Opera Positions

Opera Positions

This is a moving studio
motion
you're independent.

I'm holed up with Search Boy again
sniffing the heroine.

From the room
where Bodeen is sleeping
to a hundred year old
building downtown
a mathematical structure.

Jack Burlington
in his land of crack head hos
his holy mass.

Touches of exile
in this squalid box
brandishing browdsword.

Locked away
at the edge of the world
sealed on a cliff.

Tomorrow always closing in
shut down future.

Opera positions
in the front seat
formalities
forward.

Doc Pendleton
running on empty
pacing
placing
fleeing
accelerating,
vacant broadcast.

Seeing what it's like
to be old again
aged vision
youth drugs played out.

A date with an empathetic expanse
like the portrait of Dorian Grey.

Silhouette shadow lady
your tender river hands.

He remembered the harmonicas of Ed Gray
The years of this separation.

I feel green like Jack Midnight
The freedom
the crushing loneliness of freedom.

Tomorrow closing in again
never get blessed with a memory lapse.

Opera positions
in the front seat
we've lost the passion.

Studio house with no lights
concubine by candle light.

Stacks of art books
and furniture
sex sleep.

Having a bad day in a bad year
mischief in the neighborhood
generation of the Hood.

Sinister figures in the paintings
she's devious
her nose is covered.

Sinister friends breaking and entering
lap dance pirouette.

This school
is destroying my poetry
and the cranking power
of this honky-tonk.

Or is it just boxing it in
with discipline
feeling like a punch drunk lumberjack.

I'm not doing words of some rich soap opera
some blue velvet candybox
I'm right here in the streets.

-Will Dockery (1997)

Cheshire Bridge Road (edit)

Cheshire Bridge Road

Early Sunday morning walking with you
on Cheshire Bridge Road
barefoot in the dew.
Sunlight burned until the fog was gone
as it brought in the dawn.
First time I saw your face
it reminded me of music,
smiling across that yard.

-Will Dockery (1981)

Sensitive One

Sensitive One

When we were young
when we were cool.
That pancake thick mask
made you look like a fool.

Got a stash in my mind
so I can get higher
than you'll ever be.

Pentagrams and cages
pretending to be
a slave of Thoth
you see.

I know you have courage
and you're a midget
just for me.
And he, he's the owl
and sees everything.

Disco salsa
a load of lumpy love
from a casualty
in the battles of love.

Under reconstruction
by the good grace of the King.
By his consent
you bestow on me
your magnanimous love.

Ghost of Cortez the Killer
a spontaneous Hitler.
The mystic ringed
an industrial collapse.

Like a rolling snowball
come feel my nature.
Let's come simultaneously
rebuked and accumulating karma.

It was a lot of fun
but just one of those things.
Sit around on Nebraska Street
and just stew.

Your ice cream from Venus
on my lips.
I must see you tonight
love me
I am the sensitive one.

-Will Dockery

Bluebird

Bluebird

So many tears
on a moonlit mile
through Aokigahara forest
old man tips his
snow cap.

Bluebird
on white snow
shivers her timbers.

Snow balling
a white kiss
a love seconded.

She makes me think of
a haiku, though unfinished.

-Will Dockery

These Night Moves

These Night Moves

The night moves dark and silent
I walk the midnight streets again.
Fire up a final cigarette in the starlight
a storm is brewing
a twist in the wind.

The clouds cover the moon in grey swirls
the moon like an egg standing.
The night I met you it was like a dream
had no idea you'd mean a thing to me.
Breaking diamonds on the trail
and sliding back twist and shake.

-Will Dockery / June 1977

Quicksilver

Quicksilver

However possible
through nagic or other means
let's make it work.

Let me light
whatever spark you need
to take you from your pain.

Can you stand it
living this life at top speed
you need to slow down... somehow.

-Will Dockery

Humidity

Humidity

The humidity is misty
remember when she kissed me
now all she wanna do is dismiss me
if she see me she just hiss at me.

A fading piece of history
her love is a mystery.

My heart is smashed but she caint see,
or care that she do these things to me.
Wander in this future fantasy
a nightmare in a black sea

My words have sank to mediocrity
in the mirror is a monster I see.

Pestilence in the sensory,
at the end of the century
a plague in my memory.

In this masquerade, she's such a cutie
go on and do her duty, like a female Jonsey
she just looking for the bone, see.

The humidity is misty
and she never ever miss me
and she never ever miss me.

So here I remain, it's the truth
in the rain, a black tooth.
My soul is stained
my brain in pain
it aint the same
now there's nothing left to claim
there's smoke but I see no flame.

All I see is lots of green girl
smelled but not seen girl
I see you down in that obscene world
like a helicopter in a downward swirl
as you make love wearing fancy pearls.

Poet girl
the time has come I must forget you
somebody else will desecrate you
my karma blackens in this fate stew.

-Will Dockery (1998)