In India I was greatly taken up
With a fly in a temple
Which gave me the distinct feeling,
It is possible, just possible,
That we had met before.

Was it in Mexico City?
Climbing the blood-spotted, yellow legs
Of the crucified Christ
While his eyes grew larger and larger.
"May God seat you on the highest throne
Of his invisible Kingdom,"
A blind beggar said to me in English.
He knew what I saw.

At the saloon where Pancho Villa
Fired his revolvers at the ceiling,
On the bare ass of a naked nymph
Stepping out of lake in a painting,
And now shamelessly crawling up
One of Buddha's nostrils,
Whose smile got even more buoyant,
Even more squint-eyed.

Barber College Haircut

In my head thrown back as in a nose bleed,
There are, of course,
A dozen or so replicas of myself,
Much reduced, wearing hoods perhaps.

They sit at the same table
With a conspiratorial air debating
The baffling question of my identity,
The unresolved pros and cons

Shuffled back and forth like a deck
Of smutty postcards. Embracing couples
In haystacks, on hotel beds,
Moonlit beaches at night, saloons--

The grim reaper buying me a drink--
What the hell is going on here, I said?
At which the barber rushed over
And threw a hot towel over my eyes.

House of Horrors

Infinity devours us, folks,
Ah, the screams, the burst of giggles,
The stink of deep fry,
The taste of candied apples!

The beast with serene table manners
Is behind that white curtain.
The thin knife and fork it uses
Silhouetted stabbing a heart.

And now the public announcement
With the name of lost children.
Don't their parents know
How to mind the little brats?

Or so I shouted into the echoing,
They-are-playing-me-for-a-sucker,
It's-been-going-on-forever,
Mostly empty House of Horrors.

Beauty Parlor

School of the deaf with a playground
In a tangle of dead weeds and trash
On a street of torched cars and vans,
Here then in the white and red banner,
Grime-streaked and wind-torn,
Still inviting us to the GRAND OPENING.

The one with a flame-thrower hairdo
Who set all our hearts on fire,
Where is she today? I inquired
Of a ragged little tree in front,
While its branches took swipes at my head
As if to knock some sense into me.