Book Excerpts

From Inhale

(scroll down to see excerpts from previous books)

Excerpt from 'Dream Liveaboard Seabreeze'

I was on a ferry in the Gulf of Mexico. I was senseless, dull. My eyes were 

sore. As I bowed my head to sleep, I was jolted from my wrought-iron seat 

by the sound of a twelve-speed passing by. Larry McMurtry tipped his ten- 

gallon as he flew on down the riding path. His biker flip-flops showed 

wrinkly feet. One of his toenails was hung.

With my head turned, I saw Samuel Clemens dangling his pants overboard 

trying to trap the carp and swordfish. He seemed mighty amazed. I witnessed 

Poe and Chandler standing in the cafe line eating turkey legs and talking to 

three very dark-haired women. They motioned me over, but I was frightened.

Their noses were sharp and nearly touching.

'They want you up top,' Poe said with thin lips. He pointed to the unlit stairs. 

"Hop over the frogs, will you? I want to keep them for an experiment." As I 

climbed through a small portal, I could see the calm Tennessee sitting in a

cozy hammock, smoking a pipe and licking his pen. I arrived near the 

spinning wheel to see a very hairy man, a hairy, hairy man, waiting for a 

chess partner. He beckoned me to sit and began.

'This Morning I Could Only Think'

I’ve shaped a lot of people, girls and boys,

Women and men. I talk less and less some days.

I have nearly nothing and everything at the same time

And that could last me the rest of my life.

I’m short of a few concepts but have written many.

I hate when I break my own policy about

Giving up on somebody.

Marriage is like a V-belt.

Somewhere somehow somebody is changing

The world and therefore changing my mind.

Countertops are for love too.

I cry seldom, but also not long ago.

I worry less than I cry.

I am surprised by the beauty of a bonfire

And also how I can fall asleep next to one.

Babies are younger than me.

Sometimes I look at pictures of friends to see them

But am happy not to hear them.

I get hungover on disappointment.

Peter Pan will never last forever.

From Thoughtica

Excerpt from 'To My Woman, To My Stream'

But my devils and messengers never found you.

Not in places of this atmosphere.

No, you found me, and are taking me.

Your parts cover me in shallow gold and

Drain my grapes as you ooze across my skin.

I remember when I blew your pilot light out by mistake.

I heard the rapturous gas rise up through your

Esophagus before it even opened your tremorous mouth.

I had to keep my face between the two hot embers

Until I nearly blew the place up.

Excerpt from 'As One Dreamer Does'

Glass cage full of water vapor water drips over us clings to us our 

third member of the party is sweat rocking the cage back and forth 

speeding across the seafloor turning over and sideways with no 

apparent form of gravity merely floating falling rising looking gazing 

as water flows around us in the glass cage come see it for yourself 

enter someone whenever you can moving way too fast in the massive 

currents to aim like watching two damp and blurry ghost reflections 

haunt you hunt you heat you we are ancient strangers coming back 

together our bodies like lotion sea lions and sea monkeys and 

sea giraffes and sea cucumbers everyone stares as we speed by 

in a current made for turtles and oysters.

From Cacoethes

'Like To See You...'

I like to see you looking.

You look so precious in the dark,

With your very dark eyes and eyebrows,

Shifting slow over the shadows.

I like to see you looking.

I like to see you wondering.

You look so deviled and tenderly,

With your very dark thoughts and
Wonderful scents. Are you wondering me?

I like to see you wondering.

I like to see you kissing.

You look so free when kissing me,

With your bread-like lips and stinging tongue.

Do you kiss me when I am not there? When I can,

I like to see you kissing.

I like to see you love me.

I like to be in pieces when you look at me.

You drown the world and let me float,

And are you filling my lungs with air?

I like to see you loving.


Excerpt from 'Tall Tall Grass In A Dream Of Africa'

Because of her I dreamed of Africa...again, only this time we didn't 
meet any strange people and it was concrete and we did our own thing.

I remember the colors being vibrant, enriched so royal, and we had 
lion meat, which was better than the elephant kabob and the hyena 
gnocchi. There was a short blue tent on the full green plain amidst the 
tall yellow grass and the deep sleepy sun was landing as we pulled 
luscious red wine out of the old Tambootie tree. It was filled with 
holes, that tree, and in each was a piece of the dream, but the only 
hole we pulled from was the bottom one, easiest to reach, from 
which came the bottle we got happy on. and damn if we didn't make 
love in that tent, and then on the plain, and then in the grass. 

And we were watched, but we didn't hold back. The sound of the 
crackling and glowing and fire padded the world.