M.T. Wilkens

M.T. Wilkens is happy to be here with you. He lives in San Francisco, where he is avid.

"The Wind And My Sofa"

it's weird when you listen to the wind,
when you sit and think of things to say.

my mouth is made of pillow, my sofa lies,
my eyes fleece blankets in disguise.

I only wish envelopes were often opened
by friendly men with tennis wrists
and big fat teeth

who would smile and say, "damn that
weatherman shoulda mentioned the mountains, eh?"

I’d like to borrow more objects
and refuse they exist,

especially everything most important to you.
these treasures I seek to stare at dazedly while most confused
by my presence in the anteroom of your true fortune.

does the guy who washes windows think of reflections?
I bet he wears casual clothes out at night and enjoys sculpting.

it's weird when you listen to the wind
because most of the time he doesn’t make much
of a sudden such.

he only likes to touch.

still my sofa sleeps and dreams of someday swimming.

because to live always earthbound requires quiet calm patience
and an inquiring mind. a picture of a castle
you once were Christian in helps as well.

there can be no mistake - everything in the dictionary is false,
there is no such thing as mystery or mere fantasy, art is
forevermore and god is fun and nothing is something
when you look away from it not the absence of
something.

see, seeing it creates the thing, said the wind.

but who gives a shit, said my sofa,
sarcastic.
© m.t.w. 2003

"Puzzle Meant"

I am puzzled recently by signs I see
of reparation promises and liquor license,
a marquee that reads TONIGHT: FUCK ME,
a billboard all black, large and luminously lit,
the yellow letter Y centered on it as if asking.

perhaps there are things I should have meant, made up,
yet maybe there still is time - destiny is like the doorknob
that so often shocks a bit after you've shuffled
across the eversame carpet.

I wish my pajamas would talk to me, tell me
I'm a fool for listening to laughter, laughing
at gas, gloating - no, I don't.

for where would I be without noise and then silence:
unused to variation, worshipping gregarity and rain?

a thin man once told me to stop my insolence and behave.
"music is sham, forget it all live," he lied - I lied
beneath him looking up, stars glittered
behind his head like a mighty night crown.
I felt humble but then it was just a dream.

walking toward the milkshake place
something makes me think of children,
how they never share candy. a woman
with easy eyes approaches and smiles sly.
she has a tattoo of a puzzle piece on her shoulder
and I wonder what it means.
© 2003 m.t.w.

"Disasterpiece"

Her soft eyelids flutter then close.
The scientist scrutinizes a shower
of silver moondust floating through
the air. Her hair spills shadowblack
like the vinyl records shattered
on the floor, scattered shards of
accumulated sadness, broken bits
of other lovers' dreams. He is
unable to elucidate the sensation
he feels; he trembles. His mouth
is pursed into a pucker, his jaw tight,
tension in his temples. "The future of
artistry," he believed, earlier, "is to
destroy a beautiful thing in order to
create it." She thought the only way
to destroy something was to destroy it,
and the only way to create something
was to believe it could be destroyed,
to know that it was impermanent.

This was how they spent
an evening together, threatening
each other in coded phrase. This was
how they seethed in their supreme leisure,
how they drank merlot till they were sweating,
how they threw things and screamed, cursed
till they mumbled, fucked till they fell
apart, angered and spent.

In the stillness of 4 a.m., her body heaves.
The scientist does not want to think about art
any longer; he only wants to be a different man
for a day. He wonders if she dreams
of this man, and he smiles.
© m.t.w. 2004

"Once Was Words"

there once was words
where upon time said
there is no time.

where once was words
there upon time said
where are you.
© 2003 m.t.w.

"The Afterlife"

Sit there. Every day. Sit there,
and stare, and sit. There.
There is nowhere else to sit,
so you sit there. Every day.

You work. Work there.
Every day, you work. There.
There is where you work.
There is nowhere else to work,
so you work there. Every day.

Think of it. It. What is it?
Think. It is nice. You want it,
but why? Because it is nice.
Why is it nice? Because you
think of it, and because
you want it. You think of it,
every day, and you want it.

Home is here. Here is where
you sleep. Here, at home.
You do not work here. You
sleep here. You like it here
because you are not there.
And you like it here because
you sleep here, at home.

I see you. I say hello. You say
hello. We say how are you
to each other. Fine, we say.
We love each other, but we
do not say so. We are the same.
We have always been the same,
and we always say hello and
how are you. Then we say goodbye.
© m.t.w. 2004

"Danger Cat"

Danger Cat was a mouse, which
didn’t make sense too much to some,
but them typa folk’re dumb,
and who really gives a poop
about them
anyway.

it was his name, and he was
rad.

he was about yay
tall, gray, and he ripped
shit up
on the gittar
anymutherfuckin
day

that’s right.

he put out an album
with beats that made people
say uh.

It was called
The Shit.

once, Danger Cat ate fifty hotdogs
in a day. with bun.
no one could believe it.

he lived in a nice place;
his roommates were
chill. he slept
in a pillow case
that was inside another
pillow case.

his favorite word was
bliss. he said
he liked it best because
it sounded like what
it meant.

Danger Cat loved a special lady, too,
and she kept his heart hidden
in her smile. she was
fly.

one day I asked Danger Cat,
what is it
all about?

he said, "this."
© m.t.w. 2003

"Wrote a Poem Once"

I wrote a poem once
in a place where it will never
be read.

I don't know why I did
this.

I wrote a poem once
about secrecy
and doubt.

I wrote a poem once
that was nothing more
than desire

pronounced this ire.

I wrote a poem once
about the moon and the
trees and the moonlight in
a forest and a stream and
silence.

the poem was okay
except it said too much.

there's nothing that makes
sense, I wrote in a poem once,
as if it made sense.

I wrote a poem once
about the three things I will
never understand.

I rode a poem once
all the way home, then
gave it to a stranger who
smoked a joint on my stoop.

he nodded, a kind man
I never saw again.

I wrote a poem once
because I was sitting there
shitting and I suddenly didn’t know
when the last time I wrote a
poem was,
and I grimaced.

I wrote a poem once, typing
with the keypad of a cellphone,
bored in an airport.

no one knew it was poetry.

no one ever does.

I wrote a poem once
about what difference does it make
if a poem is a poem is a poem
and imagine that.

I wrote a poem once
gargling: I stuck my tongue
out after spitting the mouthwash
and the madness in the mirror
dared laugh, the laughter
a poetic sound.

"Telepathy"

I think if aliens come
the thing that will confuse them most
will probably be the alphabet.

the scripted strokes, the layout of letters on a keyboard,
the arbitrary order, the capital and lower case.

also, if they're robots,
they probably won't like love and dreams
and other stuff that can’t be explained.

"o humans, we envy your spirits," they may say,
and how will we know if they mean
our wines or gods or souls or what?