WE USE WHAT WE GOT (every little bitty thing) THAT GOD GAVE US

like guns
& pocket mirrors;
like a hairy fist,
or a fast thumb;
like tits
on a '55 Cadillac's bumper
put in a push-up bra,
or a chiseled jaw
bracing a British accent;
we use our parent's wealth,
or food stamped passivity.
We use our reputation,
the written word,
stuttering,
or long legs leading to mysterious fortunes.
We play humor, twist pathos, dance with angels
or devils or landlords or tax collectors--
all that dross,
--secrets & solitudes
and the desperation
of others;
vanity/poverty
& holidays of blue suicides,
big dicks & tight cunts
snapping shut or dribbling
out the clock;
sophisticated offhandedness,
construction sweat,
a beaten fighter's courage,
a hooker's scars,
a priest's purity--
what we got,
is what we use.
I do it.
You do it.
We all do it
in the service
of love,
like the worm,
like the snake,
like the slug.
Everywhere.

Norman Savage
Greenwich Village, 2017

A PALL

has descended
over me; I struggle
to do anything
except move my fingers
over the keys and let
whatever flies & lands
in my head create the lie
of exercise & movement.

Depression is gifted
for the young;
melancholy
for the lovelorn.
I am neither.
I am like my words:
lugubrious labored
leaden lonely.
A shroud covers
my TV, anchors of folly
slither over its face.

I'm waiting for the earth
to turn over
us and the intrepid worm
become our jailers.

Norman Savage
Greenwich Village, 2017