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Nicholas Karavatos
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This
can/not be real. This can/not be happening. Thus, philosophy – or not.
A
star is born billions now on Earth. Photographs on her refrigerator.
It
is I who am living in my world.
Brilliance. Who is that knocking at my door at this hour?
Once, I answered with guitars. I will again.
This
is not the life lived or the world lived in that I imagined I would.
An
aside with the author, please.
Can
you help me you can because you’re here.
I
think of you thickly. Behold the mind of man.
It
is tempting to close my eyes. The cats are kind.
Each
keyboard player is the sacrificial undead.
There must be somebody I can fake my way into the big time past.
While driving my onboard dj now nineteen
Keeps me informed. Listening to music
Is
doing
Is
intention
Is
act of will
Of
concentration
Of
alert relaxation
A
meditative devotion
A
devotional meditation
Burning carbohydrates quietly.
It
was the age of the instrumental break that couldn’t be whistled or hummed.
I
wrote a serial poem called Bass Player.
The
rope of lineage frayed in snare threads I entangled myself with.
Once
upon a time in the same week I attended a
Spoken word performance, a performance art piece, a tragicomic monologue,
a
Poetry reading and other written works staged, and was confused.
She
has died
And
for him
There is nothing left of her but her drugs.
After a year even the drugs couldn’t replace her.
Nights and days are spent coding for a new game: Great Battles of the
Bible.
Bloody OT swordplay and visionary jihad with Jesus Christ.
Is
that name stealth or is it just lame? It sounds like recess at Sunday
School.
Add
a third layer and just call it: Jihad.
Is
this computer game a tool of Satan because the scenarios
Are
open to historical revisionism
As
Goliath defeats David or Jesus fights back along the Stations of the Cross
Or
Mohammed loses decisive battles with the Mekkan Pagans and Arabian Jews?
What
if the Muslim army – not the Banu Nadir – stood buried up to their necks
Beneath the swinging swords after the Battle of the Trench?
What
then? Play on? Yes, or
Press the God button on the handset
Whenever scripture is about to be changed by the outcome of a game or
A
game can be set to default to a preordained predestined fate that
miraculously
Comes to pass in retrospect.
I
wished that music in my life to pass so
I
pressed the button.
This
is not my house but I live in its photographs
Looking for myself and I’m not home.
This
has been a shitty year.
I am
defecating into the future by letting go of the past.
The
body is revolving.
Now
that home seems like a foreign country to me
I
can feel how nice it would be to live here.
Listen to me like this. I am finding myself again.
Is
Jesus such the happy ending?
Where is English common law in Chinatown?
I am
not that male model in a woman’s world of skin.
Nicholas Karavatos is currently an Assistant Professor in the Department of English at the American University of Sharjah, United Arab Emirates. Graduate of Humboldt State University in Arcata and New College of California's Poetics Program in San Francisco. Poems have appeared in After the Fallen, Blackbox, Certain Stones, Cherry Bleeds, Country Activist, debt, Earth First! Radical Environmental Journal, EcoNews, Edge City Magazine, Humboldt-Central American Solidarity Newsletter, Juke Jar, Log, Minotaur, mirage[periodical], Paisley Moon, PoetsWest Online, Prophetic Voices, Prosodia, San Fernando Poetry Journal, Steelhead Special, Thieves Jargon, Tight, Travelling Poet, Toyon, Unlikely Stories and What the Hell.
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