> next page 

EASTSIDE / WESTSIDE

I have news from the front
the unseen battle rages on. 

You look at your neighbor
with a leery eye

and nothing really changes
as time goes by 

out on the streets
you just accept things
as they are. 

Trust is a hard word to speak
when you’re never spoken to

so watch your back
you never know
what’s coming up behind you. 

Eastside, Westside,
why don’t you get on the right side?

Eastside, Westside,
get on the right side.

Well, I don’t want to mislead you
in trying to cross that bridge

but anything is possible
if you truly want it to be. 

It’s a cold war out there

but it’s no longer
between the Soviets and the West 

it’s more like night and day
there’s no softer gray

it’s either or
it gets in the way. 

Maybe I’m just too hopeful
I see things
up in the sky. 

A zebra unicorn
with silver wings

flies high above the city
and sweetly sings 

but no one can hear it
no one can really see it. 

Eastside, Westside,
why don’t you get on the right side?
Eastside, Westside,
get on the right side 

and take the center lane
the middle of the road 

compromise
look into your eyes
and become energized. 

Middle of the road
it’s going to take you far

middle of the road
it’s going to take you far. 

And so I say to you
it’s a freeway out of here
it’s a freeway out of here. 

Eastside, Westside,
why don’t you get on the right side?

Eastside, Westside,
get on the right side 

Eastside, Westside,
let’s get on the right side

Eastside, Westside
it’s time to get on the right side.

Joe Balaz

BLISS OF THE SONGSTAR
 
bliss on all fours
in bliss the obsolete
moonlight, the vagrant
bliss of remedies, a
bliss of obscene proportions
the calipers of great
bliss, bliss aromas in
gargantuan kiln hearts
giant overlapping
bliss mantra
bliss united
bliss supreme
bliss aria
bliss open
bliss unconquerable
the day of the fire urns
lining the road of yer
commotion, bliss on the
way to trail spirals
over everything the bliss of thee

kuhar

FUCK THE MUSE

she’s just a fat-ass whore anyway
a fickle tantric partner
that just as soon go garage sale shopping
as write poetry
all she’s ever done is measure his poet’s worth
in dime store plastic Buddha’s
the only time she’d every really let him write
was if he’d finger her lips and made her come
then she’d return the favor
but she’d be gone as quick as that
Fuck she is just dangerously
unreliable. 

at 3:40 am. draped in a fevered stupor
he might want more but wouldn’t get it
she is toga trailer trash
thru and thru
she’d return now
only
by crawling back into his dreams
through the side door that opened onto Savannah Ave.
the one that ran down the near side of East Cleveland
down to the railroad tracks
eyes glazed & mind reeling
mark of Shiva on his forehead
maybe it isn’t the flu after all
likely just a scorpion bite
a prick
delivered on the backs of the
suburban patrol
Cleveland’s wide-eyed wonders
clueless riders on the ghost train to nowhere
they’d run the Blues out of town once before
no wonder they’re under suspicion
the gestures of holy men
are always under suspicion in East Cleveland
especially
seen cast in the street light glow of after hours
libation
I don’t think now it is the flu
just some leftover 20th century karma
wrapped up in an old copy of the Cleveland Press.

c.m. brooks

> next page

Bookmark with: