A Way Somehow
I don’t know, at times,
if you are really people, I
know you are people, I mean,
you aren’t walking on fours, and you
wear clothes. (But sometimes, when
you’re naked, I don’t know if you are human,
and get confused, that’s why I don’t
go to strip joints anymore, or have sex)
How did you all become people? How did
you get so good at showing up on time for work,
and doing what your manager says, how did you
get so good at being detailed oriented. There
is an ad on craigslist for a processor, that says, ‘We are
looking for someone seriously ready to start a career
and care about the work they do every day.’
Seriously the article doesn’t even state what the
company produces? How the fuck can you people,
care about some unknown something, will you even care
after you get the job?
How do you become a person?
Usually, instead of trying to get a job,
I listen to music on youtube, instead of being
a person, I try to become the notes of songs,
the chord structure of ‘Will you still love me tomorrow’
covered by Amy Winehouse, I want to become that song, I learned
the song on guitar and strum it on my adobe porch thing,
trying to become non-human, sometimes I try to become
the taste of a Carls Jr. cheeseburger, I want to be
that delicious, that bad for you.
Sometimes I listen to Amitabha Chants,
Navajo Chants, even old
Kentucky Old Regular Baptists call out chants, I
want to be a pure feeling, that may lead to heaven,
but instead I am Noah Cicero, sometimes I scream, I
can’t be controlled, I can’t be tamed, because I
don’t know what to be-
When you see a pronghorn antelope from your car, high up
north in Nevada, by the Walker River Rez. I don’t know
what to be, the antelope, the person seeing the antelope, the grass
that the antelope is eating, the feeling the person gets from
seeing the antelope, the feeling the antelope has while
eating the grass, so I try to be all things, then I realize,
I’m just wind, swirling and swirling, and it is okay, and
it isn’t okay,
and all will work itself out, something is taking its course, but
it never works out, and all all all it comes, and the wind
shaking the leaves of the palm tree, the hum of bugs, and
me trying to find a job on craigslist,
Say it to me Now
I sent her an email,
it said, ‘Call at 8pm, your time
today. and read these sentences
to me, don’t even wait for me to say
hello, just start reading-
Noah, you will never see me again.
Noah, you will never hold me again.
Noah, if we are in the same room, we cannot
kiss, we cannot touch, we cannot do
anything physical together, because
I have a new boyfriend.
At night or when I’m bored at work, I will
remember sitting with you
next to The Cuyahoga and Han River.
I will even remember the
river in Santa Fe that had no water.’
Then in a peaceful voice, say-
‘Goodbye Noah.’
She never called that day. He received
an email four days later stating, ‘Noah,
get it together, its been a year. Watch
some Greta Gerwig movies, and get
over it.’
Noah Cicero is the author of The Collected Works Volume 1, and Go to Work and Do Your Job. Care for Your Children. Pay Your Bills. Obey the Law. Buy Products.
Banner image: ‘The Brouhers’ by Ric Bower
