Dr. Mel Waldman

Bloody Mary

by Dr. Mel Waldman

Mary Jones, the owner of the Bloody Mary liquor store in the South Bronx, stood almost six feet tall and weighed 350 pounds. Women gossiped about the full-figured gal and labeled her grotesque and bestial. But most men claimed she had the prettiest face in the borough.

Mary had a few sidelines—dealing drugs and running an after-hours S & M club. Most folks feared her. But secretly, Bloody Mary loved Tommy the Toy, her midget lover and accountant.

Tonight, the Bloods had ordered a hit on the big mama, initiation rites for a wannabe Blood.

At 11, Tommy dozed off in the back room.

At midnight, Harvey Stone, Joe the Beast, and Jimmy the Speed Freak arrived.

At 12:05, a skinny kid rushed into the store brandishing a .38.

“What the fuck?” Joe the Beast yelled, pulling out a large piece.

The kid blew his head off.

Jimmy screamed. Harvey fainted. He killed them, too.

Mary took out her .45 Magnum and shot the kid exactly when he blasted her.

Later, Tommy woke up, kissed Mary’s corpse, took the money, and sauntered off.

THE GIRL FROM PLANET XES

By Dr. Mel Waldman

The pencil-thin girl from Planet XES came into my office six months ago for an emergency session. With protruding bones and dark brown eyes, the ghostly little thing stood about five feet tall.

“Dr. Jacob Weiss referred me to you.”

“How is my former colleague?”

The girl stared blankly at me.

“Did he give you a referral letter?”

“No.”

“Well, what seems to be the problem?”

“I just returned from Planet XES.”

“Planet XES?”

“Yeah. The motherfuckers kidnapped and transported me there. They XESED my brain, body, and soul.”

It took her forever to tell me she had discovered a glowing object in a corner of her bedroom. When she gazed at the minuscule thing, she blanked out and woke up on Planet XES.

“After they XESED me, they left me alone in a glittering white sphere. The burning light blinded me. And suddenly I was home again.”

I made a couple calls yesterday. Found out Dr. Weiss vanished a year ago.

Now, I sit with the girl. Her freaky eyes glow fiercely. They XES me, take me there, enslave me. Planet XES is real.

“Who are you, MOTHER-XESER?”

I look into her hellfire eyes and burn.

REVOLUTION IN THE MADHOUSE

by Dr. Mel Waldman

In a jabberwocky universe, you can pull it off, switch places or sneak in and hang out, on the inside. Why not?

Indeed, in antediluvian Shrink-land, other explorers conducted secret experiments on psyche wards, tricked the staff, and discovered weird truths, the color of gunmetal, which blew the minds of the uptight status quo bureaucrats.

Now, I’m intoxicated with this thrilling notion of a one-day or one-week revolution in the madhouse, more breathtaking and exciting than a pulchritudinous femme fatale.

My revolution isn’t crimson or bloody red; it’s the color of creamy white gardenias or pale pink azaleas, or perhaps, yellow or white daffodils; my revolution is not a bomb or volcanic explosion; it’s not about deadly force or any other kind of power; my revolution is soft and curious, and sweet as an old-fashioned vanilla malted and a slice of creamy cheesecake with whipped cream; and in a jabberwocky universe, it’s about empathy, compassion, and love—the ultimate inner space exploration.

But here, in the rational universe, I need the approval of the Committee (that’s a bummer), and an experimental design (perhaps, you could help me work out the kinks).

And, if all goes well (and I drill a hole through the brick-red wall of resistance and cut the thick red tape), I will feast on infinite out-of-the-box ideas, high on knowledge; but if not, in a jabberwocky universe, I can pull it off, alone.

COMMENCEMENT DAY

by Dr. Mel Waldman

The end was the beginning, and it arrived in the summer of ’65, for time is a cannibal that devoured Mother, a tiny woman clutching a small ration of life that remained in the quiet ruins of that seething apocalyptic day.

Her gold eyes perched on olive skin gazed at us as she lay in bed. She held a fake plastic cigarette in her minuscule hand, I imagine. Or was she caressing Father’s trembling hands?

An oxygen tank stood tall on the night table, like a centurion guarding a moribund prisoner. Outside our home, a womb of death, Brooklyn overflowed with Eros, the life force.

We watched her gasp for air, black out, wake up, open her celestial eyes, and whisper, “I thought I was dying.” And then she passed away, quietly, and forever.

In that cutting moment, I, too, crossed an invisible boundary, and began a long, unfathomable journey.

VANISHING MAN

by Dr. Mel Waldman

I watched the old man vanish, when he came to stay with me after his third wife kicked him out. He flew in from Florida.

Sometimes he disappeared in the middle of a conversation, or when he was mute and meandered around my small apartment, naked and confused.

On occasion, he lost control and suddenly, like a Hemingway bull, he looked ready to charge. But he didn’t.

His dark brown eyes glared at me. He roared and shrieked and when his body shook, I hugged his fragile torso and whispered, “Dad, I love you.”

The little man grew a big fat smile and proudly displayed his glittering gold tooth.

I remember our time together. He often vanished, but always reappeared, until he left for Florida, and his wife, and destiny.

She shipped him off to a nursing home where his merciless disease ate his mutilated brain. And when I spoke to him long distance, he whispered, “Yes, no, yes, no,” until he vanished forever.

On empty nights, I sometimes gaze into my meandrous mind, a broken road with scattered potholes of forgetfulness, and mutter,

“Will I vanish too?”

AN UNHOLY VISION:

THE TRANSVERBERATION OF THE INVISIBLE MAN

By Dr. Mel Waldman

After midnight, the invisible man saunters along Ocean Parkway in sidereal time, the empty wasteland of his barren pitted face pointing upward, his dead eyes whirling around the Heavens & back to Earth, & drilling through the darkness as he slowly approaches Coney Island, a distant dream & a vanishing point in his moribund mind;

& when he arrives at the swirling center of the unholy night, he drifts toward the Coney Island Boardwalk & slithers beneath its low ceiling, lies in the seething swirling sand of the sultry August night, a sweet phantasmagoria, & falls into a deep abysmal sleep;

& suddenly, an unholy vision sweeps across his dissolving brain cells, & trapped in inner space, he witnesses the transverberation of the invisible man—the piercing stabbing death of his fragile diaphanous flesh;

& perched on the phantom stars of his multilayered nightmare, he shrieks hellfire as a frozen icicle burns & slashes his heart until he is still forever in an unfathomable landscape beyond Space & Time;

& tomorrow, after the tempest, his mutilated corpse lies buried in the deep snow of winter in the sweeping whiteness of Coney Island beneath the cold barren boardwalk for the invisible man has passed through the labyrinth of final dreams & discovered the soothing heat of summer in sweet phantasmagoria, an eerie place & last exit before a chilling unreality of unending stillness

LADY XES

by Dr. Mel Waldman

She struts across Mallory Square like a glamorous Hollywood movie star, a deliciously divine diva walking the red carpet.

Yet she does not wear high heels, no stilettos tonight, in Key West, no see-through gown, diaphanous and devastating, with long slits revealing lovely legs.

Her sensuous buttocks swing and sway and sashay in tight and torn blue jeans, and her tiny feet move inside soothing soft-blue slip-ons, Proenza Schouler espadrilles.

& now, in a low-cut red T-shirt that purrs, XES ROCKS, she enters the dock, mystical and magical, and watches weird performers, freaky and fantastic.

& all wandering eyes find her, for she is Lady XES, femme fatale of the 21^st century, Lady XES from Planet XES-XESY, XESUAL, and mother XESer of the unfathomable universe, here on earth to be with us,

& vanish every night with the sinking red sun into the eerie sea and the distant horizon, dying in the Gulf of Mexico, resurrected in the darkness, and returning tomorrow, perhaps, to XES us for eternity

THE METAMORPHOSIS OF MY IMAGINARY COFFIN

by Dr. Mel Waldman

Come

with me

into my coffin,

my imaginary coffin,

a voice within a dream whispers,

then swirls into a sphere of turquoise light

vanishes.

after, I awaken,

inside a wooden coffin,

ensconced in a whirling dream, a frostbitten

dream of winter, within an ocean of dreams;

looking up,

at the cold wood covered with the flowing chill

of darkness, my frozen eyes observe the metamorphosis

of my imaginary coffin, nestled in a fierce phantasmagoria,

where I am empty inside this eerie emptiness, & still, like the

silenced dead;

through the blinding black hole I watch a frightening alchemy—

wooden coffin becoming gold & glowing in the House of Non-Existence,

then flowing into a turquoise light & vanishing, becoming raw dust, but resurrected

in the bowels of the earth, & soon, a nameless weapon of glory, drills through the foul

earth, rises furiously toward the snow-covered Heavens, explodes & obliterates the cosmos,

inside this supernatural coffin, my Post-Apocalyptic home,

I lie,

alone,

for eternity,

in a locked box,

nothing

above,

beyond,

only

the

monstrous

Void

A DEATH BEFORE DEATH

THE DEEP SNOW OF ALZHEIMER’S

by Dr. Mel Waldman

My father passed through a black hole and disappeared. I waited for his return.

When the mind dies, it sleeps in a frozen coffin.

Buried in the deep snow, and tasting flakes of non-existence, as real as the wet, whirling beasts in his vanishing brain cells, he suffered a death before death.

Strangers gazed at him and saw a peek-a-boo man, clothed in a shroud of non-identity, a ghostly veil of human emptiness.

I saw a man named Father.

I watched him vanish into a shattered time capsule of random, remote yesterdays, swaddled in a strait jacket of unbearable restraint.

I witnessed his death before death.

When the mind dies, it hides in the deep snow.

He disappeared in front of me, his dark, vacant eyes far away, perched in nowhere.

My soul-severed eyes darted and flitted back and forth, between the mutilated spaces that connected us. I reached out to his moribund mind-spirit.

I could not save him.

When the mind dies, it dangles between nowhere and nowhere.

Before his final death, a private snowstorm swept mercilessly across the wasteland of his mind. The blizzard covered his battered brain, almost obliterated it.

Yet sometimes, he was reborn for a few seconds or minutes, resurrected by chance neural connections.

We’d say hello. Instinctively, he grew a big fat smile, revealing his precious gold teeth. His eyes were real until they became vacant again.

I discovered death in his dark brown eyes.

In his heyday, he was a fierce, ferocious man who did not know how to love or be loved. We raged against each other. But at the end of his fragile life, I loved him fully, forgave his flaws and sins, and forgave my own.

I witnessed his horrific death before death.

Strangers saw a peek-a-boo man. I saw a man called Father.

A DEATH IN OLD BROOKLYN

by Dr. Mel Waldman

Old Brooklyn is dead,

drifting

inner space,

lost

lingering

antediluvian

brain cells

dangling

between

shattered

synapses

too,

Old Brooklyn is dead,

mourn

for

the

soothing snow

mythological childhood,

celestial landscape

constant flux

recreation;

mourn

interminably

for

the

boy-dreamer

once

was,

covered

dead time

the

coffin of the past;

mourn

for

him

this

lost spirit-love

inside

me,

the

dream-shards

dangling

still life

the

scattered sparks

divinity

frozen

the

seething fires-

the porphyry

burning time,

merciful

angels

suspended

mid-air

before

the

unending

freedom journey;

mourn incessantly

for

eleemosynary

thoughts

merging

with

celestial visions

the

child;

Yes,

mourn

for

so much-

too much

life

used

spent

buried

the

death-box

behind

me,

tomb

everlasting vastness

longing,

the

transverberation

shrinking spirit;

mourn

unendurably,

sometimes,

after

preternatural sunset,

sidereal

time,

beneath

the

mystical stars,

gaze

backwards

into

the

reconstructed landscape

resurrect

the boy

the

soothing snow

mythic childhood

within

holy

ring

purple-red stones,

prophetic

porphyry

fugitive dreams,

a death in Old Brooklyn

rushing

away

from

frozen

time,

here

now,

everywhere

nowhere,

never

touching

tomorrow

BLESSINGS BEFORE THE APOCALYPSE

by Dr. Mel Waldman

The snow falls interminably.

“Come now with me, into the holy house. It is time to receive the blessings before the Apocalypse.”

But the others rush off, vanishing in the rolling hills. & so, I enter, alone, and when the holy man speaks, his sweet voice is a zephyr brushing against my olive skin, and his words are a river of revelations, holy susurrations that flow into me and soothe my shattered spirit, a kaleidoscope of crippled butterflies.

“Welcome, fellow travelers of the unfathomable universe, and bless you.”

He speaks to a chimerical throng of believers, for I am alone, with him, and a sphere of holy light encircles me.

“After life flows into death . . . and death feeds the earth . . . beyond the ruins . . . is the ferocious mystery . . . the ineffable miracle of resurrection and . . .”

My gold eyes rush to the mammoth window to my left, swallow the deep snow that covers the moribund earth and I say goodbye to my life and all that I have loved and the world outside. It is time to pray and hide beneath the canopy of the prophet’s visions.

Ensconced in the vastness of his words, and this holy place & time, nestled in a cocoon of revelations & silence, I close my eyes and wait for the Apocalypse, and after, a swarm of monarchs and mourning cloaks may rise from the ruins and soar, or perhaps, nothing, not even traces of our dreams, shall exist to reveal who and what we were or why we did not hear or heed, in time, the deafening words of the prophecy

CRIMSON FACE

Dr. Mel Waldman

Look closely at my sweet-smelling face. Come close now. Stop! And smell the roses.

What cologne am I wearing? Can you guess? I am the Garden of Eden. Take a deep breath and inhale the seductive scent I wear. Does it belong to Adam, Eve, or the snake? Is it Eternity, or Eros, or the foul suffocative smell of Thanatos?

Come close now. Beneath the sundry masks I wear, do you see the real me?

Touch my face—the soft, smooth skin. Remove my masks. Peel them off, if you dare, and discover the crimson face—the bloody cauldron of rage.

Now, do you know who I am? Or are you confused by my disarming smile, my gentle demeanor, and my melodious voice?

Come closer into my arms, look up—into my cannibalistic eyes and see who I really am and let your mind and heart dissolve in a long eternal kiss while the killer inside me, the beast with the crimson face, caresses and strangles you to death.

MY POEM,

MY PRAYER

By Dr. Mel Waldman

(on reading Jack Kerouac’s poem-Hymn)

After dark,

in the deep of the night

drink the stars outside my Brooklyn home

gazing upward at the glorious unfathomable creations,

turn inward,

look into the mirror of my meandering mind

rushing slowly

into inner space,

pray to our unknowable Source,

bathe

in the beautiful darkness & the omniscient silence,

enter

the Oneness,

I pray until my prayer blesses me with creation

a turquoise butterfly appears & swirls around my brainwaves

in a poignant moment, perhaps, in the everflowing circle of the night

in the deep silence of the dawn, when crepuscular insects awaken with me,

write my poem, my prayer

on the blank page of metaphysical creation, in my minuscule blank book,

scribble my holy creation—my hymn to Brooklyn & to the majestic universe

celestial conundrums that surround it

my words weep the sadness & joy of prayer

sing a cornucopia of sweeping emotions

the vastness where I shed the skin of loss

I create

remember the Coney Island of my youth,

the whirling wonderland by the sea,

where we gathered—

Mother, Father, Sister, & I

devoured

Nathan’s frankfurters & French fries & the soothing innocence of our time

we believed in something beautiful transcendent & real

lovely as this poem, this prayer

as real as the invisible landscape of boundless love

where

Mother& Father live now ensconced in my beauty

the mansion of my mind on the Coney Island pier of Yesterday,

gazing

at the rolling waves of the Atlantic Ocean & the swirling rhapsody

the Coney Island rides,

smiling majestically at me in their Seats to Heaven

while

I stroll along the wooden Boardwalk & sing songs of love

scribble words of glory in the deep silence of creation

until

my poem, my prayer comes forth,

out

of nothingness,

the omnipotent music

the Source

SILENCE,

DEEP SILENCE

by Dr. Mel Waldman

(on reading Stefan Brecht’s poem “Silence”)

Silence,

deep silence

inside

the swirl

falling into a fallen divinity

the stone speaks silence

I listen

drift into visions of

an old man with a Charlie Chaplin moustache

dives into the river of silence

caresses

a little lady glowing with the opalescent light of love

lovelier than Greta Garbo

I weep silence

swallow

phantom voices

Mother’s

otherworldly whispers celestial softness brushing against my olive skin

Father’s

ferocious gorgeous grin gold tooth glittering after dark

rushes across the ruins of silence reaches me growls love

gallops off through inner space

AWAY FAR AWAY

I drink the river of despair

drown in the deep silence of the apocalypse

vanish in the mournful flood of loss

I kiss & taste the succulent lips of silence

long for redemption,

perhaps,

the Queen of Rebirth,

a fallen divinity

asleep in the vastness where the stone speaks silence

waiting

for me to awaken her

waiting

for us to save each other

the deep silence

THE SUDDEN DEATH

MY UNKNOWABLE FATHER

LONG AGO

LOST TIME,

STRANGER

THE HOUSE OF MY SOUL

by Dr. Mel Waldman

(on reading Joanne Kyger’s poem “My Father Died This Spring”)

Long ago,

inside the labyrinth of lost time, my unknowable father, a faraway man, distant in life

shrouded in secrets, died suddenly in a Florida nursing home, a ghost of a vanishing man,

shriveled up & emptied of thought, gazing mindlessly at a moribund TV & a soporific soap opera in the sultry dayroom decades ago, his dark brown eyes fixed on random

images

floating in raw nothingness on a Spring day

until

the old phantom, having suffered the 1^st Death of No-Mind, brainwaves dissolving

inside

the wasteland of the Deep Snow,

slumped over in his rickety chair & slipped off into the otherworldly Void that swallows all life-the nowhere-hole of oblivion for those forever bereft of the cosmic breath of life

banished from earth & our human flow—the furious beautiful rivers & oceans of Eros.

Looking back

through a swirling oval darkness, my weary eyes locked shut,

sit within a circle of silence & plummet into my private space & a mournful past;

but

soon, I hear the cutting voice of an interloper, the hallucinatory soliloquy of the Beat Poet

Joanne Kyger

slicing the seething silence, speaking of her dead father,

confessing,

“You can’t say he wasn’t strange and difficult.”

listen to her poignant words again & again, orange-red flames of mournful music that fill

my emptiness until her haunting voice melts in the merciless fire, becoming a murmur-whisper-susurration, & vanishing in the abyss.

After,

I am alone, once more—terribly alone.

Father,

my unknowable father, you’ve passed through the sacred wormhole into the beyond

the lost landscape of eternity.

Now,

tell me who you are & I shall discover who I am.

Father,

you are a stranger in the House of My Soul. Yet I welcome you in. Come now, come into

my home. Father, my unknowable father, you are undecipherable & unfathomable like the universe & the Source of all life. I am too. So come now, from far away, come into

my home, & let us search together for our truth & let us love

BEAUTIFUL CHAOS

by Dr. Mel Waldman

Follow me

into a beautiful chaos

the flowing rear space

lit up

with the fire of efflorescence.

Follow me.

the clock explodes

within

the whirling yellow-orange labyrinth of unreality

still Rabbi Silverman teaches Torah at a corner table.

Nearby,

I read Yehoshua November’s poem “Prayer”

my phantom soul flows up & down the Tree of Life

glows with otherworldly phosphorescence

a few feet away,

Mike,

my funny Egyptian Muslim friend,

unleashes

the swirling music of Saturday Night Fever on his smart cell phone

he & the old timers of Dunkin’ Donuts dance with John Travolta & Karen Lynn Gorney

we caress the past with the Bee Gees & Tavares,

free

in our little Tower of Babel

for

this is our world

beyond

Heaven & Hell

different voices & tongues

coalescing

the blessing of one

PHANTOM VOICES

FLOATING

ABOVE

BROOKLYN

SING

REVELATIONS

THE DEAD

by Dr. Mel Waldman

(on reading D. Nurkse’s poem-The Dead Reveal Secrets of Brooklyn)

Phantom voices

floating above Brooklyn

wafting

to earth

resting secretly on the old roof

James Madison High

invisibly

swirling & whirling beyond time,

perched on Pandora’s Box in a preternatural meditation,

phantom voices

sing revelations of the dead.

Mr. B

sails

across Brooklyn on his 1955 Vincent Black Prince,

majestic motorcycle

flying high from Coney Island to Midwood northbound on Ocean Parkway

turning east on Kings Highway & south on Bedford Avenue

sweeping

through the unreality of sweet phantasmagoria within my whirling dreamscape

my private divinity

Mr. B

returns to James Madison High

I-to Yesterday-wearing the ethereal shroud of euphoria/dysphoria

circa 1958

rushing to his English class &The Poetry & Philosophy Club

I kiss Destiny, the strange seductive flower growing in the Garden of the Past,

return to You & caress my ferocious flower within my Dream-Mind

what shall I find when You awaken within my dream?

With

Your rebirth, what shall I find?

ghostly voices, light & mellifluous as the susurrations of zephyrs & opalescent angels,

whisper,

The dead never die.

an invisible orchestra plays Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue

phantom voices sing

phantom voices sing revelations of the dead

death is the boy falling into the deep snow of mourning

the very hot summer of despair as sweat falls from his (my) brow

He . . . floats with phantom voices

I taste the eerie emptiness of mother’s lost lacerated voice

She lies beside her otherworldly oxygen tank, rises suddenly, & shrieks,

“I thought I was dying,”

dies,

blasting off

into the unfathomable black hole of everlasting stillness.

I plummet through the trapdoor of my electrocuted brain

I die too.

Dr. Z,

my high school Hebrew teacher,

frees me, asks the dream-boy at James Madison High to read again from Isaiah 2:3-4.

Why?

Why do I pass through this supernatural door?

Now, the boy sings poetic words, sings revelations of the dead,

“. . . and they shall beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks.”

Then suddenly, Dr. Z & dream-boy vanish,

within

the harrowing hour, in a mournful, mutilated room of black flowers,

one unfathomable day,

I hear,

Young X, honor student, member of the rifle club, has taken his life!

I hear,

as C, the robotic school official, tells us—the senior class—this soul-cutting truth,

rushes off while we meditate on death.

phantom voices sing,

. . . the evanescence of death is everlasting . . .

. . . everlasting is the obscene evanescence . . .

the young Kafka of James Madison High,

asks,

Why?

I die while phantom voices floating above Brooklyn sing revelations of the dead

within the swirling dream-flower of my life

die too forever,

again & again

die

CONUNDRUM STREET.

by Dr. Mel Waldman

(on reading Lawrence Ferlinghetti’s poem “The Long Street”)

Conundrum Street

follow a throng

haunted humans

a cornucopia of creatures

Coney Island

taste the cool metaphysical air

inhale the raw wisdom

the burning sand & the bestial ocean

ride on the cosmic Cyclone again

the otherworldly Wonder Wheel

whirling around a chimerical omphalos

look up at the Parachute Jump

our

antediluvian landmark

mourn for the old & weary & obsolete

the dead & the lost & the living dead

until

I saunter off

a trancelike state

Nathan’s

devour

sizzling

hot dogs supreme

crackling crunchy

French

fries majestic

soon, oblivious of who I am

where I’m going I rush slowly

across

Conundrum Street

the

unfathomable street

that

swirls around the world

pirouettes across the universe

mindlessly I go on my magical journey

meander through Brooklyn

orphan

cockroaches & odd creatures by my side

weird humans

with

vacant eyes still in the wilderness

wild anorexic beings

with

turquoise auras & telepathic powers

peripatetic phantoms too

join

mindlessly I go on my odyssey

through

Brighton & Manhattan Beach

Sheepshead Bay & Midwood

all the neighborhoods I know

all the ones still undiscovered

along the way

find myself in Lily Pond

Brooklyn College

until

I wander off to Brooklyn Heights

stroll along the Promenade

gaze at the Twin Towers

longer there

so it goes

Conundrum Street

time travel too

return

to the Garment Center

sit

with Father

hard

working dress salesman

Horn & Hardart

listen to the little man’s voice

the vastness of his dreams

look dreamily into his dark brown eyes

perched

on his Austrian horse-scarred face

adorned

with a Lilliputian equine bite

cascading

down one cheek

above

a thin black moustache

a glittering gold tooth

majestically

revealed

protruding

with a wide wicked smile

childlike joy

I see my Father-God

his bestial beauty

unalloyed

ecstasy

but

how odd that we-

are

oblivious of our mortality

harrowing destiny

fast-forward a few decades

recall the death of Father’s mind & memory

the

insidious death before death

slithering

in the remains of a broken brain

the

snake that eats the past

devours

synapses

severs

the self

Conundrum Street

that

swirls around the world

pirouettes across the universe

merges

time

caresses

yesterday

swallows

now

tastes tomorrow

street that never ends

even

when it comes to a cul-de-sac

bathes in frozen stillness

the

peculiar blessing of non-being

follows phantoms

through

the House of the Dead

the other side of Conundrum Street

beyond

UNFATHOMABLE RHAPSODY

PSYCHOSIS

by Dr. Mel Waldman

Unfathomable Rhapsody

beautiful

grotesque

rushes

eerily through crackling exploding brain cells

the other hears hallucinatory music

the

harrowing & haunting Music of Un-Reality

phantom voices riding oceanic waves

flood

the wounded self

drowning

in the dreamscape

the unfathomable rhapsody rushes through the apparitional universe.

The other

drinks the overflowing ocean of psychosis

swallows

a cornucopia of madness

OD’s on otherworldly sensory overload

but

awakens & dances deliriously to the spectral music of trauma.

“Psychosis

is a blessing,” a phantasmal voice whispers.

“Or is it

a bestial blizzard of unbearable revelations,

a strange rhapsody

or fantastic requiem for the living dead?”

A ghostly chorus shrieks, “Salvation or sudden death?”

HOUSE

UN-REALITY

by Dr. Mel Waldman

(on reading Tomas Tranströmer’s poem “The Blue House”)

trauma-filled days

return to the vanishing house of my youth

the

House of Un-Reality

Old Brooklyn

East 7^th Street

around

the corner from Ocean Parkway

phantom flowing vastness

galloping

to the lost time of Coney & beyond

Avenue Yesterday

Highway

to nowhere

for

even the Coney Island of the boy

exists

now only in a spiraling dream

distant vision

phantasmagoria

from

far away

rushing

cascading

down Chimerical Falls

into

an ocean of electrical synaptic chaos

still I return to Old Brooklyn

hunched

over in Trauma Time

across

the street from the house I once lived in

I gaze wistfully at my House of Un-Reality

lost

in blossoming waves of longing & melancholy

swept

away in a swirl of iridescence

dancing

butterfly wings

shimmering peacock feathers

glittering sea shells

pirouetting

across a mythical seascape—

flood of nostalgia & fluid memories

magically with the X-ray vision of Superman

gold eyes puncture the past

see

through the brick façade

look inward

where

the phantom boy

gallops

around a child’s little universe

wearing

a Hopalong Cassidy crown-shaped black cowboy hat

the

Champie

a Hoppy double-holster with gold revolvers & black grips

for

Hoppy’s a child’s hero

the now of yesterday’s dream

beautiful blossoming

flowing

symbol of good in all black

pristine

& sinless man of morality

fights

evil with gallantry

captures

villains & foe

Hoppy’s

a child’s hero

mounted

on Topper

his

white horse

a dream

the House of Un-Reality

the boy’s oblivious

real gunfire

happy

in play

galloping

around yesterday

soon

when

the boy inhales the fire of Father’s fury

he’ll

become Hoppy again

be free

Hoppy, Hoppy, Hoppy, Hopalong Cassidy

THE GHOSTS

BORGES

OTHERS

RUSHING SLOWLY

RISING

THROUGH

THE UNDERGROUND LABYRINTH

THE HOUSE OF UN-REALITY

By Dr. Mel Waldman

(on reading Tomas Tranströmer’s poem “The Bookcase”)

am not alone

this alone-ness place

here

in the nowhere of nowhere

the House of Un-Reality

am not alone

Gold

eyes gaze into the tomb of trauma in the swirling Room of Infinity

the

eerie omphalos

phantom center of ghosts

barren cornucopia

dystopia of emptiness

the human-less vastness

the wild waves of snow for miles & miles

the blessings of oblivion

ineffable

vision

overflowing

in the blind man’s blizzard

the

ghost of Borges in the House of Un-Reality

Above,

old objects possess preternatural power

the unspeakable hour of revelations

mundane

objects in metamorphosis

approaching

transcendence & illumination—

mutilated

antiques

convex

& concave mirrors

swinging doors through a wormhole into the soul

metaphysical paintings singing of non-being

Bizarro portraits of the dead

wounded walls & harrowing halls

torn books read long ago

adorned

with ashes & dust

ruins

& rust

moribund bookcases with broken shelves & splintered wood & lost selves

obsolete manuscripts

esoteric notes on Post-its about the nature of the universe & the Apocalypse

Below,

the ghosts of Borges & others

rush

slowly & rise through the underground labyrinth

while

metaphysical notes pirouette across non-being

unfathomable

sound from the underground

a ghost rhapsody

in a transcendental chasm of time

schism in space

pause in Un-Reality

carved

with the celestial hand of Dali

the fabulous words of Borges

this

is the blessing & despair

while

the mystical clock chimes nowhere

after the Apocalypse

this

is the trauma & the ecstasy

while

the deathless clock chimes divinity

the ghosts gaze into the quantum universe

search of Schrödinger’s cat & revelations

before

rising again in the ineffable hour of illuminations

for

a rendezvous with old objects in metamorphosis—

the

keepers of history

the secret Labyrinth of Infinity & the boundless Mirror of Anguish & Bliss

BORGES

TRAPPED

THE OVAL MIRROR

BLACKNESS

by Dr. Mel Waldman

am Borges

trapped in the oval mirror of blackness gushing darkness in a barren universe of non-being bereft of the blessings of light a spectral dot in a vacant galaxy whirling around the rim of a wounded dream dead eyes looking out & cutting through the shroud of the everlasting night & tasting broken glass & the swirl of a dust devil & eating celestial visions

am Borges

diving into the deep of phantasmagoria a magic lantern on fire exploding with chimerical light & unreality

am Borges

blessing you with the metaphysical flow of divinity the metamorphosis & miracle of sacred words illuminating the unfathomable universe

HESSE

by Dr. Mel Waldman

am Hesse

soul-hunter

a stranger in the forbidden kingdom of Shadows lost in the bestial landscape I cross in the celestial light & the oval darkness the eerie swirls of night in search of my fugitive self

Unblessed & trapped in my antediluvian House of Duality I dangle in inner space between the divine & demonic like my Steppenwolf half-man & half-wolf

In the deep of despair, I descend into the Shadows & swallow the flood of darkness overflowing with loss & death & drink & drown in self-pity in mourner’s unreality

After Mother’s death & my absence from her funeral I eat everlasting emptiness & time is a mustang galloping across phantasmagoria & unholy years vanish until I taste the fire of foul Truths—Father’s death my distant Johannes & my youngest son’s terrible illness my precious Martin & my wife’s voyage into madness poor Mia’s schizophrenia—& plummet into oblivion

am Hesse

intoxicated & vanishing in the kingdom of sin a sensuous stranger commanding me to be you within the bestial bars & lurid dance halls of Zurich for I am my creation Steppenwolf too

Now I enter therapy with Dr. Lang & float in the sea of Jungian archetypes & see for the very first time through the preternatural window of perception for this is my crisis & psychoanalysis is my labyrinthine exit out of melancholy & the abyss

& when the merciless hour of anguish returns I meet with Dr. Jung in search of self & spirituality & my psychoanalysis is a holy metamorphosis & catharsis for from the throes of depression comes healing & integration & the transcendent oneness of a thousand selves

am Hesse

the soul-hunter

floating in the sea of Jungian archetypes luminous images rushing through the psyche & a cornucopia of revelations from the collective unconscious Persona, Shadow, Anima/Animus, & Self & . . . now I unmask my social faces & gaze into the maw of darkness & see the eerie female in me in syzygy & the oneness of self the oneness of who I am

CAMUS

by Dr. Mel Waldman

Born

in the bestial abyss of poverty

am Camus

child-man of the sun & sea tasting the African sun the sprawling canopy of fire above & the Mediterranean Sea that bathes my flesh & feeds my unfathomable being in the blazing universe

I am Camus

fatherless

in a foreign universe

Father—

Lucien Auguste Camus—I did not know you killed in WWI I was less than one bereft & left with Mother & older brother & a chilling anecdote that burned the ferocious truth into my brainwaves the barren revelation that once you witnessed a public execution & got deathly ill from this obliteration & this visceral micro-story filled my emptiness & an un-blessing entered my mind & body became part of me imprinted in the invisible universe within & so I wrote & wrote & wrote transforming pain into words for this is my metamorphosis & yes this is my being & evolution as a writer

Mother—

Catherine Helene (Sintes) Camus—you were deaf & illiterate & after Father’s death we moved to Algiers & lived with your family condemned confined incarcerated in a claustrophobic prison cell of poverty a raw merciless flood mind drowning in the ruinous downpour of reality

am Camus

child-man

of the sun & sea intoxicated with the sensuous universe cosmos of splendor cornucopia of gorgeous glorious galaxies the sensuous universe the African sun

nature’s

grandeur everlasting & the everflowing panorama is a rhapsody the music of the desert & the mountain the sky & sea

the strange beautiful bestial paradox of paradise & poverty side by side

man is alone in this grand universe

am alone

tasting

& swallowing the chilling fire of cosmic indifference no God no transcendence only the furious waves of human existence in an ocean of absurdity Heaven & Hell here & now in the African sun & the Mediterranean Sea

I am Camus

like Mersault, my fictional creation, I too am a stranger drifting along a seething beach swallowing the African sun & nature’s majesty & drinking the opalescence luminescence of the meaningless universe & its monstrous beauty

eating my aloneness isolation & merciless mortality in the maw of death my everlasting ebony hole of nothingness the abyss of my nonbeing in the overflowing cosmos oblivious of me child-man of the sun & sea

Fatherless

in a foreign universe

am the isolated man forever the stranger & the outsider observing the inside world & gazing inward

swallowing

the Sisyphean struggle of my being quietly singing the song of the rebel solitary man ferocious sensualist natural man lover of nature for the sensuous universe is all—it is Father & Mother & I am the other & its

lover

am Camus

Father

of Catherine & Jean the twins

call

me loving soothing Papa & we play soccer & I laugh uproariously child-man of the sun & sea

I am Camus

lover

of women 2 wives & sundry mistresses

Yet

with Simone my 1^st wife

was alone

poor

Simone hooked on morphine Simone Hie we had to say goodbye

Francine Faure

my 2^nd wife gave me more Mother of Catherine & Jean

But

did I drive my precious Francine into the unforgiving & unfathomable abyss of madness?

this my guilt & un-blessing for my carnal lust?

Must

I confess again & again?

Yes

I love the others too my mistresses my lovers but you Francine are my precious wife for life & Mother of Catherine & Jean & to you I am your husband Albert Camus

am Camus

child-man

of the sun & sea & wounded man who almost died of TB lover of the grand universe lover of gorgeous galloping nature lover of 2 wives & sundry mistresses

loving

soothing Father of the twins

like you a human of mortal & carnal sins

now in the fall of 1957 I receive the Nobel Prize too soon at 44 can’t fathom why unworthy am I

this Heaven or Hell?

am Camus

writer

& rebel

the absurd universe there’s so much more to write still ensconced in mid-career here in this death-bound existence so much more to do too soon for early goodbyes

am forever Albert Camus

A BEAUTIFUL MADNESS

MALLORY SQUARE

by Dr. Mel Waldman

beautiful madness on Mallory Square

the

blessings of the tropical sun

the feast of oneness

waiting

for a glorious sunset

opals

in the sky

a celestial cornucopia

eerie

earthy otherworldly celebration

watching

the gorgeous galloping red sun

plummet

into

illusion

the phantasmagoria

the

fire of the sun

the Eyes of all

sail

above

swirl

& follow the hypnotic vision

holy union & love

waiting

for the ineffable moment

the

fantastic fall & flow

watching

the magical sphere

drop

& merge & vanish

with

the chimerical horizon

the Gulf of Mexico

below

before

& after & across the vastness of the everlasting Key West party

sunset celebration for humans of the world

visitors

& visionaries

magicians

& circus people

musicians

& artists

kaleidoscope of entertainers & vendors

mystical gathering

a beautiful madness on Mallory Square

BEAUTIFUL DEATH

MALLORY SQUARE

by Dr. Mel Waldman

beautiful death on Mallory Square

rushing

slowly along the pier

the Gulf of Mexico

below

the gorgeous sun

sprawling canopy of blazing red

our

omnipotent Lady of the Light

anointing

devouring

blessing

us with delirious revelations & celestial ecstasy

visions of Palomino Mustangs

golden

horses with creamy manes & tails gallop across my Mind’s Eye

while

strangers say, “hello,”

stroll along the docks

wearing

eerie auras of divinity

waiting

for the grand sunset & the bestial secrets of the night

to the invisible universe,

whisper the metaphysical

why?

magicians & circus folks

“Cookie Lady”

“Cat Man”

madmen & mystics

artists & musicians

a cornucopia of un-real performers

enchant

& amaze bewilder & delight us

inside

the existential maze of Mallory Square

otherworldly travelers

grin

wisely, enigmatically at you & me

wait for the Great Rondini

magnificent

escape artist & neo-Houdini

appear in chains here & now on Mallory Square & free himself at sunset

too wish to be free

ride the celestial waves

rushing

slowly along the pier

the Gulf of Mexico on Mallory Square

where

the invisible universe flows & fuels metamorphosis & transcendence

creation obliteration & resurrection

I wish to be free

my chimerical Palomino Mustangs galloping across my Mind’s Eye

unbridled & unleashed

the beautiful death on Mallory Square

that

blesses us on this everlasting night where our Lady of the Light dies

yes,

I wish to be free & unbridled

letting

go of the reins of the human brain

free

I release the self from its bestial cage

transformed

I watch my ego melt by the Gulf of Mexico

below

our vanishing Lady

here

on Mallory Square

where

I shall be transcendentally free

LUMINOUS METAMORPHOSIS

MALLORY SQUARE

by Dr. Mel Waldman

luminous metamorphosis on Mallory Square

strangers

darting & flitting

rushing slowly

within

the wild efflorescence & divine rhapsody of light

gold eyes drink the opalescence of celestial design

an eerie paradox

cornucopia of chaos & dazzling illumination

visionary eyes swallow a sweet phantasmagoria

beneath

the vastness of the red sun

inside

the invisible Circle of Un-Reality

soon I watch the others who watch me too

with

love & peace

not

paranoia

time-out

from

the

troubles of humanity

strangers

in sync dreaming & waiting for transcendence

watching the hypnotic sun

drop

into the Gulf of Mexico

disappear

I vanish too

within

a luminous metamorphosis my mystical death

nearby

Zero Duval Street

phantom alter ego

sits

at the Sunset Pier

the Ocean Key House

shrouded

in preternatural light

waiting

for a metaphysical re-union

the

marriage of spirit & flesh

after

death

everlasting resurrection

STRANGE DAYS

CAFÉ BIZARRO

by Dr. Mel Waldman

(inspired by the song and lyrics of Strange Days by The Doors)

Strange

days at Café Bizarro

intoxicating

Un-Reality

flooding

my brain

the

insane invasion is here

apocalypse

nowhere

tomorrow merges with yesterday

flows

fiercely

reveals

my hallucinatory story

the

eerie everlasting past is now

far

away & within

yesterday

my sin

long for Old Brooklyn

but

can’t find my way there

don’t

belong here anymore

still

craving sweet phantasmagoria

visions

of the eerie everlasting past

euphoria

dysphoria?

visions of the grand unknown

dreaming of

peace & love

with

a Doors song

overflowing otherworldly madness

blessings

of a visionary

the

ghost of Jim Morrison

here

apocalypse nowhere

Strange

days at Café Bizarro

the phantom sun waits for tomorrow

tomorrow is out there

somewhere

beyond where I belong singing a Doors song

tasting

the sin of Old Brooklyn & visions of the grand unknown

alone

the vastness of my dreams

alone

NIGHT REVELATIONS

BIZARRO COUNTRY

by Dr. Mel Waldman

drink the oval darkness

swirling Sombrero

rotating

Mexican hat

&/or

mind-altering vanilla malted

Kahlua

on the rocks with cream

otherworldly dream journey

taste the raw scent of phantasmagoria

eerie sweetness

the

bite of paradox

the bitter maw of illusion

magic lantern

a dream rushing forth in my trauma-flooded head

the mad waves of Freud’s ID

oceanic

storm in the forbidden darkness

a mad dog in Un-Reality

a demonic migraine that floods my brain with unbearable pain

but

in a grand metamorphosis

sweet

phantasmagoria

gallops

across my Mind’s Eye like a gorgeous mustang

my beautiful beast of grandeur/transcendence

recreates

me on my everlasting journey into Bizarro Country

in the deep nothingness

drink the terrible darkness

devour night revelations

the

glimmer of divine light

the Mysterium Tremendum

fear/seek

metaphysical conundrum

here

in the nowhere of Bizarro Country

THE ROOM

WITH

NO EXIT SIGN

A.K.A.

THE PRISON CELL

THE SELF

by Dr. Mel Waldman

(on reading Lawrence Ferlinghetti’s poem—

As in a Play by Jean-Paul Sartre)

always happens

the room

with

a no exit sign

dangling

from the low ceiling

antediluvian room

the primal swirl of nowhere

the glittering thing

crackling

light bulb

scarier than the Mysterium Tremendum

the

terrible mystery engulfing us

an ominous omen

a tiny cell

tomb

perhaps

in the no-place of sin

with

vanishing visions of Heaven

a flood of red wine

pours

out of a no exit sign

crimson & black walls too

from

west to east

north to south

into

the claustrophobic space & you

the

one buried in the deep snow

encircling

enclosing

the cold mask

an other-ness face

without

a trace of truth

soothing fire

into the phantom mouth of the beast

monstrous maw of demonic invisibility

power

that

swallows

the

pariah

the harrowing hour

once again

the

past comes forth

in a waterfall of blood

a phantasmagoria

unspeakable visions

cascades

over the room

for

the past is here forever

possessing

its prey

in this private cell

the

prisoner travels across the dreamscape

no exit

escape

on the way to destiny

crossing

a cornucopia of boulevards & avenues

across

the earth & beyond

bizarro

journeys

into

multiple galaxies & the multiverse

always the same news

the

eerie birth of the same past

the

same outcomes

around

the bend

fatalistic end

frightful manifestation

the Freudian repetition compulsion

until

the Deus ex machina arrives

Freud’s heir

the false self-dies

here

in the room with a no exit sign

a.k.a.

the prison cell of the self

where

the lost other

lets

expels

despair/uncages love

gives birth to the real self—rising from the deep snow

ODE

OLD BROOKLYN

by Dr. Mel Waldman

On empty nights I return to the deep snow

of winter & the sizzling heat of summer &

the grand dream

of yesterday

so faraway

& still I know

Old Brooklyn &

my forbidden dream

I do not belong

& so I long to sing an antediluvian song

On machine-fueled nights that devour

me,

severed self, displaced visionary

in the harrowing hour

of techno-toy possession

& cultural obsession

I travel to a timeless place of love & sin

rushing slowly through Old Brooklyn

in my bestial brain/broken spirit

Now, I sit

on my chimerical-memory chair

& gaze inward into the deep nothingness where

I clutch the lost past the lost rhapsody

& soon I see

what no longer belongs to me

& still I drink soothing visions of picture-postcard homes on the Old Brooklyn block we shared

because we cared

& we possessed a one-ness

without other-ness

& that’s why I watch the boy play ball

& Mother cook for all

on the children’s block no longer there

where I wish to be, not here

Instinctively, we understood Martin Buber’s I and Thou

but how?

Just kids, we played stickball & punchball

“all for one & one for all”

on the corner & the rim of our wondrous universe blessing/holding us in a beautiful bond

& sometimes the ball sailed into the world beyond

lost forever in chimerical time

gone with an old-fashioned rhyme

& suddenly my Old Brooklyn rhapsody

dissolves into cacophony

& Father, a thin mustached tiny man, chases me through Old Brooklyn

never catches me

with crimson fury

clutching a black leather strap in his mighty hand

clutching sin

clutching rage

but out of breath

can’t follow me through space & time

as I return to the empty night & the cage

of loss & a death

vaster than Death

LOST

GREENWICH VILLAGE

By Dr. Mel Waldman

Looking out the window in my tiny room, I watch the sun drop in the sky and die, vanishing in the August night. For a few seconds, I imagine I’m back in Mallory Square, Key West gazing at a gorgeous sunset. And my mind, an old mustang, gallops into the sweet phantasmagoria of the Heavens, a beautiful place that feeds my broken soul.

Soon, in a trancelike state, I turn around, sit in a wooden chair and open a paperback book. It is The Secret of Evil by Roberto Bolaño. My gold eyes dart and flit across the hypnotic pages and now, I too vanish inside his addictive words and eerie stories. Later, I take my evening INFER pills for my illness and saunter off into the seething night.

Leaving my room on the Upper West Side, I head south on Broadway. Time dissolves and space shrinks and I meander through the forbidden streets of Manhattan. By chance or destiny, I find myself in Washington Square Park. I sit on a bench by the Washington Arch and ponder the beautiful night.

The swirl of darkness swallows my brain and suddenly, I rise and rush off. I don’t know where I’m going. But it seems I’m heading west.

I wander through the West Village until my weary body stops at the Riviera Café at 7^th Avenue South. “Thought the place had closed down,” I mutter. “But it’s still here.”

I enter the familiar café where we used to dine every week.

A short dark-eyed woman welcomes me and asks, “Your usual table, Sir?”

“Sure,” I say. Yet I don’t recall where we used to sit nor the tiny woman who knows me.

She takes me to a dimly lit corner in the back. “Your waiter will be with you shortly.” She scurries off.

Soon, a lanky waiter arrives. “How are you tonight?”

“Fine.”

“Will your wife and twin girls be joining you?”

“No.”

“Well, give them my best.”

“Of course.”

“Will you be having our Dinner Special #1?”

I look quizzically at him.

“It’s your favorite meal.”

“Sure.”

He hurries off.

I gaze at the oval darkness through the Riviera’s glass walls and vanish in boketto. After drifting across an ocean of vacant gazing, I return to a beautiful place.

In my mind’s eye, we’re lying on the sprawling sand in Manhattan Beach. My wife Sarah and our twins Anna and Annette are by my side on a mammoth aqua beach towel.

But soon, they scurry across the burning sand and jump into the cool waters of the Atlantic Ocean. I sit up and watch them splashing and swimming. When Sarah and the girls return, Anna, my brown-eyed wonder, cries out, “Daddy, can we go to Coney Island and eat some hot dogs and fries?” “And can we go on the rides?” Annette adds, her brown eyes, a shade lighter than Anna’s, stare longingly at me.

Sarah grins wickedly and says, “Your father works hard all week, girls. Maybe he wants to go home and rest.”

My girls hug my chest and beg, “Please, Daddy…”

“Okay, girls. Just for a short while,” I growl. Yet being with my wife and girls is the thrill of my life.

Then suddenly, my family and Manhattan Beach disappear.

I’m floating in boketto, looking out into the merciless darkness.

“What happened?” a distant voice cries out, cutting through the seething darkness. “What really happened?”

The voice is eerily familiar. Is it the ominous sound of my alter ego shrieking from the other side of reality? Or is it Sarah’s mournful voice or the melancholy voices of my precious girls? Who is calling out to me? Who?

Time dissolves and space shrinks again. Like an out-of-body experience, I watch the Riviera Café and Greenwich village vanish. Where am I? Who am I?

I look around and find myself back in my claustrophobic room. The clock on the night table says 3 a.m. Time to take my bedtime medicine-a cornucopia of INFER pills. After swallowing the potent pills, I lie down and read The Secret of Evil.

Time rushes slowly through my brain and I hear someone crying next door. I place my head against the wall. The crying stops abruptly.

After an interlude of silence, an uncanny voice whispers, “What happened? What really happened?”

I lie down again and notice a long white envelope next to the clock. Inside, is a note to myself.

I am in the Riviera Hotel. I take 3 INFERNO pills 3 times a day to cope with my illness. Someday, I’ll remember… Until then and forever, I love my wife Sarah and our twin girls Anna and Annette. What shall I get them for Valentine’s Day, only 6 months away?

I ponder these beautiful thoughts as I plummet into a deep sleep-a therapeutic exploration of the 9 circles of inner space induced by my INFERNO pills. The pain will diminish in time; my doctors tell me. And now, from faraway, in a safe place, I whisper, “Happy Valentine’s Day.”

EERIE JOURNEY

DOWN

THE INVISIBLE STAIRCASE

by Dr. Mel Waldman

(on reading Margaret Atwood’s poem-Down)

I travel across the invisible universe within my whirling brainwaves rising & falling in the wilds of my vanishing mind each moribund moment buried in the deep snow of unreal days where I breathe the fire of cosmic breath & taste the sweet phantasmagoria of my daily voyage-an eerie journey down the invisible staircase into an unfathomable netherworld.

Even

when the sun arrives & shoots light into my little home I eat the darkness & within the sprawling luminosity I see the butchered battered landscape the wounded crimson terrain overflowing with the broken glass of trauma.

Outside,

crepuscular insects rise & breathe light & still I descend the otherworldly stairs into the blackness that permeates my perforated brain.

now, I inhale the scent of anguish & the foul odor of unbearable losses & a cornucopia of merciless deaths. More unreal than the strangeness of everyday life is my descent into this frightful realm. Phantoms shrouded in spheres of invisibility fill my ferocious emptiness & slice my barren being. Is this piercing/shattering the transverberation of my soul? Immersed in an antediluvian kingdom, I step into the deep of darkness.

What

is this untraceable place? Is it the deep of the divine or the bestial maw of the demonic? Flooded with the ineffable, I slip farther into the blackness & plummet into an unfathomable/unknowable Un-Reality overflowing with eerie voices & unspeakable truths from beyond, buried in the thick bizarro snow that covers all & falls forever

LAY

WITH

TIGERS

by Dr. Mel Waldman

(on reading Jorge Luis Borges’s poem-The Gold of the Tigers)

lay with tigers

the vastness of inner space

the rush of the ruins of an unknown countryside

the

Un-Reality

the sweep & swirl of sweet phantasmagoria

the frightful flow

a fantastic revelation

apocalypse nowhere

here

within the phantom mansion

a lucid dream rushing slowly through infinity

lay beside the beautiful beasts

brushing

against their majesty

lost within the postern of my lacerated mind

behind

their terrible torsos & striped skin

listened to their bestial breaths

lay behind gold & white & black tigers,

never

gazing at their ferocious faces/omnipotent eyes

that

could rip my soul apart

nor

did I taste the fury & foul scent of heavy tiger breaths

hovering

above the eerie earth

but

still I brushed against their ferocious skin

smelled the exotic aroma of tiger fur

pungent otherworldly odor

inner space

suddenly, the black & white tigers

vanished

without a trace

only the gold beauties stayed with me

soon a celestial veil covered me

droplets of serenity oozed from my mind

my wounded flesh no longer reeked of terror

the foul odor evaporated in the nothingness of nowhere

evanescing

into the sea of divinity

hallucinatory waves carried me to my private Heaven

so I lay with gold tigers

nestled

in their harrowing realm

suddenly, the glittering aura of bestial presence lost its eerie glow

without fear/terror

blessed the dream that possessed me

the beasts within the wilds of my brain

within the celestial ocean of sweet phantasmagoria

watched gold tigers kiss my vanishing soul

ghost of a ghost of glorious light

the phantom flow of opalescence

my beautiful beasts merged with the mystical light

the blackness of my dream

we were one

basking

in the chimerical sun

this magical night

metamorphosis

the

night of my transcendence

when

I lay with tigers

tasted visions of Heaven

RUSHING SLOWLY

THROUGH

LUCID DREAM

WITH

ROBERTO BOLAÑO

by Dr. Mel Waldman

Lost in Greenwich Village, I meander mindlessly around the charming landscape that enchants & encircles me, an exotic conundrum & magical place/dazzling maze propelling me westward until I return to the Riviera Café.

“Is this Kismet?” I mutter.

Standing on 7^th Avenue South, nestled between 7^th Avenue & West 4^th & West 10^th Streets, I look through the café’s fantastic window. My friend Charlie sits in a corner.

Inside, I reveal an eerie dream.

My short rotund Charlie grins wickedly; his celestial smile gallops into my invisible universe. “The turquoise sky dissolves; years/decades evaporate; sail/swirl into . . .” Charlie gazes quizzically at me; his thin moustache quivers. He whispers a chimerical vision, “An olive-colored man, blonde woman, & dirty blond baby rest on the beach, 3 souls entwined.” He shrieks, “Where are they?”

“Is this Kismet?” I mutter.

The white sand is a gorgeous galloping expanse of love/loss. “Is this Kismet on Fire Island or a pristine beach on Cape Cod?” A vast unbearable silence sweeps through us, lacerates our celestial oneness, points to the secret story, perhaps, a ferocious fate. “One beach whispers love entwined. The other is the deafening voice of death.”

The past returns forever in a bestial swirl of brainwaves. A dust devil shoots up from oblivion & the dead caress our shattered souls in inner space.

We sit in the Riviera Café. Charlie dissolves/vanishes & then one by one the café & the woman & child & the beach/beaches & Greenwich Village evaporate. But where am I?

ODE

OGUNQUIT

by Dr. Mel Waldman

Is this the dreamer’s year;

here

in this unfathomable nowhere

within the swirl of a soft diaphanous Un-Reality?

Now, I return to the “beautiful place by the sea”

my intoxicating Ogunquit

& sit

in Bessie’s in a nostalgia booth

where I say goodbye to the phantom youth

again & celebrate my truth

by a hanging lamp of subdued light

dazzling insight

flowing freely in my Mind’s Eye

like a child’s kite sailing in the turquoise sky

& in the phantasmagoria of a sensuous dream

I rediscover Perkins Cove

A haven/harbor

of love

& a metaphysical door

to transcendence/serenity

supreme

enchanting metamorphosis in “the beautiful place by the sea”

within the wilds of a wondrous dream

& at Jackie’s Too

I taste the mystical blue

of the sea

while a curious seagull perched on the rocks stares at me

& waits mindlessly,

perhaps, for the unknowable moment

the scent

of peace & love

by the opalescent sea

& on the Marginal Way

the celestial cliff-walk I travel on

I inhale

the wind & the sea & the prophetic day

an overflowing panorama of visions that reveal

the oneness/blessing

of cosmic breath

like gorgeous galloping zephyrs floating by

brushing my olive face & gone

vanishing

in a holy death

& sudden goodbye

for all must die

even the non-living

& still in my Mind’s Eye

I always see “the beautiful place by the sea”

everlasting

in the sweet phantasmagoria of my vanishing

dream/my life—a delirious memory

rushing slowly out to sea

the faraway phantom sea

THE DOOR

THE OLD HOUSE

BIZARRO COUNTRY

by Dr. Mel Waldman

(on reading Margaret Atwood’s poem “The Door”)

Above

& beyond the old house looms in my mind’s eye & I see the flowing cliffs & the turquoise sea below & now I watch myself rush slowly up the winding path in winter’s wind & snow to the antediluvian home that opens up for me & I enter.

The illuminated house is human-less, a labyrinth of gorgeous glittering rooms, a desert of opalescence without life, & within this vastness of French windows & doors, secret rooms, attics, & spiral staircases, I drift through the vacant house & discover a decrepit wooden door that does not belong here. There, on the other side of this Lilliputian threshold, I shall know.

The creaky door opens. I enter. A swirling blackness swallows me. I find a light switch. Click. & there is light. Down the stairs & into a dusty basement I go. & now I know.

this mirrored room, I remove my mask, breathe freely, and gaze into my past. I see folks dining in restaurants sharing food, holy breaths & air; going to work, coming home; time off-time out, summer vacations & trips, concerts, movies, & Broadway shows; or a walk in the park-lovers touching, tasting succulent lips-love sacredly entwined.

Now,

I taste the vastness of loss. Trapped in Bizarro Country, I gaze through a mirrored universe, longing for the past & dreaming of tomorrow’s exit.

THE SEASON

THE APOCALYPSE

by Dr. Mel Waldman

the season of the Apocalypse

one

human in the harrowing vastness mourning/remembering blessings lost & the cost of life

Often,

I sat with the others in the little park of un-reality tasting desolation through unfathomable time & into the summer of despair

Now

in the eerie fall moribund humans watch mutilated leaves earthbound & dying & I am here in this frightful place where folks abruptly vanished

exist in this Lilliputian space nestled in the invisible dome of death that covers all, a shattered butterfly awakening & reborn in the fall of the Apocalypse

Who

shall survive? Shall I?

beseech the Without End in the deep of nowhere. In the season of the Apocalypse, clinging to this time this place, I taste doubt & search for divinity

believe because I must

BILL’S

OTHERWORLDLY

OUTDOOR CAFE

ACROSS

FROM

CAFÉ BIZARRO

by Dr. Mel Waldman

Across

the way at Bill’s Café

the

phantom universe opens up at midnight

a lost lacerated flower blossoming/birthing

the black hole of the unfathomable night

shattered flower—adorned with mystery & illuminated/

lit

up by spheres of celestial light

lit

up/

shooting forth from nowhere

Covid visions of Café Bizarro appear—

here/

in Bill’s otherworldly outdoor Café

the everlasting hour of no-time

so/

I am

survivor gazing at the mirrored universe

oval eyes galloping across the vastness see the overflowing ocean of divinity

a purple amethyst swirls on the rim of Un-Reality

I too dangle/

Covid time & space & invisibility

from Bill’s otherworldly outdoor Café

across

from Café Bizarro

witness the Covid shattering

watch Café Bizarro

dissolve/

so do the folks inside/

sitting

together—

holding

hands that shatter

kissing lips that melt away in the mirrored universe of yesterday

across

the way at Bill’s Café

with

some folks singing & dancing/

devolving

& vanishing in the back room/

across

the way at Bill’s Café

across

the way at Bill’s Café

across

the Covid way

Dr. Mel Waldman is a psychologist, poet, and writer whose stories have appeared in numerous magazines including HARDBOILED DETECTIVE, ESPIONAGE, THE SAINT, PULP METAL MAGAZINE, and AUDIENCE. His poems have been widely published in magazines and books including A NEW ULSTER, CLOCKWISE CAT, CRAB FAT LITERARY MAGAZINE, ESKIMO PIE, INDIANA VOICE JOURNAL, LIQUID IMAGINATION, THE BROOKLYN LITERARY REVIEW, BRICKPLIGHT, SKIVE MAGAZINE,

ODDBALL MAGAZINE, PABLO LENNIS, POETRY PACIFIC, POETICA, RED FEZ, SQUAWK BACK, SWEET ANNIE & SWEET PEA REVIEW, THE JEWISH LITERARY JOURNAL, THE JEWISH PRESS, THE JERUSALEM POST, HOTMETAL PRESS, MAD SWIRL, HAGGARD & HALLOO, ASCENT ASPIRATIONS, YELLOW MAMA, THE BITCHIN’ KITSCH, SOUL-LIT, TWO DROPS OF INK, and NAMASTE FIJI: THE INTERNATIONAL ANTHOLOGY OF POETRY. A past winner of the literary GRADIVA AWARD in Psychoanalysis, he was nominated for a PUSHCART PRIZE in literature and is the author of 11 books.

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