.)
Time flies like an arrow. Fruit flies like a banana.
In democracy your vote counts. In feudalism your count votes.
She had a boyfriend with a wooden leg, but broke it off.
A chicken crossing the road is poultry in motion.
If you don't pay your exorcist, you get repossessed.
With her marriage, she got a new name and a dress.
Show me a piano falling down a mine shaft, and I'll show you A flat minor.
When a clock is hungry, it goes back four seconds.
The man who fell into an upholstery machine is fully recovered.
A grenade thrown into a kitchen in France would result in Linoleum Blown apart.
You feel stuck with your debt if you can't budge it.
Local Area Network in Australia: the LAN down under.
He often broke into song because he couldn't find the key.
Every calendar's days are numbered.
A lot of money is tainted - It taint yours and it taint mine.
A boiled egg in the morning is hard to beat.
He had a photographic memory that was never developed.
A plateau is a high form of flattery.
The short fortuneteller who escaped from prison was a medium at large.
Those who get too big for their britches will be exposed in the end.
Once you've seen one shopping center, you've seen a mall.
Those who jump off a Paris bridge are in Seine.
When an actress saw her first strands of gray hair, she thought she'd dye.
Bakers trade bread recipes on a knead-to-know basis.
Santa's helpers are subordinate clauses.
Acupuncture is a jab well done.
Marathon runners with bad footwear suffer the agony of defeat.
The poor guy fell into a glass grinding machine and made a spectacle of
Himself
________________________________
The Royal Road
I am on the 405.
I’ll be home by seven,
on the set at 5 a.m.,
that’s fourteen hours, man.
My kids think I’m a house guest.
My wife thinks I’m Zantrax.
I am key grip and proud to be Spanish.
A Mexican with a job is Spanish.
We are approaching the 10
and things are moving muy
despacio. I’m in the tree-
hugger lane, putt-putting in
my pre-historic Prius, but
slow is still woe and the kids
will be asleep.
Get me out of here!
I’ll move to Montana and be
free at last. I’ll become a
transcendental pelvic therapist
and drive as fast as I like.
We make it past the 10
and we’re picking up again.
Am I going 50 on
the Camino Real?
Who says you can’t go home again?
Montana can wait.
I’ve got some hugging to do.
muy despacio: very slowly
________________________________
CALIFORNIA DREAMS
We left New York and came west
as far as the sea.
Better pizza, water, sushi,
and panache.
All this and Napa grapes
to ooze and soothe the palate.
St. Joan of Didion talks about
the haunting, slanting light
and pioneers of grit.
Gonzos speak of Madonna’s lips
and J-Lo’s hips and the ballyhoo
of music gone mad.
I stuck a gun in her mouth
and pulled the trigger.
So it looks like rehab for me.
Let us not test the trivia
of stars.
These are the dreams of fools.
Real California lies between
the brake shoes and the master cylinder.
A thin layer of smiles and hope
That carries beyond the gangs,
the bangs of death,
and the solitude of the sea.
We don’t want to go back to New York
or Kansas. We want to swim
in the deep water, bathe in the beachlight
and breathe the breath of new stars.
________________________________
The Gift
Around the bend of a narrow street—
there she is. Tall, thin, stately.
Skin the color of bark.
Bandanna way back.
Pushing a grocery cart
with yesterday’s clothes, rags, cans,
bottles, scraps of battered time,
leaning forward, like a ploughman
fighting a furrow. After
hellos, a touchstone ivory smile,
two dollars and a petition for
our heavenly father
to bless me, we part.
Walking away, a flash in
the sky turns me around.
The cart is a gloden chariot,
the cans have turned into silver goblets,
the rags to sensuous silk. Her dress
a purple velvet, the bandanna
a tiara of rubies.
“Lantana, where are we?”
“Honey, we ain’t no place but here.”
“But things have changed.”
“I know”
Flowers bloom in the richness
of compassion, blossoms stampede
in the matrix of hope.
________________________________
SUNFLOWER
Prisoner of the prairie,
pride of the Helios:
tilt your head toward the red ball of fire
that nurtures us all.
The strength of your colors—
yellow brown and green—
waves across the sunspots of the world.
A field of gold sustains colors
to salute the seeds that feed
our voracious hunger.
Your oil fuels a thousand human engines,
beauty to turn an artist’s head.
Stay forever, princess of the plain.
The bees may forsake you
but never my undulating eye.
________________________________
Trophy Wife
Bobbles, bangles and blonds
Five foot nine and tan as the look of winter fronds.
Smile as wide as the Harbor Freeway
She’s not from here, but give here some leeway.
Playing parent to scornful kids
Forget her time with life on the skids.
High maintenance and loot
I’ll take Hawaii and a Hummer to boot.
A bad hair day does not exist
The upstairs maid has a beautician’s twist.
Chardonnay only from France
Silk are her sheets and likewise her pants.
Personal trainer with lots of pow
Daddy I want Hawaii and I want it now!
She glides though dreaming
And kaleidoscope scheming.
So here’s to our love with all of her meaning.
Spare her the creeping sting of age
And here’s to the giver who thinks he’s a sage.
________________________________
CLOUD NINE
(A poem based on things I do not like in poetry: politics, lost love, moonlight, clouds, Greek gods)
Mnemosyne,
do not cloud
my memory of
how much I hate her:
her infidelity,
her infancy,
her intended hypocrisy,
her insatiable verbosity.
Calm me
from the steam of vitriol,
as we lie naked
on the moonlit beach.
All three hundred of us
in the proud name of
peace.
________________________________
Friendship Mantra
Most all of my friends are Jewish, Buddhists,
gay, poets, or any combination of the above.
I don’t choose my friends, they choose me.
On Sundays I watch football and watch
my incredulous friends shaking their heads.
On Tuesdays I watch basketball
and watch their eyes roll. On Saturdays
I play golf and ask Berkowitz
if he wants me to turn on his lights.
This Wednesday I met two Buddhists
on the elevator. They clasped their hands
in reverence, bowed their heads,
and asked about my well-being.
“I’m drunk,” I reported.
“For now,” they said, and bowed again.
It takes many years for them to turn on the light.
Maybe they like hockey.
________________________________
I love English. Can you read these right the first time?
1) The bandage was wound around the wound.
2) The farm was used to produce produce.
3) The dump was so full that it had to refuse more refuse.
4) We must polish the Polish furniture.
5) He could lead if he would get the lead out.
6) The soldier decided to desert his dessert in the desert.
7) Since there is no time like the present, he thought it was time to present the present.
8) A bass was painted on the head of the bass drum
9) When shot at, the dove dove into the bushes.
10) I did not object to the object.
11) The insurance was invalid for the invalid.
12) There was a row among the oarsmen about how to row.
13) They were too close to the door to close it
14) The buck does funny things when the does are present.
15) A seamstress and a sewer fell down into a sewer line.
16) To help with planting, the farmer taught his sow to sow.
17) The wind was too strong to wind the sail.
18) Upon seeing the tear in the painting I shed a tear.
19) I had to subject the subject to a series of tests.
20) How can I intimate this to my most intimate friend?
________________________________
You lovers of the English language might enjoy this . . . There is a two-letter word that perhaps
has more meanings than any other two-letter word, and that is "UP."
It's easy to understand UP, meaning toward the sky or at the top of the list, but when we awaken in the morning, why do we wake UP? At a meeting, why does a topic come UP? Why do we speak UP and why are the officers UP for election and why is it UP to the secretary to write UP a report?
We call UP our friends. And we use it to brighten UP a room, polish UP the silver, we warm UP the leftovers and clean UP the kitchen. We lock UP the house and some guys fix UP the old car. At other times the little word has real special meaning. People stir UP trouble, line UP for tickets, work UP an appetite, and think UP excuses. To be dressed is one thing but to be dressed UP is special.
And this UP is confusing: A drain must be opened UP because it is stopped UP. We open UP a store in the morning but we close it UP at night.
We seem to be pretty mixed UP about UP! To be knowledgeable about the proper uses of UP, look the word UP in the dictionary. In a desk-sized dictionary, it takes UP almost 1/4th of the page and can add UP to about thirty definitions. If you are UP to it, you might try building UP a list of the many ways UP is used. It will take UP a lot of your time, but if you don't give UP, you may wind UP with a hundred or more. When it threatens to rain, we say it is clouding UP. When the sun comes out we say it is clearing UP.
When it rains, it wets the earth and messes things UP. When it doesn't rain for awhile, things dry UP.
Fess UP...you like this!
One could go on and on, but I'll wrap it UP, for now my time is UP, so.... Time to shut UP!
Oh...one more thing:
What is the first thing you do in the morning & the last thing you do at night? U-P
________________________________
TOTEM
The icons of life
add concrete to the blowing sand.
Soft and hard mold together
like a grilled cheese sandwich.
Contemplate:
I. The lion and the mouse
II. The sparrow and the anvil
III. The feather and the hammer
IV. The hangman and the dove
V. A hand extended in the trapezoid of death
There are no soft sides to an anvil.
The triumph of our lives,
our world, our sweetness depends
upon the feather not the anvil.
________________________________
Wee Noc ’n Noggin
James Dickey drank too much malt
his Muse moved from steel to a bag of salt.
Sylvia Plath going mad with her shtick
Ted was a drunk, never a brick.
Crazy Willy Blake, for heaven’s sake
invented Mad Cow while barely awake.
John Berryman had hair on his hands
thanks to Absinthe and the barley corn man.
Teddy Roethke draws no breath
rankles of gin yielded an early death.
Brendan and Dylan from the Celts did arise,
so wee noc ‘n noggin was no surprise.
So where am I a pilgrim poet of wanna be ilk
trapped in a land of 2% milk?
________________________________
And friend
Gloria Vando Butchered Art
They slit the throats of heifers one by one
rather than bruise the hide and lose the sale,
then hang them by their hooves until they’re drained.
Dogs yip at their dangling tongues. Merciful
springs of blood coat their dull eyes, turn the mud
below into a frenzied palette for
a Pollock or Soutine. Stains on the butchers’
smocks forecast Ter Hell.* I was a child
when soldiers shot Il Duce and Petacci,
strung them upside down like sides of beef.
They hung for days in every paper,
magazine. Each time I bite into a slice
of meat, these spectres take me by surprise,
shake my belief in art, death’s domicile.
—inspired by a Theodore Roethke exercise
Ter Hell is a contemporary German Expressionist painter,
influenced by the action paintings of Jackson Pollock
________________________________
Designer showcase
A monthly planner from my much loved insurance agent.
Now my life has meaning—structure—organization,
an overview of things to come, everything spelled out.
No more anxiety, no more slow motion dreams.
Goodbye tribulation. Here comes the sword of certainty.
Dare I plan for dreams? Barbara Mahoney on Thursday,
a 5% mortgage on Friday, a Red Sox win on Saturday.
John Calvin, predestination, a master plan,
Intelligent Design, Dumb Design, designated driver.
The magic mountain is right here.
Eureka! Mahoney said yes, Washington Mutual
said 5%, Schilling shut down the Yankees.
I am not feeling power, I feel preciously magnificent.
Mark it down. I’ll try for more.
October 15th: Jews and Arabs work it out.
October 27th: world peace.
November 7th: no more children’s bulging stomachs,
flies in the eyes, and other horrors of Africa.
November 12th: it rains five inches in Khartoum.
Animals are free. We are all liberated.
A sudden jolt and I hear the soft petals of reality.
“Honey, wake up; the kids will be late for school.”
Do not be careful what you wish for.
Be careful what you dream.
________________________________
How I Met My Wife
Jack Winter, the New Yorker, July 25, 1994.
It had been a rough day, so when I walked into the party I was very chalant, despite my efforts to appear gruntled and consolate.
I was furling my wieldy umbrella for the coat check when I saw her standing alone in a corner. She was a descript person, a woman in a state of total array. Her hair was kempt, her clothing shevelled, and she moved in a gainly way.
I wanted desperately to meet her, but I knew I'd have to make bones about it, since I was traveling cognito. Beknowst to me, the hostess, whom I could see both hide and hair of, was very proper, so it would be skin off my nose if anything bad happened. And even though I had only swerving loyalty to her, my manners couldn't be peccable. Only toward and heard-of behavior would do.
Fortunately, the embarrassment that my maculate appearance might cause was evitable. There were two ways about it, but the chances that someone as flappable as I would be ept enough to become persona grata or a sung hero were slim. I was, after all, something to sneeze at, someone you could easily hold a candle to, someone who usually aroused bridled passion.
So I decided not to risk it. But then, all at once, for some apparent reason, she looked in my direction and smiled in a way that I could make head or tails of.
I was plussed. It was concerting to see that she was communicado, and it nerved me that she was interested in a pareil like me, sight seen. Normally, I had a domitable spirit, but, being corrigible, I felt capacitated—as if this were something I was great shakes at—and forgot that I had succeeded in situations like this only a told number of times. So, after a terminable delay, I acted with mitigated gall and made my way through the ruly crowd with strong givings.
Nevertheless, since this was all new hat to me and I had not time to prepare a promptu speech, I was petuous. Wanting to make only called-for remarks, I started talking about the hors d'oeuvres, trying to abuse her of the notion that I was sipid, and perhaps even bunk a few myths about myselfs.
She responded well, and I was mayed that she considered me a savoury character who was up to some good. She told me who she was. "What a perfect nomer," I said, advertently. The conversation became more and more choate, and we spoke at length to much avail. But I was defatigable, so I had to leave at a godly hour. I asked if she wanted to come with me. To my delight, she was committal. We left the party together and have been together ever since. I have given her my love, and she has requited it.
