GRATITUDE

RIP MR, JP

madonna's dad joe got mugged and i was pissed

i phoned the daily news and asked for mike royko

one ring: "royko"

i told him the story and the backstory

"i'll check it out"

meanwhile madonna's sister phoned him with the same facts

a few days later he did a column*

i went to the billy goat for a beer, the bar was crowded, i sat next to royko

though tempted to say hello

his aura was profoundly private

reading the paper

chain smoking pall malls 

"where particular people congregate" 's their motto

he slammed shots of christian brothers brandy

one after the other

where particular people congregate

*04/03/1972 chicago daily news

copyright © 2017 by patrick o'hayer

BLOOD BROTHERS

for noam chomsky

the barkeep's satanic wisdom

the existential madness of the clientele

mentor, mentee

exemplar

protege

cartesian

common 

sense

copyright © 2017 by p. o'hayer

PHYSICS

for BR

fuck physics

fuck a-bombs, h-bombs

fuck the gloriously wasteful moon shots, the space programs,

and psychotically dangerous

electricity generation

fuck nuclear medicine

fuck them all

fuck ben franklin

fuck galileo and his lifetime house arrest

fuck the italian inquisition for failing us

fuck these lethal speculations murdering millions

fuck big science too

fuck physics subsidies to big business

especially fuck big science

fuck sir isaac newton, mystic math wiz

fuck fermi

fuck the manhattan project and the commie physicist spies

fuck albert einstein, adulterer and a-bomb enthusiast

and terrible violinist

fuck the paradoxes of physics

fuck dark matter

fuck contradictions of absolute laws--bad poetry

fuck bad poetry

fuck predicting electron indeterminacy--who the fuck cares

fuck all the physics smartypants

their arrogance, their big-dollar lobbying, their bogus rationales

their miles-long underground accelerator toys

don't get me fucking started

fuck pop physics propaganda, clever marketing to the stupid

fuck the hubble telescope, multi-trillion-dollar hobbies

fuck the god particle

fuck cold fusion, so safe

we'll see

fuck the law of unintended consequences

fuck the catastrophic waste of big science

fuck three mile island, fukushima, chernobyl with the skeptical locals

fuck the fucking japs for world war two

fuck nagasaki, because the fucking physicists had to be sure

fuck trinity--good job, physicists

fuck the rationale that we can afford these searing levels of waste

we're starving here, dying here, killing 

everyone in sight, the twin towers

the shining path, the two state solution

fuck yucca mountain 

fuck reprocessing/storing murderous nuclear waste 

essentially

fuck physics

doesn't pass the smell test

cliches are so useful

but in the end

fuck physics

agreed?

no doubt, except for the physicists

but fuck physicists

fuck string theory

fuck 16 dimensions

fuck big experimental physic toys

fuck cern 

hey, physicists, fuck your mother

copyright @ 2017 by p. fucking o'hayer

THE MACHINE

"Chicago ain't ready for reform." ~Paddy Bauler

my uncle bobby, born in 1915,
had down syndrome
back then those kids
were usually dead by age 18
no treatment

paddy bauler
the most corrupt of the corrupt
--his best pal, the hugely corrupt
charlie weber, of the famed
Charlie Weber Day at Riverview Park--
died mysteriously, a mob hit probably,
in the only mansion in my neighborhood
Addison & Wolcott*

so, paddy bauler
the 43rd ward alderman
corrupt to his eyeballs
gave my uncle bobby a desk
at the ward office next door
to paddy's saloon at North & Sedgwick
in Old St. Michael's parish in Old Town
let him run errands, do the make-work
so appalling to Republicans

bobby ran errands, bobby visited shut-ins
was a kind of saintly kid
according to my mother

when he died young
the neighborhood turned out
for the funeral - i never met bobby
but think of him when
the beastly republicans/progressives/libertarians
go all holier than thou
--make-work jobs, Monicagate, crooked hillary
and all the rest--

the wise old cop always told me
that chicago pols had to be very wary
around the downstate republicans in
illinois who'd pick your pocket
while quoting bible verses
--fucking republicans, governor george ryan--
and now we get donald the yahoo
roy cohn's protege

what goes around comes around
tricky dick nixon
--the joke in 1960? you can't lick our dick--
flashing the V sign boarding
the resignation jet staircase
yeah, how do you spell irony?

bounder JFK needed a little help
from paddy and friends
to carry illinois in 1960
though charlie weber wouldn't sign on
the fatal decision

of course the nixon victories in alabama and mississippi
were never helped by black vote suppression
by lynch law - dixiecrats

requiescat in pace, bobby laarveld

copyright © 2017 by patrick o'hayer

*https://www.flickr.com/photos/chicagocrimescenes/13677720415 - for the story click on the lower-right arrow

LOVE & HATE: FAREWELL HOPE AND CHANGE

'war all the time' ~gore vidal

'no one complains more loudly about freedom than the colonial slave drivers'
~samuel johnson

hated ACA, dictated by health
care moguls whose shares
blew up
the initial computer glitch
said it all
hated barack's senatorial mentor
joe 'i adore the iraq war' lieberman
i think of joe whenever
i hear that al gore
--and his supremely hawkish VP--
would never have declared perpetual
war in the mid-east
like W did
after 9/11
sour grapes ralph
nader hating democrats
can blow me
sorta loved the paltry stimulus bill
a little
loved repeal of don't ask don't tell
loved cuba deals, sorta
loved the iran nukes deal
hate the drone war
hate guantanamo
hate joe biden b/c clarence thomas and
anita hill--no forgiveness, julie, sorry
loved michelle and the girls
hated the syria red line business
rolled by mr. putin
a chance to do some good
but barack walked it back
really hate the drone war
really hate his smooth
his smarts
his hopeless eloquence
his hotness even hotter than bubba
trump transparently
showed the presidency biz
and it is a business
to be reality tv
been like that since st. george
'richest american of his day &
devoted enslaver' wasington
st. thomas 'proud enslaver' jefferson
b/c sally hemmings
st. james 'minority of the
opulent' madison
--it's why we have a senate,
to safeguard the riches
of TMOTOs--
history is so fraught
take the good with the bad?
revere the good?
forgive the bad?
not on your fucking life

copyright © 2017 by patrick o'hayer

BALZAC

'coffee for my breakfast, shot of whiskey on the side' ~robert cray

for madonna p

i crashed early last night, 9 p.m.,

no better sleep aid than the

NFL playoffs, bitches,

so i was up at 4 this morning

wide awake after 7 hours

of perfect sleep

to start the morning
canned moka pot italian coffee plus
very hot whole milk
lots of sugar
some leftover panetone

during my postprandial smoke
i noticed lights in the attic
of the 7,000 square-foot behemoth
across the street
our own local balzac
at work no doubt
20 cups of coffee with 20
cigarets recording the melodrama
of the trump election
and contemporary
elite bedroom living

the balzacs moved here paying
an enormous housing
premium just to avoid
drive-bys
my big sis
moved here in 1970
with 9 kids and a drunk
bus-driver husband
because housing then was then so
dirt-basement cheap
'a beautiful place in the country'
or so said the jingle

how times have changed

big sis returned from ft. myers
last year to be with family--la familia--
i'd advised her to stay put
here in town way back
when, her paid-off house the drunk bus
driver had provided but the lure
of the 4 bedroom
one-and-a-half-story quintupled
equity was too irresistible

couldn't blame her really
she refurnished her entire life with the proceeds
and moved to a florida condo to find
another mr. right
the drunk having succumbed
to his pleasures

a year ago her corporate VP
son bought her a house
back here in the 'ville
she thrived playing daily scrabble
with her beautiful daughter
and her, the daughter's, 5 kids

hope you got this all down
and your all-night
composing bears fruit,
monsieur honoré

copyright © 2017 by p. o'hayer

POEM: IN HER MISSPENT YOUTH

in her misspent youth

my niece hung out
with a girlfriend
a honey bear
but when together
you'd overlook the HB
because my niece
glowed so
dangerously
5 kids later
she's looking better
than ever - dangerous
beauty

copyright © by p. o'hayer

RESTING BITCH FACE IS REAL, SCIENCE SAYS

ogling the walk-in
at my fave restaurant - i
had been chatting with the owner
while he rearranged antique
decor - she looked troubled
and as soon as she
entered she about-faced
back into the parking lot
super intense on her mobile
i pretended to smoke
hoping for a further ogle
but saw it was not the time
for in-depth ogling
so i headed in the opposite direction

there i espied an
out of service
payphone, weathered and sad
someone had bent thick
now-rusty wire to prop up
the handset but it hadn't held
the handset dangled
dangerously
i've been on a lucky streak
since the two october
deaths made me insane
a quick reajustment
had the handset resting correctly
in the cradle--operation complete
a bit of found sculpture

inside i beamed

re-entering the joint
i encountered the oglee now
standing in the vestibule
holding back tears
tense, teary, not your
average resting bitch face
that science now says is real

averting my glance
i skulked past
back into bottaio's
on milwaukee avenue
libertyville, illinois
back into the
sacred oblivion of
mourning

copyright © 2017 by patrick o'hayer