Dear Allen

Dear Allen

you opened my eyes

with your poetry, your life

you suffered within yourself

just like me, more than me

the world was turbulent

is turbulent but not like your world

wars and AIDS

you were a crime

everything you were was a crime

and you called Che cute once

and he was cute and everyone

in Cuba hated you and loved you

and your mother loved you and

you loved her but the world

didn't like that and her head didn't

like that and you both ended up

in the same place and

you had Holy Lucien and Holy Peter

and you Howled at the moon and

opened eyes and beat the close-minded.

You choked and sputtered and

sought purchase and sought

yourself and your poetry

and nobody else sought because they had the formulas of

Shakespeare and Byron but you

had Whitman and WCW and

Burroughs and you didn't care

so you let the skeletons dance and

you put America through the

washing machine.

Nobody knew, nobody knows what you're saying but they feel what

you're saying, what you're saying

is relevant will always be

relevant

free speech! Gay rights!

Lovely Orlovsky and Bell's Palsy

and angry angry strokes

you beatnik! You hippie!

Good little boy at Columbia the YMHA

and contraband

the president spies on you, you beatnik!

You broke the barriers, you ushered in

a new world

beat beat beat beat

Dear Allen

thank you

to hell with Byron

to hell with Romance

beat beat beat beat

Dear Allen

Holy Allen Holy Peter

ultimately (un)Holy Lucien

Holy Burroughs Holy William(s)

Holy Lawrence

Zen Allen Free Allen

thank you