I'm a Racoon.

Today I have had a long day reacquainting myself with the duties of a diligent grad student, which is to say that I realized that I have more crap to do than I have time.

I got a lot done today. I have a lot still to do tomorrow. For now, here is a picture of a baby racoon miming how I feel right now.

P.S. My life is SO HARD! I had to read stuff all day and then write about the stuff I read. Big tears here.

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Apparently the French word for 'word' is pronounced "moo". One day I will use this information to create the most pretentious joke ever.

Apparently the French word for 'word' is pronounced "moo". One day I will use this information to create the most pretentious joke ever. Source:

Apparently the French word for 'word' is pronounced "moo". One day I will use this information to create the most pretentious joke ever.

— james bezerra (@standardkink) February 1, 2015

January 31, 2015 at 06:33PM

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I have seen 3 different men today wearing camouflage pants. Am I being excluded from some male bonding event again?

I have seen 3 different men today wearing camouflage pants. Am I being excluded from some male bonding event again? Source:

I have seen 3 different men today wearing camouflage pants. Am I being excluded from some male bonding event again?

— james bezerra (@standardkink) February 1, 2015

January 31, 2015 at 05:08PM

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It has taken me the entire day just to get to the point where I can begin doing my homework. #gradschoolproblems

It has taken me the entire day just to get to the point where I can begin doing my homework. #gradschoolproblems Source:

It has taken me the entire day just to get to the point where I can begin doing my homework. #gradschoolproblems

— james bezerra (@standardkink) February 1, 2015

January 31, 2015 at 04:10PM

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Snow Day.

Below is a cool little video essay about the recent blizzard in New York City. I stumbled across it on Bloomberg News of all places. I wish I knew how to make things like this. Probably I just need a bunch of pictures and a pretty song, right?

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A Funeral Dirge.

Today is the fiftieth anniversary of Winston Churchill’s funeral, so I wrote him a poem. I was going to call it a “funeral dirge” because that sounds so cool, but it turns out a dirge is a song. Who knew?

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What a Man.

What a Man.

by james bezerra

Fifty years it’s been

since under the shadow of Big Ben

passed the body of the world’s

best ever alcoholic.

Hugely complicated legacy left

by fat little man from Marlborough.

Never imperious, always imperial,

colonial, racist, and drunk.

But yet,

whatta man, whatta man,

what a mighty good man,

a god sent original.

Admiralty, Gallipoli, depression, Ploegsteert Wood.

The Irish, the Kurdish, that pesky teetotaler Gandhi.

Bolsheviks, Fascists, liberals, Zionists, and

that Charlie Chaplin-looking motherfucker from Austria.

Fight them on the beaches. Fight them on the sea.

Nothing to offer but blood

and toil and tears and sweat.

A dangerously unique moment in history.

Now fifty years its been

since MV Havengore bore

the lead lined casket away.

Whatta man.

Thames dock workers bowed

crane jibs. The Queen had a drink.

A god sent original;

what a man.

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Breaking News 30 January 2015.

Breaking News 30 January 2015

by james bezerra

It so saddens me

that good ol’ Romney

won’t make another run!

His runs are always so fun

to laugh at on the TV.

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I got a new button!

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OMG! I just bumped into the cute girl from the coffee shop. She just works at a different coffee shop now! #daybrightened

OMG! I just bumped into the cute girl from the coffee shop. She just works at a different coffee shop now! #daybrightened Source:

OMG! I just bumped into the cute girl from the coffee shop. She just works at a different coffee shop now! #daybrightened

— james bezerra (@standardkink) January 27, 2015

January 27, 2015 at 09:00AM

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I know I should feel lame that all I'm doing on a Friday night is lint rolling my hat, but somehow I'm actually okay with it.

I know I should feel lame that all I'm doing on a Friday night is lint rolling my hat, but somehow I'm actually okay with it. Source:

I know I should feel lame that all I'm doing on a Friday night is lint rolling my hat, but somehow I'm actually okay with it.

— james bezerra (@standardkink) January 24, 2015

January 23, 2015 at 08:10PM

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When you are driving behind a car exactly like yours and you begin to wonder if the person in that car is you.

When you are driving behind a car exactly like yours and you begin to wonder if the person in that car is you. Source:

When you are driving behind a car exactly like yours and you begin to wonder if the person in that car is you.

— james bezerra (@standardkink) January 22, 2015

January 22, 2015 at 09:19AM

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English Department humor.

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That deep sense of pride you get when sorting your backpacking gear and noticing how perfectly packed all your tents are. Amiright??

That deep sense of pride you get when sorting your backpacking gear and noticing how perfectly packed all your tents are. Amiright?? Source:

That deep sense of pride you get when sorting your backpacking gear and noticing how perfectly packed all your tents are. Amiright??

— james bezerra (@standardkink) January 18, 2015

January 18, 2015 at 09:46AM

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Sleepy face-plant kitty.

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Just got passed by a guy riding what was clearly a homemade moped down the sidewalk.

Just got passed by a guy riding what was clearly a homemade moped down the sidewalk. Source:

Just got passed by a guy riding what was clearly a homemade moped down the sidewalk.

— james bezerra (@standardkink) January 18, 2015

January 17, 2015 at 11:09PM

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I had to go to the mall. I had forgotten how massively fucking annoying these places are.

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The coffee shop changed their cups without checking with me first and now my whole day is going to be weird.

The coffee shop changed their cups without checking with me first and now my whole day is going to be weird. Source:

The coffee shop changed their cups without checking with me first and now my whole day is going to be weird.

— james bezerra (@standardkink) January 16, 2015

January 16, 2015 at 08:09AM

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This morning I have the Destiny's Child song "Say My Name" stuck in my head, but just the chorus.

This morning I have the Destiny's Child song "Say My Name" stuck in my head, but just the chorus. Source:

This morning I have the Destiny's Child song "Say My Name" stuck in my head, but just the chorus.

— james bezerra (@standardkink) January 16, 2015

January 16, 2015 at 07:59AM

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I'm keeping these socks. Forever.

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I wonder why there are no single women in this bar with all the rainbow flags inside ...

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Someone is offering to share my lunch with me.

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I worked out really hard last night and now I can't stand up.

I worked out really hard last night and now I can't stand up. Source:

I worked out really hard last night and now I can't stand up.

— james bezerra (@standardkink) January 8, 2015

January 08, 2015 at 08:13AM

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Fair Warning.

This is just a fair warning that there is some of my awful poetry below. And it really is awful. This is all, like, first draft quality stuff. Recently I was talking to a guy I’d just met and poetry came up and he asked if I was a poet and I said that I write poetry but I am not a poet and he said well if you write poetry how are you not a poet and I said that I have too much respect for the people who do it well to call myself one.

And anyway, I much prefer saying that I am “a writer”. When I say to someone that I am "a writer" what I am actually thinking in my head is that I am like a ninja’s Swiss Army Knife, but with words. Anyway, that’s always my subtext.

But you were asking about poetry.

Yeah, there is some below.

I always feel the need to preface my poetry posts with a preemptive apology like this one. Writing these apology posts about poetry always make me think of a poem by Jayne Cortez. That poem is actually called “Poetry”. Luckily for you I have the collection that it is in ... let me find it real quick … hold on … okay, here it is … the poem called “Poetry” is about poetry and here it is the part of the poem I am always reminded of when I apologize for my poetry:

Today poems are like flags

flying on liquor store roof

poems are like baboons

waiting to be fed by tourists

So there you go folks. If and when I ever get a collection of poetry published, I am going to get Jayne Cortez to blurb that about me.

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WAIT!

WAIT!

One more Jayne Cortez thing. If you ever have the chance to flip through her collection Somewhere in Advance of Nowhere, be sure to read the poem “These New York City Pigeons”. I love it. This is probably my favorite stanza:

New York City pigeons

flap viral feather fungus dust from wings to faces

then sit on steps vocalizing & waiting

for the death of humankind

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Do You Know the Way to JFK.

Do You Know the Way to JFK

by james bezerra

Uptown

Queens-bound

E Train

crossing under

East River

$22

to my name

3,000 miles

from home.

I’m not even worth mugging.

Like a monk

with just a bowl,

I got a plane ticket

a metrocard

and a smile.

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Sad Space Probes Playing Old Songs.

Sad Space Probes Playing Old Songs

by james bezerra

Sometimes

I hear songs

from when I was married

and wonder if they’re

only lonely echos

just now returning

percussion bounced

off cold canyon walls

or back

from distant stars

like sad little space probes

watching the earth

orbit away

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Shelter.

Shelter

by james bezerra

I’ve always been

a better shelter to you

than I ever was a man.

Even now, you curl

like sleep into

the skinny crook of my arm

and your eyelashes flutter

as you drift off. And away.

I was always a better lover to you

than I ever was a friend.

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Marie, the Organic Horticulturalist.

Marie, the Organic Horticulturalist

by james bezerra

The organic horticulturalist

who grows Manhattanite cannabis.

Katie Holmes pretty but clearly

with greater faculty.

In this up high westside bar where

she’s sweet enough to answer

whiskey questions about

the feel of rich soil

in one’s hands

about dirt in soft grooves of her palm.

Rain titter on rooftop canopy.

Her white sweater, maybe cashmere.

Night glow of the Empire State.

A yellow drink with an orange slice.

Deeply believes with half a smile that things will get better.

A complicated relationship,

maybe,

with peace?

A complicated relationship,

it seems,

with joy

with traffic laws

with the business of business

with leaving the stillness of the country quiet

for the elevator babylon chaos of the city.

Who can grow things

from the ground

with just time

and hands

and patience

and rain

and 
half a smile.

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Twang a Lute

That last poem was about a woman I was introduced to during my recent travels. Her name was not Marie but she actually was an organic horticulturalist and as soon as she said it I said that I was going to steal that for a poem. Those words just feel good in the mouth. Go ahead and say it out loud right now: organic horticulturalist.

It’s fun to say, right?!

This is one of those times when I would have to agree with William Burroughs in that the sound and the feel of the words is the source of our pleasure (as opposed to their meanings). I guess we should take that with a grain of salt though since Burroughs also once wrote the sentence, “Naked Mugwump twangs a lute.”

The editors here at Standardkink have been quietly muttering “the organic horticulturalist” to themselves since I wrote that last poem and they have also been composing a list of other professions which are similarly pleasurable to say out loud:

The desirable phlebotomist

The despondent urologist

The schizophrenic meteorologist

The syphilitic televangelist

The condescending dentist

The quadriplegic archaeologist

The incestious epedimiologist

The lovelorn mixologist

The flammable typist

The buoyant marine biologist

The forgetful hypnotist

The disoriented oncologist

The hearing impaired flutist

The vengeful zoologist

The moist philatelist

The inconsistent arsonist

The incarcerated organist

The debauched hydroclimatologist

The engorged pederast

The hypoglycemic pediadist

The agoraphobic aerialist

The carnivorous mammalogist

The cunning linguist

The cantankerous gastroenterologist

Spoiler alert, “The Moist Philatelist” is totally going to be the name of my band’s next album.

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A Minimalist Travelogue.

As you may very well have gathered from the metric fuckload of pictures I have posted on here recently, I went back east for Christmas and New Years. I do not have any detailed notes about the trip and I haven’t really written up a long and rambling thing about it (yet!), but below I have posted what I am going to call a minimalist travelogue. I probably couldn’t have nailed the trip better if I'd written a whole book about it.

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Trip.

Trip

by james bezerra

LA

Bus

Train

Airport

Airport bar

Plane

JFK

Cold

Taxi

Stairs stairs stairs stairs stairs

Sleep

Coffee

Walk

Cold

Wine wine wine wine wine

Train

Connecticut

Cold cold cold

Dinner

Wine wine wine wine wine wine wine

Sleep

Coffee aspirin coffee

Dinner

Unexpectedly heavy Christmas Eve sadness

Wine

Sleep

Christmas

Coffee

Wine

Sleep

Coffee

Wine

Sleep

Coffee

Wine

Sleep

New year

Coffee

Cold

Train

Snow

City

Rain

Cold

Dinner

Strawberry gimlets

Sleep

Train

Airport

Airport bar

Plane

California

Warm

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