$50.00 Poem - 2 mpegs - 10 lanes of explosions - 20 blocks down broadway - Anything but snails - Because of Ben - Before my girlfriend - The Bastard Son of California - Blood, white and blue - catskull balcony - Civic Lessons in WINCity - damned awareness - Dead rock babies - Delicate hat girl - Easter Sunday - the end of the Internet - Every day except weekends and holidays - The fall of America will take place inside an am pm - fucking loved ones - girls girls girls - I Am Not A Political Poet - I Grew Older - incapable of a coffeestain - July 4 - La Jolla I & II - Lad - Lines composed 35,000 feet over Wichita, Kansas concerning unimportance of a crafted scapegoat on March 26, 2001 - Miller and Mayhew - MPL - My friends - My girlfriend's bed - no rest for the wicked - nothingness - the obligatory low - On giant chickens - On the corner of Rosecrans and Midway - Out Here - People who stalk - Perhaps it's television? - A Poem Not Called I Want - progression - Sunday Siempre - then - turns to sex - worker>machine>product - wrote counting the hours - wrote in American lit - wrote on my resume - variable the outcome - zeitgeist

I should write something here... 2014


I was self important.

The one thing that sticks out when reading these pieces of poetry and prose is they are written by a young man who feels as though his view is unique and important. And, from what I recall of myself at the time, that's precisely what I thought I was. It's okay, it was my 20s.

I often dismiss this writing and the time in which I wrote it by saying, "I was living in Southern California, in community college, wrote some self important poetry..." This stuff isn't going in any anthologies. Other than of course, Asunder Press.

But for the sake of providing an intro to this portfolio, allow me to be self important again.



It does provide a journal of sorts for who I was and what I (and the country along with me in some cases) was enduring. This was the end of the '90s, pre Sept. 11, post Sept. 11, W, the onset of the Internet, the end of one millennium and the beginning of another . And, in spite of all the self importance, that shows through frequently in this writing.

I was learning how to think critically and using that skill as much as possible. I had not yet learned humility, restraint or poise. These would come later.

Some of these are better than others. I think "La Jolla 1 & 2" are apt comments on wealth. "2 mpegs" is a pretty decent statement on accessibility to sex and violence the Internet brought. "Miller and Mayhew" is a sweet ode to my instructors at City College.

Of course, the kid that was me missed a lot too. Not sure what I was thinking with the dystopic "Civic Lessons in WINCity" or the weird Western-themed "Lad." What was supposed to be an ode to dead female vocalists ended up being the cheesy and melodramatic "Dead Rock Babies."

I will let the reader decide what to think of "fucking loved ones."

Dubious luster of the writing aside, it at least exists. It survived. Mostly thanks to technology and the same self importance that created it. But, good or bad, it endures. And it will never change. I may change how I look at it but it will always remain in its moment. And that is better than it never existing at all.