Walter Edgewater Talks to God on the Train
(on the theme of David Bowie)
The trees outside are slow today.
God, are you there? It’s me, Walter.
You again? Yes, me again. Whaddaya want?
I’ve got a brand new song to show you,
though it probably won’t blow your mind.
So sing it already. Jesus. I’m on the home
stretch. Only a few more months of pills
& this brain fog. You’re welcome.
What did you do? I never asked for your help.
You’re stuck with me now. Well, unstick me.
I’m not playing your game. I give back
my ticket. I’m done. You entered
into a contract, Walter. That was the old me.
I doubt that’s valid anymore. Until the end
of time. You don’t run the atomic clock.
You swam against the tide but you drowned
in the sky. That makes sense to me now.
I’ve got a song for you too: Because my love
for you would break my heart in two,
if you should fall
into my arms
& tremble
like a flower.
What happened to originality? It was lost
when I became man. Not so easy, is it?
I don’t know how you people do it.
It’s a matter of resolve—a feeling
that everything will get better. The body,
this fleshy mess, repairs itself & houses
whatever it is that writes my songs.
You know I’m the ghost writer, don’t you?
No, you’re not. It is mankind
that sings. It’s why we gave ourselves
vocal chords, chatterbox. You wouldn’t
understand. Hey, I put this thing in motion
in a matter of days. Do you realize how quickly
I could take it all away? You should read
my latest pamphlet. That’s okay, old
friend. Things have changed. We built this
up & we’ll be the ones to tear it down.
But what about me? We’ll give you
a front row seat & then, once it’s gone,
it’s back to the infinite nothing for you.
Maybe I’ll see what Beelzebub’s up to.
Whatever you do, get ready.
You’ll wish that you had somebody
to sing your songs for you.
________________________
Walter Edgewater & The Tiny Cup
(on the theme of coffee)
Frankly, gentlemen, I don’t care
about what business was like
when you were street vendors.
All I want is a place to sit, but not
atop rogue coats left by a ghost
or a robot. Everything belongs
to someone. No apparitions, only
partitions between the real
& the right, plate glass window
connected by sunlight—showing
insides, smudges, & tape stains.
Two girls sit next to me:
1. The one I love, wrote her
love poems on Valentine’s, & now,
President’s Day. 2. One wearing the same
green & black flannel shirt as me.
Hunched over the same way.
Hair tossed & messed the same way.
Chomping fingernails the same way.
Funny how these minute details
& modicum appearances are missed
by one & celebrated by another persona.
1. She’s got polka-dotted sneakers,
gray & white flannel. Before we were
seated, she raised her voice & needed to
leave immediately—people crashed
& bumped her like she wasn’t there.
Now seated in the sun, she’s kissed—
now, again. Still wearing sneakers.
3. Girl across table: please stop
picking your nose. By now, you should
know that I see everything, all
is filtered through me. To understand,
I throw myself into the depths.
Someday I’ll get out & we’ll see.
Until then I’m here & we’ll see.
_________
Walter Edgewater Sees a Nosaj Thing
(on the theme of coffee)
Is this what the kids are listening to
today—zombie music? Two guys
in overcoats, eyes like silver dollars,
(sand dollars, Papier Gamâché says), skulk
& swing arms, shoulders brandished, ready
to strike anyone willing to look. I’m sore
to the spine, back cracking & knees rigid.
In a shifty room I’m not moving,
not even the softest toe tap or head nod.
In between acts, tripping patrons flock
to doors, need to leave. They reach the back,
run into the rope blocking the path
from the pit, gaze around, befuddled.
This is the strangest thing they’ve ever seen.
Nosaj Thing finally takes the stage,
the shakers rush forward & nod knowingly
to the music of the skinny kid,
barely twenty, so busy, knob-twisting,
head-neck-shoulder dipping & ducking,
so busy up there, an art so intricate,
tempo controlled by twists of the wrists,
effortless, he only stops midair
to casually wipe sweat from his brow,
a movement figured into the equation,
all so mathematical, precise, every single
sound placed in its proper container.
He plays for ninety minutes straight
without even the slightest silence. I pay
attention as best I can with some guy
swaying in front of me, inching closer
& closer with every loop, no regard
for my space, until I’m purposely mouth-
breathing down his neck so he knows
I’m the strangest thing he’s ever seen.
He asks me to back up. I do not change.
I leave early, joints too tired to stand.
Today is a Sunday. I drink coffee
in my leopard print robe. Tomorrow,
I’ll listen to last night’s songs
through headphones at my desk
as I answer work emails.
_______________
Walter Edgewater Never Gives all the Heart
(on the theme of love)
I never give all the heart, for love
is bullshit, mostly. I leave
work early to find your sheets
left at last night’s laundromat, children
threatening as I enter. They’re right
where you left them—cold
in the dryer. You return home
again, but only to complain
about the heat—we can’t control it,
or our hearts. I hope you’re happy
when you’re not here, where others
appreciate you more, as you remind me.
I was happy, years ago, & I was
last night. A thin young woman
danced next to me—I leaned
against the stage—her hairy arm
brushed mine bare. She stared
at me, I thought, but really
she looked through to the stack
of empty beer cups left
by the night’s opening
act. She split them apart
& swung the little swill
& screamed, I’m just really thirsty!
All night I heard airborne signals
of love from another (You know
I love you, right?). I tried giving
everything once before—I failed.
Tonight I sloppily tuck you in
after you chastise me for stealing
the blankets last night, as I do
each night, while I sleep & you lie
awake. Everything is sometimes
lovely & a brief, dreamy, kind
delight (the latter a word used
so often to describe me)—sometimes.
I have lost before
& I will lose again.
You have lost me before
& you will lose me again.
_________________________
Walter Edgewater’s Reasons to Fall in Love with Walter Edgewater
(on the theme of love)
I have a job.
I am a locomotive.
My name is an anagram for “Wet, Wet, Large Dear.”
As a boy, the tip of my finger
was ground in the gears
of a mechanical chicken.
I have no will to live.
I live to serve my maker, wherever he is.
I see stars.
I drink shit coffee.
I skinned my foreskin
in a bicycle accident
as a child & didn’t
know if I should show
my friend because I didn’t know
if he or she was a he or a she.
I’m pretty okay at math.
I contemplate the philosophies
of everything in the universe.
I can do as many sit-ups
as Herschel Walker,
the former Dallas Cowboys star less famous
for his multiple personality disorder.
I’m a language poet.
I’ve never been to a dogfight.
…
Okay, I’ve been to one dogfight.
I lost my virginity on a kitchen floor
next to bowls of dog food.
Horses ride me.
I’m a champion
luchador.
I make my own cardboard.
Everything I buy is on sale.
I’m lonely.
I see the best minds of my generation
at the titty bar.
I’m really good at pissing
money away at the greyhound track.
I’m a member of a world-
wide poetry collective
based on chicken sandwiches.
I once stepped on a beehive
& when they swarmed on me,
I stung them.
Do I contradict myself?
I fall in love but never
out of it.
I’m a sailboat skipper.
I’m a coxcomb
but I just found out.
I planted America’s seed
in the sun.
I am the godhead
on fire.
I was born at a very early age.
I intend to live forever,
or die trying.
I can seal an envelope.
I am an actor
& this page is my stage.
I am a Renaissance man
on weekends in April & May
at the Oklahoma Renaissance
Festival in Muskogee, OK
at the Castle of Muskogee.
I get jokes.
I’ve been to the center
of the earth to search for the black sun
but found only rotten dinosaurs
(also known as oil, according to someone
who claims to have loved me once).
I objectify the human form.
I make a mean grilled cheese.
I make a gentle grilled cheese.
I make cheese.
Please, please, please—I’m in love
with the world, so help me
make it love me back.
I’m in love with you.
________________________
I Give Walter Edgewater a Haircut
(on the theme of childhood)
Walter has been here since childhood,
numbed & sleeping & threaded with cloth
to a three-post bed—the fourth yanked off
for whenever he thrashes or tries to
sail off. He’s fitted with a permanent sleep
mask, smeared with coal & threaded
with green & white electrical wires. I speak
into his ears while I cover my mouth
with the mesh of a window screen. First
I state the true meaning (here, “paper”)
& then what I will really say (here, “piper”).
Piper, Walter. Piper. He doesn’t know
anything but the boxy outlines of letters
projected onto the back of his sticky eyelids,
& the white text forging lines on black
expanse. I really mean “source” but say
“sauce.” Sauce, Walter. I’m feeding him
sleep intravenously & I stick patches
on his forehead & chest. All is hooked
with a nest of messy wires to the plasma
TV hanging rigid on the wall. I suppose you can say
he can only see what I tell him to imagine, indirectly.
Tonight, it’s time for a haircut in our old home-
town: the barbershop run by the local ex-con (Mike
the Butcher, as our grandmother called him).
He’s known for slicing little boys’ ears. Walter, gracious,
shows me the list of rules on the brown wall: “1. If your hair is long
we’re going to buzz it.” But wait—who’s that outside
in the darkened lot, next to the wooden wagon?
It’s her, last’s night final procession,
the woman with silken locks & no face. Why can’t you
give her a goddamned face, Walter? I’m saying face
& I MEAN IT. Face. Face. Fine.