My review of Bettye LaVette's new album, "Things Have Changed."

Listening to Bettye LaVette's album "Things Have Changed" on Spotify. She's very much dialed in. Wondering if that's Larry Campbell's lead on "Things Have Changed." Guessing it probably is. She really tears these songs down and puts them back together again almost as if it's a Bob Dylan Motown record. So many Bob covers and so few of them have any real meat on their clunky bones. This record is all about that sweet fat hanging off her ribs. I wish I had a wet nap so I could wipe my hands after each greasy, delicious morsel. “It Ain't Me Babe” is remorse at a heightened level that is painful to listen to because it reminds us just how many heartbreaks stand in the way of our happiness. The way she half growls - half whispers certain words leaves me in both delicious agony and expunged, laconic ecstasy. In fact it's the kind of ecstasy Lou Reed ordered up when he believed he was alone and the black leather - blue mask was put up on the shelf. “Political World” she stretches out and gets us up close and personal to the executioner’s face. It’s Bob rap served up by Bettye and Keith Richards with no apology as the song drives through Detroit, top down without a fucking care in this world or the next. “Don’t Fall Apart On Me Tonight” breaks it wide open. Imagine Easter with no Christ or Passover without gefilte fish. This is one Bob song I always wished Bob would surprise us with and hearing it now brings fresh tears to my unrepentant eyes. I am loving this record because Bettye clearly loves these songs and understands that to do them any justice whatsoever you must bring tough love into the equation or else the geometry just won’t work. Not really finding the piss and vinegar that I am used to with “Seeing The Real You At Last”, but you can’t have everything as you sail through the storm strapped to the mast. “I'm gonna quit this bullshit now.” This record is a conversation between Bettye and her twin or maybe her audience or maybe just maybe she’s talking directly to her creator and leaving nothing to chance. I love in a recent RS interview she says “He writes arguments. He writes grievances. He doesn't write any love stories.” And as I listen to this record I get exactly what she’s saying. It’s not poetry, no, these are very much the 95 Theses Luther nailed to the Church’s door. “Mama, You Been On My Mind” gets under your skin and refuses to go anywhere. I recently lost my mother and this song will now live inside of me until I expire. “Ain’t Talkin’” has the excess skin flayed from its back of transgression and tribulation and the results are stark, unfunny and harrowing to say the very least especially when followed by a “The Times They Are A-Changin’” that I’ve never heard the likes of before. Many have covered this song, but few have truly uncovered what these words are actually reporting. This song is more than a plea, it’s an evocation and Bettye clearly understands this as the words flow out of her mouth like unanswered prayers from on high. Forget religion because God will hardly recognize you when the Pearly Gates slowly open and Saint Peter gives you a moment to change your mind and actually make a difference with your unexamined life. “What Was It You Wanted” yes Bettye, Mercy! Trombone Shorty is a revelation on this song. As I listen I am taken back to Marvin Gaye and the dark night of a soul when bullets replaced words and not even “Sexual Healing” could save him. How one song transitions into the next must be heard to be believed. “Emotionally Yours” is a hymn to the servitude of real love without any back talk or sass to muddy the waters of a journey connecting hearts and minds. I find myself swooning and wanting to hear that one again as I put on my shoes so I can set out to find my one true love. Another killer transition because hearing things in chronological order makes zero sense when dealing with Bob’s extensive and excruciating catalog of hits and more hits. “Do Right To Me Baby (Do Unto Others)” is a thumb in your eye as the good book comes alive and helps every one of us make up for lost Robinson Crusoe time.  No better song to end this album than “Going, Going, Gone” another song underplayed and underappreciated from an album that deserves more love. Her growl is right in the pocket as our heartstrings are again given a good talking to before she throws you a backward glance and walks right out that door. Thank you Bettye and thank you Bob!   - Charles Cicirella 3/30/18

Nature cannot be composed.

https://www.podomatic.com/podcasts/charlespoet/episodes/2018-03-24T15_01_44-07_00

Less guns

Less God

We’re so doomed

Waiting for them to show the condo

It’s time for me to leave

Crossroads call out to me like a frozen lake

Some poems take longer to birth

We’re all midwives in our own ways and deplorable means

Hide your eyes I am ready to flash the world my nonessentials

Less emotional baggage

Less hypocritical bullshit

We’re so out of touch

I walked the pier until the wind kicked up a howling ultimatum

Linda walked to the end and thankfully made it back to the picnic table

We were lost and then we were found, buked and scorned by lasting first impressions

Waiting for them to knock on the cell door and ask what I want for my last meal

It’s time to cozy up to the governor and pray a stay of execution is in my near future

Don’t rely upon coincidence when chaos keeps you in line with a closed fist

Charles Cicirella

2/26/18

I Want You (Strange Happenings) (For Emily)

https://www.podomatic.com/podcasts/charlespoet/episodes/2018-03-15T18_52_55-07_00

Want to write a poem for you

I hope I can pull it off

Like burning off leeches or watching The African Queen under the influence of granola

She was something special

Asked me to dance when no one else wanted anything to do with me

It was probably the only Winnie Cooper moment I’ll ever have in this one life

Let’s trade punches or kisses as In Through The Out Door plays in endless rotation like the Earth rotates around the sun

Newton had nothing on us except that he developed his theory of gravity while relying on the occult idea of action at a distance, across a vacuum, and did it while spitting in no one’s eye

Let’s face it compared to Sir Isaac we’re fucking losers or worse yet, Republicans

Want to spy you naked as I attempt to scale the trestle beneath your imaginary window

I’m not a stalker or a stuntman just a loathsome poet who never thought Corey Feldman was much of an actor even when he was oddly in vogue in the eighties

Bring back the firing squad, a cigarette and blindfold and maybe then I’ll die for this over extended country of haves and have s’mores  

Emily is an actress and an improviser of ferocious skill and wit

Someone who can trip the light fandango without even moving her pinky finger

Canada called and wants to wish us luck before they turn their enlightened backs on our divided states of amnesia

Charles Cicirella

3/15/18

Little Girl Blue (For Laura Mvula)

https://www.podomatic.com/podcasts/charlespoet/episodes/2018-03-09T13_03_30-08_00

Piano keys undress you

Suspense heightened when you smile

Lost in your elegiac escapades

Don’t wish to rely upon comfort for this poem

These words must be born from a volcano

Your sound nothing pedestrian, thank God for that

We stir in everything and anything we can think of

The kitchen sink another tool instrumental in uncovering our histories

You came onto the scene already a legend, and nothing will stop you now

Let’s begin by forgetting our a,b,c's

Let’s begin by forsaking our Gods

Let’s begin by uncovering our mouths and speaking out against everything silencing us

There’s a racket in my soul that I hear every time I turn off the television in my mind

There’s a rebellious nature that mustn’t be squelched as you wake up and walk toward the sun

Saw, heard and felt you and know I’ll never be the same again.

Charles Cicirella

3/9/18

Bucket List

https://www.podomatic.com/podcasts/charlespoet/episodes/2018-03-09T10_22_29-08_00

I want to be there in the morning with you when you put on antiperspirant

I want to be there when you’re sitting on the toilet with your A-frame tuchus looking into the void wondering what went right and what went wrong

Your lane’s the only one worth a damn in a world of shrinking dividends

The good days are when I remind myself I’m a working poet. The bad days advance like a silent thunder, never letting up on the gas or empty, lonesome prairies

Let’s fill the unwelcomed silences with trivia bowls and trivial, unthreatening sex

I stared hard into the crystal ball and saw only broken debutantes and French revolutions gone belly up

I wish to be there with you when you find out who your biological parents are

I desire to be present when you realize your taste in men isn’t as awful as you once believed it to be

I cannot get enough of you looking so deeply into my soul that the roots of all the best parts of me are no longer thirsty or in need of plastic drugs or plastic people

Charles Cicirella

3/7/18

Burnt Umber (For Tamara)

https://www.podomatic.com/podcasts/charlespoet/episodes/2018-02-22T23_37_41-08_00

Cover the sky in smoky shyness

Walk by the water and drowned in another artist’s heavy words

One line at a time until you climb out of your madness like Spiderman

Stalled in the everyday desolation of evil flowers smelled and spat out

Normalcy coopted by orange greed and pistols popping no longer turns our stomachs

She was a good girl before she started shooting heroin into her apple pie veins

First worlds are all the shit until they’re not

Third worlds move up the ladder like a repairman on the take

I’m just another wanna be human desiring human companionship

Throw another Molotov cocktail into the unexamined crowd

Learn to do without oxygen as air pollution cleans all of our grandfather clocks

When she sat on my face and smiled I knew I could retire my bucket list for good

Uncover the hallowed ground and wish upon a heap of innocent starlings

Chase your blues away by opening the window and not jumping to your death

Let me come to you with only my words and I promise to keep you laughing

Charles Cicirella

2/22/18

Peacefully Coexist

https://www.podomatic.com/podcasts/charlespoet/episodes/2018-02-11T07_41_34-08_00

Watching Strange Weather and eating chocolate Oreos

I am waking up to the very real possibility I’m slipping away

The truth hits me likes waves upon the craggy rocks

I cannot escape these impenetrable feelings that I have wronged myself in some way

I stopped reading my horoscope because I was tired of the future staring me in the face

The pygmy goat across the hall kept me awake morning, noon and night with its crying

I treasured the time we spent together until our treasure chest became an albatross around both of our necks

I wore a big cross and traveled down south like a pseudo gentile in search of something concrete or at the very least solid enough to keep my monsters at bay

You wore a wig hat and acted all high and mighty like a servant of God or music critic

After licking the chocolate off my fingers I took a sip of root beer and turned down the thermostat

Let’s remember who we are and that when times are tough its best to hunker down like a reformed saint

Politicians can all bite me for how little civic duty any of them are actually feeling

We peacefully coexist or we don’t it’s just that simple once everything comes out in the wash

I trusted you until I noticed the knife you had so ruefully stuck in my back

What’s the point of holding a grudge when it will only make you weaker and more susceptible to further attacks?

This loneliness haunts me like a ghost with no recompense and I am starting to believe this human stain won’t dissipate no matter how much water I pour onto my raging inferno soul

Watching from across the room as I tear myself into the littlest pieces and parts

There’s no coming back from this permanent darkness not when your brain refuses to shutoff even for just an hour or two

Let’s cut the chitchat and stop pretending the investment we’ve made into each other wasn’t real or worth its weight in gold

Pick the words that best represent you and leave the rest to chance

Making it up while you go along is about the only life plan left that makes any sense

Turn down the heat and cool yourself off in the unbearable lightness of your own being

Charles Cicirella

2/11/18

The Life and Times of a Beatnik

https://www.podomatic.com/podcasts/charlespoet/episodes/2018-02-10T17_44_08-08_00

Desolation angels

Let’s take what’s left and try our best to keep it whole

Race across the country looking for your father

The Holy Ghost called and wants his martyr complex back

I was so bent out of shape I couldn’t get straight

All the country songs in the world won’t make me an alcoholic

I tried and I tried and still I did not fit in the skeleton keyhole

If you’re comfortable basking in someone else’s fifteen minutes there’s no hope for you

Doctor Sax

Sitting on the toilet writing your guts out while an exterminator looks for a clean needle

Living with your mother may not be all that, but when you’re cracking up it may be the very last safety net you have left

Streams of mediocrity wrap around my throat and silence my pangs for acceptance and alchemy

I desire to be free of all constraints, but I don’t wish to die if such a thing is even possible

I resist everything and everyone, but I have to admit waking up alone is getting old

I must pull my head out of my ass, but to do that I will need to discover some sunshine in my life pronto

Maybe I need to go to a library and get lost in the books before it’s too late

On the Road

When I was a kid I liked to go to 7-11 and eat a burrito on the wall outside the store

It made me feel like I was some kind of cool cat different than all the rest of the alley cats

Started to again buy frozen burritos and they do lend me some solace in these dark days

Woke up about an hour ago with that sinking feeling in my gut already taking hold

Charles Cicirella

2/10/18

Alone

https://www.podomatic.com/podcasts/charlespoet/episodes/2018-02-07T17_59_52-08_00

Listening to Craig Firsdon read one of his poems

The last thing I remember is picking up black material from one of my socks

I’m alone ever since my mother passed away in October

I have no family to speak of

My friends are the only family I have and they’re all busy with their own families

Am I feeling sorry for myself? No, not really. It’s just the truth and the truth will either whip me into shape or retire me as I attempt breaking back into the human race

Craig lays it all down in the moment and I’m alone with his generous, genuine spirit

As I listen I’m reminded how it felt hearing Lincoln deliver the Gettysburg Address

Yes, I was there or I like to believe I was because when moments are marked in blood we must push through history and relive the very best parts of our future and past selves

The porn does only so much and the art fills in quite a bit, but there is still something I’m missing as I look back and see only one set of footprints in the embryonic snow

Maybe God was carrying me or maybe just maybe I’ll forever be lost in this empty space

The grieving process takes time like standing in line at the airport or sinking your teeth into a juicy steak

Charles Cicirella

2/7/18

I Woke Up Screaming

https://www.podomatic.com/podcasts/charlespoet/episodes/2018-02-04T20_20_15-08_00

Woke up screaming

Nobody gives a shit

You’re told to reach out if you’re feeling bad,

But what good does it do if no one picks up the phone?

I’m lost in the narcissistic membranes of synapses that pay me no mind

The only thing that has ever made one iota of sense to me is the art and the art never fails me even when I fail myself

I woke up screaming like a Barbie with no head and whose Dreamhouse is under water

It’s like I hardly exist or I exist, but only to myself behind shutters the color of coal dust

Skate on the frozen ice and pray it does not crack and swallow you whole

I’ve always believed I was brilliant, but that does not feed nor clothe me no matter how generous my daydreams are

She told me she heard my message, but that she was going through her own depression and calling would not be possible at this time

I understand we have to be our biggest champions, but sometimes self-love just ain’t enough in these claustrophobic days and nights of continual terror

Woke up wishing I were dead

Woke up with ice water in my veins

Woke up feeling like I had swallowed Charlie Brown, the football and Schroeder’s piano

Woke up and texted a friend and that only made me feel worse

I am tired of being the only one there for myself

I had a dog when I was fourteen and didn’t fully appreciate him

I’ve done things my way for as long as I can remember and it hasn’t helped me one bit

I need a change of scenery, but don’t drive so I’ll exist behind these canvas curtains and pray God hasn’t completely forgotten about me

Charles Cicirella

2/4/18

Blue Flowers

https://www.podomatic.com/podcasts/charlespoet/episodes/2018-01-28T18_27_05-08_00

She writes like the wind.

A pirate plundering blue marigolds.

A mission statement turned on its patchwork head.

The generic pills will not be the death of you.

You’ve never allowed anything to slow you down for too long.

A masterful witch who enriches everyone she comes into contact with.

Poem’s coming out crinkled like an angry doily or a balloon animal retaining water.

1776 is America’s official beginning of its nationhood. It’s also the year you stopped making sense and I had to finally buy a gun and face up to the insensible facts.

Paralysis has been kicking my ass since 2002, but it beats being put out to pasture or at least that’s what I keep telling myself.

I dated an assassin who trained me in the art of excommunication.

Juliet knew how to take a drag on a Camel cigarette like no one I’ve encountered before or since.

Was going stark raving mad until I slowed my roll and realized everything really is better "when it's sittin' on a Ritz."

She writes like a steppe wolf hunting a Caspian seal.

Been on fire since a blue tipped match ignited her passion and blew up her world.

I am a mynah bird mimicking the human voice. My dark-brown plumage keeps me ever mindful that I can always take flight.

Charles Cicirella

1/27/18

Desert or Dessert (For Julie)

https://www.podomatic.com/podcasts/charlespoet/episodes/2018-01-26T02_38_53-08_00

Syrian ruins

Heart fragments

I desire to drive with you through the antique robotic deserts

Lose ourselves in the splintered mirrors of disenchanted time and expanding space

We choose to either be a hero or a villain before we’re even born

We make allowances for our weaknesses while ramping up our strengths with interfaith

I wanted love, you wanted dessert

I was out of my depth, you were only concerned with the calories

Fairytales do come true

If you’re willing to suspend disbelief and focus on self preservation

Captive audience

The laugh track in your heart keeps you free from lonesome fear and disarming truth

Charles Cicirella

1/25/18

Mellow

https://www.podomatic.com/podcasts/charlespoet/episodes/2018-01-26T02_17_53-08_00

Stoned in waves

Elvis corrupts me

Marchand microfiche

Charles Cicirella

1/22/18

Snap My Head Back (For Juliet)

https://www.podomatic.com/podcasts/charlespoet/episodes/2018-01-24T02_07_45-08_00

Trying to get my thoughts straight

Everything coming out hurried

Panic seizes me around the throat

You’ve always been the perfect tonic

A femme fatale who doesn’t know her own strength

Your allure bombards me like melting confetti

Wish to hang out with you in a bathroom stall

Or an unused confessional in a gothic church

Watch you sleep like the Glitter-Witch you are

Trying to get my head on straight

Anxiety sits atop my chest like an M-4 Sherman Tank

I’m astounded by your grace and machine gun parlance

Keeps me coming back for more

A psychedelic soda shop zeroing in on only good trips

I will try to not wake up screaming

Charles Cicirella

1/24/18

Clam Shack

https://www.podomatic.com/podcasts/charlespoet/episodes/2018-01-10T21_37_41-08_00

Watching Wonder Wheel and eating clams.

I believe it’s how Woody would have wanted it.

If I’m wrong there’s nothing that can be done about it now.

Watching Wonder Wheel and enjoying all the bright colors.

I won’t say Woody hit it out of the park, but the film works and that’s more than I can say about many of his later films.

The songs he has chosen and their placement is also expertly executed and makes me smile and tap my toes.

Kate Winslet is an anguished joy to watch and Jim Belushi channels a lesser Brando which is no small feat because Jim Belushi more often than not does nothing for me.

I won’t tell you I’m enjoying Justin Timberlake’s performance, but he is given the uncomfortable task of playing Woody’s character and no one but Woody can ever truly pull that off.

Juno Temple honestly made no impression on me. I’ve changed my mind. Juno Temple is a rising starlet!

Watching Wonder Wheel as Coney Island rears its ranshackled head and reminds me of another time when beauty was in the eye of the beholder and the beholder was beautiful.

The allegations against Woody can go jump in the lake. I’m not defending him. I’m just not ready to get out my pitchfork and run him out of Tinseltown.

Wonder Wheel feels inspired more than stilted like many of his later films and I pray he continues to find inspiration and that when he finds himself going through the motions that he stops and takes a deep breath.

Charles Cicirella

1/7/18

Stand Your Ground

https://www.podomatic.com/podcasts/charlespoet/episodes/2017-12-21T17_04_35-08_00

Words are consequences

The division of right and wrong is not partisan

Both sides of the aisle is cooked up spin and divided we fall

Loosen the screws

Prisons are full of parole violators

Drive into the crowd and claim religious intolerance

At some point might making right and determining policy needs to cease and desist

Our end game of the end always justifying the means doesn’t amount to a hill of brown or black beans

Social justice has been hung out to dry as we’re put back into chains and the truth has been sidelined by a man-child whose only plan of attack is distract, distract, distract

I want what’s right

You want what’s right

Or are we ready to simply settle for what’s convenient as we drive thru yet another Starbucks and get our fix of designer caffeine and Hail Mary innuendos?

Our word should mean more than just a Caesar salad and our inability to squarely look our own Foggy Bottom reflections in the bloodshot eyes

Why is it so tough for liberals to push back on conservatives? It’s most certainly not because the right has the left beat on the issues

I believe if we don’t stand our ground sooner than later we’re going to lose more than just our consciences in this fight between the haves and have nots

Are you willing to sell your country out for a few more votes?

The Republicans are and did

Are you willing to just look the other way as another human being is treated like they’ve no right to say anything when they’re manhandled or even worse raped into silence?

Are you just going to stand there and do nothing or even worse add your vote to a chorus of dissenting voices on not only the rule of law, but the rule of humanity in our closeted system of reprobates and soiled Bible salesmen?

Charles Cicirella

12/19/17

Rough and Tumble (For Joe Cohen)

https://www.podomatic.com/podcasts/charlespoet/episodes/2017-12-19T07_41_19-08_00

We were in the same homeroom all through junior high and high school.

He was one of the popular kids. Me, I knew all of the popular kids, but I didn’t fit in anywhere. Not even with the other outcasts.

Joe had this way about him that always made you feel good about yourself and I believe that’s because he accepts people for who they are no ifs, ands or buts.

When I see him at the reunions I always feel like I’m meeting the Godfather of Mayfield Heights or wherever it is he resides because he carries himself with such an unmistakable confidence you know messing with him would be a big mistake.

I was surprised when he told me he reads my poetry that I post on FB, but that just goes to show you, you never know whose paying attention and what interests they may hold.

Going to watch another episode of The Walking Dead and try and get it out of my head that I may soon be on the street like an overzealous zombie or disabused Democrat.

The wind is breaking and there’s a good chance it will never get put back together again. Not if the deregulation continues and the climate deniers refuse to see the inconvenient truth through the burning trees.

Some people are probably wondering if this poem is about Joe Cohen, me or our screwed up politics that has us under siege and my answer is simply that this poem is about everything and nothing.

It’s about laying down a gauntlet or drawing a line in the sand or whatever metaphor makes sense to you as Joe and I catch up over lunch and for at least an hour or so I feel safe and like no one can touch me because Mr. Cohen has my back.

Charles Cicirella

12/19/17

Am I Hot?

https://www.podomatic.com/podcasts/charlespoet/episodes/2017-12-17T13_34_10-08_00

There’s more and more crust in my ears.

Probably because I am showering less and less.

I’ve been depressed since before the burning bush took residence in my head.

I remember when I was a kid not being able to push down the malaise covering me like Paddington’s orange marmalade.

Only trips to the library on my yellow Free Spirit ten speed did anything to lessen the fear and anxiety I was experiencing.

When I started to write at fourteen it was like I’d finally found a friend and didn’t feel so lost or uncomfortable in my own skin.

You want the truth?

You want to know if magic’s real and if wishes really do come true?

Watch me ride into Jerusalem on the back of an ass and never forget how easy it is to get lost in your own complex of martyrs and Minotaur’s.

My crotch smells like the cheese rotting in the fridge and I’m resistant to taking a shower because I don’t particularly like the water’s fingers touching my opaque skin.

I know I best drag myself into the bathroom no matter if there’s a door or not because bathing is a part of life like the Heimlich maneuver and five o’clock shadow.

It’s always been so much easier to write a poem than to do the day to day things we must do to stay human like laundry and finding gainful employment.

Even other poets don’t seem to get me and that’s okay because I’ve never much trusted the status quo or the academic sludge passed off as poetry.

I wonder if when Christ returns if he’ll have any time for me or if he’ll dismiss my chosen status and instead pick someone else to play on his basketball team.

My fifteen minutes of fame escape from my penis like Stormtroopers hell-bent on protecting the Death Star or at the very least making sure George Lucas is not disturbed.

There’s less and less skin being left in the game as high-ranking insiders decide even their own companies are no longer worth investing in.

We’re at a crossroads of cataclysmic proportions and even the Cowardly Lion can no longer protect us from ourselves.

If we’re not willing to face the absolute truth then what good are we as we continue to take God’s name in vain and become more and more comfortable with the yellow and blue flames?

Charles Cicirella

12/17/17

Am I Dead?

https://www.podomatic.com/podcasts/charlespoet/episodes/2017-12-16T15_57_57-08_00

I know I shouldn’t have to ask, but sometimes that which is obvious eludes me like a hard spanking or soft kiss.

The poetry stuffed inside my gut like Little Debbie Snack Cakes and sometimes it makes sense while most of the time I’m left hanging by the most tenuous of threads.

It’s not a sign of death, but oftentimes avoiding your deepest, darkest feelings will only leave you in limbo or Passaic, New Jersey.

I’m calling out to you like a harpy.

Like a Bettie Page pin-up who allowed the leopard to lick her pussy because she liked how the leopard changed its spots for the holidays.

I’m calling out to you from underneath the coffee table because I’m afraid to face all the burgeoning questions resting atop another unread copy of Vanity Fair or within the folds of your James Brown “Mother Popcorn” skin.

The Democrats have finally proven beyond the shadow of any doubt just how spineless they are as the Mad Hatter sits in the White House eating his curds and whey, shitting out more self-congratulatory tweets and poisoning America with an unabashed ignorance we’ve not seen in a century or more on Pennsylvania Avenue.

Let’s go the way of the Dreamers who if congress have their way will be deported before you can blink an eye or flick a booger off your pointed and pugnacious finger.

I wanted to stay inside where it was warm, but I knew if I didn’t go out into the streets and start to march I’d find myself questioning why I still even exist in this land of defamation and ridicule.

Are we already dead?

Are we quite sure we’ll have the upper hand when push comes to shove and shove decides to sneak across the border and become Canadian?

You want the biggest slice of the pie? Okay fine, but just keep in mind the karmic chickens that will eventually come home to roost and all the repercussions that will whip you like a slave in orbit once a not so silent minority has their final say.

Charles Cicirella

12/16/17

Am I Alive?

https://www.podomatic.com/podcasts/charlespoet/episodes/2017-12-15T21_20_12-08_00

I know I shouldn’t have to ask, but sometimes it’s hard to tell the living from the dead.

The poetry pours from me like blood, semen, piss and shit.

It’s not a sign of life, but sometimes you just have to take what you can get.

Let’s lose ourselves down the rabbit hole.

Alice called and wants her looking glass back.

Jack the Ripper called and said thanks for not putting up too much of a fight.

The Republicans have finally proven beyond the shadow of any doubt party before country no matter what, no matter who gets dead.

It’s the five year anniversary of Sandy Hook. We mustn’t celebrate our inability or ineffectiveness to make a difference.

This goes triple for you President Obama who proved just how dangerous hope can be when used as a dowsing rod to locate a nation’s sweet spot and then exploit it for their own political means.

Are we alive?

Does it matter if we’re only normalizing our horror until the spilling of blood becomes our national pastime like the trafficking of children and the privatization of our morality?

Proof of life is overrated especially when the air is unbreathable, the water is undrinkable and you’re a ghost walking around in someone else’s skin.

Charles Cicirella

12/15/17

Evolution

https://www.podomatic.com/podcasts/charlespoet/episodes/2017-12-02T23_39_14-08_00

Ready to grow.

Moon pours through the trees.

Cat pounces on dead tortoise.

A slave to the art.

Justifications and rationales do not exist.

There is no glass. All therapists are full of shit.

Printing innards keeps me grounded and focused on what’s possible.

When she posts about assembling chapbooks my loins start to quiver and shake.

A means to an end doesn’t mean a damn thing if you’re not willing to commiserate.

Ready to get up and go.

Ready to go the distance no matter pratfalls or syrupy endings.

I desire to bring out the best in you by sharing only the best parts of myself.

Charles Eric Cicirella

12/2/17

Secret Alphabets

https://www.podomatic.com/podcasts/charlespoet/episodes/2017-11-22T01_07_45-08_00

Writing again

I think

The kind of writing that will never get the attention of John Burroughs

Sometimes I wonder why that is. Most of the time I just accept the reality lying before us, perverse and swollen, bubbling with machismo and rapid fire flatulence

Christina M. Brooks is considering quitting poetry which really pisses me off because she has a real gift. Plus not sure how you give up something you’re born to do

Smoking pot

Listening to The Doors

Thinking about the young woman who sold me my bong. Her ass looked amazing inside those tight blue jeans. Made me rethink killing myself for the time being

Wanna get high?

Wanna break on through?

Then stop believing the endless barrage of bullshit being spilt like milk or a child’s blood

Charles Cicirella

11/19/17

Just The Tip

https://www.podomatic.com/podcasts/charlespoet/episodes/2017-11-28T22_13_28-08_00

Burned the tip of my finger

Lighting the glass pipe

I guess it’s the price of being a stoner

Always wanted to believe irresponsibility was a virtue

Here’s my rub if fucking little boys in the butt

Isn’t a cardinal sin then pray tell what is?

Drank the two cans of Coke in the frig

Now I want more because it only takes one can

To become addicted to the Black Death that is Coca-Cola

And I wanted to drink lemonade with you beneath a shade tree,

But there’s only the lemons of my life and shade is non existent

In this Donnie Darko darkness

Maybe a sugar free grape Popsicle will do the trick

If I can get passed the flavor of artificial sweetener

I’m not a rat in a maze even though Pavlov is my God

I know the grass is running out

I’d be a liar if I said that wasn’t bringing me down

The genius of being a genius is catch and release

Charles Cicirella

10/24/17

I don’t know how to grieve.

https://www.podomatic.com/podcasts/charlespoet/episodes/2017-11-02T11_58_59-07_00

My mother died

Don’t have a clue what to do with this Intel

All my tears are conscientious objectors from another unobserved police action

I covered up her face with a white sheet

Then I uncovered her face so she could sing like a nightingale

I pray the check to the rabbi doesn’t bounce because I don’t feel like going to Hell today

I don’t know how to grieve

Properly or improperly

All my coping mechanisms have flown south for the winter

Tired of pretending I’m broken

Tired of wishing ill on others because I don’t know how to build my own happiness

Tired of being tired and want to wake up and walk away from all this sadness

My mother is dead

My father has been out of the picture for quite some time

Picture perfect families only exist on TV and in our most warped of nightmares

Grief and I have never quite seen eye to eye

When Hospice called I was inconsolable

Soon I stopped crying and a drought took hold like an absentee parent or vengeful God

Charles Cicirella

11/2/17

Baby Doll Mask (For Juliet)

https://www.podomatic.com/podcasts/charlespoet/episodes/2017-11-01T11_01_21-07_00

Sequined pain

Streaming blood pageantries

Rusted Midwest soliloquies

Art witch seductress Brainiac

Bathroom stalled Obsessive

Charles Cicirella

11/1/17