Exit

Exit

“There's only one life and this is it.” --Allen Ginsberg

You got yer exit here

You got yer exit there

You dance all around

Until yer body's found

Barry G. Wick

Rain Sound

Rain Sound

Who needs sound

Besides the deaf

For whom any sound

Becomes love 

Even explosions

First heard

would be an orgasm

The resident of the city

Listens to prerecorded rain

To fall asleep

The lonely rancher

Needs the occasional

Bellow from a steer

That makes its sounds

Knowing it's missing

Parts of anatomy taken

When just prancing prairie-ful

In the hills I heard the creek

At night shoving boulders

Thumping in argument

With the water that demands

Respect for its ability to control

The shape of the canyon

That sleep differed from the city

Where I learned to sleep

With traffic and drunk screams

At midnight as I tossed in the heat

Rain on the roof 

of my home In iowa

Makes me wonder

If a hidden tornado

Will toss me as if 

I was a spark from a camp fire

Flying upwards ready to burn out

The distant sound of tires

Against hard concrete

Sings to me at Night

As America falls asleep

Waiting for delivery

Of a pillow that yells

At a sleeping head

“Wake up, I hear rain.”

With me tossing and adjusting

As I calm its fears

Barry G. Wick

Dredge

Dredge

On this river that drains

From the port where we dock

To the old ship once prowled

There is a way to sail through

With help for a berthing

It is the dredge that clears

A channel for ship on the sea

Even now a sail cannot be seen

To be certain rough hands

Will do their digging 

Nobody wants to see the truth

Brought up from the bottom

For everyone to see it's colors

Deposited on the shore

They just want a clean channel

Our ship raised a flag to say

What it believes in the waves

And while the waters try to fill

What was hidden in the depths

The channel is open for all

Barry G. Wick

Paradise

Paradise

“In Paradise, roasted pigeons fly into your mouth.”--Werner Herzog in Fata Morgana

A fly once flew into my mouth

I think a bee or wasp

It's been long ago

Since then I've been

Able to keep my mouth shut

Only my fingers slam out words

That I can't retract

Some I chew on for years

Some actions also

Its those pigeons I worry about

Are the bones soft

Is there any lead shot

Hiding in the wings

And feathers

We're they plucked before cooking

Is Herzog watching me

Or is he throwing those pigeons

At people who made it to paradise

But the first thing is a bird

Slammed into my mouth

I'm against forced feeding

Especially when I'm dead

Or about to be

Let me go someplace

Without the rats of the air

And just who besides Herzog

Thinks force feeding pigeons

Is an elegant action in paradise

Is paradise a place to eat

I want to read the review

In the Times or Tribune

Is there only pigeon

Or something else on the menu

If godd controls this place

What's he got against pigeons

That he has to kack and roast them

Woo, this place might not be for me

I come from beef country

Imagine getting hit in the pie hole

With a twelve hundred pound

Barbequed steer hooves and all

More sauce please

Barry G. Wick

Glowing Paper

Glowing Paper--(a really stupid poem)

Books get wet

Bugs eat books

People burn books

Books go to the trash

The mail loses books

Paper books turn to dust

Special paper may save books

I write on glowing paper

And am perfectly happy

To have the bomb make

All that I write disappear

In a white flash

Like what I write on

Only brighter

The shadows I create

Lose their meaning

Once the fingers 

Go on to the next glow

And the next chemical brain plug-in

Where the finger never gets wet

To turn the page with its tiny

Electrical charge detected

I disappear for my reader

Turning into an invisible character

In a video distribution

Of words that I make now

With my muscles

From brain to finger

What will you collect of me

The skin cells that fall from my organs

On the carpet of my mobile home

My shoes and breechcloths

The greatest prize for collectors

Will be my two jockstraps

That could never make me

Look like a Bob Miser model

It's time to yawn enough

To pull the comforter over

My body in bed where

Everyone is headed with

Their phones and tablets

Filled with glowing paper

Barry G. Wick