jimjakk

[jimjakk]

March 16, 2020

"Though trapped in a bubble, the die dictates our every move." #Poem: "March 16, 2020"

I read that gun store sales have surged, that they have lines around the chopping block. So we decide when shots rupture our street, we’ll drive to my mom’s– far from any city– instead of hiding in a closet in our basement of centipedes. Should we go there now? No, we should wait it out. We uncork a white wine and play twenty games of Trouble. Hours of moving plastic pieces in circles. Though…

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#2020 #coronavirus #covid #covid-19 #covid19 #isolation #pittsburgh #Poem #Poet #Poetry #quarantine #Writer #Writing

[jimjakk]

Peony Martini

"maybe then I’ll be a good drunk" #Poem: "Peony Martini"

I will drink this peony martini until I bloom some kind of floral print-design inside myself a garden blueprint upon which I will feed myself to the masses and bees will flourish within the replenished fields and maybe then I’ll be a good drunk   (originally published in Fishbowl Press, Winter 2020)

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#Poem #Poet #Poetry #Writer #Writing

[jimjakk]

Unlike Reality

"television / the mechanism" #Poem: "Unlike Reality"

television the mechanism wherein brains dwindle upon a string tethered to satellite voices in my ears and yours a stranger intimately confined to believe one of us is real   (originally published in DASH Literary Journal, Spring 2020)

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#al #Poem #Poet #Poetry #reality #tv #Writer #Writing

[jimjakk]

Drought

It rains today in Los Angeles. Crows hunt for worms in the outskirts’ dark pores, sifting ribs from the wet.   (originally published in Goat’s Milk Magazine, Spring 2020)

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#Poem #Poet #Poetry #Writer #Writing

[jimjakk]

I do not want to sleep I want to get smashed

I fall asleep it is Friday my youth is waning. #Poem: "I do not want to sleep I want to get smashed"

but I fall asleep it is Friday my youth is waning. Please tell me every time you want me there. I love to say I will think about it. And I will. To feel if the sun will warm the air enough to drink gallons the death of me. I want you to nail me down I want to stay in bed I want to surround myself with hanging lights and loud whiskey-drinkers and dance around smashed Bud Light bottles gleaming…

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#Age #Bud Light #drinking #drunk #Friday #party #Poem #Poet #Poetry #Writer #Writing #young

[jimjakk]

Peel the Cityfruit

I bite into the apple of new downtowns sweet against my tongue feed car through deserts to find myself toward perceived oases los angeles in the middle of a drought of ideas guitars strum the streets & make a new city to be lost in   (originally published in First Literary Review – East, Summer 2020)

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#city #Poem #Poet #Poetry #Writer #Writing

[jimjakk]

Rust

can’t play trombone without the mouthpiece my lips are silver and gold a statue I am out of practice standing in a crowd of marigolds listening to airplanes   (originally published in Fishbowl Press, Winter 2020)

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#Poem #Poet #Poetry #rust #trombone #Writer #Writing

[jimjakk]

Watering a Flower

"I have been growing better, forth in time." #Poem: "Watering a Flower"

Meditation is mellifluousmelody ignoring the choo-choo train inside my head, but I have been growingbetter, forth in time.There are meadows I will never enter – renterof everything. Nothing I meetin this life I keep. Honest. Lover bearing forever strandsof hair? God, infinity isso infinite when glimpsed. Such the rose moongrows on thisspecific sky.(originally published in Count Seeds With Me,…

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#2020 #chapbook #flower #garden #god #Haruomi Hosono #moon #music #pandemic #Poem #Poet #Poetry #quarantine #Writer #Writing

[jimjakk]

Drowning in a Small Bowl

"For what it is worth, / self-worth is not defined / by worth." #Poem: "Drowning in a Small Bowl"

I play too much in this ruin. Wing- dings over profits, always, despite ancient language bleating over the human market. For what it is worth, self-worth is not defined by worth. The milk is not transferable to white. When projecting nonsense, be sure to include my name in the credits. (originally published in Eunoia Review, Fall 2021)

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#Film #Poem #Poet #Poetry #work #Writer #Writing

[jimjakk]

Seesaw (California / Ohio)

"I’m sorry. You said there was a way to make long distance work and I was no one in return but another." #Poem: "Seesaw (California / Ohio)"

I wanted to be a wayward lasso, to toss and be tossed. Racetrack for the rainy season. Horsetail-whipped. Grieve not the slobbering mouth of distance. I wanted a different chance. Someone else, or no one– there, entwined, I’m sorry. You said there was a way to make long distance work and I was no one in return but another. Already, then, I was galloping to the dark place of convincing the…

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#akron #california #los angeles #ohio #Poem #Poet #Poetry #race #Writer #Writing

[jimjakk]

In the Night Time Car

"Summertime was a memory I ate like strawberries behind the wheel." #Poem: "In the Night Time Car"

Dark and spacious carriage– architecture splits before me, chunks of wood floating in green pond. Summertime was a memory I ate like strawberries behind the wheel. Sticky khaki shorts and burnt-out suns encapsulate the void closing in: a blood pressure monitor on my pale and hairless arm.   (originally published in Eunoia Review, Winter 2020)

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#Poem #Poet #Poetry #Summertime #Writer #Writing

[jimjakk]

Driving in Loops to Enterprise

"For a long time I believed if you drove the actor’s maroon luxury vehicle, you’d become the moon yourself, at long last a god you believed in." #Poem: "Driving in Loops to Enterprise"

We cruised Penn Avenue as compliant vagabonds to the parking garage train station to deposit/withdraw rental cars in other people’s names. For a long time I believed if you drove the actor’s maroon luxury vehicle, you’d become the moon yourself, at long last a god you believed in. Being one who has to drive it to where it must go, I know by now you will guide its hand back to beneath the famous…

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#enterprise #Film #kg #manhunt #manhunt deadly games #manhunt lone wolf #office pa #pa #penn #penn ave #penn avenue #pennsylvania #pittsburgh #Poem #Poet #Poetry #rent-a-car #rental car #strip #television #the strip #Writer #Writing

[jimjakk]

Multimodality

goldfisted, I punch Jupiter #Poem: "Multimodality"

too many avenues to take to achieve              [what]? goldfisted, I punch Jupiter through the rings I’m bound to. a racetrack this zipline I cling to the forest not the tether nor the trees many branched and beholden to gravity I seek to lunge headfirst through the brush renewal in sharp sticks and scrape the surface of what composes me (originally published in Ginosko Literary Magazine,…

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#art #columbus #creativity #imagination #ohio #Poem #Poet #Poetry #Writer #Writing

[jimjakk]

Blue

"the world is dying, but first our friends and neighbors" #Poem: "Blue"

The wave at the shore was followed by blood and flame. California singes itself, Thousand Oaks surrounded by smoke clouds rising into a blanket, smothering, like the chorus assembling on our streets– the world is dying, but first our friends and neighbors, how this bloodshed has been on the fringe of our existence until it’s not, it’s everywhere– down the road, polluting our hope, it…

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#burning #california #climate change #election #environment #fire #flame #LA #los angeles #Poem #Poet #Poetry #thousand oaks #Writer #Writing

[jimjakk]

Carl Reiner Photoshoot

#Poem written after a photoshoot with Carl Reiner for the New York Times back in 2014:

After we leave, me and the photographer, cramped in my car, talk how it must be like to live to be ninety. How free and young we are to zigzag the curves of Laurel Canyon near bullet-speed, windshield wipers screeching in rare California rain.   (originally published in Ariel Chart, Fall 2017)

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#beverly hills #bri #camera #carl #carl reiner #erik #erik madigan heck #existential #heck #journalism #killion #literary #madigan #mel brooks #new york times #new york times magazine #ny #nyt #old #old master #old masters at the top of their game #photo #photography #Poem #Poet #Poetry #portrait #reiner #rob #twitter

[jimjakk]

Float Through

"I don’t know how to interact anymore." #Poem from my chapbook Count Seeds With Me: "Float Through"

Today, I slide on slush on my drive. Unplowed roads, slippery odometer– morning snow surprise. Pittsburgh’s a city of hills unavoidable, and later, waiting on a grocery pickup, I stare into the rearview mirror at the frost- tipped pines when a knock on my window removes me from my existential stupor. I don’t know how to interact anymore. Crank the window the wrong way. Peppermint mocha, the years…

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#2020 #405 #california #covid #covid-19 #dentist #dunkin #fiesta #ford #los angeles #pandemic #pennsylvania #pittsburgh #Poem #Poet #Poetry #quarantine #snow #winter #Writer #Writing

[jimjakk]

For Halloween I’ll be Jesus You Be Mary Magdalene

"Watch men get crucified by wine" #Poem: "For Halloween I’ll be Jesus You Be Mary Magdalene"

my cigarette-smoking badass waitress       the Bible I’ll defenestrate at 3 A.M.                Mary I went to Catholic school while Josh played bagpipes at the Oval Absorb tradition with sugary cocktails                I didn’t say a word in the play                as Pontius Pilate    I wouldn’t                have contributed Watch men get crucified by wine Watch women excise their seven…

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#bagpipes #bible #Catholic #Catholicism #drinking #halloween #jagermeister #jesus #mary #mary magdalene #ohio state #osu #party #Poem #Poet #Poetry #pontius pilate #school #Writer #Writing #zombie