Poetry: Selections from William Taylor Jr.

All the True Poems of the World

The dark struts around like it owns the joint

and all the places we used to hide

 

are shuttered up or filled with

the useless faces of the average man

 

I don't know where the lost

and the broken congregate these days

 

so I skim along the busted earth

a ghost among ghosts

 

in these days without stories

these nights without dreams

 

all the true poems of the world

have been disappeared

 

I heard the jackboots on the doors

and then the terrible silence

 

we find a few are now and then

haphazard in shallow graves

but most you never hear from

 

I imagine they're out there

fragile shades frightened

as they drift

 

listless in the void

waiting for someone

to call them home.

It's April Again and I Don't Know

It's April again and I don't know

about it being crueler than any

other month but the terror of things

is certainly in full swing

and despite it being the 21st century

and despite the supposed advances of science

and civilization and the rest of it

on any given day

you'll still see bloated bodies

tossed into shallow graves like

the garbage they are, as rusted

tanks trundle through whatever's

left of somebody's

hometown just like

it were 1943

or 1912 or 1972

and I'm not trying to get

political here, I'm just thinking

out loud, writing down the obvious

in my ragged little book like

I always have, because

it still seems to help a bit

when nothing else does

on a Tuesday afternoon in April

when I'm tried of work

and life and love

and death and everything

else they're selling

on those big screen  

televisions above

the bar.

Me & the Ghosts

There was nowhere I had to be.

It was late afternoon, I was on Market Street

in the midst of the financial district.

I was walking to the Ferry Building

for no reason other than it was a place to go.

It had bathrooms and people to look at.

It had little stores in which to buy food

and drink. People were getting off work,

rushing for buses, going in pairs and groups

to restaurants and bars. All of the girls

looked pretty, even the ones who weren't.

All the old men seemed kindly enough.

On the concrete plaza the skateboard kids

were doing their thing, sliding down railings

and weaving through throngs of people

with the grace of birds.

The people of the street stood in groups

exchanging drugs and money with a studied nonchalance.

I entered the Ferry Building and used the restroom.

I bought a cup of coffee at a kiosk

went out to where the ferries were

and saw the people lined up to board.

I looked at the people drinking wine

and eating seafood on the restaurant patios,

talking about things they seemed pretty

sure about, businessmen slapping

each others' backs and laughing like horses.

I looked at the ocean and a few ships

that were headed somewhere.

I looked at the bay bridge, filled with cars

and trucks and buses going in one direction

or the other. I eventually got bored

and started back along Market Street

with no destination in mind.

Everything around me, the people

and the buildings, the sky and the earth

all seemed possessed of some sense

of purpose and permanence

I've never been able to manage.

I didn't mind so much, I was used to it.

Me and the ghosts, we just drift.

A Thing I Have Learned

The world won't stand to let you

sit somewhere quiet and alone

with a glass of wine

watching all the pretty things

from a distance as they fade

for any length of time before

it has to go and pull some shit.

William Taylor Jr. lives and writes in San Francisco. He is the author of numerous books of poetry, and a volume of fiction. His work has been published widely in journals across the globe, including Rattle, The New York Quarterly, andThe Chiron Review. He was a recipient of the 2013 Kathy Acker Award, and edited Cocky Moon: Selected Poems of Jack Micheline (Zeitgeist Press, 2014). Pretty Things to Say (Six Ft. Swells Press, 2020) is his latest collection of poetry. A new collection is also forthcoming from Roadside Press.