The Day is a Song by William Taylor Jr.

 

The day is a song Leonard Cohen
didn’t have the chance to finish

and I’m caught inside it
like a wounded thing

and sometimes my poems leave me
like a woman
or the hours in a day
or a last breath at the end of things

and I’m left with this ghost of a life
and still this hunger for beauty
in whatever form it can still afford

outside there’s the rain
and the broken people beneath

a pretty uselessness that pulls the heart

and sometimes it seems
the best plan is to be forgotten
just as soon as you can manage

yet there’s a music to it all
that’s kept me going
so far

and when I finish this beer
I’ll go outside and find some alley
I’ve never seen

I’ll turn the corner and take
whatever’s there.

Don’t Ever Tell Anybody Anything. If You Do, You Start Missing Everybody by William Taylor Jr.

Baby you once said
love is just losing your strut
for a little while and letting yourself
be naked

and I remember a time
when we stood in each others’ presence

naked and glorious

and like children we imagined it would last

but our prayers got busted
halfway to heaven

and rained back down
upon us like dirty snow

and now we’re covered in shit
and years and regrets

and you probably don’t
ever think about it much

but I carry lost moments
through the years like painted stones

and baby I will always call you baby
and I’ll always remember you naked.

As we wait for the moment when I disappoint you by William Taylor Jr.

We both know it’s coming as sure as the dawn
but for now let’s put it in the place
where we keep all the things
we don’t think about
until we have no choice

because it’s a lovely afternoon
and we’ve found a pretty good place
to hide

and seeing my face
from a certain angle
and in a certain light

it’s possible to imagine
that this love has transformed me
into something bigger
than I am

and it’s true that sometimes people
have been known
to rise above their baser selves
to forge the future like a
spear

and for now it’s much more pleasant
to think of that
rather than the other

because this thing inside me
could be mistaken for love

the sex is really good

and sometimes it’s fun
to believe in things.

WILLIAM TAYLOR JR.

Joy On Most Every Corner

It’s starting to feel like winter
even here in San Francisco
and it’s harder than it should be
to find an open bar on Valencia St.
at 3 o’clock on a weekday afternoon
and as I walk I feel myself
evaporating like the rain
on the sidewalks and I know
this is the nature of things

but I’d like to hold on
for just a little while more
see I’m still not tired
of the sky’s lovely grey
and though I still don’t
know how to say I’m sorry
for all I am
and all I’m not
despite all my talk of darkness
at any given moment
I still can fall in love
with everything all over again
and I still think we are often beautiful
in our pristine and plastic
uselessness
and sometimes I still see
joy on most every corner
and I can still walk these
Mission Street sidewalks
in the wintertime
and sing.

____________

The Universe and Everyone

It’s just like old Sherwood
Anderson said, everything
is on fire all the time
and that means you
and me
and the suns and the stars
and the houses and the oceans
there’s no shame in it
and to understand and
accept it is not giving up
it’s just opening yourself
to the nature of things
and there is great power
in this and if you realize
that all there is
all there ever was and
will be
is this moment
burning
and you inside it
burning
you can give yourself
to it completely
you can burn so big
and bright
people will see
the universe and everyone
will see
and when you are gone
they will remember
and say
wow.

____________
The Sad Ghosts of Poets

I drink in an old
North Beach bar
surrounded by the
sad ghosts
of poets

( I am
speaking now
of the dead
ghosts not
the living
ones)

I look out
the window
down upon
Columbus
Avenue

and think
O Jack
O Bob
O Richard
O Dylan
O Jack

at your best you had
the power to turn
these lonely alleys
into songs

you broke the darkness
with a desperate joy

and mined these
dirty sidewalks
for a beauty Death
had no answer for

but Death
has no shame
I see it
spare changing on
every corner

it follows me like
a starving dog
most everywhere
I go

it waits for me
outside these doors
just like it waited
for you.

Luck With the Day by William Taylor Jr.

We didn’t have much
luck with the day
it came apart
so easy in our hands

and we can blame
the heat
the hangover
or the blank faced
hipster kids
sprawling outside
the bars on Polk Street

all I know is
tonight we’ll drink
too much wine
and sleep
the sleep of the
blissfully gone

dreaming that
should tomorrow come
it will be made of
sterner stuff.

Two Poems by William Taylor Jr.

If There Must

If there must be an afterlife let mine
be a little bar in San Francisco
somewhere near the ocean
an endless grey sky stretching
out over everything
dim lights
and a soft rain falling
with grand windows to watch it through
a bartender with a knowing smile
leaning to fill my glass
a jukebox with all the right songs
and endless credits
to the left of me sits a blowsy blonde
with enormous laughter
and to the right an old man
with shining eyes of kindness
and stories to tell of days long passed
and we will talk
if we want to talk
or just be quiet and listen to the rain
time is obsolete
and there’s no place anyone ever
has to be and maybe an old dog
the color of gold
asleep in the corner
and people could smoke if they wanted to
I wouldn’t
mind.

____________

The Woman in the Building

The woman in the building
next to mine
has big sad eyes
and a pretty mouth
that never smiles.

Her long black hair
is streaked with silver grey.

She looks a bit like Patti Smith
and smokes many cigarettes.

I see her on the sidewalk,
in the Goodwill

and at the corner liquor store.

She never meets my eye.

She’s always alone
and moves is if
through water,

not quite of this world.

I like to imagine her
a poet,

someone with stories to tell.

More likely she’s just
another sad lady

who never smiles
and doesn’t care

that I’ll never tell her
how I like her face.

Protests by William Taylor Jr.

Outside they’re trashing police cars
and setting things on fire,

everything is sirens and anger
beneath a burning moon.

I shut the panes against the noise of it
but leave the curtains drawn so I can see
the colors.

In good conscience we all must protest
the way of things in our own fashion;

I’ve plenty of beer and sad old music
to last me through these lightless hours.

Down in the streets I guess the cops
and their billy clubs are having their say.

I turn the record over and pour another drink
remembering the failed revolution of our kiss.